I seriously do not see the point of arguing about the bows when the Saudis are trying to buy Trumps policy with this military deal.
I would much rather have the discussion about whether or not this deal represents a win for the US (this is problematic because I think most people here would think no)
Whoās tired of all the winning?
Hey man, I just posted a picture. Then Androgenoid decided to use words he doesnāt know, so had to intervene because #WordsMatter EDIT: Believe Me.
Itās a continuation of support that Britain / US has given to the Saudis since before The First World War. Nothing new here.
I donāt think itās a good deal for the US. It is for defense industry magnates and Saudi royalty, but not for the US. While the Gulf countries saw Obama as weak (for good reason, in many instances), Obama did begin to create some separation from that area in terms of security guarantees and the like. That was a good development. We have needed for some time to put some distance between the US and Gulf countries.
Trump wants to double down on our commitment there on a purported theory the Gulf countries (here, the Saudis) will be robust counterterrorism partners. I donāt buy it, and I think thatās mostly a pretext to what is primarily a trade and industry deal, not a national security one.
Politically, itās also odd for Trump - he spends a lot of time bashing NATO and Europe for abusing the US security guaranty (although he backtracked some after he got elected), but heās more than happy to further extend it to Gulf countries? The āAmerica Firstā wing of Trump supporters should be very confused and angry about this.
All in, this deal doesnāt make the US all that safer and certainly doesnāt make us more independent- it enriches some industries and companies in exchange for having to (over)commit to intervening in the Gulf.
Totally different now - that was just Game back then. Now Trump has done the electric slide with the woman enslavers and the gay haters, and, uh, MAGA.
Jared Kushner selling green cards to Chinese moguls. Absolutely gross. This is fully indefensible.
I have been more than willing to give the Trump admin the benefit of the doubt, but not if this is how it will proceed.
Speaking of āTotally Differentā, TB:
" In his speech in Riyadh; the President did not utter the phrase āradical Islamic terrorism,ā; words former President Obama declined to use during his time in office, but that Mr. Trump not only used frequently on the campaign trail; but frequently criticized President Obama for not using".
(Must all be part of āThe Gameā I guess, TBā¦)
Foreign donors control US foreign policy.
Those foreign donors arenāt Russians
Why would he do that in Saudi Arabia? Thatās inappropriate
Ohā¦my badā¦
Trump never does or says anything inappropriateā¦
ā¦Putin and the Saudi Crown?
Nah, I wasnāt diggin on you mate. I was speaking in general about the situationāto me a bow is not something I am happy the President would do (especially being the leader of the most powerful nation in the world) but the formalism matters less to me than whether our policy choices hurt or help us.
Apologies that wasnāt clear.
Is there a point youāre trying to make?
Sure, but do you think this new evolution is a change in quality?
Most of you know I like Peggy Noonan. You may not know that she won the Pulitzer Prize for her commentary on the Trump campaign. I liked this Op. Ed.
Paywalled - Long Block of Text.
Democracy Is Not Your Plaything
This will be unpleasantly earnest, but having witnessed the atmospherics the past 10 days itās what I think needs saying:
Everyone, get serious.
Democracy is not your plaything.
This is not a game.
The president of the United States has produced a building crisis that is unprecedented in our history. The question, at bottom, is whether Donald Trump has demonstrated, in his first four months, that he is unfit for the presidencyāwholly unsuited in terms of judgment, knowledge, mental capacity, personal stability. That epic question is then broken down into discrete and specific questions: Did he improperly attempt to interfere with an FBI criminal investigation, did his presidential campaign collude with a foreign government, etc.
But the epic question underlies all. It couldnāt be more consequential and will take time to resolve. The sheer gravity of the drama will demand the best from all of us. Are we up to it?
Mr. Trumpās longtime foes, especially Democrats and progressives, are in the throes of a kind of obsessive delight. Every new blunder, every suggestion of an illegality, gives them pleasure. āHeāll be gone by autumn.ā
But he was duly and legally elected by tens of millions of Americans who had legitimate reasons to support him, who knew they were throwing the long ball, and who, polls suggest, continue to support him. They believe the press is trying to kill him. āHeās new, not a politician, give him a chance.ā What would it do to them, what would it say to them, to have him brusquely removed by his enemies after so little time? Would it tell them democracy is a con, the swamp always wins, you nobodies can make your little choices but weāre in control? What will that do to their faith in our institutions, in democracy itself?
These are wrenching questions.
But if Mr. Trump is truly unfitāif he has demonstrated already, so quickly, that he cannot competently perform the role, and that his drama will only get more dangerous and chaotic, how much time should pass to let him prove it? And how dangerous will the proving get?
Again, wrenching questions. So this is no time for blood lust and delight. Because democracy is not your plaything.
The presidentās staffers seem to spend most of their time on the phone, leaking and seeking advantage, trying not to be named in the next White House Shake-Up story. A reliable anonymous source who gives good quote will be protectedāfor a while. The president spends his time tweeting his inane, bizarre messagesāheās the victim of a āwitch huntāāfrom his bed, with his iPad. And giving speeches, as he did this week at the Coast Guard Academy: āNo politician in history, and I say this with great surety, has been treated worse or more unfairly.ā Actually Lincoln got secession, civil war and a daily pounding from an abolitionist press that thought he didnāt go far enough and moderates who slammed his brutalist pursuit of victory. Then someone shot him in the head. So he had his challenges.
Journalists on fire with the great story of their livesāthe most bizarre presidency in U.S. history and the breaking news of its daily misstepsācheer when their scoop that could bring down a president gets more hits then the previous record holder, the scoop that could bring down the candidate.
Stop leaking, tweeting, cheering. Democracy is not your plaything.
Thereās a sense nobodyās in charge, that thereās no power center thatās holding, that in Washington theyāre all randomly slamming into each other.
Which is not good in a crisis.
For Capitol Hill Democrats the crisis appears to be primarily a chance to showboat. Republicans are evolving, some starting to use the word āunfitā and some, as a congressman told me, ātalking like theyāre in a shelter for abused women. āHe didnāt mean to throw me down the stairs.ā āHe promised not to punch me again.ā ā
Weāre chasing so many rabbits, we canāt keep trackāComey, FBI, memoranda; Russia, Flynn, the Trump campaign; Lavrov, indiscretions with intelligence. Itās become a blur.
But thereās an emerging sense of tragedy, isnāt there? Crucially needed reforms in taxing, regulation and infrastructureāchanges the country needs!āare thwarted, all momentum killed. Markets are nervous.
The world sees the U.S. political system once again as a circus. Once the circus comes to town, it consumes everything, absorbs all energy.
I asked the ambassador to the U.S. from one of our greatest allies: āWhat does Europe say now when America leaves the room?ā Youāre still great, he said, but āwe think youāre having a nervous breakdown.ā
It is absurd to think the president can solve his problems by firing his staff. They are not the problem. He is the problem. Theyāre not the A-Team, theyāre not the counselors youād want, experienced and wise. Theyāre the island of misfit toys. But they could function adequately if he could lead adequately. For months heās told friends heās about to make big changes, and doesnāt. Why? Maybe because talented people on the outside donāt want to enter a poisonous staff environment just for the joy of committing career suicide. So heās stuck, surrounded by people who increasingly resent him, who fear his unpredictability and pique and will surely one day begin to speak on the record.
A mystery: Why is the president never careful? He doesnāt act as if heās picking his way through a minefield every day, which he is. He acts like heās gamboling through safe terrain. Thus he indulges himself with strange claims, statements, tweets. He comports himself as if he has a buffer of deep support. He doesnāt. Nationally his approval numbers are in the mid to high 30s.
His position is not secure. And yet he gambols on, both paranoid and oblivious.
History is going to judge us by how we comported ourselves in this murky time. It will see who cared first for the country and who didnāt, who kept his head and did not, who remained true and calm and played it straight.
Now there will be a special prosecutor. In the short term this buys the White House time.
Hereās an idea.
It would be good if top Hill Republicans went en masse to the president and said: āStop it. Clean up your act. Shut your mouth. Do your job. Stop tweeting. Stop seething. Stop wasting time. You lost the thread and donāt even know what you were elected to do anymore. Get a grip. Grow up and look at the terrain, see it for what it is. We have limited time. Every day you undercut yourself, you undercut us. More important, you keep from happening the good policy things we could have done together. If you donāt grow up fast, youāll wind up abandoned and alone. Act like a president or leave the presidency.ā
Could it help? For a minute. But it would be constructiveānot just carping, leaking, posing, cheering and tweeting but actually trying to lead.
The president needs to be told: Democracy is not your plaything.
Outstanding article. Just awesome.
