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**MARCH 28, 2024**

On the Prospect website

[link removed]
How Biden Boxed Himself In on Gaza

The president draws on 50 years of unflagging support for Israel,
and not even a humanitarian crisis can dislodge him from that viewpoint.
BY JONATHAN GUYER

The Long Road Back for the Port of Baltimore

For the moment, Maryland officials are focused on crisis
management. BY GABRIELLE GURLEY

[link removed]
How Everything Changed at Volkswagen in Chattanooga

This union drive by the UAW looks very different from two other
attempts in 2014 and 2019. BY MIKE ELK

[link removed]
Suicide Mission

What Boeing did to all the guys who remember how to build a plane
BY MAUREEN TKACIK

Cooper on TAP

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**** Should House Democrats Bail Out Mike
Johnson?

If he will agree to a vote on Ukraine aid, it might be worth it.

Since Republicans took control of the House of Representatives after the
2022 elections, internal GOP dynamics have followed a familiar pattern.
First, a Speaker of the House is elected by making lavish promises and
concessions to right-wing extremists like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene
(R-GA). Second, whenever some routine budget business must be passed,
the same handful of extremists make insane demands that are utterly
unacceptable to either Senate Democrats or President Biden. Third, the
Speaker cuts a deal with House Democrats that largely preserves the
status quo. Fourth, the extremists try to kick out their own Speaker
using a "motion to vacate," which thanks to the aforementioned
concessions, now only requires a single member to propose.

This is what happened to Kevin McCarthy, and now Greene is threatening
to do it

to his replacement Mike Johnson. And now that several House Republicans
have resigned or been removed from office, Johnson will soon be down to
a one-vote majority.

But this time, House Democrats are considering bailing out Johnson, if
he will agree to put an aid package for Ukraine that has already passed
the Senate on the House floor. "If the choice is between Ukraine aid and
providing a vote to stop a motion to vacate, or no Ukraine aid, I think
there's a lot of Democrats who would be willing to assist in getting
it done," Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) told

**The Hill**
.

The reason Democrats are so anxious to get this aid passed is that the
tactical situation on the ground in Ukraine is dire. Since Greene and
her fellow Putin stooges have bottled up this package for months,
Ukrainian troops have run desperately short of artillery shells, the
most critical munition in the conflict. Today, Russia is out-shelling
Ukraine by a factor of perhaps 4 to 1, and as a result, has made some
progress

pushing through Ukrainian defenses.

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It should also be emphasized that the only reason Ukraine is not a
Gaza-style humanitarian catastrophe from one end to the other is that
the Ukrainian military has not been defeated in the field. We have seen
what happens in areas conquered by the Russian military, like
Mariupol-utter physical devastation

from saturation artillery bombardment, torture, murder
,
and mass kidnapping

of Ukrainian children. The stakes are very high.

If Democrats could get a clean Ukraine aid bill on the House floor, it
would almost certainly pass. Heck, probably a majority of Republicans
would vote for it. The question is whether it's worth the trade.

On the one hand, Johnson is a hard-right extremist himself whose
politics are largely similar to Greene's. It would be foolish, as some
liberals suggested when Kevin McCarthy was facing his removal vote, to
support him as a show of being the adults in the room. There is no
reason to help Republicans deal with the dysfunction created by their
own irresponsible stupidity out of some sense of civic virtue.

On the other hand, keeping Johnson in place in return for concessions
would be a different matter. As noted, Ukraine does need this aid very
badly. And it's not as if whoever replaces Johnson would be any
better-at best his replacement would be similar, at worst a complete
maniac. Indeed, with such a microscopic majority, Republicans might not
be able to agree on anyone at all. Johnson at least has demonstrated he
will cut some grudging deals

with Democrats at the last minute.

House Democrats are reportedly deferring to their leader Hakeem Jeffries
(D-NY), who hasn't come out one way or another yet. But if this deal
were on the table, I'd take it.

~ RYAN COOPER

**Follow Ryan Cooper on Twitter**
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Bluesky Social

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