Editor, Times-Union:
The mask of the Democrat Party has just been ripped off. Three weeks ago, the Dems along with the Republicans were welcoming the efforts of DOGE (The Department of Government Efficency) headed up by billionaire Elon Musk. DOGE is a two-year initiative by President Trump to examine government spending and find waste and fraud. Who doesn’t want to stop waste in our government, after all it’s tax money they are spending. Well a couple of days ago Musk and his five man team stumbled across the books of the USAID (United States agency for International Development) and found an avalanche of spending which had nothing to do with helping the development of third world countries.
The budget for USAID is $50 billion and was immediately frozen by Secretary of State Rubio for review. It would seem that this agency, which was formed by the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, has morphed into a giant slush fund. Funding ridiculus things like transgender surgeries in Guatemala to condoms for the Taliban. A maze of money trails indoctrinating Africans in DEI, a virtual potpourri of useless endeavors and in many cases unwanted by the countries receiving it. I think that the apoplectic response by the Democrat Party against Elon Musk and his DOGE operation over the past few days speaks volumes about the Democrat Party. Why would these politicians who openly supported an attempt to get government spending under control new be so fervently against it ... somebody just lost their piggy bank!
This discovery was expected but unfortunately the tip of the iceberg. I fear what will be found in the Pentagon spending or even worse the largest line item on our budget, HHS (Health and Human Services). Prepare yourself for what is about to come. It is my belief our federal government has been hollowed out by the rot of corruption. A constantly growing leviathan ever expanding for the sole purpose to conceal what is about to be uncovered. We were warned about this by President Eisenhower and again by President Reagan about the growing friendship between government and the “Military Industrial Complex” and now “Big Tech,” a government that has become an entity onto itself.
I support having two political parties, in fact it is a necessity for our Republic, but someone needs to emerge from the Democrats to wrest this floundering party from the Socialist grip it is in. Someone needs to save them from themselves because their maniacal rants and projects just isn’t a good look ... nobody likes a hypocrite.
Gerald Roach
Warsaw