As IF Times

link:  https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14393987/usaid-programs-republicans-drag-queen-ecuador.html

Well whaddya know? The veil has been lifted and to the surprise of almost no one, it’s been revealed that practically the entirety of the US media, if not media globally, has been funded by only one source: USAID.

For those paying attention through the years, it wasn’t a complete shock since often, the narrative espoused by all media outlets was practically word for word exactly the same on any given issue.  It was Pravda on a global scale. At the very least, the workforce at USAID was certainly on a global scale, numbering over 10,000 workers.

According to the Columbia Journalism Review, USAID supported 6,200 journalists, 707 news outlets and 279 media sector civil society organizations in 30 different countries. It’s revealed that USAID has been a major sponsor of fake news.

For perspective, USAID began as a humanitarian organization targeting humane causes.  It has grotesquely morphed into the main funding source for a pot pourri of bizarre causes and directed towards preposterous ends. As noted, it employs 10,000 workers to help spread American goodwill.

According to documents retrieved by Trump’s financial sleuth, Elon Musk via the DOGE initiative, a short list of beneficiaries include:

$7.9 million to teach Sri Lankan journalists how to avoid “binary-gendered language”,  $2 million for sex changes and LGBT activism in Guatemala, $1.1 million to an Armenian LGBT group, $1.5 million to promote LGBT advocacy in Jamaica, $2 million to promote LGBT equality through entrepreneurship in Latin America, $3.9 million for LGBT causes in the Western Balkans, $5.5 million for LGBT activism in Uganda, $6 million for advancing LGBT issues in priority countries around the world, and $6.3 million for men who have sex with men in South Africa.

Apart from this, USAID has funded $25 million for Deloitte to promote “green transportation” in Georgia, $6 million to transform digital spaces to reflect feminist democratic principles, $1.3 million to Arab and Jewish photographers, and $8.3 million for “USAID Education: Equity and Inclusion”

It has also funded over $4.5 million to combat disinformation in Kazakhstan. That one is amusingly ironic.  Here’s a good one: $520 million to teach people in Africa about climate change.  Why wouldn’t it have been cheaper to send Greta Thunberg for a whirlwind tour?

And yet, these are peanuts compared to the amounts distributed to media outlets.  As we can imagine, attributing an accurate figure on the amounts spent on media is difficult, but the number of at least $268 million dollars has been offered by the same Columbia Journalism Review.   The number is likely much higher since this has been going on for years if not decades.

Heretofore respected outlets such as the New York Times and Reuters were revealed to have been beneficiaries of large sums of USAID money.  Thus, people have been deluded about the veracity of a story if it was carried by these formerly venerable outlets.  The most recent example of propaganda as news was the universal support of vaccines and masks for the Covid campaign. It turns out that they were fronting for Big Pharma.

This is important because, despite all that’s happened, people still think the NY Times and Reuters are real news. It turns out, the reportage was essentially marketing scripts with the intent of shaping opinions, not providing news.

How do we know that news outlets such as Reuters were involved in large scale social deception?  Well, for one thing, the name of the USAID file of the 9 million dollar grant given to Reuters was named “Large Scale Social Deception”

As we know, people are maddeningly naïve and they will believe anything if it’s repeated often enough…and by enough media outlets.

Thus, the entire concept of a free and independent media has been a charade. Thankfully, technology has undermined their influence on people’s news consumption, because now, X is the de facto medium of record.  Though you must still navigate through a virtual firehose of opinions and facts, at the very least, there’s an unfiltered presentation of data for the discerning mind to assess. You are no longer a victim of the official narrative.  It gives people comfort that the reality that they observe is not the same as what they are told to believe.  Information is now bottom up rather than top down.

As many may know, January is the beginning of award show season for those participants in the entertainment business.  Among the long list of award shows are:  the Golden Globes, then the Oscars, then the Grammys, then the Tonys, the Emmys, the critic’s choice awards etc., etc.  The actual complete list is actually about 3 times the ones just listed including of course the Dorian awards, given by the LGBTQ community.

Some may argue that these awards are frivolous and serve only to augment the fragile egos of those in the entertainment industry.  It certainly can’t compare to the prestigious awards given by the state for being not only famous but for also being an all-around great citizen.  In the UK, such an honor is designated by the honorific ‘Sir’ or ‘Dame’ bestowed upon the winners.  Thus we have Sir Paul McCartney and Dame Agatha Christie.

In the United States, the parallel honorific is the Presidential Medal Of Freedom, which is bestowed upon people deemed to have contributed in some significant way to the cultural enrichment of the nation.  As it happens, a very large number of the recipients have been involved with the entertainment business, so we can consider it to be a more prestigious version of the Academy Awards.  In the case of the Presidential Medal Of Freedom, the requirements are rather vague, as there is no peer committee to pass judgement on the merits of the inductee.  As far as we know, it’s totally discretionary on the part of the sitting President.  What we can note is that you cannot be a winner if you’re not famous.

Among the most recent recipients are the names Hilary Clinton and George Soros.  Their names were included with such as Denzel Washington and Michael J. Fox and others in this year’s inductee group. The names of Soros and Clinton may have irked some of the other winners in the same way that a desk jockey General displaying a chest full of notional medals is paraded among genuine soldiers receiving medals of valor. Hilary Clinton has as much to do with freedom as a turtle has to roller skates.

It’s human nature to want and grant recognition; this much is obvious by the many instances of contests and awards regimes we’re all exposed to during our lifetimes. Ribbons for this, medals for that, a gold star here, a statue there. .

As Sally Field exclaimed during her Oscar acceptance speech in 1985, “…You like me, right now, you like me!..”

It’s intensely ironic that the “Medal Of Freedom” was awarded to both Clinton and Soros, both of whom have been the strongest advocates of oppression for Americans, certainly not freedom.  Soros is widely reputed to have stated that his life’s mission is, “to destroy the United States”. Maybe he was misquoted and just misunderstood; the media can exaggerate so much these days. Remember what Abe Lincoln said about stuff you find on the internet.  But this is certainly the same Soros who was evicted from Hungary for his subversive activities there. Also the same Soros who funds the Open Society Foundations supporting all manner of anti-American causes. Of course you could argue that via his activities, Soros contributed to cultural enrichment of the US by funding such as Black Lives Matter.  Contrast this with the work of Julian Assange and Edward Snowden who have sacrificed their lives in the pursuit of freedom and transparency but who remain outcasts in society.

Among the crop of this year’s recipients is Lionel Messi, a soccer player.  He concluded that the whole spectacle was not his thing and decided not to attend. We don’t know his motives, perhaps he had a scheduling conflict.  Or perhaps he didn’t want to be accorded the same accolade as some of the other honorees.  It could be that he understands that it’s all theater and he isn’t in such need of attention.  His awards case is already full of real trophies.