Former State Department official and director of Foundation for Freedom Online Mike Benz sat down once again with Tucker Carlson, where he laid out a labyrinthine narrative about U.S. power and influence that should come as no surprise to those who have been paying attention. Benz described the role non-governmental organizations (NGOs), intelligence agencies, and private philanthropic empires have engaged in to quietly shape global and domestic affairs.
“NGOs are the stem cell of the government’s central nervous system,” Benz said, adding “They are this highly flexible tool…you can’t disentangle or really separate the government from the non-governmental organizations.”
According to Benz, the US often wields power through unofficial channels – increasingly through a network of publicly funded and privately directed institutions Benz dubbed “the Blob,” a term originally coined by Ben Rhodes, a former deputy national security advisor to President Obama.
According to Benz, the roots of this NGO influence structure go back to the early 20th century, with the 1913 introduction of the income tax and the subsequent 1917 law making contributions to charities tax-deductible. This opened a floodgate of elite philanthropy which, during World War II and the Cold War, merged with U.S. intelligence objectives.
“In 1948,” said Benz, “the CIA achieved its first covert operation: rigging the Italian election by working through trade unions, charity fronts, and other non-profits.” He cited a now-declassified memo by diplomat George Kennan, who described the need for a “Bureau of Political Warfare” and endorsed a system where covert influence would appear to originate from civil society.
Benz divided the “Blob” into three strata: official government actors (State Department, Pentagon, CIA, USAID), a network of NGOs funded and coordinated by these agencies, and the “donor-drafter class” – high-net-worth individuals like George Soros and Bill Gates, whose foundations shape U.S. foreign policy priorities.
Hellbound and Down 