Friday Insights-February 21, 2025
A sense of foreboding
I woke this morning to an image of Elon Musk at the CPAC conference holding a chainsaw above his head. The firing of thousands of federal workers is something to celebrate, right? And Trump now talks about a $5,000 “DOGE bonus” to taxpayers while still talking about a balanced budget and proposing an extension of his 2017 tax cuts at a cost of $4.5 trillion. And then the Senate confirmed Kash Patel as FBI director. Get ready for retribution and “investigations” by the FBI reminiscent of Hitler’s Gestapo.
Trump has thrown Ukraine and President Zelensky under the bus. Putin will visit the president in Washington this year. Who could have imagined that four months ago?
These are dark days. Three people told me this week that they feared democracy was about to end, and two others believed it was already gone. I hope all five are wrong.
Trump emerges as Putin’s chief negotiator on Ukraine, stabbing Zelensky in the back.
I am with Donald Trump on wanting the war in Ukraine to end. I disagree with the rest of his approach, which looks more and more like the handiwork of a lunatic. (I use the word “lunatic” reluctantly because Trump has hurled it at so many people who don’t deserve the label to render it meaningless.)
Trump has emerged as Putin’s man of the hour. Trump deserves one if Russia still awards “Order of Lenin” medals. Perhaps it can award one to an American president for the first time in history when Trump visits Moscow later this year.
Trump has taken NATO membership for Ukraine off the table, blessed Russia’s territorial thefts, and now supports Russia’s efforts to remove Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, from power. He appointed the U.S. as chief negotiator for Ukraine while excluding Ukraine’s president from the negotiation table. Not surprisingly, Vladimir Putin likes the idea.
Trump continues to blame Ukraine and, of course, Joe Biden for the war, claiming it would have never occurred had he been president. Now, he argues that “only TRUMP” can negotiate an end to the war.
Trump may be right that he can negotiate an end to the war and that only he can make that happen. Because Ukraine is dependent on U.S. support for weapons and because Trump controls that support, he can cut off support and render Ukraine unable to continue the war against Russia’s aggression.
Trump’s “peace plan” will go down as a shameful betrayal of democracy.
What sort of man posts a photo of his mugshot in his home?
Since his first felony indictment—and there have been dozens—Trump appreciated the publicity value of having his image appear on the front page of most American newspapers. He also appreciated that his claim of “weaponization” could be used to rally his supporters and cast him as a victim, sacrificing himself unselfishly for the good of those supporters.
Trump’s approach worked, and a man who some predicted (unrealistically) would be behind bars before January 20, 2025, was sworn into another term as president.
One takeaway is that Donald Trump understands the American public better than I do.
The Budget.
I’ll be watching the progress on the FY 2026 budget resolution. The Senate has passed its version, and the House will act next week.
This is a rapidly developing story. I’ll write more about it on Sunday.
The president is golfing.
As DOGE continues its tour of terror through the federal government, recklessly canceling grants and contracts and leaving a trail of preemptively dismissed civil servants in their wake, I concluded that Trump thinks of the “savings” as a bank account from which he should feel free to make withdrawals from. What do I mean? Trump is offsetting some of “his” savings with massive expenditures of federal money on activities necessary for Trump to satisfy his ego.
I have already written about Trump’s Super Bowl outing—he left at half-time. And Trump had a lot of fun with an Air Force One flyover the Daytona 500 track and a pace lap in the presidential limo. Both wastes of federal money that serve no purpose other than promoting Trump’s popularity and stroking Trump’s apparently limitless ego.
Yesterday, I read that Trump played golf nine times in his first thirty days in office, all on his own courses. The cost? Over $10 million.
Trump has spent over $20 million in taxpayer money, effectively on himself.
And why is Trump holding official White House events at his private club in Mar-a-Lago? I have a suspicion.
A word about John W. Dean, III.
In the last two weeks, several readers have assumed I am John W. Dean III, the former president's counsel during the Nixon administration. That assumption is wrong. Mr. Dean, who is older than me, is no relation. I have read some of his books, which I recommend, and seen him on television. That’s it.
John W. Dean, III has no relationship with Dean’s Issues & Insights.
Thank you.
Thank you for reading Friday Insights today. I appreciate your interest in my perspective on today’s news.