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Blaming Ukraine is quickly becoming the right’s modern equivalent to “Thanks, Obama.”
During the Obama presidency, conservatives would seemingly look to blame everything — from minor inconveniences to full-scale tragedies — on the country’s first Black president. The meme got so popular that Obama parodied it himself. Over time, “Thanks, Obama” came to be the epitome of Republicans’ desperate desire to scapegoat the 44th president.
Conservatives, who’ve grown more Russophilic with Trump as the GOP’s standard-bearer, seem to have found a similar scapegoat in Ukraine.
It seems there’s nothing that can’t be pinned on Ukraine, from poverty to another coronavirus — and now, even the devastation in Maui.
Although the cause of the wildfires has yet to be determined, the severity of the damage was undeniably amplified by climate change, experts say. A sane person might respond to what happened by talking about ways to avoid similar tragedies in the future, perhaps by ramping up federal efforts to combat climate change.
So, as you might expect, many Republicans have said nothing of the sort.
Instead, prominent conservative lawmakers and media figures are using the opportunity to denounce U.S. aid to Ukraine, as though this aid has somehow prevented officials from providing adequate aid to Hawaii.
Yes, these lines of attack are illogical. Contrary to the tweet from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., the president had addressed the fires days prior. The federal government committed aid to Hawaii on Aug. 10, and the Biden administration has vowed to send more.
There’s also no indication whatsoever that Ukraine aid has hindered the response. And, importantly: If Republicans wanted to authorize additional funding for the Maui response, they would likely receive near-universal support.
There’s nothing stopping them from passing that bill as I type this. But I won’t hold my breath waiting.
In a June piece for The New Republic headlined “The Con Artists Who Blame Ukraine Aid for America’s Social Problems,” Alaric DeArment wrote:
[They’re] peddling a false dichotomy and perverting the traditional guns-versus-butter debate, but their message resonates with millions because it plays into genuine anger and frustration over economic inequality as well as concern and distaste for foreign entanglements, particularly in the wake of the Iraq War and misadventures in Libya, Syria, and Afghanistan.
DeArment was referring to people like conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and writer Glenn Greenwald in that passage, but other conservatives fit the bill as well. It’s like they’re trying to channel the spirit of that old Tupac line: “They got money for wars but can’t feed the poor.” And I imagine they’d sound more convincing if we didn’t have so much evidence of inaction regarding people marginalized by natural — or unnatural — disasters.
But this virtue signaling is convenient for conservatives. It lets them leapfrog productive political conversations (which are like kryptonite to today’s obstructionist Republicans) and get right to one of their favorite new activities: bashing Ukraine and anyone who supports it.