USAID'S LONG TRACK RECORD OF WASTEFUL, LEFT-WING SPENDING MADE IT AN OBVIOUS FIRST TARGET FOR MUSK

National Review

 

USAID’s Long Track Record of Wasteful, Left-Wing Spending Made It an Obvious First Target for Musk

By David Zimmermann

February 4, 2025 12:38 PM

 

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has come under scrutiny after tech billionaire Elon Musk chose the agency as the first target in his campaign to reduce ballooning government costs and root out progressive ideology from within the executive branch.

 

Musk’s decision to first declare war on USAID in his role as head of the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency should come as no surprise, given the agency’s long history of wasteful, ideologically driven spending.

 

Established in 1961 under the Kennedy administration, USAID is meant to oversee humanitarian, development, and security programs, doing so in over 100 foreign countries. As originally conceived, the agency was meant to distribute aid in a way that advances U.S. interests, ideally without antagonizing the local population.

 

But, for decades now, the agency has apparently strayed from that mission.

 

In 1994, whistleblower Paul Neifert revealed that the agency was distributing U.S. aid based on race in violation of federal law.

 

“As far as I’m concerned, Mr. Musk is quite correct in calling USAID a criminal organization,” Neifert told National Review. “Their misconduct goes back years in my case and is not surprising to those familiar with USAID methods. This apple is indeed rotten.”

 

Stationed in South Africa three decades ago, Neifert accused senior USAID officials of violating procurement laws and the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act that authorized U.S. assistance to the country following the end of apartheid in 1990. On top of being illegal, it was also a self-defeating policy, Neifert explained.

 

“In bizarre fashion, it was in conflict with the non-racial ideals of pre- and post-Mandela South Africa, which held that abolishment of the raced-based system of apartheid was for the benefit of all members of its ‘rainbow’ coalition,” he said.

 

“USAID instituted its twisted version of a race-based, spoils system, which required its staff to circumvent U.S. procurement laws by providing USAID funding on a racialized basis to USAID’s favored recipients both in the U.S. and South Africa.”

 

Neifert went to the press and Congress with his allegations while fighting against the agency in court. He ultimately settled for monetary compensation and agreed to leave USAID after twelve years. The whistleblower left in “disgust,” he said.

 

More recently, USAID continued its track record of working against U.S. interests by awarding the U.S.-based EcoHealth Alliance millions of dollars in grants, which ended up helping to fund risky bat coronavirus research at a lab in Wuhan, China — research that is now widely believed to be responsible for the Covid-19 pandemic.

 

The agency planned to renew EcoHealth’s funding even after the pandemic until it was forced to cut off all funding under immense political pressure last year.

 

Senator Joni Ernst (R., Iowa) pushed to suspend the flow of American taxpayer dollars to EcoHealth.

 

“From funneling tax dollars for batty studies with the Wuhan Institute in China, to sending Ukrainians to Paris Fashion Week, USAID has been one of the worst offenders of waste in Washington,” Ernst told NR.

 

“The agency charges roughly 50–60 percent for ‘negotiated indirect cost rate agreements,’ which is Washington speak for shady contractors lining their pockets through overhead costs and charging taxpayers for fancy dinners. It is long past time to put the American people first and stop the wasteful and dangerous spending by USAID.”

 

In fiscal year 2023, USAID managed about $43.4 billion on foreign assistance programs primarily related to sectors such as governance, humanitarian, and health, per an updated January report from the non-partisan Congressional Research Service. The third largest sector, health services, received $7 billion in funding.

 

Because USAID receives foreign policy guidance from the State Department, the agency will reportedly fold into State if the administration gets its way.

 

“There are probably some arguments to be made about what could be important work that falls under USAID, but the fact of the matter is, it has been overshadowed by these bad actors,” Ernst said on an X Spaces livestream that Musk hosted. “If there are truly good pro-American programs, then let’s move them to the State Department. Let’s make sure we have proper oversight.”

 

Another controversial funding area involved $230 million that USAID sent to support the Palestinian people, contributing to the $2.1 billion total in humanitarian aid provided since October 7, 2023. At least some of that funding was expected to fall into the hands of Hamas terrorists, according to an October 2023 letter from the House Oversight Committee to then-USAID administrator Samantha Power. The letter pointed out that Palestinian aid had been cut under the Trump administration because it couldn’t be safely accounted for, only for the Biden administration to open the tap on it once again.

 

In addition to those big-ticket items, like Palestinian aid, USAID spends relatively small amounts of money on bizarre cultural projects that appear to have no purpose other than to promote niche left-wing ideologies around race and gender.

 

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt cited a few such programs in a recent statement to reporters: $1.5 million to “advance DEI in Serbia’s workplaces,” $70,000 for an Irish DEI-centric musical, $47,000 for a “transgender opera” in Colombia, and $32,000 on a “transgender comic book” in Peru.

 

“As an American taxpayer, I don’t want my dollars going toward this crap, and I know the American people don’t either,” Leavitt told reporters. “And that’s exactly what Elon Musk has been tasked by President Trump to do — to get the fraud, waste, and abuse out of our federal government.”

 

While Republicans are on board with shutting down or otherwise merging USAID with the State Department, Democrats are pushing back.

 

Hours after the agency’s doors were closed for the day, Senator Brian Schatz (D., Hawaii) placed a blanket hold on Trump’s State Department nominees to protest what congressional Democrats called an illegal shutdown of USAID.

 

“Dismantling USAID is illegal and makes us less safe,” Schatz said before explaining that Congress needs to pass a law to eliminate or fundamentally change the agency. “This is self-inflicted chaos of epic proportions that will have dangerous consequences all around the world.”

 

Meanwhile, Trump is pushing the narrative that because USAID is run by “radical lunatics,” executive action needs to be taken. When asked if Congress is the only one that can “do away” with USAID, Trump suggested that may not be the case if USAID is found to have engaged in fraud.

 

“I don’t know, I don’t think so. Not when it comes to fraud,” the president told reporters. “These people are lunatics, and if it comes to fraud, you wouldn’t have an act of Congress. I’m not sure that you would anyway, but we just want to do the right thing. It’s something that should have been done a long time ago.”

 

While Musk called USAID a “criminal organization” that needs to “die,” the agency is a creation of Congress and it’s unclear just how far Musk can go in dismantling it without congressional approval.

 

“Elon Musk, you didn’t create USAID. The United States Congress did for the American people,” Representative Jamie Raskin (D., Md.), ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, said during a press conference outside the agency’s closed headquarters. “And just like Elon Musk did not create USAID, he doesn’t have the power to destroy it. And who’s going to stop him? We are!”

 

If USAID does survive in some form, along with some of its existing workforce, Secretary of State Marco Rubio could have a hard time bringing the agency to heel, as Mark Moyar knows from experience.

 

Moyar was a senior political appointee at USAID during Trump’s first term. That is until he reported widespread waste, fraud, and abuse within the agency, after which he got the ax.

 

Moyar’s efforts to clean up the agency “caused subversive bureaucrats to orchestrate my termination on bogus charges of divulging classified information,” he told National Review. “Those same bureaucrats helped maintain employment for the people who perpetrated the waste, fraud, and abuse. Fortunately, these individuals have just been put on leave for their most recent efforts to obstruct the Trump White House.”

 

Moyar chronicles his experience working for USAID and provides a blueprint for how a presidential administration could “drain the swamp” in his 2024 book, Masters of Corruption: How the Federal Bureaucracy Sabotaged the Trump Administration. He currently teaches military history at Hillsdale College.

 

Rubio is working to “move, reorganize, and integrate” certain USAID programs into the department he leads while leaving room for abolishing other aspects of the agency’s work, Rubio wrote in a letter to top lawmakers from both parties.

 

Rubio’s temporary role as USAID acting administrator, Moyar said, is a “clear sign” that the agency will formally join the State Department in some capacity. “It’s possible that some parts will be shifted to other agencies,” the professor added. “The worst parts can be expected to disappear.”

NEW STUDY FINDS ENTIRE SPOONFUL OF MICROPLASTICS IN PEOPLE'S BRAINS

New York Post

 

New study finds entire spoonful of microplastics in people’s brains — and 3 times as much in those with dementia

By McKenzie Beard

Published Feb. 4, 2025, 11:08 a.m. ET

 

Your brain is 99.5% brain tissue — but the rest? Plastic.

 

That’s the unsettling takeaway from a new study co-lead by Matthew Campen, who found microplastics in human brains at far higher levels than other organs. Even more troubling, these tiny particles are accumulating rapidly, having increased 50% over the past eight years.

 

“There’s much more plastic in our brains than I ever would have imagined or been comfortable with,” said Campen, distinguished professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque.

 

On average, the brain samples studied contained about 7 grams of microplastics — roughly the weight of an average plastic spoon.

 

To make matters worse, the study also found up to 10 times the amount of microplastics in the brains of 12 dementia patients compared to healthy brains. While the correlation is clear, researchers cautioned that further study is needed to establish a direct link.

 

The research team analyzed 52 brain samples — 28 from autopsies conducted in 2016 and 24 from 2024. While microplastics were present in every single sample, the concentrations were notably higher in the more recent specimens.

 

Additional brain samples dating back to 1997 followed the same alarming pattern, with higher microplastic levels found in newer samples.

 

Campen said the increase mirrors the global surge in plastic waste. Global plastic production has more than doubled over the past two decades, now totaling about 400 million tons annually.

 

Scientists previously found that humans consume 5 grams of microplastics each week, which is about the weight of a credit card. Microplastics have been detected in various parts of the body, including the lungs, liver, kidneys, placenta, blood, semen and even breast milk.

 

The most common microplastic that researchers from the University of New Mexico detected was polyethylene, widely used in packaging materials like bottles and cups. What’s more, many of these particles were smaller than previously thought — some are no bigger than viruses.

 

Campen said these tiny fragments are small enough to cross the blood-brain barrier, though he noted that the exact process of how they are transported to the brain remains unclear. He suspects that a primary route of entry is through our food, particularly meat.

 

“The way we irrigate fields with plastic-contaminated water, we postulate that the plastics build up there,” Campen said. “We feed those crops to our livestock. We take the manure and put it back on the field, so there may be a sort of feed-forward biomagnification.”

 

Other studies suggest another potential route for microplastics to enter the human body: through the nose. The olfactory bulb might allow these tiny particles to travel directly to the brain when we breathe.

 

Despite a global push to reduce plastic production, researchers warn that the microplastic threat isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Plastic takes decades to break down into microscopic particles, meaning the environmental contamination will continue to grow for years to come.

 

While the full health impact of microplastics remains uncertain, studies suggest they can damage cells, trigger inflammation, disrupt organ function and alter immune responses. Exposure to these tiny particles has also been linked to an increased risk of heart attack and stroke as well as some cancers.

 

Though microplastics may be nearly impossible to avoid entirely, there are steps you can take to limit your exposure.

 

Start by cutting out single-use plastics — think food and beverage packaging, as well as takeout containers. Swap plastic storage containers for glass or metal, and never reheat food in plastic containers in the microwave.

 

Experts also recommend filtering your tap water, investing in high-quality air filters for your home and cleaning your living space more frequently.

 

Another simple but effective tip: cut back on processed foods, which tend to have higher levels of these tiny particles.

WOMAN REFUSES TO ATTEND SISTER'S WEDDING BECAUSE SHE WON'T LET HER BRING HER SERVICE DOG

PEOPLE

 

Woman Refuses to Attend Sister's Wedding Because She Won't Let Her Bring Service Dog

"My parents are furious and think I'm being heartless. They said I should be willing to do anything to have my sister there on my special day," the bride's sister wrote on Reddit

By Erin Clack  Published on February 4, 2025 05:58PM EST

 

A bride's sister is boycotting her upcoming wedding because she won't be allowed to bring her service dog.

 

The bride explained the dilemma in a post on Reddit, beginning by noting that she and her fiancé have planned "a big, elegant affair" and have "spared no expense" for their nuptials. While the couple is thrilled with the venue they have booked, it has very strict rules — one of which is that no animals are allowed on the property "due to its historical nature."

 

The bride's sister experiences "severe anxiety" and "panic attacks," and her service dog, a golden retriever named Max, helps ease her symptoms.

 

While the venue does make an exception for "legitimate service animals," the bride said, it seems she still does not want her sister's dog at the wedding. "Max is highly trained and well-behaved, but he's still a dog," the bride noted.

 

"The thing is, I've been waiting for this day my whole life, and I don't want anything to go wrong," she continued to explain. "I'm worried that even though Max is a service dog, he could still cause some sort of issue or be a distraction. Also, I don't want to start a fight with the venue that could risk our deposit or the entire booking."

 

The bride said she told her sister that while she would love to have her at her wedding, Max needs to stay home. As a compromise, she offered to arrange transportation and a pet sitter to be "close by" so her sister could "check in" with the dog. But her sister insisted she needs Max with her "at all times."

 

"She then said that if Max couldn't come, she wouldn't be able to attend, and now she's not speaking to me," the bride wrote, noting that other family members have taken her sister's side on the issue.

 

"My parents are furious and think I'm being heartless. They said I should be willing to do anything to have my sister there on my special day," she added, concluding her post by asking fellow Redditors, "AITA [am I the a------] for not letting my sister bring her service dog?"

 

In the comments section, the general consensus was that the bride was being unkind to her sister by not letting her have Max at her side, particularly as the venue does welcome service dogs.

 

"A service dog isn't a pet; it's essential for her well-being, and excluding her like this sends a pretty cold message. Would you rather have a flawless setting or your own sister present on your wedding day?" one person wrote.

 

Others suggested that the bride might be "worried the dog will take attention away" from her on her wedding day. "I feel like you are just using this 'venue' narrative to push your actual intentions of excluding her," one person argued.

 

"Are you doing this because of the venue... or because you believe a golden retriever will steal attention away from you?" another asked. "Because this reads like this is all about your ego and not the venue's rules."

AMUSING TWEETS ABOUT TRUMP AND GAZA

Amusing tweets about Trump and Gaza:

 

Frank J. Fleming Verified account @IMAO_: Finally, a two-state solution — the two states being the U.S. and Israel.

 

Joel Pollak Verified account @joelpollak: I will be the starting pitcher for the Gaza Rockets.

 

Sunny Verified account @sunnyright: Listen we can have Canada or Gaza. We can't annex two terrorist-riddled, failed regions at once.

 

Spencer Brown Verified account @itsSpencerBrown: If you thought the taco bowls were good at Trump Tower, just wait until you have the shawarma at Trump National Gaza.

 

Noam Blum Verified account @neontaster: I can't believe the US is about to invade Gaza and our government has zero dollars to put on any transgender musicals there.

 

Eyal Yakoby Verified account @EYakoby: Pro-Palestinians for the last 15 months: “Jews should go back to Poland, Palestine is Arab.” Pro-Palestinians now: “Telling people to relocate is absolutely unacceptable.”

WHY IT'S BETTER FOR WOMEN TO GO COMMANDO AT NIGHT

New York Post

 

Why it’s better for women to go commando at night — and if you must wear underwear, this is best

By Reda Wigle

Published Feb. 3, 2025, 1:24 p.m. ET

 

For women, commando is the way to go.

 

Hailey Puckett (@HaileyPtheNP), a women’s health nurse practitioner, has taken to TikTok to explain why going underwear-free supports vaginal health.

 

“In the past week, I have had thousands of people ask me if you can go commando. From a vaginal health standpoint, please do,” she said.

 

Puckett explained that topics related to women’s health are taboo, and talking about underwear, or lack thereof, even more so.

 

“If you do not want to wear anything, do not wear anything. It is extremely healthy. But if you want to wear things, ensure they’re appropriate,” she recommended.

 

Puckett stressed that “the vagina is a self-cleaning oven.”

 

As such, that very intimate appliance does not fare well when certain things prevent it from working as designed. According to Puckett, “If you hold things into the oven, things go wrong. Letting things breathe can be the best.”

 

If you’re unready or unwilling to kick your lingerie habit, the nurse practitioner offered a middle ground: Wear your knickers during the day but skip the skivvies when it’s time for bed.

 

“If you are somebody that likes to wear underwear throughout the day, at night commando, nothing, nada,” she said.

 

If you want to wear underthings during the day, Puckett has some criteria to protect and promote vaginal health.

 

“Making sure that you’re comfortable is definitely most important. Data tells us that cotton underwear is the best for vaginal health purposes. There are a lot of underwear that are not 100% cotton,” she warned.

 

According to other experts, the benefits of cotton (or any fabric) can vary, depending on the quality of the fiber, types of weaves and circumstances.

 

Air circulates better through natural fabrics like cotton, hemp, bamboo and linen than through synthetic fabrics like polyester, nylon and satin.

 

Puckett urged consumers to aim for the highest percentage of cotton and more significant swaths of fabric.

 

“The more, the better, especially that little bottom portion,” she explained, mimicking the gusset or crotch pocket portion of the undergarment.

 

“You want it wide enough so everything can kinda stay inside of it. You don’t want things to split. If things split, [the fabric] gets closer and it holds more up. So looser.”

 

Changing your underwear after a workout and making sure you wear clean pants every day are also crucial to promoting vaginal health.

 

And if you’re prone to infections, save the whale tail for special occasions or brief encounters (pun intended).

 

“Generally speaking, thongs are really bad for vaginal health because the way they fit is a little unhygienic,” Dr. Usha Rajagopal, a board-certified plastic surgeon and founder of the V Suite, told The Post.

 

She explained that women’s thongs can be tight and restrictive and pull bacteria from the rectal area toward the vaginal opening, which could lead to a bacterial infection.

 

And when it comes time for bed, experts agree that less is more and bare is best.

THE FOOD WE EAT IS INFLUENCED BY WHAT WE SEE

New York Post

 

The food we eat is influenced by the colors we see: How we ‘taste’ with our eyes

By Associated Press

Published Feb. 5, 2025, 12:31 p.m. ET

 

You know you’ve said it. We all have. “Mmm, that looks so delicious — I want to try some!” That’s because when it comes to what we eat, it’s not just a matter of taste.

 

What foods and drinks look like — the colors we see before the first morsels or sips hit our tastebuds — have mattered to people for millennia.

 

And nowhere has that been more blatant than the American food palate, where the visual spectrum we choose from includes not only the primary colors but artificial ones that nature couldn’t even dream up.

 

For well over a century, food manufacturers in the United States have used synthetic dyes in their products as part of their production and marketing efforts.

 

Often, it’s been in hopes of making a mass-produced food look as fresh and natural as possible, reminiscent of the raw ingredients used in its production.

 

In other cases, it’s been about making an item look interesting or distinctive from competitors, like candies or desserts in an electric blue or neon pink.

 

Think “blue raspberry Slurpee” or “Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.”

 

It hasn’t been without controversy.

 

Over the decades, there have been pushback and government regulation over just HOW food and drink have been colored, most recently with the decision last month from the federal Food and Drug Administration to ban red dye No. 3 from foods and oral-ingested drugs because of concerns over a possible cancer risk. But no one’s calling for food NOT to be colorful.

 

That’s because there’s no escaping the importance of what we see when it comes to what we eat, says Devina Wadhera, faculty associate at the College of Integrative Sciences and Arts of Arizona State University.

 

“Your first sensory contact, if your eyes are open, is going to be sight,” she says. “That’s going to be the first judgment we’re going to make.”

 

Visual appeal is pivotal

 

The food manufacturers of the late 19th century knew they had to get the visual appeal right. It was part of their marketing, as a shorthand to encourage brand recognition, to make consumers feel comfortable about quality and overcome worries (or realities) about spoilage as food production became industrialized, says Ai Hisano, author of “Visualizing Taste: How Business Changed the Look of What You Eat.”

 

Synthetic dyes helped overcome problems like foods losing color in the production process and helped make foods look more “natural,” she says.

 

Then, over time, dyes were deployed to make foods look “fun” and appealing to audiences like young children. (That doesn’t mean manufacturers didn’t sometimes use colorants that could even be deadly — hence the reason there’s regulation.)

 

She pointed to the mid-20th century example of cake mixes, which reduced the amount of effort required to bake a cake at home because most of the ingredients were already included.

 

Food companies began promoting colorful icing for the cakes as a way women baking at home “could kind of present their personality even though they are making a pre-mixed cake,” Hisano says.

 

We become conditioned to coloring

 

The connections we make between colors and foods are learned, Wadhera says. “Throughout our lives, we make associations which mean things.

 

Cake is associated with birthdays. Ice cream is associated with parties and good times, so everything is associative learning.

 

Color is one of those things that we have this tendency to learn about different flavor pairings.”

 

She gave the example of the spate of products like chips and other snacks that are marketed as having an extra kick. Often, “they’re super red because (companies are) trying to say, ‘Hey, this is going to be spicy’ because they’re trying to get to this sensation or perception that this is going to be really spicy — buy it.”

 

The connections that we make between color and taste can also change according to the context, says Charles Spence, professor of experimental psychology at the University of Oxford.

 

A blue liquid in a plastic cup in a bathroom? Could be minty mouthwash.

 

The exact same color liquid, in a bar, held in a rocks glass? Could be bitter gin.

 

Different cultures around the world also have different color associations, he says, although it’s fairly constant across geographies that the more vivid a color is, the more intense people assume the flavor will be.

 

It can even extend past the food itself to the colors involved in its presentation, Wadhera says, pointing to research showing people eating different amounts or preferring certain foods linked to the colors of the dishes used to serve them.

 

And much of the time, she says, people aren’t necessarily aware they’re doing it.

 

“There’s a lot of things with color that you can manipulate and affect judgments,” she says. “You don’t think of it, though. … We make automatic judgments on the food and we don’t even realize it.”