Donald Trump’s gangster diplomacy and anger management issues went viral on the front page of newspapers around the globe on Saturday, following his verbal assault on Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the President of Ukraine, in the Oval Office on Friday. Those headlines were then parsed and debated on Sunday’s TV news programs here in the U.S. and by U.S. based newspaper columnists.
Margaret Brennan of the CBS News program, Face the Nation, reported on her program on Sunday morning that “Our social media producers tell us that, as of this morning, we have had more than 100 million views on posts related to the meeting across our CBS News social media platforms.”
The reason for the unprecedented interest is because no other U.S. President in history has conducted such thug “diplomacy” with a foreign ally by screaming at him in the Oval Office in front of television cameras. Trump, turning red in the face, yelled at Zelensky that he had no cards to play and wasn’t showing proper gratitude to the United States.
In a Sunday New York Times column (paywall) titled “Trump Is Doing Real Damage to America,” conservative columnist, David French, assessed the situation as follows:
“Consider what happened in the Oval Office on Friday. Trump and Vice President JD Vance ambushed President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on live television. Vance accused Zelensky of being ‘disrespectful,’ and Trump attacked him directly…
“Trump’s attack on Zelensky is just the latest salvo against our allies. Back in office, Trump has taught our most important strategic partners a lesson they will not soon forget: America can — and will — change sides. Its voters may indeed choose a leader who will abandon our traditional alliances and actively support one of the world’s most dangerous and oppressive regimes.
“Even if Democrats sweep the midterms in 2026 and defeat the Republican candidate in 2028, that lesson will still hold. Our allies will know that our alliances are only as stable as the next presidential election — and that promises are only good for one term (at most).
“It’s extraordinarily difficult — if not impossible — to build a sustainable defense strategy under those circumstances. It’s impossible to enact sustainable trade policies. And it’s impossible to conduct any form of lasting diplomacy. If agreements are subject to immediate revocation with the advent of a new administration, will any sensible world power rely on America’s word — or America itself?”
The answer is obvious. Trump just switched sides in a three-year old war, moving to the side of the invader and dictator, Vladimir Putin, while leaving our allies in Europe in stunned disbelief.