Swollen Thumb said:
A quick google search will also tell you who Mike Benz is.
Well, more to the point, I don't know him well enough to know if he did some lazy research or is full of ***** It's the problem with X journalism.
Swollen Thumb said:
A quick google search will also tell you who Mike Benz is.
LOL, thank you for your intrepid insights/research. I never use Google, first of all. BBC:BBRex said:I don't know who Mike Benz is, but a quick Google search will show that tweet is absolutely inaccurate.Quote:
Bono's first foray into "philanthropy," the Live Aid music concerts of the 1980s, raised $100 million for famine relief in Ethiopia. BBC later reported that just $5 million of it went to food -- $95 million of it went to buy guns and organize CIA-backed warlords.
And btw, the Ethiopian ruler's grift off of USAID has continued in the decades since.Quote:
But the merchant Mr Peberdy dealt with in that transaction claims he was, in fact, a senior member of the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF).
"I was given clothes to make me look like a Muslim merchant. This was a trick for the NGOs," says Gebremedhin Araya.
Underneath the sacks of grain he sold, he says, were sacks filled with sand.
He says he handed over the money he received to TPLF leaders, including Meles Zenawi - the man who went on to become Ethiopia's prime minister in 1991.
Mr Meles, who is still in office, has declined to comment on the allegations.
But Mr Gebremedhin's version of events is supported by the TPLF's former commander, Aregawi Berhe.
Now living in exile in the Netherlands, he says the rebels put on what he describes as a "drama" to get the money.
"The aid workers were fooled," he says.
He says that some $100m went through the hands of the TPLF and affiliated groups.
Some 95% of it was allocated to buying weapons and building up a hard-line Marxist political party within the rebel movement.
Both Mr Aregawi and Mr Gebremedhin fell out with the TPLF leadership and fled the country.
Joined by @MoF_Ethiopia Ahmed Shide, @USAID, as well as federal and regional emergency response officials from Amhara, Dire Dawa, Oromia, Somali, and Tigray regions today to announce $331 million in new, lifesaving humanitarian assistance for Ethiopia. pic.twitter.com/nuc9fnviqR
— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) March 15, 2023
Don’t forget the multiple calls from @SecBlinken in the past month thanking @AbiyAhmedAli for waging a genocidal war on Amharas and bringing “stability” to the region. #WarOnAmhara #AmharaGenocide #Ethiopia https://t.co/0oCOCDw8o1 pic.twitter.com/oau1rH7mzR
— ነብዩ (@neby_G) October 5, 2023
Or maybe Reuters:Quote:
The BBC has apologised over reports claiming millions of pounds raised by Band Aid was used to buy arms.
In March, World Service's Assignment said cash raised by charities to help Ethiopia had been diverted by rebels.
The BBC has admitted that Assignment gave the impression that Band Aid and Live Aid money had been diverted despite no evidence to back that up.
It apologised for further TV, radio and online reports which actually stated that Band Aid money had paid for arms.
The BBC's Editorial Complaints Unit found in its ruling that there was no evidence to support such statements and that "they should not have been broadcast".
"The BBC wishes to apologise unreservedly to the Band Aid Trust for the misleading and unfair impression which was created," it added.
How many lives do you think were reported as being “saved” by these fake USAID public health programs later revealed to be CIA fronts? https://t.co/9ujJU88GSF
— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) July 2, 2025
Bill Gates could single-handedly pay for the entire USAID public health budget for the next 5 years and still be worth $70 billion. This means Bill Gates is directly personally killing 12 million people unless he pays up. https://t.co/XLfnHMTkzr
— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) July 2, 2025
Today marks the first day of the State Department's America First foreign assistance rebranding initiative, led by @SecRubio.
— Department of State (@StateDept) July 2, 2025
Consistent branding will ensure contributions made by the the United States will be immediately recognized as American.
"The redesign is very simple,… pic.twitter.com/HZnbOxU0Sq
Who's defending the honor of USAID? I think it's a **** organization, based on what I've seen. I just think there seems to be a lot of uncritical acceptance of X posts that align with the majority view.oh no said:
We've got posters on here defending the honor of USAID and confident in "news" that Benz is wrong - more than 5 of the $100 million raised by LiveAid in Ethiopia did go to food! and not all of the other $95 million went to warlords for regime changes and coups! Yay! Maybe we should keep the "philanthropy" going all over the world! I'm now confident all my tax dollars are being wisely spent on good causes overseas!
Mike Benz is not some random X poster. The fact that you are not aware of who he is tells me you have not been following the USAID story very closely.BBRex said:Who's defending the honor of USAID? I think it's a **** organization, based on what I've seen. I just think there seems to be a lot of uncritical acceptance of X posts that align with the majority view.oh no said:
We've got posters on here defending the honor of USAID and confident in "news" that Benz is wrong - more than 5 of the $100 million raised by LiveAid in Ethiopia did go to food! and not all of the other $95 million went to warlords for regime changes and coups! Yay! Maybe we should keep the "philanthropy" going all over the world! I'm now confident all my tax dollars are being wisely spent on good causes overseas!
OMG. State Dept Spokeswoman Tammy Bruce says 90% of foreign aid never actually made it to its intended destination.
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) July 2, 2025
The amount of fraud is mind-boggling. This is why Democrats fought DOGE so hard.
We need more arrests. pic.twitter.com/V24D8ibtoQ
Grok has scoured the twitter archives and the internet and cannot confirm what Tammy Bruce just said. It must not be true!nortex97 said:
Well, what does she know? One can surely just google to find that is incorrect.
oh no said:Grok has scoured the twitter archives and the internet and cannot confirm what Tammy Bruce just said. It must not be true!nortex97 said:
Well, what does she know? One can surely just google to find that is incorrect.
This is the exact structure of USAID and covert ops I describe Harvard as having been consistently running for the past 70 years here: https://t.co/6Y1H3MntA4
— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) July 4, 2025
It's nothing but a communist indoctrination camp.
— Maximonious (@Maximonious1) July 4, 2025
Here it is:
— 🇺🇸RealRobert🇺🇸 (@Real_RobN) July 5, 2025
Barack Obama funneled $1.2 billion through USAID that was supposed to go to Pakistan for “aid,” but instead laundered it to the Cayman Islands to help overthrow the Cuban government.
Just as USAID funneled $27 million to Black Lives Matter through the Tides… pic.twitter.com/kpSG7m7x9m
DEEP DIVE | MIKE BENZ: INTERNEWS & THE REAGAN INTELLIGENCE REVAMP@MikeBenzCyber explained how Reagan restructured U.S influence operations after the Church Committee and Carter’s CIA purge - shifting covert media work into new institutional forms
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) July 7, 2025
Internews was born alongside… https://t.co/HhoqkuQH67 pic.twitter.com/j1tEhkO39Y
The NOTUS article states: there are current and former trained federal officials trained in formenting color revolutions who believe that the United States has become an authoritarian country, and they are applying these same tactics at home in hopes of a "nationwide general… pic.twitter.com/0gD6KTQWfI
— DataRepublican (small r) (@DataRepublican) July 7, 2025
She has a low profile, but I was able to find a deleted website linking to this page: pic.twitter.com/MNPimiCb1V
— DataRepublican (small r) (@DataRepublican) July 7, 2025
DemocracyAID was also co-founded by Danielle Reiff, who also has an extensive USAID profile. She leads Signal chats with the "community."
— DataRepublican (small r) (@DataRepublican) July 7, 2025
Just five days ago, she wrote a LinkedIn post saying "USAID is being born again" in many ways - while quoting a post, Meridian Guild, which… pic.twitter.com/4wO9mLxyFd
Quote:
It's a remarkable story when you think about it.Their basic claim is that Trump's America is authoritarian; therefore, they have the right to take it down. The proof that America is authoritarian appears to be that they, the rightful rulers of the country, are being frozen out by the democratically elected president, so to protect democracy that they, the non-elected, have a right to control, they must bring down elected officials.Quote:
"Take it from those of us who worked in authoritarian countries: We've become one," said a currently employed federal official, who spoke to NOTUS on condition of anonymity. "They were so quick to disband AID, the group that supposedly instigates color revolutions. But they've done a very foolish thing. You just released a bunch of well-trained individuals into your population. If you kept our offices going and had us play solitaire in the office, it might have been safer to keep your regime."
The former officials tell NOTUS they're holding workshops on a tactic called "noncooperation." They're building a network of government workers willing to engage in even minor acts of rebellion in the office. And they're planting the seeds of what they hope could become a nationwide general strike.
Some in the informal network of Trump opponents are sharing an old CIA pamphlet with allies who still work in the government: It's called "Simple Sabotage."
Quote:
We are past the point where anybody can claim that there is no Deep State and worked our way to the "Deep State is awesome" phase of media coverage.
During Trump's first term they were called the resistance, and we were told that their cause was just. This time around they are DemocracyAID, and the premise is the same: bureaucrats, not elected officials, are the ones who have the right to rule over us.
USAID was disbanded precisely because this was its real mission--taking over countries for the benefit of the transnational elite. This is why Trump was elected, and the transnational elite is not happy at all about it.Quote:
The focus quickly shifted from salvaging the foreign assistance infrastructure to redeploying inside the United States. Reiff and Tucci joined forces, held dozens of meetings, sketched out a general structure and split it up into working groups that concentrate on separate missions like communications and training. They now have 200 volunteers and an Instagram account, @friendsofUSAID, with over 88,000 followers. A recent post shared "5 ways to keep up the momentum" of last month's "No Kings" protests.
Reiff said that some of the training sessions are "just letter writing: how to write op-eds to a local newspaper for a local story."
"We're democracy officers at the end of the day. We're still in a strategic planning process. We've got a lot of different irons in the fire," she told NOTUS.
EXCLUSIVE: USAID Quietly Sent Thousands Of Viruses To Chinese Military-Linked Biolab https://t.co/AqJ9zfgIHT
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 8, 2025
“I think the CIA was involved certainly in this research. They were funding it through USAID. NIH gave about $26 million in funding to the Wuhan lab. But USAID, which was functioning as the CIA surrogate, gave over $64 million." @RobertKennedyJrhttps://t.co/RvfXjotToT
— E 🇺🇸 (@Simply4Truth_) February 2, 2025
I go to work in a hard hat so the government can take a quarter of my earnings to teach Liberians not to poop in the street https://t.co/ompblvWZwQ
— Oilfield Rando (@Oilfield_Rando) July 10, 2025
And they aren't spending a dime to make sure people don't defecate in the streets of San Francisco?oh no said:I go to work in a hard hat so the government can take a quarter of my earnings to teach Liberians not to poop in the street https://t.co/ompblvWZwQ
— Oilfield Rando (@Oilfield_Rando) July 10, 2025
DOGE just terminated 230 wasteful contracts worth $2.8 billion including a $420k contract for “mentoring, evaluation, learning specialist services in Haiti” pic.twitter.com/TLhkKdIpjz
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) July 13, 2025
nortex97 said:DOGE just terminated 230 wasteful contracts worth $2.8 billion including a $420k contract for “mentoring, evaluation, learning specialist services in Haiti” pic.twitter.com/TLhkKdIpjz
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) July 13, 2025
A billion here and there, and pretty soon you are talking about real money. $420K for mentors in Haiti, LOL.