Biden would veto any Israel-only aid bill, White House says

Wilshire@sopuli.xyz to Ukraine@sopuli.xyz – 256 points –
Biden would veto any Israel-only aid bill, White House says
thehill.com
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Good. It's shameful this is even a problem. But bundling the two ensures the Ukraine aid will not get stuck.

This is the best summary I could come up with:


National security spokesperson John Kirby on Thursday made clear that President Biden would veto a bill that includes only funding for Israel’s war against Hamas if it were sent to his desk instead of a combination aid package he’s proposed that would also help Ukraine.

I think we have made that clear,” Kirby said when pressed on if Biden would be against a clean Israel funding bill.

House Republicans have unveiled a bill that would provide $14.3 billion in aid for Israel, in exchange for cuts to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that were one of several hallmarks of the president’s Inflation Reduction Act.

The White House has previously said Biden would veto that package, but Kirby’s comments suggest Biden would veto any package that only funds Israeli’s battle against Hamas, the militant group that carried out terrorist attacks Oct. 7, and not other aid as well.

Officials have said there doesn’t need to be offsets to pass a supplemental funding bill and, in its earlier veto threat, asserted the GOP proposal marks a break from bipartisan precedent by seeking funding cuts as part of an emergency national security package.

The White House last month outlined a roughly $106 billion national security supplemental funding request that included money for Israel and Ukraine, which is fighting off invading Russian forces, as well as investments in the Indo-Pacific, humanitarian aid and border security measures.


The original article contains 290 words, the summary contains 230 words. Saved 21%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Give up robust tax enforcement while spending ourselves into the grave. Our officials are morons.

I want to know why did the Democrats vote to remove the old speaker. Why did they throw away someone that would work with them for a unknown and now someone that is willing to duck over the world to get what he wants.

I didn't know about all the backstabbing that McCarthy did, thanks to the ones that explained it.

Republicans, specifically Matt Gaetz, voted to remove McCarthy. It's not Democrat's responsibility to vote for Republicans.

Wrong. Gaetz started the voting process and Dems could have voted no to keep McCarthy.

This particular comment of mine is not saying they should have.

This is such a dishonest argument. You're nothing more then a troll.

Can you explain to me why it's dishonest? I believe I'm just stating facts.

Edit: What I mean is that I just corrected what OP wrote.

It's dishonest because the Republicans both initiated the vote to remove McCarthy and had the numbers to reelect him. While you are correct democrats could have voted for McCarthy, I'm not really sure why they should/wpuld as he had already reneged on budgetary issues - https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4047677-democratic-leader-accuses-mccarthy-of-reneging-budget-deal-biden/

Jesus Christ, am I on Reddit right now? The guy is spitting facts and getting lectured and downvoted. Are liberals really this sensitive now? It's mind-blowing to an older guy.

It’s dishonest because the Republicans both initiated the vote to remove McCarthy

This is what I wrote

and had the numbers to reelect him.

This is in accordance with what I wrote: Dems could've reelected McCarthy.

While you are correct democrats could have voted for McCarthy,

Right? And

I’m not really sure why they should/wpuld as he had already reneged on budgetary issues

As I clarified in that comment, I was not saying they should.

So, you're not disagreeing with me, are you? I therefore don't see why I'm criticized.

The initial comment stated that it was the Republicans who voted McCarthy out. You called that statement wrong, that democrats voted him out. While you could argue semantics about the voting process, this historic event of ousting a speaker was controlled by the republican party. You're claim otherwise is dishonest (misleading) because the democrats acted the way the minority party always acts for speaker votes, meaning the Republicans knew what the outcome of the vote would be.

It would be the same as saying democrats were the ones responsible for the initial election of McCarthy taking so long. While they didn't vote for him, that's not new or surprising, the surprising thing was Republicans inability to agree on a speaker (and thus making them the ones primarily at fault for failing to elect a speaker). To state otherwise is misleading because you are purposefully ignoring important details.

This simply isn't true. The minority party, GOP or Dem have been known to support speakers of the opposite party when it suited their purposes.

Look at any of the elections since 2001 (and probably well before). Not a single vote (at least that I saw) for the opposition from either party - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Speaker_of_the_United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections

This is why you're getting down voted, it's not about what politics it's that you aren't giving correct information.

Nah, the downvotes are weird partisanship. The rest of the world knows that these parties sometimes cut deals on speakers.

https://time.com/6320202/house-democrats-refused-save-kevin-mccarthy/

On Tuesday, Democrats voted unanimously alongside Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida and seven other GOP members to remove McCarthy as Speaker. Despite talk over the weekend that some Democrats might cut a deal with McCarthy to save him, the Speaker ultimately refused to offer members of the opposition party any concessions, leaving Democrats united against him. In the narrowly divided House, only a handful of Republicans needed to join Democrats to create the majority needed to win the vote.

I understand what you say, but in this particular instance I'd like to live with the view that both semantics holds, due to the following criterion on my side.

The perception by some newspaper I read outside the US was that Gaetz & co. was a small minority rightwing and everybody didn't want to play his childish game.

You say it was predictable that Dems would vote against a Republican Speaker, and that indeed turned out to be the case. However, at the same time Dems essentially voted together with Gaetz and that was a bit surprising to me and that newspaper.

Ah, that last paragraph really helps explain your viewpoint. While you could argue that Dems voted "with" Gaetz against McCarthy, they certainly didn't vote for the same people for speaker. The real problem here is that while US, by law (as in laws officially recognize a two party system), is a two party system this situation is best understood from a 3 party perspective (Maga, Republicans, democrats).

The Republicans need the Maga votes to form a coalition to elect a speaker, democrats would prefer their coalition gets to elect a speaker. When you understand all of the chaos is the republicans and Maga Republicans fighting over power in their "coalition" it's easier to understand everyone's behavior.

With that context none of this has been surprising and many people were expecting a Maga republican to call the speaker vote at some point. It also reinforces the concept that this is more about republican infighting rather than anything going on with the democrats.

Just like in parliamentary systems, one coalition isn't going to vote for the other without some concessions. Republicans weren't willing to concede anything to democrats and thus had to cater to the Maga Republicans (which is why most wouldn't put blame on democrats in this scenario).

It's an intellectually deficint argument. You know the gop called the vote and yet you want to act like this has anything to do with the democrats. The only reason you are pushing this "point" is to try to both sides this bullshit. You are doing nothing but attempting to push a narrative, a lazy one that no one is buying btw.

Wait, it's not like OP criticized Trump and I said "but Hillary".

The OP's argument was wrong. It was not Mat Gaetz' "vote". Dems did choose to oust McCarthy.

That's not "both side". I just corrected OP.

Edit: the context is that Rs votes split exactly as expected. Dems knew the expectation and chose to oust McCarthy. That's a fact.

Edit: the context is that Rs votes split exactly as expected. Dems knew the expectation and chose to oust McCarthy. That’s a fact.

This can NOT be serious. This argument is on the same level as "I didn't punch him, I was just swinging my arms wildly and they put their face in the path of my fist". Are you actually 5 years old, or just pretending?

@Tar_alcaran @bedrooms

Who has the majority in the House?

The Republicans.

End of story.

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As I wrote, Rs against McCarthy didn't reach majority.

So, would you please take back that insult? Should I explain further what you don't understand here?

Let me flip your argument: US conservatives always knew there would be roughly 212 democratic votes against anything they do.

Why would they, with 221 votes in their side, do something like this? If they didn't want this to happen, why would conservatives take this action?

Why do democrats have to clean up conservative messes? Why can't they be adults and act responsibly?

Can you explain to me why my comment equated to "I didn’t punch him, I was just swinging my arms wildly and they put their face in the path of my fist"?

I don't see how.

Conservatives started this by starting the vote, by having people like Gaetz in the party without doing anything about it. Conservatives are letting MAGA idiots into their party without issue. Conservatives then start a vote to get rid of someone democrats loathe, and they do exactly what's expected, enabled by a number of conservatives who could easily stop such a vote since they're the larger party.

Then conservatives completely fail to clean up the mess they created. And now you're saying "why would democrats allow us to remove our own speaker? Don't they know everyone gets hurts when we're allowed to do the things we do?"

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Yea, dishonest argument. Peace out.

You're just shouting "dishonest". Can you tell me exactly which part of my text is dishonest? It feels as if you're in tribalism where you label any inconvenient fact as dishonesty and move on to protect yourself.

I did. And I'm done here. Good day.

It is a fact.

Really wish Lemmyverse liberals here weren't exactly as pedantic and defensive as they are on every other social media site.

Well, thank god, I occasionally find someone with reading skills here.

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I have to disagree with that, they had someone that was working with them and they threw it away. If the funding for Ukraine doesn't pass or the gov shuts down I see it as much as the Dems fault as the Repubs.

Everything McCarthy did, he did to please Republicans. Most Republicans privately don't want a shutdown, they know it's electoral poison for the GOP. Especially for Republicans in vulnerable districts, like Boebert (ever wonder why she voted to keep government open? Now you know).

Likewise, apart from a few loudmouths Republicans generally want Ukraine aid - in fact McConnell insists on it - and that's the only reason McCarthy included it.

McCarthy wasn't doing Democrats any favors. On the contrary, he backstabbed Democrats when he thought he could get away with it. No reason for Democrats to support someone like that.

Johnson isn't deaf, Republicans will privately make the same demands to him that they did to McCarthy, he has to do what they want just like McCarthy did, and Democrats know it. Hopefully with less backstabbing this time.

Then you are a useful idiot for Republicans, assuming you're not just a troll.

You have a valid point and these people just seem to miss it because they're too mired in partisanism to see it.

I'm guessing the real explanation here is that the Dems think the Republicans having extremists in charge makes them look like fools and will ultimately be a political win even if it means dealing with this sort term political deadlock.

What's better? Republicans you have to work with or a shot at a majority dem house next time?

You have a valid point and these people just seem to miss it because they're too mired in partisanism to see it.

Except they don't, because McCarthy didn't work with the dems. He quite literally went back on his word and backstabbed them days before he was ousted. Just because he was occasionally ever so slightly less of an obstructionist shitbag does not mean he was good.

Are you seriously asking why the democrats didn't, once again, act like the only adults in the room to clean up the mess the republicans made on purpose?

It's not a valid point because McCarthy didn't work with Democrats on virtually any issue. He repeatedly told Dems to go fuck themselves. Dude was a moron who had no clue how to play politics and somehow thought he could get away with pissing everyone on both sides off. Complete coward.

It's incredible to me that people like you think your opinions are valid when you clearly don't know shit about the issue at hand. It's telling that you pin all the blame on democrats when moderate Republicans could have just as easily cured for a Dem speaker.

The partisanship in here, among what I assume are mostly adults, is monstrously depressing.

I'm tired of the echo chamber the internet people throw to us. They can't even see a point if it has an ounce of anti-norm.

Yeah, but if Ukraine end up unfunded that'd be too big a price.
And I'm not even sure if Dems' naivety this time is working well for Dems.

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Because McCarthy wasn't actually working with Democrats. Simple as that.

This. McCarthy was blaming Democrats for the looming shut down. He didn't work with Democrats or offer anything for their support.

Why didn't a few Republicans vote for the Democrat that was so close to winning the speakership?

The don't want to lose the "escaped mental patient" votes

McCarthy explicitly refused to work with Democrats on the vast majority of issues. The dude was an enormous coward

That may be true but he also would have been voted out by his own party if he had. Honestly, they turned on him as soon as he DID work with Democrats.

Generally when your opponent points a gun at their foot, you don't tell them to stop.

McCarthy was never ally to democrats and if he wanted their vote to save his ass from his own party, he could have easily offered them something in exchange. Like it or not, that's the way politics works.

I'm not sure what they gained, they have two opponents (GOP and MAGA) and empowered the more radical of the two. I think thia would be more obvious in a parliamentary system.

I think their rational, as it was with trump in 2016, is that extreme republicans in power bulster democratic support. I think it's an open question if that's correct, or if they are assisting the rightward slide of american politics and not getting much of what they promised done.

McCarthy was a gigantic coward who couldn't be trusted for anything. The Dems would negotiate with him and the next day he'd turncoat and go back on it. You can't make deals with people like him in politics. He had no strength to say no to the maga crowd.

It's very likely we'd be in the exact same situation today with McCarthy because the man repeatedly caved to maga. Even towards the end of his tenure he was still attacking Democrats even though they were the only people who could save him at that point.

The moron couldn't realize that he had a choice between being a moderate aisle-crosser or a magahead. He tried to choose neither, which resulted in him having zero support, which is why he's out of job now.

If the Democrats had voted to keep McCarthy as the speaker despite McCarthy’s previous record of uncooperation and reneging, it would have signaled to him and the republicans that the democrats can be pushed back further. It would have been a disastrous move politically for the democrats. Remember, McCarthy voted against certifying the election results so he did not have a great record of upholding democratic values and could not be trusted to negotiate in good faith.

Anyone who gets a speaker position in that house is a cunt, no doubt.

Finally something here In this particular comment thread I can agree with 100%. Same goes for a president. After all the shit it took for them to get to this spot, you don’t want them as president.

They thought either they're going to teach a lesson or they'll enjoy the chaos.

I think they achieved both but not in the way they thought.

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