Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Friday introduced a motion to vacate against House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), threatening a vote to remove him.
"Several House Democrats indicated Friday that they would be willing to shield Johnson from Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene's motion to vacate. In exchange, the speaker must bring a Ukraine aid package to the floor for a vote." news.yahoo.com
Spkr Johnson has another problem...
House Speaker's Unpopularity With Rich Donors Widens Republicans' Fundraising Gap
ca.news.yahoo.com
... House Republicans are falling further behind on campaign cash with little-known House Speaker Mike Johnson at the helm.
Unlike his predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, Johnson is struggling to build a donor network. His difficulties come just months before the November election with Republicans' narrow majority at risk.
Johnson, who lacks McCarthy's fundraising prowess and deep business ties, has dramatically ramped up meetings with donors, traveling to 50 cities in nearly 20 states. But the party's deficit with Democrats is growing, according to federal filings.
Johnson's reputation as a devout evangelical Christian who frequently makes biblical references is at odds with the beliefs of some business executives invited to meetings and dinners, one person familiar with GOP fundraising said. ...
What a jerk. How short-sighted!
To stay free, Ukraine needs the US behind it.
In 1991, 91% of Ukrainians voted to be free of Russia and fully independent. Even the majority of Crimeans also voted for this.
Then, and again in 1995 and 1997, Russians ratifies recognition of borders between the two countries (sbornik-zakonov.ru).
One would expect that to be enough to ensure Ukraine's sovereignty, but in 2013, Ukraine then President Victor Yanukovich reneged on his campaign promise to Ukraine's voters to increase trade relations with the EU. This led to popular pro-democracy demonstrations in Maidan Sq. and pressure from Moscow for Yanukovich to use force to quell the demonstrations.
Yanukovich honored Putin's wishes and ordered guns turned on the demonstrators. Dozens of unarmed Ukrainian civiliand were killed. Ukrainians and Ukraine's legislators were enraged and Yanukovich fled to Russia. Shortly after, Russia intervened in 2014 by forcefully overrunning Crimea and beginning a war in Donbas and Luhansk.
Gor MTG & her FOP pals, since 1945, the recognized protocol wss that there would be no "land grabs" in Europe. While the Soviets "essentially" complied, Moscow had little compunction to enforce allegiance of lron Curtain partnerships as it did in Hungary in the 1950s and Czechoslovakia in the 1960s. Its 2014 land grab of Crimea, Donbas and Luhansk set a new precedent, and underscored Putin's governments to Soviet-style heavy handedness.
Now Putin is adding to his Ukraine effort by securing his control over the Russian-occupied Abkhazia part of Georgia (the former lGeorgian SSR) by building a new Black Sea Fleet base there, and striving to encourage Moldova's Russian speaking residents of the Transnistria region along Ukraine's border to bevready to undermine Moldova's democracy.
This is a perilous situation. If the West were to abandon Ukraine, it wouldn't be long for Putin to push to overthrow Ukraine's democracy and to install a Soviet-style pro-Moscow puppet leader there. And then to focus on Moldova and Georgia to bring their governments in "line", too,
Who knows what would follow after. (Probably some subversive manipulations to the democracies of Romania and Bulgaria to strengthen Putin's desire to "own" the Black Sea, and in the Baltics and Poland to open up the Baltic Sea to Russia's maneuverability there.)
In any event, Republican games in Congress to make legislators do what Trump wants, means screwing freedom seeking Europeans living in Putin's targeted former Iron Curtain "territories". If Republicans love Putin's model of klepto-fascism, then ditch Speaker Johnson and support Putin. Trump and Putin will love that.
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