US Senate Candidate: Washington Must End Military Aid to Ukraine, Stop Fueling Conflict
07:36 GMT 01.11.2022 (Updated: 17:06 GMT 20.04.2023)
© AP Photo / Roman Koksarov
Subscribe
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - The United States should end its military assistance to Ukraine and stop inflaming the ongoing conflict, LaRouche independent Senate candidate Diane Sare told Sputnik.
US voters head to the polls on November 8 to determine who will control Сongress, with the Democrats at risk of losing both chambers. The Senate is likely to be decided by six tight races. 35 of the 100 seats in the US Senate - and all 435 House seats - are up for grabs this year, in addition to statewide and local positions.
Sare, who is competing for the New York seat currently occupied by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer in the November 8 midterm elections, is the founder and co-director of the Schiller Institute New York City Chorus. According to her campaign site, Sare is running against the interests of Wall Street and in support of a new world economic order.
Biden recently expressed concern that Republicans could jeopardize future aid for Ukraine after current House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy warned of need to stop writing "blank checks" to Kiev if Republicans get the majority after the elections. The Republicans are highly favored to seize the House, according to recent polls, while control of the Senate appears to remain "up for grabs."
"First of all, I think we should stop supplying weapons to Ukraine. Number one. But it's really not about Ukraine. That's the problem. The problem comes from the West," Sare said. "We know that [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky was inclined already back in March-April to talk about Ukraine remaining neutral, [and] not joining NATO."
Then Boris Johnson, who was the UK prime minster at the time, Sare added, flew over there and said, "don't negotiate. We'll send you more weapons."
"We [the United States] have to completely change our policy," Sare said.
Sare said it is a definite possibility that the funding for weapons and aid to Ukraine will be cut if Republicans take Congress.
24 October 2022, 06:07 GMT
She believes that by changing Washington's policy on military assistance to Ukraine, the situation can be resolved and a diplomatic solution to the conflict can be found.
"I can't imagine myself how the soldiers on the ground, at least the ones who are not Nazis, on both sides, I mean, the Russian troops, and the regular Ukrainian people who are not in Azov* or these extremist groups are feeling about this because the people of Ukraine, the people of Russia are very close. It's the same family," she said. "Therefore, you're going to have, I think, an approach like Abraham Lincoln after the Civil War. We're going to have to have a massive plan for reconstruction."
The United States, the CIA, and British intelligence will have to stop backing Nazi insurgent groups, Sare added.
"And we're going to have to put it in the context of a new order of relations among nations in the world which is based on mutual respect of the security interests of all and that includes emphatically the right of every nation to sovereign economic development," Sare said.
When asked what role Congress can play in doing that, Sare pointed out the situation with the letter recently sent by the American lawmakers to US President Joe Biden.
25 October 2022, 05:18 GMT
Last Monday, a group of 30 Democratic Congressmen sent a letter to Biden urging him to fundamentally change his administration’s strategy with respect to the crisis in Ukraine and seek direct negotiations with Russia. However, the following day, the Congressional Progressive Caucus said it had withdrawn the letter.
"That was a very mild letter in terms of what I think is needed, but it shows that you can influence the Congress," Sare said. "Of course, it wasn't as strong enough influence because they are clearly more terrified of Chuck Schumer, [former US President Barack] Obama and the FBI or whatever they were threatened with, because within 24 hours, they took it back."
However, Sare said the situation is not completely doomed.
"I don't think it's hopeless. I think the Congress could be moved to demand that we stop fueling the fire," Sare said.
Repairing Inter-Parliamentary Ties With Russia
She also assured that she is determined to do her best to revive inter-parliamntary relations with Russia.
"I would absolutely do it," Sare said when asked about reviving the process. "I would do whatever I could do to repair this [US-Russian] relationship."
Regarding her possible travel to Russia in the capacity of a lawmaker, Sare said, "You know, I would have to convince people at the State Department, I suppose."
"I don't know what the restrictions are on that right now," she said. "I think we have an enormous amount of work to do here... You know, I say everything, somewhat hypothetically, because I don't know what the conditions will be. I don't know what conditions this regime will place on US senators."
Cancel Culture War Against Russia is a 'Complete Outrage'
The outrageous cancel culture war waged against Russia limits the ability of people to communicate in a domain of common interests, Sare told Sputnik.
"I think it's a complete outrage," Sare, who is a trained classical musician and choral conductor, said. "The role of the artists is not a political role. It's not a partisan role. The role of the artist is to ennoble mankind."
Canceling great artists or great writers, whether it's Tchaikovsky, the Bolshoi Ballet, Tolstoy, or Dostoevsky, she added, is "very ugly" because culture is universal among human beings.
"So, trying to stop this, to nullify it, you really are limiting the ability for human beings to communicate with each other in the domain where we have common interests and a common identity," she added.
Sare went on to say that 2024 will mark the 200th anniversary of of the Missa Solemnis of Beethoven, which was premiered in St. Petersburg.
"It was written for that chorus because the chorus in St. Petersburg in 1824 probably was the best chorus in the world," she said. "Beethoven is slandered all the time, because the vocal parts in this piece are so difficult. Everyone said he was crazy. He didn't understand the singing voice. No, he was writing it for the best chorus in the world. Now, I think this is incredible. We just had the 250 year anniversary of Beethoven, which we didn't celebrate properly because of the pandemic. But what an extraordinary thing. Shouldn't we be collaborating to celebrate the 200 year anniversary of this masterpiece, and the legacy of the history of the choral tradition in St. Petersburg, and probably we're not even allowed to talk about it?"
7 March 2022, 03:26 GMT
Sare said it is impossible to erase somebody's culture.
"The media, the news media are really making a terrible mistake. They think that they control the narrative because they control the airwaves," she said.
Since the beginning of Russia's special military operation in Ukraine, performances of many representatives of Russian arts and culture, ballet troupes, and musicians have been canceled, while works of Russian composers Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Dmitri Shostakovich, and Sergei Rachmaninoff have been removed from posters.
Idea of Democracy in US 'Complete Fraud'
The affirmations that the United States has democracy is a complete fraud in light of the challenges third party candidates face in trying to run for office, Sare told Sputnik.
"I want the world to know that the idea of democracy in the United States is a complete fraud," Sare said. "I'm telling you this without saying anything about what happened in 2020, but merely my own experience, what I had to do to get on the ballot, and then a blatantly rigged opinion poll to keep me out of the debate."
Sare said in order to get on the ballot she had to get triple the signatures of the Democrats and Republicans. They were only required to get 15,000 signatures in a statewide race, whereas Sare was required to get 45,000 signatures in six weeks.
"They had many minor parties which people have heard of - the Libertarian Party, the Green Party, the Serve America party. Not one minor party succeeded to make this threshold. It was designed to silence debate," she said. "They were frankly very unhappy that I succeeded. I did not pay anyone. I had a full volunteer force and we turned in 66,000 signatures."
Sare said she was the only statewide Independent candidate to make it on the ballot in New York but was excluded from a debate between Schumer and the Republican challenger.
Spectrum News told her she was not invited to the debate because she did not meet the criterion of 15% in the opinion poll. However, Dare said there was a major problem with the surveys.
"Not one of the polls allows the voters to choose Diane Sare," she pointed out.
Why won't @JosephPinion & @SenSchumer debate me? 'No' Pinion ran off the stage before answering the question. Support me in breaking the media silence and contact Spectrum News to demand that I be included in tomorrow's critical debate. #DemandtheDebate @impassionedisa1 pic.twitter.com/uhpf6wvmGU
— Diane Sare for U.S. Senate (@DianeSare) October 29, 2022
Sare wrote to the station and said this is rigged, "you must include me. 66,000 people want me in this debate." The station said there is an option to pick "other."
"My name is not ‘other.' My name is Diane Sare," she said. "I know personally that two of my petitioners got called by the pollsters and when they said we're voting for Diane Sare, they were told that's not an option."
Sare said regardless of the results she is not going to disappear as a political voice.
"This fight is not going to go away. My point of this campaign is to win the policy. And I intend to win the policy, whether I'm in the Senate or whether I'm not," she said.
"If Republicans don't take the majority of the seats, I'm afraid the lunatic wing of the Democratic Party will see this as a mandate to continue their insane policies, first of all," Sare concluded. "If the Republicans do take the majority, then we perhaps have an opportunity for change but I really fear that change is not going to be made through the electoral process, but through the citizenry, raising their voices and forcing our so-called representatives to actually represent us."
According to recent polling, Republicans appear well-positioned to take the US House while the battle for control of the Senate is expected to come down to the wire and may hinge on the outcome of six tight races.
*Azov is a terrorist organization banned in Russia.
