Those of you that voted Trump.... any regrets yet?

@Avectoijesuismoi It was clearly premeditated to humiliate Zelensky. It's bullying a war-torn country in a weak position.

I have no problem with wanting to end the war. What I do object to is the strong-arming of him to make him sign away Ukraine's mineral resources to US companies.

@Burnley123 The dynamics have changed Business head wants returns the bottom line is the US is the worlds most indebted country they cannot fund it

There is a deal on the table and it is probably reads something like Russia gets Donbas and Crimea and US gets 50% of the Ukraine's mineral wealth.

@Avectoijesuismoi The former I can agree with, but the latter is just crudely exploiting someone in a weak position.

Whether or not you now agree with it, America committed to supporting Ukraine in the war and it is an ally.

@Burnley123 Unfortunately that is exactly a very valid business strategy in a takeover you hit and you hit hard when it is in a weak position.

As for the second part Biden committed America, Trump is different ball game altogether he doesn't see it the same way

@Avectoijesuismoi Which basically tells the rest of the world that the United States can’t be trusted with Donald Trump in charge. Most of whom well knew this after his first administration. 🤨

@Avectoijesuismoi So you're basically saying businessman are inherently evil and make terrible government leaders.


I tend to agree

@Burnley123 It really is business as usual for lower tier "allies".

And he was fine signing away some of the most valuable farm land in the world and violated the Ukrainian constitution to do it in 2019.

And being an ally particularly an American ally is not and never been a binding promise to get dragged into a war for them.

Kissinger was a monster but he was honest about it.

" Being America's enemy is dangerous. Being America's friend is fatal."

Hell the president of South Korea was shot when he was no longer useful and didn't play nice.

@PicturesOfABetterTomorrow I'm a Chomsky fanboy and I have long been a critic of imperialism.

Maybe one way of looking at is that the US now treats European nations and Canada as it once treated El Salvador.

This regime is worse than normal neoliberal imperialsims, though, It's tech-fascism coupled with British 19th-century imperialism and reality TV show humiliation techniques.

@Avectoijesuismoi Could Ukraine afford it's support in our pointless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?

@bijouxbroussard It also tells the rest of the world we can't be trusted period. Not that this is the first example, but it seems the message that you can't trust us because in the next election.... You might have the deal changed and get screwed royally.

@MethDozer Thank you.

@Avectoijesuismoi You, and Putin, seem to be forgetting a three-way treaty known as the 1994 Budapest Memorandum.

Essentially, Ukraine agreed to give up all its nuclear weapons to Russia in exchange for safety from a U.S. or Russian invasion. Russia's invasion of Ukraine violates that treaty. And as a signatory to that 1994 Budapest Memorandum, the U.S. has a definite interest in righting Putin's current wrongs.

https://www.verifythis.com/article/news/verify/global-conflicts/ukraine-agreed-to-give-up-nukes-in-exchange-for-safety-from-russia-invasion-attack-budapest-memorandum-treaty/536-8748a51f-10ee-47f0-be30-b4088750ee44

Russia promised specifically NOT to invade Ukraine, and the U.S. promised specifically to ASSIST Ukraine if the treaty were ever violated. And that's what the U.S. had been doing until tRump chose appeasement over upholding our treaty obligations.

@MethDozer I am not saying that businessman are evil, but they are used to making decisions purely on bottomline figures, because they have to do that.
You cannot run a business that is leaking money left, right and centre. You have to look at ways of cutting your expenditure or where ever else you can make savings.

Whether you like Trump or not, he has one fact the USA is the most indebted country in the world.
In a round about way they are actually borrowing the money to give it away.
So bottom line is in reality he cannot afford to keep chucking money into a bottomless pit.

Further he needs to start to recoup the expenditure hence why he wants rights to the Ukraine's minerals.
There are many other area's that need the expenditure cut not because he wants to do it, pure and simple it has to be done.

NATO being another currently the USA is in for almost $ 300 billion most of which is to defend Europe that is why they are telling Europe that each member has to come up with 5% of their GDP for defence there are currently 28 members only 7 contribute The next highest is Germany on about 97 billion.
He is basically saying if you want to have security you have to be willing to at least contribute towards it. Bottom line is if he pulls out NATO would almost certainly cease to exist financially.
We all seen what DOGE is doing in a nutshell it is what is called Business Rescue plan, anything and anybody that is not needed gets chopped.
It is a totally unemotional and brutal method it sees fact and figures.
Rough guess USA probably needs to cut 3-5 trillion dollars in expenditure per year. If it doesn't it will be a gigantic version of Greece collapse except for Greece had the EU to bail it out.
The bad news is that because everyone is linked because of the use of the dollar as the trade mechanism the world will all follow it into a recession that will make the 2008 one look like a blimp.
Russia probably would actually be the one country that benefits because currently they are mostly insulated from that possible scenario.
There are all ready huge strains on countries finances from things like COVID, Donald and a lot of us will be long gone when those debts are paid back.

@ElwoodBlues This is a financial business type decision.

There is going to be a deal for peace on the table most likely a bilateral one between US and Russia. If it stops the war that is a good thing.
It probably might look something like the Donbas and Crimea go to Russia, US gets 50% rights to Ukraine minerals
Neither Russia nor US are of the opinion that they desire European input.
Unless Europe can come up with a sweetener for instance of alignment with Immigration policies.
You never know Gaza strip might get chucked in as a sweetener
Russia has influence in Iran the main problem

@Avectoijesuismoi Dude doge is literally just Elon and Trump defunding things they don't like and to get back at people they feel slighted by.

NATO serves mostly American interests so....


Ukraine helped us out fight pointless wars that put us into debt. We owe them our part of the agreement. To look at the situation as a way to profit is just sick and depraved


You're literally just describing how businessmen make terrible government leaders and policy makers. And yes the way you're describing it, inherently evil

@MethDozer This is a statement made about it
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told ABC: "You're not going to bring [the Russians] to the table if you're calling them names, if you're being antagonistic. That's just the president's instincts from years and years and years of putting together deals."

@MethDozer I am not saying it is nice or fair I am just stating it is get a deal done time and they always involve trade offs
The art of it is to give away something that isn't going to cost you anything to give it.

@Avectoijesuismoi You're saying that it's perfectly OK to violate treaties if there's money in it.

Keeping our word isn't important, but money is.

Supporting freedom and democracy in the world isn't a good thing unless it's profitable.

Funny thing - that's EXACTLY how tRump tried to bring Zelenskyy to the table🤣😂

tRump: May 2023: “They’re dying, Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying. And I’ll have that done — I’ll have that done in 24 hours.”
FAIL

@ElwoodBlues Well Biden failed at it for years .. so not like the Dems had any plans that would change anything. Just $$BILLIONS more unaccounted aid to flow out to a cause doomed to lose.

@Burnley123 I agree on the tech feudalism bit on the domestic front. No doubt about that.


The big difference about how allies are treated is not actually a difference in policy. The big difference is for decades Europeans in particular had convinced themselves that they are special and above the other American allies. Probably because of delusions that their past imperial grandeur of 200 years ago somehow still mattered.

The Americans never at any point gave them any special status and are just like El Salvador to them. Now Europe is learning the hard way that they are not all that.

Don't forget the very first CIA operation after WW2 was rigging an Italian election.


And other countries have made similar mistakes of not understanding the power dynamic. In the 50s Ho Chi Min contacted I believe it was Eisenhower to ask for help with getting the French out of their country. He believed they were friends because Ho Chi Min and his communist fighters were instrumental (along with others like Mao) in saving Americans by clearing out the Japanese from various south east Asian island chains,.

Instead the Americans helped the French and later took their own turn at invading Vietnam.

2020 years ago George Bush tried to crash the Canadian economy as punishment for not deploying to Iraq.

Bottom line. Some of us have understood what being "allies" with Americans really means for years. European leaders are just being forced to learn their actual place in the world order.

@ElwoodBlues No, you conveniently forget that the USA put the nail in the coffin in that agreement with the overthrow of the Ukrainian government in 2014 and then the first thing the puppet regime did was renounce neutrality and declared itself hostile to Russia.

And you also forgot "not one inch east of Berlin"

Or the ABM treaty, the INF treaty all unilaterally ended by the Americans.

Basically every agreement made to end the cold war was signed in bad faith by the USA.

They started violating those agreements under Clinton nearly 30 years ago.

@ElwoodBlues You seem totally cool with the USA violating treaties whenever the POTUS has a random whim to do so. So you are in no position to lecture.

@BrandNewMan It has been accounted. Most of it was spent on US soil.




https://www.csis.org/analysis/where-missing-100-billion-us-aid-ukraine