![\"Donald](\"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/Pix\/Trump\/trump-angry-red.jpg\")
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To prove his prowess at screwing up the affairs of state, Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday, ostensibly to finalize an agreement to provide continued military assistance to Ukraine, in exchange for a ransom of Ukrainian minerals to satisfy Trump’s transactional greed. The meeting, however, did not go as planned. Or did it?<\/p>\n
It did not take long for Trump to transform the diplomatic discussion into a verbal venting wherein Trump, lashed out with uncontrolled vitriol at Zelenskyy. Trump even veered off on a “Russia, Russia, Russia”<\/em> rant, whining about his impeachment and prior conflicts with Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton. Both Trump and his vice-president unleashed ugly attacks that had little to nothing to do with the purpose of the meeting. [The full video of the exchange is here<\/a><\/strong>, if you have the stomach for it]<\/p>\n Trump engaged in ego-driven blather, complaining that “You gotta be more thankful. Because, lemme tell you, you don’t have the cards.”<\/em> He is typically focused on forcing people to pay undeserved homage to him. Vance joined in with a rather telling admission, saying that “I think it’s disrespectful for you to come into the oval office and try to litigate this in front of the American media.”<\/em><\/p>\n That’s right. According to Vance, Zelenskyy is somehow at fault for Trump blowing up at him in front of the media that Trump invited. A suspicious cynic might surmise that Trump planned this Oval Office putsch in order to derail the $500 billion mineral deal that Trump might have recently learned was not as advantageous for Trump, and his client Russia, as he thought. As NBC News reported<\/a><\/strong>…<\/p>\n “According to a 2023 study by Forbes Ukraine, the country\u2019s rare earth and other critical minerals could be worth as much as $14.8 trillion.” […and that…]<\/em> “There are no current rare earth projects underway in Ukraine and experts say it will take years to get projects off the ground, possibly up to a decade.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n So Trump needed a a reason to ditch the deal. Preferably with witnesses. Which makes this a good time to point out the specific representatives of the press that Trump invited to this meeting. As media watchers know, the Trump regime has recently been making changes to the way they interact with the press. They have outright banned some outlets from covering the president, and have ended the century-long practice of having the independent White House Correspondents Association assign journalists to cover Trump and Company.<\/p>\n SEE THIS: Trump Declares Himself King of the White House Press Corps, Will Now Decide Who Can Question Him<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Consequently, longstanding, credible journalists from the Associated Press and Reuters were not allowed to cover the Zelenskyy meeting. However, extremist right-wing outlets were on the White House’s approved list. But that isn’t all. Russia’s own state news agency, TASS, somehow got into the room. At least until someone noticed…<\/p>\n UPDATE from a @WhiteHouse<\/a> official:<\/p>\n \u201cTASS was not on the approved list of media for today\u2019s pool. As soon as it came to the attention of press office staff that he was in the Oval, he was escorted out by the @PressSec<\/a>. He is not on the approved list for the press conference.\u201d<\/p>\n — Andrew Feinberg (@AndrewFeinberg) February 28, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n