For most politicians, the transcript release by the White House today of a call between the presidents of the United States and a foreign power would prove damning for the former.
President Trump spent the better part of a 30-minute call asking Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky for favors that would benefit his personal political prospects. Littered throughout are repeated reminders of American favors to a besieged nation.
First, Trump noted that the U.S. contributes disproportionate aid to Ukraine in comparison to Europe. He says that the relationship between the U.S. and Ukraine is not “reciprocal” and then lays out a series of requests, prefaced with the line, “I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it.”
For any other president in recent memory, this would probably be interpreted as a very subtly implied quid pro quo, plain and simple. But without an audio recording of the call, and based on what we know about Trump, he probably wasn’t playing 3D chess. He wasn’t even playing tic-tac-toe. Instead, Occam’s Razor implies that Trump was doing what he always does: bragging, bloviating, and putting his own selfish demands above all else.
For example, is it more likely that Trump had the foresight to mention American aid to butter up an already sycophantic Zelensky, or that he’s a braggart who wanted to emphasize how much bigger and better and richer the U.S. is than Europe?
And did Trump mention Biden in the first place because he expected that Zelensky would mention Rudy Giuliani? Or was it rather because he was reminded by Zelensky’s replacement of the former U.S. ambassador who had been around during the Hunter Biden debacle and felt the need to run at the mouth about her and her supposed shortcomings?
Trump’s own self-indulgent thoughtlessness was his best defense in the obstruction question brought up by the Mueller report, and it’s his best defense now. That might keep him from being impeached, but it also isn’t a cause for celebration for his administration.
