You are so right. Too many moving pieces to this puzzle. Project Ukraine is blowing up bigly. They have been keeping their finger in the dike till the midterms were over. Now they may throw Puddin Pops under the bus and run over him a few times. They will blame the entire debacle, including Afghanistan on his mental status, etc. I wonder if they may also be trying to get ahead of whatever the Russians are going to find in those salt mines at Soledar. Since they believe their own hype and propaganda, the fall of Soledar has taken them by surprise. Ukraine threw an enormous amount of resources trying to defend Bakhmut knowing it was going to fall anyway - why? None of this makes any rational sense.

Don't trust RR or any of those slime balls. As far as Trump hiring these guys, it is not like he had a great employment pool to fish in. It is the swamp after all. He got some really bad advice and unfortunately he listened. He learned some really hard lessons in his first term.

I think you are right. Those that are not outright black hats are definitely a shade or two of grey. They are the worst because they can't be trusted and will go whichever way the wind is blowing and can be purchased by the highest bidder. Grey is exactly where most of those swamp creatures live. At least with the die hard socialists and neocons, you know what to expect.