Independence Abroad, Occupation at Home

On Ukraine’s defiance, Trump’s fealty to Putin, empty boxes, empty streets, and the billionaire hype machine running out of gas

Good morning! We may as well begin in Kyiv, where President Zelensky stood at “Zero Kilometer” on Independence Square and delivered an Ukrainian Independence Day speech that could not have been more symbolic. Thirty-four years ago Ukraine declared independence from Moscow; today, under the shadow of Russia’s invasion, Zelensky vowed that every flag planted, every hospital defended, every fire extinguished, every poem written in Ukrainian is part of the same resistance: “Independence shields the skies each night. Independence does not sleep.” From that square he promised his people that no distance, no occupation, no so-called compromise will erase their sovereignty. It was a speech of memory and defiance, where history’s weight met the present’s clarity.

Contrast that clarity with Washington. The Wall Street Journal revealed that the Pentagon, under Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth, has quietly been blocking Ukraine from firing American ATACMS missiles into Russian territory since spring. This “review mechanism,” devised by Elbridge Colby, ensures that every request to hit Russia lands on Hegseth’s desk, where it dies. On social media, Trump blusters that “you can’t win a war without attacking,” yet his own team has slammed the door on Ukraine’s ability to strike back. It is duplicity dressed up as strategy: empty tweets for the base, real concessions for the Kremlin, enforcing once again Trump’s fealty and favor toward Putin.

As Diane Francis, a Canadian-American journalist and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, reminded listeners this week, appeasement isn’t just foolish, it’s suicidal. Francis, who writes widely on geopolitics and authoritarianism, warned that Putin cannot stop this war because history shows every failed Russian adventure abroad has ended with revolution at home. Afghanistan toppled the Soviet Union, and Ukraine could unravel Putin’s Russia. Send a couple million brutalized soldiers home with nothing to show for it, and the regime collapses under the weight of its own failure. With even modest U.S. support, a Ukrainian victory would give Russia the chance to implode from within, which is exactly why Putin clings so desperately to this war. That is why Trump’s insistence on deal-making photo ops is so catastrophically naive. Or perhaps not naive at all, merely transactional, as always. Either way, it buys Putin time, stature, and breathing room.

And while Trump curtails Ukrainian independence abroad, he’s busy rehearsing his own occupation at home. Washington, D.C. restaurants sit empty under National Guard patrols; chants of “these racist cops have got to go” echo down U Street; and Illinois governor JB Pritzker has to remind the nation that Chicago did not need and did not ask for Trump’s troops. Yet the Pentagon is already sketching the plan, as if authoritarian cosplay is now a standing military operation. A crackdown on what, exactly? Bad Yelp reviews? The mayor’s taste in deep-dish? Crime rates aren’t spiking; there is no emergency. What Trump is staging isn’t law and order but the slow normalization of permanent military rule in blue America. Ukrainians gather in Maidan to celebrate freedom; Washingtonians huddle in empty restaurants under federal occupation. Independence Day abroad, Potemkin martial law at home.

If you want a measure of how America’s economy is really doing, don’t bother with Trump’s cooked job numbers or whatever fairy tale he’s spinning about tariffs paying for themselves. Look at the boxes. Corrugated cardboard shipments, the humble containers that carry everything from your doughnuts to your dishwashers, just hit their lowest second-quarter level since 2015. International Paper reported a 5% drop, Smurfit Westrock a 4.5% slide, and across the industry it’s the same story: retailers aren’t ordering, manufacturers aren’t stocking, consumers aren’t buying. Even the grocery store is pushing “buy two, get three free” deals, the retail equivalent of “please, just take it off our hands.” When the “box index” collapses, America’s consumer engine isn’t purring it’s stalling out on the shoulder with the hazard lights on.

And as if on cue, the global shipping arteries that keep those boxes moving are seizing up. The end of the “de minimis” tariff exemption on low-value imports has forced European postal services, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Italy, with France and Austria right behind, to suspend package deliveries to the U.S. entirely. One day you can order a pair of shoes from Milan or a book from Berlin, the next it’s stuck at the border because Trump decided your Amazon cart is a national security threat. The irony writes itself: a president who claims to defend American consumers has managed to leave them boxed out, tapped out, and empty-handed.

These are real-time pulses of the economy: empty packages, closed paper mills, abandoned delivery routes. Forget the MAGA hype about a “manufacturing renaissance.” The reality is shuttered plants in Louisiana, towns losing their tax bases, couriers refusing to issue guidance, and consumers so skittish they’re choking off demand. The cardboard slump and postal suspensions tell the same story, America under Trump isn’t building, it’s shrinking, one brown box at a time.

And because this is Trump, no roundup would be complete without a note of farce layered atop the menace. His hands and ankles continue to betray his failing health even as he mugs for cameras with a photo of himself and Vladimir Putin like a high school sophomore flashing around his prom pic. His DOJ dumps 33,000 recycled Epstein documents on Congress while hoping the public will suddenly find Ghislaine Maxwell a trustworthy narrator. Jim Jordan solemnly assures the nation that a convicted sex trafficker is “very credible,” which is like vouching for Al Capone’s tax honesty. And meanwhile, Trump’s fundraising emails have reached the level of 2 a.m. infomercials. “Holy macaroni, you’ve just been invited to join the one and only Trump lifetime membership.” “You just won the gold medal in Trump world.” “This is getting sad.” Yes, Donald, it really is.

If, like me, you enjoy a little schadenfreude with your coffee, Tesla’s investors, who once dreamed of fleets of self-driving robotaxis, are now watching a San Jose startup called Tensor roll out the world’s first consumer-ready, fully autonomous vehicle. Tensor’s RoboCar doesn’t just boast “full self-driving”, it actually delivers it: no steering wheel, no human babysitter, no fine print disclaimers about still needing to keep your hands on the wheel “just in case.” Meanwhile, Musk’s empire continues hawking the same “coming soon” promise it’s been selling for years, as shareholders underwrite one long beta test that never leaves the lot. Add to this the U.S. military openly musing about using Cybertrucks for missile target practice, and the contrast couldn’t be starker. Elon once promised humanity a colony on Mars; now his trucks are being sized up for live-fire drills. The man who interfered with democracy, bought himself a U.S. president, sort of, and gutted essential services in the name of disruption is finally getting what he deserves. There’s a certain poetic justice in watching the hype machine sputter, stall, and die in the dust of a San Jose parking lot while the competition laps it.

So the mood today is paradoxical: defiance and dignity in Kyiv, duplicity and decay in Washington, chants of resistance on American streets, and the comedy of billionaires watching their promises unravel. Independence is celebrated, withheld, fought for, and mocked, and the contrast could not be starker.

Marz is feeling so much better he is taking me for a walk this morning. Thank you to everyone!