Source: Law & Liberty
by Andy Smarick
“For many Gen Xers, the greatest Saturday Night Live sketch of all time is ‘Sprockets,’ a recurring piece in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It made genius use of our vague notions about the bleakness of German popular culture during the twilight of the Cold War. The sketch had black turtlenecks, celebrations of the macabre, and an inexplicable pet monkey. I remember reading that one of the sketch’s writers had never seen German television, but Sprockets is what he imagined it was like. … It’s time to admit that DOGE was the ‘Sprockets’ of government reform. Elon Musk seemed genuinely enthusiastic about cutting government, but he didn’t know a lick about governing. He took bits of information, added some uncharitable speculation, and created a caricature of policy and public leadership. In the end, what he offered America was comic theatre.” (06/30/25)