Michael Lewis Tells a Good Story. He Skips the Real Problem.

Michael Lewis was on CNBC this morning promoting his new book, Blockers: Rebels in the Deep State. It tells the story of six government employees who pushed back against DOGE. Lewis is a great storyteller, and his six heroes are easy to like. But he leaves out the biggest reason Washington never changes.

In most jobs, if you stall or stand in the way, there are consequences. Federal civil service rules work differently. They allow government unions to negotiate collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) that make it slow and difficult to discipline, reassign or change anything. Where no CBA exists in a business unit, the bureaucracy tends to fill the gap by resisting change on its own. When no one is ultimately accountable, inertia wins. Lewis never asks why the system makes blocking so easy, or why it protects the people who stall.

Six dedicated public servants make a compelling narrative, but they are the exception. The real Blockers are the silent majority who aren't rebels at all. They are the people and processes that stop reform by default, because the system rewards stalling. That is unfair to the hardworking federal employees who show up and do their jobs, and to the taxpayers who fund them.

No president seriously took this on until President Trump, who signed an executive order pulling union bargaining out of key agencies. The union bosses' response? They sued. The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) has fought so hard to keep its VA contract that a federal judge ordered the VA to honor it for the third time before an appeals court stepped in. Another judge just ordered the Bureau of Prisons to restore its union contract through 2029. That's what real blocking looks like.

Workers and taxpayers deserve a government that rewards good performance, holds people accountable, and doesn't protect the status quo for its own sake. A book that celebrates resistance without asking why the system shields it tells only half the story.