Opinion | Why MAGA Loves Russia and Hates Ukraine
www.nytimes.com
Inside the far right’s latest bespoke reality.

As I type this newsletter, continued American aid for Ukraine is in grave doubt. Tucker Carlson is in Moscow to conduct a friendly interview with Vladimir Putin. And we’re receiving reports from the front lines that Russia is advancing, in part because of Ukrainian ammunition shortages. In short, the war is reaching a critical stage, and Ukraine may lose because Republicans are willing to hand authoritarian Russia a historic military victory rather than supply further aid to a democratic ally.

Ronald Reagan isn’t just rolling over in his grave; he may also lurch from it in a fit of incredulous rage. This is a remarkable and potentially catastrophic reversal by a political party that is in a state of near-total, frequently random ideological transformation.

To explain the intensity of Republican resistance to Ukraine aid, I need to return to a concept I wrote about in November: that of bespoke realities. My friend Renée DiResta, the technical research manager at the Stanford Internet Observatory, coined the term, and she wrote that it refers to the “bubble realities” constructed by communities “that operate with their own norms, media, trusted authorities and frameworks of facts.”

Among those who oppose aid to Ukraine, there are certainly several paleoconservatives who object on classic isolationist grounds: It’s not our fight, our support is costly, we might find ourselves inadvertently embroiled in war, and so on. But the mass Republican movement against Ukraine is rooted far less in policy than it is in a particular bespoke reality of the MAGA universe, in which Ukraine is a pernicious villain, Putin is a flawed hero and Russia should have crushed Ukraine long ago.

MAGA Republicans’ hatred and contempt for Volodymyr Zelensky and the Ukrainian cause is shockingly vehement. Candace Owens says she wants to “punch” Zelensky. Donald Trump Jr. calls him an “international welfare queen.” Carlson says he dresses “like the manager of a strip club.” It’s all bizarre and unreasonable. And it all fits the broader MAGA narrative.

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  • @laverabeEnglish
    3•11 months ago

    Republicans are just making sure the funds are doing what they’re supposed too.

    all $44 billion? Where was there concern for the fiscal responsibility during Iraq when we spent $3000 billion?.

    Congress specifically allocated a hefty $42 million for oversight purposes. That is plenty to get the job done. If there are problems, it is the accountability structure that should be advanced, but by no means should it be an argument to stop funding Ukraine. As of February 2023, the Department of Defense Office of Inspector General (OIG) has more than 90 professionals engaged in oversight of security assistance to Ukraine. So far, there have been no reports of major fraud by the OIG. Furthermore, the OIG also collaborates with oversight staff from the Department of State and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

    With U.S. support, Ukraine has demonstrated incredible results considering that Russia planned to take over Kyiv in a few days. Since the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has regained more than half of its occupied territory. Russia now occupies approximately 14 percent of the country’s territory, while at the height of the invasion in March 2022 it had about 27 percent of the territory. In addition, the United States and European Union did not have to lose any active-duty military personnel, and the transatlantic alliance has been strengthened. At the same time, “the war has severely degraded Russia’s military power and its ability to threaten NATO allies,” according to Steven Moore, the former chief of staff to retired representative Pete Roskam (R-IL). UK defense chief Tony Radakin said in July that “Russia lost nearly half the combat effectiveness of its army,” adding that“last year, [Russia] fired 10 million artillery shells but at best can produce 1 million shells a year. It has lost 2,500 tanks and at best can produce 200 tanks a year.” Russian military casualties are near 300,000. In sum, for a fraction of what the United States spends on its military every year, Ukraine has inflicted significant losses on an international competitor with no commitment of U.S. military forces. 1

    This war has real costs to the US. Russia has been at war with the US. They were directly responsible for the election of their puppet president who nearly withdrew us from NATO.

    We would be fools not to send defensive assistance to an ally who is now running out of a means to defend themselves.