MALARIA TRUMP....PROMOTING HER BULLYING CAMPAIGN....
SHOULD BEGIN BY STOPPING TRUMP'S ATTACKS!
TRUMP: ALWAYS ON FOX NEWS = FAKE NEWS LIARS
TRUMP SPEWING LIES ABOUT EUROPEAN SUPPORT FOR UKRAINE!
TRUMP SPEWING LIES ABOUT PRESIDENT BIDEN...REMOVED RUSSIAN
SANCTIONS....RETURNED $$$ TO RUSSIA? AND THE YACHTS?
MUSK BLABS ABOUT SOCIAL SECURITY BEING A PONZI SCHEME
BECAUSE HE'S BRAIN DEAD!
LARRY KUDLOW: INCOMPETENT BOOB!
MAGA GOP BLAMING SOROS & DEMOCRATS FOR TOWN HALL PROTESTS....
WOW! OMNIPOTENT DEMOCRATS!
INFLICT HARDSHIP ON PEOPLE....
TRUMP'S BUSINESS FAILURES & BANKRUPTCIES....
HOWARD LUTNICK....YA GOTTA WATCH!
PETER DOOCEY.....
RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA....LOTS OF DELUSIONS!
There have been numerous comments about CHICKENS in your backyard....just another BRAIN DEAD APPOINTMENT! Not everyone has a backyard...not everyone lives in a community that permits CHICKENS...one woman wrote that she lived on the 20th floor....
Let's remember that REAGAN eliminated ASYLUMS so they all flocked to the REPUBLICAN PARTY!
Meidas Pod on Trump TANKING Economy as Backlash Grows (Ad-Free)
Watch the latest episode of the MeidasTouch Podcast ad-free right here on the Meidas+ Substack!
Brett Meiselas, Ben Meiselas, Jordy Meiselas, and MeidasTouch Network
Mar 4
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In this episode of the MeidasTouch Podcast, Trump tanks the stock market during a speech, adding to growing warning signs for the U.S. economy. Meanwhile, more voters in red districts are turning against their representatives, signaling a deepening revolt. As Trump and his VP, JD Vance, attack Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and pull U.S. aid, the world rallies around Ukraine in response. Ben, Brett, and Jordy break it all down, covering these major developments and more.
If you know anything about me, you know I’m not afraid to speak my mind and hold those in power accountable.
That’s my job as a member of Congress representing the great people of Texas.
But along the way, it’s earned me a target on my back from the likes of Elon Musk and Donald Trump.
That’s why a Republican who’s challenging me for reelection here in my home district is now desperately trying to get the attention of Donald Trump and Elon Musk by parroting their far-right talking points and spewing extreme MAGA nonsense.
And if he succeeds, I have no doubt that Trump and Musk will pump his campaign full of cash to help kick me out of Congress.
With Trump and Elon running a wrecking ball through our economy and the federal government, I know they’d love nothing more than to silence their least favorite member of Congress.
That’s why my opponent is trying so hard to get their support and bending over backwards to please the MAGA base.
But as long as I serve the people, I refuse to keep my mouth shut. And as long as I have your support, I’ll continue to fight back and speak out.
As the Freshman Leadership Representative of the 118th Congress, Jasmine Crockett is holding the GOP accountable, amplifying the people's voice, and fighting like hell to make sure Democrats take back the House majority.
Yesterday, I joined Jim Acosta on Substack Live to discuss The Folly of Realism and how Trump is emboldening Putin while undermining America’s security and global standing. In our conversation, we explored why Trump is aligning U.S. foreign policy with the Kremlin’s interests and how this moment was entirely predictable—because America keeps making the same mistakes when it comes to Russia.
I am including two short clips from our discussion in this post, but the full recording of our conversation is available exclusively for paid subscribers here.
To celebrate today being one week since the release of The Folly of Realism, I am running a one-day-only 25% discount on all annual subscriptions to my Substack. Paid subscribers get access to exclusive content, deep-dive policy analysis, and behind-the-scenes insights you won’t find anywhere else.
TELL CONGRESS: Israel just blocked all humanitarian aid to Gaza as the ceasefire begins to fall apart. And Trump just announced yet ANOTHER weapons sale to the Netanyahu regime. Sign the petition: Join Sen. Bernie Sanders and oppose Trump’s weapons sales to Israel!
Israel has blocked all humanitarian aid to Gazaas the ceasefire falls apart AND violence against Palestinians in the West Bank intensifies.1
U.S. funding continues to support Israel’s violence in Gaza and the West Bank and punishment of civilians in need of food, water, and medical aid. Now, Trump is attempting to bypass Congress to send over $11 billion in weapons to Israel.2,3
Senator Bernie Sanders and members of the House led by Rep. Pramila Jayapal have introduced legislation to stop Trump’s U.S. weapons sales to Israel.4We need our lawmakers to finally take a stand and stop the flow of American weapons fueling Israel’s atrocities against Palestinians.
“With Trump and Netanyahu openly talking about forcibly displacing millions of Palestinians from Gaza – in other words, ethnic cleansing – it would be unconscionable to provide more of the bombs and weapons Israel has used to kill so many civilians and make life unlivable in Gaza,” Sen. Sanders said.5
The World Health Organization and United Nations have expressed grave concerns about rising violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.6
Trump’s plan to send billions more in weapons to Netanyahu, and his recent statements supporting ethnic cleansing, are green lights for Israel to intensify its atrocities against Palestinians. American support for these horrors must end.
BBC, “Israel blocks entry of all humanitarian aid into Gaza,” March 2, 2025.
New York Times, “Trump Administration Moves to Send $8 Billion in Arms to Israel, Bypassing Some Lawmakers,” February 8, 2025.
CBS News, “Trump administration approves nearly $3 billion arms sale to Israel,” March 1, 2025.
Amnesty International, “Congress Urged to Pass Joint Resolutions of Disapproval and End Arms Transfers to Government of Israel,” March 4, 2025.
Office of Senator Bernie Sanders, “NEWS: Sanders Files Joint Resolutions of Disapproval to Block Trump Arms Sales to Israel,” February 24, 2025.
Reuters, “WHO worries about West Bank violence, impact on healthcare,” February 25, 2025.
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Last week, standing in front of President Donald Trump’s first Cabinet meeting, Elon Musk, the unelected billionaire running a blitzkrieg against the US government, acknowledged that he had made a mistake—that in going after the US Agency for International Development, the foreign assistance program that he has all but destroyed, he accidentally ended the Ebola prevention project it ran overseas. Musk claimed the error was quickly fixed and there was no interruption in service. But former and current USAID staff quickly told the Washington Post that Musk was wrong—the Ebola response remained sharply curtailed. And, as the Bulwarkreported, Nicholas Enrich, the acting assistant administrator for global health at USAID, who was placed on administrative leave Sunday, had drafted an unfinished memo that predicted the demolition of USAID would lead to more than 28,000 cases of Ebola and related diseases, as well as a 28 to 32 percent increase in tuberculosis globally, up to 18 million cases of malaria (with up to 166,000 deaths annually), and an additional 200,000 cases of paralytic polio a year.
Musk’s assertion that his slash-and-burn assault on USAID had no negative impact on combating Ebola was disinformation. He was hiding the truth on a critical global health issue. I spoke about Musk’s claim with Jeremy Konyndyk, president of Refugees International. He ran the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance at USAID during the Obama years and returned to the agency to work on Covid during the Biden administration. I asked him to describe how dangerous the cuts are. Have Trump and Musk seriously undermined the nation’s ability to prevent a major pandemic from hitting the United States?
Watch the interview and read the lightly edited and condensed Q&A below.
What does USAID do to prevent the spread of Ebola and other highly infectious and dangerous diseases overseas?
So you’ve got two big chunks to that. One is preparedness. You want to have the systems in place at a country level that can respond when an outbreak emerges and also reduce the likelihood that it emerges. That includes things like laboratory capacity for diagnostics and surveillance, so you can detect things rapidly when they emerge. And then you have to implement treatment, isolation, and infection prevention, so that when people begin showing up sick, they don’t infect health workers or other people.
USAID makes those kinds of investments, along with the Centers for Disease Control [and Prevention], in a lot of countries overseas that are prone to novel outbreaks. When something is detected—like the Ebola outbreak now underway in Uganda—USAID would normally swing into action with an active response team, deploying technical experts to support the Ugandan government, ramping up supplies, and providing personal protective equipment.
Another important element is traveler screening. You might remember the big hullabaloo in 2014 about travelers reaching the United States with Ebola. There’s a lot of investment in traveler screening to prevent people who are sick from traveling and potentially spreading the disease to other countries.
We should underscore here that this obviously helps people in the countries where this is happening. But we also have a bit of self-interest in preventing the spread, right? We’re doing good for others and for ourselves. Does this entail using USAID workers or working with contractors?
Typically, that would mean deploying some USAID personnel, but a lot of the frontline work is done through partner organizations—providing grants and contracts to aid organizations to support the Ugandan government and to run some of their own activities.
When Elon Musk came in with his minions and shut down USAID and froze federal foreign assistance, how did that affect this?
Almost none of the things that would routinely happen in a major outbreak actually took place. USAID did not deploy anyone to Uganda to support the response. They did not get money out to partners quickly. It took them weeks, when it would normally take hours or days. And even the funds that did go out were very, very small. Some contracts were canceled. One of the awards that had been made was to a partner supporting traveler screening at Uganda’s major airport in Entebbe—that was just canceled last week.
That means people can get on a plane in Entebbe and fly to London, Frankfurt, New York—wherever—and no one’s asking them about Ebola?
It means that the support to the Ugandan government to make sure that screening is as robust and airtight as possible is gone. So it’s a huge risk.
Elon Musk “has no idea what he’s talking about. He’s making it up as he goes. He doesn’t understand the things he’s canceling.”
Elon Musk says everything’s been fixed. No?
He has no idea what he’s talking about. He’s making it up as he goes. He doesn’t understand the things he’s canceling. He and his team of teenagers and twentysomethings are using AI—or keyword searches, as far as we can tell—to decide what to cut. They’re not bothering to stop and understand what they’re actually losing when they shut these programs down.
We’re focused here on Ebola, but what does this mean in terms of other diseases and other possible pandemic threats?
One of the things you realize really quickly when you start getting involved in outbreak response is that there are outbreaks all over the world all the time. It’s really hard to know at the front end of one which has the potential to truly explode at a global level. That’s why it’s important to get on top of all of them very, very quickly, before they have a chance to spread. When you lose these capabilities, you increase the chances that one of those outbreaks will spread and get out of control globally.
I read in the newspaper that there’s something going on in the Democratic Republic of Congo, 50 people dead from a mysterious illness. What does it mean now that the US aid capacity has been severely cut, if not abolished?
This is a good and interesting example. This was a mystery for the first few weeks. Over the weekend, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced they now believe it’s due to water contamination—a waterborne illness. If that’s confirmed, then hopefully that one won’t pose a risk of spreading. But we only know that because WHO was on top of it.
Why is WHO on top of it? Because the section at WHO that handles emergencies and outbreaks was largely created at the behest of—and under pressure from—the US government after Ebola in 2014. And we are the principal funder of it.
“We’re actively weakening the entire global infrastructure we built to keep us safe from these threats.”
Now, the United States is withdrawing from WHO, and the CDC has been barred from talking to WHO. All of our funding is being pulled. So we’re not just taking ourselves out of the game—we’re actively weakening the entire global infrastructure we built to keep us safe from these threats.
That doesn’t sound very encouraging. Let’s see if we can end on a somewhat optimistic note. Would it be possible to restore these capacities if, for some reason, a wave of rationality and sanity struck the Trump-Musk team?
It absolutely would. One of the ironic things here is that clearly, Musk feels pressure over this. He wants to reassure the public and the administration that they’re not cutting things that put Americans at risk. But, of course, they are. He has no idea what to cut and what not to cut—he’s just cutting everything by default.
“It’s going to take decades to rebuild what we’re about to lose.”
There could be a different approach. Congress could intervene and put parameters around this, asserting itself in the process. They haven’t really done that yet. But when you look at what’s actually been done to USAID—yes, they are canceling contracts; yes, they’re trying to push out staff—none of that is unsalvageable. It could still be pulled back, as you say, in a fit of rationality. The risk is that if we persist on this path—if we lose all this capability, all this expertise—it’s going to take decades to rebuild what we’re about to lose. Right now, they’ve done more talking than actual damage. They’re close to locking it in, but it’s not locked in yet. They have no idea how to read the things they’re looking at, and they’re not bothering to stop and listen to the people who could explain it to them. They’re just making fools of themselves.
