FRIDAY: A grim situation seems to obtain!

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2025

Commander shouts and fumes: Is it possible that Vladimir Putin is getting tired of all the winning?

We start with the pair of headlines which have just appeared atop the front page of the online New York Times:

Trump-Zelensky Meeting Turns Into a Shouting Match

'You Either Make a Deal or We Are Out,' Trump Tells Ukrainian Leader

Those are not good headlines. 

The dual headline shown below also doesn't seem good. Online, it sits atop a report which appeared in this morning's print editions:

Trump Says Canada and Mexico Tariffs Will Go Into Effect Next Week
The president also said he would impose an additional 10 percent tariff on China as he tries to force other countries to take more action on drug shipments.

Question! Should we all apologize and tell the commander that it actually is the Gulf of America? That it has been all along?

At this point, we turn to a second question: Is it possible that something is "wrong" with President Trump? 

We know! Mainstream journalists have persistently agreed that they must never wonder or ask. 

Still, as that question floats in the air, we return to some of the unusual things Trump said at Wednesday's cabinet meeting. In this morning's report, we posted one part of this chunk:

REPORTER (2/27/28: Mr. President, have you just made a decision on what level you'll seek on tariffs in the European Union?

PRESIDENT TRUMP: We have made a decision. We'll be announcing it very soon, and it'll be 25%, generally speaking, and that'll be on cars and all of the things. And European Union is a different case than Canada, different kind of case. They've really taken advantage of us in a different way...

Now, I love the countries of Europe. I guess I'm from there at some point a long time ago, right? But indirectly—pretty directly too, I guess. But I love the countries of Europe. I love all countries, frankly, all different. 

But the European Union's been—it was formed in order to screw the United States. I mean, look, let's be honest. The European Union was formed in order to screw the United States. That's the purpose of it. And they've done a good job of it. But now I'm president.

REPORTER: What will happen if these countries or the EU retaliate?

TRUMP: They can't. I mean, they can try...They can try, but the numbers can never equal what ours, because we could go off. We are the pot of gold, we're the one that everybody wants. And they can retaliate, but it cannot be a successful retaliation because we just go cold turkey, we don't buy anymore. And if that happens, we win.

If the Euros try that, we get the win! For now, could it be Putin who's winning?

"The European Union was formed to screw the United States?" As far as we know, you shouldn't assume that any of the statistical claims in that full presentation are accurate. But that assessment of the EU's foundational purpose doesn't sound like a very good sign.

The cabinet meeting crawled with factual claims by President Trump which have been debunked a million times. That doesn't seem like a very good sign—and journalists are still failing to treat this relentless trafficking of widely discounted factual claims as a stand-along point of concern which ought to rate stand-alone coverage on a daily basis.

Then too, there's what we saw Tim Miller say on yesterday's Deadline: White House. 

We've never seen anyone refer to the possibility that Musk may be exhibiting some sort of problem with drugs, but that's a possibility to which Miller alluded.

We have no idea if that speculation is accurate. On the other hand, we have no way of knowing it isn't.

Long ago, Dr. Bandy X. Lee, the Yale psychiatrist, said this was going to happen. In an assortment of ways, she was eventually shown the door.

She wasn't allowed to raise such concerns. As for ourselves, we continue to recommend pity and concern for people who may somehow be afflicted. That said, is it possible that Dr. Lee possibly got it right way back when this spiral began?