At best, Donnie has demonstrated he's a very weak negotiator (russia/ukraine)

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For a while there it looked like Donnie was almost drifting away from putin's hold. He even suggested that Putin wasn't a demigod.

Then came the summit. He treated Putin like something between royalty and rockstar, and emerged without anything good to say, no deal but supposedly some unspecified "progress". As close to an admission of leaving empty-handed as you'll ever see.

But Putin clearly got something. Donnie is back to treating Zelenskyy like dirt, back to parroting the Russian propaganda such as how Ukraine somehow started the war, by invading itself with Russian tanks and troops I guess. And Donnie is back to saying Ukraine needs to surrender land, including land it still controls, while calling surrender a "swap" where they get nothing in return.

Here on du, we know Donnie has long been a Putin puppet, something Hillary called out nearly a decades ago. So Putin reminding him of whatever kompromat he had on Donnie or perhaps making a death threat brought him back under control. That's certainly an obvious and logical possibility.

But let's say Donnie's his own person, there no compromise of blackmail or anything like that, just an honest negotiation.

Giving him that benefit or the doubt does him no favors because then it only shows he's an inept and weak negotiator, giving Putin a major boost, apparently with America getting nothing in return. At best, it shows Donnie is easily led.

Not a good look for mr. art of the deal.