President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance gaslighted, scolded, berated, and insulted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and then kicked him out of the White House because he refused to sign an agreement ceding partial profits from rare earth minerals to the United States, and giving control of the rebuilding of Ukraine’s war-shattered infrastructure to the U.S. government (who would, of course, give U.S. construction companies this lucrative work). The U.S. also refused to provide the security guarantees that Ukraine repeatedly asked for.
Instead, Trump accused Ukraine of starting the war (how? by being invaded?), and of “not really wanting peace,” because it is unwilling to accept what will amount to a surrender, or to abandon its people who live in the illegally-occupied territories.
On these matters I cannot remain silent any longer. The video-display abruptly begun by Vance and taken up by Trump was a deplorable instance of bullying, blaming the victim, and heaping up disrespect upon a world leader the likes of which I have never seen publicly presented from the White House.
It almost looked like an effort to manufacture a pretext for turning away from alliance with Zelenskyy in his nation’s fight against the neo-Stalinist Vladimir Putin’s aggressive efforts to eliminate Ukraine’s very existence and identity. It seemed to provide a pretext for a rapidly developing despotic U.S. government to align with Putin’s autocratic expansionism.
Will the U.S. participate (overtly or covertly) in the new despotic world order that Russia and China wish to build? We’ll have to see how this unfolds.
In any case their public verbal abuse against a world leader fighting to save the freedom and independence of his nation was juvenile, cowardly, and shameful. It was entirely dishonorable! It was one of the lowest moments in the history of the United States of America.
I have covered Ukraine extensively on this blog during the past three years, and have explained the sources of the deep solidarity I feel called to extend to these brave people. I have explained the special circumstances of the Ukrainian Greek (Byzantine) Catholic Church in full communion with Rome. You must, therefore, realize how the behavior of my own government makes me weep.
My own country—once the “leader of the Free World”—has become an embarrassment, and worse than that, an agent of chaos in a very dangerous moment in world history. I fear more than ever that war will soon be upon us all, using forces of destruction beyond anything we can imagine.
Dear Jesus, save us! We are weak and sinful We need you. I need you, in new ways, so that all the suffering of these people and the treachery that dehumanizes them will not break my heart into a thousand pieces of sorrow.
