#aid for Ukraine

[mellorocket]

Quick Heads-Up: The US House of Representatives will be voting on aid for Ukraine, possibly on Saturday! Now would be a good time to reach out to your local Representative to send in your support!

I'm reposting this from another website, but I found the information incredibly helpful with the process! (Original Post)

How to Contact Your Representative: 1. Click www.house.gov to search for your Representative by Zip Code (in the upper right-hand corner) 2. Write a brief message about how you feel about the proposed bill into the contact form and press send. Sample Correspondence: Dear Representative (name): I am aware of the House Appropriations Committee's initiative for critical supplemental funding for Ukraine. As your constituent, I urge you to support Ukraine. The supplemental initiative is not only about Ukraine defending its own country, sovereignty, and territorial integrity, it is also an investment in the international law-based security dynamic. Assisting Ukraine and curbing Russian aggression now will prevent prolonged American involvement in a future worldwide conflict. I look forward to your affirmative vote for the Ukraine supplemental bill. Thank you!

[tomorrowusa]

« If Trump wins, I’m sure he will cut off aid and sell out Ukraine. If Biden wins, and if two-thirds of Congress remains supportive of Ukraine, the aid can keep flowing — and Vladimir Putin will gradually realize that he can’t prevail. That, in turn, might galvanize Russia into serious peace negotiations. »

— Columnist Max Boot at the Washington Post.

Max Boot was born in Russia and came to the United States at an early age with his family. He understands the mindset of authoritarians and oligarchs there.

Right now Putin isn't interested in negotiation – just surrender or crippling concessions from Ukraine. Sadly, the only way to end the war is to raise the price for Russia continuing it.

And the only way to push back against Russia is to continue the flow of Western aid – a plurality of it coming from the US.

A vote for Trump or for Congressional Republicans is a vote for Russia.

Liberal democracy cannot survive in the US if it is under assault around the world. Voting Democratic helps protect both.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 24, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 25, 2024

This morning, President Joe Biden signed into law the $95 billion national security supplemental bill providing military aid to Ukraine, Israel, and the Indo-Pacific, as well as humanitarian aid to Gaza and other peoples suffering humanitarian crises. The Pentagon immediately sent about a billion dollars worth of ammunition, air defense munitions, and artillery rounds, as well as weapons and armored vehicles to Ukraine. The U.S. Department of Defense had moved supplies into Poland and Germany in hopes that the measure would pass; they should move into Ukraine soon. 

The Pentagon also said today that in mid-March it provided Ukraine Army Tactical Missile Systems, or ATACMS, with a range of 185 miles (300 kilometers), twice that of previous weapons sent by the U.S. 

For many months, Ukraine has been desperately short of supplies, especially ammunition, and its war effort has suffered as it waited for the reinforcements that are finally on their way. 

In a speech after signing the law, Biden explained that the U.S. would send equipment to Ukraine from its own stockpiles and then “replenish those stockpiles with new products made by American companies here in America: Patriot missiles made in Arizona, Javelins made in Alabama, artillery shells made in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas. In other words, we’re helping Ukraine while at the same time investing in our own industrial base, strengthening our own national security, and supporting jobs in nearly 40 states all across America.” 

Biden emphasized that the law is “going to make America safer. It’s going to make the world safer. And it continues America’s leadership in the world, and everyone knows it.” But he called out that border security was missing from the bill, and he promised to bring that measure back. 

Biden made it a point “to thank everyone in Congress who made it possible, especially the bipartisan leadership: Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson; Leader Jeffries; Leaders Schumer and McConnell. They don’t always agree, but when it matters most, they stepped up and did the right thing. And I mean this sincerely, history will remember this time.” 

“We don’t walk away from our allies; we stand with them. We don’t let tyrants win; we oppose them. We don’t merely watch global events unfold; we shape them. That’s what it means to be the…indispensable nation. That’s what it means to be the world’s superpower and the world’s leading democracy. Some of our MAGA Republican friends reject that vision,” he said, “but this vote makes it clear: There is a bipartisan consensus for that kind of American leadership. That’s exactly what we’ll continue to deliver.” 

This morning, Arlette Saenz of CNN reported on the six months of behind-the-scenes negotiating Biden and his team engaged in to get House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) behind Ukraine aid. Meetings, phone calls, defense briefings, and so on, laid out for Johnson just what abandoning Ukraine would mean for U.S. and global security. 

Biden urged his team to stay in close contact with Johnson, as well as House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), but to avoid attacking Johnson in order to allow room to move discussions forward. 

Counselor to the president Steve Ricchetti, a key negotiator, told Saenz: “He just kept saying, ‘Keep talking. Keep working.’ You know, keep finding ways to resolve differences. And that was his direction.”

Biden’s focus on the slow, steady work of governance is a change from the actions of Republican leaders since 1981 whose goal was not to build up successful programs that helped Americans in general, but rather to slash the government. Killing programs requires only saying no to other people’s ideas and riling up voters to endorse that anti-government program by flame-throwing on right-wing media. 

Over the years, it seems we have become accustomed to the idea that flame-throwing defines politics, but in fact, Biden’s reliance on slow, careful negotiation harks back to the eras when leaders sought to build coalitions and find common ground in order to pass legislation.   

North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) acknowledged the power of Biden’s approach today when it endorsed Biden for president in 2024. The union’s president, Sean McGarvey,  noted that Trump had promised to protect pensions and to pass infrastructure laws that would help employment in the building trades, but did neither. In contrast, Biden worked to pass the American Rescue Plan, which protected pensions, and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the Chips and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act, which McGarvey said “have brought life-changing, opportunity-creating, generational change focused on the working men and women of this great country who have for far too long been clamoring for a leader to finally keep their word.”

In an ad, McGarvey said: “Donald Trump is incapable of running anything, let alone the most powerful country in the history of the world.”

The NABTU has 3 million members across the country and has committed to investing heavily to organize workers to vote for Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, where about 250,000 of their members live.

Trump has other problems today, as well, after an Arizona grand jury yesterday indicted 11 of the fake electors in that state with conspiracy, fraudulent schemes and artifices, fraudulent schemes and practices, and forgery for their attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. 

Those charged included state senators Jake Hoffman and Anthony Kern, former Arizona Republican Party chair Kelli Ward, and Tyler Bowyer of the right-wing advocacy organization Turning Points Action. The indictment lists seven other co-conspirators, who are not yet named but who appear from descriptions to include Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Christina Bobb, Boris Epshteyn, and Jenna Ellis; Trump campaign operative Mike Roman; and Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows. Bobb is now senior counsel for “election integrity” for the Republican National Committee.

Trump is listed as an unindicted co-conspirator.   

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

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[batboyblog]

Things the Biden-Harris Administration Did This Week #30

August 2-9 2024

The Department of Interior announced the largest investment since 1979 in outdoor recreation and conservation projects. The $325 million will go to support State, territorial, DC, and tribal governments in buying new land for parks and outdoor recreation sites. It also supports expansion and refurbishment of existing sites.

The EPA announced that Birmingham Alabama will get $171 million to update and replace its water system. The city of Birmingham is 70% black and like many black majority cities as struggled with aging water systems and lead pipes causing dangerous drinking water conditions. This investment is part of the Biden-Harris administrations plan to replace all of the nation's lead pipes.

The Department of Energy announced $2.2 billion in investments in the national power grid to help boost resiliency in the face of extreme weather. The projects will add 13 gigawatts of capacity, support 5,000 new jobs and upgrade 1,000 miles of transmission. Major projects will cut power outages in the west, drive down energy prices in New England, add off shore wind, and enable the development of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s wind resources.

The Justice Department won its massive anti-trust case against Google. A federal judge ruled that Google was an illegal monopoly. The DOJ has an ongoing antitrust suit against Apple, while the Federal Trade Commission is suing Facebook and Amazon for their monopolist practices

The US Government announced $3.9 billion in direct aid to Ukraine. The money will help the Government of Ukraine make up for massive budget short falls caused by the war with Russia. It'll help pay the salaries of teachers, emergency workers, and other public employees, as well helping displaced persons, low-income families and people with disabilities.

The Department of Energy announced $190 million to improve air quality and energy upgrades in K-12 schools. The grants to 320 schools across 25 states will impact 123,000 students, 94% of these schools service student bodies where over half the students qualify for free and reduced lunch. In the face of climate change more schools have been forced to close for extreme heat. These grants will help schools with everything from air filtration, to AC, to more robust energy systems, to replacing lighting.

USAID announced $424 million in additional humanitarian aid to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Due to ongoing conflict and food insecurity, 25 million Congolese are in need of humanitarian aid. This year alone the US has sent close to a billion dollars in aid to the DRC, making it the single largest donor to the crisis.

The Senate approved President Biden's appointment of Stacey Neumann of Maine, Meredith Vacca of New York, and Joseph Saporito Jr. of Pennsylvania to life time federal Judgeships. This brings the total of judges appointed by President Biden to 205. President Biden is the first President who's judicial nominations have not been majority white men, Judge Vacca is the first Asian American to serve in her district court. President Biden has also focused on former public defenders, like Judge Saporito, and former labor lawyers like Judge Neumann, as well as civil rights lawyers.

[urgent-attention]

First Of All, We Wishes You & Your Family A Happy Life This Year & A Happy New Year 2025 🕊️🌠🎁🎄

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[save-alaa-children]

Hello My Friends 🌹

My beautiful cats eat lentils with rice due to the lack of meat, chicken & fish. Help me to travel with them outside Gaza🕊️

We have been living a harsh WAR on Gaza, Palestine from 439 Days.

We were Forced to move to a Tent with my children & kittens that's lacking life.

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[mishacollins]

As every SPNFamily member knows: when you’re fighting evil, don’t forget the salt.

Go donate and play Minesalt to help United24… the winners get an Xbox and pack of Solidarity rock salt signed by President Zelenskyy!

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[apicturewithasmile]

Fun thing to do for Americans today:

Call your congress people and demand that they vote for the Ukraine aid bill.

It's been almost 500 days since congress last approved aid to Ukraine. 🇺🇦 forces are severely lacking in ammunition there, which means they cannot protect their cities and energy infrastructure and have to leave soldiers at the frontline without cover because they need to ration their firepower. Civilians are dying, soldiers defending freedom and democracy are dying. Ukraine will lose and cease to exist if they run out of weapons.

Russia is 100% responsible for the war, but inaction makes the USA complicit and will lead to a bigger war in Europe that is very likely going to include NATO directly, meaning your fellow countrypeople will actually have to come here and fight. Don't want that? Then fucking support Ukraine NOW! It's the morally right and logical thing to do and serves your own interests!!

[tomorrowusa]

House Speaker "MAGA Mike" Johnson is making a pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago to ceremonially kiss Donald Trump's butt. This is another example of how the Republican Party is now nothing more than a cult which worships the Orange One.

Johnson is hoping that his record on election denial will impress Trump and will encourage the latter to support Johnson against Marjorie Taylor Greene's challenge to his leadership.

Of course Trump demands total loyalty from everybody but gives it to nobody. Ask Kevin McCarthy if you don't believe me.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Chris Britt. Florida Politics

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

February 20, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

Both global and national affairs appeared to shift over the holiday weekend. Events of the past week or so highlighted the global stakes of not stopping the aggression of Russia’s president Vladimir Putin. In turn, those global stakes highlighted that Trump’s MAGA Republicans are strengthening Putin’s hand. 

Since October, MAGA Republicans have managed to delay a national security supplemental bill that would provide additional aid to Ukraine. Although a bipartisan majority of Congress supports the measure, House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) recessed the House on Thursday without taking it up, just days after former president Trump attacked the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and suggested he would urge Russia to “do whatever the hell they want” to U.S. allies if they didn’t meet a guideline of spending 2% of their gross domestic product on their own military forces. 

On Friday, February 16, Russian authorities murdered opposition leader Alexei Navalny in prison, where he was being held on trumped-up charges, and on Saturday, Russian forces advanced into the front-line city of Avdiivka. 

The Munich Security Conference, the world’s largest gathering on international security policy, met this year in the midst of these events, from Friday, February 16, to Sunday, February 18. At Saturday’s lunch, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen of Denmark made a surprise announcement. Denmark, she said, will donate all its artillery to Ukraine. She suggested other countries, too, could do more than they already have.

According to Jack Detsch and Robbie Gramer of Foreign Policy, Frederiksen’s announcement “left attendees grappling with some existential questions: Are they prepared not just to help Ukraine but also to defend Europe from a possible Russian attack on a NATO country? Are democracies capable of standing up against the threat of territory-grabbing dictatorships like Russian President Vladimir Putin’s?”

Sweden today announced it will donate about $682 million in equipment and cash to Ukraine, its 15th aid package to Ukraine since the 2022 Russian invasion. The European Union today announced it is committing 83 million euros, or about $89 million, in humanitarian aid for those in Ukraine and Moldova affected by the war. Three weeks ago it approved $54 billion in military aid.

There is increasing pressure, as well, to transfer Russia’s frozen assets to Ukraine. On Saturday, February 17, the U.S. Justice Department, which is in charge of a task force called “KleptoCapture,” transferred $500,000 in forfeited Russian funds to Estonia for fixing Ukraine’s electrical transmission and distribution systems. Biden promised more sanctions against Russia on Friday and has again called for House Republicans to pass the national security supplemental bill. 

Indeed, the real elephant in the room is the fact that MAGA Republicans in the House are refusing to commit more U.S. aid. The Institute for the Study of War, a nonprofit research organization, assessed on Sunday that “delays in Western security assistance to Ukraine are likely helping Russia launch…offensive operations along several sectors of the frontline in order to place pressure on Ukrainian forces along multiple axes.” 

MAGA Republicans are refusing that aid although it is popular both in Congress and among Americans at large. A Pew study released Friday, before news of Navalny’s murder broke, showed that 74% of Americans believe the war in Ukraine is important to U.S. interests; 59% say it’s important to them personally. 

House speaker Johnson condemned Putin as “a vicious dictator” over the weekend and said he was “likely directly responsible” for Navalny’s death. But on Monday he posted to Twitter a photograph of him standing alongside Trump, apparently at Trump’s West Palm Beach golf club, flashing a smile and a thumbs-up sign. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has vowed to try to throw Johnson out of the speaker’s chair if he even brings Ukraine funding to the floor. Trump himself referred to Navalny’s murder on Sunday simply by calling it a “sudden death” before launching into an attack on the United States.

On Sunday, former representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) came out and said it: the Republican Party has a “Putin wing.” She said: “The issue of this election cycle is making sure the Putin wing of the Republican Party does not take over the West Wing of the White House.” Conservative pundit Bill Kristol agreed, in italics: “The likely nominee of one of our two major political parties is pro–Vladimir Putin. This is an astonishing fact. It is an appalling fact. It has to be a central fact of the 2024 campaign.”

Russian authorities have cracked down on those expressing sorrow for the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny and are refusing to hand over his body to his mother and lawyer, who flew to the penal colony north of the Arctic Circle to reclaim it, saying they need to keep the body for “chemical analysis.”

Meanwhile, a Russian who defected to Ukraine last year has been killed in Spain, and Russian authorities have arrested for “treason” a dual Russia-U.S. citizen who lives in Los Angeles as she traveled in Russia after having participated in pro-Ukraine rallies.

Putin is facing an election next month, and he may have intended the murder of Navalny to frighten other opponents and intimidate Russian voters. But it is possible it had the opposite effect. 

Yesterday, Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, stepped into his place, saying: “Putin didn’t only kill Alexei Navalny as a person. He wanted to kill our hope, our freedom, our future. But the most important thing we can do for Alexei and for ourselves is to go on fighting. I will continue Alexei Navalny’s work. Continue to fight for our country. I call on you to stand alongside me. To share not only the grief and unending pain that has enveloped us and won't let go. I also ask you to share the fury and hate for those who dared to kill our future. I speak to you in the words of Alexei, in which I believe truly: There is no shame in doing little. There is shame in doing nothing. In allowing them to scare you…. By killing Alexei, Putin has killed half of me. Half of my heart and my soul. But I have another half and it tells me that I don’t have the right to give in.”

Today she urged the European Union not to recognize the results of Russia’s March election, saying that “a president who assassinated his main political opponent cannot be legitimate by definition.”  

In the U.S., there has not been any apparent move from House Republicans to come back into session to approve the national security package. Indeed, Trump appears to be strengthening his hand over the mechanics of the Republican Party, with the state parties he salted with loyalists lining up behind him, supporters in Congress killing legislation at his demand, and lawmakers who are interested in actually making laws exiting Congress out of fear or frustration. 

But the apparent support of MAGA Republicans for Putin is unlikely to play well in the U.S. Today, Republican candidate for president Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina, tricked the Fox News Channel into covering live what she said was a major speech, likely leading producers to think she was withdrawing. Rather than doing so, she came out swinging with an attack on Trump. 

Aaron Rupar of Public Notice recorded her comments, spoken with the backdrop of the past week in everyone’s mind. Americans “deserve a real choice,” she said, “not a Soviet-style election where there's only one candidate and he gets 99 percent of the vote.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Morgan Stephens at Daily Kos:

Behind the scenes, President Joe Biden’s team has been preparing for his big final weeks in office, regardless of who won the 2024 election. “The schedule will be robust and he plans to leave it all on the field,” White House communications director Ben LaBolt told NBC News in September.  During his speech to the nation last Wednesday, Biden addressed some of his administration’s final priorities, including a focus on infrastructure spending, which was a major legislative accomplishment of his presidency. "We're going to see over a trillion dollars' worth of infrastructure work done, changing people's lives in rural communities and communities that are in real difficulty," the president said.  In addition to getting infrastructure projects off the ground before Trump takes office, White House advisers said Biden will also work to safeguard freedoms the president believes are under threat, strengthen global alliances, and take steps to reduce costs for Americans.

[originalleftist]

Russia blew up a ship carrying humanitarian for Palestine.

"The strike, which killed eight people and injured another 11, hit a Panama-flagged civilian vessel and damaged its cargo of aid. It was the third Russian attack against a civilian vessel in four days.

The U.N. had delivered an order for the aid to be sent to Palestine.

"Ukraine, despite the war, supplies products for 400 million people around the world," said Agriculture Minister Vitalii Koval."'

Russia's attacks on civilian shipping from Ukraine aren't just attacks on Ukraine- they're an attack on the entire world, in particular poorer nations who often rely on Ukrainian grain.

But hey, I'm sure the "pro-Palestinian" Tankies who also love Putin and its Iranian allies because they're against "the West" will not be silent about this. Right?

Any time now, guys.

[stil-lindigo]

DONATE THROUGH PAYPAL

DONATE THROUGH VENMO

Safebow, led by raindovemodel over on instagram, is a grassroots team currently doing their best to evacuate almost 200 Palestinian individuals from Gaza.

To do this, they had to raise over $300,000 in a very short amount of time. Amazingly, they not only raised that amount, but surpassed it to the point that they'll now be able to buy prosthetics for the hospitals they work with.

However, Gofundme has thrown a spanner into the work by going completely silent and holding up over half of their funds.

They are on a time crunch as they desperately try to recoup their money before the border closes. Please donate to their Paypal, Venmo or Zelle. Their window of success is genuinely a matter of days.