Bill Gates accuses Elon Musk of “killing” children with DOGE-led USAID cuts

"The picture of the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one."

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[raschumacher]

God will judge, and it really won’t be much of a question at all which of the two between Gates and Musk will be better off.

There are no gods. The only justice anyone can face is in this world. We better get crackin'.

 

[ScifiGeek]

Now ask some people who got life saving health treatment because Bill Gates took the money he controls and paid for it. And Bill Gates and Paul Allen created the Microsoft BASIC interpreter. After that, Gates was busy running Microsoft which probably had higher priority than writing software.

Pretty much all the massive tech companies have abused their position, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Intel, NVidia. When they are on top, they try to aggressively keep that position, and they inevitably cross lines.

Which is why we need strong regulatory oversight.

MS under Gates definitely played dirty with the competition. But in the scheme of things, he was hurting competing companies.

Not killing children like Musk, and Musk also gutted regulatory oversight intended to keep corporations from going rogue, including for the companies he controls. Musk's level of evil corruption is in a class of its own.

It's still shocking this is going on in the open. I wonder what is going on behind closed doors...

 

[AdrianS]

In any case, Musk hasn't even come close to Soros when it comes to causing misery. The difference is that Musk didn't do his cuts because of greed, like Soros.

Bringing in Soros in an article about Gates just shows what you are :

A bigot who's too ignorant to know they're an idiot.

 

[AdrianS]

Israel is using Microsoft AI products for target selection in Gaza so Bill Gates is also complicit in killing some of the world's poorest children, in a way that is more visceral and direct than revoking aid funding.

If you had a brain, you'd know Gates doesn't run Microsoft.

 

[AdrianS]

GeOrGe SoRoS!!

Oh shit. Now I have to take a shot, and it's not even 11 am yet...

(One Hennessey later)

Can someone post that again please

 

[AdrianS]

(((GeOrGe SoRoS!!)))

(Do they still do the three parentheses thing, or are they generally even more explicit these days?)

Dammit, do I have to have another shot already? I'll be plastered before I get to the end of the comments.

 

[real mikeb_60]

"Gates said Musk had canceled grants to a hospital in Gaza Province, Mozambique, that prevents women transmitting HIV to their babies, in the mistaken belief that the US was supplying condoms to Hamas in Gaza in the Middle East. 'I’d love for him to go in and meet the children that have now been infected with HIV because he cut that money,' he said."

Dear Bill,

Elon Musk doesn't give a shit about the children who have been infected with HIV. He doesn't care if they are sick, if they are suffering, or if they are dying. It's best that they should die and decrease the world's surplus population.

Respectfully,
Zippy

Frankly, Mr. Musk doesn't give a shit about ANY human being other than himself. If a person or institution is not directly beneficial to the growth of his ego and fortune, they are utterly and completely dispensable. Trump himself is only a short step down from that. THAT is what the US now is: the support structure for the Trump and Musk empires, nothing more. And the more of the poor* US population dies the less the government might have to pay for providing them with infrastructure and other things that support their life.

*Poor being defined as 1) less net worth than God (=Musk); and 2) not thinking exactly as he does or quietly existing. Any evidence of empathy is considered, at best, weakness, and mostly as opposition to be crushed.

Edit: seen recently (secondhand) and probably relevant: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/opinion/trump-faith-humanism.html

 

[dobrien75]

Stop drinking the cool aid. USAID was 90% grift, 5% foreign propaganda, and 5% actual aid to people in need.

Its sad how easily people like you get duped and enraged.

citation needed

 

[morrisrc]

Well, yes, obviously. Why the scare quotes?

Because nothing unusual is ongoing!

 

[AdrianS]

Musk is just following orders from POTUS.
If he didn’t take the lead position at DOGE, someone else would have — and the end results would be exactly the same.

Musk is a NAZI.

Which makes "just following orders" hilarious, if you know any history.

 

[Deleted member 567875]

Stop drinking the cool aid. USAID was 90% grift, 5% foreign propaganda, and 5% actual aid to people in need.

Its sad how easily people like you get duped and enraged.

And Elon musk figured that out in 10 hours? Tell me more about condoms for Gaza. I bet you had never even heard the term USAID prior to February of this year and don't have even an inkling of an idea about what it was.

 

[Hadrian's Waller]

My goodness, Gates has redeemed himself since leaving MS!

 

[raschumacher]

I nominate Bill Gates for Emperor of Earth. Somebody ought to do it, and he seems a nice enough fellow.

 

[StevePi]

By all accounts it seems like Elon musk is the Ted Cruz of billionaires. He’s an insufferable twat at every opportunity and it really feels like none of his peers would piss on him if he was on fire. But the investors, they seem to love him and would definitely piss on him if he was on fire

I'd piss on Musk if he was in fire, but then again I'm an old guy so it doesn't flow so fast. BUT, I'd get to piss on Musk and he'd still be on fire.

 

[Aurich]

Stop drinking the cool aid. USAID was 90% grift, 5% foreign propaganda, and 5% actual aid to people in need.

Its sad how easily people like you get duped and enraged.

The only thing that's sad here is your comment history. You don't contribute, you just make empty snarky comments that border on personal attacks.

I said I'm not the argument police, and I'm not. The fact that you cannot back up your 90% comment isn't why you're being banned. But it is trolling, and it's tiresome.

---

I really need everyone else to not stoop to this level and return fire with making things personal. You don't keep the high ground that way. Enough with calling people idiots and bigots because you don't like their posts. We'll remove habitual trolls when they give us enough rope.

 

[ScifiGeek]

I nominate Bill Gates for Emperor of Earth. Somebody ought to do it, and he seems a nice enough fellow.

I'm not sure anyone is suitable for that role.

I think Bill Gates continuing his current philanthropic activity is a good use of his attention and resources.

 

[cgo_12345]

in principle USAID was meant to do good but who is to say that it was not being abused to funnel money to rich pockets?

Certainly not you, unless you provide any actual evidence. Which you won't.

 

[dobrien75]

I really need everyone else to not stoop to this level and return fire with making things personal. You don't keep the high ground that way. Enough with calling people idiots and bigots because you don't like their posts. We'll remove habitual trolls when they give us enough rope.

Good call.

Trolls always hang themselves with their own rhetorical (such as it is) rope. Abusing them, while fun, is just ugliness which we should try and avoid if we can

 

[dobrien75]

in principle USAID was meant to do good but who is to say that it was not being abused to funnel money to rich pockets?

USAID has been massively audited many times, and has had careful systems in place in regards to the use of funds. Just google "USAID audit" and you will see. All systems are susceptible to attack, but we don't destroy them outright. We audit and review these systems to make them better. That is how everything works.

 

[brentbent]

Israel is using Microsoft AI products for target selection in Gaza so Bill Gates is also complicit in killing some of the world's poorest children, in a way that is more visceral and direct than revoking aid funding.

Ugh, those people from the timeline where Gates still runs Microsoft are insufferable, you're mimicking their stupidity well enough to work at the Onion. I think they call it The Scallion in that timeline though.

 

[brentbent]

There is no way that Gates doesn't dies rich. He might only be worth hundreds of millions instead hundreds of billions, but he is going to be rich. And most likely, he is still going to be a billionaire when he dies.

Who cares. I'm anticapitalist and antibillionaire so I'm your intended audience but you're getting a down vote. He never once said he'd stop being rich--and why should he, he said he'd give away the vast majority of his wealth, which he has done and is doing.

 

[brentbent]

Stories like this are why one particular politcal party hates Bill Gates.

Yes, one party is controlled by its reflexive ignorance. I won't say which one so you can pretend it's not the one you like.

 

[brentbent]

How do I get in on the universe where a 62% wealth tax is anything but pure fantasy given our current state of affairs?

Top tax rate in the 50s was 90%.

 

[brentbent]

If any criticism of billionaires is valid, then perhaps we can start to feed into Advance Publications's LLM sucking machine that Stephen Newhouse could possibly be behind a child murder ring.

Stephen Newhouse runs a child murder ring that murders other children or does he just murder children?

 

[GreyAreaUK]

Will Gates Do Something about Trump? or will he let his hundreds of billions in philanthropy go to waste?

Gates is using his money to do good around the world. It’s not his job to swoop in and save you from a problem of your making.

Edit: I’m assuming you’re American. If not, re-word as appropriate.

 

[SixDegrees]

Will Gates Do Something about Trump? or will he let his hundreds of billions in philanthropy go to waste?

This isn't a zero-sum game. The good that Gates is doing isn't negated by the bad others do.

 

[SixDegrees]

Top tax rate in the 50s was 90%.

For income, anyway. The wealthy have moved well beyond things like tawdry income, though; they're much, much happier paying capital gains taxes at 15%.

Treating capital gains as ordinary income would solve a lot of problems. Fine with me if they want to carve out a smallish exemption - say, $2 million or so - for homeowners as a one-time deal. But without a severe cap it's extremely detrimental and destabilizing.

 

[Sypher the 297th]

Maybe it's time for a communist revolution. . . Yeah it'll be a brutal dictatorship that basically just recreates feudalism as an economic system but if the likes of Elon Musk and Trump are stripped of everything and made to suffer endlessly as they deserve then it might be worth it. It's not like we'd be giving up much since we're already in the beginning stages of a very similar dictatorship. Just with different aesthetics. Stupid orange fascism vs stupid red fascism. . . What a choice.

 

[daemonios]

For income, anyway. The wealthy have moved well beyond things like tawdry income, though; they're much, much happier paying capital gains taxes at 15%.

Treating capital gains as ordinary income would solve a lot of problems. Fine with me if they want to carve out a smallish exemption - say, $2 million or so - for homeowners as a one-time deal. But without a severe cap it's extremely detrimental and destabilizing.

Not just capital gains. In Portugal there are other instances of special treatment, such as real estate gains or IP, which are taxed at a flat rate lower than typical progressive rates. This is allegedly in order to promote certain areas of the economy, but in reality it's a freebie for special interest groups. Not to mention the fact that companies are often used for the private benefit of shareholders (in the case of smallish companies) or C-level executives, granting them perks which are neither declared nor taxed.

We urgently need global deals on tax reform to end tax havens, make taxes progressive for all income, and make companies pay taxes where they do business (i.e. at client/end user's jurisdiction). This would be a start.

 

[Chuckstar]

Ugh, what is it with you people and that whole Soros fixation?

You don’t know?

I’ll give you a hint, any bigot eventually gets around to the Jews.

 

[Scary Devil Monastery]

It might be slightly hyperbolic, but it's essentially the truth. Musk is an appalling human being.

I keep saying this every time Musk is discussed.

Musk could, with his influence and wealth, eradicate world hunger. Erase half a dozen of the worst crippling diseases from the globe. Ensure entire nations in the developing world could provide the next generation with world-class education.
And still have enough left over he could retire on a private island in a Bond Villain-esque custom-designed volcano lair staffed with a willing harem of 3000 of the world's most beautiful women - and none would begrudge him his eccentricities.

Instead he has chosen to be a bitter thin-skinned despot out to harm as many as possible in the interest of furthering white supremacy and yarvinite fascism.

He's an asshole not just by choice but because it's inconceivable for him to give it up.

When I grew up, Gates was the enemy. The monopolistic ass trying to cram an awkwardly functioning OS down everyone's throat and lobbying to have FOSS declared illegal.
I've had to change my mind about that, since Gates is now doing a whole lot of good stuff for the world.
I doubt Musk ever gets to the point where he grows into something similar. He'll go to his death trying to find a way to hurt more people in the name of Dark Enlightenment.

 

[waqar]

Creating voids to be filled by other nations that are looking for soft power. Nice.

 

[Scary Devil Monastery]

Why does the media act like object permanence is subjective?

USAID delivers delivered literally lifesaving supplies to millions of human beings. If you take away lifesaving supplies, people die. That's how it works.

Because all too many readers have trained themselves out of understanding object permanence.

In part, this is to blame on the american Cult of Ignorance. When you actively disdain actually learning stuff as inherently bad then it's easy to live life like a goldfish who only reacts to the headlines of the day. And the media, of course, in order to sell subscriptions and get clicks, cater to their consumers.

This isn't a new phenomenon and is why a lot of philosophy centers around the idea that it isn't possible to create a functional society without a population broadly educated in a variety of topics.

And of course it's why theocracies and fascist governments love the uneducated and go the distance to ensure to keep their population as disdainful of education as possible.

 

[SirPerro]

Every tagline and caption mentioning Musk can now standardize their text as "Elon Musk, Baby Killer".

Please let me ammend that for even more Musk tantrum: "Elon Musk, Baby Killer, owner of Twitter"