Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
The 'with or without guarantees' in 3 is the crux of the entire disagreement though, isn't it. To simplify, Europe and Ukraine want 3 with guarantees, the US wants 3 without guarantees.
The version without guarantees is the one that could be said to be fellating Putin since it asks literally nothing of him that he doesn't want.
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
What do you think it is I don't know? Zelenskyy is managing multiple open questions -- the minerals deal, the prospect of a ceasefire/peace deal and how it will be enforced, and longer term planning for what happens if Russia musters forces and stages a third invasion. All those things are interconnected. The meeting seemed to suppose that just the minerals deal would be signed in advance of anything else being resolved, which seems foolhardy on Ukraine's part (if they were not in fact expecting further dialogue prior to signing). Negotiations by their nature can't be done piecemeal because once a concession is made it can't be taken back. As much as possible needs to be agreed at once. To think the minerals deal is security guarantee enough because of 'skin in the game' is to assume far too much. It surely only makes sense as part of an overall package of 'what next?' and I think it's likely that additional discussions and agreements relating to security would need to happen for Ukraine to be sensible to go forward with it without being unduly trusting.
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
When you step back the fact the meeting was allowed to take place in the way it did is baffling.
The minerals deal in itself is one sided -- it's not clear why Zelenskyy should give away so much without something -- anything at all -- in exchange, presumably a security guarantee. So one would think he's thinking the purpose of the visit is partly to discuss that. Maybe Trump thinks Zelenskyy is visiting simply to sign over the minerals and pay homage, but Zelenskyy has a different understanding, that there must be a chance of the US discussing Ukraine's terms further before signing. And the administration should know he's thinking that.
Yet despite this stark unfinished business, the first meeting in Washington is in front of the media, as if the visit is primarily ceremonial, and goes on for an hour. This seems highly unusual. Who planned it this way and for what reason? Not to mention, it was staged with both Trump and Vance there but only Zelenskyy from his side -- why??
Superficially it seems like the behind-the-scenes diplomats failed dismally at their jobs in allowing the meeting to happen at all in advance of the signing (of course they may have had a better plan that was overruled). Else the meeting was arranged like this deliberately to go wrong, but I don't really understand why.
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
My opinion, yeah, but particularly in speeches. (And just in case: if you think I edit my posts on The Motte for brevity or any other reason, I do not!)
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
As a sometime professional speechwriter I have no idea how to answer this. One recommendation though is that your page should look more like poetry than prose. Another is that you should write to a clear structure, and include logical connective tissue in your first draft, but then tear down the scaffolding once the thing is built. All the 'howevers' and 'because of thats' just take too long to say.
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
On reflection I'm inclined to change my mind and agree with this and the post before. I do think doing it this way signals his allegiance clearly (he sees the whole of government administration as the enemy). And if he were to simply fire everyone who didn't reply, THAT would create an incendiary effect. But I agree the message currently being sent is that his main objective is just getting attention.
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
Isn't this just Musk's intention? I'm sure he could do it in a more orderly fashion if he wanted but that wouldn't express his disruptive intent and contempt for bureaucracy as clearly. The version of reality where everyone instantly obeys him without checking with their bosses is what he's working towards I suppose but it will require employees who check their brains at the door and have a clear loyalty to a single leader rather than a line manager, job function or their own ideas about their job. (Cough, fascist.)
Rosencrantz2
5mo ago
I can get behind the idea of explaining what you do and how it serves a specific directive from Congress (everyone should be able to explain this much). I have to send my boss a similar missive every week.
Doing it for your boss who you know is one thing, the point here is that you're doing it for someone a million levels above you with no context or two-way communication whatsoever. I would find it absurd to reply at all, whether I was a high or low functioning employee, so I agree with you the manner Musk is doing this is likely intended just to annoy people.
Indeed. You can actually see the rising Ukrainian GDP per capita figures drop as a consequence of each Russian invasion, so it is ironic to cite their low GDP as a reason Russian occupation would be helpful to their GDP.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
I guess they are feeling defeated and correctly don't think it would help, until a more organised #resistance forms? I also think a good contingent of Dems will be looking askance at how much wild stuff the Trump administration is doing and thinking their best bet to keep quiet while their opponent is maybe making mistakes. There could be all kinds of bad fallout from so much action so fast, and it's better to attack that when it happens than be seen as hysterical yet again for e.g. noticing that Trump is a fascist (he is, but there is little profit left in saying it so the only option is to try to criticise him on specific bad consequences of his executive orders).
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
Yes though the more common case is they simply refuse to address the question of whether they are now Putin supporters, because it is too confusing.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
The hypothetical Trump supporters' chain of logic you give is notable for its implication that Russian propaganda is actually true, or at least could be arrived as the result of Trump's good reasons.
So the charge of hypocrisy is just shifted to whether or not they will openly acknowledge a fourth point:
- Russian propaganda is true (at least the various bits of it that Trump happens to agree with).
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
If you are the hegemon though, people can appeal to you. People are appealing to Trump to pick the side of Ukraine but it doesn't seem in his nature to ever support an underdog.
'Might is right' is an ultimate fact, not an ultimate morality.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
Of course it's significantly more corrupt than Ukraine. Just look at the openness of Ukrainian elections versus Putin murdering his rivals.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
I'm not sure I understand your request? Silent praying abortion protesters do generally have signs with them btw, though I'm not sure about the specific one Vance was mentioning. Reading between the lines, though, maybe you're thinking it's a big difference between banning silent prayer and the signage of the Westboro Baptist Church, and therefore represents a difference of kind between the UK and the US attitudes toward freedom? If so, maybe, but it's a marginal and for my money irrelevant one given everything else going on in the world.
To answer your question literally, no, I don't think blue tribers typically use prayer as a form of protest. The only example I can think of at all is the silent walks that were held to protest the community neglect that led to the Grenfell fire disaster in west London. These protests were calling for higher safety standards and community cohesion so at leaning blue tribe even if not a clean example. (These should obviously not be banned.)
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
I mean another poster just said you didn't ban Westboro Baptist Church and it turns out many states actually did ban protests at funerals, so I'm not even certain if it's true that the US views protests strongly differently than the UK, it just has different values about what deserves banning.
The silent vigil story is true but refers to people doing so intentionally to influence/harrass patients around the clinic, not to people doing it privately in their homes.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
To reply to a couple of other points, the bargaining chips they gave away are (1) saying ahead of the negotiations that Ukraine will have to make territorial concessions, and (2) saying ahead of the negotiations that NATO membership is off the table. These things may not be achievable but it seems malevolent for the US to say so unilaterally before the negotiations.
And whether Vance's speech was at the level of 1956 ... I admit I don't know the story there. And what I do know as a matter of fact is that Europeans are interpreting what's coming out of the US as seismic shift in US policy. Assuming they don't wind this back, it is shaping up to be a realignment on a scale much bigger (and frankly scarier) than anything in my lifetime, though I guess I wouldn't know about 70 years ago.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
That's a wilful misunderstanding of the law invented by the Telegraph – the most extreme case that might fall under the legislation would be people praying in a window visible from the abortion clinic with the intention of influencing the patients. I don't actually agree with the law but it's clearly been made in order to deal with persistent protesters causing upset to patients, not to criminalise what people do in their own heads.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
I wondered if you were right and this is the first thing google turned up – protests at military funerals were in fact banned in nine states and twenty others at least considered doing the same. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/apr/18/usa.gayrights
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
Re military hospitals, I had meant that I can imagine protests being banned outside some sensitive location in the US, especially if they are held repeatedly, are disturbing to the staff and visitors at a vulnerable moment, and are in contradiction of a court order. This is what happened outside a UK abortion centre, and that Vance is furious about. Obviously the same thing wouldn't happen outside a US abortion centre in the current climate, my point is that an equal infringement of freedoms at a different location not so important to christian fundamentalists would not cause any outrage, so if that's true, it's not at actually freedom that is at issue.
A military hospital was just my stab at an example location where the American public might not like to see repeated protests held.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
Zelensky also finally broke and criticised Trump back, saying that Trump is in a 'Russian disinformation bubble' (this appears to be simply factual based on Trump's recent Russian propaganda style claims such as that Zelensky has 4% domestic support; there is no source for this and it other polls show over 50% trust him). When the current object of Trump's ire bites back at all, based on past experience, Trump is likely to double down, get vindictive, and may be unable to act constructively, so I predict that, even if it was a negotiation tactic on Trump's part, he will be sucked in emotionally and move even further towards trying to give Russia a sweetheart deal, one neither Ukraine or the EU will be able to accept.
Or maybe there is someone, somewhere in his orbit who'll manage to advise him differently, but we'll see.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
From what I can tell the United States is still providing Ukraine with weapons, which means they are actively taking Ukraine's side in the conflict.
I mean, the US is probably paying some DEI consultancy bills still too, but it doesn't say much about the direction of travel or the intended end point.
[A US-Russia alliance] does not seem like a serious possibility to me, and I wonder where you got this idea. I've seen the United States talk about lifting sanctions with Russia, which is not an "alliance" any more than Nordstream constitutes an "alliance" between Germany and Russia. Trump trying to hit the same reset button that Obama, Bush, etc. tried to hit does not mean that the United States is allying with Russia.
Where I got the idea is just listening to the drumbeat of criticism of Ukraine and praise for Russia, and the US's willingness to throw away all the bargaining chips immediately. Has a technical alliance emerged, no. Is it apparent to Europe that they now face a transformed world after 80 years of relative confidence in the US's ideological preferences, yes.
Regarding religious freedoms in Europe, I think that American concerns are pretty much bullshit and an excuse, and that if Trump introduced things like protest exclusion zones outside, I dunno, military hospitals instead of abortion centres (such things were seemingly the thing JD Vance is mainly exercised about at a time of grave geopolitical danger) ... if Trump introduced those then the same people complaining about Europe's restrictions wouldn't bat an eyelid.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
It makes sense based on these considerations that the US would reduce funding and expect the EU to step up to help it with a shared aim of containing Russia. That is not what is happening though. Rather the US is actively taking Russia's side in the conflict and ideologically allying itself with an autocracy over (most of) the world's democracies. Europe's minor encroachments on religious freedoms are obviously far more problematic ideologically to the US administration today than any number of assassinations of opponents, state control of media and corruption that happen in Russia. Don't pretend that this change isn't extraordinary and new.
The outcome is now looking like a US-Russia led alliance, with the EU trying to build an army and contain Russia with the hopes the US changes its mind before the conflict expands.
I hear the opinion that Ukraine did not act wisely in courting the west but it's a great players view of the world that doesn't come naturally to me. The people were given freedom and chose the west, you can say they could have collectively seen the geopolitical writing on the wall and gone against all their own preferences to avoid being invaded, but that sounds like victim blaming to me. Democracies cannot act strategically in that manner, it's one of the reasons they need and deserve protecting.
Rosencrantz2
6mo ago
And yet it really seems as though the signals coming from the US administration are 100% favourable to Putin and 100% negative to Ukraine and Europe. "Ukraine shouldn't have started it", Trump says now. How can this music play well at home if home isn't full of Russophiles (and I'm sure you're right, it's not)? I think the extent of the reversal is becoming more exrtreme by the day, to the distress of Europeans, who are beginning to feel not abandoned (which would be one thing), but as if they are being suddenly turned on by a former friend, which is quite another and will go down in history.
Indeed – they were obviously hoping/assuming the US would be part of any guarantee, but I would imagine European leaders are, right now in London, trying to figure out what guarantees if any they can plausibly offer by themselves.
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