Almost like buying energy and funding the defense of a democracy from an invasion aren't exactly the same situation.
The funding coming on my back out of my labor and my taxes.
Is this the democracy which started when it forcibly overthrew the elected government, banned a number of political parties right after that, and which just banned the second largest political party recently? Some democracy.
The "elected government" which restricted rights of speech and protests, ordered police to open fire on protesters killing more than 50 people, and then fled to Russia.
>and which just banned the second largest political party recently
The head of that political party is Victor Medvechuk, a close associate of Putin who proudly claimed that Putin is his daughter's godfather, who was charged with treason and put on house arrest a year ago for funneling money to the DPR / LPR whomst Ukraine has been at war with for 8 years, and was recently captured while attempting to flee the country in a stolen Ukrainian military uniform after escaping his house arrest.
And the point of it, for those that don't know, is to remove the last shreds of legitimacy from any BS referendums Russia might try to hold in occupied territor, in which a minor pro-Russian politician whose party had low-single-digit support in previous elections is suddenly "elected".
> Is this the democracy which started when it forcibly overthrew the elected government
You just parrot a blatant lie by Russia
I'm not a big fan of my country's military spending, and it's probably trivial even in terms of percentage of GDP, in comparison to that of the US, Russia or China.
In terms of regime change "approach", if the US did manufacture the overthrow of the previous Ukraine government, it has the appearance of a much lower cost of human life than the approach Putin is taking. And I'm no fan of the US' "manifest destiny" ego trip but I don't want to get too far into whataboutism.