Originally published: . Volume 13, No. 3. Source pages: 2.
Every morning now I say a quick prayer before I turn on the news, hoping that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has survived another day in this Shakespearean drama unfolding on the world stage. He's Putin's #1 target.
This is the first war I’ve seen where we are close up and in real time. No embedded correspondents needed. The personal impact of war is immediately available to everyone via the Internet.
I have seen a vacuum bomb being set off in Kharkiv. I have listened in on a conversation between a Ukrainian citizen and a Russian tank driver taking place on some road in rural Ukraine. I have watched employees at a beer factory
making Molotov cocktails. And I have heard a Ukrainian cyber specialist explain how they are hacking Russian websites. Just as a sampling.
I have listened to President Zelenskyy speak with the European Union, a plea to let Ukraine in their door.
While there are no players in this tragedy with clean hands, including the US and maybe especially the US, the Ukraine president has emerged as the valiant, inspiring David in the story. He’s Ukraine’s Churchill in the darkest hour, galvanizing his people and capturing the hearts of ignorant strangers like me around the world.
Zelenskyy has a law degree, according to the Internet info, but pursued a career in acting and as a comedian. He created a production company called Kvartal 95, and produced films, cartoons, and TV shows including a show called Servant of the People in which Zelenskyy himself played the role of the president of Ukraine.
From 2015 to 2019 the series was immensely popular and spawned a political party. Zelenskyy ran for Ukrainian president in 2019 as an outsider, a populist, an anti- establishment candidate, and an anti-corruption candidate. He won the election with 73% of the vote in the second round.
It’s been said that human beings are one of the only species that can kill its own members. The hypothesis is that we psychologically distance ourselves from the instinctual taboo of taking another’s life because we use weapons. The Internet has removed some of that distance.
Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin allegedly said "The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic."
And even though I’m reminded of Jefferson‘s warning that the tree of liberty must be watered with the blood of patriots, it’s impossible not to care about Zelenskyy's survival, and all those whose faces I've seen, those whose courage I've witnessed, and those whose pleas I have heard.
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