House approves nearly $14.5 billion in military aid for Israel. Biden vows to veto the GOP approach

Cut spending on the DEA? That would cut the size of government which Democrats will never do. Democrats have had plenty of opportunities to legalize marijuana but they haven’t. Why?

 

Your argument is not reality-based:
1) McCarthy did not "abandon the Republicans' side." He negotiated for as much as he could get, for that side. You seem to believe that if he had simply held out, he would have got Biden to cave 100%, to his opening position. As I said, this idea of yours, is not connected to reality. Name one time, when this ever happened.
2) McCarthy had the blessing of Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who wanted no responsibility for trying to please the unruly Freedom Caucus, who were not even together, amongst the 20 of them, as to what they wanted.
3) The compromise deal that McCarthy negotiated, was generally seen as having done as well as was reasonable to expect, for the minority party, out of the White House, and with only a bare majority in one chamber of Congress. Remember, not only the Prez, but the Senate Dems needed to go along, to get any concessions. The Republican House leaders on both sides of the aisle, signed off, in support of this deal. It also enjoyed bipartisan approval, by the whole Senate.
4) There is no "skipping ahead," to do. What I just summarized, is where we still sit: both the Senate & the President, are ready to approve the deal, that was thought to have been set. For that matter, there should be sufficient support even in the House, to pass appropriations bills, based on this agreement but, for some stupid reason, Democrats had joined just 6 Republican objectors, to prevent bringing the Defense appropriations bill, to the floor. I don't remember the reason, but I might guess it was because it did not include Ukraine funding: so, more Democratic overreach, overestimating the strength of their position.

The sensible way forward, now, would be to adhere to this pre-arrangement. I do not expect, however, Speaker Johnson will do this.

 

I thought the Supreme Court made Marijuana legal in all 50 states just a few short years ago, in a case that is similar to the Row-v-Wade ruling. With the way that the Supreme Court overturned Row with the Trump judges, I think that Dems don't want to risk bringing that up right now.

 

I have no more interest in debating with you if you are going to question the reality of my arguments. I have looked a few moves ahead in this game and see where it's all going. Like a board game, one doesn't have to play to the last move to understand the reality of the situation we are in.

As far as your #4 point, the Republicans wanted to block the defense bill because the military was paying the traveling expenses for its soldiers to get out-of-state abortions if they were stationed in states that banned abortion.

 

It is not merely populist, it is righteous. The United States of America is not the World Congress, it is the US Congress, with US Representatives. To the extent any foreign aid is doled out, we should be switching places with the EU: We should be the arm of humanitarianism, and the EU/Ukraine should defend themselves in a war that is basically over the same European land mass, as it was a century ago.

The Israel/Gaza thing is even more infuriating. It's basically two ethnoreligious states, and we've historically been at the tilt of one(Israel) because the evangelional Christians mistake political policy for religious scripture. But even if we weren't overly linked with the Israelis, Hamas and the entire structure of the Palestinian government is also unacceptable.

And who started this mess? Our good friends, the United Kingdom(1917). The INTL community is an obstacle for the US to overcome.

 

Democrats have no problem giving well over 100 billion to Ukraine.

Did they just pluck that off the money trees?

 

What can I say, if you relate things, that are factually inaccurate? I will express it that way, then, and I apologize for my phrasing of, "reality-based." No personal insult, had been intended.

As for the military appropriations bill, as I had stated, every House Republican voted to bring it to a floor vote, except 6. That was all that was needed though, combined with all the Democrats, to prevent a vote. I actually don't blame McCarthy for having been mad at Democrats for doing this, when he was giving them an opportunity to pass a bill, conforming with the deal he'd made with Pres. Biden, which is what the Democrats wanted. Unfortunately, they can suffer a milder form of the "never enough" disease of the Freedom Caucus, in often thinking they can get a better deal, when they can't. So they had probably voted this down, I had guessed, because it did not include Ukraine aid, which McCarthy was choosing to do separately, just in order to get this bill swiftly passed.

So, the Republicans, in general, did not kill this bill-- it was only 6 of them, along with the Dems (who'd erroneously thought that they could do better). And, among those Repubs, were some who were set on removing McCarthy, so were going to vote down just about anything he tried to do. Now, if you have a source, verifying that among those 6, the military abortion travel policy was the issue leading to their vote to not bring the bill to the floor, I would appreciate your sharing that link. Even so, though, it would seem misleading to me for you to say that "Republicans wanted to block" the bill, when we could not be talking about more than 6 members, at the most, which is not enough to block anything, on their own.

I suspect that you may be mixed up. It is one Republican Senator, Tommy Tuberville, who has taken up this issue, and has been blocking any officer promotions, in our military. The total number he has now held up, is rather large, and military officials have complained about this causing a national security crisis. In fact, Republican Senators, have just started speaking out against this, also, on the Senate floor.

Of course, none of this has anything much to do with the new Speaker, who I thought was the subject of the conversation.

 

If you are interested in a very good article on the relation between Israel and Ukraine, and explaining why Speaker Johnson does not belong anywhere near the gravel, with his poor grasp of the importance of the moment, then here is a link. The article should have no pay wall, though it would not let me copy it. Almost just as well, though, because I would have wanted to copy most of it.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/02/opinion/israel-gaza-hamas.html

If you want to shorten the read, you can actually skip the first 3 paragraphs, to begin where it says "Thank goodness Johnson was not the Speaker during World War Two."

 

sounds like Republicans would never do that to me

 

I didn't explain because it was a strawman argument. I never said I didn't WANT it to pass, I said it will not pass without the other part. It has nothing to do with that I want, but I did explain why it will not pass, and I should not have had to do that because the answer was so obvious.

In the coming 10 yrs. They were estimated to collect $500B per year in uncollected taxes, so of course pseudo-cons such as yourself oppose it. It would make tax evasion more difficult.

 

Europeans do defend themselves. Ukraine is taking heavy losses, and Western Europe is helping, - more that us as a matter of fact.

Sure, blame the limies.

 

Just as it should be. Their war, their fight. I wish them all the best, but I prefer US taxpayer dollars going to Americans. Not much taxing the rich does if it goes to the coffers of war,right?

 

As you wish. I support heling Israel, Ukraine and other allies.

 

Good, I hope MTG gets her way and no money will be given to the war in Ukraine and Israel. If Biden really wanted to prevent escalating the war in Israel he'll stop giving aid to Israel and Palestine.

 

Please explain why it will not pass unless it's bundled with Ukraine and Gaza aid. Is it because the only way some Senators will vote for Israel aid is if Ukraine is included? I'm trying to follow the policy reason (or even the political reason) for that and you didn't exactly provide it. Try again.

As for the IRS nonsense, your comments of "so of course pseudo-cons such as yourself oppose it," is simply absurd. I'm open to cutting spending somewhere else or even raising taxes for it. If it's THAT important, we should pay for it, agree?

 

A vast majority of Republicans in the Senate oppose said bill, including Sen. Mitch McConnell. Not every day where the Senate Majority and Minority leaders agree on how bad a bill is.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/31/politics/senate-gop-split-israel-aid/index.html

 

Based on the CBO.

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/...t is $26 billion.,Office (CBO) said Wednesday.

 

Looks like our reps are getting a fantastic Christmas bonus this year..

 

Interesting. Any idea why Republican senators oppose aid to Israel?

 

I know it's based on the CBO. That does not engender confidence. The CBO has been wrong about Bush's Medicare Prescription plan, Obamacare, and virtually every tax plan. But as I said, if you don't like IRS cuts, make others instead. How about Biden's energy subsidies?

 

Some more inconvenient facts about which party is for weed reform.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/cannabis-reform-dead-congress-objections-032025415.html
Cannabis Reform Dead In Congress After Objections From Republicans

https://www.jsonline.com/story/news...edical-and-recreational-marijuana/7239866002/
Republicans in the Legislature won't legalize medical or recreational marijuana, the leader of the state Senate said Thursday.

 

Israel has a great economy… we don’t n ed to give them anything … I have no problem though with selling them the resources that they need … they have been on Uncle Sam’s teat for far too long …

 

What is the ROI for the proposed spending? ROI for American taxpayers that is. We have given Israel more than 260 Billion over the years. The Republican party claims to be against domestic welfare, wants to cut SNAP benefits, medicare coverage and the like, but for other countries they hand out welfare and spend money like drunken sailors.

 

Well deserved I’m sure. Not!

 

Then let Joey live with his failure. No compromise Joe is bad for the nation!