Coffee Cups on TV

Submitted By: pelksorensen@gmail.com – Click to email about this post

Recently, I watched a sitcom where the actors were handed cups of coffee. The cups are supposed to be full of hot coffee but, because they were empty, the actors would hold them awkwardly and at angles that a person wouldn’t do if the cups were full. The producers didn’t bother to fill the cups with anything and left the actors to make the viewers believe they were real. The cups obviously didn’t have any substance and no reality. They were just for show.

In viewing what DOGE is doing, I see the same thing. They say millions of 150 year-olds are getting Social Security. The “doge bros” didn’t bother to ask why these millions of people all have the same birth date – it must have been a very busy day in 1875. This claim is so obviously a lie, I’m surprised that anyone would believe it but I know some do. According to Pew Research, there are approximately 101,000 people in the US over 100. According to the Social Security Administration, around 74,000 receive benefits. Clearly, this is nowhere near the millions of people that DOGE has claimed.
Having been a software engineer for longer than these guys have been alive, I know it is common practice to have an arbitrary date in the past to indicate that the data wasn’t provided. I have seen systems with a default date of 1900 so, to me, this makes sense. And, yes, I have seen dates like these in government systems.

I would need more information before I would believe they are all getting social security because social security benefits are paid by social security number, not birth date. Another important date is DOD (date of death). In this case, the benefits end or can revert to the spouse, if still living. DOGE, of course, didn’t consider this either since it wouldn’t make for a sensational press release.

Also, there was great fanfare when DOGE published a list of all the “savings” they are finding. They were forced to remove the top 5 “savings” because it was pointed out that the billions of dollars were greatly inflated. In some cases, they claimed credit for canceling contracts that the previous administration had already canceled. No, DOGE didn’t tell anyone, they just removed them from the website. I wonder why?

When viewing what the current administration is doing, I tend to remember the coffee cups on TV. They are performative and meant to convey a point of view but what they really are is devoid of substance and without a context in reality. They are for show. Using common sense and digging a little reveals how empty they are.

Paul Sorensen
Manzanita

About me: I’m a Software Architect for a global healthcare company. I’ve worked with government agencies, hospitals and clinics as well as other companies.