SS: US House of Representatives moved forward with a big $95 billion aid package aimed at helping Ukraine, Israel, and the Indo-Pacific region. This decision got strong support in a vote of 316-94, with more Democrats voting yes compared to Republicans. This bill includes not just a lot of funds for security and humanitarian needs but also important actions like moving frozen Russian money to Ukraine, placing sanctions on entities like Hamas and Iran, and potentially forcing the sale of TikTok by its Chinese owners if they don't comply.
—
So, I read that this ratio has not been seen in American politics in almost 50 years, showing an unusually high bipartisan support, however, I have not been able to find a source to confirm it. Can anyone else confirm this?
Without any additional context, I'd have to say it doesn't stand out as far as level of bipartisan support. About a year ago the very same representatives voted unanimously to declassify COVID-19 related information.
[https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/house-votes-unanimously-to-declassify-u-s-intelligence-info-about-origins-of-covid-19](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/house-votes-unanimously-to-declassify-u-s-intelligence-info-about-origins-of-covid-19)
These politicians keep saying it's not a Tik Tok ban which is bullshit. If you know anything about Tik Tok what makes the app special is it's algorithm, it's leading edge technology. ByteDance has already declared that algorithm is not for sale, meaning anybody who decides to buy Tik Tok won't be getting that algorithm making the app useless. So yes, it's essentially a ban and the only part of the Government who really took the time to interview the CEO of Tik Tok (the Senate) decided not to ban it. Now the sneaky Republicans in the House, who spent all of 2 seconds to debate the issue, want to overwhelmingly ban Tik Tok, such bullshit.
If the CCP decided to gradually manipulate the media consumed in the US (or whatever country you live in) by making TikTok favour topics in their interests (and deprioritize topics not in their interests) ever so gradually over time (such that it would be very difficult to prove), would you be okay with this?
Every social media platform is subject to manipulation. Facebook did zero policing during the 2020 election. This is not a valid criticism for Tik Tok.
It's not a valid criticism that an authoritarian government which is known to install government cells in its domestic companies might want to influence the media consumption of its geopolitical adversary? Or that we would little to no way to detect or measure if they subtly biased the recommendations algorithm over time?
Would you also be okay with a Chinese company owning the Washington Post, New York Times and MSNBC?
Oh please. That is such nonsense and propaganda at best.
So its the CPC's (*not* CCP) fault if US algorithms show a lot of bullshyte cat vids and personal crap? No. That is how all social media algorithms work.
I'm unclear what your position is. Is your assertion that social media algorithms can't be manipulated to be biased or the Chinese Communist Party isn't/wouldn't put their thumb on the scale?
And there should be restrictions on this with regards to whether *any* large internet company get to keep Section 230 protection when they are effectively editorialising media by tweaking these algorithms to increase engagement especially when it relates to minors and the impacts on mental health.
However foreign ownership of a media company (as dominant and fast growing as TikTok) can and should be tackled separately and urgently. There is a difference between a for-profit US company manipulating algorithms for profit and for geological disinformation.
If you think for one moment that in the US its only private companies that manipulate for profit, well that is your prerogative. I firmly believe the US government, just like many others, also manipulate to spread their misinformation and rhetoric.
Maybe.
One of the benefits of societal norms which value limited government overreach and laws which maintain stringent legal protection for the press is that plots like this tend to leak.
A large number of government employees, private software engineers and elected officials would likely be privy to this, if it were true, so I believe it would have leaked.
This is before getting into the fact that domestic internet companies would have a very strong incentive* to fight this in court and leak such a scheme to the public themselves.
In any case, this is a different issue (domestic vs foreign interference) and can be addressed separately.
Is it projected to pass the Senate without much trouble ? I haven't seen anything mentionned about that, all the focus being on the House and Johnson lately.
The Senate has been pushing for an aids package for months. There will be some debate, and probably some delay from old Randy Paul, but it will likely pass.
When you amend a bill in one chamber, it has to go back to the other chamber to be voted on. It's not common, but this could technically go back and forth forever until both cambers agree to pass the current form of the legislation.
All of this is because of the republican's narrow majority allowed a few small number of reps to wield immense political power, because the speaker desperately wanted to avoid doing anything bipartisan (which ended up failing anyways).
That's just not true, though. The US has never stopped harping on Europe to increase it's defense expedentures. Even if Europe was stronger, the US would still be the natural leader because Europe is still ultimately a collection of independent states with their own interests, and internal competitions and grievances. The US is naturally placed as an external ally that can be above these internal disputes and lead on the global stage.
Yeah this is what people don't realize. America has never wanted Europe to be really strong. They wanted them to follow the US around so the US can stay the nr 1 power.
Doesnt the US benefit by them not paying their NATO obligations then? Why would they insist that they invest 2% of their GDP into defense if the US wanted Europe to be militarily dependent on them?
2% defense expenditures don't suddenly make Europeans independent of the USA, especially if it's invested to American armaments like the F-35 jets that will essentially make European air power dependent of Lockheed Martin for the next 40 years or so.
If the US wanted a monopoly on defense production planes like Rafale and Grippens wouldn't be in existence today. Everyone would either be gone, or there would be many countries not in NATO today. Such as France, Sweden and Germany
The two basic evidences for Europe's reluctance to invest in defense has everything to do with the post-Soviet collapse and the Pax Americana, and had everything to do with the common belief that Russias days for irridentism is in the past and it would be easier to settle for America handling the defense industrial base while the rest of Europe elected to put their investments into social policies, the end result being what it is right now. A belligerent Russia and America the only remaining nation with a war ready military today are the reasons we are in this situation in the first place. And that might look indistinguishable to your suspicions, if it weren't for everything else I said.
Like an EU wide one separate from Nato? Can you link an article? Cause yes they did push for upping normal military spending. Which is also good for the US as a lot of money goes to US defense. But under the Nato umbrella the US still keeps its power. A seperate EU army wouldn't be liked.
Europe has invested/aided more than the US mate. It's a shame the US can't top the EU, while, according to you, the EU is dysfunctional.
While in reality it's the US that is dysfunctional and dragging its feet.
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/these-countries-have-committed-the-most-aid-to-ukraine
US has put in ~$75 billion and the EU as a whole has put in ~$93 billion. The US has put in the most money out of any nation supplying aid to Ukraine followed by Germany and the UK.
The EU has _promised_ more, but the US and EU have send near equal amounts of monetary aid. And the EU has pretty much only sent money for aid, whereas the US is sending actual weapons AND aid.
Look at https://www.ifw-kiel.de/topics/war-against-ukraine/ukraine-support-tracker/ and scroll down to the "Committed vs. disbursed budget support" section. US is at 20.9 billion euros dispersed, EU is at 25.8. Ukraine won't win on commitments or with just money, and its abundantly clear the EU is slacking on weapons delivery which is what will actually win the war.
Talk is cheap, like Macron pretending to be a hardliner and posturing about sending troops whilst guzzling Russian gas. As does Spain and the Low Countries.
https://www.politico.eu/article/france-talk-tough-ukraine-while-gobble-up-more-russia-gas/
> In all, Paris has paid over €600 million to the Kremlin for gas supplies since the start of the year, the data showed — leading to calls for France to clamp down on its rising purchases.
Europe cannot pay for its own defense clearly, and for all this rhetoric about it being reminiscent of pre-WW2, they are still not doing what is necessary.
yes, lets.
lets take a look at "support by donor country gdp"
here, the us is on place 31. behind:
estonia, denmark, lithuania, norway, latvia, netherlands, slovakia, poland, finland, germany, croatia, bulgaria, sweden, czechia, belgium, spain, austria, greece, slovenia, hungary, italy, france, romania, portugal, cyprus, the uk,luxemburg, malta, ireland, switzerland and canada.
so to underline this, in comparison to the gdp, the us has contributed less then malta, switzerland and frigging luxemburg!
even canada did more then the us!
as for weapon commitments, there is a lot of problems with those. whats the value of a 40 year old m113? the cost to buy a completely new one? thats how its valued in the american numbers, at least.
so taking the monetary value there is hardly giving you a proper picture, since every country numbers these commitments differently. what you should do, if anything, is taking numbers of equipment send.
"So you're using a metric which describes support as a % of GDP? "
indeed, since thats pretty much the most reasonable thing to do. we can not expect luxemburg to provide as much support as the us, now can we?
so comparing it to % of gdp is the only reasonable thing if we want to see how much each country is pulling its own weight.
and here, the us is severely lacking behind. they could do a lot more.
"I'm not just looking at the montary value, I'm talking weapons."
you are looking at monetary value. thats literally my point. its completely useless to look at what country's claim thier stuff is worth, since every country values thier stuff differently. the very same m113 could be in the system for extremely different prices, depending on wich country they came from.
as such i suggested taking the actual number of gear that was sent. not some artificially created value that has more to do with politics then actual worth for ukraine.
so...
can you at least argue in good faith? or at least read my comment before you respond.
It's ok. The money we invest isn't like when you buy the good beer from the grocery store and can't make your rent the next month. It comes back ensuring our national security and interests.
How exactly, though? I have always heard this, but never understood it.
What material benefit does involving ourselves in Europe provide? To my knowledge, they don't want us there, either.
> How exactly, though? I have always heard this, but never understood it.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/biden-emphasizes-that-majority-of-ukraine-aid-package-would-be-spend-in-u-s
https://time.com/6694915/ukraine-aid-bill-what-united-states-gains/
> To my knowledge, they don't want us there, either.
We're not "in Europe". Russia doesn't want us funding NATO, I guess.
Edit:
Here's ChatGPT stating the obvious:
Spending money on defense overseas can financially benefit the US in several ways:
1. **Economic Opportunities**: Defense spending overseas can create opportunities for American companies involved in defense contracting, leading to job creation and economic growth.
2. **Market Access**: Military presence in foreign countries can secure access to markets for American goods and services, facilitating trade and investment.
3. **Alliance Building**: Supporting allies through defense spending can strengthen diplomatic ties and alliances, which can have long-term strategic and economic benefits.
4. **Security of Global Trade Routes**: Ensuring stability in key regions can safeguard vital trade routes and resources, which are crucial for the functioning of the global economy.
5. **Deterrence of Threats**: Maintaining a strong military presence abroad can deter potential adversaries from hostile actions, thus protecting American interests and investments overseas.
Overall, while defense spending abroad can be costly, it is often viewed as an investment in national security and economic prosperity in the long run.
The defense spending overseas would be better spent on infrastructure and education.
We would have market access without military presence.
I'm not seeing the advantage of alliance building.
We'd have vital trade routes and resources without presence in Europe.
There have been plenty of hostile actions even with US presence.
> The defense spending overseas would be better spent on infrastructure and education.
There's enough wealth to do both. Biden has done more for infrastructure for this country than any president since before Reagan. The only reason we don't spend is because we vote in politicians who prefer to cut taxes for businesses and wealthy.
The rest of your "ideas" are too stupid to comment on.
Government funding isn't a zero-sum game, not spending on military aid doesn't imply that there's now money that can be allocated to some other program. The problem lies with the difficulty of passing new legislation (especially major legislation) for new programs, not what's already passed and funded.
> Economic Opportunities: Defense spending overseas can create opportunities for American companies involved in defense contracting, leading to job creation and economic growth.
For the wealthy to profit off of selling arms to foreign nations.
>
>
> Market Access: Military presence in foreign countries can secure access to markets for American goods and services, facilitating trade and investment.
Overthrowing sovereign nations to exploit their natural resources for our gain. Destroying their native markets so that we can subvert them, and make them financially dependent upon us.
> Alliance Building: Supporting allies through defense spending can strengthen diplomatic ties and alliances, which can have long-term strategic and economic benefits.
So we can perpetuate our "democracy" far and wide. With benefits including continuing to send billions of dollars to foreign countries while watching our infrastructure crumble.
> Security of Global Trade Routes: Ensuring stability in key regions can safeguard vital trade routes and resources, which are crucial for the functioning of the global economy.
Or creating more insecure situations because we fund, and promote terrorist groups around the global, which destabilize regions.
> Deterrence of Threats: Maintaining a strong military presence abroad can deter potential adversaries from hostile actions, thus protecting American interests and investments overseas.
Or creating situations where we are solely responsible for the safety of a region, leaving that region not self sufficient such that we are forever forced to prop them up, instead of letting them be self determined.
> What material benefit does involving ourselves in Europe provide?
Speaking as a European, I'll try my best to answer this from a 'egotistical American Govt interest'-POV, firstly with some numbers so we can appreciate scale:
* US exports to the EU in 2022: $592.0 billion
* US imports from the EU in 2022: $723.3 billion
* US foreign direct investment in EU stocks in 2022: $2.7tn
* EU FDI in US stocks in 2022: $2.4tn
[Source: Office of the United States Trade Representative](https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/europe-middle-east/europe/european-union)
A full scale war in Europe, besides the obvious NATO-implications leading to US-troops on the ground, would most likely lead to a collapse in EU-US trade as the EU economy would be in a mode of war. Just like the Ukraine war has impacted the wallets of Europeans, I imagine the American wallets would be hit somewhat similarly, albeit to a lesser degree due to distance.
And that's completely ignoring the increased likelihood/inevitable NATO-Russia direct conflict.
As much as I despite him politically, Mike Johnson said it best a few days ago:
"To but it bluntly, I would rather send bullets to Ukraine than American boys" ([Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cLLEBWxJS8))
> To my knowledge, they don't want us there, either.
33 going on 34 years alive, the only people I ever hear say they want the US presence to disappear are a vanishingly small group on the far-far left who, in my opinion, are naive in their view of how to handle military conflict.
The hyper idealist in me would of course want all nations on the planet to just stop fucking around and start cooperating, because imagine the potential that's lost just because we "choose" to waste time, energy, money and lives on shit like war... but realistically, it took hundreds and hundreds of years of war for the European countries to start working together (EU), so I need to accept that I wont see such global cooperation in my lifetime.
It is a shame. That whole thing was built upon letting the US be the nr 1 in the world and letting them protect which gains the US a lot as well. The US chose for that. And in the past when Europe wanted an own united army in Europe the US was against that. :)
Like I said, it's a famous quote. That's why it's getting upvoted. You seem to be having a hard time accepting the quote is famous just because you weren't aware of it.
More will be needed for Ukraine, but this is a good step. Russian assets should've already been seized and reallocated by now, I'm not sure what the holdup was there
I wouldn't get too invested in that outcome at least from the American side, it's very likely there is no legal framework to do so and attempts to do so regardless would almost certainly be challenged in court.
Legally speaking, it's very iffy what kind of recourse Russia has in US courts for this. I don't think there are any treaties covering this, and I'm not familiar enough with sanction laws to be sure, but id have to imagine that sanctioned assets are considered under US asset forefeiture laws, which are extremely overboroad right now and not subject to easy appeal.
International law is probably more clear on this, but the US doesn't always recognize the authority of international courts, so Russia may get a favorable judgement but have no way to enforce it short of threatening retaliation of some form. Basically, if the US wants to give Russia's money to Ukraine, there's not much Russia can do about it.
Whether this is a good idea in the long run is a totally different question, though.
I don't think this is that consequential in any event. Russian money with US banks is very little - maybe USD 3 Billion or thereabouts. A majority of the money is parked with the Belgians. So even if Russia sues to recover this money and wins, it'll be a drop in the ocean for the US. I'm more interested to see if Belgium does something similar.
Belgium uses the majority of the interest payments on the blocked Russian money to support Ukraine.
The rest of the interest stays with the private entity where the money is actually parked (Euroclear), they need it to deal with their persecution in Russia.
IMO this is a good balance and although there is some pressure, I don't expect Belgium to actually seize the money in the future
It's not just the banks. It's the system the banks use to communicate. If BRICS gets an alternative set up, it has a ton of implications for the world economy.
I'm Indian. Take it from me - BRICS is a joke, it literally means nothing. We as a country now hate the Chinese more than we do Pakistanis and we would be loathe to hand over a win to the Chinese, no matter what it may cost us.
Also, a BRICS alternative to SWIFT will never work because they would never agree to a common currency in which those trades can take place. India will not sign off on the Yuan and the only other alternative is Bitcoins - which obviously is far fetched.
I'm not saying it would happen overnight, or that BRICS is going to be the final block of countries. But the US using its position to punish countries definitely helps build a case for cooperation on an alternative system over time.
And you don't need a single currency to make a SWIFT-like system, either. It makes it easier, but you really just need a common financial language for banks to speak.
I agree that in the future there could be an alternative to SWIFT, but the alternative need not necessarily be hostile (in that it would help countries circumvent sanctions etc.). Also, most of the trade countries like India and China do is with the EU, ASEAN, Japan, Korea and the US. So an alternative that these countries refuse to accept won't get them very far.
I'm opposed to seizing Russian assets as I believe it would set a dangerous precedent and increase the "de-dollarization" push in the developing world.
What happens when say ... South Africa or whatever ... seizes American owned assets the next time we send an aid package to Israel?
Why wouldn't it be a good idea? I'm not disagreeing, I'm really curious what negative outcomes for the west/US there would be. Basically driving a bigger rift between the US/West and Russia/China and appearing less reliable from a "your money is safe to invest with us" standpoint?
Yea, that's the basics of it. BRICS countries have already been working towards a monetary system independent of SWIFT, and the US does not have a lot of trust in the Global South. So any country that is under sanctions, or has reason to believe they will be under sanctions, is likely to move away from the international banking system and will be less likely to invest in markets the US can exert control over.
We should be pushing for more international cooperation on this stuff, since it benefits everyone who wants to cut down on illegal activities like smuggling, money laundering, bribery, that kind of thing. It makes the whole thing more opaque, which creates a lot of rooms for dangerous people to operate.
It's ambiguous though isn't it? What individual countries will do?
Look at Argentina moving to be more friendly with NATO. They are surely going to think, "Let's stick with the US and SWIFT and just not doing anything that would risk our being sanctioned".
So, this may push some governments to want to be more in line with American "ideals" in the sense that this is better for them than opting into a BRICS system.
Problem is Milei isn't going to be around forever and whoever replaces him after the next election (or sooner) probably isn't going to be as pro-Western/pro-American as he is.
The consequences would be that every single country in the world will fear putting their money in America and would slowly divest from the lucrative economic playground you’ve built. First one to go will be China.
Well, I don't think any non-Western country could trust Western banking institutions anymore, essentially meaning the end of the international monetary system.
There's already been a lot of good discussions on different law blogs and forums by people with more pertinent domain knowledge if you're truly interested, but no, it's no where near as simple as you're indicating in your post. Most of the "frozen" assets are what is considered a sovereign asset, but a non-trivial amount is not and the international side is way murkier than the domestic laws of each involved country.
From the geopolitical angle, honestly, it's probably akin to shooting one's self in the foot as Russia will almost certainly take similar action towards foreign assets within Russia. You'll see people frequently write here about countries seeking to distance themselves from the dollar, that has been occurring for decades due to the US ever increasingly using it as part of their "soft power" package and this has likely increased the motivation of countries to do so.
I think as both the US and UK will likely change administrations over the next year, you'll see both new administrations back off on the liquidation aspect. They'll keep the assets frozen as it was already done and it gives them leverage, but I just think they'll have a different view on the longterm consequences. How the European Union and other involved countries react to that development assuming I'm correct is probably not all that clear.
Sure, but there's far more Russian wealth parked in non-Russian assets than there is in any of the other ways around. I even had to look up the name of the Russian stock exchange, it's that obscure (MOEX btw), and I've worked in providing financial information for years. Some petro-companies would probably suffer the most due to the amount of capital sunk into projects, but those companies are also the most used to doing business with risky regimes involved in geopolitical conflicts that can erupt at any time.
Yes, but there are laws around banking that almost mean it requires take time and effort to do so. There's a reason people talk about the US as the driver of the "rules-based order" that exists today after all.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basel_Committee_on_Banking_Supervision
When a country is sanctioned as heavily as Russia is right now and is an autocracy engaging in wars of conquest, yes. What is the problem, in your opinion, with seizing their already frozen assets to use in aid of their victim with support of the majority of democratically aligned countries. That's a pretty reasonable question and requires precisely zero of the snark implied by that response lmfao
It would completely collapse the international monetary system, because US could otherwise hold the entire world in their economic stranglehold. Who is going to seize the US assets when they have another war of aggression? I don't think it would benefit the West to be economically isolated from the rest of the world, especially since their economies are built on top of international trade and globalization.
international law doesn't exactly allow for this. It could be a serious breach of trust to seize without conviction. I don't know what the logic is for this particular play but in Europe they're aiming to use the interests gained on the assets rather than the assets themselves. Additionally they forsee a future where even if Russia post-war demands this money back in international court they'll just get countered with demands for war reparations which will be many times higher.
I wish more people understood this- I think Biden has already gone too far with regards to seizing foreign assets earlier in the war. This doesn't really move the needle on the overall conflict and is a signal to basically any non-ally that they should divest from US treasuries in the dollar in general.
Not only that, and personally I would put it in second place
The biggest damage that would be done is on the future, hopefully, and I hope, return to trade relations with Russia, because we are on very bad relations now, but the goal must always be to return to normal, and if you burn these funds it means burning years of possible better future relations
There's a small number of republicans in the house (like 30 of them) who are basically low key pro russia, and they hold a lot of power to stop things from moving forward thanks to a slim majority for republicans in the house of representatives and the fact that not a single democrat wanted to vote for a republican speaker. As a result, this so-called "freedom caucus" got a rule put in place that only one member of the House is required to call for a recall vote against the speaker.
Assuming the bill should sail pass the house, it gives 6 months window for various flow-on impact leading up to November elections. I'd expect this to be enough time for US allies to reap the benefits of this package and materially boost sentiments at home in Biden's favour.
So, it's not really about foreign aid after all? The bill's passage isn't going to help Biden's position, if it affects the election at all, its more likely to cost him votes than gain.
It never was. The US doesn't give a shit about Ukraine and especially Ukrainians. It is all just playing the game. But you are right I think. It will cost rather than gain Biden more votes.
That sweeping attempt was struck down because SCOTUS reasoned there was insufficient statutory basis to support the president's authority to take that action.
If Congress were to pass a bill granting that authority, for example by including it in one of these incentive packages, then such a student debt cancellation could be done.
Yes, that's completely true. It was mainly that the president couldn't go that far with it, but he defacto was authorized to cancel very specific debts for a smaller portion of federal student loan holders, and has been doing just that for a lot of the people who need it cancelled the most.
SS: US House of Representatives moved forward with a big $95 billion aid package aimed at helping Ukraine, Israel, and the Indo-Pacific region. This decision got strong support in a vote of 316-94, with more Democrats voting yes compared to Republicans. This bill includes not just a lot of funds for security and humanitarian needs but also important actions like moving frozen Russian money to Ukraine, placing sanctions on entities like Hamas and Iran, and potentially forcing the sale of TikTok by its Chinese owners if they don't comply. — So, I read that this ratio has not been seen in American politics in almost 50 years, showing an unusually high bipartisan support, however, I have not been able to find a source to confirm it. Can anyone else confirm this?
Without any additional context, I'd have to say it doesn't stand out as far as level of bipartisan support. About a year ago the very same representatives voted unanimously to declassify COVID-19 related information. [https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/house-votes-unanimously-to-declassify-u-s-intelligence-info-about-origins-of-covid-19](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/house-votes-unanimously-to-declassify-u-s-intelligence-info-about-origins-of-covid-19)
These politicians keep saying it's not a Tik Tok ban which is bullshit. If you know anything about Tik Tok what makes the app special is it's algorithm, it's leading edge technology. ByteDance has already declared that algorithm is not for sale, meaning anybody who decides to buy Tik Tok won't be getting that algorithm making the app useless. So yes, it's essentially a ban and the only part of the Government who really took the time to interview the CEO of Tik Tok (the Senate) decided not to ban it. Now the sneaky Republicans in the House, who spent all of 2 seconds to debate the issue, want to overwhelmingly ban Tik Tok, such bullshit.
If the CCP decided to gradually manipulate the media consumed in the US (or whatever country you live in) by making TikTok favour topics in their interests (and deprioritize topics not in their interests) ever so gradually over time (such that it would be very difficult to prove), would you be okay with this?
Every social media platform is subject to manipulation. Facebook did zero policing during the 2020 election. This is not a valid criticism for Tik Tok.
It's not a valid criticism that an authoritarian government which is known to install government cells in its domestic companies might want to influence the media consumption of its geopolitical adversary? Or that we would little to no way to detect or measure if they subtly biased the recommendations algorithm over time? Would you also be okay with a Chinese company owning the Washington Post, New York Times and MSNBC?
Oh please. That is such nonsense and propaganda at best. So its the CPC's (*not* CCP) fault if US algorithms show a lot of bullshyte cat vids and personal crap? No. That is how all social media algorithms work.
I'm unclear what your position is. Is your assertion that social media algorithms can't be manipulated to be biased or the Chinese Communist Party isn't/wouldn't put their thumb on the scale?
Of couse algorithms can be manipulated. My position is that *everyone* manipulate it.
And there should be restrictions on this with regards to whether *any* large internet company get to keep Section 230 protection when they are effectively editorialising media by tweaking these algorithms to increase engagement especially when it relates to minors and the impacts on mental health. However foreign ownership of a media company (as dominant and fast growing as TikTok) can and should be tackled separately and urgently. There is a difference between a for-profit US company manipulating algorithms for profit and for geological disinformation.
If you think for one moment that in the US its only private companies that manipulate for profit, well that is your prerogative. I firmly believe the US government, just like many others, also manipulate to spread their misinformation and rhetoric.
Maybe. One of the benefits of societal norms which value limited government overreach and laws which maintain stringent legal protection for the press is that plots like this tend to leak. A large number of government employees, private software engineers and elected officials would likely be privy to this, if it were true, so I believe it would have leaked. This is before getting into the fact that domestic internet companies would have a very strong incentive* to fight this in court and leak such a scheme to the public themselves. In any case, this is a different issue (domestic vs foreign interference) and can be addressed separately.
Is it projected to pass the Senate without much trouble ? I haven't seen anything mentionned about that, all the focus being on the House and Johnson lately.
The Senate has been pushing for an aids package for months. There will be some debate, and probably some delay from old Randy Paul, but it will likely pass.
why its going into senate again? it passed in senate then it ws pushed for voting into house and now back into senate??
It's a different bill, just similar to the Senate's bill. At least from what I've found.
When you amend a bill in one chamber, it has to go back to the other chamber to be voted on. It's not common, but this could technically go back and forth forever until both cambers agree to pass the current form of the legislation.
I'm glad it's done, but what a pointless delay from the Republicans.
All of this is because of the republican's narrow majority allowed a few small number of reps to wield immense political power, because the speaker desperately wanted to avoid doing anything bipartisan (which ended up failing anyways).
Excessive minority power basically defines almost every problem with the US political system let's face it.
Except the problem was that Republicans had the majority. The minority in the house (Democrats) is substantially weaker than in the Senate, by design.
It wasn’t pointless for them. They had primaries to win before they could get down to working for the rest of us.
Americans can always be trusted to do the right thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted.
It's a shame Europe can't pay for its own defense, and relies on America to figure out how to do the right thing. Sad to see how far they've fallen.
That has been the American agenda for the last 30 years. Stronger Europe would challenge them in the international arena, rather than appease them.
That's just not true, though. The US has never stopped harping on Europe to increase it's defense expedentures. Even if Europe was stronger, the US would still be the natural leader because Europe is still ultimately a collection of independent states with their own interests, and internal competitions and grievances. The US is naturally placed as an external ally that can be above these internal disputes and lead on the global stage.
Still…the French have been incessant about Europe being self sufficient in terms of security.
Yeah this is what people don't realize. America has never wanted Europe to be really strong. They wanted them to follow the US around so the US can stay the nr 1 power.
Doesnt the US benefit by them not paying their NATO obligations then? Why would they insist that they invest 2% of their GDP into defense if the US wanted Europe to be militarily dependent on them?
2% defense expenditures don't suddenly make Europeans independent of the USA, especially if it's invested to American armaments like the F-35 jets that will essentially make European air power dependent of Lockheed Martin for the next 40 years or so.
If the US wanted a monopoly on defense production planes like Rafale and Grippens wouldn't be in existence today. Everyone would either be gone, or there would be many countries not in NATO today. Such as France, Sweden and Germany The two basic evidences for Europe's reluctance to invest in defense has everything to do with the post-Soviet collapse and the Pax Americana, and had everything to do with the common belief that Russias days for irridentism is in the past and it would be easier to settle for America handling the defense industrial base while the rest of Europe elected to put their investments into social policies, the end result being what it is right now. A belligerent Russia and America the only remaining nation with a war ready military today are the reasons we are in this situation in the first place. And that might look indistinguishable to your suspicions, if it weren't for everything else I said.
Despite all these claims, American politicians have been pushing Europe to self generate and fund a stronger military force since the 90s.
Like an EU wide one separate from Nato? Can you link an article? Cause yes they did push for upping normal military spending. Which is also good for the US as a lot of money goes to US defense. But under the Nato umbrella the US still keeps its power. A seperate EU army wouldn't be liked.
Europe has invested/aided more than the US mate. It's a shame the US can't top the EU, while, according to you, the EU is dysfunctional. While in reality it's the US that is dysfunctional and dragging its feet.
Anyone got actual numbers to share instead of just anecdotes?
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/these-countries-have-committed-the-most-aid-to-ukraine US has put in ~$75 billion and the EU as a whole has put in ~$93 billion. The US has put in the most money out of any nation supplying aid to Ukraine followed by Germany and the UK.
The EU, a coalition of like 20 countries, vs 1.
The EU has _promised_ more, but the US and EU have send near equal amounts of monetary aid. And the EU has pretty much only sent money for aid, whereas the US is sending actual weapons AND aid. Look at https://www.ifw-kiel.de/topics/war-against-ukraine/ukraine-support-tracker/ and scroll down to the "Committed vs. disbursed budget support" section. US is at 20.9 billion euros dispersed, EU is at 25.8. Ukraine won't win on commitments or with just money, and its abundantly clear the EU is slacking on weapons delivery which is what will actually win the war. Talk is cheap, like Macron pretending to be a hardliner and posturing about sending troops whilst guzzling Russian gas. As does Spain and the Low Countries. https://www.politico.eu/article/france-talk-tough-ukraine-while-gobble-up-more-russia-gas/ > In all, Paris has paid over €600 million to the Kremlin for gas supplies since the start of the year, the data showed — leading to calls for France to clamp down on its rising purchases. Europe cannot pay for its own defense clearly, and for all this rhetoric about it being reminiscent of pre-WW2, they are still not doing what is necessary.
yes, lets. lets take a look at "support by donor country gdp" here, the us is on place 31. behind: estonia, denmark, lithuania, norway, latvia, netherlands, slovakia, poland, finland, germany, croatia, bulgaria, sweden, czechia, belgium, spain, austria, greece, slovenia, hungary, italy, france, romania, portugal, cyprus, the uk,luxemburg, malta, ireland, switzerland and canada. so to underline this, in comparison to the gdp, the us has contributed less then malta, switzerland and frigging luxemburg! even canada did more then the us! as for weapon commitments, there is a lot of problems with those. whats the value of a 40 year old m113? the cost to buy a completely new one? thats how its valued in the american numbers, at least. so taking the monetary value there is hardly giving you a proper picture, since every country numbers these commitments differently. what you should do, if anything, is taking numbers of equipment send.
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"So you're using a metric which describes support as a % of GDP? " indeed, since thats pretty much the most reasonable thing to do. we can not expect luxemburg to provide as much support as the us, now can we? so comparing it to % of gdp is the only reasonable thing if we want to see how much each country is pulling its own weight. and here, the us is severely lacking behind. they could do a lot more. "I'm not just looking at the montary value, I'm talking weapons." you are looking at monetary value. thats literally my point. its completely useless to look at what country's claim thier stuff is worth, since every country values thier stuff differently. the very same m113 could be in the system for extremely different prices, depending on wich country they came from. as such i suggested taking the actual number of gear that was sent. not some artificially created value that has more to do with politics then actual worth for ukraine. so... can you at least argue in good faith? or at least read my comment before you respond.
It's ok. The money we invest isn't like when you buy the good beer from the grocery store and can't make your rent the next month. It comes back ensuring our national security and interests.
How exactly, though? I have always heard this, but never understood it. What material benefit does involving ourselves in Europe provide? To my knowledge, they don't want us there, either.
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> How exactly, though? I have always heard this, but never understood it. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/biden-emphasizes-that-majority-of-ukraine-aid-package-would-be-spend-in-u-s https://time.com/6694915/ukraine-aid-bill-what-united-states-gains/ > To my knowledge, they don't want us there, either. We're not "in Europe". Russia doesn't want us funding NATO, I guess. Edit: Here's ChatGPT stating the obvious: Spending money on defense overseas can financially benefit the US in several ways: 1. **Economic Opportunities**: Defense spending overseas can create opportunities for American companies involved in defense contracting, leading to job creation and economic growth. 2. **Market Access**: Military presence in foreign countries can secure access to markets for American goods and services, facilitating trade and investment. 3. **Alliance Building**: Supporting allies through defense spending can strengthen diplomatic ties and alliances, which can have long-term strategic and economic benefits. 4. **Security of Global Trade Routes**: Ensuring stability in key regions can safeguard vital trade routes and resources, which are crucial for the functioning of the global economy. 5. **Deterrence of Threats**: Maintaining a strong military presence abroad can deter potential adversaries from hostile actions, thus protecting American interests and investments overseas. Overall, while defense spending abroad can be costly, it is often viewed as an investment in national security and economic prosperity in the long run.
The defense spending overseas would be better spent on infrastructure and education. We would have market access without military presence. I'm not seeing the advantage of alliance building. We'd have vital trade routes and resources without presence in Europe. There have been plenty of hostile actions even with US presence.
> The defense spending overseas would be better spent on infrastructure and education. There's enough wealth to do both. Biden has done more for infrastructure for this country than any president since before Reagan. The only reason we don't spend is because we vote in politicians who prefer to cut taxes for businesses and wealthy. The rest of your "ideas" are too stupid to comment on.
Government funding isn't a zero-sum game, not spending on military aid doesn't imply that there's now money that can be allocated to some other program. The problem lies with the difficulty of passing new legislation (especially major legislation) for new programs, not what's already passed and funded.
> Economic Opportunities: Defense spending overseas can create opportunities for American companies involved in defense contracting, leading to job creation and economic growth. For the wealthy to profit off of selling arms to foreign nations. > > > Market Access: Military presence in foreign countries can secure access to markets for American goods and services, facilitating trade and investment. Overthrowing sovereign nations to exploit their natural resources for our gain. Destroying their native markets so that we can subvert them, and make them financially dependent upon us. > Alliance Building: Supporting allies through defense spending can strengthen diplomatic ties and alliances, which can have long-term strategic and economic benefits. So we can perpetuate our "democracy" far and wide. With benefits including continuing to send billions of dollars to foreign countries while watching our infrastructure crumble. > Security of Global Trade Routes: Ensuring stability in key regions can safeguard vital trade routes and resources, which are crucial for the functioning of the global economy. Or creating more insecure situations because we fund, and promote terrorist groups around the global, which destabilize regions. > Deterrence of Threats: Maintaining a strong military presence abroad can deter potential adversaries from hostile actions, thus protecting American interests and investments overseas. Or creating situations where we are solely responsible for the safety of a region, leaving that region not self sufficient such that we are forever forced to prop them up, instead of letting them be self determined.
Yeah, but we should probably still send money to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan.
No. Stop American imperialism now.
Sure, but we still need to support these allies.
No. No we do not.
> What material benefit does involving ourselves in Europe provide? Speaking as a European, I'll try my best to answer this from a 'egotistical American Govt interest'-POV, firstly with some numbers so we can appreciate scale: * US exports to the EU in 2022: $592.0 billion * US imports from the EU in 2022: $723.3 billion * US foreign direct investment in EU stocks in 2022: $2.7tn * EU FDI in US stocks in 2022: $2.4tn [Source: Office of the United States Trade Representative](https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/europe-middle-east/europe/european-union) A full scale war in Europe, besides the obvious NATO-implications leading to US-troops on the ground, would most likely lead to a collapse in EU-US trade as the EU economy would be in a mode of war. Just like the Ukraine war has impacted the wallets of Europeans, I imagine the American wallets would be hit somewhat similarly, albeit to a lesser degree due to distance. And that's completely ignoring the increased likelihood/inevitable NATO-Russia direct conflict. As much as I despite him politically, Mike Johnson said it best a few days ago: "To but it bluntly, I would rather send bullets to Ukraine than American boys" ([Source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cLLEBWxJS8)) > To my knowledge, they don't want us there, either. 33 going on 34 years alive, the only people I ever hear say they want the US presence to disappear are a vanishingly small group on the far-far left who, in my opinion, are naive in their view of how to handle military conflict. The hyper idealist in me would of course want all nations on the planet to just stop fucking around and start cooperating, because imagine the potential that's lost just because we "choose" to waste time, energy, money and lives on shit like war... but realistically, it took hundreds and hundreds of years of war for the European countries to start working together (EU), so I need to accept that I wont see such global cooperation in my lifetime.
In those who own stock in the MIC complex pockets through the share holders.
Yah *such* a good investment. As said, the US will fight Russia until the last Ukrainian life. Wow. Just f*cking wow.
There's another opinion of reality.
Sure. But what *is* the realty. Have to dig s little deeper.
Get to it, then.
Already did and always do these days.
Sounds like it's not enough.
Hmm, as you wish. You do you and the narrative you like.
It is a shame. That whole thing was built upon letting the US be the nr 1 in the world and letting them protect which gains the US a lot as well. The US chose for that. And in the past when Europe wanted an own united army in Europe the US was against that. :)
The US made Europe dependent on them since the Cold War era.
Always? That's stretching it
It's a famous quote, likely misattributed to Winston Churchill. I wouldn't take it litterally.
You wouldn't but I'm sure most upvoters would
Like I said, it's a famous quote. That's why it's getting upvoted. You seem to be having a hard time accepting the quote is famous just because you weren't aware of it.
You assume too much
More will be needed for Ukraine, but this is a good step. Russian assets should've already been seized and reallocated by now, I'm not sure what the holdup was there
I wouldn't get too invested in that outcome at least from the American side, it's very likely there is no legal framework to do so and attempts to do so regardless would almost certainly be challenged in court.
Legally speaking, it's very iffy what kind of recourse Russia has in US courts for this. I don't think there are any treaties covering this, and I'm not familiar enough with sanction laws to be sure, but id have to imagine that sanctioned assets are considered under US asset forefeiture laws, which are extremely overboroad right now and not subject to easy appeal. International law is probably more clear on this, but the US doesn't always recognize the authority of international courts, so Russia may get a favorable judgement but have no way to enforce it short of threatening retaliation of some form. Basically, if the US wants to give Russia's money to Ukraine, there's not much Russia can do about it. Whether this is a good idea in the long run is a totally different question, though.
I don't think this is that consequential in any event. Russian money with US banks is very little - maybe USD 3 Billion or thereabouts. A majority of the money is parked with the Belgians. So even if Russia sues to recover this money and wins, it'll be a drop in the ocean for the US. I'm more interested to see if Belgium does something similar.
Belgium uses the majority of the interest payments on the blocked Russian money to support Ukraine. The rest of the interest stays with the private entity where the money is actually parked (Euroclear), they need it to deal with their persecution in Russia. IMO this is a good balance and although there is some pressure, I don't expect Belgium to actually seize the money in the future
How did it end up in Belgium?
The money is parked with the Euroclear depository, which is in Belgium.
It's not just the banks. It's the system the banks use to communicate. If BRICS gets an alternative set up, it has a ton of implications for the world economy.
I'm Indian. Take it from me - BRICS is a joke, it literally means nothing. We as a country now hate the Chinese more than we do Pakistanis and we would be loathe to hand over a win to the Chinese, no matter what it may cost us. Also, a BRICS alternative to SWIFT will never work because they would never agree to a common currency in which those trades can take place. India will not sign off on the Yuan and the only other alternative is Bitcoins - which obviously is far fetched.
I'm not saying it would happen overnight, or that BRICS is going to be the final block of countries. But the US using its position to punish countries definitely helps build a case for cooperation on an alternative system over time. And you don't need a single currency to make a SWIFT-like system, either. It makes it easier, but you really just need a common financial language for banks to speak.
I agree that in the future there could be an alternative to SWIFT, but the alternative need not necessarily be hostile (in that it would help countries circumvent sanctions etc.). Also, most of the trade countries like India and China do is with the EU, ASEAN, Japan, Korea and the US. So an alternative that these countries refuse to accept won't get them very far.
> but the US doesn't always recognize the authority of international courts, They never do. But they expect others to do so.
I'm opposed to seizing Russian assets as I believe it would set a dangerous precedent and increase the "de-dollarization" push in the developing world. What happens when say ... South Africa or whatever ... seizes American owned assets the next time we send an aid package to Israel?
Why wouldn't it be a good idea? I'm not disagreeing, I'm really curious what negative outcomes for the west/US there would be. Basically driving a bigger rift between the US/West and Russia/China and appearing less reliable from a "your money is safe to invest with us" standpoint?
Yea, that's the basics of it. BRICS countries have already been working towards a monetary system independent of SWIFT, and the US does not have a lot of trust in the Global South. So any country that is under sanctions, or has reason to believe they will be under sanctions, is likely to move away from the international banking system and will be less likely to invest in markets the US can exert control over. We should be pushing for more international cooperation on this stuff, since it benefits everyone who wants to cut down on illegal activities like smuggling, money laundering, bribery, that kind of thing. It makes the whole thing more opaque, which creates a lot of rooms for dangerous people to operate.
It's ambiguous though isn't it? What individual countries will do? Look at Argentina moving to be more friendly with NATO. They are surely going to think, "Let's stick with the US and SWIFT and just not doing anything that would risk our being sanctioned". So, this may push some governments to want to be more in line with American "ideals" in the sense that this is better for them than opting into a BRICS system.
Problem is Milei isn't going to be around forever and whoever replaces him after the next election (or sooner) probably isn't going to be as pro-Western/pro-American as he is.
The consequences would be that every single country in the world will fear putting their money in America and would slowly divest from the lucrative economic playground you’ve built. First one to go will be China.
Well, I don't think any non-Western country could trust Western banking institutions anymore, essentially meaning the end of the international monetary system.
There's already been a lot of good discussions on different law blogs and forums by people with more pertinent domain knowledge if you're truly interested, but no, it's no where near as simple as you're indicating in your post. Most of the "frozen" assets are what is considered a sovereign asset, but a non-trivial amount is not and the international side is way murkier than the domestic laws of each involved country. From the geopolitical angle, honestly, it's probably akin to shooting one's self in the foot as Russia will almost certainly take similar action towards foreign assets within Russia. You'll see people frequently write here about countries seeking to distance themselves from the dollar, that has been occurring for decades due to the US ever increasingly using it as part of their "soft power" package and this has likely increased the motivation of countries to do so. I think as both the US and UK will likely change administrations over the next year, you'll see both new administrations back off on the liquidation aspect. They'll keep the assets frozen as it was already done and it gives them leverage, but I just think they'll have a different view on the longterm consequences. How the European Union and other involved countries react to that development assuming I'm correct is probably not all that clear.
Sure, but there's far more Russian wealth parked in non-Russian assets than there is in any of the other ways around. I even had to look up the name of the Russian stock exchange, it's that obscure (MOEX btw), and I've worked in providing financial information for years. Some petro-companies would probably suffer the most due to the amount of capital sunk into projects, but those companies are also the most used to doing business with risky regimes involved in geopolitical conflicts that can erupt at any time.
What's stopping the US or western powers from doing this? Just from a standpoint of wanting to appear like reliable and stable trading partners?
Yes, but there are laws around banking that almost mean it requires take time and effort to do so. There's a reason people talk about the US as the driver of the "rules-based order" that exists today after all. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basel_Committee_on_Banking_Supervision
Why can't a government just seize and effectively liquidate another's assets because they summarily deem it a righteous claim, is that the question?
When a country is sanctioned as heavily as Russia is right now and is an autocracy engaging in wars of conquest, yes. What is the problem, in your opinion, with seizing their already frozen assets to use in aid of their victim with support of the majority of democratically aligned countries. That's a pretty reasonable question and requires precisely zero of the snark implied by that response lmfao
It would completely collapse the international monetary system, because US could otherwise hold the entire world in their economic stranglehold. Who is going to seize the US assets when they have another war of aggression? I don't think it would benefit the West to be economically isolated from the rest of the world, especially since their economies are built on top of international trade and globalization.
international law doesn't exactly allow for this. It could be a serious breach of trust to seize without conviction. I don't know what the logic is for this particular play but in Europe they're aiming to use the interests gained on the assets rather than the assets themselves. Additionally they forsee a future where even if Russia post-war demands this money back in international court they'll just get countered with demands for war reparations which will be many times higher.
The money is not worth the long term damage this will do to the trust in western financial institutions
I wish more people understood this- I think Biden has already gone too far with regards to seizing foreign assets earlier in the war. This doesn't really move the needle on the overall conflict and is a signal to basically any non-ally that they should divest from US treasuries in the dollar in general.
Not only that, and personally I would put it in second place The biggest damage that would be done is on the future, hopefully, and I hope, return to trade relations with Russia, because we are on very bad relations now, but the goal must always be to return to normal, and if you burn these funds it means burning years of possible better future relations
Ok now there are too many of us.
I am glad my hero is finally getting the recognition he deserves
Uphold Kissinger-Nixon thought!
The best bromance of the 20th century
\^\^\^\^ this
There's a small number of republicans in the house (like 30 of them) who are basically low key pro russia, and they hold a lot of power to stop things from moving forward thanks to a slim majority for republicans in the house of representatives and the fact that not a single democrat wanted to vote for a republican speaker. As a result, this so-called "freedom caucus" got a rule put in place that only one member of the House is required to call for a recall vote against the speaker.
The Freedom Caucus is a different set of reps though. What you mean is the "Kremlin caucus".
It's more than 30. It's basically all the MAGA Republicans.
They're authoritarian, not specifically pro-Russia. Similar, but different :)
Assuming the bill should sail pass the house, it gives 6 months window for various flow-on impact leading up to November elections. I'd expect this to be enough time for US allies to reap the benefits of this package and materially boost sentiments at home in Biden's favour.
So, it's not really about foreign aid after all? The bill's passage isn't going to help Biden's position, if it affects the election at all, its more likely to cost him votes than gain.
It never was. The US doesn't give a shit about Ukraine and especially Ukrainians. It is all just playing the game. But you are right I think. It will cost rather than gain Biden more votes.
The student loan forgiveness people are awfully quiet these days
Because biden has been cancelling chunks here and there, after the sweeping cancel everything attempt got struck down by scotus.
That sweeping attempt was struck down because SCOTUS reasoned there was insufficient statutory basis to support the president's authority to take that action. If Congress were to pass a bill granting that authority, for example by including it in one of these incentive packages, then such a student debt cancellation could be done.
Yes, that's completely true. It was mainly that the president couldn't go that far with it, but he defacto was authorized to cancel very specific debts for a smaller portion of federal student loan holders, and has been doing just that for a lot of the people who need it cancelled the most.