Making America Isolated again.
I'm in favor of reducing our military footprint globally... however....
Defunding RFE (Radio Free Europe) cedes the narrative to Russia, China, Iran and other non free regimes. Soft power is well spent money in my view.
The trade war is likely heading us into more isolation. Our allies (former allies?) will make economic deals leaving us out of the deal and possibly harming the status of the US dollar as the world's reserve currency. Once, broken, it is difficult to reassemble.
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the king's horses and all the king's men, couldn't put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
A “no” is not a “yes” when it is a “maybe,” a “probably not,” or an “only if.”
This is the painfully predictable lesson the Trump administration’s first real foray into wartime diplomacy with the Kremlin has dealt. They’ve been hopelessly bluffed.
They asked for a 30-day, frontline-wide ceasefire, without conditions. On Tuesday, they got – after a theatrical week-long wait and hundreds more lives lost – a relatively small prisoner swap, hockey matches, more talks, and – per the Kremlin readout – a month-long mutual pause on attacks against “energy infrastructure.”
This last phrase is where an easily avoidable technical minefield begins. Per US President Donald Trump’s post and that of his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, the agreement concerned “energy and infrastructure.” These are two entirely different sets of ideas.
Russia says it will not attack Ukraine’s electricity grids and gas supplies, as it has mercilessly over the past years, to the extent that Ukraine’s winters have always been a dicey dance with icy families and reserve power sources. The White House, confusingly – in a disagreement, typo or translation nuance – has extended this truce to potentially every part of Ukraine that is considered infrastructure: bridges, perhaps key roads, or ports, or railways. It has created conditions that are almost impossible for Russia’s relentless pace of air assaults – which resumed, as they do every night, on Tuesday night – to adhere to.
It is important to emphasize that Trump’s long-heralded call with Russian President Vladimir Putin yielded almost nothing bar the predictable fact that the Kremlin head feels he can outmaneuver his counterpart effortlessly.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/18/europe/analysis-putin-trump-phone-call-ukraine-intl-latam/index.html
Zelenskyy says Putin's 'words' aren't enough after call with Trump
President Donald Trump spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday as talks continue to try to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
Their conversation came one day after Trump failed to persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to agree to a 30-day total ceasefire proposed by the U.S. and backed by Ukraine, though Putin agreed to pause attacks on energy infrastructure.
Trump, in a social media post, said the call with Zelenskyy lasted an hour and was "very good."
"Just assurances and only Putin's words that he orders not to strike energy facilities—that is not enough. Why? Because, unfortunately, this war has made us very practical people," Zelenskyy said.
"If we reach such an agreement, there will be a list of sites. We already have a list—a list of civilian, energy, and infrastructure facilities. We will definitely prepare this list and provide it to our partners. If the Russians do not strike our facilities, we will certainly not strike theirs," Zelenskyy added.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-speak-ukraines-zelenskyy-putin-144300630.html
I don't know how this will turn out but I'm 100% rooting for PEACE in Ukraine, no matter how it happens.
This is why I held my nose and voted for Donald Trump in November.
Rooting for or hoping for Trump to fail to get peace in Ukraine, as so many are doing in our country and Europe right now is despicable. Hatred does that to people. You don't want the person that you hate to have success! Even if that success is what will benefit the most people.
People now hate Elon Musk.
So they root for his stock to tank. They vandalize Tesla's.
People root for the war in Ukraine to continue because they hate Putin and can't accept anything good happening to him and are willing to sacrifice countless Ukrainian lives to hurt Russia. Cheer when Russians(who are human beings too) die. Unwilling to accept the fact that Russia DID win the war by an extremely wide margin and IS going to get much of what they fought NATO for in this war. 0.000% chance that they will ever agree to NATO in Ukraine. That's why they invaded......to stop that. And they won the fight for that decisively. They will get a huge chunk of land too. Just accept that as part of acquiring peace. I would insist that they be almost entirely responsible for rebuilding Ukraine. The more they get of it, the faster it will get rebuilt for the people living there.
We continue to justify the fight against Russia in our deluded minds by believing we are actually supporting the Ukrainians that have been pleading for peace. Forcing the Ukrainians to fight OUR/NATO's cause and war.
The Ukrainians cause is PEACE with Russia! We need to stop letting the political propaganda and media bamboozle us to think otherwise.
After we do get peace in Ukraine, the media and politicians will undoubtedly spend much more time trying to convince us that President Trump got a horrible deal. As if trying to fight with almost no army left and losing more land by the day was a better idea for Ukraine.
The good deal was offered to Joe Biden in late 2021, which would have resulted in NO invasion but he rejected it.
When Putin started massing troops on the Ukraine border with a demand that Ukraine/Biden give him an assurance that NATO would NOT take on Ukraine......Biden STOPPED THE NEGOTIATING and told Zelensky that with the US weapons and support, Ukraine would defeat Russia and get into Ukraine.
Then, the Biden/Zelensky/NATO team went on to be the worst military leaders in the history of the human race. Month after month making catastrophic blunders in a war that they never had a chance to win from the get go.
Now, 3 years later, President Trump doesn't have a time machine to get the deal Biden had.
It's a completely different dynamic now. Trump is NOT going to get a good deal. That's impossible in March 2025.
It's not December 2021 or even March 2023 or March 2024. Times when better deals could have been made.
Ukraine needs to surrender and salvage the best crummy deal they can in March 2025 because Putin is in complete control and fighting more will just make it worse and worse and worse.
The main reason to do this is for the Ukrainians. Because they want peace They have always wanted peace.
Just accept that the peace deal and the consequence of being completely trounced in the war go hand in hand!
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It's 3 years too late to whine about a crummy deal. Putin has all the cards. He won the game. Why should he give stuff up that he won in the war? Biden/Zelensky/NATO decided to fight Putin over this. Now the winner is supposed to give up much of what cost his country even more than it cost the NATO side?
He gave up so much and lost so much, exactly to WIN the war to get the reward at the end.
https://history.answers.com/us-history/What_does_it_mean_to_he_victors_come_the_spoils_of_war
https://brainly.com/question/8358778
https://brainly.com/question/38666494
The phrase 'to the victors belong the spoils' means that those who win a conflict obtain the benefits or rewards of that conflict. Historically, this often meant territories or resources seized in war, but today it can also refer to political or business victories.
Apparently Americans approve of this and the media's bombarding us with dishonest stories that are hit pieces against Trump and his agenda is backfiring instead of working like it did in the past. I'm extremely surprised!
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Unlike in Trump’s first term, Democratic voters say 2-to-1 they want party leaders to fight rather than compromise, even at the risk of not getting things done, per the NBC News poll.
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I hope to be wrong but pretty certain that we will see widespread "RESISTANCE" protesting this Summer that turns into serious rioting in many places. The MSM will be the biggest instigators.
…the blow-up does not seem to have done the Ukrainian president much harm at home. Like Canada’s Mark Carney, Mr Zelensky is finding that being attacked by Mr Trump is great for one’s ratings. A new telephone poll by Ipsos of 1,000 Ukrainians, commissioned by The Economist, shows that he commands overwhelming support in the wake of his falling-out with Trumpland. More than seven in ten Ukrainians now say they approve of Mr Zelensky’s work. Eight in ten say he is still Ukraine’s legitimate president, and reject the idea of elections while fighting continues. Over seven in ten still trust him to lead negotiations. Even more striking, the poll suggests that Mr Zelensky would win an election if one were held today, with Valery Zaluzhny, his popular former top general, in distant second place.
https://www.economist.com/europe/2025/03/12/is-zelensky-a-disliked-dictator-or-a-popular-hero?
Thanks, Larry!
Battling with Trump, unless you're part of his cult is usually the best way to increase your polling numbers.
I suppose then, since he's now Trump's puppet that the opposite should be true???
Regardless, the Economist is usually a reliable source of information as is Forbes, however on THIS topic they have acted as mouthpieces of propaganda as blatantly biased war mongers as part of the Military-Industrial-Political-Media complex.....which has consumed ALL THE MEDIA with ALL OF THEM benefiting.
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I've been wrong before, so we'll see where this goes if Trump can get elections restored in Ukraine. Whatever deals are made, the MSM will be blaming Trump for how bad they are because they want the war to continue.
Since Zelensky will also have to agree to everything, it will be interesting to see how they manage to separate the team of Trump and Zelensky to vilify one of them, while glorifying the other for the exact same thing.
Here's the latest thread on MarketForum:
https://www.marketforum.com/forum/topic/110205/
The protesting has only started to ramp up!
https://www.newsweek.com/tesla-takedown-stores-targeted-global-day-action-elon-musk-2052621
Updated Mar 29, 2025 at 2:50 PM EDT
The protests will occur around the globe at some 200 Tesla showrooms, which accounts for around half of the total showrooms and galleries around the world. The U.S. alone has 276 dealers nationwide, while Tesla has 438 global stores and an additional 100 service centers.
The organizers have repeatedly stressed the peaceful nature of these protests in contrast to the several violent and high-profile incidents that have occurred in recent weeks involving Tesla showrooms and vehicles.
"Elon Musk is destroying our democracy, and he's using the fortune he built at Tesla to do it. We are taking action at Tesla to stop Musk's illegal coup," organizers wrote on their website.
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Now that warmer weather is here........You ain't seen nothin yet!
MICHAEL LIEDTKE
https://www.yahoo.com/news/elon-says-government-people-pushing-052952207.html?fr=yhssrp_catchall
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Musk, the genius in marketing and public relations just made the most catastrophic blunder of his life!
Couldn't have happened to a better charlatan.
https://www.marketforum.com/forum/topic/110166/#110567
Musk on Mars: