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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 13h

Happy travels!

Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 19h

This is just one entry in a 16-part Bluesky series sharing what I learned about smart development aid while filming my 2020 public television special “Hunger & Hope: Lessons from Ethiopia and Guatemala.” The full hour is streaming free & ad-free on the @pbs.org app and at www.ricksteves.com/hunger.

Hunger and Hope: Lessons from Ethiopia and Guatemala

In his new hour-long special available February 1, 2020, Rick Steves travels through Ethiopia and Guatemala to learn about extreme poverty — the more than 700 million people who struggle to live on le...

www.ricksteves.com

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 19h

Before Trump began dismantling USAID, polling showed that the average American voter thought that ~25% of our federal budget went to foreign aid. But that figure was only 1%—and our foreign aid contributions represented a much smaller share of our Gross National Income than other wealthy countries.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 19h

Being in Ethiopia in person to observe the joy and love on display as mothers cradled their adorable children made me a believer in the value of smart aid as a practical investment of U.S. taxpayer dollars.

Health Posts Bring Care to the Neediest

The extremely poor, who are often extremely remote, have little access to health care or health education. United Nations’ health posts bring that service to people living off the grid.

classroom.ricksteves.com

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 19h

🧵:
The world’s extremely poor are also often extremely remote, with limited access to healthcare & health education. In many developing countries, the government—often with the help of the UN and, until this year, USAID—maintains health posts that bring these services to people living off the grid.

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Reposted by Rick Steves

patrickcarlson @pjcarlson.bsky.social · 20h

✋ raise your hand if your life has been saved by medical research.

Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Thread:

A year ago yesterday was a very happy day for me. I had lost my prostate. It was good riddance, as it was riddled with cancer. I’m now cancer-free — and thankful for the tax-funded technology that saved my life.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 19h

Thank you, Niajo. Keep on travelin'!

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Yes, I am cancer-free. On the first anniversary of my successful robotic prostatectomy surgery, here’s to taxpayer-funded medical research and expertise — and a future, for so many of us, filled with happy travels!

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

For God’s sake, take the politics out of funding medical research, embrace science, pay for it with taxes…and only then can you truly call yourself “pro-life.”

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Alzheimer’s, cancer, future pandemics, vaccines, you name it…We need science. Healthcare and medical technology are great equalizers. Science saves lives — blue lives and red lives, rich lives and poor lives, travel writers with cancer and, yes, the lives of people not even born yet.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Billions of dollars have already been invested in work that was on the verge of life-saving breakthroughs. And for no good reason, that funding has been ended, and all that promising work-in-progress is callously being tossed away.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Doctors and nurses and scientists — people who’ve dedicated their lives to advancing public health — are befuddled, stymied, and demoralized by the Trump administration’s extra-constitutional determination to stop American medical research in its tracks.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Countless Americans who, like me, are alive today because of medical research; funding that powered scientific breakthroughs that all of humanity has benefited from; and treatments and cures for life-threatening maladies that just one generation ago were a death sentence.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

To the single-issue voters who made (and make) President Trump possible, I’m speaking up on behalf of:

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

...not to mention compromise the environment their children will inherit, abandon poor and hungry people at home and abroad, and take away their very freedom (all “pro-life” causes they might support but don’t) — all for the sake of abortion politics.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

There are millions of Americans who, apparently, are willing to support a government that will defund medical research...

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

As I celebrate my health, nothing seems more “pro-life” to me than funding this research — and this anniversary has got me thinking about abortion politics.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Think of a loved one or friend of yours who’s also thankful for medical research — or should be.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 1d

Thread:

A year ago yesterday was a very happy day for me. I had lost my prostate. It was good riddance, as it was riddled with cancer. I’m now cancer-free — and thankful for the tax-funded technology that saved my life.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 4d

This is just one entry of a 16-part Bluesky series sharing what I learned about smart development aid while filming my 2020 public television special “Hunger & Hope: Lessons from Ethiopia and Guatemala,” which is streaming free and ad-free on the @pbs.org app and at www.ricksteves.com/hunger.

Hunger and Hope: Lessons from Ethiopia and Guatemala

In his new hour-long special available February 1, 2020, Rick Steves travels through Ethiopia and Guatemala to learn about extreme poverty — the more than 700 million people who struggle to live on le...

www.ricksteves.com

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 4d

Hope is better than hunger. But now, without this aid, American billionaires will be a little wealthier…and the world will be more desperate, less stable, and burdened with more refugees. (And, ultimately, we will pay a price.)

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 4d

Rather than failed states and desperate people with nothing to lose, setting small farmers up for success is an efficient way to contribute mightily to stability and peace.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 4d

...and the UN’s @wfp.org (historically supported by USAID) does just that by empowering proven NGOs to help smallholder farmers become business owners, implement exciting advances in agriculture, and take part in a green revolution.

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Rick Steves @ricksteves.bsky.social · 4d

Nearly 8% of the people on our planet are farmers who produce more than a third of the world’s food on small plots of land...just an acre or two each. These farmers want to work, produce, feed their families, sell what’s left, and stay on their farms (cont.)

Farmers Embracing Smart Agriculture

YouTube video by Classroom Europe

www.youtube.com

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Reposted by Rick Steves

Kimi Wei @kimiwei.bsky.social · 6d

@ricksteves.bsky.social teaches:

Many don’t realize that the 1st people Hitler sent to concentration camps weren’t Jewish citizens, but political opponents. When Trump rants about retribution, locking up his opponents, giving them “long sentences” – take him seriously.

VOTE against fascism.

2.3M views · 75K reactions | Many don’t realize that the first people Hitler sent to his concentration camps weren’t everyday Jewish citizens, but his political opponents. So, when Trump rants about r...

Many don’t realize that the first people Hitler sent to his concentration camps weren’t everyday Jewish citizens, but his political opponents. So, when Trump rants about retribution, locking up his...

www.facebook.com

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