Don Moynihan

• The federal government spends about twice as much on procurement (about $750 billion according to some estimates) than it spends on federal employees (about $360 billion). • State and local governments spend about twice as much on procurement as the federal government.

Maybe you are wondering “how big of a deal is procurement and contracts to current modes of governing?” The answer: a very big deal.
Political attention is focused on government employees, but we spend more on contracting, often funding the ideological opponents of the government.

Donald Trump’s Presidency Is in Free Fall Republicans typically lead on the economy, national security, and immigration. Trump is squandering the GOP’s traditional strength on all three.

Trump is in serious trouble. His war is deeply unpopular. He's now in the toilet on the economy, immigration, and national security. His public standing is getting close to being broken in an irreparable way, akin to Bush after Iraq and Katrina:
newrepublic.com/article/2074...

After slashing federal jobs, Trump administration ramps up hiring The hiring push is unfolding under new rules designed to give the White House greater influence over the government’s 2-million person civilian workforce.

“We probably have some skills that we now need to hire back, quite frankly,” Scott Kupor, the head of the OPM said... “There’s no question anytime you do restructurings … sometimes you over-restructure, sometimes you under-restructure.”

www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

I don't think you have to Nostradamus to figure that bombing Iran might raise oil prices. And it seems pretty obvious that buying oil in advance of causing an oil price spike might just save Americans a lot of money. But...

...maybe there wasn't much planning?

Procurement, Capacity and Soverignity When your contractors are also your enemy

New, from me: Trump's retribution against Anthropic is over the top. But it should cause Democrats to think about how they will deal with contractors like Musk or Ellison when they return to power.
What do you do with vendors working to oppose you? 🧵 donmoynihan.substack.com/p/procuremen...

Along with being fascist criminals:

I said National Endowment for Arts in thread, not Humanities, pardon the error

Every time I open a news app or site and this story isn’t being discussed or featured prominently I feel like I’m losing my mind. Do not look away.

ChatGPT, but yes

Will need all the help we can get

Holy shit: the guy who cut millions in grants because they were DEI cannot form a coherent explanation of what DEI is bsky.app/profile/lmrh...

Time to start rethinking your retirement strategy to be “gotta get better at polymarket”

These people are, to be blunt, substantially less intelligent than they believe they are.

anyone who has been on social media for the last 15 years has ptsd for this exact thing when the charts start to buck and the smart weirdos start to flail and vaguely gesture like this

Yeah, Scotland could regret shipping all those late tries in the unlikely scenario France beat England in a low scorer

Obviously will be cheering against Scotland next week, but when they are on form just a great team to watch

Would be good to be a flight-to-safety country now

Champagne stuff!

A handicap blue and white painted sign on the asphalt of a parking space. The symbols are meant to be a pregnant women and a baby stroller, but it doesn't look like that. It looks like pac man being killed with scissors next to a dancer

Twerkers at the barbeque get priority parking 🫡

NTSB is the last exemplar of independent professionalism in federal government, because we used to think stopping plane crashes was a goal beyond partisanship

Nikkei is down about 6.5%

maybe I'm focusing on the wrong thing here but this is the wildest shit I've ever heard a white South African say and I study racism for a living

What?

ICE has spun a massive surveillance web. We talked to people caught in it The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE and Border Patrol, is using a broad web of surveillance tools — purchased as its budget has ballooned under this administration — to monitor, apprehend and intimidate the people it seeks to deport and the U.S. citizens critical of its policies.

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE and Border Patrol, is using a broad web of surveillance tools — purchased as its budget has ballooned under this administration — to monitor, apprehend and intimidate the people it seeks to deport and the U.S. citizens critical of its policies.

Watching the France-Scotland rugby highlights and spotted this Rick Steves looking person in the crowd

The funniest part is her saying she would never ask people from other countries who they voted for, like she had some nuanced take about the differences between Finna Fail and Sinn Fein.
Who Americans vote for affects the rest of the world!

This notes the enthusiasm among US right wing Christian nationalists, inc. the church group prize moron Pete Hegseth attends, for 'household voting' - i.e. only the patriarch votes.

Meanwhile, in the UK the far right are busy screaming about what they call 'family voting' in minority communities...

Another one for the American Caudillismo files.

Never a big Narnia guy but this 6 seconds typifies everything I love about British television.

March 8, 2026 - Tehran at sunrise today. But the sun is hidden behind a sky filled with smoke. After a night of intensive strikes on oil facilities, thick black clouds now hang over the city, turning morning into something that feels like night.