Tag Archives: Kevin McCarthy

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If You Support Freedom and Ukraine, Remember These People

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy acceded to his party’s lunatic anti-Ukraine caucus and said no to a request by Ukraine’s President, Volodymyr Zelensky, to address a joint session of Congress, or to bring together House members for a meeting with Zelensky during his current visit to Washington. .

Whatever you think of President Biden, he has been steadfast in his support of Ukraine, unlike the Republican party’s leader, former President Trump, who has been an embarrassing Putin acolyte.

“When he was President, Trump rarely missed a chance to excoriate the nation’s allies and praise its adversaries and parroted Russian talking points on Ukraine,” New Yorker staff writer  Susan B. Glasser wrote this week. “After the 2022 invasion, he even went so far as to laud Putin’s strategic “genius.” Just a few days ago, Trump revelled once again in praise from Putin, who has all but endorsed the former President’s campaign to return to the White House in 2024.”

Peace at any price is a fool’s game. As President Theodore Roosevelt put it, “The things that will destroy America are prosperity at any price, peace at any price, safety first instead of duty first…”

Yesterday, 28 Republican members of Congress, led by Senator J.D. Vance (R- Ohio) ignored this when sending a letter to Shalanda Young, Director, Office of Management and Budget. 

The letter asserted, “It would be an absurd abdication of congressional responsibility to grant” the Administration’s request fort additional aid to Ukraine, specifically an August 10, 2023 request for additional supplemental appropriations, in which the Administration asked Congress to provide another $24 billion in security, economic, and humanitarian assistance related to the war in Ukraine. 

The Republicans couched their opposition to additional expenditure for the war in Ukraine as opposition to “…an open-ended commitment to supporting the war in Ukraine of an indeterminate nature, based on a strategy that is unclear, to achieve a goal yet to be articulated to the public or the Congress,” but that’s a ruse. The reality is they want to undermine US support for Ukraine. 

It all reminds me of the America Firsters and their isolationist pressure against American entry into World War II.  “The doctrine that we must enter the wars of Europe in order to defend America will be fatal to our nation if we follow it,” Charles Lindbergh, a leading voice of the America First movement said in 1941.  

Lindbergh was wrong then and the 28 Republicans sending the letter to Shalanda Young are wrong now.

Remember their names:

JD Vance, United States Senator

Rand Paul, M.D. United States Senator

Mike Braun, United States Senator 

Tommy Tuberville United States Senator 

Paul A. Gosar, D.D.S. Member of Congress 

Dan Bishop, Member of Congress 

Bill Posey, Member of Congress 

Chip Roy, Member of Congress 

Mike Lee, United States Senator 

Roger Marshall, M.D. United States Senator 

Roger Williams, Member of Congress 

Clay Higgins, Member of Congress 

Harriet M. Hageman, Member of Congress 

Bob Good, Member of Congress 

Warren Davidson, Member of Congress 

Anna Paulina Luna, Member of Congress 

W. Gregory Steube, Member of Congress 

Josh Brecheen Member of Congress 

Andy Ogles, Member of Congress 

Andy Biggs, Member of Congress 

Russell Fry, Member of Congress 

Eli Crane, Member of Congress 

Jeff Duncan, Member of Congress 

Beth Van Duyne, Member of Congress 

Lance Gooden, Member of Congress 

Mary E. Miller, Member of Congress 

Byron Donalds, Member of Congress 

Michael Cloud, Member of Congress 

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George Santos: It Takes a Con Man to Know a Con Man

George Anthony Devolder-Santos

A review of the campaign finance records of Republican George Anthony Devolder-Santos, the beleaguered winner of New York’s 2022 3rd Congressional District race, reveals that his biggest single contributor was FTX.US, part of FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried’s collapsed crypto empire.

According to OpenSecrets.org,  a nonprofit that tracks data on campaign finance and lobbying, the employees and owners of FTX.US contributed a total of $29,000 to Santos’ campaign. 

FTX halted withdrawals in November and filed for bankruptcy after customers rushed to pull their holdings from the cryptocurrency exchange.

FTX.US made contributions totaling $21,882,932 in the 2022 election cycle, with 81.44% of that going to Democrats. 

The Oregonian has reported that a $500,000 contribution to the Democratic Party of Oregon PAC came from Nishad Singh, director of engineering at FTX. Pressure is building for recipients of contributions from FTX-affiliated donors to return the money. The Oregon Democratic Party hasn’t yet said it will do so. The PAC had $691,532 cash on hand as of Nov. 28, 2022, according to OpenSecrets.org.

FTX has started trying to claw back payments made by its former management to politicians, The Guardian reported on Dec. 22, 2022. 

FTX “intends to commence actions before the bankruptcy court to require the return of such payments, with interest accruing from the date any action is commenced”, the company said, sharing an email address – FTXrepay@ftx.us – that recipients could use to voluntarily return money.

“Recipients are cautioned that making a payment or donation to a third party (including a charity) in the amount of any payment received from a FTX contributor does not prevent the FTX debtors from seeking recovery from the recipient or any subsequent transferee,” FTX added in a statement.

Given the current scandal over Santos’ lying about his personal, academic and professional background, it’s surprising that another significant contributor to his campaign was PACS and individuals associated with prominent companies that apparently didn’t look into Santos’ background.

This includes Fisher Investments, Forman Capital Investments and Majority Committee PAC, a Leadership PAC associated with Rep. Kevin McCarthy, (R-CA), who now wants Santos’ vote to become Speaker of the House. 

Liar-elect Santos also raised a substantial portion of his $2,933,614.16 in contributions reported to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) from out-of-district and out-of-state sources, including Patriots Always Triumph, a Leadership PAC affiliated with Rep. Patrick Fallon (R-Texas).

Fortunately, it looks like most Oregonians showed some good sense. Only three people in Oregon contributed a total of $240 to Santos, according to the FEC. 

Whew! We don’t own this one.