Love letters and Apologies to Ukraine's New Anti-Corruption President.

To Ukraine's new President Zelensky -- comedian, turned politician -- who won an overwhelming victory on an anti-corruption ticket. These are your people:in these images. Every one is Ukrainian. You are their hope. I hope you can honor their trust and justify their hopes for a more honest system of government. I, and like-minded Americans, are greatly embarrassed by recent attempts from corrupt US envoys who sought to turn you, a dedicated corruption fighter, voted into office by an overwhelming majority who sought to moralize about Ukraine's fight against corruption. They had no right to claim moral high ground in the quest for right and reason tor to lay claim to the fight against internal corruption. The ham-fisted approach of these corrupt Americans is repugnant; we hope to turn against them by shining a bright light of truth and fairness on their tactics and failed ideology. They have tried to lecture you, a corruption fighter, on the evils of corruption, and in doing so they have betrayed the best values of the US system with its great, enduring foundation, and our Constiuton, with its high regard for the rule of law and the even-handed application of that law. Our great Constitution. exemplified by fair, even-handed Rule of Law has guided out country trough over 200 years of history that often has made made the US a beacon of liberty and a model of a great, democratic government construct: governance based on rule of law, kept from excess by a Constitution that recognizes the need for checks and balances against foreseeable excess. We apologize for the attempts of our corrupt, power hungry politicians to profit off your country's misfortune and simultaneously run America's Democracy off the rails. We regret that these same persons have tried to interfere with your ability to govern and seeking greater prosperity. We are armed by the US Constitution and over 200 years of a system that has worked to now. We now face our ultimate test, possibly fomented by the same adversary you fight on your country's East -- a test of how to fight assymetrical warfare designed to weaken global peace. It's the same force that started a war that has claimed over 13,000 lives and displaced over 1 million on your Russian-speaking east. Ukraine needs your help to clean its own house -- your voters recognized the need to fight corruption, to strengthen the rule of law in Ukraine, and hopefully to rise your country's level of prosperity as well as its pride and dignity. Ironically it's Russia on your East and corrupt politicians from our country that have attacked your nation's existence -- in a somewhat asymmetrical pair of attacks also directed to weaken our country. Our country long ago fought and won the fight against foreign oppression; it's a fight that continues today. Arisen anew, the enemies of our system of democracy are at it again, as they have arisen from time to time, and it is our great task to defeat them and regain the integrity of our system of law and governance with its checks and balances against excesses. The existential fight in America has arisen anew while your country faces a more direct existential fight-- one to preserve its own existence as a sovereign nation. Together we fight our twin fights, perhaps against the same adversary that started the war that has cost 13,000 lives in your country's East and displaced over one million refugees. You lead the fight for your country's existence, on the heels of the Maidan fighters who threw out a corrupt president-- a fight I watched and photographed. In that fight the hardened warriors of substantial age who came to Kiev to form a tent city may have overshadowed the tens of thousands of the more youthful, who left their first jobs and gtheir lives as students daily who joined the fight on the ground of Maidan, aily and whose mothers filled the incengdoary bombs, and torre up flat carpets to serve as wicks for those gasoline filled bottles of fire. youths who daily also fought the fight, whose mothers filled those firebombs with gasoline and tore up flat carpet for wicks for the fire bombs that kept the riot police who would suppress the forces of freedom at bay. Then the unsung heroes, those youths, who simply returned to their lives after the overthrow almost without mention or notice. They knew they did the right thing and fought with their hearts, but did not seek glory. They fought tor a free, democratic Ukraine, then returned almost overnight to their former lives, without seeking recognition. I knew and met these unsung heroes. I seldom raise political issues; I take photographs, and almost all without a political view. I leave politics to the people. But this last fight has turned into one of good versus evil, and in that fight I cannot shrink from being heard. Here again, are photos of your people. Please honor them by sgtrengthening their goernmnent and suppressing corruption. And forgive the recent outrageous conduct by power=hungery Americans to subvert your task -0 to make it more difficult as you labor under almost impossible circumsgtances. These images are sent to you as custodian of the Ukrainian people They are my love letters to your great people from an admirer. I hope these images of the people you lead give you some inspiration and also hope that there are a huge number of Americans who back your country's fight for self determination and a system of fairness through rule of law. You were elected with an overwhelming mandate to reform matters, and I personally apologize for those from America whosought to subvert your immense task. john (John Crosley) On behalf of many other like-minded Americans. We Americans e struggle to right our country against the corruption thtat would suibvert it. But we have ove rtwo centuries of rule of law and a sysytem of check s and baolances to prevent gtriumph of excesses. You do not have those insrtruments to right the ship of steagte under its most intent struggle for its existence We Americans have those self-righting institutions and know how to use them As you struggle against an armed aggressor, it seems likely we are fighting against the same aggressor who has sought to weaponize our own institutions of democracy against us. I believe the righteous can win; let's prove it together. With great apologies for those embarrassing, corrupt and power-hungry who have sought to subvert your quest to steer Ukraine's ship of state to more prosperous times. With greatest good wishes from me personally and a great number of like-minded Americans, we send you these photos and our greatest good wishes for success in keeping your promises of reform to your country. john (John Crosley) and like minded Americans)