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One story, one agency, and Elon Musk's despicable "tell us what you did last week" email [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-02-23

This is one of those pieces you hope never to have to write, but then if

wishes were horses, beggars could ride.

Alrighty, I cannot provide the actual source for this as it is a real human being who, along with his/her colleagues, is being treated like a piece of crap.

This whole "you have to tell us what you accomplished last week" deal, as sent out so crassly in an email by Elon Musk to all federal employees is at the heart of this story. As so many Americans already know, this email has caused almost unimaginable distress and stress because if they do not follow his dictate, they will be considered as having resigned. With folks not knowing how or whether to respond and with reporting if accurate that is telling us many agencies have already told their government workers not to respond.

One thing I can source: According to Forbes, so far even Kash Patel has told FBI employees not to respond, Dept of Defense said do not respond, Federal Judiciary (Justice Department) told their folks not to respond, Tulsi Gabbard told her employees not to respond, State Department said do not respond etc. However, the problem still remains as far as I can tell: should federal employees actually trust Patel, Hegseth, Gabbard, Bondi, or Rubio that they won't be considered as resigning or as the employees say, FIRED if they trust the likes of this bunch?

However, this is not an across-the-board statement from all agency heads anyway. The hierarchy, or I'd guess whatever remains of it, from our very important National Institutes of Health (NIH) reached out to Robert Kennedy Jr. to ask if this was "for real" and he said yep, and you will be terminated automatically if you do not send in your email.

In a show of both spine and risky business, the hierarchy took a principled stand and told their employees, all of them, DO NOT RESPOND. This is at last count, over 19,000 people.

What is risky about this? RFK, Jr. doesn't from all that most of us have seen of him seem to be the most stable or rational of human beings and the calculation is that he may just pull the plug on all 19,000 employees, firing all of them in one fell swoop, and then America will witness our premier research institution go down in flames. And yes, let me repeat, the actual wording isn't as inflammatory--they will be told by Musk and then by Kennedy that their non-compliance is considered their resignation. Which seems like splitting hairs over whether being fired or forced to resign are two different things, yes?

And this isn't the worst of what may be happening not only to NIH but to all government agencies and their employees. Again, sorry but I cannot provide my source for this and you'll see why in a minute if you read on.

Government employees are being told to stop using Facebook Messenger and even to stay off of Facebook altogether. The fear is coming from the knowledge that Zuckerberg is now in Trump's pocket and may allow the privacy of thousands of government employees to be violated. They have been told that any "Likes" they give to Facebook pages that are critical of any of Trump's policies may be under scrutiny. This is big brother and 1984 all rolled into one. Adding on: they are also being told to stop texting on their cell phones.

I have never been a big conspiracy theory person, far too logical for all of that. But as like you I've been watching this entire nightmare unfold in front of my eyes, I am rethinking some of what I believed about conspiracies and it's not making me one bit comfortable. But maybe that's the point---we need to be alarmed and very uncomfortable about even the possibility that our social media platforms and our cell phones could be weaponized against us and our inherent right to free speech could become just an empty phrase. No glibness intended here: this is some scary shit.

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