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20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

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Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#181

Post by iamEAP »

_qbxi wrote: post #168
ryandrake wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost any reply to a political thread in the next four years is going to be "That sounds illegal" but it's only illegal if the law gets enforced. I encourage anyone responding with "That sounds illegal" or "They can't do that" to also include in their response, "...and it will be enforced by [xxxx]." and try to come up with a realistic xxxx. EDIT: I'm not making any judgment about whether this particular thing is le…

Illegal acts should be called out, even if our government is failing to enforce the law. Otherwise it will become easy for the acts to get ignored entirely.

Unless you’re a member of congress or a civil servant in the executive branch, paying any attention to this is wasted energy.

We already saw this play out in his last term. Directing how laws are enforced is a function of the executive branch. Nothing will be done.

Your energy is better spent identifying and articulating the values you hold that these actions are an affront to and shouting that out.

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#182

Post by ahi »

tombert wrote: post #145
scarface_74 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re-hire people for what? They don’t want a functioning government

I suspect that after all these cuts, they're going to realize that some of these things actually are required in order for the American people not to complain too much. I just remember in Trump's first term, and this is something that has stuck with me since, was how he promised, on day one, to "repeal and replace" the Affordable Care Act, only for a few weeks after taking office saying "Nobody knew health care could…

I'm skeptical. Most of these federal jobs either marginally improve millions of lives or are completely critical for 10k Americans. The former is so spread out it will be hard to connect the dots; chronic stress of wondering why is everything sus these days. The latter mostly serves the already disenfranchised, e.g. adult daycare cuts.

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#183

Post by inetknght »

i80and wrote: post #177
ryandrake wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost any reply to a political thread in the next four years is going to be "That sounds illegal" but it's only illegal if the law gets enforced. I encourage anyone responding with "That sounds illegal" or "They can't do that" to also include in their response, "...and it will be enforced by [xxxx]." and try to come up with a realistic xxxx. EDIT: I'm not making any judgment about whether this particular thing is le…

Things can be illegal even if there's no enforcement mechanism, and while it's a really frustrating situation, people are right to be vocal and proactive about saying it.

Yes, and it would be valuable to help understand what enforcement agencies people think can/should do enforcement, and also to help educate those people when they're wrong.

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#184

Post by Jtsummers »

enragedcacti wrote: post #179
dev_daftly wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Can we not just make things up please? His buyout plan was approved by congress and signed into law before he allowed anyone to opt in which is the entire crux of the issue. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1994-03-31-mn-40541-...

That option is also available to Trump but it has not been made yet, it's the VSIP option and is an actual buyout.

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#185

Post by ziddoap »

ryandrake wrote: post #161
bigmattystyles wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds illegal

Almost any reply to a political thread in the next four years is going to be "That sounds illegal" but it's only illegal if the law gets enforced. I encourage anyone responding with "That sounds illegal" or "They can't do that" to also include in their response, "...and it will be enforced by [xxxx]." and try to come up with a realistic xxxx. EDIT: I'm not making any judgment about whether this particular thing is le…

>it's only illegal if the law gets enforced.

It is completely valid to say something is illegal and unenforced.

Consider that non-enforcement doesn't suddenly make something legal. Enforcement can start at any time. (Will it? Who knows!)

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#186

Post by [deleted] »

transcriptase wrote: post #140
bigmattystyles wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because of a then ongoing pandemic and making an allowance. That's completely different than just do nothing for 6+ months then quit. If you can't see that, there's no hope for this discussion.

So the OPM grants them a sabbatical or extended vacation or a hundred other things they have the discretion to do. Pretending or hoping everything unorthodox or unprecedented is somehow illegal is already becoming tiresome to read about in comment sections and it hasn’t even been a month of this administration.

[deleted]

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#187

Post by michaelmrose »

rich_sasha wrote: post #54
csa wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this was never authorized by congress, Correct. > so the money to pay people to September is questionable if it exists at best Incorrect. The money is budgeted through September (end of federal FY). Things are currently only funded through March 15 (CRs and whatnot). The money is or will be there. Historically, even if there is a furlough, this money is backfilled and folks are paid. Note that there will probably b…

Is it a given there would be a budget impasse, if all institutions of power are held by Republicans? Non-American here with only a Mickey Mouse understanding of US mechanics of power.

So the fed defunding whatever they like by fiat gives the Republicans nothing to offer the other side to play ball because anything that they offer could easily be taken away. Its like showing up to the auction with monopoly money.

Without the dems they need almost every Republican to agree because their margin is only 5 votes. Historically this is difficult because their ranks now include several morons and extremists most notably the lady who actually believed Jews were responsible for starting wildfires with space based lasers.

If a handful of extremists don't ask for crazy nonsense they will still have every hand out for pork.

Then it goes to the Senate where it needs 60 votes including dems to pass anything. The first round of crazy if it passes anything might easily end up with something too stupid to pass the Senate without also termination of the fillibuster.

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#189

Post by numpad0 »

Not an American, but the reported resignation process of just sending arbitrary content email with subject "resign" to "hr@opm.gov" feels like the real aim is to collect emails and response time data to establish cluster system health metric to determine which nodes can be murdered safely.

It's almost strange to me that this aspect, and stupidity of injecting non-compiling code to human mainframes collective that runs on legalese in an attempt to collect such data, seem to be rarely discussed.

Re: 20k federal workers take "buyout" so far, official says

#190

Post by johnrgrace »

rich_sasha wrote: post #54
csa wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this was never authorized by congress, Correct. > so the money to pay people to September is questionable if it exists at best Incorrect. The money is budgeted through September (end of federal FY). Things are currently only funded through March 15 (CRs and whatnot). The money is or will be there. Historically, even if there is a furlough, this money is backfilled and folks are paid. Note that there will probably b…

Is it a given there would be a budget impasse, if all institutions of power are held by Republicans? Non-American here with only a Mickey Mouse understanding of US mechanics of power.

Republicans only hold the house by two seats so to pass something they need to have everyone on board. Any single republican member of congress that wants to hold the whole thing hostage for demands pretty much can.
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