Irrational hatred of President Donald Trump, more commonly known as Trump Derangement Syndrome, leads to a variety of symptoms.
In Hollywood, for instance, TDS has turned actors and actresses into mindless warmongers.
At Sunday’s 97th Academy Awards, host and comedian Conan O’Brien gave the TDS-afflicted audience what it wanted when he made a reference to an award-winning film then used that reference to take a very thinly veiled shot at Trump.
The film in question, “Anora,” won five Oscars, including best picture. The movie database IMDb has described the film’s plot as follows:
“A young escort from Brooklyn meets and impulsively marries the son of a Russian oligarch. Once the news reaches Russia, her fairy tale is threatened as his parents set out for New York to get the marriage annulled.”
In other words, the story’s villain is a Russian, so you know where this is going.
When O’Brien returned from commercial break, he reminded the audience that “Anora” had enjoyed a successful night to that point.
“Two wins already,” the host said in a clip posted to the social media platform X.
“I guess Americans are excited to see somebody finally stand up to a powerful Russian,” he added.
“I guess Americans are excited to see somebody finally stand up to a powerful Russian” – Conan O’Brien jokes about #Anora at the #Oscars pic.twitter.com/JysZcRdZ3d
— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) March 3, 2025
O’Brien, of course, did not mention Trump by name. But who could fail to recognize the implication?
After all, on Friday at the White House, Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance stood up for Americans, Ukrainians, Russians, Europeans, and the cause of peace when they engaged in a very heated public exchange with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the presumptuous, diminutive, ungrateful, panhandling dictator who had used the meeting with Trump and Vance as a platform from which to argue for prolonging Ukraine’s unwinnable war against Russia.
Predictably, TDS-afflicted liberals across the globe lost their minds.
Never mind that Trump has done everything in his power to stop the pointless bloodshed in Ukraine. And never mind that much of Hollywood once enthusiastically embraced Soviet Communism. Times have changed.
More than eight years ago, the establishment and its media minions decided to dishonestly associate Trump with Russia. For years they peddled the false Russia collusion narrative regarding the 2016 election. Democrats also impeached Trump over a phone call involving Zelenskyy and Ukraine.
Thus, the establishment successfully planted the “Trump bad, Russia bad, Ukraine good” narrative in the minds of low-information liberals who watch MSNBC or CNN and read The New York Times or The Atlantic Monthly.
In hindsight, it looks like one of history’s most effective propaganda campaigns.
Do you approve of how Trump has handled the Ukraine situation?
Yes: 97% (113 Votes)
No: 3% (4 Votes)
After all, when Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, that propaganda took immediate effect. Social media users added Ukrainian flags to their profiles. Most probably could not have found Ukraine on a map. But they undoubtedly remembered the Trump-Russia connection: Trump bad, Russia bad, Ukraine good.
Thus, O’Brien merely activated years of programming. The crowd cheered his lame joke, for in Hollywood they would rather see hundreds of thousands of battlefield deaths and risk World War III than seek help for their TDS.
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