The disgraceful behavior of the Speaker of the House and the GOP, regarding aid to Ukraine
The disgraceful behavior of the Speaker of the House and the GOP, regarding aid to Ukraine
The GOP just can't shake their Russian and oligarch addiction.
Introduction
So TAT friends, it turned out to be a blessing that my substack, was one of those affected by a couple hours of outage yesterday. It gave me a chance to sleep on this article, to avoid a mini rant. Today, let’s calmly walk through this treasonous, continuing behavior by the GOP, as it pertains to Russia.
This week, the list of 70 Republican members of the House of Representatives voted with disgraced Florida congressman, Matt Gaetz to vote to shut down all aid to Ukraine. This represents a full 1/3 of the GOP controlled House. Yes, the slim majority of the GOP in the House and led by Speaker McCarthy, is still dominated by the MAGA crowd who openly support what benefits Russia, and a global cabal of US and foreign oligarchs. They also refuse to support US constitutional and founding principles that have seen our nation become the victims of anti-constitutional Christian Nationalists, from Mainstreet through the US Supreme Court.
The entire issue, in the Trump era and beginning with Newt Gingrich’s tenure as Speaker of the House a few decades ago, is a story far too long to write about, here today. I have written in-depth often on most of the topics and with countless embedded links to the most credible sources. I will embed those links here today as I tell of the current national security threats supported by their very recent behavior. As always, I don’t do this for partisan reasons. As the name of this publication clearly states, I tell the truth about national security threats and through the lens of my decades of experience in the national security community.
It would require a two-volume set of books to write the entire story but today, we’ll hit the highlights or more accurately, the lowlights. I’ll weave the following three issues together in order to give as coherent narrative as possible regarding this extremely complex threat.
Aid to Ukraine
Addiction of the GOP to Russia
Who pays the GOP to continue destroying American democracy
Part I, Aid to Ukraine
Like a great many Americans and when threats arise, I’m someone whose family tradition includes serving our nation in uniform. Even the mention of defaulting on the most basic of American patriotic principles to serve liberty for our nation and our allies, runs the risk of triggering my core values. When it includes all that, I’ll discuss today that trigger can be powerful and most certainly will elicit a response. As noted at the beginning, I’ve learned to sleep on these responses in order to professionally tell their story.
Even before Trump’s Russian assisted ascension to the White House, Trump was already and openly supportive of a much closer relationship with Putin. Most Americans could never have envisioned that his support of Putin would be deferential to the point of treason. Now we know, not only was it treasonous but it was on a level that presented the biggest threat to American and global democracy since WW II.
The following graphics are screenshots taken from the 966 pg. Volume V of SSCI, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Their three- and half-year investigation, supported by reporting and analysis from the finest of American Intelligence, filled five volumes and with the CI/ Counterintelligence report, the fifth being the most damning. A couple of their findings are in the following screenshots.
These five screenshots only show what was being investigated and not the havoc that Trump would wreak over the course of his singular term in office. Yes, it gets far worse from here.
Also, it’s important to insert here, the role of the NRA in assisting Russia’s influence campaign against the US. They were not only the mechanism that helped provide funding to GOP political candidates and Trump from donors and Russia, but were the mouthpiece of some of the most heinous conspiracy theories and lies, still part of GOP ideology.
Russia and the Soviets before them operated in influence against the US and the West, specifically NATO nations during the Cold War in order to weaken the Article V portion of the NATO Treaty. The methodology they used is called “Active Measures.” Article V has been for decades, the single biggest deterrent against Soviet and now, Russian aggression. Hence, Trump once in office sought to undermine and eventually remove the US from NATO.
Now, with Putin’s genocidal invasion of Ukraine, we can clearly see how Trump’s subservience to Putin’s needs, could have left Ukraine defenseless. In short, it is a forgone conclusion by nearly all US and allied intelligence agencies, that had Putin recovered Ukraine, other European nations would have been next, especially in Eastern Europe. Had Trump remained president, US inclusion in the NATO alliance would probably been over. This means Russian aggression would have been far harder to repulse.
The GOP supported Trump blindly in his endeavors to weaken NATO, cooperate with Putin and to expand American Oligarchy into an even more dominant force of American politics. The problem is, all of this not only flies in the face of American ideals, but also weakens our democracy to the point of annihilation. The armed rebellion, coup, insurrection or whatever name you wish to apply to January 6th, was intended to convert our democracy into an authoritarian nation. Trump and his descendants would become a Putin-styled oligarchy, that impersonates democracy.
Yes, the GOP supported all of this and as we can see from the Matt Gaetz crowd and Speaker McCarthy’s subservience to them, they continue to do so.
By the end of his term, Trump had already handed over our Kurdish Allies to ruthless Russian and Syrian thugs, and concurrently their oil resources. Putin was smiling all the way to the bank. He had weakened NATO significantly and had destabilized all of our allies and partners around the world. He preferred a close relationship with other authoritarians like Modi, Bolsonaro, Orban, Kim Jung Un, Marine le Pen etc.
The points above are intended to show just how deeply that the current version of the GOP kowtowed to Trump who was kowtowing to Putin. Now that Putin is perpetuating his massive war crimes against an innocent Ukraine, the GOP still seeks to further Trump and Putin’s wishes by shutting down aid to Ukraine. There have been countless votes and floor speeches in Congress, including by the now Speaker, Kevin McCarthy about stopping or reducing aid to Ukraine. No one benefits from this but Putin and tangentially, China.
There are no serious and experienced intelligence analysts that don’t see aid to Ukraine as not only critical to US and Allied security but also that any aid the that we provide as a “cents on the dollar” investment. In other words, continued support for Ukraine, regarding Russian aggression, is a bargain considering how much it would cost had we had to do this ourselves, even with NATO.
The risk that few talk about here in the US, is who funds these GOP elected officials serving Putin, Oligarchs and the undermining of American democracy? This is made more of a threat with the current SCOTUS that enables oligarchy that they euphemistically call, “business friendly.”
I’ll begin with the oil and gas industry. No, I’m NOT talking about the hard-working men and women of the industry. but the unethical exploitation of America’s power over US and global systems, by a massive investment from the Board Rooms of the globe’s biggest producers. Yes, there are plenty of reasons that oil, and gas overwhelmingly favor the GOP and it’s the financial gain of the Boards, shareholders and their Wall Street financiers. Their support, to be blunt, is much of the reason that the rest of us are at the mercy of not only US producers, but that of the OPEC and OPEC + members too.
The current Saudi government, their Gulf allies, all big Oil producers like Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Conoco, Phillips, Midland Energy and even Russia and Iran, are the big benefactors of production cuts, dictated largely by Putin and the Saudis. If you’re angry at prices at your local gas station, look no further than US producers and their OPEC buddies, especially Russia and the Saudis. This is why you always see the GOP blaming politics for high prices. They are obfuscating their deep and subservient role to big oil. Don’t even get me started on big oil’s significant responsibility for climate change disasters.
Now, lets see how much that the oil and gas industry supports the GOP vs. the other side of the aisle in this link from the folks at Open Secrets. There are seven graphics in the link to open secrets, but I have selected the one below as an excellent example of who supports the un-American and unconstitutional agenda of the current GOP.
It’s not just Oil and Gas though, it’s a plethora of other industries like big pharma, real estate investors, financial institutions, Wall Street etc. To be fair, most corporations have long doled out donations to candidates, issues and both political parties. Since SCOTUS decided the Citizens United case in 2010, there has been an explosion of dark money that “buys elections.” American democracy never was intended to be purchased. Just an early sign that parts of our SCOTUS have long been influenced by mega donors.
In full disclosure, using big oil and gas as a prime example, is due to living in Texas. Big oil owns Greg Abbott and the TX GOP. It is they, more than any other industry that is at fault for thirty years of decline in national ratings for the critical issues like; justice, equitable access to voting, healthcare, education, teen pregnancy, rape, income disparity, freedom from religious oppression and far more. For thirty years, the GOP has exclusively run TX but still claim beyond reason, that it’s the other party that is responsible for their failure.
Abbott, funded largely by big oil and gas as well as other oligarchical industries and persons, is now competing with DeSantis in a race to the bottom, to be the Trumpiest of all. If the GOP cannot be shaken loose from their minority perch but with outsized political power, American democracy will as they say, “go the way of the dodo bird.”
Political donations have sadly always been a critical issue for democracies. It’s one reason that I despise all big money politics. What I won’t keep silent about though is when a party becomes a serious threat to democracy, and in our current era that is exclusively the GOP.
Summary
I am grateful for everyone who’s made it through this long TAT. I have tried to be succinct but as noted at the beginning, this is a complex threat that I have tried to narrow down to three related, primary issues. As mentioned, I don’t support any party because I despise what the US Supreme Court has allowed in order to enable profiteering in politics at most citizens’ expense. I believe it contrary to American, democratic principles to allow oligarchy to flourish.
Only one party, the current, MAGA dominated GOP though, is a threat. If we can resist the oppressive system that the GOP wishes to impose on all of us, we can then start taming the issues that allowed them to wield minority power over the majority, like radical gerrymandering, Jim Crow 2.0 voting laws like here in TX, tax benefits for the 1% while the rest of us pay their way and the kowtowing to other global extremist authoritarians like Putin, Xi, Orban, Modi etc.
If you are willing, there are plenty of links embedded in this article that can offer you faith, that what I am opining about, is legitimate. I’m merely standing up for our founding principles that have served us well for 247 years. If we continue to hand over our democracy to oligarchs and powermongers, those principles will be replaced that denies us our founding principles and only benefitting the 1%. They only care for their own selfish wants, not the principles that sustain a freedom loving nation.
America’s draw to immigrants from places under authoritarian rule, has always been the founding principles our nation was founded upon and with a few exceptions have protected. With Christian nationalists, oligarchy enabling by SCOTUS, a strong, MAGA presence that owns the GOP and foreign influence by thugs like Putin who is supported by that same GOP, our democracy is at significant risk. It is every citizen’s duty to stand up for our nation when presented with such threats. Most Americans do this, but it cannot be done by partisanship. Loyal Republicans who put party over country must see that they have been duped and led down a dangerous, suicidal path. They also must join the ranks of truly patriotic Americans to end this cruel era of oligarchical/ authoritarian threats.
I’m all in. I would respectfully ask that you join me and millions of others, regardless of party in defending the principles which have brought so much goodness to the world. We haven’t perfected goodness by a long shot, but we are still a powerful and magnetic attraction to those who believe in freedom, equality and morality. That is the nation I believe in and wish to protect for my children and grandchildren. I would imagine that most Americans do too. Let’s unite to save our nation and its illustrious founding principles.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend,
Paul