The depths of depravity to which Donald Trump will sink appear to be bottomless. As Putin was invading Ukraine, Trump was calling the ex-KGB authoritarian ruler of Russia a smart guy for sending his military into a sovereign nation without any good reason.
Donald Trump on Wednesday called Russian President Vladimir Putin "very smart" for launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, suggesting that he supports a military conflict that will lead to untold civilian death.
"I mean, he's taken over a country for $2 worth of sanctions. I'd say that's pretty smart," Trump said during a Mar-a-Lago fundraiser. "He's taking over a country, literally, a vast, vast, location, a great piece of land with a lot of people, and just walking right in."
We can't let the astounding nature of Trump's remarks pass by lightly, just because Trump has been spewing crap like this for so long, it's difficult to be surprised at his offensive remarks.
Trump is an ex-president of the United States. He isn't a performer in a cheap comedy club.
Trump is saying that the first invasion of a sovereign nation in Europe since World War II is just fine and dandy with him, even if the United States and all of our key allies are united in condemning Putin's action.
Soon the full extent of the horrors Putin is producing in Ukraine will come to light. Things are already bad enough, but they will get worse.
If we're so unlucky that Trump runs for president in 2024, the clip of him saying that Putin is very smart for invading Ukraine should be front and center in political ads calling for the election of Trump's opponent.
Sadly, it seems that most Republicans don't care about Trump's love of the havoc Putin is inflicting on the world. All of Oregon's Democratic members of Congress have condemned the invasion of Ukraine, while the sole Republican, Cliff Bentz, has been silent.
Here's some Twitter tweets I've been collecting about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. There's courage of display, as the people of Ukraine battle the stronger Russian military, and brave Russian citizens demonstrate against what Putin has wrought, risking arrest for speaking truth to power.
From the perspective of the warped demagogue Putin, his move into Ukraine now is indeed a smart move. Trump is absolutely correct. By saying Putin is smart does not at all mean the invasion is "fine and dandy" with him. Trump never said anything to that effect. That is wild and unfounded speculation and distortion by the blog host.
It just means that Trump thinks Putin is smart in the sense of clever or shrewd, but not necessarily wise (if one can understand the distinction between the meaning of those terms). Putin has long sought to reunify and even expand the former USSR and conditions were ripe to add one more piece of the puzzle. The USA is under weak and incompetent leadership who foolishly cut off their own oil supply which, besides creating inflation at home, made it impossible to supplement Europe's energy needs for which they are now dependent on Putin. This raises the price of Russian oil thus enriching Putin's coffers and finances his war effort.
With stupid leadership like we have in the US right now why should Putin fear a strong, effective reprisal from the US? Yes, Putin is evil but he is smart to see the time is ripe to further his ambitions.
Posted by: tucson | February 26, 2022 at 06:47 PM
Such a good time for political nonsense. All Biden's fault. If Trump were in office, there would not have been an invasion. All would be peachy. All speculation and beside the point. The battle between dictatorships and quasi democratic governments, which are still relatively new, historically speaking, has now captured the world's attention.
The current conflict began in 2014 (see Wiki for background). Since then, Russian backed separatists have fought for control in Eastern Ukraine and, although 14,000 lives were lost, many of the battles were small (with police stations, representing government in small towns ,sometimes changing hands from day to day). Separatists fought as stridently as Ukrainians are now fighting. When the Soviet Union broke up, factory farms and manufacturing collapsed in these areas. Sources of what little wealth remained was concentrated in and around Moscow. Areas such as Eastern Ukraine struggled even more than they did during the Soviet era. They were on their own. Many became nostalgic for the past.
Western Ukraine is becoming more European and Eastern Ukraine remains largely committed to the ideals of the defunct Russian Republic. It will take some real diplomatic magic to pull this rabbit out of the hat. If the current conflict blows up, all bets are off.
Whether one supports dictatorships or quasi democracies will depend on one's circumstances and values. It seems that most people prefer greater freedom from authority, but Putin has 75% support within his state media controlled environment. Constitutional democracies willl need to more faithfully live up to their founding principles if they want to recapture the hope that they offered to the world - a world that is becoming more and more dangerous and seems to be caught up within the forces of entropy.
Posted by: Kurt | February 27, 2022 at 10:30 PM