RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://amgreatness.com/2025/02/21/temper-tantrums-by-zelensky-and-european-leaders-could-scuttle-trumps-ukraine-peace-efforts/

You would think that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would be extremely grateful to President Trump for his extraordinary full-court press to end the war in Ukraine. You might also assume that America’s European allies would appreciate that America now has a president who is reasserting strong American leadership on the international stage to promote peace in the Ukraine/Russia War, the Middle East, and around the world.

Over the last two weeks, Trump began an aggressive diplomatic effort to end the war in Ukraine. He enlisted his National Security Adviser, Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Secretary of the Treasury, Russia/Ukraine special envoy, Middle East special envoy, and other officials to engage with Ukrainian, European, and Russian officials on how to end the war. Trump spoke on the phone with Putin and Zelensky. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff arranged the release of American prisoners from Russia, which hopefully was a sign of good faith by Putin in joining future peace talks.

This week, Secretary of State Rubio, National Security Adviser Waltz, and Witkoff held four hours of meetings in Riyadh with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov and Russian foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov. This meeting was intended to repair U.S.-Russian relations after years of neglect by the Biden administration and start a conversation with Russian officials on how to reach a cease-fire and a peace agreement in the Ukraine War.

Instead of promoting and supporting Trump’s peace efforts, European leaders and Zelensky threw temper tantrums. They have opposed everything Trump has tried to do, asserted that Trump is siding with Putin against Ukraine, and claimed they are being excluded from U.S. peace efforts.

European leaders, Zelensky, and the mainstream press have harshly attacked President Trump and his national security team for appeasing Putin, claiming that the U.S. talking with Russian officials rewards Russia by ending its isolation. This argument doesn’t make sense because it obviously is impossible to negotiate an end to the war without dialogue with Russia.

The real issue here is that Zelensky and European officials want to stick to the fantasy policy on the war they pursued with the Biden administration. This included no compromises whatsoever to Russia. Russia must withdraw from all Ukrainian territory. They want Russia to pay reparations to Ukraine and Russian officials to be tried for war crimes.

https://quadrant.org.au/news-opinions/africa/on-the-road-to-bulawayo/

In 1980 Bulawayo was the pearl of Rhodesia. Beautifully maintained, it was well laid out with attractive gardens, public spaces, excellent utilities and competently functioning services. Former residents speak nostalgically of their happy memories.

Try it now (above). Berlin 1945 is not too much of an exaggeration. Buildings are crumbling, closed and shuttered ruins, exuding an air of emptiness, desolation and gloom. The railway station is permanently closed. Giant potholes making the road look like the surface of the moon ensure travel over 20kms is impossible. There are no shoulders and cars just cruise on regardless through the unsigned intersections. Alongside the road sit or lie listless ghost people with pathetic displays of goods. The museum, formerly one of the best in Africa, now has dusty untended cabinets mostly invisible due to the theft of light bulbs.

It is a picture of utter dystopia, African style. In one of the worst examples of vicious irony, a statue of Joshua Nkomo, the leader of ZAPU, has displaced Cecil Rhodes – no doubt intended as a reminder to the locals of the near-genocide of Nkomo’s followers by Mugabe’s North Korean thugs should they have any ideas about protesting their fate.

What produces this oasis of desolation and despair, no different to the state of the rest of Zimbabwe? Forty-five years of rule by ZANU, that’s what, a depressing rebuttal to Ian Smith’s comment that had Rhodesia Front been left to gradually bring in full voting while retaining white expertise and institutional memory there would have been a far superior outcome.

What does this tell us? Every independence or liberation party in Southern Africa, if not the rest of Africa, once in power has held on regardless, running their economies into the ground and producing desolation, poverty and misery for their people that dwarfs anything they experienced in the colonial days. Look at Mozambique, Angola, Namibia where the governing parties have held on, going to any lengths to ensure that no democratic process can evict them, regardless of the desire of the suffering population.

It is not difficult to find how this comes about. These parties are run by unreconstructed Stalinists, hardwired with the National Democratic(!) Revolution ideology. This template is the map for centralising all state institutions, stripping away democratic rights and crushing all opposition to create a one-party state. The results are predictable and appalling. The mass of the population are driven into severe poverty, infrastructure is ruined, the remaining middle class is crushed while the party and its acolytes become enormously richer, stripping the country of every resource they can lay their hands on. It is kleptocracy that dwarfs countries like Nigeria, even Russia.

Consider Zimbabwe. Infrastructure gone, farming ruined – the former breadbasket of Africa now has to import food – and fully one-third of the population has fled to other countries. Mozambique is no better. The government has ruthlessly suppressed all protest after an election it lost. Such is the desolation and poverty that an ISIS group has invaded the oil-rich north, where they have no difficulty finding supporters among the wretched population.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/nevertrump-european-scolds-president-trump/

Last week the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed by Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the erstwhile Prime Minister of Denmark, Nato Secretary General, and fervent supporter of the “rules based international order,” to which Rasmussen has “dedicated much of [his] life,” and that functions as a globalist, antinationalist foreign policy talisman that for decades U.S. taxpayers have financed.

Having returned to the White House, Trump is once again challenging that order with his America first policies and impatience with our allies’ refusal to share the cost of being the “world’s policeman.”  Rasmussen fears Trump has “gone rogue” and “no longer exercises his authority over geopolitical gangsters, or becomes abusive toward the world’s most steadfast rule followers” ––by which he means Europeans, especially the Nato nations.

In other words, stale NeverTrump clichés we’ve been hearing since 2016––and much longer when targets were conservative Republicans who challenged “we are the world” globalism. But what it’s really all about is a simple principle of that order: “Let you Yanks and the bad guy fight––and you pick up the bill.” Now Europeans are miffed because we again have a president who first looks to his own countrymen and their interests ahead of those of international oligarchs, plutocrats, and cognitive elites who malign the U.S. and its citizens who don’t get in line with the globalist program, as the Democrats have.

Another bad NeverTrump habit Rasmussen indulges was identified by commentator Salena Zito in 2016: When Trump uses his trademark hyperbolic bluster, the press and the Dems “take him literally but not seriously,” whereas his supporters “take him seriously but not literally.” They understand that such exaggerations, insults, and bravado are tools for getting international attention, gaining leverage, and creating uncertainty in our adversaries, which often include our nominal allies.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2025/02/the_german_central_bank_agrees_with_president_trump.html

In trade relations between Germany and the U.S., the European nation has clearly been on the winning side of unfair policies, and now the president of the nation’s central bank says Germany would “suffer” if President Trump were to implement the same tariffs that they have on us. From Reuters, via Yahoo News:

Trump’s tariff plans put Germany’s growth at particular risk, Bundesbank warns

Germany is particularly vulnerable to US trade tariffs, which could curb growth for years to come and hold back an economy already suffering through two straight years of contraction, Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel said on Monday.

Germany, Europe’s largest economy, has been in a deep industrial recession, due in great part to subsidised Chinese output crowding out German products at a time when soaring energy costs at home are already weighing on competitiveness.

Modelling projections based on tariff threats from U.S. President Donald Trump, the Bundesbank concluded that Germany would suffer but the U.S. would also take a hit that would more than offset any positive impact of the trade barriers.

Germany clearly has lots of problems not associated with America. China dumps its products there, and its own “green” policies are hammering citizens with high energy prices.

According to Google AI, Germany’s tariffs on American cars is 10%, plus they have a 19% value added tax. Meanwhile America only has a 2.5% tariff on German cars. That doesn’t sound fair, does it? And after all, all these European progressives are “fairness,” right?

Why should America subsidize Germany’s economy to the tune of $65 billion per year? From the same Reuters item:

The German trade surplus with the United States is heading towards a record level just before U.S. President-elect Donald Trump arrives at the White House, an analysis of statistics office data showed.

https://dianebederman.com/trudeau-one-thing-about-stupid-its-contagious/

One thing about Stupid-it’s contagious

Dear Canadians now booing the American anthem. You stand with Trudeau’s sudden case of righteousness regarding big, bad, old Trump and his calls for the annexation of Canada and implementation of tariffs.

Where were you when Trudeau stamped out the rights of hard-working  TRUCK-DRIVING Canadians when they refused to get the Covid shot after driving all over Canada and the USA, with no open rest stops or restaurants? He called these people and those of us standing with their right not to be jabbed; racists and misogynists .

January, 2022

“Yes, we will get out of this pandemic by vaccination. We all know people who are a little bit hesitant. We will continue to try and convince them, but there are also people who are fiercely against vaccination,”

“They are extremists who don’t believe in science, they’re often misogynists, also often racists. It’s a small group that muscles in, and we have to make a choice in terms of leaders, in terms of the country. Do we tolerate these people? Or do we say, hey, most of the Quebecois people – 80% – are vaccinated. We want to come back to things we like doing. It’s not those people who are blocking us.”

https://jihadwatch.org/2025/02/pakistan-christian-girls-abducted-raped-forcibly-converted-to-islam?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=pakistan-christian-girls-abducted-raped-forcibly-converted-to-islam

The number of Pakistani Christian girls abducted, abused, and forcefully converted to Islam with the law’s consent is growing.

In January, the Christian Daily International-Morning Star News reported the following cases:

On January 5, a married, 35-year-old Muslim neighbor of a 12-year-old Christian girl, Saba Shafique, abducted her in Punjab Province. He took her to another province, where he forcibly converted her to Islam and married her, her father said.
On January 9, five Muslims abducted a 14-year-old Christian girl, Saneha Sharif, from outside her home in Punjab. Sharif Masih said he fears the kidnappers may try to forcibly convert his daughter to Islam and force her to marry one of the Muslim suspects.
On January 20, three Muslims abducted a 12-year-old Christian girl, Ariha Gulzar, at gunpoint from her home in Punjab. They have threatened to sell her into sexual slavery, her parents said.

These are not isolated cases. Many Christian girls as young as 7 — primarily from poor families and those with physical disabilities — are kidnapped, forcibly married, sexually assaulted and forced to convert to Islam on the pain of death. Some are trafficked into slave labor and the sex trade. Christian and Hindu parents are getting increasingly fearful of allowing their daughters to walk alone outside. Perpetrators are increasingly supported by Islamic religious leaders and enjoy de facto impunity for their actions.

Many Christian families never see their girls again, the state authorities rarely take meaningful action to bring perpetrators to justice, and police are often biased, refusing to file reports from Christian families.

According to the 2024 Pakistan country report by Open Doors, a human rights organization, Christian persecution in the country comes from government officials, Islamic religious leaders, violent Islamic groups and revolutionaries or paramilitary groups, political parties, ideological pressure groups and normal citizens – in other words, almost the entire country.

Discrimination and challenges for Christians are prevalent at every government tier and even in secular environments, notes Open Doors. This is true for the army, the judicial and the administrative services as well (especially at the local level) although Christians continue to serve in these areas.

The Movement for Solidarity and Peace calculates that in Pakistan up to 1,000 young Christian and Hindu girls and young women aged between 12 and 25 are abducted by Muslim men every year. The research, which suggests that Christians make up 70 percent of these cases, found that the scale of the problem “is likely to be much greater as a number of the cases are never reported and do not progress through law enforcement and the legal systems”. Many of the girls suffer rape, forced prostitution, human trafficking and domestic abuse.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21399/iran-gravy-train-to-africa

No Middle Eastern nation would unroll the red carpet for an Iranian delegation coming to foment revolution. In Europe, even those who once did seek the mullahs now shun them with disdain. No one in Asia expresses an interest in seeking revolutionary instruction from Tehran.

Tehran hopes to act as Man-Friday to its two giant allies China and Russia that have also chosen Africa as the future battleground against Western hegemony.

For almost three decades, Tehran spent over $30 billion exporting revolution and ended up with nothing. In the process, hundreds of individuals, including the late Gen. Qassem Soleimani and associates like Nasrallah and Bashar al-Assad, made huge sums of money. With that gambit closed, we witness new efforts to keep the gravy train on rail, this time with destination Africa.

Imagine that you have between $3 to $5 billion to spend on seeking and securing clients for your product in a variety of markets, Not bad, eh?

But what happens when events beyond your ken suddenly close those markets to you? One solution is to try and develop new products capable of making inroads in different markets. Another is to seek new markets for the old product.

This is the conundrum that the ruling mullahs in Tehran face today.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21400/uae-pledges-200-million-to-support-sudan

“The war has lasted too long, cost too many lives, and caused immense suffering. What we seek to do, alongside our partners, is call for a humanitarian pause to allow aid to reach those in need.” — Reem al-Hashimy, Minister of State for International Cooperation at the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs, February 14, 2025.

Iran is establishing another Hamas-like entity in Sudan, mirroring its creation of the Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces. This group, known as “Kizan,” maintains ties to Hamas, Hezbollah, and African branches of Al Qaeda. If Iran’s allies gain full control over Sudan, Iran will have effectively tightened its grip on Israel’s southern flank, adding yet another hostile front to the region.

The Biden administration’s failure to act decisively has emboldened Iran and endangered both Israel and American strategic interests.

President Donald Trump, as a leader committed to restoring U.S. strength, must confront the Iranian infiltration in Sudan head-on. Stopping Iran’s growing foothold in Africa is not just about Israel’s security — it’s about protecting U.S. economic and military interests…. The time to act is now.

Amid Ongoing Humanitarian Crisis, Addis Ababa, February 14, 2025: The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has taken a significant step in alleviating the suffering of the Sudanese people by announcing a $200 million aid package, in a high-level humanitarian conference held in Addis Ababa. The conference, organized by the UAE in collaboration with the African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, and Ethiopia, is taking place on the sidelines of the 38th African Union Summit.

A Call for Action: Mobilizing Support for Sudan’s Dire Humanitarian Needs

The UAE’s contribution is a response to the devastating civil war in Sudan, which has torn the country apart since April 2023. The brutal conflict between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and Sudan’s military has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced over 12 million people. The UAE’s announcement serves as a call for global attention and a coordinated effort to provide much-needed support to the Sudanese population.