You’re making good points and they’re all true, though it just seemed quite coincidental to me that in the exact year that the US drops a lot of support for Ukraine, the EU just happens to be capable of ramping up the funds available to their eastern neighbor.

Thankfully, the EU is not the US, but I still believe that political will has been playing an outsized role until Trump curtailed US support. Of course there’s obstructionist Orbán, at least for now, yet somehow in 2025 the EU still managed to increase their support for Ukraine.

I really hope that continues and even expands. Otherwise it may be dark times ahead for the entire EU, which I don’t want to see.

I see this and my first thought is that Europe could have been doing more the entire time, which would have been in its best interest to do.

That’s not at all to say the US shouldn’t contribute to help their (previous?) allies, but at least the blundering haphazard mad house that is the current White House has accidentally prodded Europe to help itself more.

It’s been said before and worth saying again. Fuck the IOC, and fuck the Olympics. I love that amateur athletes get to shine, but the overt corporatism and lack of respect for local communities makes it quite counter-productive.

When an athletic event is “brought to you by Coca Cola,” I mean, who are we even trying to fool?