That dastardly Vladimir Putin has once again outsmarted the buffoon Donald Trump! According to our friends at the Fanfiction Times, the US President’s plans for a Ukraine peace summit in Budapest were blown out of the water last week by Moscow.
The reason, supposedly, was that Russia demanded that several ‘root causes’ of the conflict must be addressed in a manner that displeased Washington.
And so the meeting was off.
Firstly, I must say that this does not exactly gel with the idea that Trump is some Putin sycophant, a lie that FT itself has peddled repeatedly over the last twelve months. Not exactly keeping your narrative straight, are you lads?
But this story, penned by Max Seddon, Amy Mackinnon and Christopher Miller, has more fundamental issues. Once again, FT has published something sourced only from unnamed officials. This time, the outlet’s journos say that people ‘familiar with the matter’ gave them the scoop.
How are they familiar with it? Who knows. Judging by the recent quality of reporting from the UK paper, it is difficult to take them at their word.
To make matters worse, the narrative does not make much sense. While it is true that Trump opted to turn down an immediate meeting with Putin last month, statements coming out of both powers’ capitals indicate continued interest in ending the war. Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov has insisted that their focus for the moment is on the ‘very meticulous work on the details of the settlement problem’, and that a meeting between Trump and Putin can only happen after that is done.
This, from all we can gather, is exactly the same line Washington is pushing, albeit with a bit more of a Trumpian art-of-the-deal flair.
And what about Budapest? Well, according to Hungarian officials, the summit is still on. But let’s not stop there. We at Slop Check asked around a few government offices to try and gauge how people are really feeling on the ground.
The line we kept getting was ‘cautiously optimistic’.
‘We are ready to host it once the two leaders think the time is appropriate,’ one tight-lipped staffer told us after 30 minutes of pestering. ‘In the West, Budapest is the only location where such a meeting can take place.’
For the record, Hungarians by nature are rather pessimistic. So the fact people on the inside are holding onto hope is a very good sign.
Of course, nothing is certain. But everyone in this business knows that. What’s more, everyone should really know that summits like this one are left unannounced until a few hours before they actually happen. One only needs to look at Trump’s recent meeting with Putin in Alaska, as well as his get-together with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Busan.
FT journalists should really be aware of this. Fact that they don’t seem to be is, frankly, a little worrying.
And why is it up to Slop Check to get a proper read on a major global event?
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