Why should we agree to reward sanctuary cities in latest Schumer/Biden senate bill?

[SunsetBengal]

(02-06-2024, 06:32 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: I think I mentioned this quite awhile back when we were first doing the initial aid packages to Ukraine and someone else was talking about the billions we were sending them.

With the exception of some of the more advanced precision guided missiles and such, the vast majority of military weapons and vehicles we've given Ukraine are our outdated hand-me-downs that were either in storage are were heading towards storage because they're being replaced by newer things (just because they're in storage doesn't mean they aren't still costing us money to maintain).

The Bradley IFVs they sent for example were the M2A2 ODS. Meanwhile we started making M2A3s in 2000 and we've now got some M2A4s. We sent them vehicles that are 2 generations old. They had upgrades since they were made, but it doesn't change that fact.

We sent a ton of M1113s and those are upgraded Vietnam vechicles. The most "modern" version were created in 1987 and we haven't bought any new ones since 2007 and we're working on replacing them.

Even the 31 Abrams tanks we sent were A1s which haven't been made since 1992. Meanwhile the Marine Corps just shut down their heavy armor and sent some 450 more modern versions to the Army as part of their restructuring and we're working on producing a new generation to replace the M1A2s which have had 20 years of extensive upgrades themselves (and also are producing a whole new series of don't-call-it-a-light-tank M10s).

All of those vehicles aren't being Kelly Blue Booked for wear-and-tear when they talk about the value of aid being sent. If it cost them that much to build it and that much to upgrade it, it doesn't matter it was 15 years ago and has been treated like a government mule since. It's still that much in aid. Lol.. same as when we send a couple million bullets, we just pull that stuff from pre-positioned storage around the world (same way that we gave military aid to Israel, it was already there, we just opened up the doors). We already had most of those vehicles and ammo in a storage depot in like Poland or something.

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Even that monetary aid isn't particularly truthful either. A lot of those are us "giving" them money so they can immediately buy things from us. It's basically just a roundabout way of the government paying itself and making money flow through it's industries. It's a method to keep money flowing around and keeping people working due to the demand. 

Just like how many countries are buying grain from Ukraine and then Ukraine then sends them that money for more supplies. We're sending them money, but a lot of it just comes back into our economy.

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Ultimately a weaker Russia and Putin is good news for us, and as long as we (and NATO) keep the fighting out of their/our land, out of their/our farmland, out of their/our factories, and out of their/our populace, it's ultimately significantly cheaper for us to give our hand-me-downs and surplus to them to do the job for us.

I get what you're saying about the US Military upgrading their own equipment, but sending it to Ukraine does not make it "free", the American tax payers still paid for that stuff.  That could be shit that the US sends to Mexico to battle the catels...