WASHINGTON, DC, Jan. 15, 01 (CWNews.com/LSN.ca) - Senator Jesse Helms, R-North Carolina, has proposed that the strongly pro-abortion US foreign aid agency, USAID be scrapped and that religious and private groups take over its mandate.

    Helms, the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, decried the "cold, heartless bureaucratic thinking" of USAID and said, "The time has, I think, come to reject what (President-elect) Bush correctly labels the 'failed compassion of towering, distant bureaucracies' and instead empower private and faith-based groups who care most about those in need." Helms remarks came last Thursday in a speech to the American Enterprise Institute.

    Helms put a lie to the image of the heartless Republican painted by Democrats saying that he would favor an increase in foreign aid funding if the money were to go to groups that will use it effectively. He said, however, that his top priority at the moment is to reverse President Clinton's "outrageous and unconscionable decision" to sign the treaty to create the International Criminal Court.

    USAID, while it has undertaken some good initiatives, has been heavily criticized for its involvement in population control and leftist social engineering projects and its massive waste of funds.

For other news stories, see

January 16, 2001
volume 12, no. 16
Church News in the USA

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