Letting loose a litany of half-truths, hype and hyperbole, The Donald shapes the narrative to his ends
Joe Biden, the worst president in American history, let millions of people, many of them murderers, human traffickers, gang members, and other criminals, pour in with his insane and very dangerous open border policies. He also especially let the price of eggs get out of control!
India, China, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, and countless other nations, friend and foes alike, charge tremendously higher tariffs and that ever ungrateful Volodymyr Zelensky who came calling “all dressed up” in military fatigues did not even say thank you for the billions of dollars the U.S. gave him for the war with Russia.
READ: Trumpiana: Disruptor, dealmaker, showman, spy! (March 1, 2025)
With that refrain, Donald Trump, the oldest President in American history, giving the longest ever address to the U.S. Congress running into 100 minutes and 8,562 words, let out a litany of complaints laced with half-truths, hype and hyperbole.
Taking a victory lap over his accomplishments — nearly 100 Executive Orders and more than 400 Executive Actions in a span of 43 days — POTUS 45 and 47 declared, “America is back.” — and so is the Donald with all the vengeance.
Many had called “the first month of our presidency the most successful in the history of our nation,” he said gleefully suggesting he had outdone even America’s first President. “And what makes it even more impressive is, that you know who number two is? George Washington. How about that?”
His deployment of the U.S. military and Border Patrol to repel the “invasion of our country” had brought down illegal border crossings to by far the lowest ever recorded, said Trump claiming, “They heard my words and they chose not to come. Much easier that way.”
His Department of Government Efficiency — DOGE! — headed by first buddy Elon Musk had found hundreds of billions of dollars of fraud, Trump claimed, from $22 billion to provide free housing and cars for illegal aliens to $10 million for male circumcision in Mozambique to $20 million for the Arab “Sesame Street” in the Middle East.
Draining the swamp, his administration will reclaim power from this unaccountable bureaucracy, and any federal bureaucrat who resists this change will be fired at once, he warned.
Tit for tat tariffs too would kick in on April 2 — because he didn’t want to be accused of April Fool’s Day — although that one day would cost the country a lot of money.
Again outlining his expansionist designs, Trump declared he would take up the Panama Canal built by Americans for Americans and given away by the Carter administration for $1. And he was going to get Greenland too “one way or the other.”
Ditto about Canada. After threats to impose sweeping tariffs to floating the idea of making the neighbouring nation the “51st American state,” he also publicly dismissed the US-Canada border as “an artificially drawn line.”
Amidst all these land grab plans, “I’m also working tirelessly to end the savage conflict in Ukraine,” he declared touting a letter from Zelenskyy expressing his willingness to “come to the negotiating table and work under President Trump’s strong leadership to get a peace that lasts.” The U.S. had also received strong signals from Russia that they are ready for peace, he said exclaiming thrice, “Wouldn’t that be beautiful?”
“As Trump turns decades of U.S. foreign policy upside down,” wrote the New York Times, “another dizzying swing is taking place in Russia, both in the Kremlin and on state-controlled television: The United States, the new message goes, is not that bad after all.”
Almost” overnight, it’s Europe – not the United States – that has become the source of instability in the Russian narrative,” said the Times citing a recent interview by Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov on Russian state television as he listed the ills that “Europe – not America – had brought upon the world. The United States, in his telling, had gone from evil mastermind to innocent bystander.”
Back in Washington when instead of seeking peace Russian President Vladimir Putin chose to bomb Ukraine, Trump warned Moscow in a Truth Social post that he was “strongly considering large-scale banking sanctions and tariffs on Russia until a ceasefire and final agreement on peace is reached.”
Only ours later, he reversed course saying that it was “easier” to deal with Moscow than Kyiv in negotiating a peace deal. “I’m finding it more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine. And they don’t have the cards. In terms of getting a final settlement, it may be easier dealing with Russia, which is surprising, because they have all the problems, and they’re bombing the hell out of ’em right now.”
He even came to Putin’s defence saying, “I think he’s hitting them (Ukraine) harder than he’s been hitting them. And I think probably anyone in that position would be doing that right now.”
Asked about the halt in US intelligence sharing and military aid to Ukraine, Trump claimed that Putin wanted to end the war, but “I don’t know they (Kyiv) want to settle”.
Meanwhile, back in Trumpiana a brewing conflict between Musk and his cabinet erupted into a war of words with Secretary of State Marco Rubio over the scale of firings in his department, forcing the POTUS to play peacemaker at home.
As the argument escalated, Trump, who had been watching with folded arms, finally intervened, announcing a recalibration: Cabinet secretaries would decide “as to who will remain, and who will go,” with Musk’s team merely advising, according to the Times. After the meeting, Trump posted on Truth Social that future cuts would be made with a “scalpel, not a hatchet,” a clear rebuke of Musk’s scorched-earth strategy.
But the battle for control over the administration’s cost-cutting efforts is far from over, suggested the Times with Musk unlikely to retreat quietly. Yet if the Don can keep the peace between his Cabinet and his billionaire buddy, “Wouldn’t that be beautiful?”