Where generosity ends and incontinence begins
[Thanks to Susan for the nooze tip.]
President Donald Trump wants to freeze foreign aid until he can weed out wasteful, dangerous, and silly mis-uses of the money. He raised quite a few eyebrows the other day when he said that $50 million of it went to buy condoms for Gaza (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/02/01/donald-trump-condoms-gaza/78090736007/).
A spokesman for for Global Health Policy at Georgetown University says the president’s all wet, they haven’t been buying condoms for Gaza. Believe whom you will.
Meanwhile, from 2016 to 2022, some $118 million was spent to supply Third World countries with condoms.
Not to be against humanitarian aid… but not even the United States has infinite resources to dole out to whomever is in need. Crazy spending eventually reaches an end point, even if you are the richest country in the world.
How closely do we watch to see that our aid money is being spent wisely? How many presidential palaces have we inadvertently helped build while the common people starve?
There’s nothing selfish about wanting to clean up the mess.