Just How Many Millions of American Taxpayer Dollars Is Uganda’s Anti-Gay Government Receiving?

Let’s see. There’s the “fuel, trucks, satellite phones, night-vision goggles, and air support” that is, ostensibly, going to the Ugandan Army to fight the Lord’s Resistance Army, which is responsible for things like mass murder, maiming, rape, and forcing children to become soldiers, and in the 1980s threatened to overtake the Ugandan state, but now exists as a few hundred well-armed soldiers hiding in the Congo jungle. “I think it is fair to say that civilized people everywhere would like to see the LRA destroyed,” writes Truth Wins Out’s Wayne Bessen. “There is no place on earth for such butchers to roam free and ruthlessly slaughter innocent people. However, it is difficult to see a profound difference between the LRA and the Ugandan clique the U.S. is funding. It seems that religious fundamentalist autocrats who want to impose their violent sectarian views run both sides.” Indeed, it’s impossible to argue that shutting down such a savage and violent group is not worth doing. But it means your tax dollars are going to fund a government regime that also does not believe in human rights, so there’s that. [NYT, TWO]