https://currently.att.yahoo.com/att/cm/fox-news-hits-trump-uncomfortable-101118522.html
It's all right here folks, and I can't understand why the talking heads on CNN, etc. are not pointing this out vociferously. First, J.D. Vance is flapping his mouth about how Joe Biden botched the handling of the war. If you don't want to watch the entire 7:45, go to the 2:15 mark and listen to Zelensky's response. He said that in 2019 (DURING TRUMP'S FIRST ADMINISTRATION), Russia signed a cease fire agreement, and Putin proceeded to disregard both the cease fire and the exchange of prisoners which he had also agreed to. So for me at least, the entire reason that Trump and Vance got so upset during this meeting was that Zelensky called their bluff regarding their handling of the Russia-Ukraine situation and pointed out that Trump didn't resolve anything back in 2019 even before the Russia invasion a few years ago. You do NOT sit in the Oval Office and call out Trump like that without getting a viscious response. I love Zelensky's honesty.
Unfortunately, Zelensky seems to have forgotten that he is dealing with a megalomaniac who bristles at criticism. And therefore, his brutal honesty has likely done Ukraine more harm than good.
Trump, Vance and Musk are just trolls...trolling the world creating instability for the fun of cruelty...We live in a troll society. Facebook, X...etc have become mostly trolling centers...not for everyone but there is a large proportion of people who do nothing but troll others to upset or create controversy...
Trump tried to say Ukraine started the war just last week...why? because he's nothing but a troll.
Trump and Vance got to this point by lying and blaming everything on Biden, and it's worked because people don't follow up or his followers blindly believe him. I see a lot of conservatives on social media defending Trump's childish actions with the same empty rationalizations - the same people that would have been against Russian expansion or forceful incursions a decade ago. A man who has never done anything for anyone but himself scolding a man who has done everything for his people was a hideous display of narcissism. Trump is a psychopath, but Vance makes my skin crawl ever since he showcased the ease at which he could blatantly lie during the VP debate.
This is all a game to them, something to break and leave for someone else to fix while they make it easier to profit. The same people who invited the Taliban to Martha's Vineyard and gave them the keys to Afghanistan after 20 years fighting them. The Founders installed checks and balances with the expectation we would disagree with each other, but they never expected us to elect a fool, let alone, an enemy of the state.
https://currently.att.yahoo.com/att/cm/fox-news-hits-trump-uncomfortable-101118522.html
It's all right here folks, and I can't understand why the talking heads on CNN, etc. are not pointing this out vociferously. First, J.D. Vance is flapping his mouth about how Joe Biden botched the handling of the war. If you don't want to watch the entire 7:45, go to the 2:15 mark and listen to Zelensky's response. He said that in 2019 (DURING TRUMP'S FIRST ADMINISTRATION), Russia signed a cease fire agreement, and Putin proceeded to disregard both the cease fire and the exchange of prisoners which he had also agreed to. So for me at least, the entire reason that Trump and Vance got so upset during this meeting was that Zelensky called their bluff regarding their handling of the Russia-Ukraine situation and pointed out that Trump didn't resolve anything back in 2019 even before the Russia invasion a few years ago. You do NOT sit in the Oval Office and call out Trump like that without getting a viscious response. I love Zelensky's honesty.
Unfortunately, Zelensky seems to have forgotten that he is dealing with a megalomaniac who bristles at criticism. And therefore, his brutal honesty has likely done Ukraine more harm than good.
I don't see it exactly that way.
The entire meeting was something like 50 minutes I believe. The arguing part was about the last 12 minutes. It built to this point, I think Zelenskyy was annoying them by pointing out things Russia has done or could do that Trump and Vance didn't want to hear or didn't want discussed publicly in that moment. It certainly was not an "ambush" as some in the media have suggested. If the meeting had ended after 40 minutes or if they didn't take questions there never would've been an "ambush" by Vance. I do blame Vance for how it unfolded, I just have a different view on the way in which it did.
So for 2019, that was the ceasefire, correct me if I am wrong please, but that was brokered by France and Germany between Ukraine and Russia.
I do not think the US has involvement in that agreement? Therefore what role or blame does the US or the Trump administration bear from the 2019 failures relative to now? I certainly do not trust Russia to uphold a ceasefire and any peace agreement with them would be fragile. I do however think that Trump's point is that a ceasefire he brokers with Ukraine and Russia would be firm because of the relationship he himself has with Putin. And maybe that is true. The problem is what about when Trump leaves office, and this is Ukraine's fear, that any agreement now can be violated some number of years later without a backstop or the so called security guarantees that acts as a deterrent against future Russian aggression towards Ukraine.
There is a whole debate on if supporting Ukraine is in the United States best interest, in 2025. If we have access to and are vested in their natural resources then it becomes so. In the era of Trump or beyond the era of Trump, is simply supporting or fighting for democracy in other countries worth it - he have a really bad track record at this the last 60 years and a lot of dead soldiers and a lot of 'wasted' money. We have two Ukraine threads so I don't know which we would discuss this in.
I'll end by saying I certainly don't like the pressure campaign the US is putting on Ukraine to end the war when that pressure should be applied more squarely on the Russian side.
The reason to support Ukraine is because Ukraine won’t be the last country Russia tries to invade. It’s the same approach we have always had: keep Russia from expanding. It used to be because of communism, now it’s just basic freedom - so people don’t get imprisoned or poisoned or blown up in a plane for dissenting. But Trump and some MAGAs are taken with Putin’s power, and Russia has supported Trump. We shouldnt be extorting Ukraine in a time of despair, but this administration isn’t concerned with the long game or big picture. It’s in it for immediate gratification and short financial gains and that leads to collapse.
The reason to support Ukraine is because Ukraine won’t be the last country Russia tries to invade. It’s the same approach we have always had: keep Russia from expanding. It used to be because of communism, now it’s just basic freedom - so people don’t get imprisoned or poisoned or blown up in a plane for dissenting. But Trump and some MAGAs are taken with Putin’s power, and Russia has supported Trump. We shouldnt be extorting Ukraine in a time of despair, but this administration isn’t concerned with the long game or big picture. It’s in it for immediate gratification and short financial gains and that leads to collapse.
I get that view. I never said, will never say, I'm any better than anyone else. So when I say this I acknowledge you can just lump me in with a bunch of other Americans focused on our own lives...let Europe worry about it.
Marched for Ukraine yesterday. Good turnout. So goes America, so goes the free world.
Marched for Ukraine yesterday. Good turnout. So goes America, so goes the free world.
This may be true. One might fault the rest of the free world for not doing more to promote their own strength and security rather than an over reliance on the United States to do it for them.
It's not that other countries are dependent on the USA, it's that we've built up such strong alliances since WWII with other countries that our networks and economies have become intertwined. If the US cut off relations with Canada, Australia, the Middle East, Mexico and Europe, they would be better off than we would be. We aren't Captain America.
It's not that other countries are dependent on the USA, it's that we've built up such strong alliances since WWII with other countries that our networks and economies have become intertwined. If the US cut off relations with Canada, Australia, the Middle East, Mexico and Europe, they would be better off than we would be. We aren't Captain America.
Other nations that have built said "strong alliances" with the US have spent more money on their own self interests and ignored global threats largely because the US was going to do the heavy lifting and military defense spending for them.
@nebish I'm not sure what countries you say are ignoring global threats. But while the US does provide support throughout the world, I think you are underestimating how much support other global powers provide.
Canada
State of Canadian Armed Forces' combat readiness growing worse, government report warns
Department of National Defence report also says almost half of military's equipment is 'unserviceable'
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/nato-canadian-armed-forces-europe-1.7135390
Japan
Grant Newsham, senior research fellow at the Japan Forum for Strategic Studies, told Defense News that “decades of pathological dependence” on the United States have left Japan’s military “a stunted force not really able to operate efficiently or effectively in most cases.”
This is at a time when Japan perceives unprecedented external threats. The government’s 2024 iteration of its annual Defense of Japan white paper noted, “Japan is facing the most severe and complex security environment since the end of World War II.”
Germany
"Before Russia's invasion of Ukraine, we had eight brigades at around 65% readiness," Colonel Andre Wuestner, head of the German Armed Forces Association, told Reuters in an interview. Sending weapons, ammunition and equipment to Ukraine, as well as accelerating Germany's own drills, took a toll on the available equipment, he said.Advertisement · Scroll to continue"Together, this means the German land forces are down to a readiness of around 50%," he said.
These other great nations, their defense and military is not ready for anything.
I know Japan after WWll essentially wasn't permitted to have much of a military, but that was 80 years ago now. Back in the 1970s or 80s once they became a serious player on global trade that maybe they should have begun to invest in their own security in a serious way. And sure, we can say it isn't fair for NATO nations to all of a sudden realize that the United States might not be lock-step with them at all times when for decades they assumed it would be. But their lack of spending predates Obama's urging to get them to spend more. It is just not a serious priority in some of these countries, well, time may be up that they will get to find out. Everyone should have been taking much more of a proactive approach to their military enlistment and preparedness. But they didn't, because the good old United States was doing it for them if there was something to happen.
