Today, we present a guest post written by Jeffrey Frankel, Harpel Professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, and formerly a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. A shorter version appeared at Project Syndicate on January 25th..
January 28, 2024 — Much is difficult to understand about what has happened to one of our two political parties in the US. Among other things, I don’t understand why some Republican congresspeople oppose an extension of US support for the government of Ukraine in its fight against the Russian invasion, and why others who may be in favor of continuing support give it so low priority as to allow their colleagues to block it, by holding it hostage to unrelated Mexican border concerns.
Weighing costs and benefits, backing Ukraine is one of the most sensible US foreign affairs policy priorities in a long time. Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky said earlier this month, “Giving us money or giving us weapons, you support yourself.”
Let’s review some basic history, which is well-known, but of which some in Congress apparently need reminding.
- Two 20th-century cycles
President Woodrow Wilson in 1916 was re-elected on the platform, “He kept us out of war.” This was consistent with the tradition, dating to the founding of the republic, of avoiding “entangling alliances” and refraining from going “abroad in search of monsters to destroy.”
Nevertheless, the US entered World War I the next year, 1917, in large part due to Germany’s resumption of submarine attacks on neutral shipping with an attendant loss of American lives. US troops tipped the balance in Europe. Armistice was declared November 11, 1918. In the Versailles negotiations of 1919, Wilson got the European powers to agree to a new world order embodied in the idealistic League of Nations. But back home in the US, there was a strong return to isolationism and the Senate rejected participation in the League of Nations. Another manifestation of the interwar swing to isolationism was strong tariff protection, which subsequently made the Great Depression worse than it had to be.
In the presidential campaign of 1940, Franklin Roosevelt recognized that the domestic majority was opposed to intervention in World War II and again promised to keep the US out of foreign wars if re-elected. In place of sending American troops to Europe, he responded to an appeal of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill by making the US the “arsenal of democracy,” and sending large-scale material aid to Great Britain, which at the time was standing almost alone against the Nazi war machine. Speaking before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Henry Stimson, Secretary of War, said of the Lend-Lease Act (March 11, 1941), “We are buying our own security.” But a year after Roosevelt’s re-election, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and the US entered the war.
By the end of World War II, Americans had acquired the view (roughly speaking), “We tried to keep to ourselves; but these Europeans just can’t be left to manage affairs on their own, requiring us to intervene militarily twice in 25 years. This time, we will take an active role internationally, so as to make a third cataclysm unlikely.” There followed the Marshall Plan, NATO, the Bretton Woods institutions, the WTO, and the rest of a US-led liberal international order. This approach was spectacularly successful, helping to achieve something virtually unprecedented in global history: eight decades of relative peace and prosperity in most of the world. During this period, there have been very few changes in national borders achieved by force.
- Erratic foreign policy
To be sure, post-war US foreign policy made a lot of mistakes. The US helped many unworthy governments that lacked the support of their own peoples, imagining tests of will against foreign adversaries that were unnecessary. The American inclination to intervene was excessive, under the theory that fighting a small-scale war abroad would preclude a large-scale war later on. Taking two examples, the theory was applied misguidedly to justify military interventions in Vietnam and Iraq. These wars were ill-conceived from the beginning. In Vietnam, the US mistook an anti-colonial independence movement for a test of wills with the Soviet Union and/or China. In Iraq, the US reacted to the September 11 terrorist attacks by lashing out at a country that had nothing to do with them. In neither case was much gained, as the local conditions for a stable, democratic government did not exist. In both cases, the costs of intervention were high, in blood and treasure.
Periodically, as in the 1993 failure of intervention in Somalia and as today, the US pendulum has swung toward the non-interventionist pole. But each time events have eventually forced a return. The US has often sent muddy signals, not just by failing to carry out threats it has made and but also by carrying out interventions that it had neglected to threaten.
- The cost of supporting Ukraine
The main costs of helping Ukraine are budgetary. American liberals sometimes compare, say, the cost of the National Endowment for the Humanities (a total of $211 million in the most recent federal fiscal year) to the cost of a bomber plane ($750 million per single plane, in the case of the B-21 Raider). This is unpersuasive to those who puts little value on the NEH.
But in the case of support for Ukraine, the tradeoff is between competing expenditures in the name of national security. The US has spent a bit over $75 billion helping Ukraine since January 2022. This is not peanuts, but it is less, as a share of GDP, than aid to Ukraine from many European countries, especially Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, who are nearer to Russia. By comparison US military spending in 2022 was $812 billion. The total cost of the Iraq war has been estimated at $2.9 trillion or $3.0 trillion (not to mention the cost of some 500,000 lives). Yet that combat operation arguably contributed nothing to US national security.
Unlike in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq, the Ukrainians support their (democratically elected) government; they are fighting for their country of their own volition. At the same time, the principle that national borders should not be changed by force remains important to everyone’s security globally. Even those who may be relatively skeptical of the efficacy of military force in general, understand the need to oppose such naked aggression as the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939 or the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
There are good reasons for the US to avoid engaging Russia directly — not least, the danger of nuclear war. But all the Ukrainians ask is the means to defend themselves. Is the US only willing to open the taps when it entails the loss of American soldiers or when the link to true national security is tenuous or worse?
This post written by Jeffrey Frankel.
You make a strong case for supporting Ukraine. However, there are benefits that go beyond what you lay out. The greatest benefit of supporting Ukraine now is future cost avoidance. If Ukraine can soundly defeat Russia, Russia will be less reluctant to threaten NATO and others in the world that it perceives as weak enough to defeat. By spending to support Ukraine, we potentially avoid implementing NATO article 5 which requires us to come to the military support of fellow members.
And don’t forget that China and others are watching. If we lose our nerve, they will take it as a sign they can get away with aggression as well. Support Ukraine and the consequences and costs of that outcome will also be avoided.
Jim,
You are completely right. If Russia wins in Ukraine, it might be emboldened to intrude on the Baltic republics next. It is unfortunate that this sort of logic has so often been abused in the past. — JF
@ Professor Frankel
Russia’s Central Bank forecast for Russia GDP 0.5% to 1.5% this year
Russia’s Economic Ministry forecast for GDP 2.3% for the year
IMF GDP forecast: 2.6% this year
i.e. IMF has the most optimistic forecast, more optimistic than Russia’s own internal forecasts. Thoughts??
https://www.ft.com/content/21a5be9c-afaa-495f-b7af-cf937093144d
Do people think I’m being some kinda jerk or sarcastic when I ask these questions?? I thought it was a pretty decent query. That the IMF gave a better projection than Russia’s own propaganda team doesn’t strike people as curious?? Now I know how Ed Tom felt at the very end of “No Country for Old Men”, and the dreams aren’t helping me either.
I’m old enough to remember regular and prolific commenters on this blog with doctorates who said Russia would “never” invade Ukraine.
Good times……
““Helping Ukraine is a National Security No-brainer”’
Yeah, that’s what they said about Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. Remember LBJ’s famous domino theory? And Saddam’s WMDs?
I particularly like this line: “Unlike in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq, the Ukrainians support their (democratically elected) government,” which is why so many Ukrainians decided to leave the country rather than stay and fight.”
Wikipedia: “In July 2023, Reuters reported that due to the refugee outpouring into Western Europe, the population of Kyiv-controlled areas may have decreased to as low as 28 million. This is a steep decline from 2020, when it had a population of almost 42 million people.” Lots more would have fled if the government had not banned men ages 18-60 from leaving the country.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Ukraine
Lots of smart Ukrainians realized that it was in their self interest to flee rather than fight in a pointless and futile US proxy war.
I see you failed to read what Dr. Frankel wrote. Or if you did – your single digit IQ kept you from understanding what was a very good coverage of the pros and cons of US foreign policy over the last century. Even though you truly suck at economics – your ability to grasp foreign policy issues is even worse.
” Remember LBJ’s famous domino theory? And Saddam’s WMDs?”
Yea but here’s the thing dumba$$. Frankel covered these mistakes a lot better than you ever could. You might actually learn something if you ever shut your stupid yap and actually read what smart people are writing. But you won’t as you never cared about having adult conversations.
“Yeah, that’s what they said about Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq.”
Who, pray tell, are “they”? And how is South Korea worse off, how are South Korea’s democratic allies worse off, because of the Korean War?
“Lots of smart Ukrainians realized that it was in their self interest to flee rather than fight in a pointless and futile US proxy war.”
Johnny is lying, again, about Ukraine’s defense against Russian invasion being g a “proxy war”. Ukrainians are defending themselves, their homes, their country. The kernel of Johnny’s final paragraph is that Ukrainians should leave Ukraine to Russia; there can be no clearer evidence that Johnny speaks for Russian interests.
Johnny hasn’t addressed Professor Frankel’s argument. He has dodged it, instead spewing the same old Moscow-approved babbling point.
Russia invaded Ukraine, twice. Russia has committed war crimes in Ukraine. Russia has targeted civilians in Ukraine. The U.S. is not fighting in Ukraine, but is helping Ukrainians to defend themselves. Those are the facts, facts about which Johnny routinely lies.
Did you enjoy how Jonny boy attributed Eisenhower’s domino theory to President Johnson? This is up there with Jonny boy saying Senator McConnell’s filibusters in the Senate are the same as invading Central American nations. Yea – little Jonny boy ain’t very bright.
South Korea should be commended for its evolution towards democracy since 1987…after 35 years of being governed by US-backed dictators.
Since Tricky Ducky is totally ignorant of South Korean history, here’s what happened: “Despite economic growth and success in diplomatic relations, the [Chun] government that gained power by coup d’état in 1979 was essentially a military regime and the public’s support and trust in it was low when the promises for democratic reform never materialized. In the 1985 National Assembly elections, opposition parties won more votes than the government party, clearly indicating that the public wanted a change. Many started to sympathize with the protesting students. The Gwangju massacre was never forgotten and in January 1987, when a protesting Seoul National University student died under police interrogation, public fury was immense. In April 1987, President Chun made a declaration that measures would be taken to protect the current constitution, instead of reforming it to allow for the direct election of the president. This announcement consolidated and strengthened the opposition; in June 1987, more than a million students and citizens participated in the nationwide anti-government protests of the June Struggle.
On 29 June 1987, the government’s presidential nominee Roh Tae-woo gave in to the demands and announced the June 29 Declaration, which called for the holding of direct presidential elections and restoration of civil rights. In October 1987 a revised Constitution was approved by a national referendum and direct elections for a new president were held in December, bringing the Fifth Republic to a close.
The Sixth Republic was established in 1987 and remains the current polity of South Korea. Roh Tae-woo became president for the 13th presidential term in the first direct presidential election in 16 years…Roh was officially inaugurated in February 1988. The government set out to eliminate past vestiges of authoritarian rule, by revising laws and decrees to fit democratic provisions. Freedom of the press was expanded, university autonomy recognised, and restrictions on overseas travels were lifted.”
Democracy started to appear two generations after the Korean War and after 35 years of US-backed authoritarian, mostly military rule. The US’ role in 1988 amount to acquiescing to democratic rule, not fostering it.
Johnny is once again pretending gto read minds. He claims to know what I know. This is quite the joke, since Johnny seems to know so little, but anyway…
So we should ignore South Korea’s current democratic poetical structure and its success in providing for its people, so that Johnny can justify having Russia invade a sovereign country and grab its land? That’s the argument? Good to know.
Jonny boy suggests South Korea was a horrible place before 1987. Now did this lying Know Nothing check its economic growth. FRED might help:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/NGDPRSAXDCKRQ
Huh. Economic growth from 1960 to 1987 averaged 9.5% per year. Horrible. Sheer poverty. Now North Korea flourished during the same period – right? Well in Jonny boy’s little made up world!
Let’s see. Income per capita in Jonny boy’s dream world of North Korea is $1100 per person while income per capita in poverty ridden South Korea is a mere $33,000 per person. You heard that right. Income per capita in South Korea is 33 times income per capita in North Korea.
But no worries – Jonny boy is still getting his daily dose of doggie food in the Kremlin.
An Unpromising Recovery: South Korea’s Post-Korean War Economic Development: 1953-1961
https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/an-unpromising-recovery-south-koreas-post-korean-war-economic-development-1953-1961/
Something you will never get from the moron Jonny boy. An honest accounting of how poorly South Korea developed before 1961 but how the economy boomed after that.
Seriously – as bad as little Jonny boy is with basic economics, he is much worse at history. But you knew that.
Johnny therefore believes that north korea is a fine outcome. Only it should be bigger and more powerful. Well stated johnny. Let us hope for even more north koreas, but let them occur without a fight. Idiot.
“Lots of smart Ukrainians realized that it was in their self interest to flee rather than fight in a pointless and futile US proxy war.”
Such disgusting dishonesty from Putin’s pet poodle. We are talking about children leaving with their mothers. Of course little Jonny boy takes great glee in witnessing Putin’s war crimes where the women and children that could not leave are being murdered and/or raped. Yea – little Jonny boy is truly a sick puppy who gets off on the suffering of the Ukrainian people.
So, pgl, if it was just women and children fleeing, why did the Ukrainian government ban men ages 18-60 from leaving? In “democratic” Ukraine, why couldn’t they decide for themselves whether to volunteer or flee? The claim that “they are fighting for their country of their own volition” is just BS, although I have no doubt that this is still true for some, even as Zelensky sends them into the meat grinder.
“The claim that “they are fighting for their country of their own volition” is just BS”
You are disgusting. Yes they are fighting for their nation. But little Jonny boy would prefer that they just paid down and let Russian soldiers rape their wives and kill their children. Jonny boy’s only pleasure in life.
Actually the majority of those (14 million) didn’t flee, they stayed – and the areas where they lived were taken over by Russian troops. However the set backs for Russia means that a number of them now again are in “Kyiv-controlled areas”. So the majority of these people were in and out of “Kyiv-controlled areas” without ever leaving their homes. And those who did flee into Europe were mostly children and women who didn’t flee to avoid having to fight but to avoid being raped, tortured and murdered.
Russia is the one banning the exodus of men from the country and forcing conscripts through a draft. Russia is sending its people into the meat grinder in a foreign land that is has illegally invaded. But johnny is silent on these crimes of russia.
“But johnny is silent on these crimes of russia.”
Of course Jonny boy cannot be honest here. If he were – the Kremlin would no longer give this pet poodle his dog food.
More about that claim that “Unlike in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq, the Ukrainians support their (democratically elected) government; they are fighting for their country of their own volition.” Yeah, right!
“army recruiters have become increasingly aggressive in their efforts to replenish the ranks, in some cases pulling men off the streets and whisking them to recruiting centers using intimidation and even physical force.
Recruiters have confiscated passports, taken people from their jobs and, in at least one case, tried to send a mentally disabled person to military training, according to lawyers, activists and Ukrainian men who have been subject to coercive tactics. Videos of soldiers shoving people into cars and holding men against their will in recruiting centers are surfacing with increasing frequency on social media and in local news reports.
The harsh tactics are being aimed not just at draft dodgers but at men who would ordinarily be exempt from service…”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/15/world/europe/ukraine-military-recruitment.html
Jonny boy forgets to mention the harsh tactics have used to get Russians to participate in his war crimes. Is Putin giving his little pet poodle extra bones.
JohnH apparently prefers the “more humanitarian” recruiting efforts of Prigozhin’s “Wagner”, which was facilitated by Putin releasing murderers and serial rapists from Russian prisons. This is JohnH’s version of “classy recruiting methods”
JohnH All of the cases you cited (viz., Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq) were examples in which US troops were actively involved in the fighting. That’s not what Ukraine is about. One reason we should support Ukraine doing their own fighting is precisely so US troops won’t have to fight. That’s kind of an important distinction. With someone like Putin any show of weakness just leads to more aggression. Failure to support Ukraine with materiel would tell Putin that the US commitment to Europe is so weak that we likely wouldn’t intervene if he invaded Latvia or Estonia, which would require an even bigger US commitment. If we aren’t willing to pay a small price to defeat Putin’s aggression, they he could rationally concluded that we’re even less likely to pay a much higher price in defending small NATO countries.
It’s a bit ironic that you resurrected the domino theory. The reference to a “row-of-dominoes” originated in a classified policy memorandum regarding the PRC’s blockade of Quemoy in September 1958. Why is it ironic that you chose that phrase? Because the Eisenhower Administration’s handling of the Quemoy crisis is generally considered a successful application of deterrence through coercive diplomacy. So you used an analogy that ended up informing a successful result.
Remember Neville Chamberlain. His attitude was like yours and it didn’t work out so well.
More interesting is the adventure of “hitting” Iran for “its proxies” killing Americans, in Jordan near Syria.
Brent futures, anyone?
Eight years of relative peace, based on a commitment to resist military aggression.
Prudential considerations for the budget – spend enough now to support Ukraine’s defense, and we may avoid much larger expenditures in the future to defend the rest of Europe.
So, yeah, the argument is clear. But it is not a political argument. The political argument is also clear and has no room for principle nor for the national interest. Donald Trump smeared the reputation of Ukraine in an effort to smear Hunter Biden. Trump is an isolationist with a fawning attraction to authoritarian strong men. The Republican party has transformed itself into a party of personality rather than principle, and so mirrors the policy preferences of whomever is the personality of the hour. That personality is, for now, Donald Trump.
Take the border issue as a related example; the Speaker of the House is in lock step with Trump, ignoring his own party’s Senate caucus, ignoring the principled arguments at every turn.
Politics no longer stops at the water’s edge for the Republican Party. Principled arguments don’t carry much weight in Republican politics. It’s that simple.
“Remember LBJ’s famous domino theory?”
Actually this domino theory was expressed by President Eisenhower not President Johnson. But of course little Jonny boy can’t even tie his own shoe laces so how do we expect this moron to get American history?
pgl caught in yet another lie: “As vice president, Lyndon B. Johnson in 1961 endorsed the domino theory without hesitation; he told President Kennedy that the United States must either hold the line in Vietnam and Thailand or pull its defenses back to San Francisco.”
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=lbj+domino+theory&ia=web
Moral of the story? If the US can’t find a national security interest for a pointless and futile quagmire, it will always invent one.
I lied when I said the Domino Theory originated in the 1950’s not the 1960’s. Hey dumba$$, from your first link:
By 1950, U.S. foreign policy officials had firmly embraced the idea that the fall of Indochina to communism would lead rapidly to the collapse of other nations in Southeast Asia. The National Security Council included the theory in a 1952 report on Indochina, and in April 1954, during the decisive battle between Viet Minh and French forces at Dien Bien Phu, President Dwight D. Eisenhower articulated it as the “falling domino” principle: “You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly,” Eisenhower said. “So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.” In Eisenhower’s view, the loss of Vietnam to communist control would lead to similar communist victories in neighboring countries in Southeast Asia (including Laos, Cambodia and Thailand) and elsewhere (India, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, and even Australia and New Zealand). “The possible consequences of the loss [of Indochina],” Eisenhower said, “are just incalculable to the free world.” After Eisenhower’s speech, the phrase “domino theory” began to be used as a shorthand expression of the strategic importance of South Vietnam to the United States, as well as the need to contain the spread of communism throughout the world.
Now little Jonny boy has flunked preK reading for over a decade. Maybe this pathetic troll should spend a little time listening to his teachers.
This should endear American taxpayers to Zelensky and his relentless campaign for ever more money and arms: “Ukraine says it uncovers $40m arms corruption scheme. The Security Service of Ukraine says five charged over plot to embezzle funds earmarked to buy 100,000 mortar shells…an investigation had “exposed officials of the Ministry of Defence and managers of arms supplier Lviv Arsenal, who stole nearly 1.5 billion hryvnias [$40m] in the purchase of shells…investigation had “exposed officials of the Ministry of Defence and managers of arms supplier Lviv Arsenal, who stole nearly 1.5 billion hryvnias [$40m] in the purchase of shells…
“According to the investigation, former and current high-ranking officials of the Ministry of Defence and heads of affiliated companies are involved in the embezzlement,” the SBU said. Don’t you just love those Ukrainians who are “fighting to defend their country” and milk Uncle Sam for all he’s worth?
Of course, rampant inflation has been a feature of the government in Ukraine, even though the BBC said back in 2019, “Corruption in Ukraine has to be stopped” and…an MP noted that “”Fixing corruption in this country is Ukraine’s number one problem, it has to be stopped,” he says.”It’s in the interests of Europe and the whole world and that’s why I urge friends abroad not to back Ukraine’s corrupt leadership but to protect anti-corruption institutions – and free and fair elections.” https://www.bbc.com/news/business-47571043
And then, wouldn’t you know, “DOD Certified that Ukraine Met Corruption Benchmarks!!!” (Of course, DOD can’t account for 60% of their assets, so they are a reliable judge. Talk about the fox guarding the hen house!!!)
Amd then, only four months ago, Politico reported that a “Leaked U.S. strategy on Ukraine sees corruption as the real threat.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/10/02/biden-admin-ukraine-strategy-corruption-00119237
And yet Biden wants to pour $60 million more down the rat hole. And “Senate Democrats blocked watchdog for Ukraine aid–ignoring lessons from Afghanistan.”
https://theintercept.com/2023/08/02/ukraine-aid-special-inspector-afghanistan/
Could politicians in Washington have more at stake in Ukraine than just geopolitical primacy? After all, corruption was a feature, not a bug, of the US’ pointless and futile wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. All that’s missing is for Ukraine to become the world’s leading producer of opium!
“Of course, rampant inflation has been a feature of the government in Ukraine”
Poor little Jonny boy – he can’t bother to check the data. Let’s see – Trading Economics reports their inflation rate at 5% but Russia’s is at 7.4%.
Come on Jonny boy – the folks at the Kremlin love the fact that you lie for them but this kind of utter incompetence makes them angry. Oh I’m sorry – no dog food for you this week!
It seems Jonny boy read the headline of that 2019 BBC article but not the first two paragraphs:
The port of Mariupol in eastern Ukraine has become a symbol in recent months of the country’s economic struggles. A recent partial blockade by Russian naval vessels of the nearby Kerch Strait means that fewer ships are now docking at the harbour. The port has lost 33% of its fleet and up to 140,000 tonnes of exported metal products a month since Russia’s construction of a bridge across the Kerch Strait in May 2018, and restrictions on the size of ships that can pass underneath.
WTF – the story leads with Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and dumba$$ Jonny boy thinks this says Ukraine is corrupt today? Yea Putin’s pet poodle is a mentally retarded moron.
In the make believe world long inhabited by JohnH, he preens proudly as defender of the innocent, those caught up in futile, needless, wasteful wars. Alas, yes, it’s make believe, JohnH created fantasy land where an invading army has every right to seize territory from a sovereign nation while destroying its infrastructure and murdering its women and children.
In his now normal tongue twisting, the invaded are clearly villains, the invaders heroic champions of liberty. Meanwhile, apparently no one notices his blatant hypocrisy and daily lying, JohnH continues to hand wring and call for a negotiated settlement that would award the invaders generous territories in the invaded country.
Given numerous opportunities to voice his opposition to the invasion, JohnH will do no such thing. He’d prefer instead to spin more fairy tales, especially the one where the Ukrainian wolf is a grave danger to Grandma Putin’s house and must be stopped before he blows the house down.
Two additional practical reasons:
1. There has never been a cheaper opportunity to test our weapons and strategies against Russian weapons and strategies. What we have learned about the Russian military (what they do and don’t) and their weapons (what the can and can’t) is easily worth 10% of the US military budget and we have only been spending half of that. What a bargain.
2. Russia is clearly one of our two main adversaries. This war is degrading them, without risking a direct nuclear confrontation. Their power was build on a strong military and huge hydrocarbon incomes to support it. Huge amounts of money will be needed to rebuild and replace just the hardware Russia lost so far- and the shift away from hydrocarbons has been hastened ensuring they will be deprived of the money needed to do that.
Whereas history has show several cases where US failed to take the moral high ground in support of democracy, that doesn’t mean that we can never take the moral high ground. Clearly the people of Ukraine are willing to make huge sacrifices to remain a democrats and we should support that here and now no matter how many times before we failed to do the right thing.
Great piece!
Thank you Professor Frankel – I would argue that the actions of the MAGA/Trump/GOP is not difficult to understand when you consider they are firmly in the back pocket of criminal kleptocrat Putin. Numerous examples – starting with 2016 Russian interference in election to aid Trump https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_interference_in_the_2016_United_States_elections and Trump’s first impeachment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_impeachment_of_Donald_Trump to the GOP constant pushing of Russian disinformation with a private citizen’s hacked laptop (not alone MTG attempts to show the nation her pornographic photo collection) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_Biden_laptop_controversy to Senator “Women are not allowed to get healthcare” Tuberville crippling our military by holding up top level military appointments for months https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/08/12/military-promotions-blocked-tuberville/ Also we have yet to find out/probably never will know details of the great harm Trump caused to nation with stealing of classified documents. As Trump says – it is all about “Russia, Russia, Russia.”
BTW – the top GOP leadership have always known that Putin pays Trump https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/17/putin-pays-donald-trump-kevin-mccarthy-recording
My regular take out the JohnH trash again. In two comments this Putin poodle pretends a couple of things:
(1) He actually claims that the only reason Ukrainian men have stayed to fight for the freedom of their homeland is that the
government mandated that they do. Seriously?
(2) Now it is true that South Korea ended up with a truly democratic government in 1987 but does Jonny bot truly believe North Koreans are better off politically? In terms of economic development, South Korea began doing much better for much longer than that.
Of course we all know little Jonny boy has to spin his trash lest Putin does not give this pet poodle his dog food.
JohnH has become SO CUTE using DuckDuckGo now – I guess Google has not been turning up enough dishonesty for little Jonny boy. Now little Jonny boy claimed I lied when I said it was Eisenhower who first used the term Domino Theory. I just read a history.com link that little Jonny boy’s new search found. I suspect little Jonny boy forgot to read that one as it noted clearly that the Domino Theory idea originated in the 1950’s.
Now maybe Jonny boy may think this was the Kennedy-Johnson years but even the two year olds know this was the Eisenhower-Nixon years. Now it is true that Kennedy increased our presence in Vietnam in 1961 and 1962 but at that point in time LBJ was only VP.
Come on Jonny boy – you do not have to convince us that you suck at history. We know that already. Then again you suck at everthinng.
Putin’s pet poodle JohnH is in full blown smear Zelensky mode. OK, this LIAR has not dusted off the false claim that Zelensky’s wife used aid money to buy a $4.5 million house. But he has dusted off a five year old story about alleged corruption. Maybe little Jonny boy forgot to read the date of the story. And then there’s the story about how Biden and Zelensky are working to make sure corruption does not occur. Got that? Jonny boy wants us to believe they are corrupt because they are ensuring corruption does not occur.
That is up there with Jonny boy’s claim that Ukrainian men do not want to defend their own nation. One has to wonder why these soldiers are doing so well against Putin’s war criminals. Oh wait – Putin is the one forcing Russsian men to fight a war they do not believe in. Of course if little Jonny boy ever admitted that – Putin would cut off his daily doses of dog food.