The beleaguered king is still in the house (Washington File)

Ukraine is the most maligned word in the Washington mix right now. Wherever one goes in the city of intrigue, President Donald Trump remains much vilified and yet his popularity hasn't lost too much of his sheen.

The Twitter warrior took to his favourite socmedia to launch a scathing attack on his detractors. "The so-called Whistleblower, before knowing I was going to release the exact Transcript, stated that my call with the Ukrainian President was 'crazy, frightening, and completely lacking in substance related to national security'. This is a very big Lie. Read the Transcript!" In the art of reading semiotics, Washington reckons that he will not even go kicking and screaming, well ensconced as he is despite the bruising battle that he finds himself slapbang in the middle of.

It is clear that the pressure is mounting on the embattled presidency, though ostensibly he continues to remain impervious in his social media handle. As the master communicator on Twitter, he fired salvos one after the other - "No Pressure at all said Ukraine! Very congenial, a perfect call. The Whistleblower and others spoke BEFORE seeing the Transcript. Now they must apologize to me and stop this ridiculous impeachment!" However, the Dems remain confident that all his stone-walling will not slow down the probe.

The fusillade continued: "The Do Nothing Democrats are Con Artists, only looking to hurt the Republican Party and President. Their total focus is 2020, nothing more, and nothing less. The good news is that WE WILL WIN!!!!

This came against the backdrop of a virtuoso performance on Tuesday night by two of his biggest defenders - Former US Attorney Joseph E. diGenova turned to European history to describe the Democrats' impeachment inquiry into President Trump, calling their efforts "regicide", the act of killing a king. He was joined by Trump's personal lawyer and ex-NYC Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani who describes the two anonymous whistle-blowers as "suicide bombers" and accused Democrats of "sedition".

Trump and many Republicans reckon that this conspiracy to defame the President is an attempt to overturn the coming election. The hoi polloi are bitterly divided here for many believe that Trump has compromised the presidency. Washington Post explains the Ukraine controversy which threatens to engulf the Trump presidency succinctly - A whistleblower from the U.S. intelligence community filed a complaint Aug. 12 that alleged some kind of wrongdoing at high levels of the U.S. government. But we haven't seen the complaint, nor has it been shared with Congress.

Thanks to reporting from The Washington Post's national security team, though, we now know that this whistle-blower's complaint involves Trump and alleges that he made some kind of a "promise" to a foreign leader. We then learned that the complaint involves Ukraine. By Friday afternoon, we learned that Trump had pressured Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in a July 25 call to launch an investigation involving former Vice President and now presidential candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden. And on Monday, The Post's team reported that Trump had told his administration to withhold nearly $400 million in aid to Ukraine a week before the call.

So, it doesn't get murkier than this, at the very centrifuge of the unsavoury controversy is a foreign country and it involves an ex veep, a Trump insider and now a presidential candidate. What makes this Ukraine controversy more credible is that Inspector General of the Intelligence Community, Michael Atkinson has corroborated these findings. Since then, Trump has been targeted by Nancy Pelosi and the chairmen of various house select committees.

And just when he was surrounded by his foes, he turned the tables by pulling out of Syria and the war against IS where the US was fighting along with Kurdish rebels. This has created further consternation in DC and his tweet today validated his thinking but ended up confusing one and all: "The United States has spent EIGHT TRILLION DOLLARS fighting and policing in the Middle East. Thousands of our Great Soldiers have died or been badly wounded. Millions of people have died on the other side. GOING INTO THE MIDDLE EAST IS THE WORST DECISION EVER MADE....."

Cocky as always, he finished off by posting: "So why is someone a good or great President if they needed to Spy on someone else's Campaign in order to win (that didn't work out so well), and if they were unable to fill 142 important Federal Judgeships (a record by far), handing them all to me to chose. Will have 182 soon!"IANS