Re: “U.S. terminates funding for polio, HIV, malaria and nutrition programs around the world” (Feb. 27, Nation & World):
Over the past year, including the run-up to the election and after, I have been able to hold a place of equanimity. I was not surprised by the results of the election. I stayed calm. I advocated for the change I wanted and didn’t obsess over my disagreement with the new administration’s actions.
That ended when I read the article containing a long list of the United States Agency for International Development projects being terminated. I fell apart!
I was in Colombia, South America, in 1968 when the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated within months of each other. My friends there asked me to explain how/why that could happen in the USA. I had no explanation then … and I have no explanation now.
My heart is broken.
Susan Aigner, Des Moines