“Foreign aid might be defined as a transfer of money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.”
~ Doug Casey, Crisis Investing (1979)
Joel Bowman with today’s Note From the End of the World: Buenos Aires, Argentina…
Vroom… Vroom… VROOM!
What’s that we hear, dear reader? Could it be the sweet euphony of gnarled chainsaw teeth ripping into the flabby underbelly of the Leviathan?
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Yesterday, greasy-palmed grifters at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) suddenly found their keys no longer fit the locks. On the bed stand lay a note:
“It’s not us, it’s you.” ~ Signed, D.O.G.E.
Conflicts of Interest
Here’s how the once serious BBC “reported” the story on Monday…
The future of the US government’s main overseas aid agency has been cast into doubt, with employees locked out and the Trump administration planning to merge it with the US Department of State.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) would continue to function as a branch of the state department, but the plan involves a significant reduction in its funding and the workforce, CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, reports.
On Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio accused USAID’s leadership of “insubordination” and said he was now its “acting head”.
US President Donald Trump and one of his top advisers, billionaire Elon Musk, have been strongly critical of the agency.
But the move to shut it down could have a profound impact on humanitarian programmes around the world.
It wasn’t until the tenth paragraph of the story that the BCC thought it worth disclosing the following…
The BBC’s international charity BBC Media Action, which is funded by external grants and voluntary contributions, receives funding from USAID. According to a 2024 report, USAID donated $3.23m (£2.6m), making it the charity’s second-largest donor that financial year.
Hmm…
Why are American taxpayers, through USAID, funding the British Broadcasting Corporation, you wonder?
Why, to shape the narrative, of course! To train up the brave Pavlovian presstitutes of tomorrow, teaching them how to justify the fact that USAID spent $47,000 funding trans operas in Colombia… and $70,000 producing Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) musicals in Ireland… and $2.5 million supporting various other DEI programs across Serbia, to name just a few blatant boondoggles and pork barrel programs.
Billions in Babble
And to think, that’s is just the small fry… the morsels that fall from the gilded plates of decidedly more well-connected insiders, those with their snouts deep in the public trough.
Take, for example, major Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) recipients like Deloitte, which received $1.2 billion from USAID between fiscal years 2012-2023. Deloitte, based in London, is one of the globe’s “Big Four” accounting firms. According to their website (emphasis theirs):
“We believe diversity, equity, and inclusion challenges require human-centric solutions, centered on the needs of those who are the most historically marginalized. We have learned that equity is a systemic outcome of the work done within the spaces of diversity, inclusion, and anti-oppression…”
“And,” they might have added, “whatever other blah-blah buzzwords garner us the most money from our paymasters in Washington, DC.”
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Then there’s FHI 360, a non-profit which received a non-trivial $3.8 billion over the same timeframe. According to their jargon basted website, FHI 360 “works with communities to expand social and economic equity” by “bringing together deep expertise and diverse perspectives” to “expand collective impact.”
More blabber… more jabber… more MBA-laced gobbledygook… and more money from poor people in rich countries going to rich people in poor countries.
There’s also Chemonics International ($4.5 billion); Development Alternatives, Inc. ($3 billion); ABT Associates, Inc. ($2.6 billion); RTI International ($2.3 billion): John Snow International ($1.8 billion); ARD, Inc. ($1.5 billion); and Jhpiego Corporation: $1.3 billion (nonprofit)… the list goes on… and on…
And while we’re at it, let’s not forget the $54 million that made its way from USAID to EcoHealth Alliance, via the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). EcoHealth, you’ll recall, was the non-profit run by Peter Daszak, which helped fund the… ahem… “questionable” research at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, the very same lab from which the US Government now admits that pesky Covid-19 virus likely leaked. Oops!
(Source: The Intercept)
Daszak and his fellow EcoHealth Alliance charlatans were issued formal, 5-year debarments and suspended from receiving any federal funding for their rolls in the scandal. Dr. Anthony Fauci, meanwhile, who served as director of NIAID at the time it was funding the research, was issued a preemptive pardon by outgoing president, Joe Biden. Naturally.
But still, we are talking little fish… or is it diminutive bats?
