As in any war, there are innocent casualties. Actions to correct flagrant and long-standing abuses are long overdue and the view from high above the shock and awe bombing is gratifying. However, on the ground it looks a lot different to many who were just living their lives and following the rules as best they could.

This message came in on an agricultural list that I read.

" As a now retired USDA employee, and seeing reports from both the news and former colleagues, what I understand is happening with some of the conservation programs and essentially all of the employees within their probationary period is:

" Payments to individual farmers for work completed under conservation contracts that were funded under Biden's Inflation Reduction Act, such as EQIP, have been "paused." The explanation was this is to allow the new Secretary of Agriculture time to review the contracts and decide if they are acceptable or not. I don't know the basis for USDA deciding that a contract it signed with an individual farmer is not valid, if the farmer or rancher did what they agreed to do in the contract. In the meantime farmers have outstanding bills to pay for work done, or don't know if they should go ahead and start work they promised to do, which by the way failure to complete work they agreed to do is itself a contract violation.

" Apparently ALL employees still within their probationary period (one year for my old agency) have been given termination notices for reason of "poor performance." That's important because even if within the probationary period, there is supposed to be a reason for the termination, not just because the agency feels like it. Some people have posted regulatory references about this, though i haven't read them. It seems to be happening at all departments of the government.