on the anti-US-imperialist left (“tankies”), i wonder if part of Trump’s appeal, perhaps only semiconsciously, is that he’d be openly as bad as they were always sure the United States always was. they’d be proven right, and no more of what they perceived as hypocritical sanctimony.
@interfluidity Both the tankies and #Trump are broadly against war, although tankies are far more principled in that stance than #Trump ofc
I mean, we're talking about a president who made an ally of #TulsiGabbard. You don't see many people more anti-imperialist than her in the #USA government.
@realcaseyrollins anti-imperialist, or pro other empires, our dear Tulsi. Trump portrayed himself as antiwar while campaigning, now he won’t rule out the use of force against Greenland/Denmark and Panama, he promises “all hell is going to break loose” in Gaza Saturday if all hostages are released, openly seeks territorial expansion in a way no US President has for more than a century.
> tankies are far more principled in that stance than #Trump ofc
@realcaseyrollins i’ll believe that when i see more of them disavowing their support for Trump as somehow the lesser evil.
@interfluidity Rooting for the "no new wars" president over the guy who instigated a conflict in the middle east while a completely different one was going on is about at principled as you can be if what you oppose war TBF
@realcaseyrollins i can respect that.
but then i’d expect some expressions of disappointment for a “no new wars” candidate who has now hinted at openly imperialistic military actions that were so far off the table you’d have needed a warp drive to find them a few months ago.
@interfluidity I get you to a point. There were always people in the government calling for the #USA to do even more aggressive actions in #Gaza than what #Trump is willing to cosign. #LindseyGraham is a great example of this.
@Phil@freeatlantis.com@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity
Some people would only be happy if he surrendered in advance to everybody.
Some people, of small brain, can't grasp that he took an oath to protect and defend, and that includes American hostages. Some people are too dense to realize that being anti war can only go so far and isn't the same as being a surrender monkey or pacivist.
There are actually people that cant tell the difference between projecting power and war adventurism.
Sadly, these zombies vote.
@Phil @interfluidity I mean yes you are correct but at least antiwar tankies are typically principled, at least when it comes to war (I don't follow tankies that closely in general) so I can respect that ideological consistency.
@realcaseyrollins @Phil i guess i'll respect it when i see it. so far, the folks i know who went for Trump on a supposed ant-imperialist / anti-war line have not been willing to acknowledge any important transgressions. "russiagate" outweighs all of it, they say. it's just his bluster.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Well if he actually starts a war, we'll have an opportunity to see how the react to an actual trangression, as opposed to an imaginary one.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins of course i hope i'll have to concede this one to you. god help us we don't need a war now.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins his oath, by the way, is to protect and defend the Constitution. but i sure hope he does protect and defend American citizens. i'll be impressed if he doesn't take the Biden Administration approach of ignoring deaths of American citizens in Israel/Palestine if they are ethnic Palestinians. 1/
@Phil @realcaseyrollins so far i've seen the opposite of any kind of successful or meaningful projection of power, other than in Israel, where Netanyahu wanted to give his ally a win in exchange for greater help and license going forward. which he has gotten, in Trump's plain endorsement of population transfer / "ethnic cleansing" from Gaza. (which, to be clear, at least has the virtue of a certain honesty that the prior administration lacked on Gaza). /fin
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
You aren't looking in the right places, or are too blinded by TDS to notice.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins I mean, domestically Musk is "projecting power", illegally and doing great harm. Much of that will be reversed, but much that is broken will take a long time to fix. And none of what he's attacking is at the heart of any of our problems. (Of course the heart of all our problems is brain death: the Constitution makes Congress the brains of our system, and Congress no longer functions due to rigging the electoral system for job security.)
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
All Musk has done is uncover how incredibly broken the federal leviathan is. He hasn't done so much as an ounce of harm to anybody but corrupt people who are personally benefiting from ripping off US taxpayers.
It's proving educational to people. Shining a light on the evil, is the first and most important step and CANNOT be undone. And that makes it glorious.
There is nothing illegal about it and nothing dems havent done before. I hope they enjoy sucking on it
@Phil @realcaseyrollins There is everything illegal about it, food aid is rotting, people who would have been going hungry, and you are willfully blind. Might USAID have been reformed? Sure. That's what Congress is for, and you wind things down to minimize harms, if you decide you are going to wind things down.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Show proof, No lifesaving aid was blocked. it was transferred to the State Department.
This is pure propoganda.
It's perfectly legal for the President to uncover and smash corruption in the executive branch. It is his duty and within the power that the constitution vests in him.
2. USAID was NOT established by congress, it was done by executive order by JFK as ONE way to meet requirements of the law on which it was based but isn't required.
@Phil @interfluidity I heard that sex clinics in #SouthAfrica did get shut down actually. Not sure that any stateside lifesaving aid was halted though.
@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity Oh no! what will the world do without US funded Sex clinics?
@Phil @realcaseyrollins PEPFAR, established by GWB, administered by USAID, has saved conservatively 18M lives. maybe you contest the stats. but boy you are awfully glib about this stuff. sex clinics!
i think Trump people have said they mean to continue PEPFAR. there have been interruptions of medication however which risks emergence of resistant strains of HIV, endangering us all.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
I am personally against using ANY us funds for any such purpose.
@Phil @interfluidity Die of #AIDS. But...if it's not in the #USA...
Not our government's job to fix. Let #BillGates do it or something, he cares about the lives of Africans or something.
@interfluidity @Phil I'm lost is #USAID mentioned in the #Constitution or something? Why is defunding or shutting it down illegal? What law does that break?
@realcaseyrollins USAID was, as @Phil says, initially established by executive order under JFK to pursue objectives set out in the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.
but it was formally codified into a Congressionally mandated agency in the Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act of 1997 https://www.congress.gov/bill/105th-congress/house-bill/1757/text
what Congress mandates only Congress can undo.
this was less than 10 minutes of Googling. willful ignorance.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Did you read that law? What it does is transfer USAID and place it under the authority of the Secretary of State.
It does't do anything to codify its structure or existence as is today, into law.
It clearly states that Agency personnell needs are under the descretion of the Secretary of State.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins It enshrines an agency. Yes, under the state dept, Secretary of State:
"Unless abolished pursuant to the reorganization
plan submitted under section 601, and except as provided in section
412, there is within the executive branch of Government the United
States Agency for International Development as an entity described in
section 104 of title 5, United States Code."
Pretty plain language! 1/
@Phil @realcaseyrollins 602 explicitly forsees the reorganization of AID, but sets a deadline of October 1, 1998. 2/
@Phil @realcaseyrollins that "under this division" in 611 is referring back to 601. it's not perpetual authorization for SoS to reorganize the State department. that's the very function of this bill! it was permission that expired in 1998. /fin
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
It in no way codifies a seperate entity called USAID.
Congress loves to pass vague laws and in this case in workes out quite well.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins it precisely codifies an agency it calls AID — Agency for International Development — and creates a period of time during which a potential reorganization might be pursued. that period very long ago expired, with AID still extant.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins are you suggesting calling it "United States Agency for International Development" means it wasn't the codified agency? man, what a bureaucrat you'd be.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
No, I'm suggesting that the law acknowledges it's existence and refers to it, but doesn't codify it's existence or structure.
@Phil @interfluidity hmmm. Yeah I can see the argument for that, that makes sense
@Phil @realcaseyrollins yes. an administration could internally reorganize AID! but AID must exist, and it must pursue the purposes for which Congress mandated it, until Congress unmandates it.
taking something to the "wood chipper" means destroying it. that is illegal. is taping over the name of US AID and removing all signange an internal reorganization?
what DOGE was clearly doing was abolishing. yes, they'll be stopped, because it's illegal. it's rich for you to try to rely on that.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Congress never mandated it. There is absolutely no text anywhere in that law that does so.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins "there is within the executive branch of Government the United
States Agency for International Development as an entity described in
section 104 of title 5, United States Code."
@interfluidity @Phil Okay and there's a bluebird by my window. Doesn't mean there always will be.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
This is not codifying it into law, it is just describing the law under which the agency was set up.
@interfluidity @Phil Is there anything in the law that dictates that #USAID must exist in perpetuity?
@realcaseyrollins @Phil Congressional action doesn't sunset unless the law they pass explicitly imposes such a sunset. absent some explicitly enacted executive option to abolish, only Congress can undo what Congress had said must exist.
@interfluidity @Phil So...I'm guessing no?
@interfluidity @Phil I was about to say, if that entity isn't #USAID, what agency is it
@interfluidity @Phil Now, to be fair, what I'm seeing is that #USAID was defunded, not shut down. Are those the same thing, legally?
@realcaseyrollins @Phil the only entity that can defund AID is Congress. Congress has power of the purse! it's crown jewel Congressional power! the Trump Administration can organize AID as it wants, but it still has to do what Congress established it for, including spending any money for any purposes Congress mandates.
The Executive Branch's job is to follow those mandates well, competently, effectively. It shouldn't spend the money wastefully or fraudulently. That's not what Congress mandated!
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Have you read the laws regarding foreign assistence? The leave heaps of it up the the presidents judgement and provide guidelines/objectives. Congress doesn't give a line by line of what must be given to whom.
They provide a budget and give the executive branch discression.
Finallly the executive branch is actually excercising some.
@Phil @interfluidity Which laws would you like us to look into?
@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity
start with the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961.
After that they may be others, but mostly it's just continued with budget allocations.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins to the degree Congress gives the executive discretion in how its expenditures are administered, that's fine. if Congress does not explicitly allocate funds to AID, the executive can pursue its purposes through other aspects of state, sure.
but AID must continue to exist. and any expenditures specifically allocated to AID must be spent for its intended purposes through AID.
@interfluidity @Phil I agree with you on that point. It's something I've criticized #Trump for before.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
It's just acknowledging it's existence, since it's part of the consolidation plan, which is the point of the bill. Nothing in this law requires it's existence, it even starts UNLESS ABOLISHED,
and then grants the SOS to abolish it in the section I posted. Thus, it was perfectly legal to move it into the state department, and no doubt the Justice Department has already advised Trump on the legality of this.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
Read it and weep
SEC. 611. REORGANIZATION AUTHORITY.
(a) In General.--The Secretary is authorized, subject to the
requirements of this division, to allocate or reallocate any function
transferred to the Department under any title of this division, and to
establish, consolidate, alter, or discontinue such organizational
entities within the Department as may be necessary or appropriate to
carry out any reorganization under this division
@Phil @realcaseyrollins *under this division* sheesh. a reorganization exercise that expired in 1998.
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
And the bulk of the stuff stopped, was in violation of that law.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins willfully blind. even the aid they mean to send they've broken the competence to do so. they are the epitome of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "careless people". https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/10/usaid-trump-elon-musk-cuts
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
hahahahaha. You have to be a special kind of credulous if you think USAID was competent.
@Phil @interfluidity To be fair to the #USAID they did get some things done.
@realcaseyrollins @interfluidity
Sure they did. They guy who broke into my house and took a bunch of stuff, also made it much easier to clean.
@interfluidity @Phil Do we have American citizens in #Gaza or the #WestBank rn? If not, this claim makes no sense.
@realcaseyrollins @Phil yes, we do have US citizens in the West Bank, we did in Gaza hopefully by now they've been evacuated but i don't know. we've had several US citizens killed by Israeli soldiers in the West Bank https://www.npr.org/2024/10/10/nx-s1-5106059/west-bank-gaza-israel-justice-department
@interfluidity @realcaseyrollins
And of course, you understand that protecting and defending the constitution means more than just slapping pelosi if she decides to try and shred it, to make some childish point.
@Phil @realcaseyrollins i'm all for defending US citizens abroad. i'm also for defending the separation of powers!