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Here's a sentence that can only exist in 2018: Rapper Kanye West and US President Donald Trump have been showing off their friendship on Twitter.
If you haven't watched all the drama unfold this morning, let's get you up to speed (we'll assume you're familiar with Kanye and Mr Trump).
How did this all start?
Ten days ago, Kanye started tweeting again (he deleted his Twitter account back in May, 2017).
His fans were excited because he announced a new album.
Twitter was excited because Kanye's tweets are definitely never boring.
In the past week, he showed support for a couple of Donald Trump's biggest fans (YouTuber and Fox News personality Candace Owens and cartoonist Scott Adams) and tweeted about the "thought police" and "fake news".
Fans' eyebrows were raised.
Got it. When did Donald Trump get involved?
Kanye's spent the last few days defending himself from fans who questioned his perceived support of the US President.
He directly addressed it in this tweet to his 27 million followers this morning:
Please don't ask us to explain what "dragon energy" is.
It took three hours for his support to catch the eye of Mr Trump, who tweeted this to his 51 million followers:
And thus, the internet's newest obsession was born.
In a follow-up tweet (apparently prompted by his wife, Kim Kardashian, who you might also have heard of), the rapper said he did not agree with everything Mr Trump does.
"I don't agree 100% with anyone but myself," Kanye said in the tweet .
Then he posted a picture of his signed MAGA hat (which the US President then quote tweeted with the caption "MAGA!")
Is this the first time the Trump/Kanye universe has collided?
Not at all.
Kanye had a meeting with then president-elect Trump in 2016.
At the time Kanye said he met with Trump to discuss multicultural issues, while Mr Trump told reporters they'd been "friends for a long time".
The trip was the first public outing for Kanye after he spent a week in a Los Angeles clinic with an unexplained condition.
That meeting blew up Twitter at the time as well.
Why are people mad about all this?
Some fans are mad because Kanye's support for Donald Trump is at odds with much of the entertainment industry.
It's also starkly at odds with his wife's very public support for Hillary Clinton.
Kanye even appeared in a selfie with Kardashian and the former Democratic presidential candidate.
FWIW, she is fine with Kanye's tweets and has been defending him on her own account:
Is this all over?
Nope.
One of Mr Trump's sons waded in, Kanye is still tweeting (a total of 66 times today when this story was published), and Twitter founder Jack Dorsey has liked a string of Kanye's tweets.
Jordan Peele, the director of Get Out, even got involved after people suggested Kanye was stuck in The Sunken Place.
We'll get back to you once we figure out what dragon energy is.
ABC/AP
Topics: world-politics, arts-and-entertainment, music, donald-trump, united-states
First posted