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It may be that Trump, Musk et al. "accidentally" halted support for regime change operations abroad, but that seems unlikely. To some degree, USAID is blown as a CIA and Pentagon cover. I'm a suspicious fellow, and I think one needs to look carefully at how certain groups get financed in the coming period.

Personally, I believe that Trump didn't feel he could separate out his anti-woke paranoid fantasies from the operation of USAID abroad, and would rather trash the agency and start anew with his own brand of nationalist-conservative-reactionary politics, untarnished by so-called "woke" liberalism, i.e., to any taint of anti-racist or anti-sexist ideology mixed in with the takeover of markets and World Bank/IMF "loans" to immiserate the targeted countries and bring them firmly under the umbrella of U.S. imperialism. In the meantime, the CIA knows how to covertly finance those they wish to finance.

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My thinking is very similar. The entire purpose of farming out CIA ops to NED/USAID was to use openness as a cover. By this point both organisations have been so thoroughly burned - USAID's meddling has been critically reported in the mainstream for years, in a manner the Endowment's chicanery ceased to be a decade ago - that their entire raison d'etre is effectively defeated. It is very clear from some revealing exchanges between former USAID staffers and US intel operatives I've highlighted on 'X' that the corruption and incompetence of USAID was widely known and frowned upon within DC. I'd suggest USAID's card was marked a long time ago, Trump is just a flak-carrier for the organisation's overdue shuttering.

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I liked the article, and I also agree with you. When I read your comment I thought about a generational effect: I'm 61 years old and a Brazilian, so I remember the USAID very well, and how it funded the US policies in the newly established fascist military dictatorship down there, for example. And how its presence there served to prepare the 1964 Coup. But you are right, and a lot has changed in the past 30 years. That cover was probably blown, or partly so. The liberal/neocon establishment is unhapp.

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I’m fairly certain this is more kabuki theatre as some other disgusting entity draped in cogdis wrappings will be trotted out as a replacement. It’s like TIA being openly disparaged only to be realized with FUSION centers. As Edward Curtain so aptly described the clown car known as politics

The U.S. political economy is controlled by a small group of the wealthiest nihilists and is maintained through lies, a military-industrial economy, and perpetual wars around the world to maintain and increase their wealth. It is a death cult that people worship by their participation.

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and that work around by the CIA needs to be plugged as well.

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Well! This is a good news...

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Right that's what I said. I am thinking this is great news.

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Good article. I think you meant 'neutering' not 'nurturing' towards the end?

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Thank you, Just updated that.

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“I honestly don’t think Trump, Elon Musk, or any of the Trump team actually knows what USAID is used for.”

They are learning.

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We have to wonder if the Trump people are fools, brain-dead, or so ideological that they cannot even glimpse that which is real. I understand that USAID does run some clinics, etc, probably for cover, but along with the NED, it is just a tool for producing chaos and manipulating populations of targeted countries. As this is so obvious to those on the Left, that US leadership ignores its utility as a weapon is baffling. Perhaps this is the first step back from hegemony as Marco Rubio recently opined.

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Go watch the recent DNC party elections and then tell me about brain dead fools.

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Of course it does that. The US and every other country does this sort of thing.

But one of its targeted countries is us.

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Seek mental help

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Great stuff, and thanks for the shoutout!

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I do not think for a minute it was accidental.

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1dEdited

What’s most concerning, after my career working for US military Intelligence, is that people like the author still, somehow, believe that violent foreign interference, and coups… is good politics. How you sidle up to this heinous activity on the Tax payers dime, will forever escape me… it’s not humane, or constructive. History doesn’t lie, and this is not the way forward.

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This is deliciously funny. The flow of grift to CIA-cutouts was shut off, and now they're squealing like stuck pigs. I've seen ads from a couple of them begging for money already. If Trump keeps this up, we'll be seeing the National Endowment for Democracy with its hand out on Jimmy Dore's show!

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good news even if it is very temporary... as I suspect it will be

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It’s not accidental. “Trump team may end up accidentally dismantling some of the most vital tools for U.S. imperialism.”

Trump isn’t an Imperialist, he’s a nationalist and interested in improving the Domestic American situation. The Globalists, who you’re calling Imperialists, are his mortal enemies; they tried to kill him, if you recall. Trump who’s always been interested in improving the economic lot of Americans has gotten dragged into - and in his first term down and out- by these American enemies. Never mind his base of the working and war fighting classes, who hate the Globalists (Imperialists) intensely. We also call this “The Deep State.”

Trump is properly asserting Constitutional control of the Executive Branch under Article II of the Constitution, along the way USAID (full of Trump’s enemies) are getting handled roughly.

In fact the only center of power not yet being handled roughly or purged so far is the CIA; which seems to be waiting on the arrival of Tulsi Gabbard. Any mischief from that agency will be limited, as they’re quite isolated now.

If you doubt this or consider any of it accidental, have a look at the rout of DOJ and the panic at the FBI.

That we 🇺🇸 are doing this for our own reasons instead of whatever the motives of the author should be reassuring, not discomforting, that’s far more solid a basis than some ideology- that we don’t share.

Cheers

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We 🇺🇸 have to stop regime change here before we can stop regime change over there…

See?

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We shall see. I hope you are right, but you only are if the regime change operations stop.

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We 🇺🇸 have to stop regime change here before we can stop regime change over there…

See?

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Trump 1.0 couldn’t stop HIS REGIME being changed in 2020, he is properly starting in the USA.

Nixon Watergate was Regime Change, you understand?

So probably JFK.

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lol!

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There's also been massive gritting going on in some of these agencies that doesn't benefit the US so maybe the audit is also them trying to get there cut🤔

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This seems likely. I can't imagine the chronically online Musk hasn't noticed the agency's activities. Also cf Barron, most strategy analysts, anyone looking into Victoria Nuland, social media counter ops, RFK Jr's team, the exposés of Ukraine that float around, and whatever was matter of factly discussed in term 1 ie Venezuela. The hidden activity skimming or pursuing DNC-permanent state goals using the funds may crumble or start yelping in these 3 months and I'd think that's a goal.

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Well done--do your predictions usually prove out this fast? If this rag says it, it must be impossible to ignore. 😅 https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/02/03/us/trump-usaid-news

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Monday that he had taken over as acting administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, but that he planned to delegate its day-to-day business to another person whom he has not yet named.

Speaking to reporters in El Salvador, Mr. Rubio said that many of U.S.A.I.D.’s programs were worthwhile and would continue under the umbrella of the State Department. He added that the organization change was prompted by what he described as efforts by U.S.A.I.D. officials to obscure details about their work and cooperate with reasonable questions from the incoming Trump administration.

Mr. Rubio faulted U.S.A.I.D. employees for “deciding that they’re somehow a global charity separate from the national interest or taxpayer dollars.” He added, “That sort of level of insubordination makes it impossible to conduct a sort of mature and serious review.”

Mr. Rubio’s criticism of U.S.A.I.D. was still markedly softer than that of Elon Musk, who has accused the agency of doing “criminal” work, and said overnight that he and President Trump had decided it was time to dissolve the agency.

“We’re shutting it down,” Mr. Musk said during a live chat on X, his social media platform, early Monday, later adding in a post that “we spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper.”

U.S.A.I.D. employees were told overnight not to report to work on Monday because its Washington, D.C., headquarters would be closed, fueling fears that the already-hobbled agency would soon be shuttered for good.

The unusual staffwide directive was emailed out around 12:45 a.m. Eastern time, shortly after Mr. Musk’s announcement.

The notice exacerbated the panic that had already taken hold among agency employees, who have been bracing for a shutdown since representatives of Mr. Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency, an ad hoc task force housed on the White House grounds, entered agency headquarters last week.

Two top security officials were put on administrative leave for attempting to refuse those representatives access to internal systems, including a secure space where classified materials were housed.

By Monday, hundreds of U.S.A.I.D. employees were locked out of their email accounts, and contractors as well as regular staff discovered they could no longer access their official records, according to three employees with knowledge of the changes. In Washington, D.C., a throng of U.S.A.I.D. employees gathered outside the agency’s headquarters at the Ronald Reagan Building, a few blocks away from the White House.

The email directing employees not to show up to the agency’s headquarters was from Gavin Kliger and sent from an agency server, although Mr. Kliger is said to be an engineer on Mr. Musk’s task force. Mr. Kliger did not respond to requests for comment.

Foreign assistance distributed by the agency, which supports health services, disaster relief, anti-poverty efforts and a range of other programs, makes up less than 1 percent of the federal budget.

Democratic lawmakers have argued that any moves to dismantle U.S.A.I.D. are illegal, as Congress created the agency and continues to fund its operations.

“Any effort to merge or fold USAID into the Department of State should be, and by law must be, previewed, discussed, and approved by Congress,” the Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee wrote in a letter on Sunday to Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

The senators pointed out that they had received no advance notice that Mr. Musk’s task force would be entering U.S.A.I.D., or that they were trying to shut down operations.

“That would be illegal. He cannot unilaterally close a federal agency. Another assault on the constitution,” Senator Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, wrote on social media over the weekend of the administration’s reported plans to shutter U.S.A.I.D.

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🤣😂🤣

I watched an Active Measures video and they talked about the grift going on in USAID that the US wasn't getting a cut of. Knowing how the US "government" behaves like a mob boss, they would not allow that to stand.

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Lol!

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Ukraine was one of the worst🤣 It was so bad even Zelensky was complaining about it🤣

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"It didn't STOP anything. It may have paused it, but it will just go back to CIA and completely dark in time. This is temporary, if there was any actual disruption at all" - cooler heads

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This article isn’t aging very well. After Saturday night, they know exactly what is going on at USAID. It’s not just foreign aid, and destabilization. Or woke. It’s the hub of progressive political financial support for everything.

It is a democrat wishlist funding agency.

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Some of the comments on this thread are confusing. I don’t know who they are directed at. Usaid’s being instrumental in regime change by whatever means necessary is a given. Just looking at what happened in Ukraine in 2014 is enough to confirm that they were active before, during and after the goings on at that time. That the same game plan was tried in South America is of no surprise, though things didn’t go according to plan. Same as Romania. Ukraine and Israel continuing to get aid makes the whole exercise look cynical.

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Don't know how "accidental" this was. It was perhaps a warning shot against the CIA, framed as broadly as possible to remain aligned with the admin agenda of deconstructing the Deep State and unaccounted for spending.

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And that would be a brilliant idea.

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lol

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