US President Donald Trump has signed an order to strip back the federally-funded news organisation Voice of America, accusing it of being “anti-Trump” and “radical”.

A White House statement said the order would “ensure taxpayers are no longer on the hook for radical propaganda”, and included quotes from politicians and right-wing media railing against the “leftist”, “partisan” VOA.

  • Kazumara@discuss.tchncs.de
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    38
    ·
    8 hours ago

    Isn’t Voice of America like the USA’s equivalent of Deutsche Welle?

    Basically a vehicle for internationally transporting news from the US American perspective?

    Trump really hates any and all soft power the USA have available.

    • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      23
      ·
      edit-2
      6 hours ago

      I would imagine it would be something along the lines of:

      What will the shills on Lemmy post now?”

  • limonfiesta@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    148
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    edit-2
    23 hours ago

    I don’t understand the naysayers here.

    This is hilarious. Trump wants to simultaneously expand the American empire, while he dismantles the tools of it that he’s too stupid to understand the importance of.

    No matter their mission statement, or any tangible benefits they might have provided, both USAID and VOA, were tools of empire. These aren’t mutually exclusive concepts.

    • AutistoMephisto@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      6 hours ago

      See, the thing is, those tools of empire were government-funded. Congress allocated money and resources to those tools for them to do their jobs. The intent is to eventually replace those with privately owned, profit-motivated alternatives. Why do you think they cut NOAA and NWS funding and fired all their probies? So that private companies can fill the void. Then if you want life-saving weather information in the event of a tornado or hurricane, pay a monthly subscription fee to some billionaire’s weather/disaster alert service.

    • lorty@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      8 hours ago

      This isn’t fundamentally changing anything. It’s about using different tools for the same goal.

      • limonfiesta@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        11
        ·
        edit-2
        7 hours ago

        America cannot dominate the world militarily, nor could that even serve the goals of its contemporary brand of neoimperialism.

        Soft power i.e. culture, propaganda, and diplomatic/idealogical relationships, are the foundation upon which it’s built.

        Yes, military hard power plays a critical role, but it cannot replace soft power.

        This isn’t empire for the sake of raw nationalism, and nothing would accelerate the American collapse faster than dismantling the state’s soft power tools. The end result will be attempts to maintain power by spending its military resources on peer, or near peer conflicts.

        • Hemingways_Shotgun@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          7
          ·
          7 hours ago

          In Trump’s brain, soft power isn’t properly deferential to him personally. That’s what it amounts to.

          It all comes down to his raging narcissism; soft power is done with tact and diplomacy in whispers. For Trump, that’s weakness. It’s not true power unless people/countries/organizations proclaim his power with effusive thank-yous and obsequious shows of capitulation.

          It’s not enough to lead the free world; the rest of the world needs to be properly thankful for it in a way that he himself finds acceptable. (namely by making a big show of bending the knee)

        • lorty@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          7 hours ago

          It’s not really about changing it for cold hard power, but changing how their soft power will be projected. I’ve seen some theories that the rethoric is going to change from being about freedom of expression and LGBT rights and similar to ideas about traditional family values or something, and I think it’s very plausible.

          • limonfiesta@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            8
            ·
            edit-2
            7 hours ago

            …and how will that be disseminated? That’s what organizations like VOA and USAID were for.

            Trump has the capacity to destroy organizations, but I find it doubtful he could recreate them out of whole cloth.

            That’s my point.

            • AutistoMephisto@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              edit-2
              5 hours ago

              He can’t recreate them out of whole cloth, you’re right. But he’s got friends who could. They have the capital, they have the manpower, they have the brainpower, and could easily leverage all of that to creating privately owned alternatives, paving the way for Curtis Yarvin’s world to exist. America as we know it would be dead and replaced with hundreds, if not thousands, of small city-states owned and controlled by corporations, whose executive boards would have absolute free reign to control. If you’ve ever played BioShock, it would be akin to a bunch of Raptures, but on dry land.

              Yarvin posits it as a collection of corporate city-states that would compete for citizens like corporations compete for customers. If you don’t like the oppression going on in your current city-state, you can simply move to another one and join it.(Nevermind that the corporate oligarch running your current city-state could write policy forbidding you to leave, or placing conditions on your emigration, such as taking all your money.) There’s also some crypto nonsense about how borders wouldn’t exist because you can be a citizen of one of those “network states” without ever having visited simply by logging in and signing up like you could for a social network. (Nevermind that the corporate oligarch running your current city-state might have beef with the oligarch of the state you wish to join and could restrict access to their network.)

    • jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      24
      ·
      17 hours ago

      We’re talking about a guy whose business accumen is so poor he managed to run multiple casinos into the ground. His “successful businessman” schtick has always been propped up by a mountain of debt and crime. If he had so much as two brain cells to rub together, he would have stuck with Ivana because she was the only member of the Trump family to have even a shred of sense.

    • metaldream@sopuli.xyz
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      78
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      22 hours ago

      Trump’s mission is to weaken the US, NATO, and the EU. Eliminating VoA helps do that. Notice how he isn’t threatening China with invasion, but Canada and Denmark instead.

      • CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        20
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        21 hours ago

        Because Trump knows that China can and will fight back.

        Canada and Denmark are friends of ours that Trump is now throwing salt in their eyes and saying “neener neener” while showing them his ass.

        Because of our history, they aren’t fighting back.

        If they do, Russia wins.

        • Zorque@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          27
          ·
          19 hours ago

          In what world isn’t Canada fighting back?

          Which isn’t to say they shouldn’t, but they are pushing back to all the shit Trump is throwing at them. Just because they’re not launching missiles doesn’t mean they’re not fighting back.

          • ElegantBiscuit@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            4
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            9 hours ago

            China has nukes, a gargantuan military with no other purpose than to fight back, and the internal cohesion to resist the pressure. Canada has a much smaller military spread out much further, a much higher dependence on US specific trade simply by nature of physical infrastructure, and an unfortunately not insignificant percent of the population in the central provinces who would probably side with the US. It’s not anbout fighting back, it’s all about who is easier to bully, where friends mean nothing because everyone’s worth is determined by how much he can exploit them and the leverage the us has over them.

            • Hemingways_Shotgun@lemmy.ca
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              7 hours ago

              an unfortunately not insignificant percent of the population in the central provinces who would probably side with the US

              As someone from the prairies (Saskatchewan), I can assure you that while, yes, we do have our fair share of pretty hard-right leaning individuals, most of even THEM are anti-trump because of the sovereignty issue. Even the ones who agree with what he is doing and would like to see Poppinfresh in power to do similar up here, would never side them militarily in an annexation attempt for the same reason that American MAGA flies the US flag…sovereignty is their identity; CANADIAN sovereignty.

              There is a TINY number (some dipshits in Alberta) who actually want Alberta to join the US. But they are fractionally insignificant.

    • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      38
      ·
      22 hours ago

      Trump doesn’t want to expand the American empire though. He makes noises about it, but words are cheap. Judging by his actions he wants to create chaos so oligarchs can profit.

      The ultrawealthy have no national allegience.

      • HakFoo@lemmy.sdf.org
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        ·
        edit-2
        22 hours ago

        I could see him loving the idea of expansion to manufacture a legacy. Jefferson may have been a philosopher or a slave-romancer but that’s college academic stuff: every middle school student learns he bought Louisiana. McKinley got us as close to an on-paper empire as we got, and they put him on the $500 note for it.

        Soft power will never fill the same goal. Being the cultural or moral lighthouse for the West is inherently different from actually raising a flag over their capitals.

        • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          9
          ·
          edit-2
          19 hours ago

          Trump may be narcissistic and senile but he still obeys his oligarch masters, probably from the usual motives of greed and fear.

          I don’t know what your local children will learn at school but he’s fast earning himself a footnote in the international history books as the epoch that marks the tipping point into waning US power.

          I may be wrong but I think the problem with the US cult of presidents/“great man of history” theory is that people like Trump keep the US populace speculating what he “wants” or “thinks” instead of on what his function is and what is actually happening.

          • Maeve@midwest.social
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            8 hours ago

            The kleptocrats run every nation, afaict. There may be a few small exceptions, we will see, and see if they can keep it that way.

    • grue@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      43
      arrow-down
      5
      ·
      23 hours ago

      Everything Trump does – everything – suddenly makes sense when viewed through the lens of “how does Putin benefit?”

      • limonfiesta@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        17
        arrow-down
        9
        ·
        23 hours ago

        That’s an incredibly myopic take that confuses correlation with causation.

        These moves may benefit Putin, but Russia isn’t the only county to benefit. Infact, Russia is in a historically weak position to fill gaps left by a receding American empire.

        I’d wager that China is likely to see much more geopolitical gains because they have the resources and capacity to take advantage of the situation.

        I’m not saying Putin won’t benefit, just pointing out how limiting it is to view Trump through a singular lens.

        • grue@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          14
          arrow-down
          4
          ·
          edit-2
          18 hours ago

          Trump has had close business and personal ties with Russia since the 1980s. He very clearly admires dictators in general but Putin in particular, and has praised him on numerous occasions. In Trump’s infamous public call for election interference, it was “Russia, if you’re listening.” Not China, not some other country, Russia.

          If you can’t see the obvious signs of causation – not just correlation – you’re the one who needs some coke-bottle specs!

          I’m not saying Putin won’t benefit, just pointing out how limiting it is to view Trump through a singular lens.

          It’s the explanation – and the only one, to boot – that fits all the pieces. It may be a “singular lens,” bit it is singularly useful!

    • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      5
      arrow-down
      9
      ·
      edit-2
      23 hours ago

      That’s why we call him JDPON Don - this dumbass is going to dismantle the empire and usher in global proletarian revolution.

      • PugJesus@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        6
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        18 hours ago

        That’s why we call him JDPON Don - this dumbass is going to dismantle the empire and usher in global proletarian revolution.

        Accelerationist fascists simping for oligarchs under the belief that THIS time it will work out for them. How surprising.

      • comfy@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        20 hours ago

        If we’re lucky, we might avoid the World Wars which made many other revolutions possible.

  • Sanctus@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    157
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 day ago

    How is everything that is “anti-Trump” radical? You fucking dictator.

    • Forester@pawb.social
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      44
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      22 hours ago

      “If you smell shit everywhere you go it’s probably because you’re covered in it” Anon

  • HakFoo@lemmy.sdf.org
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    44
    ·
    22 hours ago

    It must also be weird for the sycophants who he just nominated to staff it too.

    The equivalent of “Daddy got you a pink convertible and you get three minutes to drive it before the repo guy comes”

    • Bob Robertson IX @discuss.tchncs.de
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      18
      ·
      19 hours ago

      Oh no, his people will keep their jobs. He isn’t getting rid of it, he’s just firing anyone who does anything, and his people will come in and get paid to do nothing. It’s very likely that he can’t just do away with it, but he can just fire the people working there.

  • rc__buggy@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    59
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    1 day ago

    Under $300 million a year to spread US propaganda to over 300 million people. That’s a fucking bargain man.

    This is going to give up so, SO much soft power because of a snowflake’s ego. This is a bad deal.

  • ninjabard@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    66
    arrow-down
    5
    ·
    1 day ago

    As an American, I would like to apologize that the idiots of this country re-elected Mango Mussolini. And I’m sorry that the rest of the world has to suffer because of this idiot and his cronies.

      • zib@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        23 hours ago

        It’s a pretty scary idea when the odds are very high that we would just get murdered by police or secret service. And in this hypothetical, if we were to fail, Trump would just bring them hammer down even harder on everyone else, making future attempts much more difficult if not impossible. Until the people are organized on a large scale and collectively convinced this is the only option we have left, we have too much to lose with very little chance of success.

        • 0li0li@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          3 hours ago

          Sure, you’re 100% right here, but he’s coming for guns as well, so waiting might not be an option either. Let’s just hope everyone gets pissed sooner than later

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        22 hours ago

        Hell, most of them aren’t even using their first ammendment yet.

  • adarza@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    23
    ·
    1 day ago

    usagm is an independent agency. it and its predecessors, and voa, were created by congress. only congress can eliminate them

  • Intergalactic@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    24
    arrow-down
    14
    ·
    edit-2
    22 hours ago

    It was mostly a propaganda machine against socialist movements. I’m glad it is gone, but it should have been gone way before Trump. Because he doesn’t deserve credit for shit.

      • ERROR: Earth.exe has crashed@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        13
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        18 hours ago

        “Socialist” movements like:

        checks notes

        People’s Republic of China with its draconian:

        • One Child Policy that almost got me killed because they were trying for force my mother to have an abortion against her will (since I was the second child)
        • Rich people and high-ranking party members get away with crimes (as long as they do not go against the paramount leader)
        • If you want treatment, you have to wait a long time, and you have to pre-pay, even if its an Emergency Room life and death situation
        • 户口 (Hukou, Household Registration) System that confines you to where you’re born, and you cant even to move to other parts of your own country, and if you tried you are treated as a second-class citizen, essentially Casteism

        Such “Socialism” aka: State-Capitalism

      • EmpireInDecay@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        arrow-down
        7
        ·
        18 hours ago

        Every single one of them since the end of World War 2. Voice of America, Radio for Europe, Radio Free Asia they’re all arms of US imperialist propaganda.

    • NOT_RICK@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      46
      ·
      1 day ago

      I know foreign people who listened to VoA, and now it won’t be there anymore for them.

      Stuff like this is a perfect example of how little Trump understands soft power. That was an outlet for American ideals (ok, propaganda) and American culture to diffuse across the world. Seeing how power abhors a vacuum, I won’t be surprised when China increasingly fills this void.

      • NJSpradlin@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        12
        ·
        24 hours ago

        Remember, Trump isn’t dancing by his own tune. Who stands to benefit the most from the US undoing their relationships, contracts, defense agreements, and soft power agendas?

        Then also remember that at the rate we’re moving, the 1st amendment is or will be dead very soon. Even this comment could end up with me being blacked bagged after not too long.

      • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        ·
        1 day ago

        I won’t be surprised when China increasingly fills this void.

        The language barrier makes that unlikely. I think this one is going to remain empty for a while.

    • barsoap@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      23 hours ago

      DW still does very limited shortwave in Africa, I guess they’ll be happy to take over time/frequency slots but let’s face it the amount of people that you can only reach via short wave is dwindling, they mostly switched to satellite. They rather feed into the local FM broadcast network, and of course you can stream over the internet.

      • Cosmic Cleric@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        23 hours ago

        but let’s face it the amount of people that you can only reach via short wave is dwindling, they mostly switched to satellite. They rather feed into the local FM broadcast network, and of course you can stream over the internet.

        You would actually be surprised how many poor regions in Central and South America as well as in Africa and Central Asia actually rely on shortwave still.

        A lot of it is Christian and right-wing broadcasts, but still, it’s used more than you would think. Not everyone can afford expensive satellite rigs to receive.

        This comment is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

        • barsoap@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          edit-2
          7 hours ago

          The point is rather if you’re operating an FM transmitter, you not only have the money for a satellite dish and DVB-S decoder you already have one, and FM radios are dirt cheap. The electronics for short wave certainly aren’t more expensive but you’ll need a proper antenna. Meanwhile, much of Africa actually has quite decent mobile phone coverage, there’s some piss-poor countries and large areas of nothing, generally desert, but overall, if there’s people, there’s probably reception. Their whole banking system works via mobile phone.

          • Cosmic Cleric@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            ·
            edit-2
            4 hours ago

            The point is rather if you’re operating an FM transmitter, you not only have the money for a satellite dish

            Talking about people who listen, receive, not transmit, and who do not have ready funds available.

            Also, FM reception distances is much shorter than shortwave, something you didn’t mention.

            This comment is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

            • barsoap@lemm.ee
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              edit-2
              4 hours ago

              Point being FM coverage is almost universal in any area where there’s a significant number of people, not just lone homesteaders, uncontacted tribes, suchlike. Yes there may be people there that could be reached but the total number is small and if they want any news, they’re getting them from the town over once a month.

              Contrast that to the situation when those shortwave broadcasts were originally set up where you had whole cities with actual population that had no electricity, no radio, and certainly no internet. You’ll still find settlements like that, but, as said, not a large amount of people. Alternatively, people behind the iron curtain: You don’t need short-wave to get into North Korea and any Chinese or Russian who cares can access any western media, anyway.

              The purpose of these broadcasts isn’t “play some music to 20 evangelical homesteaders 100km away from the next road”. Those people aren’t the kind of people who might, one day, protest in front of the president’s palace.

              • Cosmic Cleric@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                edit-2
                3 hours ago

                Point being FM coverage is almost universal in any area where there’s a significant number of people, not just lone homesteaders, uncontacted tribes, suchlike. Yes there may be people there that could be reached but the total number is small and if they want any news, they’re getting them from the town over once a month.

                [Citation required]

                There’s no need for us to keep arguing this point, I totally agree that the coverage of listeners of shortwave radio today is a lot less than what it was in the past, but my point is that it’s a lot more still than you’re imagining.

                This comment is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

  • Kittybeer@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    23 hours ago

    Does this mean Kari Lake is out of a job? As an Arizonian, I hope she come back here claiming to be our governor again.

  • PlasticLove@lemmy.today
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    18
    arrow-down
    19
    ·
    1 day ago

    Broken clock strikes again.

    Glad to see US propaganda go away, sad it was Trump to do it.

  • RangerJosey@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    22
    arrow-down
    24
    ·
    1 day ago

    Leftist and partisan are not how I, an actual leftist, would describe the various propaganda outlets scattered around the world such as VOA.

    It’s a cia op. And literally always was. Since 1942 when it was established.

      • hark@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        6
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        16 hours ago

        They correctly called out VOA for what it is. You pointing out that they made an account on the lemmy.ml instance adds nothing.