@metal-brain said"So the federal government wasn’t shut down over the weekend, although we may have to go through this whole drama again in six weeks. Kevin McCarthy, the speaker of the House, ended up doing the obvious: bringing a funding bill to the floor that could pass only with Democratic votes, because the hard-liners in his own party wouldn’t agree to anything feasible. And the bill didn’t include any of the spending cuts Republicans have been demanding, except for one big, bad thing: a cutoff of aid to Ukraine.
He wants more war funding for Ukraine instead of social programs at home. Is he an idiot or a fake socialist who doesn't give a damn about the poor in the USA?
Democrats appear to have agreed to this bill because they expect to get a separate vote on Ukraine aid; President Biden has indicated that he believes he has a deal with McCarthy to that effect. I hope they’re right.
But why did things turn out this way? Michael Strain of the right-leaning (but mostly not MAGA) American Enterprise Institute has called the fiscal confrontation the “‘Seinfeld’ shutdown” — that is, a shutdown about nothing. That’s a good line, but if we’re going to do popular culture references, I think it might be better to call it the “Network” shutdown, as in people shouting “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!”
Nothing short of a coup can satisfy this inchoate rage. But McCarthy evidently thought he could reduce the backlash against his deal with Democrats by betraying, or at least pretending to betray, Ukraine. That’s clearly something MAGA wants. But why?
Whatever anti-Ukraine voices like Elon Musk may pretend, it’s not about the money.
Right-wing hard-liners, both in Congress and outside, claim to be upset about the amount we’re spending supporting Ukraine. But if they really cared about the financial burden of aid, they’d make the minimal effort required to get the numbers right. No, aid to Ukraine isn’t undermining the future of Social Security or making it impossible to secure our border or consuming 40 percent of America’s G.D.P.
How much are we actually spending supporting Ukraine? In the 18 months after the Russian invasion, U.S. aid totaled $77 billion. That may sound like a lot. It is a lot compared with the tiny sums we usually allocate to foreign aid. But total federal outlays are currently running at more than $6 trillion a year, or more than $9 trillion every 18 months, so Ukraine aid accounts for less than 1 percent of federal spending (and less than 0.3 percent of G.D.P.). The military portion of that spending is equal to less than 5 percent of America’s defense budget.
Incidentally, the United States is by no means bearing the burden of aiding Ukraine alone. In the past, Donald Trump and others have complained that European nations aren’t spending enough on their own defense. But when it comes to Ukraine, European countries and institutions collectively have made substantially larger aid commitments than we have. Notably, most of Europe, including France, Germany and Britain, has promised aid that is higher as a percentage of G.D.P. than the U.S. commitment.
But back to the costs of aiding Ukraine: Given how small a budget item that aid is, claims that aid to Ukraine somehow makes it impossible to do other necessary things, such as securing the border, are nonsense. MAGA types aren’t known for getting their numbers right or, for that matter, caring whether they get their numbers right, but I doubt that even they really believe that the monetary costs of helping Ukraine are insupportable.
And the benefits of aiding a beleaguered democracy are huge. Remember, before the war, Russia was widely viewed as a major military power, which a majority of Americans saw as a critical threat (and whose nonwoke military some Republicans exalted). That power has now been humbled.
Ukraine’s unexpectedly successful resistance to Russian aggression has also put other autocratic regimes that might have been tempted to engage in wars of conquest on notice that democracies aren’t that easy to overrun. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Russia’s failures in Ukraine have surely reduced the chances that China will invade Taiwan.
Finally, what even Republicans used to call the free world has clearly been strengthened. NATO has risen to the occasion, confounding the cynics, and is adding members. Western weapons have proved their effectiveness.
Those are big payoffs for outlays that are a small fraction of what we spent in Iraq and Afghanistan, and let’s not forget that Ukrainians are doing the fighting and dying. Why, then, do MAGA politicians want to cut Ukraine off?
The answer is, unfortunately, obvious. Whatever Republican hard-liners may say, they want Putin to win. They view the Putin regime’s cruelty and repression as admirable features that America should emulate. They support a wannabe dictator at home and are sympathetic to actual dictators abroad.
So pay no attention to all those complaints about how much we’re spending in Ukraine. They aren’t justified by the actual cost of aid, and the people claiming to be worried about the cost don’t really care about the money. What they are, basically, is enemies of democracy, both abroad and at home"
Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate in Economics, NYT's OpEd 10/3/23
@phranny saidis there any person in the US that knows where any of the money we are sending to Ukraine is used for? thks
"So the federal government wasn’t shut down over the weekend, although we may have to go through this whole drama again in six weeks. Kevin McCarthy, the speaker of the House, ended up doing the obvious: bringing a funding bill to the floor that could pass only with Democratic votes, because the hard-liners in his own party wouldn’t agree to anything feasible. And the bill di ...[text shortened]... f democracy, both abroad and at home"
Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate in Economics, NYT's OpEd 10/3/23
@mott-the-hoople saidSomeone knows, just a bit past the RHP forum pay grade.
is there any person in the US that knows where any of the money we are sending to Ukraine is used for? thks
The same can be said for half of the DOD budget every single year. Just poof.
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@metal-brain saidIn the latest version, now it is Putin being the aggressor, yet here you are, acting the part of Chamberlain, wanting to give Putin the Ukraine, hoping beyond all sense that it is all he wants.
In that movie the Russians fought Hitler because Hitler invaded Russia.
You forgot the part of the movie where the USA and the USSR were allies fighting fascism.
Well, newsflash, sweetie. We were told that all he wanted was Crimea. Sound familiar, yet?
@mott-the-hoople saidAre you just stupid? The money is being used to help Ukraine fight off the invading aggressor.
is there any person in the US that knows where any of the money we are sending to Ukraine is used for? thks
You DO know who that is, right? Yes, your friend, not ours, Putin, the dictatorial leader of Russia, the same Russia who wants your weak dictator wanna-be, Donald Trump, to be re-installed president. Are we clear now?
@phranny saidIndeed. Well-rendered, and well-said.
"So the federal government wasn’t shut down over the weekend, although we may have to go through this whole drama again in six weeks. Kevin McCarthy, the speaker of the House, ended up doing the obvious: bringing a funding bill to the floor that could pass only with Democratic votes, because the hard-liners in his own party wouldn’t agree to anything feasible. And the bill di ...[text shortened]... f democracy, both abroad and at home"
Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate in Economics, NYT's OpEd 10/3/23
@mott-the-hoople saidStop embarrassing yourself.
is there any person in the US that knows where any of the money we are sending to Ukraine is used for? thks
@suzianne saidThe USA is the aggressor in Syria. Did you forget abut that history?
In the latest version, now it is Putin being the aggressor, yet here you are, acting the part of Chamberlain, wanting to give Putin the Ukraine, hoping beyond all sense that it is all he wants.
Well, newsflash, sweetie. We were told that all he wanted was Crimea. Sound familiar, yet?
https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/12/29/obama-never-understood-how-history-works/
I don't believe all this "Putin will try to conquer the world IF he isn't utterly defeated in Ukraine" talk. His conquest plans are sure slow; after Georgia, which he withdrew from, it sure took him a long time to advance to Phase 2. Not seeing the Hitler like relentless march most posters here have talked themselves into buying.
Be that as it may, the invasion remains a Crime Against Peace and the UN Charter bans the acquisition of territory by aggressive war (I'm sure MB will.be ready with "whataboutisms" but international law is still law binding on States even if other States have violated it). So any deal simply ceding conquered territory to Russia without the consent of the People who lived there would be unjust.
At the present time, Russian military ineptitude has led to an overly optimistic belief by the West and more importantly the Ukrainians, that they can be decisively defeated and pushed out of the Ukraine entirely. I find this highly unlikely. But until Ukraine's People accept that, a peace deal isn't going to happen.
It's a bad situation as any war is, but I don't see any moral choice but to continue to help arm the Ukrainians against the invaders until both sides are willing to agree to at least a cease-fire.
@suzianne saidSo only the latest aggressors matter? Kind of like the last one running through a red light? So USA aggression against Syria is forgivable? Why? Why the double standard?
In the latest version, now it is Putin being the aggressor, yet here you are, acting the part of Chamberlain, wanting to give Putin the Ukraine, hoping beyond all sense that it is all he wants.
Well, newsflash, sweetie. We were told that all he wanted was Crimea. Sound familiar, yet?
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@suzianne saidThere are obviously a few differences in the scenarios.
Hitler said, a year before invading Poland, after cutting a deal with Britain and France for the Sudetenland, that it was his last territorial claim in Northern Europe. This was 30 September 1938. In March 1939, he invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia and on 1 September 1939, he invaded Poland.
We've seen this movie before. Those who ignore history are destined to repeat it.
1. Russia won’t and can’t invade a NATO or EU country. That would be strategically and financially damning itself.
2. Ukraine is not the poor victim you so willingly make it out to be. Nor are they morally the centre of all that is good and wise.
3. There are layers of hypocricy within the anti-Russian spin. Vietnam, Central America, Afghanistan, Iraq, supporting Iraq in the Iraq-Iranian war, etc. ad finitum.
I am no Putin supporter.
I am not even pro-Russian (unless we’re talking about selling Poland and Hungary to them for a bottle of vodka and some caviar).
I do not think Russia should be in Ukraine; both strategically and morally.
However, I would not support Ukraine in this, other than humanitarian aid.
That being said, the next time another country invades another country, we will be able to hold up this example to point out the hypocrisy in our responses.
@no1marauder saidFormer United Kingdom defense secretary Ben Wallace has claimed that Kiev is succeeding in its counteroffensive, but in order to “finish the job,” Zelensky must force more and younger Ukrainians into battle, while the West provides them with weapons to defeat Russia, according to a report by RT.
I don't believe all this "Putin will try to conquer the world IF he isn't utterly defeated in Ukraine" talk. His conquest plans are sure slow; after Georgia, which he withdrew from, it sure took him a long time to advance to Phase 2. Not seeing the Hitler like relentless march most posters here have talked themselves into buying.
Be that as it may, the invasion remain ...[text shortened]... the Ukrainians against the invaders until both sides are willing to agree to at least a cease-fire.
“The average age of the soldiers at the front is over 40. I understand President Zelensky’s desire to preserve the young for the future, but… just as Britain did in 1939 and 1941, perhaps it is time to reassess the scale of Ukraine’s mobilization,” Wallace wrote in an opinion piece published by The Telegraph con Sunday.
https://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/zelensky-should-conscript-more-young-people-and-force-them-to-kill-or-be-killed
Ukraine will inevitably run out of enough soldiers to fight the war. That means either cede territory to Russia or foreign troops will be sent in. Guess who is getting ready for that.
https://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/the-us-military-is-laying-the-groundwork-to-reinstitute-the-draft
@metal-brain saidAs I’ve stated before, there is no possible win in this scenario for Russia.
Former United Kingdom defense secretary Ben Wallace has claimed that Kiev is succeeding in its counteroffensive, but in order to “finish the job,” Zelensky must force more and younger Ukrainians into battle, while the West provides them with weapons to defeat Russia, according to a report by RT.
“The average age of the soldiers at the front is over 40. I understand Pr ...[text shortened]... s://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/the-us-military-is-laying-the-groundwork-to-reinstitute-the-draft
Even if they win the war, they’ll only be tied up in a never-ending circle of friction, draining their finances until they leave dispirited.
The invasion was stupidity fuelled by ego.