Republicans: we have to spend our money on Americans first
Also Republicans: fuck you, no more student load help
Republicans don’t want to help all Americans, just their own class.
Not even that they’ll gladly sell each other out if it can benefit their personal business interests.
Okay, fine. Then let’s spend our money on healthcare for Americans.
No? Then what about green technologies to keep us competitive, create jobs, and help the environment? Also no?
Oh, I see. We should spend the money on payments to the wealthy in the hopes that they would let a few pennies spill out of their pockets and be too lazy to pick them up before the poor people scramble to get them. Got it.
spend our money on Americans first
Well that’s actually true! It’s just that they want it spent on a very small and select group of Americans first.
You can’t call yourself a true patriot if you don’t relish the thought of an old adversary perishing in a war against someone else. Its gotta be obvious the Republican party is compromised at this point, especially after allegations over the years.
Nationalism doesn’t usually end well.
They are self ascribed patriots. I’m just calling them out. Please, don’t start a nationalist party.
I’d rather start an Internationalist party. ;)
Eh I wouldn’t go that far. I have no desire for the UK nor Germany to perish in a war for instance. And I don’t want to see Russia perish in war. But they must absolutely lose in Ukraine, unequivocally.
I would’ve preferred to see them be a thriving democracy, perhaps one that had figured out how to better mix capitalism and communism. We could have shared our cultures and combined our knowledge to make massive scientific advancements.
But Russia didn’t choose that path. And now they have to be defeated. They promoted far right candidates in the West with the intent of destabilizing countries, and they actively spread COVID misinformation. If there’s to be a hope for democracy and a free Russian people, we have to do everything we can to defeat the Putin regime.
I agree with you. But I am tired of these “Patriots” supporting a country that does nothing but destabilize ours and sells oil. If they are the true red-blooded patriots they say they are then they should be lining up to pay Ukraine themselves.
I completely agree, but it’s good to know your audience. I usually save that language directly for the traitorous fucks, and try to be more conciliatory otherwise. It’s often better for getting people to see your viewpoint and agree.
Why couldn’t we have helped Russia after the collapse of the USSR instead of letting it languish and turn into what it has become today? That would’ve saved a lot of lives, but I suppose then you couldn’t have that eternal enemy to show off how much of a patriot you are.
I both agree and disagree, but you are blaming the US/West far too much. Russia was not a US colony, and there is no manual on how to fix a country when it collapses. It’s not entirely clear how we could’ve helped, especially in a manner that didn’t just look like enriching private corporations or wealthy Russian oligarchs.
What happened in the end is a very common story – a place is having economic hardship and struggle, a strongman leader restores stability, the strongman rules as a tyrant. The tyrant longs for old days of glory, and so forth.
I disagree with the commenter above that we should relish the thought of Russia’s defeat because they were a former adversary. I wish things had happened far differently. My disdain is largely for Putin, not for Russia itself. We can learn from the past, but the fact remains – Putin and Russia must fail in Ukraine for peace to be established, innocent lives to be saved, and sovereignty to be respected. Ukraine is not Russia’s colony, and Putin needs to be punished for forgetting that.
Say Russia loses and Putin is deposed. What do you think the US and West should do in that situation? This isn’t some gotcha question, I’m genuinely interested in what you think would be the best path forward for the Russian people to thrive and have a peaceful democracy.
There is a manual on how to fix a country when it collapses and it was written after world war 2. We saw how Germany was punished after world war 1 and how it didn’t solve the underlying problems. The problem was solved when Germany got proper support instead of being let to fester in economic misery. It takes a village to raise to raise a child and a world to raise a country. Instead, the US sought to exploit the fall of the USSR with “free market” BS and laundering money for the wealthy to maximize wealth extraction.
When this war has ended, my hope is that the world extends a hand to help Russia diversify its economy and become more stable. We should also dismantle cold war era organizations like NATO, whose only goal is to act as an adversary. We need to emphasize cooperation.
That’s the thing though, proper support and enriching the wealthy aren’t mutually exclusive here. Whatever aid we provide, some big companies will benefit and oligarchs will get richer. Either way though, I think we can agree that while the West was not obligated to do more, they should have done more. And I am completely with you on a global effort to rebuild and stabilize Russia as a liberal democracy. We need to make sure the country doesn’t fall into ruin again and give us Putin 2.0.
I will have to disagree on NATO though, largely because countries like Ukraine are going to want defensive assurances for a very long time after this. It provides peace of mind to the smaller nations that we won’t allow them to be conquered by neo imperialist upstarts. What I do think though is NATO needs to expand into a general defensive pact. Perhaps it should become an agreement by the largest military powers that they will defend all democracies from attack, or something.
Things like NATO will naturally die when they are no longer relevant. People really didn’t care as much about it before the Ukraine invasion, and much of the left questioned why we even had it. Russia has made it relevant again. In a hundred years, it may exist only on paper, if Russia and the West have jolly cooperation.
NATO was no longer relevant when the USSR collapsed and the cold war supposedly ended. It took over a quarter of a century of irrelevance for this war to happen and it’s not unreasonable to think that NATO played a role of escalation in order to ensure job security.
NATO is application only. It’s growth is because Russia sought to exert power through punishment instead of cooperation. It drove people to NATO for safety.
We could have, and we should have. But those choices were made by different people than us. Maybe if we had made some other choices instead of just nationalist ones we could have had an ally by now. But as you said, we’d have no eternal enemy to point to, and imperialists love state enemies.
The choices being made right now are being made by different people than us (the literal us). Voters largely have little say in US foreign policy.
Voters absolutely have a say in foreign policy because they absolutely have control over how their representatives vote. If anything, they have undue influence due to rampant gerrymandering.
Are you being sarcastic? I can’t tell because I’ve seen your other posts and let’s just say your takes are really something, so it’s hard to tell if you’re being serious.
My takes are the truth, which rubs a lot of people here the wrong way.
If you don’t believe you have a say in foreign policy, consider that maybe as small a number as 100k Americans just ousted the Speaker of the House.
It’s not my fault most people don’t understand politics at all.
deleted by creator
Regarding shady actions, the US has thrown its weight around in the region perhaps the whole time: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa
We did help Russia after the collapse of the USSR.
Russians are a broken people culturally inured to welcoming and even demanding tyrants.
I wouldn’t call the terrible market reforms that created the oligarchs “help”. That “broken people culturally inured” line is nonsense. You’re like those racists who think black people are genetically programmed for crime.
Except unlike racism, which is nonsense, countries do in fact have a persistent cultural zeitgeist
So when the US elected Trump, they were “a broken people culturally inured to welcoming and even demanding tyrants”?
No, rather the US is very prone to demagoguery by nationalists.
Dressing up the word doesn’t change anything. Nationalism runs rampant in the US. You can see it in all the flag-waving, the chants of “U-S-A, U-S-A, Number 1, Number 1!”, American exceptionalism, and constant claims of being the greatest country on Earth.
You can’t call yourself human if you relish the thought of war.
Helping Ukraine isn’t relishing war. Yes, peace would be better, but that’s entirely in Russia’s control. If Mexico invaded the US and seized a state or two, does anyone think that the US would just sign a peace treaty and give up those states? (I mean, maybe if it was Mississippi or Alabama.) No, we’d strike back until we took back every inch of territory that we had lost.
Russia could have peace tomorrow by pulling their troops out and agreeing to never again invade a sovereign country. (I’m sure there were be more conditions before it would be a lasting peace, but that would be a great start.) Russia’s idea of “peace,” though, is “Ukraine becomes part of Russia and everyone in Ukraine who doesn’t like this is tortured, raped, and then killed.”
It’s a false equivalence to pretend that fighting to free your country from an invading force is the same as fighting as part of the invading force.
We certainly aren’t fighting to free our country!
We’re giving Ukraine juuust enough support to never lose, but not enough to ever win. The goal isn’t to free Ukraine, the goal is the weaken Russia.
America would prefer this war never ends.
Don’t dehumanize what humanity is capable of.
You don’t have to relish war, but you can be hopeful about the outcome. The unfortunate reality is, to keep peace you must be ready for war.
You can’t call yourself human if you’re not willing to fight monsters.
Also it’s not a bad we’re aligning “the bread basket of Europe” with the west at a time when food insecurity in rising all around the world.
For no other reason than: if poor = no food for you.
They don’t want a weak Russia. They want a strong Russia. Because that’s what Putin wants and Putin now controls their party as much as Trump does.
Remember when a bunch of high profile Republicans went on a trip to Moscow and tried to get an audience with Putin on Independence Day?
The republican traitor filth are owned by the blyats. That’s why they can’t acknowledge the obvious: Western interests, and especially American interests, are perfectly aligned with helping Ukraine. We’re getting another century of American-led Western dominance by destroying the pathological russian state. And at a steep discount, compared to direct action.
Western Civilization is… problematic.
$10b would provide meals for kids in schools and eliminate school food debt. We did it for one year during COVID but now lunch ladies get to go back to debt collection. Just to put these figures in perspective. The US govt doesn’t care about its own people.
$10b is nothing, a rounding error in the federal budget. It’s a sad day when you come to the realization that people go hungry and homeless simply because we allow it. Both problems could be solved in under a year if we had the will to do so.
That said, Ukraine is worth supporting, it’s definitely not an either/or situation.
In Afghanistan and Iraq … Washington spent more than $8 trillion
Never let anyone say we (America) don’t have the money do to things. That’s bullshit. If this country could spend $8 trillion dollars on a war that accomplished nothing, we can spend money to help those that need it.
To do the right thing for Ukraine, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) will now have to go against a growing portion of the Republican base.
Aaaand he’s gone the very next day.
Weakening the enemy and getting Intel at a fraction of the cost with someone else’s boots on the ground. Then there’s looking good on the world stage and strengthening relationships with allies. They’re also getting rid of old gear to swap for new. It’s cheaper giving it away then dismantling it.
This isn’t “world police” bullshit. The US is taking advantage it.
Exactly. And if this war does expand to NATO vs Russia (which segments of Russia seem to really want and others rightfully fear), it will involve fresh NATO troops with tons of weapons and intel as to how to use them for maximum damage vs tired Russian troops with limited supplies/ammo.
Assuming such a hypothetical scenario doesn’t turn nuclear (which, admittedly, is a big assumption), the US/NATO would be a much better position for having supported Ukraine. In fact, it might prevent such a war because Russia might have been so weakened by the Ukraine conflict that they don’t even try to attack a NATO country - knowing that they’ll be soundly defeated.
This is “world police” shit and we should be the world police.
Yeah, why should I care if another family’s son dies for “freedom?” /s
someone else’s boots on the ground
That it absolutely fucking disgusting! Saying the death of someone else is ok so the profits of companies like Blackrock, Boeing, Lockheed, etc are protected. You have lowered the value of someone else’s life to chattel
This is framing it in the terms Republicans say they care about. “It’s too expensive!” “No, it’s a fucking bargain. What else you got?”
Chattel is usually less expensive because they are not seen as human with human rights. If the US wants to go to war they need to send their own people to die
They aren’t chattel. They are people fighting to defend their homeland from an aggressor nation. Are you suggesting Ukrainians would be better off under the Russian yoke? Look at how the Russians treat their own citizens. Let’s not pretend we are forcing them to defend themselves. We’re are enabling it.
If the US and the terrorist organization NATO stayed out of Ukriane there wouldn’t be war. If the US honored their agreements there wouldn’t be war. As the NATO chief recently pointed out this war is 100% provoked by NATO and the US
This doesn’t sound ridiculous at all, CommieTrash
Yeah they just outed themselves as a troll not to be taken seriously. I need a Lemmy app that lets me tag people with a note so I have an alternative other than blocking.
terrorist organization NATO
Lmao
Oooh look at me. I’m CommieTrash and I’m outraged!!!
I’m not outraged, I’m disgusted by BlueMAGA posing as progressive.
Scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds
Oh yes. You’re outrage is palpable. Always outraged. Leading the outrage rush on whatever the outrage topic of the day, right ya fucking retard??
Your constant use of that word suggests you may be projecting
Or maybe youre just a fucking retard
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The bad news is that billions of dollars of funding for Ukraine were stripped from the continuing resolution as a sop to House Republicans who want to cut off the embattled democracy altogether.
To do the right thing for Ukraine, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) will now have to go against a growing portion of the Republican base.
It is, nevertheless, imperative that he show a modicum of backbone and bring a Ukraine funding bill to the floor immediately.
In fact, it is hard to think of any U.S. foreign policy initiative since the end of the Cold War that has been more successful or more important than U.S. aid to Ukraine.
We are funding a free people fighting to preserve a liberal democracy that will be a stalwart member of the Western community for years to come.
Republicans often complain that the United States is doing the heavy lifting and our European allies aren’t doing their fair share.
The original article contains 1,096 words, the summary contains 159 words. Saved 85%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
We’ve provided enough support, The US’s goal of weakening Russia and sending a message to China is complete. Europe can continue providing all the support they want. If US Tax player dollars are going to go to fire fighters, doctors, EMT’s it should at least go to those based on US soil.
The west can not afford to let Ukraine be destroyed and taken over by Russia. It would set an incredibly dangerous precedent and it would send a certain message to all allies and everyone else that would destroy diplomatic standing of usa. The support usa gave is miniscule, mostly old weapons that they would have to pay do destroy anyway. Miniscule in regards their military budget, a budget that is huge exactly because of Russia and threats like it.
I agree, Europe can’t afford it. The US has contributed way more than necessary all ready, more than all other nations combined. We are literally paying peoples salary in Ukraine now. Enough is enough, Europe can take charge of their own back yard clean up now and will have to for at least the next month because the temporary funding bill that just passed in the US eliminated any further aid.
Like I said already, it’s mostly old weapons without any real value. USA has not contributed nearly enough. It was just breadcrumbs. Of course they have all the perogative to stop, but when you look at the economics of the situation, usa has no option but to continue and drastically increase funding for Ukraine. That is what is happening and will continue to happen until Ukraine is not occupied anymore and is protected enough against threats from Russia.
The aid you speak of that was supposed to be eliminated is only an aid mechanism which was never used. The aid is coming in through other channels, usually directly through congress. In reality, nothing has changed and it’s likely this mechanism will also be soon reinstated to give Ukraine more options on the conditions it receives aid on.
If you want to talk numbers, I think Ukraine will need at least half of the usa military budget to win this war and more to keep the Russian hordes at bay after the war. Europe can provide some of that, but where weapons are in question, that is more of a usa thing.
If America wants to keep it’s status in the world, which provides enormous diplomatic and economic benefits, they have to step up when that is needed.
I’m tired of my tax dollars going to being world police. My tax dollars should go to my community not be used to fund a war half way around the world. If Ukraine would like to BUY military equipment from us then fantastic. I also hear the Taliban have a shit ton of our military equipment they might be looking to sell. The countries in Europe should have always been the first ones to step in with aid and contribute the largest amounts.
If your claim is true that Ukraine still needs half of our military budget just to survive, then that sounds like a lost cause to me. Because they obviously can’t afford that, and it’s certainly not the US taxpayers job to fund it.
You may be tired, but then prepare to get completely exhausted. America is America because of its army and how that army is used. Your community is that, because of who and what americas army is. For better and for worse. Europe is how it is because of that also.
In this situation it is the job of America and the west to defend Ukraine and it is the moral imperitive for the west to stand behind them and help with whatever we can. That is the only option. The only option. If we don’t do it, the consequences may be dire, but it is also the right thing to do. America should and will increase the funding. My estimates are half of the budget for one year. That money is a negligible percentage of all the money that was spent in history to bring Russia to it’s knees and no American soldiers lives.
Actually, if we want to assume hurting Russia is what’s best for America, then we need to trickle just enough material aid to keep Ukraine’s military from complete collapse and let the whole conflict grind on for a few decades. Just like what we did for Afghanistan in the 1980’s, the last thing we’d want is for Ukraine to win quickly.
I’ve heard this talking point before, but it’s completely illogical. If you want to hurt Russia you give the other side everything they want and in great numbers and let them do whatever they want with it.
You don’t pay enough in taxes to deserve a say.
I know this because to be this dumb there’s no way you have a real job.
lucky for me, the US constitution says otherwise!
It really doesn’t. You get a vote, but not a say.
And, statistically, your vote isn’t impactful because you probably don’t live somewhere where it matters.
Enjoy voting no on school levies or whatever though.
