The List

[Gadianton]

When Trump sends his supporters, he's not sending his best.

You sure about that? These folks seem a cut above his cabinet picks.

[canpakes]

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We’re about a month in with the new Trump Administration, and while Trump seems to have checked out on his promise of ending the war in Ukraine on ‘Day 1’, he has (some would say predictably) now taken to calling Ukraine’s Zelenskyy a ‘dictator’ and accused Ukraine of starting the war. No one is quite sure how Ukraine managed to pull Russian tanks on to its soil from Russia, but it’s obvious at this point where this is going, especially with Trump and Putin chatting on the phone in secret just a few days ago.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Trump Criticizes Zelensky, Calling Him a Dictator

U.S. president accuses Ukrainian leader of misusing U.S. aid, marking significant escalation of attacks

By James Marson, Jane Lytvynenko and Ievgeniia Sivorka

President Trump excoriated Volodymyr Zelensky, calling him a “dictator” and accusing him of misusing U.S. aid, after the Ukrainian leader said Trump was repeating Russian propaganda points.

“He refuses to have Elections, is very low in Ukrainian Polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing Biden ‘like a fiddle,’” Trump wrote in a social-media post on Wednesday. “A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left.”

The comments marked a significant escalation of Trump’s criticism of Zelensky. They come one day after the U.S. president accused Zelensky of starting Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Zelensky told reporters in Ukraine on Wednesday that Trump is “living in this disinformation space.”

He added, “I want there to be more truth in Trump’s team.”
Zelensky’s defiant comments—his sharpest yet in response to Trump’s criticisms of his leadership and courting of Russian President Vladimir Putin—highlighted a widening gap between Ukraine and the U.S., the country that has been Kyiv’s most important backer.

Trump has said he wants to quickly settle the war in Ukraine, which started when Putin ordered a large-scale invasion of Russia’s smaller neighbor three years ago. He has increasingly blamed Ukraine—and Zelensky personally—for the invasion while engaging with Putin about ways to end it.

Zelensky’s tone reflected a darkening mood toward the Trump administration in Ukraine, which has for three years fought off Russian expansionism at the cost of tens of thousands of troops and civilians killed, and dozens of cities destroyed.

Ukrainian Army Sgt. Oleksandr Solonko, a soldier in a drone unit fighting near the embattled eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, said Trump’s comments showed “a complete misunderstanding of the nature of the war, its real causes and the mentality of the Ukrainian people.”

At the same time, Trump’s position drew praise from Russia on Wednesday. Putin said talks had been “friendly” and covered a range of topics from Ukraine to restoring diplomatic ties as well as the Middle East.

“From the American side it was completely different people who were open for the negotiating process without any prejudice,” Putin told reporters.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Trump “is the first, and so far only Western leader to publicly and loudly say that one of the root causes of the Ukraine situation is the impudent line of the previous administration to draw Ukraine into NATO.”

“It’s a signal that he understands our position,” Lavrov told the Russian parliament.

Trump’s Ukraine envoy, retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, arrived in Ukraine on Wednesday for his first official visit. At the train station in Kyiv, he said he looked forward to “good, substantial talks.” His mission was to listen, then talk to Trump to “ensure we get this thing right,” he said.

Senior U.S. and Russian officials met in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Tuesday and agreed to appoint teams to negotiate a settlement to the war in Ukraine, marking an end to three years of U.S. policy that focused on isolating Moscow and supporting Kyiv for as long as it was willing to keep fighting.

Zelensky has expressed frustration about not being included in talks and said Kyiv wouldn’t recognize agreements reached without his country. He said he hoped European countries would continue supporting Ukraine if the U.S. didn’t. “Our strength is that this deal is impossible without us,” he said Wednesday.

Trump indicated Zelensky should hold elections if he wanted a seat at the table, claiming the Ukrainian president’s approval rating had fallen to 4%. He also criticized Zelensky for wanting to take part in talks, saying: “You should’ve ended it in three years. You should have never started it.”

Zelensky hit back Wednesday noting a fresh poll by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology that put his approval rating at 57% in February, a rise of 5 percentage points from December.

“We saw this disinformation,” Zelensky said. “We understand that it is coming from Russia. We understand this and have proof that these figures are being discussed between America and Russia.”

Zelensky criticized a U.S. proposal presented to him last week that would have seen Ukraine hand over hundreds of billions of dollars in future revenue from natural-resource extraction, with no security guarantees offered in return. “That’s not a serious conversation,” he said. “I can’t sell our state.”

He said, however, that he was prepared to continue discussing the proposal.
Soldiers and civilians expressed anger Wednesday over Trump’s comments and attempts to seal a peace deal with Putin. On social media, Ukrainians posted images of corpses and mass graves discovered in parts of Ukraine after they were retaken from Russian control, with the words: “Russian occupation is not peace, it is a death camp.”

“Russia doesn’t want to negotiate with Ukraine, it wants to destroy it,” said Ukrainian Army Maj. Arislav Pasternak. “So negotiations with them are impossible unless victory on the battlefield becomes impossible for them.”

Lt. Dmytro Ianok urged Americans not to abandon Ukraine, recalling support he had felt on visits to the U.S. “Right now, we need you,” he said.

Ianok, an artillery officer, said Ukrainians were peaceful and were fighting only to defend against an invader. “When authoritarian terror faces no resistance, it doesn’t stop—it spreads, like mold. Let it consume Ukraine, and the entire free world will suffocate in distrust and drown in fear,” he said.

Ukraine’s military-intelligence chief, Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, summed up the mood in a laconic post on his social-media channels: “We will endure.”

As Trump chided Ukraine, 167 Russian attack drones arrowed into Ukrainian skies overnight. Some of them struck power infrastructure in the southern port city of Odesa, leaving more than 160,000 people, as well as schools, kindergartens and hospitals, without heat or electricity as temperatures dipped well below freezing, Zelensky said.

Zelensky said the attack proved that Russia can’t be trusted. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, said Tuesday in Riyadh that Russia didn’t attack Ukrainian energy infrastructure. Russia has repeatedly targeted Ukraine’s power stations and electricity grid with missiles and explosive drones, and knocked out heat for 100,000 people in the southern city of Mykolaiv last week.

Tymofiy Mylovanov, president of the Kyiv School of Economics and a former economy minister under Zelensky, said the Ukrainian leader was doing the right thing by pushing back on Trump with facts and noting Russian disinformation while not criticizing the U.S. president personally.

“It’s a tough balancing act,” Mylovanov wrote on Twitter.

https://www.wsj.com/world/zelensky-says ... r-08989b98

[canpakes]

One month in, and the blame game begins.

UH-OH: Trump Just Publicly Abandoned 1 Of His Biggest 'Day 1' Promises

Trump vowed to control this on his first day in office. Now, he says he had "nothing to do with" the latest turn of events.

By Ed Mazza


President Donald Trump this week admitted that prices are rising ― but insisted that it’s not his fault despite repeatedly claiming he would bring prices down on his first day in office. 

“Inflation is back,” he told Fox News host Sean Hannity in an interview that aired on Tuesday night. “I’m only here for two and a half weeks ... I had nothing to do with it.” 

The consumer price index jumped by 3% in January compared to January 2024, according to the Labor Department, a number higher than most analysts expected.  

Trump immediately blamed former President Joe Biden despite previously claiming he’d stop inflation within hours of taking office on Jan. 20. 

“I will immediately bring prices down starting on Day 1,” he said on Aug. 15, according to video resurfaced by progressive media outlet MeidasTouch, which also found him saying two days later: “Starting the day I take the oath of office, I will rapidly drive prices down.”

Trump has said it at other points, too, including a claim last summer that “starting on Day 1, we will end inflation and make America affordable again.” 

Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) has been keeping a list of numerous other times Trump made similar promises. 

Once in office, however, Trump quickly backed off the notion that he’d be able to immediately cut inflation and improve the economy and has also admitted that his plan to impose tariffs on other nations could lead to “short-term a little pain” for American consumers. 

And when Hannity tried to bring up the economy during a previous interview, Trump didn’t want to talk about it at all. 

“Let me get to the economy,” Hannity said during the interview shortly after Trump took office. “I’m running out of time.”

“I don’t care,” Trump fired back as he went on a lengthy rant against Biden. “This is more important.”

Voters, however, don’t seem to agree. 

Last week, CNN data reporter Harry Enten said new polls found that a majority of Americans want Trump to focus on inflation or the economy in general, but two-thirds say he hasn’t done so. 

And that, he predicted, could cause Trump’s approval ratings to take a dive. 
“Let me be perfectly clear: Inflation crushed the Joe Biden presidency, it ate it alive,” Enten said. “If Donald Trump is not careful, inflation will crush his presidency and eat it alive.” 

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/Trump-in ... 1801af34e5

[canpakes]

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Regarding ‘ending the Ukraine-Russia war within 1 day: at nearly two months into his term, Trump continues his campaign to publicly demonize Ukraine while simultaneously crippling its ability to defend itself, in favor of allowing Putin to retake hundreds of square miles of territory.

Trump can no longer claim that Russia never took Ukrainian territory on his watch, and his obsequious deference to Putin is a dramatic reversal in Russia’s favor.

From: https://phillipspobrien.substack.com/p/ ... e=substack

The Week The USA Started Killing Ukrainians

The United States government took some dramatic steps this week to help Russia and weaken Ukraine—the intended result of which will be more Ukrainian deaths, fewer Russian losses, and the undermining of Ukrainian democracy.

The steps were comprehensive, layered, and designed to punish Ukraine for not doing what Trump wants. Its worth listing them just so you can see how significant the changes are.

- The USA has stopped the delivery of all military supplies to Ukraine. The Trump administration had actually been slowing the supply of remaining Biden era supplies for a while. However now even Biden appropriations are not being delivered.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/03/us-paus ... house.html

- The USA has stopped allowing Ukraine to attack Russian forces with certain high-value US systems such as HIMARS.
https://newsukraine.rbc.United Airlines/news/us-cuts ... 03400.html

- The USA, in a particularly twisted move, has made it far more difficult for Ukraine to defend against Russian missile attacks. What the USA has done is no longer provide Ukraine with warning of such attacks—which will make them far more deadly and effective.
https://kyivindependent.com/u-s-intelli ... t-reports/

- The USA is actually stopping non-military supplies such as medical equipment, which is vital to keep wounded Ukrainians alive. This had started with the USAID cut—but has now reached an extreme level with no medical supplies to treat Ukrainian soldiers. The USA is also forbidding the Ukrainians from having access to Maxar commercial satellite data—which has been widely available to them (and many civilian agencies) throughout the conflict.
https://x.com/AdamKinzinger/status/1898044590029992080

- The USA is signalling strong support to Putin that they want to see his strategic priorities met in the short term.
https://www.lbc.co.uk/world-news/russia ... deal-nato/

Note—for point 4 I’ve linked to an Adam Kinzinger tweet for the evidence on medical supplies being cut off to Ukraine. All I will say is that his source is extremely good (for those of you who don’t know, he and I have discussed the situation regularly, including in this podcast). I’m entirely comfortable saying that this is true.

The cut in military aid to Ukraine was something that Trump had been itching for for a while. There had been a noticeable slow-down in deliveries in the previous weeks, but this week everything was stopped—even if it was just over the border to Ukraine and about to be delivered. Moreover, I've been told that US forces in Europe are actively making it more difficult for other partners to deliver aid to Ukraine. This will create some major headaches soon, in areas such as air defense.

This step will save many Russian lives and lead to many more Ukrainian deaths, both soldiers and civilians

The US moves to weaken both Ukrainian offensive and defensive capabilities (points 2 and 3) comes down to the immediate shut-down of US intelligence sharing. The US has been providing Ukraine vital aid to allow the Ukrainian military to both attack Russian forces (mostly in the battle area is has to be said) and also to help the Ukrainians defend their cities and civilian infrastructure.

Supposedly at 2pm on Wednesday of this week (March 5) the US cut the data that it was supplying, which left Ukraine completely in the dark and unable to target their HIMARS in the normal way. Now, the Trump administration had supposedly already been limiting the offensive intelligence supplied to a restricted area close to the battle line—but then it all went dead. So no more targeting help from the USA for Ukraine.

This step will immediately help save Russian soldiers and equipment from losses.

The intelligence cut also meant that the USA no longer is providing the Ukrainians with notice of Russian preparations to launch missiles (their most effective weapons) against Ukrainian cities. Fast Russian missiles demand the most preparation time possible, both so Ukrainian civilians can take cover and so that Ukrainian anti-air forces can get ready. Now, Ukraine will have far less notice that the Russian are launching ranged attacks.

Indeed, this step seems to have been almost coordinated with Putin. Its interesting that for a while before the intelligence ban had been put into place by the USA, the Russians had used relatively few missiles to attack Ukraine and had been relying on their Shaheds (which are much easier to shoot down). However, almost immediately after Trump cuts intelligence sharing, the Russians launch a massive missile barrage.

This step will immediately lead to greater Ukrainian civilian casualties and greater civilian suffering as Ukraine’s infrastructure will be harder to defend.

The punitive nature of what the USA is doing to Ukraine might be seen in these steps to really punish the country. The stopping of medical supplies just means more wounded Ukrainian soldiers will die. The cutting off of Maxar technology is just another way to try and make sure that the Ukrainians cannot attack the Russian effectively. Its basically going the extra mile to help the Russians and hurt the Ukrainians.

This is also part of a plan by Trump and Putin to weaken Ukrainian democracy. They want to crush both the morale of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians—which will help force a bad deal on Ukraine.

Its psychopathic.

These steps will save Russian resources and soldiers and lead to more dead Ukrainians—particularly soldiers who are wounded.

The signalling of support to Putin is clear and unambiguous—and crucially involves Trump personally as can be seen in his press conference last night (March 7). I've linked to that below.

Its ridiculous how its being reported. The day after Trump froze US intelligence sharing with Ukraine, the Russians, seemingly coordinating with him and launched their large missile attack. Trump’s response was typically perverse. He publicly seems a little miffed at the attack, and even teases new sanctions against Russia. However, he never takes concrete actions to increase pressure on Russia and almost certainly wont here.

As an example, we had Trump threaten sanctions and tariffs on Russia in January, a move which caused some people to lose their heads. However, once the threat was made, it was shown to be toothless. On the other hand, Zelensky does not wear a tie to the Oval Office, and this seems to be reason for Trump, and some Trump backers, to take brutal actions to kill Ukrainians.

However, Trump is not really mad at Russia—as always his anger is directed at Ukraine. He could not repress his real views after his toothless threats to add more sanctions on Russia. He pivoted almost entirely and said he much preferred working with Putin, that what Russia was doing was justified and almost seeming to enjoy the destruction he (and the USA) was helping to inflict on Ukraine. Trump even openly admitted that he was weakening Ukrainian air defenses to put pressure on the Ukrainians. Here are some quotes from his press conference—the last one is where he admits he is starving them of air defense.

"... right now they're bombing the hell out of Ukraine. I'm finding it more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine.

"Do you think that Vladimir Putin is taking advantage of the U.S. pause right now on intelligence and military aid to Ukraine?" — Trump was just asked. Trump: "... I actually think he's doing what anybody else would do. I think he wants to get it stopped and settled. And I think he's hitting harder than he's been hitting. And I think probably anybody in that position would be doing that right now.

"Why not give Ukraine air defenses to prevent Putin from pounding them?" — Trump was just asked Trump: “I have to know that they want to settle. I don’t know that they want to settle. If they don't want to settle, we're out of there because we want them to settle.“

by the way, you can watch the whole press conference here. It has Trump expressing lots of anti-European thoughts in general, which is notable. When it comes to his statements on Ukraine, they start around the 14th minute.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qTw1LBJcK ... p=2AEBkAIB

Conclusion

As a rule of thumb, Trump only ever takes concrete action to harm Ukraine and only ever takes concrete action to help Russia. In this case, he is admitting to helping Russia kill Ukrainians.

This is the official position of the US Government and through that the people of the USA. Its amazing how little this is being criticized.

Europe needs to understand—if the USA is willing to help Russia kill Ukrainians today, it could easily be willing to help Russia kill other Europeans tomorrow.

[canpakes]

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The mass deportation program is still getting the kinks ironed out …

With a key hearing before a federal judge looming that could stop or slow the Trump administration’s transfer of more migrants to Guantánamo Bay, migrants the administration has already sent to Cuba have now been quietly returned to the United States, according to The Washington Post. 

Forty men were reportedly the last group of immigrants being held at the Guántanamo Bay naval station, the paper said Wednesday. The transfer reportedly occurred over the last two days, when the men were sent back to the U.S. and detained at Immigrations and Customs Enforcement facilities in Alexandria, Louisiana. 

[canpakes]

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The “I will bring prices down on Day 1” claim isn’t taking hold too well with the public, nearly two months in:

Consumer Confidence Falls to Lowest Since 2022; Tariff Concerns Mount

Consumer confidence in the U.S. sank further this month, reflecting increasing unease over President Trump's tariff policy and its potential to drive inflation higher.



The University of Michigan's closely watched index of consumer sentiment nosedived to 57.9 in mid-March from 64.7 last month, much weaker than expectations of 63.2.

It marks the lowest level since 2022 and a third fall in as many months.

Inflation expectations for the year ahead jumped to 4.9%, from 4.3% last month, the highest reading since late 2022, according to the survey.

Many consumers cited the high level of uncertainty around policy and other economic factors, said Joanne Hsu, director of the survey.

"Frequent gyrations in economic policies make it very difficult for consumers to plan for the future, regardless of one's policy preferences," Hsu added.

Consumers from all political affiliations were in agreement that the outlook has weakened since February, albeit with varying intensity. The survey's expectation index declined:

10% for Republicans,
12% for independents,
24% for Democrats.

Expectations for the future deteriorated across multiple facets of the economy, including personal finances, labor markets, inflation, business conditions, and stock markets, Hsu noted.

https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock- ... 7FjviVIfdG

[canpakes]

Now that the Trump Administration is getting settled back in, it can start nudging the US back towards allowing segregation. At least the possibility seems important enough to the Administration to make this change.

After a recent change by the Trump administration, the federal government no longer explicitly prohibits contractors from having segregated restaurants, waiting rooms and drinking fountains.

The segregation clause is one of several identified in a public memo issued by the General Services Administration last month, affecting all civil federal agencies. The memo explains that it is making changes prompted by President Trump’s executive order on diversity, equity and inclusion, which repealed an executive order signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965 regarding federal contractors and nondiscrimination. The memo also addresses Trump’s executive order on gender identity.

While there are still state and federal laws that outlaw segregation and discrimination that companies need to comply with, legal experts say this change to contracts across the federal government is significant.

“It’s symbolic, but it's incredibly meaningful in its symbolism,” says Melissa Murray, a constitutional law professor at New York University. “These provisions that required federal contractors to adhere to and comply with federal civil rights laws and to maintain integrated rather than segregated workplaces were all part of the federal government's efforts to facilitate the settlement that led to integration in the 1950s and 1960s.

“The fact that they are now excluding those provisions from the requirements for federal contractors, I think, speaks volumes,” Murray says.

Deleted mentions of drinking fountains, transportation, housing
The clause in question is in the Federal Acquisition Regulation, known as the FAR — a huge document used by agencies to write contracts for anyone providing goods or services to the federal government.

Clause 52.222-21 of the FAR is titled "Prohibition of Segregated Facilities" and reads: “The Contractor agrees that it does not and will not maintain or provide for its employees any segregated facilities at any of its establishments, and that it does not and will not permit its employees to perform their services at any location under its control where segregated facilities are maintained.”

It defines segregated facilities as work areas, restaurants, drinking fountains, transportation, housing and more — and it says you can’t segregate based on “race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin.”
Several federal agencies, including the departments of Defense, Commerce and Homeland Security, have notified staff who oversee federal contracts that they should start instituting these changes.

https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-heal ... tion-Trump

[canpakes]

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This move seems weirdly petty.



“Arlington National Cemetery is the most venerated final resting ground in the nation, overseen by silent soldiers in immaculate uniforms with ramrod-straight discipline. Across its hundreds of acres in Virginia, they watch over 400,000 graves of U.S. service members dating back to the Civil War, including two presidents, and more than 400 Medal of Honor recipients.

But in recent weeks, the cemetery’s public website has scrubbed dozens of pages on gravesites and educational materials that include histories of prominent Black, Hispanic and female service members buried in the cemetery, along with educational material on dozens of Medal of Honor recipients and maps of prominent gravesites of Marine Corps veterans and other services.

Cemetery officials confirmed to Task & Purpose that the pages were “unpublished” to meet recent orders by President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth targeting race and gender-related language and policies in the military.

Gone from public view are links to lists of dozens of “Notable Graves” at Arlington of women and Black and Hispanic service members who are buried in the cemetery. About a dozen other “Notable Graves” lists remain highlighted on the website, including lists of politicians, athletes and even foreign nationals.

Also gone are dozens of academic lesson plans — some built for classroom use, others as self-guided walking tours — on Arlington’s history and those interred there. Among the documents removed or hidden from the cemetery’s “Education” section are maps and notes for self-guided walking tours to the graves of dozens of Medal of Honor recipients and other maps to notable gravesites for war heroes from each military service. Why information on recipients of the Medal of Honor — the nation’s highest award for combat valor — would be removed is unclear, but three of the service members whose graves were noted in the lessons were awarded the Medal of Honor decades after their combat actions following formal Pentagon reviews that determined they had been denied the award on racial grounds.”

More at: https://taskandpurpose.com/news/arlingt ... bsite-dei/

[canpakes]

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Initial moves by the Trump Administration are making prescription drug prices more expensive.

On January 20, 2025, President Trump rescinded the Biden administration’s Executive Order 14087: Lower Prescription Drug Prices for Americans.

In 2022, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) gave Medicare the right – for the first time in its history – to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies over prices the federal government paid for drugs in Medicare Part D (the part of Medicare that provides insurance coverage for prescription drugs). This provision of the IRA was a huge step forward to lowering costs and easing stress on family budgets for working Americans, and it also helped lower government spending and reduce deficits.

executive order 14087 directed the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to consider additional actions that could reduce prescription drug costs. In response to the executive order, the HHS put forward several models of improved affordability and access to prescription drugs that policymakers could implement. It included proposals to institute a $2 co-payment for generic prescription drugs across Medicare Part D, and to help state governments in their own negotiations with drug companies over prices in Medicaid.

If the recommendations of the executive order were advanced by the Trump administration rather than rescinded, further progress in reducing working families’ cost-of-living could have been made.

https://www.epi.org/policywatch/rescind ... americans/

[canpakes]

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‘America Last’

The Agriculture Department has halted millions of dollars worth of deliveries to food banks without explanation, according to food bank leaders in six states.

USDA had previously allocated $500 million in deliveries to food banks for fiscal year 2025 through The Emergency Food Assistance Program. Now, the food bank leaders say many of those orders have been canceled.

The halting of these deliveries, first reported by POLITICO, comes after the Agriculture Department separately axed two other food programs, ending more than $1 billion in planned federal spending for schools and food banks to purchase from local farmers.

USDA did not respond to multiple requests for comment.