I read yesterday on devex.com that Trump, in his zeal to cut programs formerly managed by USAID, the CIA’s $50 billion slush fund, had accidentally cut some “life-giving humanitarian aid” programs in the Third World. But that they had been restored.

Whew! That was a close call.

Then I started to think about the relationship between the First World and the Third World in the post-WW 2 period. All of which I have lived through.

First World humanitarian “help”

Let’s take a broad look at what First World “humanitarian” programs have done for the Third World.

Let’s see…color revolutions, political assassinations, and CIA- sponsored NGOs destabilizing societies in Third World countries when their governments take a false step. Leaders and governments in Third World countries overthrown: Mossadegh in Iran, Lumumba in the Congo, Arbenz in Guatemala, Allende in Chile. And who can forget the lovely war in Vietnam? The two civil conflicts in Ukraine – the Orange Revolution in ’04 and the EuroMaidan color revolution in ’14, in which Yanukovich, the popularly elected candidate, was “replaced” by one more sympathetic to NATO and the EU – because the CIA and the State Department don’t like pro-Russian leaders. And then there are the 20-year wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, whose leaders were simply unacceptable. That’s just a partial list.

Let us not forget about the IMF and World Bank loans that have kept many of these countries financial slaves to the First World. And, of course, our wonderful and helpful “foreign aid” that goes not to the people, but to dictators and elite rulers, many of whom graduated from a Western university. (For USAID’s role in all this, see John Perkins’ book Confessions of an Economic Hitman. Laughably, Perkins’ first-hand account of his actions was dismissed as a conspiracy theory!).

Then there are the First World created “rebel groups” who magically spring up when deposits of oil – or some other valuable resource necessary to First World industries – are discovered. And last but not least, the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, who love to test new vaccines on African children.

Since Third World countries achieved independence over half a century ago, their peoples have never really had the freedom to choose their own governments, or to organize their societies, without First World interference.

Look at what happened in the former Yugoslavia between 1991 and 2001. That country was a perfect example of the power of this disruptive system, as Yugoslavia broke apart into six independent countries exactly matching the six former Soviet republics that had previously constituted Yugoslavia. These conflicts were described by First World media as “inter-ethnic.” Bombs were dropped on civilians, villages were destroyed, and it was all blamed on dictators like Slobodan Milosevich. Magically, the activities of the CIA, the Pentagon, and other First World intelligence services were barely mentioned.

The only Third World country that has managed to get out of this trap is China, and that’s only because this 5,000-year-old society and their elites play the Long Game. China’s leaders turned the tables on their Western counterparts. China took the West’s money, built up their industries, became the world’s factory floor, and stole enough intellectual property to become independent. At least for the present. China is the one that got away.

Now, when the U.S. part of this corrupt system – which has spread its tentacles across the entire planet – is in the process of being dismantled, Western elites and media cry bitterly that Third World countries are being irrevocably harmed. As my father used to say, “with friends like that you don’t need any enemies.”

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is another example. The DRC is a pathetic communist country run by the usual thugs and dictators propped up by First World money. The DRC’s main claim to fame is its huge deposits of cobalt, which are essential for making the world’s lithium-ion EV batteries. A significant portion of this cobalt is hand-mined, by child slave labor. This has been known for decades. And of course the large foreign-owned mining operations have free reign to strip the DRC’s land for this valuable resource.

Nothing is done because the First World doesn’t give a shit. No, it’s much better to fight a pointless 20-year war in Afghanistan to bring “democracy” to a tribal society that has gotten along just fine on its own for centuries. Or to start a conflict in Libya to depose Muammar Ghadaffi (using a First World sponsored “rebel group,” the National Liberation Army). Ghadaffi was a Libyan nationalist who threatened to not pay for his oil with U.S. dollars. Heresy! This bothered State and the CIA and the powers that be, despite Ghadaffi’s popularity within his own country.

Seven wars in five years

Such wars harken back to the Pentagon’s program to overthrow “7 countries in 5 years.”

General Wesley Clark describes what happened on Sept. 20, 2001, shortly after 9/11.

“About ten days after 9/11, I went through the Pentagon and I saw Secretary Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz. I went downstairs just to say hello to some of the people on the Joint Staff who used to work for me, and one of the generals called me in. He said, “Sir, you’ve got to come in and talk to me a second.” I said, “Well, you’re too busy.” He said, “No, no.” He says, “We’ve made the decision we’re going to war with Iraq.” This was on or about the 20th of September. I said, “We’re going to war with Iraq? Why?” He said, “I don’t know.” He said, “I guess they don’t know what else to do.” So I said, “Well, did they find some information connecting Saddam to al-Qaeda?” He said, “No, no.” He says, “There’s nothing new that way. They just made the decision to go to war with Iraq.” He said, “I guess it’s like we don’t know what to do about terrorists, but we’ve got a good military and we can take down governments.” And he said, “I guess if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem has to look like a nail.”

The seven countries, by the way, are Iraq, Syria (which has recently experienced the toppling of its leader Bashar al-Assad), Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Iran. By this time in 2001 the US was already bombing in Afghanistan.

And lately, Iran has been in the news as another possible war zone.

That’s how the system works.

Balance must be restored

We all know about the various wars that have been fought across the planet. These wars are almost exclusively created by First World elites looking to make more money for themselves. Establishing democracy? That’s just so much bullshit.

Everyone knows this. I’m not saying anything new here; I’m just venting at those who keep defending this system, even in 2025, when everyone should know better.

Should we be concerned about the dismantling of USAID, or other government bureaucracies? Well, this rotten, murderous system has been in place far too long. If a little excessive cost- and personnel-cutting occurs (at places like USAID, the State Department, and the CIA) it’s a price worth paying. And at other bureaucracies that support the system.

The First World has been living off the labor and exploiting the resources of the Third World for far too long.

That’s why the Global South movement is gaining so much steam.

Balance must be restored if humanity wants peace on earth.

The markets operate on fear and greed. In my post, “The Beginning of the End,” my conspiracy theory about an engineered collapse of the stock market was just that: a conspiracy theory. The market crashed after fears about Trump’s impositions of tariffs last Thursday. Today (Wednesday), Trump suspended the tariffs (except for China) and the markets are way up (the Dow up over 2,900 points).

Now, 70 countries are in negotiations with the US about trade.

Trump’s plan all along, I believe, is to lower tariffs around the world, primarily to reduce the absurd $1.22 Trillion U.S. trade deficit with the rest of the world. It’s clear to me that Trump is also trying to crush the Chinese economy with the goal of collapsing the Chinese Communist Party. The tariffs on CCP goods is now 125% (as of Thursday April 9). The “de minimus” exception for CCP goods into the US has also been canceled. All Chinese goods $800 or less used to enter the US duty-free, allowing the CCP to market directly to the U.S. consumer. Thus the rise of CCP exporters such as Temu and Shein. Bye bye!

One thing is certain: the US cannot continue to run $2Trillion annual budget deficits. The $1.22T trade deficit is a big part of the problem.

Who knows, if Trump resumes the tariffs the markets will probably go down again. But if that happens, it won’t be an engineered collapse: it will be just more fear and greed as usual.

In his “Liberation Day” speech on April 3rd, Trump began in earnest to restore the American economy and American industry

The shot heard round the world

In the war of freedom vs Collectivism, Trump fired a “Fort Sumter” shot at those who have been looting the American economy for over two decades. (Longer than that actually, but let’s say since 9/11.) The attack on Fort Sumter by the Confederacy in 1861 marked the beginning of the Civil War (1861–1865).

I have trouble listening to Trump’s speeches – he rambles on, utters incoherent sentence fragments, takes complete credit for situations that many people are involved in, and ignores the negative effects of his policies. But in this speech, he outlines tariff policies that are absolutely necessary to restore an economy that has been eviscerated from the inside out.

The US trade deficit last fiscal year was $1.22 TRILLION dollars. How is that possible? After WW II, when the US produced 60% of all goods in the world economy, we could afford to ignore tariffs placed by other countries on our exports. But the US is now, by far, the largest debtor nation in the world, with a government deficit of $37 trillion, and with 2- to 3-trillion annual budget deficits into the foreseeable future.

This insanity has to stop.

I read the transcript of Trump’s speech and agreed with all of it. The goal of the new tariff policy is to restore balance in worldwide trade. For too many years the US has been subsidizing the economies of other nations, to the detriment of American workers and a hollowed-out manufacturing sector.

Trump was diplomatic in this speech, saying correctly that U.S. Presidents of both parties allowed our massive deficits to happen. George Bush and Barack Obama presided over the exfiltration of thousands of factories, with good paying jobs, to China, Mexico, and S.E. Asia. This was done gleefully by the globalist millionaires who saw the opportunity to use cheap Third World labor and fatten their balance sheets.

This can no longer continue if the US wants to have a real economy, not one based on accounting tricks and government spending.

The fake economy

Even though the US supposedly has the world’s third largest manufacturing base, much of our economic “productivity” is based now on printing fake money by the trillions. If Elon is to be believed (I see no reason why he would lie about it, and no one has contradicted his statement) that is why Trump fired the Treasury paymaster, who wrote checks for over $4 Trillion with no Treasury account tags attached.  This means that no one can trace who the money was sent to because no one knows which account it went to. This is a joke. Everyone in the world has some accounting system, no matter how primitive, that outlines where their money is going.

The U.S. government is a gigantic, open air Grift that is being systematically looted, almost exclusively by people in the US. The massive trade deficit is a big part of the problem.

When the United States achieved its independence, it immediately imposed tariffs against the great economic powers of the world, chiefly England, in order to develop our domestic industries. This was the economic policy of the US up until the early 20th century, when tariffs were lowered and the Income Tax was established. China, after it was admitted into the WTO in 2001, did the same thing.

The goals of Trump’s tariff policy

The goal of Trump’s tariff policy – called a “trade war” by the mindless idiots in mainstream media – are 5-fold:

1. Bring manufacturing back to the United States to create well paying jobs. The US still has the largest pool of skilled workers in the world, so this is feasible.

2. Encourage direct foreign investment in the United States. This is already occurring. Taiwan’s TSMC, the world’s premiere high-end chip manufacturer, is building a $200 billion plant in the US to avoid tariffs. According to Apple, it will spend $500 billion in the US over the next 4 years, in manufacturing facilities in Michigan, Texas, California, Arizona, Nevada, Iowa, Oregon, North Carolina, and Washington. Nvidia is also investing hundreds of billions of dollars over the next four years in U.S.-based manufacturing operations.

3. Lower long-term interest rates to reduce the cost of debt repayment. This is vital because in FY 2025 the interest on the national debt – money we have already borrowed and must pay back – is $1.13 Trillion! That is over $200 billion more than the entire Pentagon budget. The higher interest rates go, the more money it takes to repay the debt.

4. Shift the U.S. economy from fake financial engineering, accounting tricks, and money printing to the manufacturing of tangible goods.

5. Lower the value of the dollar to support exports. A lower dollar means U.S. exports are cheaper for other countries to purchase.

Number 5 is the heart of the trade deficit problem: other countries don’t want to purchase U.S. goods, but they want us to buy their exports. In 2024, the US had a $157 billion trade deficit with Mexico, a $100 billion trade deficit with Canada, a $113 billion trade deficit with Vietnam, and a  $274 billion trade deficit with China.

A trade deficit of $113 billion with little Vietnam? How does that happen?

The trade deficit with China is much larger than $274 billion because the CCP sets up their manufacturing plants in little countries like Cambodia and Vietnam, where they can exploit even cheaper slave labor than they have in their own country.

Many countries cheat the system in order to lower the price of their exports to the US – the world’s largest national consumer market. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), for example, practices predatory capitalism that distorts trade: The CCP, as is well-known, steals U.S. intellectual property; the CCP massively subsidizes its state industries, taking losses for years if necessary until their foreign competitors go out of business; it engages in currency manipulation, wage suppression, and labor rights violations. These predatory policies have led to the closure of many U.S. manufacturers and the loss of millions of U.S. jobs.

OK, that’s why Trump instituted higher tariffs. But the US will only impose HALF the tariffs on other countries that they do to us. Far from being a “trade war,” it is a very fair realignment of a totally imbalanced trade system that exploits the American economy, and American workers and taxpayers. The US is violating no World Trade Organization rules.

Trump understands that our own leaders have allowed this to happen. He states that if the US were in a similar position we would do the same thing. He doesn’t blame anyone for taking advantage of the U.S.’ crazy trade policies. He understands that U.S. companies make much of their money via arbitrage, not producing and selling goods themselves. This comes from the short-term mindset of “maximizing shareholder revenue” quarter to quarter. A U.S. company will contract production out to foreign firms (send its manufacturing overseas to take advantage of cheap labor), then import the product back into the US. This displaces American workers and kills off American companies, all for short-term profit.   

I support this trade policy even though my life savings are invested in the stock market. If stocks continue to crash I lose 90% of my savings. I am putting my money where my mouth is. And if more inflation occurs I am the loser as well, because I’m a senior living on a fixed income.

The End Game (warning: conspiracy theory!)

So what happened after Trump made his speech? The stock market crashed on April 3rd, down 1,697 points. On Friday the 3rd it crashed even more, down over 2,200 points.

This may be a calculated operation by the globalists to take down the stock market and crash the U.S. economy. These psychopaths finally see a way to take down Trump once and for all, and they will do it even if the United States crashes too. This conspiracy theory is not really so crazy. They tried to kill the guy twice, before the 2024 election. Trump knows where all the bodies are buried.

If there is a globalist plan to depose Trump (there always is), here’s what it might look like:

1. Crash the stock market by selling everything. Keep doing this until the clamor for impeachment reaches a frenzy.

2. Impeach Trump. With markets collapsing, there will be enough Republican votes to reach the 67 required to get him out of office. The Democrats have 47 votes and they will all vote en masse for impeachment. All that is needed is 20 Republican votes, and there will be little problem finding them. The UniParty is mostly Democrat, but there are plenty of weak-ass Senators in the controlled-opposition, fake Republican Party who smell blood in the water.

3. After Trump is impeached, the globalist’s operative in the White House, J.D. Vance, takes over as President. He works to appoint a globalist Republican like Senate Majority leader Thune, as VP.

4. All of Trump’s EOs are canceled, a new globalist Cabinet is appointed (quickly approved by the new UniParty coalition in the Senate), and The Grift continues until the U.S. financially implodes under a massive, unpayable debt burden. Or a second civil war begins. Either of these scenarios is acceptable to the globalists.

Even if this plan is implemented, I’m optimistic it won’t work, for two reasons.

1. Trump’s plan to restore the U.S. economy is already working. Yes, the stock market is crashing but this plan, I believe, is more supportive of the bond market, which is much bigger than the stock market and the source of all U.S. government borrowing. Despite all their bluster, eventually most countries in the world run by adults will agree to a more fair and balanced international trading system. It’s already begun as Vietnam and India are considering the lowering of their tariffs vis-a-vis the US. Trump will renegotiate with Canada and Mexico separately to restore trade balance in North America.

The goal of Trump’s tariff plan is to LOWER tariffs all over the world.

2. Even if the U.S. economy collapses, the solution will be a worldwide debt amnesty. It will be the only solution to avoid world chaos. Wipe the slate clean, erase the quadrillions of worthless investment bank derivative securities, wipe the debt clean from all Third World nations to the globalist IMF and World Bank, and pay off those who invested in U.S. securities.

A complete global financial reset.

Everybody starts over with a clean debt slate.

My guess is that plans have already been made for this.

The handwriting is already on the wall: the U.S. financial sector must collapse under the insane money printing policies of the current idiots in both parties in Congress, who can only agree to raise debt ceilings and deficits and to spend even more. Trump and Musk are trying to halt this process with DOGE and the exposure of the massive grifting and corruption within the federal government, but that might fail because only Congress has the Constitutional authority to spend. Neither the Executive branch nor the Judicial branch can do a thing about the self-centered, irresponsible children in Congress.

We’ll see what happens with the stock market in the coming weeks. If the crash continues, scenario 2 might occur, but in my mind scenario 1 is far more likely. Even though the U.S. Congress is the dumbest institution on the planet, there are too many smart and sane adult humans out there who won’t allow civilization on planet earth to collapse.

Postscript – The Grift continues

In case you thought grifting was reserved only to the federal government, check this story out. Apparently grifting off the government is also alive and well at the state level:

Minnesota food bank CEO steps down as legislators question her $721,000 salary.

Oh boy.  

“Allison O’Toole, CEO of Second Harvest Heartland, earned $721,000 in total compensation in 2022—even as the nonprofit has lobbied for taxpayer funding and warned of rising hunger across Minnesota, where 26% of households with children are food insecure, according to its own research. Now, as O’Toole steps down after six years at the helm, lawmakers are raising questions.”

This is Clown World. This woman was receiving an outrageous salary for six years before somebody in the legislature noticed? Maybe Congress is the dumbest outfit in the country, but the Minnesota legislature is a close second.

“Records show Second Harvest brought in roughly $260 million in total revenue in 2022—with over $6 million coming from government grants, according to a report in the American Experiment. And it’s not just O’Toole earning well into the six figures at the food shelf.

“Several executives at Second Harvest earn over $300,000 annually, with at least seven staffers making between $140,000 to $280,000 per year, according to the 2022 tax records. Despite the high salaries, Second Harvest Heartland has maintained a strong presence at the Capitol this session, requesting public funding to address what it calls record-breaking demand for food assistance. [This is the essence of The Grift. While ripping off massive subsidies from the government, NGOs and their entitled, self-indulgent “executives” lobby without concern for more money from the taxpayer.]

“Altendorf also pointed to what she sees as a deeper issue. She says the nonprofit hired a “voter engagement coordinator” in 2024 to conduct get-out-the-vote efforts—something she calls “a huge conflict of interest” for an organization receiving taxpayer dollars. “The public is waking up to the money funneling system happening within the Minnesota state government,” Altendorf said. “And I’m hearing loud and clear—taxpayers have had enough.”

So  – not only do these NGOs rip off the taxpayer, but they use that money for political activism instead of their stated mission (to eliminate hunger). But what do people like the former CEO of the food bank care about the sweaty deplorables who supply their funding? Those uneducated working class primitives and middle class desk jockeys deserve what they get!

For all the adults in the room

This is the best speech I ever heard. 50 mins of telling truth with the bark off at the European Parliament.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4c-YRPXDoM