I flow back to Greece from London Gatwick on the 5 February via Athens to Leros. My flight from Athens airport to Leros was scheduled for following morning. Flight delays were announced at the gate to Leros eventually being cancelled completed due to high winds.
Leros small landing strip is at Pantani at northern part of the island with hilly terrain as you come into land between two hills. The winds whistle through causing a Venturi effect. The winds blow from the north across the Aegean Sea. The temperature in Athens was chilly. Fortunately Olympic air put us up in the Sofitel Hotel at the airport. 5 star including meals. The following morning Inga checked in again same problem flight cancelled another night the Sofitel hotel. Same room 230 I just spent time in the hotel relaxing flowing day another cancellation another night in room 230!
I eventually decided to change my flight to Kos and hope conditions allowed us land okay. Flow out on the Sunday morning and landed safely in Kos. Flowing morning I got fast ferry to the capital Lakki hired a car for the day to get myself from Lakki to Artemis boatyard and Stella Polaris.
During past couple of weeks I’ve been busy painting the hull preparing the boat for my sailing odyssey. Final was having full service on the engine. Problem with a seal from dip stick had failed sea water ingress causing a number components to need replacing. Possibly delay leaving but weather not favourable presently strong winds further adverse winds off Sicily.
I had been listening to a number YouTube discussions about the new presidency of Donald J Trump. He’s only been in the Oval Office for few weeks and he’s been writing executive orders constantly!
His government reform Tzar is a private individual called Elon Musk. Elon is reputed to be the wealthiest man in the world. Famous for Tesla cars, Space X , Starlink and now Twitter or X.
There lots consternation about Musk with his business interests these conflict with large contracts with the US government through his Space X business. He’s presently laying off government workers and the press is calling it a coup.
What really has concerned me is his so called peace negotiations with Putin and the Russian regime. Evidently he’s jealous about Obama being awarded the Nobel peace prize. Trump is a rather lazy ignorant individual. I don’t think he has a good grasp of geopolitical politics.
He’s been talking to Putin the Russian dictator about peace talks, but things are not going well! Why? Ukraine hasn’t been involved in the discussion with the Russians in Saudi Arabia. He did similar thing over head of Afghanistan government when he negotiated deal with the Taliban. Left Biden in bad situation caused a debacle with the US withdrawal!
At the Munich defence security meetings his vice president JD Vance and Pete Hagseth his Defence Secretary upset the Europeans at the meeting with crass insults about free speech and Ukraine not being allowed to join NATO. And Trump won’t endorse US troops being part of a security defence alliance if there was a peace deal. Putin cannot be trusted I’m sure the Russians would infringe any peace deal and cessation of violence.
Trump is a vindictive man and he doesn’t seem to like the Ukraine president Zelenskyy. Goes back to when he was indicted during his previous presidency over Joe Biden son and his business dealings in Ukraine. He was looking for dirt on Joe Biden to undermine his presidential run.
Now he’s back in power he’s gunning for people who indicted him and the FBI agents and judges who charged him for his various law breaking activities.
Now he has real spat with President Zelenskyy after calling him a dictator and starting the war. Which is totally untrue. It’s the hypocrisy when you consider Putin kills his political adversaries and hadn’t had an honest election since he’s came into power 25years ago.
What I find strange Trump has never said a negative word about Putin! Why? Putin helped Trump with his disinformation campaign against Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential primaries. However I’d like to talk about a dossier that was brought to light from a retired security MI6 Russian intelligent agent.
Background; Steele was recruited by MI6 directly following his graduation from Cambridge and initially worked in London at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) from 1987 to 1989. From 1990 to 1993, Steele worked under diplomatic cover as an MI6 officer in Moscow, serving at the Embassy of the United Kingdom in Moscow. Steele was an “internal traveller”,visiting newly-accessible cities such as Samara and Kazan.
The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier, is a controversial political opposition research report on the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump compiled by counterintelligencespecialist Christopher Steele. It was published without permission in 2017 as an unfinished 35-page compilation of “unverified, and potentially unverifiable”[a] memos that were considered by Steele to be “raw intelligence — not established facts, but a starting point for further investigation”
Trump never has bad word to say about Putin invasion of Ukraine 🇺🇦 and the butchering of innocent Ukraine civilians. Christopher Steele after 22 years with MI6 is a professional ex Russian intelligent officer. Something about Trump tower project in Moscow is very murky water. Trump acts like mafia head he threatens people he’s vindictive and a felon. His business
Acumen is suspect many of his business go bankrupt. He’s had 11 failed business enterprises the most famous bankruptcies were the result of over-leveraged hotel and casino businesses in Atlantic City and New York: Trump Taj Mahal (1991), Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino (1992), Plaza Hotel (1992), Trump Castle Hotel and Casino (1992), Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts (2004), and Trump Entertainment Resorts (2009). On many occasions he was bailed out by his father Fred Trump.
Finally in conclusion I feel that Trump views Putin as a role model. He aligns himself with him because he likes how Putin has total control over his nation be it it’s legal system, it’s military, it’s intelligence agencies, security, finally it’s press. This is Trumps playbook he wants to be the new dictator of the United States of America.