Permitting Reform is a bipartisan issue

from Packy McCormick’s Weekly Dose of Optimism newsletter:

Democratic Office of Government Efficiency

Government efficiency should not be a partisan issue. Republican or Democrat, you should want your government to work both harder and smarter for you, for your tax dollars to go a bit further, and for there to be less unnecessary red tape.

We’re excited about what DOGE is going to do on this front: auditing and slashing costs, bringing government workers back to the office, and reducing unnecessary regulations. We think this will have a real, tangible impact on how well the government serves its people. The symbolic impact, however, may have an even larger impact: if DOGE can make efficiency a winning political value proposition, then you are going to see leaders from both sides of the aisle adopt it. You may even start to see politicians competing over, and then bragging on X about, who can be the most efficient.

Democratic Pennsylvanian Governor Josh Shapiro is already starting. Shapiro has been on the efficiency train since before it was cool — his record-breaking 1-95 reconstruction put him on the map — and now he’s really leaning into it. That’ll force other Democrats to do the same.

And that’s a good thing for Americans. Efficiency should not be the end goal here. Ultimately, we’ll want not just an efficient government but an effective one, too. But in order to get there, there’s some fat that needs to be trimmed. The government cannot be effective until it is efficient.

Let’s Make Government Efficient Again! And I say that in the least partisan way possible.