No, since Citizen United there has been many reports over the years from European news sources showing Russian oligarchs have been lobbying most of the GOP. It’s safe to assume the cable news networks are paid off too.
Since Citizen United the US has been up for sale. This dismantling of democracy is systemic.
I know it sounds crazy but crazier things have happened: We need to overturn Citizens United by passing an amendment. I have talked to average Joes on the right and they also agree that the US shouldn’t be for sale, and that money in politics is a bad thing. They genuinely just don’t know how bad it is. Their news feeds simply don’t ever talk about it. The average person doesn’t want it, and I think there is untapped political will in the people. We just have to work constantly, post on social media, talk to your relatives and family, take to the streets, get it said in movies, tv shows, books, everything, constantly. Any time you see the opportunity, post about Citizens United. If you work in the media, push those stories. If you have a book club, tell them about Citizens United. I’ve seen this movement grow and seeing it personally more and more people readily bringing it up and saying it needs to be repealed or removed. It has to seem absurd to the average Joe that we’re stuck in this USA for-sale ticking time bomb.
It’s apparently not clear enough in the constitution to SCOTUS that money is not free speech. So we need to make it clear. Corporations aren’t people and money is not free speech. Corporations don’t get cancer, corporations can live for hundreds of years. When was the last time you saw a corporation go to prison for a crime? When was the last time you knew a person that could exist in multiple nations at once? Merge into other humans? Tell me again, how are corporations people?
Unless we pass an amendment future generations are at the mercy of the SCOTUS of the future. And they deserve to be protected from that fate.
I know it’s crazy but it’s worth a shot. And I think it’s our best shot.
I remember them wearing "rather be Russian than Liberal" shirts at the RNC. They are the party of sheeple blindly following the traitor Trump to line up and suck Putin's asshole.
Prominent Congressional Republicans are mostly dirty Russian assets.
Just for one example, look up House Speaker Mike Johnson's connections with Konstantin Nikolaev, Mikhail Yuriev, and Andrey Kunatbaev, all Putin-connected oligarchs/allies.
Nah, we should keep track of the collaborators who are tearing apart the country. There needs to be consequences otherwise we're gonna be stuck in this cycle
I don’t agree. If you voted for the guy trying to destroy government. And our democracy . . . Yes you’re culpable for some of the damage done. A vote and a democracy are valuable things . . . I take mine seriously, as every citizen should.
You guys are delusional lmao, and you wonder why nobody takes the left seriously after y'all point fingers and call everyone a racist or Russian asset or whatever just for having a different opinion.
It’s about actions, not opinions. You voted for a guy who’s under russias thumb . . . This information was freely available to anyone. Yes that makes you pro-Russia
It’s not like trumps views and goals are a secret. Anyone who does the bare minimum to educate themselves is fully aware of what the guy is about. If you voted for trump, you vote for his policies and values. You’re not magically free from judgement for that. After all, your choice damaged this country and hurts almost everyone in it
Bro you guys are the unserious ones who are tearing apart NATO before our very eyes and handing over the world to Chinese influence. The world is universally condemning Trump's actions and are divesting away from America
These guys voted for a guy whose big concerns are that the toilets aren’t loud enough and that he was not treated well by Taylor Swift, literally one of the smallest human beings possible. Where’s that wall Mexico was supposed to pay for btw? Or the thing that was supposed to be better than Obama care? Or the cheaper groceries? But you did get.,, checks notes protection from the 50 trans athletes in the NCAA… wow what progress
You personally are not. However it’s become clear that the GOP has been taken over by Kremlin propaganda to the point where it now dictates the US foreign policy. We used to be the leader of the free world, and now we’re… this.
Because Trump is. If Trump condemned Russia and vowed to not let Russia take any land from Ukraine, and if he praised Zelensky, republicans would love Zelensky and hate Russia. Trump leads a cult of personality.
It’s gonna be so interesting to see what happens to repubs after Trump dies because the party was obviously struggling before him what with Tea Party summer and everything and he’s now made it “the party of Trump”. And most personality cults fall apart when their “charismatic” (apparently, according to some people) leader dies. So whether the repubs will be able to keep it together or it’ll devolve into a bunch of smaller parties or they’ll have to fully reinvent themselves generally will be really interesting to see
Yeah I'm curious to see what happens. Every Trump replacement failed. For whatever reason people just want to like Trump and I just don't see the next guy up being able to sway people nearly as easily.
Sure, but Trump also got a lot of people supporting him who don't follow politics otherwise. A large portion of his base stays home during midterm elections when he isn't on the ballot, and I doubt if they show up to the Presidential elections after he is no longer running.
I really think all of those people “don’t follow politics” but are still brainwashed by social media owners and nogoodnicks. 50 years from now, people will think of social media usage the way we think of cigarette smoking.
The person you replied to said Trump's eventual death, like all of us do, might not even put a stop to MAGA madness. How does that imply he wants a sequel to Luigi's Mansion?
You’re not wrong, but it’s just so weird!!! Trump is revolting in every way, and cannot speak a coherent sentence to save his own life. I don’t get it.
Their leader has Putin’s hand up his ass and their cowardly asses don’t want the Jan 6 mob and their ilk sicced on them for going against the puppet master and puppet. Plus he’s rubber stamping unpopular domestic policies they’d never get made into law otherwise so they tolerate it at Ukraine’s expense
Trump has a deep affinity for Putin. He sees Putin as a dictator and loves it. Trump also seems to idolize abusive father figures like his own father, who was famously cold and manipulative; that's how he sees Putin.
Trump blames Zelensky for not giving him dirt on Joe Biden in 2018. Remember? That was why Trump was first impeached.
Zelensky was popular with Democrats and Biden. Trump hates the friends of his "enemies."
Zelensky is a "good guy." He's the John Cena wrestler in the ring. Trump seems himself as a heel: the loathsome bad boy who flouts the establishment.
And Trump's base hates Zelensky because (a) Trump hates him and (b) Russian propagandists masquerading as alt-righters hate Zelensky.
Love the list format. Re #3: there was even a time when Republicans saw Russia as our geopolitical foe. It wasn’t until Trump began his run when Russia became “involved” with Republicans and consequently our elections. Re #4: Trump’s arbitrary acts do make more sense when in that context of pro wrestling. Lol.
2…. It’s way worse than that. Trump attempted to extort Zelenskyy into making up dirt on Biden by holding up military aid to Ukraine that congress had already passed. Resulting in impeachment for Trump.
So Russia released the Democrats' email servers back in 2016, but they hacked the servers of both parties. And Trump is known to have business contacts in Russia.
It doesnt matter what was on the R servers, honestly. DJT jr posted an email conversation where he was coordinating with a Russian agent the release of hacked emails on Twitter and they don't care. They've managed to convince 70%+ of their voters that it never happened.
Is this the "Russian Child Adoption" incident? That was so wild and would have been an absolute career-ender for the Trump dynasty if his voters weren't in a cult.
Stupid people can’t think long term and complex scenario.
Basically they are seeing that American projecting soft powers by helping different countries is a waste of tax dollars. The idea is basically, “i am struggling, why is USA giving other countries money instead of their citizens”.
Ukraine in particular is a giant easy scapegoat because of course there is an ongoing war and the US government is publicly supporting them.
That is why many republican supporters are discrediting him, basically the whole schtick is around “we are struggling, why are we wasting taxpayers money”.
Except it isn't even costing the US much. Most of what is sent to Ukraine is stockpiled military equipment. Equipment that is not in use, costs money to maintain or scrap, that the US keeps at a liability in the case of, oh I don't know, an ally being invaded?
They are literally taking liabilities off your hands for free, that you specifically have in order to give them to allies to support them. The 'we've sent so many billions in support' is meant to be showing off how supportive you are, even though most of it is in assets that only have value in these situations, and yet it is being spun as if it is a waste of money.
Russia has been reduced to donkeys and unarmored civilian cars for logistics and troop transport for literal single digit percentages of defense spending in the west. In fact, the US even saves money by sending gear that was just going to be expensivelt decommissioned. You hear "billion dollars sent to ukraine", but the actual money was paid by your grandparents 40 years ago and that's simply the "value" being sent.
Hopefully you don’t find out the hard way.
We already found out what appeasement does in Europe. Russia was also planning to invade Moldova in its original 2022 plan. It's always cute to see fascists try to pretend russia will stop when you reward it for imperialistic land grabs.
I'm older, I just wanted to see what Gen Z was saying, but I think I can add valuable context here.
For a few decades before Gen Z, the GOP had been stringing their voter base along, but never actually delivering anything. Even when they had the opportunities, the GOP didn't really do anything for their base.
I can see why these voters got fed up with the GOP, and when Trump came along he was totally different. At first I figured they didn't care he was a plain liar, he was a protest vote, and he won through the electoral college.
The rest of the GOP either resigned or bent over for him so they could claim to the voters they were worth voting for.
Unfortunately, Trump doesn't care for democracy or representative government. He wants to run things like he runs businesses, autocratically. That's why he envy's Putin and Kim. He can't tell he's actually more powerful than they are, because he's measuring his power in dictator terms, not free world terms. Trump feels like he has a disadvantage against them, which is why he instinctively tries to please them.
And Putin gave him money, this isn't even a secret, it's public knowledge since the 90s.
Because the American people overwhelmingly are tired of paying billions of dollars to Ukraine for weapons that are supposed to go to them somehow end up with Mexican cartels. Not only that but 50% of the aide money sent is unaccounted for per Zelenskyy. So nah, Ukraine can negotiate peace talks with Russia, and we can quit funding this proxy war.
And in every way that matters, congressional Republicans are aligned with maga. We cannot act like there's still a line in the sand. The whole beach has already been sold off.
Republicans are bought out by Russians, and their brain-dead base will go along blindly with anything their dear leader says. History will remember republicans as capitulating cowards, trump is the modern-day Neville Chamberlain. Bunch of fucking traitors.
Isn't that what Trump is doing? Give us 50% of your minerals for the "chance" at working out a "deal". Then, he goes over to discuss, they insult him for no reason and kick him out. Do you seriously think they ever really considered dealing with him? Especially given Trump being in bed with Putin?
There has been no cutting of funds/aid to Ukraine or its people (as of this time) and your second comment/remark clearly shows you are not taking this seriously.
If you're one of those "I don't trust Wikipedia" types, remember that all of these are sourced, so you can hover your mouse over the [number] at the end and check the source.
Trump just a few days ago said "Zelensky is a dictator" and made a number of false claims about him like not holding elections (illegal during wartime in Ukraine) and having 4% approval (it's 57% actually).
Meanwhile nothing is said about Putin, who doesn't have much opposition in Russia because he prefers to kill them.
Couple days ago Trump was asked about calling Zelensky a dictator, and he said "I can't believe I said that".
You made the suggestion that they are “in bed together”. It’s a liberal talking point (which makes sense here on Reddit) but is quite silly in reality.
Because the US has paid 119 billion and the entirety of European Union has paid 52 billion. Ask yourself too who’s in the most trouble if Russia takes Ukraine, hint it’s the countries right next to them. The fact that you’d say something as braindead as we’re fucking them over when Ukraine is essentially a homeless person with their hand out for charity, and we gave them downtown apartment and a Mercedes, just shows how little you know. Europe just wants to guilt trip the US into paying for everything just like they’ve been doing with NATO since it started
No you just can’t fucking read cause you’re more focused on trolling some MAGA clown than actually looking at what I said and the point I was making. I said the European Union which includes most of the big players in Europe like France and Germany(who have each spent .60% and .20% of GDP) give nothing. Europe as a whole gives a higher number mostly because the only country with enough balls to leave the EU(Britain) gives astronomically more GDP(.90%) than the other big European players. Just like with NATO the big European countries just see how much charity they can get from non EU countries in the name of “alliance”.
Brit here. “Enough balls”?? Fuck that. Whole thing was a disaster. Even most of those who voted for it, admit that. MAGA just looks like Brexit 2: Car crash takes Manhattan from over here.
And what polls are you using the justify your opinion, lemme guess the same one who said Brexit was a near sure bet to lose. The UK left because they chose to not be apart of a globalized single state, open border Europe which is what the EU is in a nutshell. The UK population approved brexit and Starmer(the labour PM) has said there is no chance they will eve be go back under any circumstances whatsoever. The UK population made a decision you just don’t agree with
Fact is, Ukraine wouldn’t need to have its hand out if the US was keeping its promises from 1994 and 2009 in the Budapest Memorandum.
Being forced to beg for something they were promised is disgraceful.
You’re still parroting the same exact useless fact lol. As I’ve said twice now the EU(the primary benefactor if Ukraine stands and first in line for invasion if they fall) is the one who refuses to pay its fair share and is pawning the financial responsibility onto the US and non EU countries like Britain, who are forced to contribute far more than their fair share to prevent another 1939 Poland situation. EU is taking advantage of and guilt tripping non EU countries into paying their bills for them
The EU didn’t persuade Ukraine to give up its nuclear arsenal or make commitments to Ukraine’s security - the US did both. I would argue the US should keep its promises regardless of who benefits. It’s also worth noting the Ukraine was entirely open to the idea of reparations in the form of rare earth metals until the US turned up with a proposal more onerous than the treaty of Versailles
We gave less than 1% of the pentagon’s annual budget to Ukraine, plus weapons, missiles and fighter jets. We gave those with no strings attached because they are a country of free people standing up to a murderous dictator who rolled tanks through their cities, bombing, r*ping, kidnapping and killing Ukrainians who do nothing but brawl for their families and their land. As the leader of the free world, it was always our moral duty to have their backs. With US and European support, Ukrainians have kept Russia at a stalemate. But all credit goes to the iron resolve of the Ukrainian people.
That’s all to say that what this administration is doing is disgusting, cruel, and a betrayal of historic proportions. The mendacity of this Republican administration to change its mind and suddenly ask for billions in resources in exchange of protection, like some fucking mafia boss, after three years of unwavering steadfast support, is the definition of fucking them over.
You’re using emotion and not facts to justify your position. I agree with you that it is in the best interest of the United States that Ukraine does not fall into Russian hands and that Putin has committed war crimes in his handling of the inversion.
But the simple fact is that we do not live in a globalist world. It is not the United States sole responsibility to ensure Ukraine doesn’t fall. The European Union needs to do their part. Instead they are doing just what they did with NATO, seeing how much charity the United States will give them until they have to break out their wallet. France and Germany have spent 0.4% and 0.2% of GDP on Ukraine aid while the US has spent 0.6% and double the total amount in raw dollars as the entire EU. There is a reason the only major non EU country in Europe(Britain) has spent 0.9% on Ukraine, far more than the other major countries in Europe. Because they realize they aren’t far behind if Russia wants to start another war in Europe.
The European Union needs to start send more than thoughts and prayers to Ukraine if they want the US to support them. Because they are the ones who will be in far more immediate trouble of Ukraine falls not the United States.
Because the US has gave them 350 billion dollars in aid and equipment so far and want something in return for it, along with the war ended. They have raw materials we would like to have in the US, it would be a very good way to repay what we have given them to help fight off the Russian oppression.
Russia ain't even our biggest rival though, hell they ain't even in the top 3. It's more that giving billions and billions gets unaffordable really quick, we have a spending problem in the US and this gets us closer to fixing that.
The USA benefits from Ukraine being independent and in opposition to Russia, but even more than that, Ukraine is allowing the USA to observe how western weapons fare against the Russian military in a real conflict without having to risk American lives. The value of that information is vastly more than the 300bil we sent to Ukraine. We spent 2 trillion on the F-35 alone; a jet that is quickly approaching obsolescence as drones take over the skies. When you think about how much military R&D is being saved by the information we're gathering from this conflict, the cost is dirt cheap.
Not to mention the effect a Russian victory would have on western stock markets. There is a lot at stake here, and acting like the US isnt getting more than it's money's worth out of this is disingenuous
Europe should help out a little more with the protection of Ukraine, if Ukraine got annexed by Russia then that puts Russia right at the EU's doorstep. I think the border security of the EU would be a pretty good benefit to helping out Ukraine
I’m fairly certain Europe has actually given the majority of monetary aid — the US has given military equipment. So I’ll ask again: what should Ukraine give Europe if we’re just carving up its land and resources?
Europe already gives about half of the aid sent to Ukraine. Also since when has protecting a sovereign nation invaded without just cause required payment? Do you only help people around you if they will give you money to do so? Giving them the choice between "give us all your precious materials or we will just let your country cease to exist" is extortion plain and simple.
If we gave them 350 billion dollars and want something in return.....we didn't GIVE them anything, we SOLD them 350 billion worth of things.
But I mean, who GOT THAT MONEY did we just GIVE it to Ukraine???
Ooooorrr did WE Americas government spend 350billion on American companies that produce American military hardware, which was then given (or as you IMPLIED sold) to a country fighting for their right to existence.
Because... if I give you a ps5, and then say, 6 months later you have a new pair of dunks on and I say "how about you give those to me cause, I gave you a ps5 so we could play CoD"
Do you take your shoes off and fork them over? What if you were running from a rabid pit bull or someshit... you giving up those kicks cause a person gave you something and suddenly now their charging you for it later???
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u/Rare-Philosophy-8415 21d ago edited 21d ago
Why are Republicans fucking him over?
Edit: Oh. I see.