90 % of the nonmilitary federal employees are utterly nonessential to maintain a Constitutional system. We do not need park rangers because it is not essential that the government own and land outside of DC. Military bases can and should be leased from the States or from private property owners. Federal welfare has no Constitutional basis and neither does federal regulation of medicine or insurance or 99% of what the federal government stifles/regulates. And the ETC. is huge. If you are a Tory rather than an American style conservative then you are concerned to “conserve” the status quo for which all those government workers are essential except the ones who could be eliminated if WF&A were “cleaned up.” which could only be done by appointing a Commission to clean it up with many thousands of new federal workers to do the studies which would recommend that many more thousands be hired to do the actual cleaning up &c et al v/v.
I agree with most of what you say - my point was the meaning of "non-essential" is a technical term and not based on opinion. It can also be used for active duty in certain situations. Until/if the Feds pare down the civilian workforce for pure Constitutional economy, there are many civilians that are essential in direct military support roles. Even paring down the actual civilian workforce will not please many once they discover the costs of contractors who will be used to fill the voids where actual mission impacts would occur. I can see a long-term, target-by-target, plan being effective if properly planned and executed, but there is no quick fix.