U.S. Money Helped Opposition in Ukraine (Best democracy money can buy)

[NNN0LHI]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=544&ncid=716&e=2&u=/ap/20041210/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_ukraine_election

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has spent more than $65 million in the past two years to aid political organizations in Ukraine, paying to bring opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko to meet U.S. leaders and helping to underwrite exit polls indicating he won last month's disputed runoff election.


U.S. officials say the activities don't amount to interference in Ukraine's election, as Russian President Vladimir Putin (news - web sites) alleges, but are part of the $1 billion the State Department spends each year trying to build democracy worldwide.


No U.S. money was sent directly to Ukrainian political parties, the officials say. In most cases, it was funneled through organizations like the Carnegie Foundation or through groups aligned with Republicans and Democrats that organized election training, with human rights forums or with independent news outlets.


But officials acknowledge some of the money helped train groups and individuals opposed to the Russian-backed government candidate — people who now call themselves part of the Orange revolution.

more

[bloom]

1. oil interest in Ukraine

"If you dig deep enough, you will find that the Bush administration's displeasure with "vote fraud" in the Ukraine, while gloating about their own vote fraud in the United States, is because Puppet President Bush and his Oil Kingdom Puppeteers were counting on having total control of the Ukraine so they could take oil out of the Caspian that way, too. "

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/121004Schwarz/121004schwarz.html



http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/ukraine.html

[nascarblue]

18. I knew this was going to come out the minute I heard Bush's speech

The sad thing is that I was predicting exactly this and catching lots of heat from rightwing rascist online Bushistas for the last few weeks. How many times do lies and crimes need to be revealed where these Bushistas will finally admit the Chimp is a lying crook?

[Judi Lynn]

2. God, this is sad. We still have American citizens who will claim

until their dying breath that other governments are simply dirty, dicatorial, not good enough, and we are superior in all ways. They do not acknowledge our hard-earned taxes are shunted off behind our back to out-of-power politicians friendly to U.S. interests, or, if they do, they believe that's the way it should be!

Crooked, sneaky, dishonest, and dirty. Christalmighty. Evil institutionalized. And they remain pompous, prideful, and even DARE to pretend they are completely saturated with good old fashioned "morality."

[NNN0LHI]

3. I have had a dozen of them right here swear the US had nothing to do...

...with the "orange revolution". With a straight face I might add. I don't know who they think they are talking to? Schmucks.

Don

[0007]

8. That's the American way Judi Lynn, and ignorance is always sad.

If Yshchenko is elected, I kind of wonder which way he'll go. With the US or Europe?

Yushchenko is friendlier toward Europe and the United States than his opponent, who has Putin's support as well as backing from the current Ukrainian government of President Leonid Kuchma. Putin lauded Yanukovych during state visits to Ukraine within a week of both the Oct. 31 election and the Nov. 21 runoff.

Both the United States and Russia has home support eroding badly, not to mention the economy aspect of the two counties which are in the toilet.

[NNN0LHI]

10. Google Katherine, Kathy, or Kateryna Yushchenko...

...and you will have your answer.

Don

[0007]

11. I read a few articles on Yushchendo and his family life.

My take is that he's a very dedicated man to his country and the honesty of which it operates. Although spending time in the U.S. and furthering his education here, I did not get a sense of how he felt about this country or Europe enhancing Ukraine's future.

There were many google hits and I only read the first two, so as of yet I failed to receive my answer.

[veggiemama]

23. "Kathy Chumachenko" yields a bumper crop of ties to the BFEE

and the Neocons. She's quite a gal!

[fedsron2us]

4. First, the 'Rose Revolution' then the 'Orange Revolution'

you can almost see the propoganda goons writing the PR. Of course, the target for all this crap is Putin's Russia and the fact that it is no longer prepared to allow itself to be robbed by western oil companies. The bad news for the White House is that Moscow is not going to take this sort of attack on its interests lying down. Nor are the Chinese going to sit on their hands whilst the US tries to seize control of all the oil resources in the world. They are both going to retaliate by stirring up trouble for the US interests in places like Latin America. This is why the current administration is getting so twitchy about Chavez buying arms from Russia and cutting trade deals with Beijing. Welcome to the world of eternal war between Oceania, Eurasia and East Asia as predicted by Orwell in 1984.

edit for typo

[sweetheart]

6. Lying down! ha! Putin got screwed big time

Putin is a fool to trust bush, as americans always lie, ALWAYS. Bush
must have convinced him that the anti-soviet cold warriors were not
on the war path... and putin, a low ranking nobody from the KGB was
too dumb and fell for it. Now condi is the cold warrior in chief
ramming the lies down their throats.

All we can know, is that bush 'll do everything in his power to
screw over anyone related to democracy. That one principal seems to
be a universal guideline. Everything else is doublespeak.

[fedsron2us]

13. Putin and the Russians are no fools

They know that they got royally screwed over by the US when Yeltsin was in power and much of their asset wealth fell into the hands of US backed oligarchs. The slow, unrelenting campaign by the Kremlin to regain control of these assets has been enjoying some success. The western stooges who ran the Yukos oil company have recently fled Russia and the state run company Gazprom will be taking control of many of the Yukos oil fields. Putin has also built up Russia's gold and foreign currency reserves to the value of $126 billion. This means that any attempt by the West to destabilize the Russian economy by forcing a debt crisis on it as happened in the 1990's is going to be much a harder to achieve. Moreover, Russia is becoming a key energy supplier to China. Beijing definitely does not want to see these oil resources falling under US control. I think that the White House are seriously worried by the growing mutuality of interests between the Russians and the Chinese. This is why so much effort has been put by the US into installing friendly regimes in Georgia and the Ukraine. Of course, the Russians and Chinese are going to retaliate by stirring up trouble for the White House in other parts of the world. This is not going to be one way traffic.

[sweetheart]

14. Europe will likely end its arms embargo with china

And then it will be full circle. There will be no nation on earth
without multiple cross alignments.

Black and white are giving way to grey, much like the battlefield
of kurushetra in the mahabharata.

[maddezmom]

5. sorry I duped, here's the other thread with some links :)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1061810

[maddezmom]

7. wish we'd spent the 65 million on our own election

how much did the US Gov't spend on our election reforms after 2000? Anyone know? :shrug:

[sweetheart]

9. probably bush did spend that much

of our taxpayer funds for his election fraud. Figure how much the
public paid in money, lives, time, air force 1 miles, secret services
and all the other perks. Surely it is well over 65m.

I presume you meant in holding fair and just elections... ha! Yet
if brittany spears keeps getting fatter, the fat lady 'll be singing
in not long.

[nascarblue]

19. What do you mean "you wish we had spent.." Kerry still has 51 million!!

[cyberpj]

12. Heres why Bush would spend so much to defeat Putin -

MONEY AND OIL, OF COURSE.......

I've posted this before but it bears repeating here.
This information is found near the end of the article.

Understanding the dollar's decline against the euro in the oil business:

President Vladimir Putin has stated both publicly and privately that invoicing Russia's crude-oil and gas exports to the European Union in euros instead of in dollars makes very good sense for both Russia and the EU. Putin is known to have very close relations with "old Europe", primarily Germany and France. His statements and those of German and French leaders have even on occasion drawn attention to the fact that US global dominance fundamentally rests on the fact that the dollar is the international currency, and that if an exit from the dollar were to occur in the sphere of global petro-transactions, the effect would be seriously to undermine that global dominance. Furthermore, a number of oil-exporting countries have already gone on public record as to their preference to make an exit from petro-dollars in favor of petro-euros. They have indicated that if Russia begins such a move to petro-euros, they will rapidly follow Russia's lead. The net effect would be a rapid international abandonment of the dollar as the international currency, which would in turn "bring down the towers" of the heavily debt-ridden US economy.

If Russia is perhaps positioning itself to make even a partial exit from the dollar in the pricing of its petro-transactions, then the Asian and other economies don't want to risk being left out in the cold, unprepared, seeing the value of their own huge dollar reserves undermined by a steep or chaotic decline in the value of the dollar. They cannot afford to ignore Russia's moves. Hence as Russia moves to decrease the percentage of its own holdings of dollars, so are the big Asian economies, as well as many other economies around the globe. No one wants to get burned in the event Russia moves to the euro. Additionally, as the dollar continues to weaken and crude oil continues to rise in price, having the dollar as the preferred international currency for petro-transactions will become more of a liability, especially for the big Asian economies, which are heavy importers of crude oil. This fact will tend to further undermine Asian, as well as the rest of international support for the dollar.

Entire article here:
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/FK25Dj03.html

[allemand]

15. Promoting democracy is always a good thing

and I doubt that PNAC is really interested in democracy (for example they would be pretty happy with Chalabi as Saddam 2.0, I think).

Please, don't commit the error of thinking that the enemy of your enemy is automatically your friend or that the friend of your enemy is necessarily your enemy.

The EU is also supporting the opposition in Ukraine and their agenda is quite different from that of PNAC. It would be wrong to reduce what is happening in Ukraine to a PNAC conspiracy. Of course, that is how Putin's propaganda wants to paint it.

But I think it is possible to criticize PNAC and Putin at the same time.

(repost from other thread)

[podnoi]

16. This is not a normal Democratic situation. Learn the history please

This was all not as black and white as portrayed. I have relatives (we talk weekly) in the Ukraine and have been learning quite a bit about the history. I do not think either choice is great.

There is an ethnic and undemocratic aspect to Yushenko and his high level support (such as Yulia Tymoshenko, who herself apparently used strong arming to gain her reported Billions in the Oil and Gas industry and was an "Oligarch"). Yulia Tymoshenko has made very agressive ethnic statements (she publically stated that "Blue scarfs (Yanakovich supporters) should be hung". Others in her party have made comments about <b>placing Yanakovich supporters behind barbed wire and burning them to death</b>.

Should something happen to Yuschenko, Yulia will become president (edit: she is asking to be Prime Minister).

Yuschenko was part of the old "establishment". Was prime minister (under Kuchma) at a time when his second in command (edit, second in command now), Yulia, was the "Gas Queen". During this time "robber barons" accumulated great wealth while the people of the country showered with cold water and were frequently without power and heat.

The unions in the east supported Yanakovich because he fixed many of these problems, paid them (they did not often get paid under Yuschenko), and they saw a general rising of living conditions. In addition up until the last week Yuschenko and his supporters had a pretty hard line platform that was not inclusive of the Russian speaking Ukrainians (more than half the population).

Once again, I am not saying I support Yanakovich, but real democracy and change can only occur through an honest dialog. Other countries mixing in propaganda does not help the stability nor assist in truly democratic leaders to rise to the top.

[allemand]

17. Vote-rigging and poisoning of candidates are indeed neither democratic

nor "normal".

There sometimes seems to be confusion between two questions:
1. Who won the elections in Ukraine?
2. Whose politics would be the best for the country?

The second question is irrelevant when we are discussing voting irregularities. Even if Yanakovich were better for Ukraine that wouldn't justify rigging the elections.

I am happy to let the second question be decided by Ukainians themselves. The great thing about democracy is that people can vote politicians out of office if they are dissatisfied with them.

I agree with you that whoever wins the new elections has to be open for dialog and reach out to the other side in a country as divided as Ukraine.

I think the fact that the European Union is geographically so close to Ukraine will be a positive factor and beneficial for the democratic process there. Whoever wins the elections will be under close scrutiny not only by other European governments but also by the European press.

[TheLastMohican]

20. What a load of garbage

"inclusive of the Russian speaking Ukrainians (more than half the population)"

I am a russian speaking ukrainian, living in Kiev, under the last consensus Ukraine had about 73% ethnic ukrainians and 17% ethnic russian population although many more ukrainians speak russian because of the speak-only russian policy during soviet times.

Yulia Timoshenko never said those things, there are no proofs, just hearsay and usual gossip.
The Yushenko side is very open-minded, we respect the other opinion, while the blue-whites never respect ours.

I wonder where your relatives come from in means of region in Ukraine, seriously. They have a serious bullshit TV up in Donetsk which says that the demonstrators in Kiev eat drugged oranges and wear US valenki. If you don't know what is valenki, this is a typical russian footwear for the winter.

[nascarblue]

21. regardless of what is known to the public, you cannot help but..

...be very very suspicious of a candidate who is backed by $65 million from the Bush administration for "exit-poll skewing" and "opposition efforts". $65 million! Come on, you KNOW that much money went to even more than that. I say the election ended up the way it did because of the US interference. I wouldn't be surprised if those people on film beating voters were actually hired by the Bush crime family.

[goforit]

22. Hmmmm........I read this story with a grain of salt,.....Other intentions

may be looming.

I don't see Bush supporting a man who would support the
European Union.
Sorry, but no cigar on this one.

I do see this administration going to the point that is at hand
to rid this man from power.

Bush can't handle the European Union from getting stronger than it all ready is.