Pride. Greed. Lust. Envy. Gluttony. Wrath. Sloth. That’s the list of vices commonly cited, and warned against, in Christian theology.
But when you’ve already committed all of them, I suppose one more doesn’t make much of a difference . . . however vehemently you may preach to others about the importance of Christianity and family values. So I propose adding what I call Political Prostitution to the list. Or we could just call it Betrayal.
And yes, of course I have an example.
In the past week, Vladimir Putin has murdered two dozen civilians in the Ukrainian town of Pryluky, wiped out another 33 in a targeted missile strike on a civilian bus in Kramatorsk, and left around 6,000 to starve to death in blockaded Oleshky.
All of these blatant war crimes, and more, were committed in spite of the sweeping new sanctions against Russia passed by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by Donald Trump last month.
One would naturally expect a harsh response from Trump, at least as strongly worded as those issued by European leaders. But that didn’t happen. Instead, he announced on social media yesterday that he had made a deal with the Russian president by phone, in which it was agreed that Russia would immediately supply more than 300,000 tons of diesel fuel, followed by an additional 500,000 tons in November, and another one million tons “immediately thereafter” . . . plus a whopping additional three million tons “within a short period of time” after that. [Michelle L. Price and Collin Binkley, Associated Press, October 9, 2026.]
Sanctions? What sanctions?
And why have they suddenly evaporated?
Actually, that’s easy. The U.S. midterm elections are just around the corner, and Trump’s Republican candidates aren’t doing well at all.
And, as we all know, the main reason they’re in jeopardy of losing the House of Representatives and possibly also the Senate is that the prices Trump had promised his followers he would lower — from food to housing to medical care to gas — have instead skyrocketed. And he thinks that, by allowing Russia to flood the market with an abundance of fuel, our gas and other fuel-related prices will magically drop overnight, winning him some desperately-needed Brownie points with the voters.
At the same time, his friend in the Kremlin will be laughing all the way to the bank as he replenishes his much-depleted war chest without having given anything in return.
So, Ukraine be damned. The rest of Europe be damned. Human decency be damned. Trump has an election to fix, to try to keep himself and his cohorts from having to face accountability for their crimes. And if he has to prostitute himself in the process . . . well, it wouldn’t be the first time.
As an added twist of the knife in Ukraine’s back, even as Trump was making this announcement, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were meeting with Ukrainian officials in Miami to discuss a proposal to end the war. [Id.]
Machiavelli had nothing on these two.
Just sayin’ . . .
Brendochka
10/10/26
