{"id":1555775,"date":"2025-08-16T01:45:00","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T05:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1555775"},"modified":"2025-08-16T01:45:00","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T05:45:00","slug":"deep-throat-for-the-deep-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/deep-throat-for-the-deep-state\/1555775\/","title":{"rendered":"Deep Throat For The Deep State"},"content":{"rendered":"

Deep Throat For The Deep State<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Authored by Sasha Gong via American Greatness,<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

By any normal standard, the recent filing from Voice of America (VOA) Director Michael Abramowitz – alleging the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) is trying to fire him illegally – should have been a Beltway bombshell. Instead, it barely rippled the news cycle. That\u2019s convenient for the people who prefer the U.S. government\u2019s vast international broadcasting complex to remain a black box, opaque, unaccountable, and – most importantly – under their control.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I remember the last time a VOA director was shown the door. On January 20, 2021, less than two hours after Joe Biden took office, Robert Reilly told me over the phone, \u201cThe guards are escorting me out of the building right now.\u201d That same day, the new administration swept out Trump appointees across the USAGM\u2014VOA, RFE\/RL, RFA, and MBN\u2014leadership, included\u2014and dissolved boards on the spot. Media outlets applauded, framing it as a restoration of \u201cexperienced journalists.\u201d The subtext was unmistakable: the right people were back in charge.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the problem. \u201cBack in charge\u201d at VOA under Biden did not mean neutral, mission-driven journalism beamed to the world. <\/strong>It meant a taxpayer-funded megaphone that echoed the ruling party\u2019s priorities while targeting Donald Trump and his voters. Programming celebrated progressive policies, blurred the line between reporting and advocacy on immigration, and, in multiple languages, provided content that critics say veered into how-to guides for navigating U.S. benefits. When your transmitter reaches 45 language services, the line between domestic influence and foreign broadcasting doesn\u2019t just blur\u2014it disappears.<\/p>\n

At the center of the current drama is Michael Abramowitz, a former Washington Post editor tapped by then\u2013USAGM chief Amanda Bennett. To Trump supporters, Abramowitz represents continuity with Washington\u2019s media-political nexus; to his defenders, he\u2019s a credentialed professional trying to keep politics out. Both can be true in Washington\u2014and that\u2019s precisely why the structure matters more than the personality.<\/p>\n

Donald Trump understood VOA\u2019s strategic value. After his 2024 victory, he named Kari Lake, an experienced broadcaster, to lead VOA and redirect it to its core mission: telling America\u2019s story credibly, not carrying any administration\u2019s water. Instead, she ran headlong into a new maze of \u201creforms\u201d installed during Biden\u2019s tenure. Agency directors could no longer be removed by the CEO; ultimate authority now rested with a seven-member International Broadcasting Advisory Board (including the Secretary of State), whose members meet sporadically and require Senate confirmation\u2014a process famous for taking forever when the minority decides it should. Another tweak eliminated the ability to appoint an interim CEO; the VOA director\u2014inevitably a holdover\u2014would automatically act in the role.<\/p>\n

Translation: permanent government beats elected government every time.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This wasn\u2019t a policy debate about programming standards. It was a procedural encirclement\u2014belt-and-suspenders bureaucracy designed to outlast elections. If you think that\u2019s too cynical, ask Michael Pack, Trump\u2019s first-term USAGM nominee, who waited three and a half years for confirmation. Or ask Kari Lake, who arrived in Washington prepared to lead VOA and discovered she first had to run the gauntlet of a never-ending confirmation calendar.<\/p>\n

Trump adjusted.<\/strong><\/p>\n

If the front door was barricaded, he\u2019d use a side entrance\u2014naming Lake a special adviser with a mandate to unwind a \u201cdefunct\u201d agency (Hillary Clinton\u2019s word, not his). That move triggered the present standoff with Abramowitz, who, according to staff accounts and his own legal filing, decided he would not step aside, would not facilitate reforms, and would instead force a legal-political confrontation that keeps the old machine humming.<\/p>\n

This is not a small fight. <\/strong><\/p>\n

USAGM\u2019s $1-billion apparatus shapes how hundreds of millions abroad understand America. If it becomes a domestically resonant propaganda arm\u2014soft power turned inward\u2014then we\u2019ve crossed a line the charter was designed to prevent. And suppose its leadership can be insulated from electoral accountability by clever rule changes and Senate slow-walking. In that case, the \u201cadministrative state\u201d has discovered yet another pressure point where it can outlast voters.<\/p>\n

The fix is simple in principle:<\/strong> restore electoral accountability while preserving the VOA Charter\u2019s editorial independence, set firm timelines for Senate confirmation so nominations can\u2019t be buried by delay, and re-center VOA on its core mission of telling America\u2019s story abroad\u2014measured annually by independent audits. Elections must have operational consequences, and the public should be able to see if the agency is living up to its mandate.<\/p>\n

Critics will object that giving a president more control risks politicizing coverage. That objection arrives decades too late.<\/p>\n

The choice isn\u2019t between politicization and purity; it\u2019s between politicization hidden inside an unaccountable bureaucracy and politicization constrained by law, sunlight, and elections. I\u2019ll take the latter.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Abramowitz\u2019s lawsuit is not the story\u2014it\u2019s the symptom. The disease is a governing class that prefers to win by rule change rather than persuasion. If the people cannot change the direction of their own government media through the ballot box, then the \u201cdeep state\u201d isn\u2019t a conspiracy theory. It\u2019s a workflow.<\/p>\n

Kari Lake promised to make VOA programming fairer, sharper, and more recognizably American. Let her try\u2014or defeat her vision in the open, not by burying it in process.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sunlight, not stalemate, is the real test of confidence. If USAGM\u2019s defenders believe in their product, they should welcome both.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nFri, 08\/15\/2025 – 21:45<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/political\/deep-throat-deep-state<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Deep Throat For The Deep State Authored by Sasha Gong via American Greatness, By any normal standard, the recent filing from Voice of America (VOA)…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1555776,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1555775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1555775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1555775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1555775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1555776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1555775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1555775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1555775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}