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  • Justice
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    9 months ago

    Beyond just being a joke/meme post…

    I think he’s saying POTUS controls the military, basically, as commander in chief.

    So in theory there’s very little stopping the one person with that power from ignoring the other branches thus negating the checks and balances.

    SCOTUS has been ignored before most infamously by Genocider in Chief Andrew Jackson. That resulted in him getting what he wanted with zero consequences.

    I’m not sure of a time when POTUS leveraged the military against congress. That may not have happened… yet. But the presidents have definitely consistently been ignoring congress’ constitutional responsibilities and, I suppose duty?, to actually pass bills to allow for authorization of wars/conflicts of any type.

    In theory the president is supposed to get some leniency until congress approves a spending bill and shit to authorize and pay for the war. Now days, and since WWII basically, congress just passes a massive fucking DoD funding bill and the president has control over all that shit with a thin veil of congressional oversight. I mean we see right now that congress has so far refused to pass this Ukraine/Israel funding bill and yet still Biden ships munitions to Israel even while Congress is in the background like “hey! We have to authorize that!” But who is stopping him? Who can or will? 🤔

      • Justice
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        9 months ago

        I tend to take Biden at his word with his desire to want to fund Ukraine. His intentions aren’t pure, but I also don’t think he’s moved on from it either.

        It’s just a material question I’d imagine… also a political one. He views resupplying Israel as priority number one. Ukraine is much further down that list. If he has 10K bombs ready to ship he wants Israel to get all 10K. No splitting.

        It’s honestly just sad from a Ukrainian perspective. I mean sure they should’ve seen this coming, but for it to happen so openly. Imagine being Zelenskyy right now. The US literally is shoving every bomb they can into the hands of Israel to continue their project of totally leveling all of Gaza. A completely unnecessary objective from a military standpoint (ignoring the morality, since clearly Biden is deeply immoral). And from the Ukrainian standpoint they just see Israel leveling their neighbor, getting resupplied, meanwhile Putin is taking territory and saying “negotiate with me now because this will only get worse for you” and the Nazis in his own country are like “negotiate with Putin and we will kill you.” I mean, gotdamn.

        But anyway, I think Joe does still care about funding the war there (not for any sort of noble reasons, imagined or real). But it’s just so far down on his list that it doesn’t even register.

        Also there’s bipartisan nearly 100% congressional support, ultimately, for the US writing blank checks to Israel and sending everything we can. Congress will only raise complaints to maintain that illusion of legitimacy, but everyone, including Israel, knows that the bombs and money won’t be stopped. Not by this president and probably not by Trump either. Ukraine is a totally different discussion and who knows if they’ll even get another resupply and cash drop. Probably, but who knows.

        • TreadOnMe [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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          9 months ago

          To put some interesting spin on your theory, Joe cares about funding the war in Ukraine with money, not with bombs, because it is highly likely that there are quite a few high level Democrats who get a bunch of funding both personal and political, by laundering it through Ukraine. I’m pretty sure that is why the Republicans oppose it. It’s a political opposition based on both wanting a taste of the lucre and not wanting to have the Democrats be funded through even more means (besides the fact that it makes them look silly when they fail to pass bills).

          The Epstein connection, Panama Papers (I think it was that or other one) and shenanigans with Hunter, indicate to me that there are alot of monetary ties to Ukraine for the Democrats, if we assume that what we know about is just the tip of the iceberg. But the bombs have to go to Israel because that is our actual military outpost in the Middle East, if we lose it or they break ties and go over to Russian influence (which is not out of the question) that is absolutely devastating to the whole of U.S. foreign policy, regardless of party. Abandoning Israel is probably one of the only things that is liable to get you shuffled off-stage one way or the other in U.S. politics.