I can only imagine, if Zelensky was well versed in American pop culture memes, he may have been humming the theme to Curb Your Enthusiasm in his head right at this moment today.
Damn! What theater!
In all my years I've never seen, nor would I ever have imagined seeing, the spectacle of what appeared to almost be, close to a near fisticuffs brawl in the Oval Office during a fully televised press junket. Would be thoroughly enjoyable and popcorn worthy if it weren't for the fact that this will likely mean the very near future of much more bloodshed...not only Ukrainian, Russian, but likely, as Zelensky boldly even tried to imply, also American.
And do you for a minute think this wasn't planned to go this way? The scheduled press conference subsequent to the Oval Office presser is cancelled and the formal "deal" for the mineral rights with Ukraine is now off with Zelensky having left the White House, and, assumably, Washington, to return back to Ukraine with nothing? It's all very mobile right now being 2:30 pm.
But listen, I could see all the signs that this wasn't going to go well. First, they had Zelensky enter through the West Wing entrance, not the front entrance like most heads of state. Next, Trump and another reporter made fun of his lack of wearing a suit. I think he's spoken before why he doesn't wear a suit. I guess he feels he's got a task to do that's more "hands-on-ish" as a leader of a nation in the midst of a brutal war and feels a suit is like wearing a costume. I kinda get it. But understand Trump's way of thinking. He sees casually dressed dudes like this pushovers, especially those of perceived milquetoast nature and demure posturing (like the way he's sitting in the screencap above). Bullies like Trump see this as weakness. Then there's Trump hogging the reporters' questions, even going off topic to the visible dismay and frustration of Zelensky. Zelensky tried to grab a few moments in the sun for himself assertively, even cutting off reporters addressing Trump (to Trump's very discrete, yet slightly visible irritation) and even said, at one point, he was creating a question for himself. He even had the gall to contradict Trump a couple times. Finally, when Zelensky dared to ask a direct question to JD Vance after Vance tried to defend Trump's negotiation tactics in attempting a ceasefire which Zelensky was ardently against, and addressed him by calling him "JD" rather than "Mr. Vice President," I knew shit was about to go down!
Step right up, folks! It's the Art of the Deal alright. The deal where Ukraine is sold to Russia for a steal.
EDIT: So an interesting thing. It's 3:30 now and the above clip is a shortened clip I chose of the one I watched live on YouTube by the Forbes Breaking News channel. It doesn't include a lot of the precursor questions from reporters and little events I noticed that I saw in the live stream because I wanted to focus on the heated exchange part of the presser rather than the whole thing. But when I went back to the full feed to replay some of the footage I watched earlier that I wrote about above, the footage has been edited out. The "LIVE stream" clip which shows a timestamp of over three hours has a significant portion removed! It shows a good amount of wasted time while the camera is just staticly focused on the West Wing entrance outside in the cold with the Marines standing by the door, Trump meeting Zelensky at the door then more wasted time watching the door. Then we cut to the point in the presser which basically mirrors the above clip. I'm not going to paste it here since I think LIVE clips tend be be deleted after a time and would not last on this blog anyway but trust me, it's been altered. Why though? I couldn't find any other news service footage of the earlier part of the press junket anywhere else either. Is this the start of press censorship?
EDIT #2: Ok, look below...I found a clip that has the full meeting. Here are my "maybes" as to why, if it's real, there may be censorship of this early part of the set...
First we have the little photo sharing moment. Clearly Trump didn't appreciate this. Zelensky was being slick here in trying to tie in the similarities to the horrific treatment of Ukrainian prisoners and make the connection to the Hamas treatment of the Israeli hostages that Trump himself so vehemently lambasted not a few days ago. Slick Volody, but the Don don't like surprises like this, especially ones that point out his duplicity and contrarianism.
Then there's his funny little no, yes, no exchange like I mentioned before. Cute but beyond the optics Trump knows that intelligent people could pierce the skin of it and find out that Volody is right, Europe has been just as important a contributor to Ukraine's survival in many ways as the US so to say that Europe gave "much less" support is disingenuous. Is this what JD means by Volody being "disrespectful?" Stating, and adhering to fact?
A wildly foreshadowing moment happens when a foreign correspondent asks Zelensky if he thinks Trump is on his side. Volody, himself an actor and one who knows how to take a moment, does so, turns to Trump smiling and asks him directly "What do you think?" Trump, misunderstanding him thinks Zelensky is asking for clarification of the reporter's question so Trump repeats the question. No Donald. Volody wasn't asking you to clarify the question. He understands English well enough. He was asking you if you were really on his side. Wow, would this soon come to a head in just a few minutes.
Next there's the joke that Trump puts himself in the hierarchy of greatest US presidents above Washington and Lincoln. To his credit, Trump reiterates that he is indeed joking, but he does so to off set the potential for his ever-present enemy "Fake News" in twisting his words into making it sound like he is a demented demagogue. No need for "Fake News" for that.
Then one of Trump's ally news outlets' reporter in the room scornfully asks Zelensky about what he surely thinks in his mind, and his MAGA listeners, is the vitally important question about his lack of appropriate attire which the Vice President can be seen and heard heartily laughing at. Nice. And later he would bitch about being "disrespected."
Yeah, looking at all this, cut out of more conservative (ie obsequious) clips, it pretty much makes sense.