Dispatches from Vilnius

Trump and his mini-me The 20-point peace plan has worked so well in Gaza that now His Trumpness is pitching one for Ukraine. After a 4-hour call with Vlad the Impaler, His Trumpness tried to convince Zelenskyy into signing a similar deal.  He even sweet talked the Ukrainian president, telling him what a nice jacket he wore and what a beautiful signature he had, a veritable work of art. The press conference was painful to watch as it was so obviously orchestrated to make the Ukrainian president look small and inconsequential. However, Zelenskyy said no thanks.  Not until Russia quits bombing our cities.  I really don't understand why it is so difficult for the Trump administration to recognize what is happening.  Either that or they simply don't care.  More important to get those mineral deals to keep making those hi tech products that dominate our market today.  Even in this regard, Russia has the upper hand, as it has seized the most valuable lithium de...

I guess if you can't win an award, the next best thing is having it dedicated to you , and that is exactly what Maria Corina Machado did with the Nobel Peace Prize.  Of course, it was a calculated move as she wants the United States to support her ongoing effort to oust Nicolas Maduro. In fact, her "democratic" campaign goes back to when Hugo Chavis was president of Venezuela. I'm not sure who she actually represents but she reminds me of  Aung San Suu Kyi . Needless to say, the White House still wasn't happy but the deadline for this year's Nobel Peace Prize was January 31.  All of Trump's great achievements came after that deadline if we are to accept his extensive resume . Better luck next year, Donald. High on the list will be the peace deal he claims he has brokered in Gaza. This went down literally on the same day the Nobel Peace Prize winner was announced.  It remains to be seen how this armistice holds up.  So far, all we have is a ceasefire, but ...

Paul McCartney Live at Red Square, 2005 It's really hard to figure out what is going on these days.  Moldova recently survived a massive propaganda assault by the Kremlin and voted for a pro-EU government by just over 50% - a clear majority. The Russian backed party finished a distant second with 24 percent. Meanwhile in the Czech Republic, a pro-Russian party headed by Billionaire Andrej Babiš won that country's parliamentary elections with 35 percent.  I don't know if he will be able to form a ruling coalition but the threat is clear, as the Czech Republic has been a major military and logistical supporter of Ukraine the past three-and-a-half years and Babiš actively campaigned against lending any more support to Ukraine. What makes this odd is that Moldova is much more readily threatened by Russia, as the Kremlin has vowed to beef up its military presence in Transnistria to 10,000 troops.  Transnistria never accepted Moldovan independence in 1991 and has remained a ...

One of the reasons we find ourselves in the current situation where Trump has demanded an FBI probe into who stopped the escalator on his way to give a speech to the UN General Assembly is because people who knew better voted for him anyway.  If " Escalatorgate " wasn't bad enough, Trump gave one of the most meandering, fact-challenged speeches in UN history.  Not even Hugo Chavez sounded more bonkers when he called George Bush " the devil " in his infamous 2006 speech to the UN. Although former Venezuelan Pres. Chavez wasn't far off. Why voters in "America" keep making the same mistake over and over again is a real mystery? Bush was bad enough. He drug the US into two wars over 9/11 and left the country in economic shambles with the worst recession since the mid 1970s.  You'd think Americans would never vote Republican again after that but they gave Obama all of two years before voting in a Republican House of Representatives in 2010.  They ...

Kamala's new book is getting a lot of attention even before it hits the shelves.  It seems to have befuddled Dems with many saying it has ruined her political career.  Judging by the tone she has set, it seems she has no plans to run for office of any kind, passing on the California governor's race in 2026, where she was considered the front runner, although many Dems were expressing their reservations .   After the election, many pundits and politicians were foisting the blame on her for the loss, especially given she was able to amass such a huge war chest in 107 days.  However, there was plenty of blame to go around, mostly on the media for focusing so heavily on Trump in the waning days of the campaign that Harris got almost no air time. The enthusiasm that had propelled her campaign to that point was gone and she had a very had time getting her message out.   The conservative media treated her as an imposter, claiming she was a DEI vice-president...

I only really knew Charlie Kirk through South Park.  When I heard he got shot in Utah, I thought it was a joke or at worst he staged it to try to give himself some cred like Trump got for that shooting in Pennsylvania last year.  Next day I heard Young Charlie was dead and that it wasn't a joke but rather a day of national mourning, at least for the MAGA faithful.  The Chief Magster even ordered flags flown at half mast to honor the "the truly great American patriot," although it oddly coincided with the commemoration of 9/11. I suppose in Magaland Charlie is a patriot, but everywhere else he was just seen as a loudmouth bigot with a podcast. The episode has since been pulled from Comedy Channel so as not to show any offense to the fallen conservative ideologue.  My biggest worry is the fallout from the incident as Magsters worldwide have sworn vengeance , although the assassin will probably turn out to be one of their own.  I was shocked to learn how far Char...

To hear Big Balls tell it , some teenage thugs assaulted him and his girlfriend getting into his car with one of them running off with his I-phone.  He gallantly tried to defend himself and his girlfriend but was left bloodied and bruised .  It created quite an uproar on social media with President Bigger Balls saying the two fifteen year-olds who were arrested should be tried as adults.   If you remember, he wanted the death penalty for the so-called "Central Park Five," which he once again defamed in last year's debate with Kamala Harris.  Turned out they were all innocent of the charges of brutally beating a white woman jogger in Central Park, which has since been made into a mini-series .  They were about the same age as the alleged assailants who beat up Big Balls, born Edward Coristine. Now Big Balls may have indeed been beaten up, as he alleged, or he might have just tripped and fell on the pavement running after the kid who nabbed his cellphone....

There is something very suspicious about Trump putting on his "big boy" pants when it comes to Russia.  I heard similar bellicose words a few years back and we know how that turned out.  This seems like nothing more than a set up for a big beautiful summit with Putin in the near future.  Hard to find neutral ground these days but the most likely place will be the United Arab Emirates.   Ukrainian President Zelenskyy has of course not been invited.  Putin isn't ready to confront his nemesis face to face.  He doesn't want to give him any legitimacy, don't you know.  The Donald seems fine with that.  After all, he's already met with Volodymyr, the most infamous being a White House visit where Donald and JD tag-teamed on him in an effort to make the Ukrainian president look small.  Since then Trump has been more cordial with Zelenskyy.  The most recent meeting being a tete-a-tete encounter at the Pope's funeral in April. Trump final...

As Trump hits countries with another round of tariffs, mostly out of spite , he announces a new ballroom that would further transform the White House into his imperial palace.  The $200 million gilded ballroom is grossly out of scale but no matter.  Trump doesn't feel like he can properly entertain all his affluent guests, whom he claims will be footing the bill.  With very little pushback, he can get away with pretty much anything these days.  I'm not sure how his MAGA base is going to take it, especially after all the Medicaid cuts in the latest spending bill, but he made sure to note the Fed is spending much more money on its home improvements . Hard to believe that Trump " came one appellate court ruling away from losing control of his empire ." He has doubled his fortune over the past year and now acts like King Midas, forcing foreign leaders and tech barons to call him "daddy" and bend the knee.  The latest to offer praise to the Commander-in-Chief i...

More and more Trump reminds me of a bad imitation of Rodney Dangerfield.  Granted, he can be funny in spite of himself but most of the time he just comes off incredibly stupid.  Here he was promoting Tulsi Gabbard's absurd claim of Obama's sedition in the 2016 elections during a WH meeting with Filipino leader Marcos.  " Obama was sedatious ." Obama wasn't laughing.  He blasted the bizarre allegations but that didn't stop Republican Congressional leaders from trying to pass off Russia's meddling in the 2016 elections as a false flag despite ample proof of their involvement.  Trump's Deputy AG at the time launched an investigation , if for no other reason than to clear Trump's name. Donald took such personal offense that he held Sessions and Rosenstein directly responsible for dragging his name into it.  The circus went on for months with Robert Mueller eventually concluding that there was Russian interference but that it didn't alter the outco...

For all the talk that Trump has grown impatient with Putin over the ceaseless war in Ukraine, there is much this administration is lifting from the Kremlin playbook.  The recent "merger" of Paramount and Skydance being a prime example. A tech oligarch will now have control over Paramount's extensive holdings including CBS.  The merger clearly favors Skydance and will see David Ellison, son of Oracle tech oligarch Larry Ellison, as the CEO.  Both are avid supporters of Trump and are hoping that the FCC will speed things along so that they can wrap up this deal by September. "Varied ideological perspectives" just means CBS will be less "woke," and help further the conservative narrative when it comes to politics.  This also means ditching The Late Show where Stephen Colbert had been dishing on the merger for months, calling the $16 million settlement between 60 Minutes and Trump a bribe.  Trump had initially sued CBS for $10 billion over what he rega...

My neighbor called last night to congratulate me on the Fourth of July.  I didn't think much of it as I've been living in Lithuania for the last 27 years, but I thanked him just the same.  Maybe we should plan a barbeque, he asked?  Our once a summer get-together as we aren't very close but it is always nice to reconnect.  One summer, I played Jaws on an outdoor screen to satisfy the kids as we had hamburgers along with Greek salad and other fixings.  A very Fourth of July thing to do. However, this time around I don't feel so convivial.  What transpired over the past week left me with a very empty feeling as I watched Republican after Republican cave in to Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill," knowing full well it would have a devastating impact on the country. For a moment it looked like Lisa Murkowski would hold her ground but eventually John Thune offered enough concessions for Alaska that she signed on, giving the GOP the 50 senators they needed with VP Vanc...