needs is to think he can fire anyone who doesn’t agree with him.

But there are thousands of federal positions that are not civil service; they are appointed by the President. Most of those are vacant right now. The rest are filled with the most incompetent and corrupt fools Trump has been able to find.

He has 73 attorneys working for him.

He fired 15 after he was on the job a few days. He wants to hire replace them with new attorneys based on "ideology" and "diversity". His words, not mine. If people aren't in line with his philosophy, they're expendable.

It's not federal, but it's the same idea. New guy in town with a different philosophy wants his people to implement his philosophy.

Ideally, these things average out as different presidents (or whoever) cycle through, leaving layers of different appointees, but with extremes filtered out. But not always.

It could be worse. Could be like in Poland. New administration in power felt the need to pack the courts to make sure the courts match the new ruler's judicial thinking. Poland was roundly condemned for the very idea.

Seriously dangerous.

They dismissed 70,000 federal employees (9% of the total); but the number of total federal employees didn't decline.

Why?

Because they just replaced them with right-wing toadies, flunkies, their family members, friends, and (in some cases) mistresses.

As those dismissed were chosen, employees were told their Twitters and Facebooks would be "checked."

In some cases, like the Public Television news staff, they were never replaced (a wet kiss to the 'Argentine Fox News', the Clarín Group).

Here's a nice list of some of the most prominent cases (note the Culture Minister's girlfriend and her apparent theft of film-making equipment):

https://upload.democraticunderground.com/111676969