To clarify, nearly all of this food has already left the United States, except for 1 warehouse in Houston. It’s already been paid for, and as it sits, it costs money to store it.

This is like buying 3 dozen eggs from Whole Foods and setting them in the hot sun after you get home because you decided to punch yourself in the face until you passed out before putting them away.

It’s food purchased already from farmers. If it rots or not, it doesn’t affect Americans.

It does affect all the people who were already supposed to get it as food aid.

Y’all, look, the post WWII order has been wobbly since 2012-2014. 9/11 and the Patriot Act changed things in a way that were not compatible with that world. We lasted barely a decade before the wheels fell off.

We can pretty much all agree that things are broken, and these people ran, and won, on a platform of tearing it all down. And so they are.

Things ARE getting ugly for a lot of people already. Hundreds of thousands globally in 2 weeks.

The only way out is through, and it’s a decade+ recovery.

Oh, hey, guys let’s play a guessing game. Which developing African county has yet to approve Starlink for use while other countries are all about it.

Hmmmm…which one, which one…hmmm…

They care about the optics of halting obvious immediate lifesaving assistance because it makes them look like they’re making “responsible” decisions.

It’s hard not to get into the weeds of this because of how complex these contracts get.

Typically, a country asks the US for help with something like developing their agriculture sector, or e-governance, or dealing with a famine. USAID doesn’t do the work itself to limit government liability. So they put up a notice that says “we want proposals to do this job, in this place, and get these results. Don’t go over $XX”

Bids come in, and because these are programs in developing countries, it’s rare that the country had any organization capable of reliably taking on a $5 million contract with tons of legal and compliance obligations. So a lot of times US-based companies that specialize in this kind of work, staffed by people who don’t mind moving their family to Malawi or wherever of necessary. Many people, both contractors and USAID staff are killed, sometimes abducted and tortured, in the course of trying to deal with humanitarian crises in dangerous places.

Because local tallent IS a cruicial part of the way these programs work, the main contracter will hire local staff, and then because no one company can do everything, they also hire small local contractors to do singular tasks, like JUST community engagement about financial planning. So unless it’s a war zone (often even then), dozens, mayne even hundreds, of local jobs might come from one contract. This is a VERY reductive version of the process in general terms.

Meaning that during this aid “review” and dismantling, it’s likely that 100,000 people or more, mostly in poor counties, are suddenly out of work. It’s unlikely that Rubio will reinstate programs without a GOP Congressperson asking, or obvious “lives will be lost” support ends.

Sure, and if the BRICS countries offer free spaghetti dinners for residents, I’ll sprout wings and fly there. This is notoriously not going to happen.

Lol, do it, bitch. Bet you’ll chicken out of this one too.

They’re freezing 99.9% of domestic and foreign assistance. This is only one specific part of what had been halted.

The idea is to strangle the government and end anything that might keep a single dollar out of the hands of the wealthy.

On top of the idiocy of this, every SINGLE contractor can, and likely will, sue the government for breach of contract and win. Likely for more than the original connect was for. As has been the case for most other stop work orders.

This is a massive and avoidable expense to taxpayers with zero to show for it.

Said like someone who confidently knows nothing about the complex process of vetting the backgrounds of people applying for refugee status.

“Yes, you see, as a country we are barely holding our shit together. We can’t even figure out how money works anymore. Our power grid is…aspirational at best. Our most notable exports are oil, emails, and Nigerians running from this place. But you see, if we join BRICS, it definitely means you all are awesome, and so are we.”

Does he mean the US Customs Office? The C in CBP?

The Customs Office that already collects tarrifs? That publishes a Harmonized Tarrif Schedule alongside the US International Trade Commission to facilitate smooth international trade?

So, like, THAT kind of thing? What a novel idea!

Know what else sounds like a good idea? Knowing how the government you already RAN for 4 years works.

If it’s a baby from Nigeria, it’s from a very small group on the border with Cameroon, one of the rarest gorilla subspecies there is. Returning it would be putting it back into possible poaching. Poachers likely killed its parents to get the baby.

Oh…