We thought Labor Day would be a fitting time to look in on the lives of our "public servants" in the federal bureaucracy.
Back in 2016, long before the seals in the Wuhan China lab started leaking, management in the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USTPO) was desperately trying to protect a telework program gullible reporters regarded as telework perfection.
Even worse, the USTPO received an award for the program — probably from other slugs who may have wanted to work from home — which means it became very expensive for taxpayers.
An "award-winning" program is immune to internal criticism and is used to bolster agency supervisors’ case for an annual bonus.
The program becomes as untouchable as Elsie at an all-vegan diner.
Outsiders kept finding evidence of tele-nappers claiming to work, when in fact they were golfing, sleeping, or shopping online.
In response USTPO public relations hacks would dispute the evidence while management stalled.
Then someone got ahold of a bad bat taco and COVID-19 came to America to answer USTPO’s prayers.
The exodus of federal "workers" from all agencies fleeing government buildings closely resembled the aftermath of dropping an anvil on a fire ant colony.
Now, long after America went back to work and Elon Musk told his employees to either come back to the office or pretend to work for someone else, Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, thinks she has an issue or at least enough for a news conference.
The Washington Times reports Ernst, "is calling on agencies to take a hard look at who they are still allowing to telework at this late stage of the pandemic, figure out if it makes sense to keep them at home, and if so, make sure taxpayers aren’t paying for their office space anymore."
Then to show she meant business, Ernst sent letters to two dozen inspectors general.
We don’t know if she sent the letters postage due to demonstrate her fury.
The good senator’s letters will be filed with requests for DNA samples from hidden alien corpses and interrogatories regarding Jeffrey Epstein’s client list.
Federal agencies have no fear of the tissue paper tigers in Congress.
And to confirm the agency’s contempt, Ernst will dutifully vote for the upcoming continuing resolution to prevent a "government shutdown" that will fully fund every agency ignoring her letters.
And speaking of aliens and mysteries.
If you think finding the location of alien spacecraft debris is a daunting task, just try to find out how many federal employees are back in the office and where the ones in a nap-from-home project are located.
"Kiran Ahuja, Office of Personnel Management’s director, told Congress this spring that she thought the rate was up to more than half of federal employees [in the office] by that time, but she couldn’t say how much more. She also couldn’t say what the telework numbers were before the pandemic."
She and her cronies don’t know because they don’t want to know and they don’t care.
Her job and that of most federal "managers" is to keep the workforce happy.
That’s why you can’t get a passport in less than months time.
No one is in the office to process your application.
No one is telling check-collectors to come back.
It’s a scandal burning millions of taxpayer dollars and no one does anything about it.
Including the comb-over conservatives in Congress.
The Times confirmed our suspicions, "And it’s unclear that employees who are working from home are actually working. A review last year of one department’s logins found as many as 30% of remote employees 'did not appear to be working at any given time during the work day.'
"One survey last fall of access key cards to federal buildings in the District of Columbia found just 5% of the pre-pandemic workforce swiped in on an average workday."
Adam Andrzejewski, founder of OpenTheBooks, put a number to the problem, "Our auditors estimate it’s $36 billion worth of salary and bonus compensation to employees we cannot meaningfully hold accountable.
"We don’t know who they are, what they do, whether they are in fact working 40 hours, or from where they’re phoning in."
That’s why all this budget talk about cutting essential services and ‘gutting the federal workforce’ is such a laugh. You could give the feds the Elon Musk treatment and not notice much change in the lack of service you get from Uncle Sam.
This outrage continues because the federal workforce and the unions that prevent reform are the voting base of the left. Collecting a paycheck without working is a small price to pay in return for some 4 million votes.
Maybe sometime in the dim future we will elect a president and Congress that will stop talking and start doing. They will abolish federal employee unions, fire the incompetents, and strike a blow for the taxpayer who has to work to earn his pay.
Just don’t count on Sen. Ernst leading the way.
Michael Reagan, the eldest son of President Reagan, is a Newsmax TV analyst. A syndicated columnist and author, he chairs The Reagan Legacy Foundation. Michael is an in-demand speaker with Premiere speaker's bureau. Read Michael Reagan's Reports — More Here.
Michael R. Shannon is a commentator, researcher for the League of American Voters, and an award-winning political and advertising consultant with nationwide and international experience. He is author of "Conservative Christian's Guidebook for Living in Secular Times (Now with added humor!)" Read Michael Shannon's Reports — More Here.