This topic will blow most people out of their bed…
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Let’s share the most fabulous things USAID have done…
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A viewpoint from an international traveller on USAID …
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“Chelsea Clinton raked in $84 million.”
Well, Chelsea is one of the most beautiful women in the world … or so I have been told. 
More seriously, it would be interesting to know how much tax she paid on that gift (grift?) from the taxpayers.
More generally, it might be useful if everyone who receives taxpayer funds from organizations like USAIDS has to make their tax returns public and has to provide full details of all their business dealings. If you want privacy, don’t take the taxpayers’ money. Let’s ask the Congressional Republicans to get on the case. Oh! I forgot. 
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Chelsea Clinton is small potatoes compared to everything else USAID is funding: most important, the foreign and domestic press: Politico, BBC.
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Full 2 hours interview with Mike Benz…
Mike Benz: “USAID is effectively a rent-a-riot operation. That raises questions about the Black Lives Matter protests.”
(0:00) The USAID Rabbit Hole Runs Deep
(5:29) Trump Is Performing Open Heart Surgery on the Country
(9:50) Is USAID Truly a Humanitarian Operation?
(19:41) What Is the Point of Funding Transgender Surgeries in Foreign Countries?
(27:13) How USAID Secretly Organizes Riots Around the World
(46:23) Is The Blob a Necessary Evil?
(52:24) Joe Biden and USAID’s Role in Social Media Censorship
(1:07:20) USAID and Russiagate
(1:17:08) How DC’s Economy Is Dependent on Foreign Aid Spending
(1:22:40) Why USAID Created a Cuban Twitter
(1:29:01) USAID’s Control of the Global Narcotic Empire
(1:34:15) How Will the Fall of USAID Impact Our Position as Leader of the Free World?
(1:38:28) How USAID Benefits Major Corporations
(1:45:17) USAID and the Black Lives Matter Riots
(1:55:42) The Stupidity of Our Foreign Policy Establishment
(2:01:29) The Soros Prosecutors
(2:04:17) How Do We Fix This?
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This is THE MOST REVEALING interview I have ever heard. As someone who was born in 1944, I grew up in a time of self-assured national optimism, unprecedented material progress and growing American hegemony - which I was thoroughly “persuaded” to believe was an unalloyed moral good. For the past few years, I have had to reassess my understanding of all that. This interview describes, in depth, the means by which we - and the rest of the world - have been propagandized and manipulated with many lies and more than a few “massaged” semi-truths.
Sadly, the US is far more flawed than I once believed. Regardless of its material status (also in serious jeopardy), the state of the US’ moral grace is in serious question and has been for a very long time. The surgery which has been begun under Trump must continue. It will take an actual miracle for the nation to survive and for it to become a genuine force for good and home for individual liberty.
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Here is where Mike Benz lost me or where I disagree: he believes that American prosperity depends on American empire
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Yeah, he went off the rails there. Mike Benz is a bit suspect, tbh. Where did he come from? Why did he suddenly burst on the scene? Some say it’s a limited hangout. Time will tell.
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Reality is MUCH darker than what Mike is telling…
It is so dark that we cannot write about it nor speak about it.
You can say I am a nutcase and I am fine with that.
You can believe in unicorns and rainbows fairy tales…
I do not want to be condescending, but what I mean is, you can and we all are, allowed to believe in whatever we like and feel comfortable with.
Reality will never surface fully.
Let me give you some hints.
Europe has always been oppressed and suppressed.
If you take this dark reality, as the core idea, and then spin it into today’s world, and with each turn you make it darker, then you will get to a good picture.
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Here a German journalist coming clean …
His death was reported as a Heart Attack in 2017, at age 57.
THROWBACK: Renowned journalist Udo Ulfkotte said in 2014 while promoting his book Journalists for Hire: How the CIA Buys the News , “I was educated to lie, betray, and not tell the truth to the public.” The former Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung editor and advisor to the Kohl administration in the late '90s also admitted to spreading anti-Russian propaganda and manipulating news under Western influence. Ulfkotte revealed that many journalists were actually “non-official cover” - serving intelligence agencies rather than the public. He accused the German and US media of PUSHING EUROPE TOWARD WAR WITH RUSSIA, calling it a “point of no return.” And now, with revelations that USAID funneled millions into media grants, are we really supposed to believe this was ever about “independent journalism”?
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Loving all of this, but I notice federal judges are busy plugging the holes DOGE has blasted in the dam. It’s all gonna be for naught if SCOTUS doesnt take on the “nationwide injunction” issue, head-on and SOON.
Congress, as any (old) schoolgirl knows, has the “power of the purse” and the executive isnt supposed to countermand spending Congress has authorized.
But here’s what I’m wondering:
When Congress authorized funding of USAID, did the legislators know what we know now?
Decades ago I visited a friend who worked in DC. He wasn’t employed in any high position, but what I remember is he had an “official briefing” on some kinda controversial missile lying around the house, and I read it. I was amazed, it was simplistic and quite shallow, nothing in it that people who watched the news didn’t know.
Did Congress itself know where this money was going? If they did then we really have an insurmountable problem. And if they didn’t—well, we have a different and equally insurmountable problem.
(Okay I should say “daunting”, not insurmountable—let’s hope it’s surmountable. But see my first paragraph.)
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Yeah, I caught that, and he made a number of “supporting” statements. I didn’t finish watching the discussion. Tucker disappoints me some times.
I’m glad I watched enough to understand Benz’s position. It will help me frame his future posts on X. He writes a lot of good stuff.
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That sounds like you have some confidence that the Critters in Congress would have cared. Obviously, most of those CongressScum are concerned only with re-election so they can continue feathering their own nests … and the country be damned!
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I speculate that Congress has shirked it’s duties again. In this case it might be biting them in the ass.
If they specifically authorized giving x dollars for y program in z country, then the President cannot stop this spending. However, I bet they authorized the spending more generically. Like the DOD will get 900 billion with a few specific authorizations. Thus, the NIH may be given billions and then the NIH decides who will get a grant. When this happens, the executive branch is deciding. Therefore, they can decide not to give grants, loans or funds not specifically authorized by the Congress critters.
I think my speculation is correct because none of the Democrats are saying that this spending was authorized by Congress.
The US citizens probably don’t know or care how the government was supposed to function. One of the things that should alarm people is how Congress functions. A small group of people develop the entire spending package and then spring it on the rest of Congress just prior to the debt ceiling causing a shut down. Either vote for a shutdown or vote for this package that you could not possibly understand. If, by chance, you could understand it, there is no time for debate or changes. For all practical purposes Congress doesn’t fulfill it’s duty with regard to funding.
The current fiasco should also make obvious that Congress doesn’t fulfill its duty with regard to oversite. They should be doing what Musk is doing. They should be conducting their own audits. Instead, they accept from the Executive branch bullshit and smoke and mirrors. As if you can get to the truth with an interrogation and no evidence. The evidence is fully redacted or not provided and Congress has found this acceptable.
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Okay but at this point, wouldn’t it be logical at this juncture for them or some of them to say, golly we had no idea! Or conversely: yes we did know and here’s why we think these projects are valuable…?
But as I write, I reckon the answer is that both of those positions are indefensible, so they’re just trying to scurry under the broad skirts of the Constitutional language. Like: WE get to control how, or rather, whether, tax money is spent, okay? Thats IT, the constitution doesn’t say we hafta pick and choose, doesn’t say we hafta know what we’re spending on.
Art I sec 9 does say that “ a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public money shall be published from time to time.”
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The real breakdown is that CongressScum have got into the habit of spending money they don’t have. They are like a teenage girl in a shopping mall with daddy’s credit card – believing that daddy will be able to pay for everything they buy. (With apologies to most teenage girls, who I suspect would be much more prudent than the average CongressScum).
Now CongressScum could choose to balance their books – making sure they raised enough revenue each year to cover their spending that year. In that case, the denizens of Congress would certainly pay a lot of attention to where the money was being spent. (“You mean my District can’t have a new bridge because you want to spend the money on Lesbian Dance classes in Outer Mongolia?”).
Congress has failed! Representative democracy has failed! And – sadly – it is all the collective fault of us voters.
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“It’s clear there is no opposition without USAID money”
Bukele
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