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A Ukrainian soldier went to Washington to explain the war. He says American politicians don't realize much of the funding actually stays in the US. (www.businessinsider.com)

submitted 8 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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A Ukrainian soldier in Washington, DC told Insider he's using his break from the front lines of the war against Russia to educate US lawmakers.

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[-] [email protected] 83 points 8 months ago

That's the whole point of how any aid works in most situations. Especially with the US's military-industrial complex. Ukraine gets munitions, US industry gets the money. The point is not to build a military industry for Ukraine.

The infamous "government cheese" was given to the needy in the US not because poor people have a dire need for cheese, but because the government wanted to give a lot of money to wealthy dairy farmers.

To suggest that lawmakers don't understand that that is what they are doing is crazy.

[-] [email protected] 29 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

The infamous "government cheese" was given to the needy in the US not because poor people have a dire need for cheese, but because the government wanted to give a lot of money to wealthy dairy farmers.

Jimmy Carter gave struggling dairy farmers money to encourage dairy production at a time when the costs of these products were rising like crazy.

~~The government bought a bunch to spur production and decrease costs for the average family. It was literally meant to help poor people the most.~~

*I must correct myself, the dairy farmers were struggling because previous government interventions had tanked the cost of dairy so low that farms weren’t turning a profit. So the government bought up supply to increase prices to a more sustainable baseline for everyone. I apologize for my mistake and will post links below so people can read some sources and decide for themselves.

They also never intended to give the cheese away at all. They were hoping to eventually sell it in some capacity.

It was only later in the early 80s under Reagan that they decided to give the cheese away, once again, to poor people and the elderly specifically.

And they only did that after a public spectacle was made when Agriculture Secretary John R. Block showed up at a White House event with a five-pound block of greening, moldy cheese and showed it to the press. “We’ve got 60 million of these that the government owns,” he said. “It’s moldy, it’s deteriorating … we can’t find a market for it, we can’t sell it, and we’re looking to try to give some of it away.”

At one point they had so much cheese it was recommended they just dump it all into the ocean because it would be the cheapest thing to do.

But yeah, it was given away mostly because we had a lot of it and we needed to get rid of it somehow.

https://www.npr.org/2021/05/21/999144678/big-government-cheese-classic

https://www.history.com/news/government-cheese-dairy-farmers-reagan

[-] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

Jimmy Carter gave struggling dairy farmers money to encourage dairy production at a time when the costs of these products were rising like crazy. The government bought a bunch to spur production and decrease costs for the average family.

This makes little sense. If the government makes big purchases of a product, the increase in demand raises, not lowers, prices. Also, if people aren't interested in eating that much cheese that the government has trouble giving it away, "spurring production" is an insane objective. It only makes sense if, as OP said, the whole point was a giveaway to farmers.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I’m no economist, I apologize, it went like this:

During the 1970s, as Americans sat in long gas lines and watched the economy tank, they faced another crisis: an unprecedented shortage of dairy products. In 1973, dairy prices shot up 30 percent as the price of other foods inflated. When the government tried to intervene, prices fell so low that the dairy industry balked. Then, in 1977, under President Jimmy Carter, the government set a new subsidy policy that poured $2 billion into the dairy industry in just four years.

Suddenly, dairy farmers who had been hurting were flush with cash—and producing as much milk as they could in order to take advantage of government support. The government purchased the milk dairy farmers couldn’t sell and began to process it into cheese, butter and dehydrated milk powder.

So they were struggling due to inflation, and the government was buying their products to prop them up for the time.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

If the policy was simply meant to address a shortage of dairy products in the market, the government should not have ended up with mountains of cheese that had to be given away.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

You’re correct, I updated the post with better info. Thank you for keeping it accurate.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Edit: this is to add to your point.

The lawmakers pretend they don’t understand. They know the benefits of aid aren’t going to the American workers, and because of suppressed wages and non-existent mandatory benefits, the tactic works. The general public is purposefully removed from how any of this works and that allows manipulators to run around yelling bullshit lies that sound true. The bureaucracy works to their advantage, and it’s why we are buried in it.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

They know the benefits of aid aren’t going to the American workers

They literally do though. It feels like you're conflating government purchases and like, tax breaks. Those aren't the same thing at all

Gov makes big purchases:

company fills larger order
suppliers make money from selling the additional supplies
Multiple manufacturers make money because of how manufacturing works in interrelated ways
employees get OT, new jobs, raises, bonuses, etc all the way up the chain
employees spend that additional money, on haircuts and in restaurants, and on jet skis, and all kinds of shit

Whereas with tax breaks:

CEO keeps more of what he already makes
specialized industries get some smaller amount of money, lowering the velocity of the money "spent" due to fewer employees and lack of scale in material needs
that's kind of it

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

You ignore the part of suppressed wages and denial of benefits. The average American worker does not receive the benefits of the aid

[-] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago

That is nonsensical.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

How does billions of tax dollars going into the military-industrial complex make it better?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Because that's effectively giving a lot of money to US citizens.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Turns out most people you trust to build your weapons and shit are your own citizens.

The call is coming from inside the house!

[-] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago

Those "US citizens" being weapons and military vehicle manufacturers, with most of the money going to executives. Cute how you're trying to frame it as going to "our guys" but your nationalistic thinking doesn't stand up to the reality that we're just lining the pockets of a few at the expense of people's lives. Before you say "b-b-but the Ukraine situation is a defensive one" that's usually not the case with the military-industrial complex and also it incentivizes the complex to set up situations where countries have to rely on them regardless.

[-] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Except we aren't, which I lay out step by step in a post right next to this one.

https://lemmy.world/comment/4837558

[-] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago

You're laying out the exact same trickle down bullshit. Oh joy, more jobs making killing machines! Are you unaware of the disparity between executive pay and regular worker pay? Again, most of the money goes to the executives anyway. Still, if you want to make this argument: why doesn't the government simply invest in manufacturing things other than killing machines?

[-] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Are you unaware of the disparity between executive pay and regular worker pay?

I literally acknowledge this disparity in one of my bullets.

why doesn’t the government simply invest in manufacturing things other than killing machines?

The US government subsidies many industries and makes internal purchases from a lot more industries.

Do you believe FEMA makes all their shit? Because they don't. They buy it.

[-] [email protected] 24 points 8 months ago

American politicians don't understand shit, because the people holding their leashes don't want people who understand shit in office.

[-] [email protected] 22 points 8 months ago

It's not that they don't understand. They're lying. They know how government procurement works. They know that all they have to do is ask the DoD who can tell them how every dollar is spent. They don't because it doesn't fit their narrative. They're lying.

[-] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago

I don't know, man, I feel like we're at the 'lunatics running the asylum' stage. A good number are lying, sure. But a good number are genuinely stupid. Or genuinely uninterested in learning, like Reagan eating his steak while the Australian Prime Minister works out a deal with his aides.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago

Even if they are profoundly stupid, and many are, their staff isn’t. They know how these things work, as they do it every day.

[-] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

ask the DoD who can tell them how every dollar is spent

Lol the DoD hasn't passed an audit in 30 years, and the reason it's only 30 years is that we didn't require them before then. Specifically, they didn't even try until 2017 and have failed every audit.

https://blog.ucsusa.org/jknox/defense-spending-reaches-record-high-as-pentagon-fails-its-audit-for-fifth-time/

[-] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

Lol. Betcha they can tell you every missile they bought or transfered to Ukraine. It's a separate account.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Sure that's accounted for as an act of congress

These fucking Congresspeople know because they argued over the bill lol

The entire time they've just been lying out of their asses. It's crazy people think we just have Ukraine literal money. "Hey go buy some bombs but not from us" - like it's insane to even imagine as a concept

[-] Quacksalber 22 points 8 months ago

That's the problem when all you hear are just trumpian one-liners. "We have spent over 100 billion on Ukraine, where is the money?" Is all they need. When all the right-wing influencers keep parroting those one-liners and their base keep mindlessly supporting whatever they say, they are effectively shielded from critical questions.

[-] [email protected] 15 points 8 months ago

We need an "I'm just a bill" for how the millitary industrial complex works.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

Become politician
Have friends that make weapons (maybe you just happen to be invested)
Start a war

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

Receive lobbying payment
????
Profit.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

itsthesamepicture.jpg

[-] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

From the business of buying and selling property, he pivoted to defending it, serving in the Ukrainian armed forces amid the Battle of Kyiv, back when just about everyone thought a Russian victory was just a matter of time.

This week, however, he's engaged in warfare of a different sort — politics — even if, technically, he's supposed to be on leave and resting up for another deployment.

"I am on vacation now because I'm going to the front lines with the brigade in two weeks," he told Insider as the sun set on the Washington Monument, where earlier about 150 activists attending a pro-Ukraine advocacy summit in Washington unfurled what organizers claimed was the world's largest blue-and-yellow flag.

But he's actually working, meeting with members of Congress to share his perspective on the war and why he thinks his country's defense is still worth supporting.

It's an intervention that comes as Republicans in the House — who will control the next year's legislative agenda — are split down the middle on whether Ukraine's fight is also America's.

But a "good portion" of the $113 billion in total aid marked for Ukraine has indeed been "spent in the States, or on US personnel," according to the Center for Strategic & International Studies, a think tank in Washington.

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this post was submitted on 26 Oct 2023

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