If you have been watching what Elon is doing with the USAID, it is not getting rid of it, it is placing it and what it does more directly under the executive branch’s control and purview. As some would say, ‘taking off the mask’. This is of course, because he is too stupid to understand how politically useful having NGO slight-of-hand is for the U.S.

It does make sense if you believe the era of U.S. soft-power domination is completely over (or is in-efficient/woke/ineffective, take your pick of the buzzwords). What we are seeing is a complete buy-in on traditional fascist ‘efficiency’ propaganda, without the savvy that the neo-liberal post-fascists displayed in earlier times. As far as I can tell the belief is that the facade costs money and has no benefits so it must be discarded. No good will come of it, but it was no good to begin with.

It’s just fascists shooting themselves in the foot because they don’t actually understand where modern fascism gets it’s power and stability from, the obfuscation of power. They seem to have this deep need to not just be recognized as powerful by the silent elite, but to be seen as powerful by people on social media platforms (who they likely see as ‘the masses’). The follow-up question is if they will try to run with the old fascist ‘clash of civilizations’ narrative after shooting themselves in the foot, or if they will just content themselves with just fucking things up for workers and bullying their reluctant allies. It is unclear at this point.