Trump was right … and then …
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7:53 am, May 17th, 2018 - 17 comments
Categories: China, Donald Trump, Europe, International, Korea, Russia, us politics -
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For about half an hour President Trump looked like he was right. And then …
Maybe he was right to criticise and withdraw funding support for the United Nations. Except the U.N. General Assembly is now fast isolating the United States about Gaza, in the absence of any sense coming out of the Security Council.
The UNOCH report is pretty damning.
Maybe he was right to threaten withdrawal of U.S. support for NATO. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation formed under the real threat of Soviet Communist expansion into Europe in the late 1940s. After the decline of Soviet-supported regimes it did a lot of good. But there’s certainly still very good reasons for European and NATO members to be protected from Russia. The U.S. Pentagon and its budget are very clear that Russia, and China, are its two greatest military threats.
So no, the kind of threats NATO was set up for have not gone at all.
Maybe he represented a necessary discursive readjustment of western hyper-liberal hegemony into a more accurate, baser truth that reconciles our trade and exploitation ethics with our kinds of capitalism. Maybe Trump is forcing a new reality to replace out perpetual pining for something that just ain’t ever going to happen.
In reality the rest of the world simply carries on without U.S. diplomatic leadership just fine. It is the same with the Paris Climate Accords.
Maybe he was right to withdraw U.S. influence in the Middle East into fewer states. Nothing the U.S. have done in the last 30 years either directly or indirectly has much improved any country from Iraq to Yemen to Egypt. As ISIS shrinks away and the temporary alliances formed for and against Assad crack apart, more regional wars will start up between them – why presume peace can happen? That doesn’t mean withdraw altogether. As noted by this exchange of very experienced U.S. diplomats, just narrow the focus and strengthen the specific results.
But again, U.S. withdrawal is simply inviting other alliances to form, as they should.
Maybe he was right to engage directly with the North Korean regime. Surely President Trump is already making more diplomatic headway with North Korea than any U.S. president since North Korea’s formation.
Except, nah.
Maybe his threats against Chinese trade practices including steel, aluminium, and intellectual property are appropriate. Maybe compared to U.S. Presidents since Ronald Reagan he is actually braver and more accurate about trade than we have cared to admit. It’s possible to benefit from China’s rise and send strong signals against its wrongdoing at the same time – if you are also a very powerful country.
Actually the U.S. markets have not on balance cared.
Maybe he will delete the Munro Doctrine and bring back the United States to a more neutral military and diplomatic agent in our world. If the world is going to remain in such a politically settled state, it’s appropriate to withdraw that propulsive manifest destiny of perpetual U.S. expansion.
In fact the best and most intuitive answer is that his regime will shrink U.S. influence to that which he can immediately comprehend – a decreasing realm that has not yet right-sized itself.
He’s definitely the most corrupt U.S. president of the 20th and 21st centuries.
Also for the record, Donald Trump is disgusting. His domestic policies are uniformly shit. But the U.S. economy is so strong it just doesn’t seem to matter. The U.S. economy surges irrespective of what international arrangements Trump forms or breaks.
Trump has had a few months of being lucky. His polls are rising. We should prepare ourselves for a world in which President Trump gets another term. But his wreckage-trail of his consequences is now longer and clearer.
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...2 weeks ago
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Kua hinga te manawa kairākau o Te Rua Tekau Ma Waru Tiwhatiwha te po! Kakarauru i te po! Ka rapuhia kei hea koe kua riro! Haere e te Ika a Whiro ki o tini hoa kua ngaro atu ki te Pō ...2 weeks ago
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The server will be getting hardware changes this evening starting at 10pm NZDT.
The site will be off line for some hours.
Not sure who this Trup is but he sounds like a right piece of work 🙂
but her fucking emails.
Well Europe’s not impressed:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/16/donald-tusk-condemns-donald-trump-transatlantic-trade-war
Best quote for me:
“He has made us realise that if you need a helping hand, you will find one at the end of your arm.”
And a long article in the Herald shows the awful intent for the Middle East of Trump and his evangelical. War will be welcomed as the just will of God.
“President Trump has surrounded himself with outspoken believers who share an end-times theology.”
“Vice-president Mike Pence is a stoic evangelical. He makes no secret that he devoutly believes that war in the Middle East is God’s will. That God wants Israel returned to the Jews. That Armageddon is part of God’s plan.”
“Put simply, you can do no wrong in the eyes of God if you support Israel.”
“The President of the United States is God’s right-hand man, many evangelicals believe. Trump is an imperfect tool God is using to create perfect works. This means nothing less than the end of days. And a one-way ticket to heaven.” ( A bit like ISIS?)
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=12052786
Its even worse than that
http://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2018/05/pastor-at-us-embassy-opening-in-jerusalem-said-hitler-was-sent-by-god.html
Loving Trump seems to be their only qualification.
‘”We thank you, O Lord, for President Donald Trump’s courage in acknowledging to the world a truth that was established 3000 years ago – that Jerusalem is and always shall be the eternal capital of the Jewish people,” Rev Hagee said.
Nostradamus prediction was something about a beast from the middle east to kick off WW3 type deal.
Benjamin come on down.
That’s all true and scary stuff, but it seems that many evangelical youth are fighting back and not accepting the indoctrination of their elders.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/05/i-went-to-an-evangelical-revival-and-it-was-all-about-fighting-racism-and-protecting-lgbt-rights/
“But there’s certainly still very good reasons for European and NATO members to be protected from Russia. The U.S. Pentagon and its budget are very clear that Russia, and China, are its two greatest military threats.”
I don’t see how Russia is threatening to anyone. It is acting in its own best interests as any nation does but I don’t see any signs of it interfering in the affairs of most nations of the world. Ironically, despite Putin’s dictatorial tendencies, Russia has become one of the few independent voices in world affairs that offers an alternative point to view to what has become a dominant and rogue United States, which most countries in the world see as the greatest threat to world peace and stability. Compared to Trump and his government, Putin and his government are coming across and sane and reasonable.
For a different, and quite reasonable and rational point of view , here Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov being interviewed by Stephen Sackur of the BBC’s Hard Talk.
My US friends reports are not those of a strong economy – nor are those of my friends in banking. The US economy is ‘technically’ strong. Technical doesn’t put chickens in pots or provide 5c cigars.
Same as our ‘Rock Star’ economy then.
It’s only for the rich and everyone else is screwed.
Trump to get another term ?
Not only that, but we can see he is grooming his own daughter to be the first female President of the United States.
H Clinton couldn’t achieve that role and Trump would like nothing better to get one up on her.
And daddy would still be in the back ground .
Trump won’t get another term. The opposition is far, far to energised to allow that to happen.
Yes and the GOP is going to be punished in the mid terms.
Even ‘safe’ republicans are fearing they’ll lose, Paul Ryans already called it a day.
Nixon won re-election in a landslide. A contributing factor was the Democrats conceding too much to extremist lefties who thought their moment had come.
Bolton invokes the Libya option for DRPK.(Removing beyond all doubt that he is a dangerous idiot)
DRPK responds.
“World knows too well that our country is neither Libya nor Iraq which have met miserable fate,” North Korea’s vice minister wrote, responding to Bolton. “It is absolutely absurd to dare compare the DPRK, a nuclear weapon state, to Libya which had been at the initial stage of nuclear development,”
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/john-bolton-may-have-derailed-north-korea-trump-talks-2018-5
Follows a US style intervention pattern
Indochina wrecked by the US war
Iraq wrecked by US war
Libya wrecked by Nato-US war
Bolton is deliberately trying to wreck the talks, as the White house staff are terrified at Trumps negotiating style. I have sneaky feeling Trump knows this and is trying to get out of the summit too
You missed the illegal bombing of Syria. The one where he did not go to congress to get permission to drop bombs on another sovereign nation.