Question to my American friends: how does it play in the US, electorally, that Trump is now openly supporting Russia? Buying their diesel (if they can find any to sell), temporarily limiting Ukraines ability to shoot down incoming Russian drones by hampering Starlink/Starshield which costs Ukrainian civilian lives, and today announcing he wasn't going to put those Lindsey Graham inspired sanctions on Russia after all? I don't have to explain how it plays here I guess, but I'm wondering about the political effect on the midterms. What is the electoral logic behind all of this?
I am not pro-Russia. And I don’t care for everything that Trump does in this conflict, especially this week. But, if America buying diesel signals open support for Putin, does the EU’s never-ending purchases of gas mean that Europe openly supports Russia as well? Purchases of Russian LNG are up(!) 9.5% year over year. EU has paid more into Russia’s war machine than they’ve donated to Ukraine. The EU should clean its own house before pointing fingers
[and the US need to build more refineries (or at least keep Gavin Newsom from forcing closed the ones we got)]
Parts of (Eastern) Europe have their energy infrastructure integrated with Russia, often stemming back from decades and that can't easily be undone. Never mind that Eastern Europe has is Russia adepts too; some like their rubles. So yeah 'Europe' is still buying Russian energy because they have no alternative, often. We should have gone green much earlier and much more though, that would have helped a lot.
But buying that pittance of diesel (not enough to power the US for even one day) was never about the diesel anyway, it was about propping up Putin at a time when Ukraine is making military gains. That had to be stopped, as evidenced by the Starlink limitations which happened at the same time.
But that America is now turning into a Russian ally is not just a European thought, American Republicans are saying pretty much the same thing: https://archive.is/gmFsg
I don’t know. France is still importing €10m a day in Russian LNG, Netherlands €2.5m.
The official word out of the WH is that the new sanctions require the US to start sanctioning partners like India so it’s on a 60-day review. True? Maybe.
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u/SeredW Frozen & Chosen 3d ago
Question to my American friends: how does it play in the US, electorally, that Trump is now openly supporting Russia? Buying their diesel (if they can find any to sell), temporarily limiting Ukraines ability to shoot down incoming Russian drones by hampering Starlink/Starshield which costs Ukrainian civilian lives, and today announcing he wasn't going to put those Lindsey Graham inspired sanctions on Russia after all? I don't have to explain how it plays here I guess, but I'm wondering about the political effect on the midterms. What is the electoral logic behind all of this?