Tag Archives: Ukraine war

International news

Trump-Vance bashing draws heat from right

Donald Trump and J.D. Vance decided to form a tag team in the Oval Office, taking turns bashing Volodymyr Zelenskyy as he came to D.C. ostensibly to sign a mineral-rights deal with the United States.

What the Ukrainian president received instead was a shameful and unconscionable hectoring from the U.S. president and vice president who stunningly decided to stand with the dictator who unleashed his army on Ukraine three years ago.

Trump and Vance made a bit of notoriety with their lecture of Zelenskyy, who has stood firm with his troops who have inflicted tremendous injury and death on the invaders. They became the first American president and VP to turn their backs on an ally while he is fighting quite literally a hostile force intending to do this nation harm.

The tag-team approach was particularly galling, it appears, even to congressional conservatives who have been talking up their displeasure over what they witnessed in the Oval Office.

The true measure of their displeasure will come when they have to cast votes on Trump policies. Newfound anger at Trump well could be just so much bluster and bravado. The validation could come when they propose tangible measures to strike back at what many of them have called a betrayal of an ally fighting for democracy.

Indeed, what we witnessed was a sickening display by the former leader of the Free World.

national news

Hero gets bum’s rush

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Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a hero to the people he serves as their preisident and is a hero to many Americans who have watched him stand his ground quite literally against the Russsian armed forces who invaded his country three years ago.

So, for the Ukrainian president to be bullied, harassed and humiiated by the president and vice president of the United States offends many Americans of both political parties, not to mention our allies in Europe who are standing behind the wartime Ukrainian leader.

The side show put on in the White House now appears to have been a deliberate effort by Donald Trump and J.D. Vance to humiliate Zelenskyy on the world stage. They said out loud in the White House meeting that Zelenskyy is fighting a lost cause against Russia and that without U.S. aid his forces would have been defeated long ago.

We cannot know any of that. Indeed, Zelenskyy only has shown himself to be much more of a man than either Trump or Vance. He stood his ground against their berating.

New York Times columnist David Brooks, who is billed as a conservative, said Friday that he felt “nauseated” by the disrespect that Trump and Vance displayed in the White House. He said that U.S. mistakes in the past usually were from “naivete or arrogance.” The POTUS and VPOTUS, Brooks said, are deliberately favoring a dictator over his foe who is fighting to preserve the democratic nation he governs.

The “gangsters” won the White House fight, according to Brooks.

And the fight for freedom against a force of tyranny took it squarely on the chin.

International news

What could go wrong?

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Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy came to the White House today supposedly to cement a deal over some mineral rights with the United States.

It didn’t end with anything signed. It ended instead with Zelenskyy storming out a shouting match with Donald Trump, who along with Vice President J.D. Vance, managed to insult the beleaguered Zelenskyy to the point of immense frustration.

This man is our ally, or at least he was our ally when Russian forces attacked Ukraine three years ago while Joe Biden was president of the United States.

It’s all changed now that Biden has retired and Trump has returned to power. Trump has buddied up to Russian goon Vladimir Putin, taking up where he left off when he lost his re-election bid to Biden in 2020.

That a meeting with Zelenskyy would crater as it did today should have surprised no one, given Trump’s propensity for saying the wrong things at the wrong time.

International news, military news

Trump betrays our ally

Donald J. Trump has made history in a sickening sort of way by being the first American president to pivot away from an ally at war with an aggressor nation.

The United States, led by President Joe Biden, went all in to defend Ukraine against the Russian invaders. The former president rallied our NATO and EU allies and mustered considerable support in the United Nations. The result has been a stiffening of resistance by Ukraine against Russia.

Now we hear Trump parroting Vladimir Putin dogma, and then Trump blames Ukraine for starting a war that began when Russian troops and tanks crossed into Ukraine.

Putin is a war criminal. He has violated multiple provisions lined out in the Geneva Accords that dictate the conduct of a land war.

Trump and Putin are seeking to negotiate an end to the three-year war without any input from Volodymr Zelenskyy.

Sickening.

International news, military news

Trump blames Ukraine for war … seriously

Donald J. Trump put his depravity on full display with a bizarre social media message that blames Ukraine for starting the war that began when Russia invaded its sovereign neighbor.

According to The Independent: In a post on his Truth Social website, Trump accused Zelensky, who he called a “modestly successful comedian” in a reference to his previous career as a sitcom star and entertainer, of having “talked the United States of America into spending $350 Billion Dollars, to go into a War that couldn’t be won, that never had to start.”

I am utterly speechless. This guy’s incessant enfatuation with a known killer and goon — Vladimir Putin — is simply beyond description.

Geez, Louise! This clown has turned his back on a dependable ally in Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy. He has stood up to Russia’s immoral and illegal invasion for three years. Ukraine has inflicted stunning casualties against an enemy force that sought to enter Ukraine’s capital city, Kyiv, just days after crossing the border.

President Joe Biden pledged financial support. He mustered full-throated NATO and EU support for Ukraine’s defense of its territory.

Now we have Donald Trump siding with his pal Putin.

Absolutely disgraceful for the new president to forsake our national pledge to help an ally defend itself against a tinhorn dictator.

International news

Trump to abandon Ukraine

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Donald J. Trump is on the verge of abandoning a longheld U.S. foreign policy, which calls for this nation to stand firm against aggression from nations that seek to undermine democratic sovereignty.

He’s going to meet soon with Russian thug/goon Vladimir Putin to “negotiate” a deal to end the war in Ukraine. The two pals no doubt are going to stick in the ear of Ukraine President Volodymr Zellenskyy, who’s been fighting his heart out against the Russian aggressors for the past three years.

How was he able to keep the Russians at bay while inflicting grievous casualties on the aggressors? Because U.S. support provided by President Joe Biden in concert with our NATO allies.

Well, Trump is now sitting in Biden’s former office and he and his MAGA cultists appear set on flattening Zellenskyy’s efforts against the Russian invaders.

I have no clue the direction these “negotiations” will take. I’m not smart enough to figure that out. I sense, though, that NATO, the EU and much of the free world is going to feel betrayed by the new administration’s cozying up to Putin.

I also believe Putin will see this suck-up policy as giving him license to continue his aggression in eastern Europe.

Joe Biden, military news

Putin threatens to go MAD

Vladimir Putin needs no explanation of what used to pass as a nuclear deterrence policy followed by the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

The Russian dictator reportedly is angry that President Biden has given Ukraine permission to use long-range missiles to strike deeply into Russia as it seeks to defend itself against Putin’s immoral and illegal invasion of its sovereign neighbor.

What is the Russian goon/thug/madman/tyrant/despot threatening to do? He is threatening to use “tactical nuclear weapons” against Ukrainian forces.

Let’s see. How do I say this tactfully? Oh, hell. I can’t.

It would be a mistake of catastrophic proportions!

You see, U.S. and Soviet nuclear deterrence was based on a policy of “mutually assured destruction.” Putin, who once led the Soviet system of spooks, knows the policy as well as any Russian alive today.

Using tactical nukes in the largest ground war in Europe since World War II well could produce a response from NATO — and the United States — that could destroy Russia.

Therefore, I am hesitant to buy fully into the notion that Vladimir Putin has gone MAD.

Then again, Putin did invade Ukraine … and his forces are getting their butts kicked in the field of battle.

International news, military news

Russia about to gain a WH friend?

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Donald Trump’s selection of J.D. Vance as his 2024 Republican Party presidential running mate should send chills up the spine of every “real Republican” out there.

Why is that? Because Vance, a freshman U.S. senator from Ohio, has emerged as Russia’s most vocal ally in the ridiculous debate over whether we should continue to assist Ukraine in its valiant fight against the Russian invaders.

Vance has made it clear: If he has any say in the matter, the United States won’t spend another dollar to assist Ukraine as it fights for its life against the immoral, illegal and unprovoked invasion by the Russian armed forces.

There has been plenty of talk about this election being a fight for democracy. That fight is playing itself out on the battlefields of Ukraine, which is fighting to preserve its democratic government against. the authoritarians in Moscow who want to take Ukraine back as a “Russian state.”

President Biden has been steadfast in his support of Ukraine, vowing to keep the United States engaged by sending money for military hardware essential for Ukraine to defeat the Russian aggressors.

Now, though, Trump and his “friendship” with Vladimir Putin stands in the way. Moreover, Trump now has a vocal running mate who is standing openly and foursquare with Putin’s designs on spreading his dictatorial regime beyond Russia’s borders.

Republican political orthodoxy used to stand against Russian aggression. We engaged in a decades-long cold war with the Soviet Union to keep them from advancing beyond their territorial limit. Two presidents named Bush, and others named Nixon, Eisenhower and Reagan stood strong against the tyrants.

We must not let the Russians win this fight!

Donald Trump, International news

MAGA misdirects its ‘pride’

How in the name of all that is holy can the MAGA movement justify its political kinship with this nation’s most notorious adversary?

I cannot even begin to comprehend this love affair with Vladimir Putin, his henchmen, his alleged principles and the idea that the MAGA cult in Congress is willing to all but give him a pass on his illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine.

The MAGA cultists, of course, adhere to the blathering of the 45th POTUS, who has acknowledged that Putin “talks nice” about him and, therefore, is a good guy and a “strong leader.”

Let’s unpack briefly something about Russia that doesn’t get much play in the American media.

For starters, Russia is a much more diverse society than what POTUS 45 envisions for this country. He bellows about how he wants this country to become a “Christian nation,” but Russia is home to a far greater percentage of non-Christians than the USA.

And did you know that abortion happens to be legal in Russia? The former Liar in Chief wouldn’t for a nanosecond blink at the notion of abortion becoming illegal in this country.

The MAGA minions continue to cling to the moronic notion that their hero in this country can make nice with a known killer and that their partnership somehow will solve all the world’s problems.

I do not get it. I will go to my grave never understanding how an iteration of Russia — the Soviet Union — was once called an Evil Empire but somehow has become the darling of the radical right wing of this nation.

International news, military news

All is quiet … for now!

NUREMBERG, Germany — I cannot help but feeling somewhat vulnerable as I visit with friends and travel around the lush countryside of this beautiful region of Europe.

Why? Because of the war that rages just two countries to the east of Bavaria in southern Germany.

Ukraine continues to fight for its life against Russian invaders. Someone will have to explain to me why Russian thug Vladimir Putin launched the invasion of Ukraine more than a year ago. It was thought Kyiv would fall in four days. It’s still standing. Ukraine is going to get more U.S. aid.

Meanwhile, Germany — the nation the world fought eight decades ago — stands on the precipice of armed conflict. As someone told me the other day, “If Russia invades any NATO country, we’re all in the fight.”

I’m here visiting friends and relaxing. It’s been a joyful time for me and for my friends as we have gotten reacquainted.

But if I get way up on my tippy toes and cast my gaze to the east, I see the signs of potential trouble for Germany … and, indeed, the rest of the world.

This just makes it imperative that we stick with Ukraine as it fights for its very life.