Can Someone Please Call CPS on the Biden Administration?
It's basically citizen-abuse at this point. Where's my militia at?
Many years ago, there was a family in our neighborhood whose kids went to school with mine. Even though both parents worked (she was some sort of doctor even), the Jordans could never seem to make ends meet. They had eight kids and on a good day, half of them would be sent to school with a lunch. The others were expected to beg or borrow for scraps or else go hungry. None of the kids ever went to a doctor or dentist—those would have been luxuries up there with new iPhones and weekly pedicures for these children—and the family’s utilities were frequently shut off when the unpaid bills piled up high enough. The Jordan kids shared a single trunk of thrift-store clothes; the oldest—with nobody to hand-them-down anything—often went barefoot to school. At one point, things got so bad they had no choice but to eat their beloved family dog.
The weirdest bit to me was that the parents, Josef and Jillian, had generously adopted and were financially supporting more than a dozen Nigerian families. They sent them thousands of dollars every month, to the point that the Nigerians enjoyed better healthcare than the Jordan children, along with new clothes, abundant food, and actual pets they didn’t even have to eat. (Josef and Jillian also liked to drape themselves in pricey designer labels, traveled first class wherever they went, and never missed a meal. But they talked a lot about sacrifice and the greater good, so they were obviously paragons of virtue and above reproach.) When the Jordan children would complain—they were good kids but only human, after all—Josef and Jillian would become furious and indignant.
Joseph and Jillian: How can you be so selfish? We lift ourselves up by lifting up others!
Jordan kids: Yeah, but we’re hungry.
Josef and Jillian: Adversity builds character and resilience!
Jordan kids: Don’t Nigerians need character and resilience?
Josef and Jillian: Go to your rooms!
Jordan kids: We don’t have rooms. You rented those out to make money to send to Nigeria and buy yourselves matching Gucci slippers.
Josef and Jillian: You know what? NONE of you is getting lunch tomorrow! It’s going to be an afternoon of severe hunger and grief for the whole sorry lot of you.
Eventually those bratty kids would shut up and drop it, because there was no arguing with Josef and Jillian. The best they could hope for was to grow up, get decent paying jobs, and if they were lucky, figure out a way to move to Canada Australia Denmark.
You may be relieved to know the Jordans only exist in my twisted mind (and no dogs were injured or eaten in the writing of this post). But if they did exist and you weren’t reading about them in a blind rage while simultaneously googling startpaging how to build a time machine so that you could go back and call child protective services on those negligent, narcissistic, nefarious parents, I’m going to guess all your social media profile photos have bright blue-and-yellow rings around them.
Call me old-fashioned or jingoistic or just plain selfish, but I believe Josef and Jillian’s first responsibility is to their own kids. As caregivers and custodians, they ought to be willing to kill or die to make sure their charges are clothed, fed, safe, and emotionally and medically protected. Putting them on a priority list below complete strangers in another country, as altruistic as that may sound in ideological theory, doesn’t just border on dependent abuse; it describes it.
Which bring us—at least in my mind—to this week’s passing of a $95.3 billion US aid package—the latest in an unending string—for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan, a set of bills our dedicated, elected congress-traitors celebrated by waving Ukrainian flags in the House chamber. I wonder if they know that treason is a serious crime with severe penalties including imprisonment and death. Somebody should tell them. Ignorance of the law is the “the dog ate my homework” of legal defenses.
On second thought, nobody say a word. Let’s get Jeff Childers on this.
These funds aren’t doled out in the form of loans; they’re gifts. “Nah, keep it. We’re solid over here. You can get lunch next time or something.” At the risk of sounding simplistic, how is this even a thing? If you do even some quick, rudimentary math, there are 332 million people in the US (legally). Considering that roughly ten percent of them live at or below the poverty level—and millions more struggle daily to make ends meet thanks to the planned demolition of our economy Build Back Better—that money could have put $2,878 into the pocket of every single one of the neediest in our own country. And that’s from this latest grant alone. When did funneling our taxpayer dollars to any and every outsider holding out a donation plate become not only acceptable but praise-worthy?
Like you, I’ve seen lots of theories as to why we’re constantly throwing cash at Ukraine and anybody else who asks or even looks at us sadly (while we’re a mere $34,583,094,955,544 in debt *not a typo* as of this writing). It’s our humanitarian duty; our diplomatic obligation. Every last member of Congress has been put or caught in at least one compromising position and is being blackmailed to speak, act, and vote a certain way. It’s an elaborate money laundering scheme disguised as foreign aid. It’s to protect the biolabs [and other dirty dealings] we have in these places. It’s just part and parcel of the war machine; because the US wins—bigly, hugely, exponentially—every time we engage in military conflict. Think of all the defense and security contractors, lobbyists, financial institutions, arms traders, real estate investors, energy companies, pharmaceutical and medical conglomerates, and politicians who benefit directly or indirectly whenever the US sticks its self-serving nose in someone else’s skirmish. Collateral damage, shlamatteral damage. Cha-ching!
I don’t care what “reason” you’ve got to support or justify this financial fuckwizardry; it’s the fiscal equivalent of feeding every last feral feline in the neighborhood while your own furballs are starving to death inside your home. Believe me, I love all the cats. I want to adopt a hundred of them and feed the rest all until their bellies are round and happy. If I won the lottery, I’d build a 4,000 square foot catio before I bought myself a new pair of socks. If there’s not enough kibble to go around, yes, some will suffer. But my duty—my obligation—is to the cats in my care first. Of course we should all give what we can when we can (and it doesn’t have to be to cats necessarily, although clearly they’re the best and most deserving creatures on the planet and seriously what’s wrong with you if you don’t realize that they were literally dressed in jewels and worshipped in Ancient Egypt and please don’t argue with me this is my substack write your own if you prefer dogs or bearded dragons or some other, lesser creature). But the home turf comes first. Always.
As is typical for my posts, there is—or should be—exactly nothing controversial about this one. It’s basic common sense; the diplomatic equivalent of should the cabin experience a sudden loss of pressure, secure your own mask before assisting others. But that’s simply not the democratic way. Which is categorically ironic, seeing as the literal definition of democracy is a government by (not to mention of and for) the people.
I’m positive that if you think I’m wrong, you’ll let me know in the comments. ;)
The fact that this is not being shouted from the rooftops and out of every window (like that "I'm mad as hell" thing) is pretty staggering. Is it so hard to notice that we are being fleeced by thugs masquerading as elected officials? Is it not obvious?
You can't pour from an empty cup. Unless you're The US government.