Biden asks for another $21 billion for Ukraine from Congress...

 

Joe Biden. AP. 

Joe Biden has asked congress for another $21 billion for Ukraine from Congress. AP. The money is part of a larger $40 billion bill and includes $13 billion in defense aid and $8 billion in humanitarian aid. The rest would be spent on replenishing disaster relief funds, enforcing the border and fighting fentanyl. The last request for aid passed easily and the new bill has support in the Senate but Republicans in the House are expecting a fight as war weariness has sunken in. Support has dropped nationally with less than 50% of Americans still supporting sending new weapons to Ukraine. 

My Comment:

Notice the trick here? They attached the critical disaster relief fund replenishment and border funding into this bill to fund the Ukraine War. So when Republicans in Congress vote against this bill, which they probably will, Biden can say Republicans are voting against disaster relief, despite the fact that the funding of the Ukraine war is increasingly unacceptable among Americans. 

Indeed, the other parts of this bill are things that the government should actually be spending money on. Nobody is against disaster relief, securing the border and fighting fentanyl but the poison pill is Ukraine aid. Attaching the Ukraine aid to this much needed funding is just as cynical as you can be. 

This is going to be a major problem for Kevin McCarthy. If he doesn't allow this to go to vote he faces the possibility of a government shutdown and will take major criticism from the Senate. If he does allow it, it won't pass without the Democrats and if he cuts a deal with him the Republicans in the house will almost certainly remove him from the leadership. He doesn't have a good option here. 

But I don't think he has much of a choice. People are absolutely sick of this war and don't understand why we are sending billions of dollars to Ukraine when there is so much need for aid here. Almost every American could find a better use of $21 billion that would actually help Americans. Hell, just not borrowing more money to pay for it would be a better use of the money than sending it to Ukraine. 

Even worse is the fact that even people that supported Ukraine in their war against Russia have to admit at this point we are just throwing good money after bad. Ukraine is not winning the war. Their offensive has failed and they suffered absurd casualties and lost three armies by now. This money would be used to build a fourth but what is even the point? Russia is going to win now and that seems to be clear to everyone except our government and the few dedicated NAFO trolls left on Twitter. 

Either way, it will be interesting to see how this fight goes. It may very well be the thing that takes down Kevin McCarthy if it passes. My hope is that the war fever that has gripped America will finally break and we will be able to stop wasting money on a war that none of us wanted in the first place.