Tag: Presidential Trips

Fearless Leader Returns Home

 

I kept up with our president at each of the stops he made on his record breaking trip….and as far as I could see nothing was accomplished with the exception of some photo ops…..nothing of substance was ever on the agenda…..

Apparently I am noy alone in my concern with the lousy trip that Fearless Leader has just return from……

Harry Kazianis previewed Trump’s Asia trip two weeks ago and was cautiously optimistic that it could be successful. I assumed it would be closer to a repeat of his first trip abroad. He returns today with a much grimmer assessment:

But the leader of the free world should have at least some idea of what is happening across the globe, and some policy strategy to match. Instead, what we saw during Trump’s tour of Asia was a series of incoherent rants, no vision or grand strategy for the future, and a strange bromance-style of foreign policy.

The notable thing about Trump’s “bromance-style” approach to foreign leaders is that he seems to think they are as impressed by his flattery as he is by theirs. The president’s chumminess with Xi, Duterte, or anyone else isn’t going to persuade them to make more concessions to the U.S., but foreign leaders have learned that it is fairly easy to buy Trump’s affection by putting on big displays and catering to his tastes when he visits. Obama was often faulted by pundits for not cultivating close personal relationships with foreign leaders, but Trump has gone to the opposite extreme by doing almost nothing but that. That causes him to be weirdly deferential to foreign leaders in a way that goes far beyond trying to maintain good relations.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/larison/trumps-unsuccessful-asia-trip/

We have no new trade agreements….North Korea is still a powder keg…..China is still kicking our butts in trade…..but Japan was bullied into buying a lot of weaponry it does not need…..and all in all it was a happy time for all……but he did offer to arbitrate the South China Sea disputes because he says “he is a very good mediator”…..

In Hanoi during a press conference with Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang, before heading to Manila, the final stop of his five-nation Asia/Pacific tour, Trump boasted about being “a very good mediator and arbitrator.”

What he considers mediation and arbitration, China and other nations call unacceptable meddling in their internal affairs.

https://www.globalresearch.ca/warrior-president-trump-i-am-a-very-good-mediator/5618006

All in all it was a waste of taxpayer money…..photo ops was all that came from this trip.

Trip From Hell–Trump Style

Our Fearless Leader should be landing in DC soon and he will be back on his natural ground with Twitter in one hand and his vitriol in the other…..he can go back to his childish insults of all the displease him.

But let’s look at his international trip…..what did he accomplish with this long trip? A record setting trip.

Did North Korea succumb to his charm?  NO!  Do we have new trading agreements with China?  NO!  Putin denied, according to Trump, that he or his country had anything to do with the hack in 2016.  What the Hell was the purpose of going to the Philippines? To get a few accolades from a demented toad.  He did con Japan into buying a mess of defense weaponry….and that stop in Vietnam….what was accomplished there?  Not much that I could see.

But according to Fearless Leader….it was a helluva trip….

President Trump headed for home Tuesday following an extensive tour of Asia that he said had been “tremendously successful” and had put the world on notice that the “rules have changed” for countries that want to trade with the US. Trump also teased a “major statement” on trade and the trip later this week at the White House, where he’s expected to promote congressional Republicans’ plan to overhaul the nation’s tax code, the AP reports. As Air Force One rolled down the runway in Manila in the Philippines, Trump told reporters traveling with him that “it’s been a really great 12 days.” And on trade, the president said confidently that US trading partners “will be treating us much differently than before.”

“The United States has to be treated fairly and in a reciprocal fashion,” he tweeted Tuesday. “The massive TRADE deficits must go down quickly!” Trump pressed that point on every stop of the grueling tour of Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam, and the Philippines, blaming his predecessors for yawning trade imbalances and declaring that the United States will no longer be taken advantage of under his watch. “We’ve had a tremendously successful trip,” Trump told reporters. “Tremendous amounts of work was done on trade.” Trump said $300 billion in deals had been reached, a sum he predicted would more than triple in a short period of time. He also spoke warmly of the “many good friends” he had made on the trip, including Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.

Fearless Leader has promised a speech some time this week about his trip and the progress made.  My guess is that the only progress made was he, Trump, got patted on the back by world leaders and that was what this trip was all about.

And afterwards we can have Sarah Huckabee whats-her-name explain what the president has just said…..I am sure it will no be clear and we will need her take the large lies and  shrink them down to smaller lies that are more easily digestible.

Our Man In China

Trump scooted off the Korean Peninsula and is now in China….he was met with a lavish “hello” ceremony….lots of color, pomp and ceremony….all the things he likes because it is all about him coming to China…..

China pulled out all the stops for President Trump’s airport arrival in Beijing: honor guard, marching band, jumping children. The ceremony accompanying Trump’s arrival Wednesday afternoon was elaborate even by China’s lavish standards. Heads of state are usually given a low-key reception at the airport, with the real pomp and circumstance reserved for his or her arrival at the Great Hall of the People in the center of Beijing. As they exited Air Force One, Trump and first lady Melania Trump were met by Chinese and American dignitaries, soldiers standing stiffly at attention, a band playing martial music, and smartly attired children waving miniature Chinese and American flags while chanting, “Welcome, welcome.”

The president and first lady appeared pleased, smiling and accepting flower bouquets, with Trump at one point throwing his arms open and appearing to exclaim, “Wow,” the AP reports. During his two-day visit, Trump is expected to discuss issues including trade, the South China Sea, and North Korea with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Trump is expected to demand that China curtail its dealings with Pyongyang and expel North Korean workers. One uncertainty for Trump: whether he will be able to use Twitter in China, which has banned the social media platform.

OMG!  A day without Twitter!  What will he do?

China has become a major power in the world as well as the US number trading partner….what will Fearless Leader have to say to the Chinese that he has not already said?

After all his strong rhetoric about China and its trade policies his tune is a bit different when he is face to face with the Chinese…….

President Trump has previously expressed being “disappointed” at China for “taking advantage” of the US with “one-sided” trade, as well as called the country a “currency manipulator.” But speaking in Beijing on Thursday, he appeared to admire any clever exploitation of the US. “I don’t blame China,” he said in a speech to business leaders after a two-hour sit-down with President Xi Jinping. “After all, who can blame a country for being able to take advantage of another country for benefit of their citizens? I give China great credit.” Instead of pointing the finger at his host nation, Trump blamed his own predecessors “for allowing this trade deficit to take place and to grow.” Trump also touted the “great chemistry” he says he shares with Xi and said he thinks the two countries will do “tremendous things,” per the Washington Post.

Trump said he mentioned the “chronic imbalance” of the nations’ trade status to Xi, and the leaders announced they’d worked out $250 billion in various trade deals, which China’s commerce minister called a “miracle,” per Reuters. Details weren’t offered, and CNN notes that many agreements were already in progress when Trump took office. Xi, for his part, was more “reserved,” per the Post, simply talking about a “new starting point” for the two nations and a “win-win” relationship while avoiding discussing his personal relationship with Trump. Trump and Xi didn’t field questions during their joint appearance; CNN notes that Trump’s three immediate predecessors in the White House had all convinced Chinese leaders on their own first state visits there to take questions. “It was at the Chinese insistence there were no questions today,” press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

To me that is the coward’s way out……one thing in the US and another when face to face with the Chinese….it is tacky at best.

Now on to Vietnam and meetings…….

Our Man In South Korea

Trump has left Japan and now he enters into South Korea…..of course this whole trip is billed as some sort of journey to put forth his desire to end North Korea’s run up to nukes and a delivery system….but it looks like he will be met with some opposition…

A coalition of more than 200 South Korean civic groups have announced plans to protest U.S. President Donald Trump’s escalation of nuclear tensions with North Korea during his scheduled visit to Seoul next week.

The protests are expected to draw thousands, and will kick off with a “No Trump, No War People’s Rally” outside the U.S. Embassy in South Korea’s capitol city on Saturday, Nov. 4, ahead of Trump’s arrival on Nov. 7 for a two-day visit. The coalition has also planned a candlelight vigil at Gwanghwamun Square for Nov. 7 and a protest outside the National Assembly building, during Trump’s address to parliament on Nov. 8.

In a statement announcing details about the president’s trip to Asia, the White House said, “The President’s engagements will strengthen the international resolve to confront the North Korean threat and ensure the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”

(commondreams.org)

Not everybody is buying the manure Trump is spreading……

The protesters plan to “call on the U.S. to stop threatening to start a war, putting pressure on the North, and forcing the South to buy American-made weapons,” the Korea Herald reports, noting:

They also want the withdrawal of the US Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense anti-missile system, which they say caters only to U.S. interests while widening the divide between South Korea and China. China, which believes the system’s radar could be used to spy on its territory, has taken what appear to be retaliatory actions against Korea, such as restrictions on Korean firms’ businesses in China.

They also want the abolishment of the Korea-U.S. bilateral trade deal, which the two countries have recently begun to renegotiate at Trump’s urging, saying the trade deal only benefits the U.S. and disadvantages Korea, especially local farmers.

That is what I’m talking about….TAKING IT TO THE STREETS!

Good from them….it warms my heart to see that there are those that still know how to protest….we Americans should learn how to make our point through protest….a lost art form in the US.

Fearless Leader has moved on from Japan and is now in South Korea…..and in true from spouting crap that his mind thinks of when he walks in front of a mike……

President Trump is in South Korea—and he hasn’t repeated his rhetoric about bringing “fire and fury” down on its northern neighbor. In a joint press conference with South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in, Trump said he’d seen a “lot of progress” in dealing with Pyongyang and urged the country to make a deal to end its nuclear weapons program, the AP reports. “It makes sense for North Korea to come to the table and make a deal that is good for the people of North Korea and for the world,” Trump said. “I do see certain movement.” Moon added that the two leaders had agreed to resolve the North Korea nuclear issue in a peaceful manner.

Trump arrived in South Korea, the second country on his five-nation Asia trip, at the Camp Humphreys military base 40 miles south of Seoul, the Washington Post reports. He had lunch with American troops in a mess hall on the base before speaking with military commanders, telling them: “Ultimately, it will all work out. It always works out.” Trump will address the South Korean National Assembly on Wednesday, and aides say he’s likely to denounce North Korea’s human rights abuses. Bloomberg reports that Moon’s administration has its differences with Trump over issues including trade and North Korea, though the South Korean leader praised Trump for making “America great again” at the start of their Tuesday meeting. (In a speech in Japan Monday, Trump refused to rule out military action against North Korea.)

Trump pushing Japan and South Korea to buy more military equipment…..and I would bet that behind closed doors he is trying to convince them in the necessity of nukes on their soil…..I say NO!  And with good reason…..

The North Korea crisis has led commentators to reassess the conventional wisdom that, when it comes to nuclear weapons, fewer is better. Unsurprisingly, South Korea and Japan are at the centre of this discussion. In a provocative piece in the Washington Post, Singapore’s Bilahari Kausikan recently made the case for nuclear proliferation (bar Taiwan) to stabilise the fractious region. At the other end of the spectrum, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons maintain that the spread of nuclear weapons undermines international security.

Both positions are missing something. Were Seoul or Tokyo to acquire nuclear-weapons capacity, abandoning their reliance on extended deterrence from the U.S., the region would not instantly become any more or less secure.

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2017/11/07/why_south_korea_and_japan_should_not_go_nuclear_112597.html

Our Man In Japan

Our Fearless leader has made it Japan and he and PM Abe went to a Koi pond to do some honors to the fish….but a faux pas ensued….

It’s probably one of the most-repeated phrases when teaching kids about how to feed fish: just a pinch. It’s a directive President Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe most definitely did not follow while the two visited the Akasaka palace’s koi carp pond Monday. The Guardian reports that the men began by spooning a bit of food in before “appearing to lose patience” and essentially dumping the contents of the boxes they held into the pond. While some in the media were quick to pounce on Trump for the apparent gaffe, the Guardian notes that video footage shows he was simply imitating Abe’s approach.

After a traditional state dinner in Japan our bubba had to sit on the floor to eat (bet that chapped his ass) and he made a speech about the subject of the day….North Korea…..

President Trump ratcheted up the pressure on North Korea on Monday, refusing to rule out eventual military action and declaring that the US “will not stand” for Pyongyang menacing America or its Asian allies. Trump, in Tokyo on the first stop of his lengthy Asia trip, denounced North Korea as “a threat to the civilized world” and exhorted dictator Kim Jong Un to cease weapons testing like the missiles he has fired over Japanese territory in recent weeks, the AP reports. Though he stood in one of the Asian capitals in range of North Korea’s missiles, Trump didn’t modulate his fiery language, declaring that Pyongyang imperiled “international peace and stability.” “Some people say my rhetoric is very strong, but look what has happened with very weak rhetoric in the last 25 years,” said Trump, who stood with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at a Monday news conference.

Abe agreed with Trump’s assessment that “all options are on the table” when dealing with the North and announced new sanctions against several dozen individuals. Though Trump and Abe repeatedly touted their friendship, Trump did complain Japan had been “winning” for decades on the trade front and rebuked the current status, saying trade deals were “not fair and not open.” Trump also pushed Japan to buy more US military equipment after Abe was asked about a report that Trump was disappointed Japan hadn’t shot North Korean missiles out of the sky. “He will shoot ’em out of the sky when he completes the purchase of lots of additional military equipment from the [US],” Trump said. Japan’s constitution was revised after World War II to include a clause renouncing war, and the country only spends about 1% of its GDP on defense; Abe has slowly tried to remove some of its constraints.

Abe as echoed some of the military minds in the US by saying when it comes to North Korea all options are on the table…..Trump has made many off-handed remarks about the possibilities of the US destroying North Korea if it does not play ball….

So my question is….is this trip setting up the scenario where the US will eventually attack NK?

The aircraft carriers USS Nimitz, USS Theodore Roosevelt, and USS Ronald Reagan—three of the most powerful warships in the world—have now converged on the western Pacific in a mighty show of force on the eve of President Trump’s 10-day trip to Asia. The three carriers, along with their accompanying cruisers, destroyers, and submarines—all armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles or other advanced munitions—are capable of raining immense destructive force on any nation targeted by the commander in chief. Not since 2007 has there been such a concentration of US firepower in the Asia-Pacific region. There can be only two plausible explanations for this extraordinary naval buildup: to provide Trump with the sort of military extravaganza he seems to enjoy; and/or to prepare for a pre-emptive military strike on North Korea.

https://www.thenation.com/article/is-the-united-states-planning-to-attack-north-korea/

Point number one……air power will not do the trick…..sorry to say but ground forces will have to be used if they want to end this thing once and for all……..

While US officials have repeatedly make clear that their goal with respect to North Korea is denuclearization, Pentagon officials are increasingly willing to admit that they view the “only way” to accomplish that as not just a war, but a full-scale US ground invasion of North Korea.

Officials are a lot less willing to make public what the implications of such a protracted ground war would be, saying an accurate assessment of the losses in such a war would be difficult. It’s not a big secret, however.

At the very least, millions of people would die in this sort of war. The toll could be broad across the entire region, with millions presumed to die in South Korea alone, with Japan and Guam also likely to be targeted, and a “catastrophic” loss of US troops participating in the war.

A number of opponents on the war in Congress are pushing for more public assessments of the consequ4ences of the conflict, saying they believe the American public should know what’s at stake going in. These lawmakers are also keen to make it clear that President Trump cannot unilaterally attack North Korea without Congressional authorization.

(antiwar.com)

Point number two……is the country willing to sacrifice more troops for yet another war?  Or do they just not care?

The American Conservative offers up some saner policies to handle NK…….

There are seven postulates that ought to inform U.S. policy regarding North Korea.

First, our objective. Nothing is more important than to be clear about what we are trying to accomplish. Our purpose should be to provide for our own security and that of our allies, especially South Korea and Japan, while avoiding war. Our purpose should not be regime change in Pyongyang or forcing Kim Jong-un to abandon his nuclear weapons program. Both of those may be desirable. Neither is worth a large-scale war.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/seven-steps-to-a-saner-u-s-policy-towards-north-korea/

After reading the 7 points I like them a whole lot better than the manure that Trump spreads……

Our man is in Japan and now would be a good time to re-think the bullshit he has said.

He has said he would talk with Kim……

President Trump vowed that he would not talk to Kim Jong-un, cooling off what has become his on-again, off-again cultivation of North Korea’s rogue dictator.

Really?  After all the insults leveled at Kim Jong Il on Twitter does he really think this little dictator will talk with him?  Is this dolt smoking crack?

This was the day in Japan from our Fearless Leader….only 4 more countries to go.

Now on to South Korea and more silly Tweets and slang…….and a screw up or two…….yeppiiee!

The Presidential Trip

How boring, I know…..just to let you know what will be on the agenda…..that is if he sticks to an agenda.

Our president will be on a 11 day road trip through Asia….oh my bad ….Indo-Pacific….(Trump’s term not mine for Asia) a record length trip….not since 1991 has a president been on such a long and tiring road trip.

What does he hope to accomplish?  Is it about North Korea and their nukes?  Or is he just looking for accolades…..a good ego massage from foreign leaders….what is this trip about?

President Trump’s ambitious 11-day, five-country trip to Asia occurs against the backdrop of yet another bout of regional anxiety over the United States’ commitment to remain an active power in the region. These worries have been exacerbated by U.S. withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Paris climate agreement; its dithering on whether it is worth the president’s time to attend the East Asia Summit; its transactional approach to relationships, including with China; and China’s concurrent efforts to position itself at the center of major regional initiatives.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2017/11/03/trumps-visit-to-asia-will-he-choose-substance-or-symbolism/

The 3 most important countries of the 5 he will visit….Japan, South Korea and China……how should he handle these 3?

Geopolitical experts like to overcomplicate matters. Donald Trump’s first trip to Asia as president is, in reality, simple. All he has to do on the three initial stops—the most important of the five visits—is listen to Japan, talk with South Korea and dictate to China.

The selection of the first stop is significant. Fortunately, long gone are the days when American leaders signaled Chinese preeminence by beginning Asia trips with Beijing.

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/trump-trip-listen-japan-talk-south-korea-dictate-china-23033

There is serious diplomatic business to be had on this trip…..the question is can Trump take advantage of the time he has in Asia….oh sorry….Indo-Pacific?  Or will he just be himself and appear as a child fighting over a teddy bear?

Donald Trump‘s upcoming tour of Asia offers plenty to keep the US president cheerful, from lavish state banquets to honour-guard pomp and even a chummy round of golf with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

That’s where the fun stops. It also represents a gruelling 12-day slog of speech-making, summits, and tricky sit-downs on a range of trade disputes – and the intractable policy headache of North Korea’s nuclear arms programme.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/donald-trump-asia-pacific-challenges-171103130933273.

First stop Japan….and he had lots to say……after patting himself on the back about telling troops about his accomplishments….and nothing about their part in the grand scheme of things Asian….

Trump told reporters on Air Force One that he will likely meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Vietnam to discuss the rogue nation, CNN reports. Trump’s arrival in Japan came on the same day a report in the Japan Times claimed the president questioned the country’s decision not to shoot down North Korean missiles earlier this year. The source said Trump, while speaking on the phone with South Asian leaders, expressed disbelief that a country of “samurai warriors” didn’t strike back.

Personally I think this is a waste of time…..he will accomplish little on this trip…..he will only illustrate his incompetence in world affairs.

Trump’s Field Trip #2

Our Fearless Leader is on his second field trip and like the first one….so far he has done nothing embarrassing but he did stick to a common subject or subjects that he uses in every speech he makes whether domestic or international.

In Poland his speech had the usual diatribes…the last election, degrading Obama, Russian thing and self-grandiose….but if you would like the BIG lines from his speech in Poland….I can help……

About an hour after his press conference Thursday morning with Polish President Andrzej Duda, President Trump headed over to Warsaw’s Krasinski Square, where what the New York Times calls a “pro-Duda crowd” showed off their Polish and American flags and confronted reporters with cries of “fake news” (one of the themes in the earlier presser). “Poland will prevail,” Trump assured his audience, referring to his host nation’s long history of strife, occupation, and invasion. “Poland will always prevail.” Other notable Trump quotes, per the Times, CBS News, the Washington Post, the BBC, and ABC News:

  • More praise for Poland: “The triumph of the Polish spirit over centuries of hardship gives us all hope in which good conquers evil and peace achieves victory over war.”
  • On the future of the Western world: “The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive. Do we have the confidence in our values to defend them at any cost? … I declare today for the world to hear the West will never, ever be broken, our values will prevail, our people will thrive, and our civilization will triumph.”
  • On cutting through government red tape: “On both sides of the Atlantic, our citizens are confronted by yet another danger, one firmly within our control … the steady creep of government bureaucracy that drains the vitality and wealth of the people.”
  • On Russia: “We urge Russia to cease its destabilizing activities in Ukraine and elsewhere, and its support for hostile regimes including Syria and Iran, and to join the community of responsible nations in our fight against common enemies and in defense of civilization itself.”

Onto the G20 Meeting and his much publicized meeting with Putin….what will he say?

RealClearPolitics has a live-stream of it here: http://bit.ly/2tZK2gX

Turn The Page!

Promises In The Promise Land

Leg two of Trump’s first international trip and we find our fair-haired leader in Israel and Palestine….and he did what is expected of him…..he made a speech to Israelis and then he went to the Territories to make a speech to the Palestinians…….

His speech to the Israelis is the same speech that all Americans presidents give to Israel….you are our friend….we support you….yada, yada….then he went to the PNA for his speech and I ask why?

Optimism abounds…at least in some circles……

Recent events have left Palestinians in an odd position: The absence of a clear strategy by a U.S. administration to resolve the conflict with Israel may have become the best bet for statehood they’ve had in years. This, at least, seems to be the thinking of Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority (PA), who met with U.S. President Donald Trump in the West Bank city of Bethlehem today.

Source: Could Trump Be Palestinians’ Best Hope? – The Atlantic

It, the speech, was as fucking generic as could be…..and guess what?

He promised a deal….a two state deal…..soon.

Can he deliver what so many other Americans presidents promised?

Source: Will Trump’s Middle East deal work?

And just like all his predecessors he offers NO details to the plans he says he has waiting in the wings……

President Trump arrived in Israel with big ambitions for the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians, and as with many of his biggest ambitions since taking office,, he’s shown little real indication of having a plan, let alone being willing to articulate it.

“I have heard it is one of the toughest deals of all, but I have a feeling that we are going to get there eventually, I hope,” Trump insisted. This was the sum total of what he set out, a feeling that a deal could happen eventually, or at least so he hopes.

Source: Trump Talks Israel-Palestinian Peace, Offers No Details on Plan — News from Antiwar.com

The same bullshit that is given about the situation since 1967……it is all a lie….Trump can find NO way to work the “deal” regardless of his promises.

After he leaves the region Israel will return to normal….destroying crops, stealing land and building illegal settlements……

Nothing new….the same lies and bullshit that Israel has pulled for 60 years.

A waste of time for the country and a waste of taxpayer cash.

The Speech That Was

The speech is over and I shall move on after this post….

The president has made his big speech in Saudi Arabia and that was about it…he was suppose to make others but with that one speech he had shot his wad….it seems he was spent (but I thought it was Clinton that was low energy)….

The speech was to the Muslim World…….he went to the heart of the “Muslim World”….Saudi Arabia…..sadly Saudi is NOT the Muslim World….regardless what the president had to say……

“I chose to make my first foreign visit a trip to the heart of the Muslim world,” President Trump said in Riyadh on Sunday, in a speech billed as a call to Muslims to promote a peaceful understanding of Islam and to unite against terrorists.

Riyadh is the capital of Saudi Arabia, but it is not the capital of the Muslim world. In fact, it’s worth remembering that “the Muslim world” is not actually a place. It’s a Western idea built on the faulty racial logic that Muslims live in a world of their own—that Islam is an eastern, foreign religion that properly belongs in a distant, faraway, dusty place. (This is arguably the logic that underlies Trump’s Muslim travel ban, currently held up in the courts: Islam is foreign, “Islam hates us,” Islam cannot possibly be a real American religion and that is why we can ban its adherents. Stephen Miller, an architect of the travel ban, was also reportedly among the writers of Trump’s Islam speech.)

Source: Trump Addressed a ‘Muslim World’ That Does Not Exist – The Atlantic

The American Conservative posted that Trump should not make this speech, this was before the trip began…..

One of the possible pitfalls of Trump’s upcoming foreign trip is the speech he intends to give in Saudi Arabia on Islam:

A speech was added in Saudi Arabia to provide an “inspiring yet direct” message to the Islamic world, according to national security adviser H.R. McMaster. That’s an echo of Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama, who addressed Muslims in Cairo in his first major speech on foreign soil.

A second address in Israel, which local newspapers reported would take place at the ancient archeological site of Masada, was moved indoors to a museum. Transporting Trump to the mountaintop overlooking the Dead Sea would have required the use of a cable car.

Both speeches were being drafted by Trump’s policy adviser Stephen Miller, who helped write Trump’s convention and inaugural addresses, with input from the large collection of advisers who are helping to plan the trip: son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, McMaster and deputy national security adviser Dina Powell.

Source: Trump’s Islam Speech Is a Mistake | The American Conservative

Well in all honesty this is a moot point because the speech he made was not about Islam at all…..but others did not seem to think much of this speech at all……

First is an op-ed from the NYT….and as one would think it is not very flattering…..

Two of our opinion writers, Mustafa Akyol in Istanbul and Wajahat Ali in the Washington, D.C. area, watched President Trump’s speech in Saudi Arabia this morning and discussed what they thought it means for the Middle East, American foreign policy and Muslims around the world.

Finally a piece written by Juan Cole……..again not very flattering……

Trump’s speech on Islam, written by notorious Islamophobe Stephen Miller, who used to organize Orwellian Two Minutes Hate sessions against Muslims at Duke, is just as bizarre as everything else Trump does.

Miller-Trump imply, as has become common in right wing American discourse, that Muslims have a peculiar problem inasmuch as they produce terrorists. What do they think the Ku Klux Klan is? I estimate that people of European Christian heritage polished off as many as 100 million persons in the 20th century and that Muslims may have killed 2-3 million.

Source: Trump on Islam: Neo-Orientalism and anti-Shi’ism

The speech on Islam was more about the divide and anti-Iran, which is a Shi’a sect within Islam, than it was about the religion per se….

Did Trump just declare an escalation in the situation between US and Iran?

Riddled with hypocrisy, clichés and absurdities, President Donald Trump’s speech Sunday before an assembly of monarchs and despots in Saudi Arabia spelled out an agenda of escalating US militarism throughout the Middle East and a buildup in particular toward war with Iran.

Hailed by a fawning American media as “presidential”–supposedly eclipsing for the moment the crises and factional struggles engulfing the administration–the speech was reportedly drafted by Stephen Miller, the extreme right-wing ideologue credited with being the chief architect of Trump’s abortive executive order banning people from seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the US.

Source: Trump’s Speech in Riyadh Signals US Escalation Against Iran | Global Research – Centre for Research on Globalization

Is this a good thing or is it a line being drawn on the backs of our military?

The speech lecture is over…..we can all go back to our regularly watched commentary.

Closing Thought–22May17

The Glowing Orb Of Destiny!

The president has made a momentous trip aboard…..first stop….Saudi Arabia.  He made his speech and the world rejoiced…..but that is not the most talked about happening on this first trip…..so far……

The most talked about thing is the handling of the “Orb of Destiny”…or maybe is more like one “Orb to bring them all”……

View image on Twitter
WTF?
Okay somebody has got to explain this…the optics are just too much…and the subtitles can go on and on…..

In reality, Trump was attending the opening of the Global Centre for Combating Extremist Ideology along with Saudi Arabia King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi when the photo was taken.

The state-of-the art centre aims to monitor and combat global extremism in real time.

During the opening, the leaders in attendance placed their hands on an illuminated globe as a gesture of their combined commitment to ending terrorism, and to officially activate the centre by launching a welcome video on the screens above.

Cue the eerie music……

Like I said…the MOST interesting thing to happen on his trip……you know maybe this was not the best place for a photo-op….just saying…..

The conspiracy ass/wads should have a field day with this piece of “news”……but like moist of the conspiracies it is nothing more than vomit down the toilet…..

With that I call the day at end……I will return tomorrow with more stuff…TTFN….chuq