In case you're not a member of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky's personal fan club and his $7 billion a month claim from the West (read: U.S. taxpayers), you may be convinced by the cover of Vogue!, writes The Federalist.

"While war ravages his country — a war which Zelensky insists the West enter — the president and his wife are enjoying their newfound spotlight, posing for a gushing Vogue puff piece with the glossy, dramatic photos to match," the author writes.

"You can both agree the deaths of innocents in Ukraine are tragic and be unsettled by the Zelenskys’ use of that tragedy to bask in the fawning adoration of global outlets. In fact, those two beliefs aren’t contradictory but complementary.

Instead of negotiating a settlement that could likely help cease the death and despair that his citizens are enduring, Zelensky is trying to escalate the Russia-Ukraine war by dragging the West into direct conflict with Russia, a nuclear power. He is milking the world’s sympathy for photoshoots in Vogue while his people suffer. While no one contests that Russian President Vladimir Putin bears full responsibility for the reprehensible war, Zelensky has shown little interest in negotiations that could potentially avoid the long, brutal slog he wants Western dollars to prolong.

I don’t blame the Zelenskys for wanting to draw attention to their struggle. I do blame them for trying to guilt the West into escalating it. And after seeing the Vogue cover story, I blame them for thinking their veneration in the minds of Americans is so sacrosanct that sitting under hair and makeup artists for an almost comically dramatic photoshoot would not make anyone question their sincerity.

The glossy Vogue images do indeed matter to Americans battling inflation and wondering whether billions of their tax dollars helped fund the photoshoot — but perhaps not in the way Vogue intended."