What's amazing is that Z didn't really respond to it. Yelling insults at a brick wall doesn't look smart. Plus I wonder if Trump really thought he could get a deal out of this? Usually a negotiator studies the person on the other side of the table It's like Trump has no idea who Z is
Trump knows what he cares about, and what he cares about is his money and ego. Putin wants to weaken Ukraine, NATO, and the West in that order. If Zelenskyy signs, Putin gets a wedge into Ukraine since Trump has total control over that vague binding agreement. If Zelenskyy refuses, Trump stages a kafabe smackdown to justify ending all support for Ukraine. True, the way it went was a more immediate win for Putin. Maybe Putin wanted this end, but he didn't have to demand it from Trump. Trump would have been focused on his beautiful Deal, and when Zelanskyy refused it ended the way it had to end.
Among other things, Zelenskyy is a show biz pro. He understood what they were trying to do, and wouldn't play. And I think Trump was genuinely pissed because he thought he had Zelenskyy over a barrel (what Trump meant by "you have no cards"), so when his beautiful Deal went up in smoke he went ballistic.
Among other things, Zelenskyy is a show biz pro. He understood what they were trying to do, and wouldn't play. And I think Trump was genuinely pissed because he thought he had Zelenskyy over a barrel (what Trump meant by "you have no cards"), so when his beautiful Deal went up in smoke he went ballistic.
( my dictation program heard that as "Woe, woe, woe")
What I can't figure out - who the hell likes Russians? I'm in my mid-60s. Late mid '60s. I remember duck and cover drills, seeing Beneath the Planet of the Apes and not sleeping for a week. I was convinced for a third of my life that me and my family were going to die as a result of a Russian nuclear attack. I read Canticle for Liebowitz when I was 12. That was just how the world was going to end - with me in it.
I like to remind everybody that the Soviet Union was a country devoted at least in theory to the elimination of capitalist production and the revolutionary triumph of the industrial proletariat, which it may not have handled very well (but it was pretty good on free medical care, free education, and ballet), while today's Russian Federation is the result of selling the whole thing off to a bourgeoisie of about 300 pigs who are now inconceivably rich, impoverishing everybody else, reestablishing the Orthodox church, and promoting a kind of apartheid division of the population between blonde Russians and dark-skinned Asian minorities.
I'm not saying it was a better place then than it is now (though it kind of was for a little while in the 20s and later in the 70s and 80s). But they are not the same countries, and it's way better attuned to US Republican sensibilities now, with its inequality and hypocritical moralism (Putin himself hates Lenin, Khrushchev, and Gorbachev but idolizes Stalin) than it was then. Republicans like Putin because they have a lot in common with him, which they didn't have with the Russians of our youth. Those guys were Communists, Putin is a fascist.
Interesting about Putin hating those guys, and good point about the USSR having its (relatively) better eras, if you had to live there. Reminds me of a joke that apparently was told there in the 70s. Under Lenin we were all on a train that was moving swiftly ahead, but under Stalin the train stopped. So Stalin ordered everyone get out and push. It didn't work, until he shot some people, which got everyone else pushing like crazy. The train started to move slowly! So now Khrushchev was in charge of the train, and he said since it's moving, some people can get back inside and sit. It was very nice! Except outside, the pushers started to collapse, and the train stopped again. Luckily Brezhnev was in charge then, and he solved this problem! He told the pushers keep trying, even though there were not nearly enough left to move this giant thing, and inside he put a record on the phonograph, playing the sounds of a train rolling down its tracks! Everyone was happy enough!
I gotta say its quite suprising that anyone has doubts the entire meeting was scripted exactly like a wrestling promo, even ignoring the Trump/WWF relationship. The poorly feigned outrage based on imaginary insults, yelling as an emotional manipulation tactic, and the gratuitous trash talk (do you even own a suit?). I understand the shock, but suprise? It had to be this way because the mineral deal was pure Art of the Deal, outrageous demands based on nothing designed to be rejected, but a basis for negotiating down to here's 1 for you 19 for me. Trump was probably sincerely outraged that Zelenskyy refused to play his role (the "you have no cards" comment) and tanked his Deal. I do agree the show was mostly for domestic consumption as a fig leaf to get Congress to back his inevitable abandonment of Ukraine. The only shred of hope I find is they keep coming up with these fig leaf fake justifications for things they promised to do, why do they bother?
The show may have been mostly for Americans (who I'm glad to say don't seem to be buying it), but the throwing out of Zelenskyy and the end of the "peace" negotiations was on Putin's orders, like so many of Trump's moves since April 2016.
Maybe, but I believe Trump was genuinely pissed when Zalenskyy wouldn't play his part in the Deal. I mean, the Deal was fuck you, pay me, but Trump really wanted to be seen as the man who brought peace to Ukraine where everyone else failed, with his beautiful Deal. Of ourse Trump's "peace" was literally nothing but a photo op where he would sign a piece of paper and walk away. Zelenskyy wasn't ready to sign a death warrant for Ukraine in exchange for that. The peace negotiations couldn't end any other way.
That was the original deal Trump proposed, where the Ukrainians were going to be indebted, as Zelenskyy said, for the next 10 generations, basically renting US support at a price they couldn’t afford. The deal that came out of negotiations was far less inequitable—more of a joint effort in which US would provide investment and Ukraine resources, and develop together. If Trump understood it he might well have wanted to reject it on his own because it wasn’t cruel enough. But he did take that Putin call on Wednesday.
of the agreement is that it establishes an agreement to develop the rare earth mining and the US gets a piece, and not much else. I suspect the vagueness is the point. What does this do to promote peace? Putin wants Zelenskyy weakened and either a signed agreement or that public humiliation moves that forward. It was a deal in Trump's wheelhouse, a development deal. Losing it must have hurt, since it locked in American profit in exchange for nothing.
I'm not arguing Putin is not involved, clearly he is. But the alignment of Putin and Trump's goals and motivations are so beutifully aligned, there doesn't need to be much micromanaging.
It had occurred to me that the deal itself was bad enough that it was not meant to be accepted by Ukraine, that Zelenskyy caught Trump's team off-guard weeks ago by agreeing to discuss it further, and that resulted in this embarrassing Plan B. So Zelenskyy could have shown up in the exact same costume Trump was wearing, said "Thank you for the aid" six times, never pushed back on a single crazy lie... and Trump and Vance would have run their script anyway. "You barge in here agreeing so much, frankly it's suspicious! Deal's off!"
I spent the rest of that awful day on Twitter reading our fellow ordinary citizens, many of whom committed to the Trump narrative lock, stock, & barrel. Not wearing a suit insults us all! Disagreeing with our president in front of a camera, who does he think he is?! "Zelenskyy has to learn, the way you negotiate is not by emotional yelling at other people!" As if we had not all just watched video of Trump doing the emotional yelling. Then there were the people who tweeted, "Tell me why I should care? You forget, Russia owned Ukraine until 1991, and it didn't affect us at all." Buddy, you're gonna want to sit down for the story of how we were very affected in 1945-1991 by Russia owning things that did not want to be owned by it...
It is difficult to gauge, though, how disproportionately Twitter represents volunteer flackeys in the dead-ender army, versus how many ordinary Trump voters actually think "That Zelenskyy -- he shouldn't have had a meltdown!" and how many of them can remember "But I *saw* who had the meltdown."
What's amazing is that Z didn't really respond to it. Yelling insults at a brick wall doesn't look smart. Plus I wonder if Trump really thought he could get a deal out of this? Usually a negotiator studies the person on the other side of the table It's like Trump has no idea who Z is
Once again, I don't think he knows anything, but it's Putin who called an end to this.
Trump knows what he cares about, and what he cares about is his money and ego. Putin wants to weaken Ukraine, NATO, and the West in that order. If Zelenskyy signs, Putin gets a wedge into Ukraine since Trump has total control over that vague binding agreement. If Zelenskyy refuses, Trump stages a kafabe smackdown to justify ending all support for Ukraine. True, the way it went was a more immediate win for Putin. Maybe Putin wanted this end, but he didn't have to demand it from Trump. Trump would have been focused on his beautiful Deal, and when Zelanskyy refused it ended the way it had to end.
Among other things, Zelenskyy is a show biz pro. He understood what they were trying to do, and wouldn't play. And I think Trump was genuinely pissed because he thought he had Zelenskyy over a barrel (what Trump meant by "you have no cards"), so when his beautiful Deal went up in smoke he went ballistic.
Among other things, Zelenskyy is a show biz pro. He understood what they were trying to do, and wouldn't play. And I think Trump was genuinely pissed because he thought he had Zelenskyy over a barrel (what Trump meant by "you have no cards"), so when his beautiful Deal went up in smoke he went ballistic.
Whoa, whoa, whoa !*
Wrestling's not real!?!?
Son of a bitch !
( my dictation program heard that as "Woe, woe, woe")
What I can't figure out - who the hell likes Russians? I'm in my mid-60s. Late mid '60s. I remember duck and cover drills, seeing Beneath the Planet of the Apes and not sleeping for a week. I was convinced for a third of my life that me and my family were going to die as a result of a Russian nuclear attack. I read Canticle for Liebowitz when I was 12. That was just how the world was going to end - with me in it.
Now we're best buds. On Trump's word?
Fuck that.
I like to remind everybody that the Soviet Union was a country devoted at least in theory to the elimination of capitalist production and the revolutionary triumph of the industrial proletariat, which it may not have handled very well (but it was pretty good on free medical care, free education, and ballet), while today's Russian Federation is the result of selling the whole thing off to a bourgeoisie of about 300 pigs who are now inconceivably rich, impoverishing everybody else, reestablishing the Orthodox church, and promoting a kind of apartheid division of the population between blonde Russians and dark-skinned Asian minorities.
I'm not saying it was a better place then than it is now (though it kind of was for a little while in the 20s and later in the 70s and 80s). But they are not the same countries, and it's way better attuned to US Republican sensibilities now, with its inequality and hypocritical moralism (Putin himself hates Lenin, Khrushchev, and Gorbachev but idolizes Stalin) than it was then. Republicans like Putin because they have a lot in common with him, which they didn't have with the Russians of our youth. Those guys were Communists, Putin is a fascist.
Interesting about Putin hating those guys, and good point about the USSR having its (relatively) better eras, if you had to live there. Reminds me of a joke that apparently was told there in the 70s. Under Lenin we were all on a train that was moving swiftly ahead, but under Stalin the train stopped. So Stalin ordered everyone get out and push. It didn't work, until he shot some people, which got everyone else pushing like crazy. The train started to move slowly! So now Khrushchev was in charge of the train, and he said since it's moving, some people can get back inside and sit. It was very nice! Except outside, the pushers started to collapse, and the train stopped again. Luckily Brezhnev was in charge then, and he solved this problem! He told the pushers keep trying, even though there were not nearly enough left to move this giant thing, and inside he put a record on the phonograph, playing the sounds of a train rolling down its tracks! Everyone was happy enough!
I gotta say its quite suprising that anyone has doubts the entire meeting was scripted exactly like a wrestling promo, even ignoring the Trump/WWF relationship. The poorly feigned outrage based on imaginary insults, yelling as an emotional manipulation tactic, and the gratuitous trash talk (do you even own a suit?). I understand the shock, but suprise? It had to be this way because the mineral deal was pure Art of the Deal, outrageous demands based on nothing designed to be rejected, but a basis for negotiating down to here's 1 for you 19 for me. Trump was probably sincerely outraged that Zelenskyy refused to play his role (the "you have no cards" comment) and tanked his Deal. I do agree the show was mostly for domestic consumption as a fig leaf to get Congress to back his inevitable abandonment of Ukraine. The only shred of hope I find is they keep coming up with these fig leaf fake justifications for things they promised to do, why do they bother?
The show may have been mostly for Americans (who I'm glad to say don't seem to be buying it), but the throwing out of Zelenskyy and the end of the "peace" negotiations was on Putin's orders, like so many of Trump's moves since April 2016.
Maybe, but I believe Trump was genuinely pissed when Zalenskyy wouldn't play his part in the Deal. I mean, the Deal was fuck you, pay me, but Trump really wanted to be seen as the man who brought peace to Ukraine where everyone else failed, with his beautiful Deal. Of ourse Trump's "peace" was literally nothing but a photo op where he would sign a piece of paper and walk away. Zelenskyy wasn't ready to sign a death warrant for Ukraine in exchange for that. The peace negotiations couldn't end any other way.
That was the original deal Trump proposed, where the Ukrainians were going to be indebted, as Zelenskyy said, for the next 10 generations, basically renting US support at a price they couldn’t afford. The deal that came out of negotiations was far less inequitable—more of a joint effort in which US would provide investment and Ukraine resources, and develop together. If Trump understood it he might well have wanted to reject it on his own because it wasn’t cruel enough. But he did take that Putin call on Wednesday.
Yeah, the Art of the Deal is
1) make insane demands
2) negotiate down to ridiculous demands
3) they agree or you crush them
Kevin Drum's summary https://jabberwocking.com/the-mineral-wealth-agreement-explained-sort-of/
of the agreement is that it establishes an agreement to develop the rare earth mining and the US gets a piece, and not much else. I suspect the vagueness is the point. What does this do to promote peace? Putin wants Zelenskyy weakened and either a signed agreement or that public humiliation moves that forward. It was a deal in Trump's wheelhouse, a development deal. Losing it must have hurt, since it locked in American profit in exchange for nothing.
I'm not arguing Putin is not involved, clearly he is. But the alignment of Putin and Trump's goals and motivations are so beutifully aligned, there doesn't need to be much micromanaging.
It had occurred to me that the deal itself was bad enough that it was not meant to be accepted by Ukraine, that Zelenskyy caught Trump's team off-guard weeks ago by agreeing to discuss it further, and that resulted in this embarrassing Plan B. So Zelenskyy could have shown up in the exact same costume Trump was wearing, said "Thank you for the aid" six times, never pushed back on a single crazy lie... and Trump and Vance would have run their script anyway. "You barge in here agreeing so much, frankly it's suspicious! Deal's off!"
I spent the rest of that awful day on Twitter reading our fellow ordinary citizens, many of whom committed to the Trump narrative lock, stock, & barrel. Not wearing a suit insults us all! Disagreeing with our president in front of a camera, who does he think he is?! "Zelenskyy has to learn, the way you negotiate is not by emotional yelling at other people!" As if we had not all just watched video of Trump doing the emotional yelling. Then there were the people who tweeted, "Tell me why I should care? You forget, Russia owned Ukraine until 1991, and it didn't affect us at all." Buddy, you're gonna want to sit down for the story of how we were very affected in 1945-1991 by Russia owning things that did not want to be owned by it...
It is difficult to gauge, though, how disproportionately Twitter represents volunteer flackeys in the dead-ender army, versus how many ordinary Trump voters actually think "That Zelenskyy -- he shouldn't have had a meltdown!" and how many of them can remember "But I *saw* who had the meltdown."