In olden times, President Donald Trump’s righteous smackdown of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would’ve ignited a Pompeii-like explosion among liberal media circles. It’s not. No doubt some people are using this to bash Trump but the beauty of the 2024 election, besides Trump winning, is that no one cares what the legacy press says anymore.
‘I don’t really care, Margaret’ has become the default response to these entitled clowns who think we must listen to them as gatekeepers of facts and a free society when they’re lied about Trump, COVID, the Hunter Biden laptop, and Russian collusion. Everyone has flocked elsewhere for information that isn’t covered in left-wing crap.
Anyone who rationally watches the full 50 minutes will see it was not an "ambush." The first 40 minutes were normal and cordial. Then came the self-inflicted meltdown by Zelensky. If you can't rationally describe the meeting, perhaps your policy extrapolations are also irrational https://t.co/iKduqPqLzk
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) March 1, 2025
Zelensky had two explicit verbal commitments from Trump that he was going to continue arming Ukraine, which is the most acute policy issue from Ukraine's perspective. But then later he decided to stupidly interject with Vance, and everything went haywire. Epic diplomatic meltdown pic.twitter.com/J4t5HVtNia
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) February 28, 2025
Even some liberal reporters, and there are some, take potshots at their side, and it’s usually more damning. Michael Tracey is no fan of Trump, but he wasn’t going to sit quietly over this fake news narrative about Zelensky’s trainwreck visit to the White House last Friday. Besides the usual ‘Kremlin Trump’ nonsense, there’s the ‘ambush’ reaction—that Trump sprung a trap on Zelensky to humiliate him.
“Anyone who rationally watches the full 50 minutes will see it was not an ‘ambush.’ The first 40 minutes were normal and cordial,” wrote Tracey on Twitter. “Then came the self-inflicted meltdown by Zelensky. If you can't rationally describe the meeting, perhaps your policy extrapolations are also irrational.”
Another irony is the paranoid EU over-reactions to every Trump tiff -- "End of the Western Alliance!" etc. -- could impel at least some of them to take rash action vis-a-vis Ukraine, potentially ensnaring the US. (The same frenzied over-reactions happened all the time in term 1)
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) March 2, 2025
Democrats have less than zero standing to object to anything on Ukraine. They’ve spent the past 3 years systematically refusing to do any reappraisal whatsoever of a policy that’s culminated in absurd WWI trench warfare. They still demand theatrical cliches over critical thinking
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) March 1, 2025
Tracey also pointed out that Zelensky was going to walk away a winner. It was there for the taking—the deal seems to have had the guarantees Zelensky tried to play off as being absent during the Oval Office implosion. He got greedy, and as the saying goes, ‘pigs get slaughtered.’ Also, with Europe starting to cut checks for Ukraine, albeit smaller ones, it could keep us roped into this conflict via NATO ties.
Reports out of the WH cite Zelenskyy’s 'demeanor' as part of the reason Trump and US officials felt disrespected —
— Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) February 28, 2025
— “shrugging and rolling his eyes" during the conversation.
It was non stop: pic.twitter.com/hkZIdpkEgp
No it’s because he’s a leech with no concept of the value of our hard earned money https://t.co/pe8I8VCOXZ
— Emma-Jo Morris (@EmmaJoNYC) March 2, 2025
The Ukrainian leader has been an insufferable, ungrateful clown since Biden’s failed presidency. Biden, who has one-third brain function, even lost his temper with this so-called president who has remained in office long after his term has expired. There might be a change—there should be a change.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent noted that Zelensky might have had one of diplomatic history's biggest ‘own goals’.