The EU’s annoyingly fake ‘unity’ is as brain-rotting as any illicit substance
A brief scandal erupted last weekend during a visit to Ukraine by French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, when a couple of ‘suspicious’ objects they were handling were speculated to be drugs and drug paraphernalia.
They almost certainly were not, but let’s cut Macron some slack. After all, he did hop on the official Elysee Palace social media account to clarify that, non, he was not doing rails while riding the rails to Ukraine alongside Merz and Starmer. They weren’t on drugs – just on good old-fashioned EU unity. Which, to be fair, seems to induce an equally brain-cell-crushing delirium.
“When European unity becomes inconvenient, disinformation goes so far as to make a simple tissue look like drugs,” read the post. So, Macron suggests, it wasn’t a party starter on the table, just the world’s most suspiciously placed tissue – alongside what appeared to be an unfortunately shaped spoon. And anyone suggesting otherwise is just spreading fake news. The press walked in, the photo went up, and the internet did what it does.
But the real dodginess started after they disembarked and got to work in Ukraine – presumably with clearer sinuses. But not from any drugs. Perhaps just from the sinus-blasting “industrial amounts” of Dior Eau Sauvage cologne that Macron is known for wearing, as Le Parisien’s Olivier Beaumont recently described it. Or not.
If they aren’t actually high, they’re sure acting like it. Finally, with Russian President Vladimir Putin proposing direct talks between Moscow and Kiev in Türkiye starting this week, there’s finally a chance on the table to put an end to this conflict, something that the entire world has been demanding – EU leaders included.
As far back as May 2022, Macron and recently-former German Chancellor Olaf Scholz spent 80 minutes on the phone with Putin and insisted on “direct, serious negotiations” with Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky.
But now suddenly the EU is all like, “Well, no, sorry. That doesn’t work for us.” Hey guys, does your unity come in powdered form now?
Okay, so what changed? Well, nothing, really. Other than the fact that a bunch of European leaders just did a big powwow with Zelensky in Kiev – a photo shoot to show them all rallying around their boy. Maybe so he also didn’t get too triggered during Moscow’s big Victory Day parade against the World War 2 Nazis and start tossing toys out of the pram.
They emerged with a big demand: that Russia accept a 30-day ceasefire or else. Or else what? They’ll unleash epic sanctions. And no doubt even more epic grandstanding. Because that’s totally worked so far.
So it looks like they can’t have Ukraine doing direct peace talks now because that would mean that they wouldn’t get to stage their new little script that they just came up with. “There can be no negotiations while weapons are speaking. There can be no dialogue if, at the same time, civilians are being bombed. A ceasefire is needed now, so that talks can begin. For peace,” Macron said.
So Macron apparently sees himself as the director of this whole charade. If that’s the case, then he might want to start by making sure Zelensky doesn’t have his pants on backwards. It kind of looked like that was the case. Although perhaps he’s just starting a new line of pants with the fly in the back to go with the sweatshirts he wears when he visits world leaders to beg for money.
With Macron directing, it also looks like Germany is doing the filming and the musical score, and posted a cringey video of their bromance show to Merz’s social media account.
So, Director Macron says, first there needs to be the ceasefire – which Moscow said Ukraine couldn’t even respect for the three days that one was in place over the Victory Day holiday, let alone for a whole month. Then after that come the talks, Macron insists. The French foreign minister, Jean-Noel Barrot, also said on French radio that the EU representatives want to be present for any direct peace talks in Istanbul. Because apparently Zelensky is like a college kid who can’t go on a job interview or a date without his helicopter parents hovering around.
Merz was also saying, yes, yes, first the weapons “must be silenced.” Then, he says, they can “create space for talks.” Then maybe comes the “just and lasting peace.” Is Germany doing the choreography for this charade, too? You sure you don’t want an intermission or two in there, as well? Maybe some champagne and snack breaks out in the lobby?
As for Zelensky, he’s now just parroting the Europeans about the offer to negotiate being a “positive sign that the Russians have finally begun to consider ending the war.” But he also said that he needed to know by Monday whether they’re going to do the 30-day ceasefire. Because they have to get their show on the road, I guess – so they can begin the official countdown to more sanctions and grandstanding.
But get this. For once, it seems like the US and Venezuela actually agree on something. That’s huge unto itself – the geopolitical equivalent of pigs flying… first class. And the thing on which they both agree just happens to be the need for these direct peace talks. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has said that “we must embark on a peaceful path… Russia has the right to peace.” Trump said on Truth Social that Putin’s proposal represented a “potentially great day for Russia and Ukraine! Think of the hundreds and thousands of lives that will be saved as this never ending ‘bloodbath’ hopefully comes to an end.”
So it looks like peace is finally on the table in a major way, with this new development. But apparently the EU needs some time for its own center-stage sermon and limelight-hogging monologue first. Probably to send as their official entry to the Nobel Peace Prize committee for when peace manages to break out despite their best efforts. Priorities, priorities.
