Trump 35: Still an Asshole to Everyone but Ivanka

[Howl]

13 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

 

This is so horrible it breaks my heart. Pompeo and whoever lobbyists deserve to burn in hell.   When you have 8.4 million people at risk of starvation, you know that you already have that many desperately hungry, malnourished people, including millions of children. 

[GreyhoundFan]

[GreyhoundFan]

[Destiny]

Oh for fuck’s sake you guys. Sorry for just a tweet instead of a real story, but i don’t have a lot of time and I read the story on Spanish language media. If you click on the twitter story, there’s a lot more to the rant than just that. 

[onekidanddone]

54 minutes ago, Destiny said:

Oh for fuck’s sake you guys. Sorry for just a tweet instead of a real story, but i don’t have a lot of time and I read the story on Spanish language media. If you click on the twitter story, there’s a lot more to the rant than just that. 

I know very well this is my BEC moment, but I so want to message my (former) friend and ask her how she likes likes the way Trump is “Making Purto Rico great again. 

Jewish woman who grew up the island and is a stone hard trump supporter. I have a feeling her husband is more hard line than she is, but that doesn’t make much better. 

I want to scream at her and ask her if she gets a fucking clue that every time Trump runs his racist pie hole about PR he is talking about her family and loved ones. He is talking about her children. He is talking about her

[GreyhoundFan]

"‘I’m not the president of the globe’: Trump goes it alone as he faces world leaders amid trade war against China"

Spoiler

NEW YORK — As China’s rapid rise presented a challenge to the United States, political leaders in Washington were confident that the American model for prosperity would triumph over the path pursued by their communist rival.

While China sought to win global influence through trans­actional, checkbook diplomacy, the United States offered a fuller package — not just financial investment but also security guarantees and leadership on human rights and the rule of law.

Now, President Trump prepares to face world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly this week in the middle of a fast-escalating, head-on trade war with China. It’s one that his critics say is being waged on Beijing’s terms, as the president has rattled U.S. allies and undermined partners, looked the other way on human rights abuses and cozied up to authoritarian leaders.

The upshot is a growing consensus that the United States under Trump is going it alone — a sharp break from the multi­lateral approach that leaders of both political parties have pursued since World War II.

Trump believes he is winning the trade dispute with Beijing, contrasting the record U.S. stock market highs with recent sluggishness in China’s economy. Economists warn that he could be underestimating the willingness of Chinese President Xi Jinping, who has consolidated power, to play the long game.

Beyond that, however, the United States under Trump has surrendered ground in other ­areas: engaging in trade disputes with Europe, South Korea, Japan, Mexico and Canada; criticizing NATO; and withdrawing from the Paris climate deal, the Iran nuclear accord and the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

The United States had long sought to manage China’s rise by pressuring it to become a more responsible global player and engage in multilateral institutions. Now it is the Trump administration that is turning away.

Last week, national security adviser John Bolton eviscerated the International Criminal Court, declaring that the autonomous body founded in 2002 in The Hague is “dead to us.” The White House also announced that Trump would skip three regional summits in Southeast Asia in November, the first time since 2013 that an American president has been absent.

In the past, American leaders believed “we could cede an absolute majority of the pie and trade that relative wealth for dramatically increased influence,” said Danny Russel, an Asia Society analyst who served as a high-ranking Asia policy official in the Obama administration. “But if we really are reverting to a more primitive barter system, then we lose that. Then we are competing on China’s terms — at a moment when China is on the upswing. Very few countries, if any, believe that of the two countries, America’s day is dawning.”

At the United Nations, aides said, Trump is prepared to amplify the message he foreshadowed on the same stage a year ago: a demand for other nations to respect the “national sovereignty” of the United States and one another. Aides said Trump’s presence at the U.N. conference — Xi is not attending — demonstrates his commitment to global partnerships. But the president has consistently sown doubt through his nationalist rhetoric and unilateral actions on trade.

“The forces opposing us in Washington are the same people who squandered trillions of dollars overseas, who sacrificed our sovereignty, who shipped away our jobs, who oversaw the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of the world,” Trump said at a campaign rally in Las Vegas on Thursday. “In 2016, the American people voted to reject this corrupt globalism. Hey, I’m the president of the United States — I’m not the president of the globe.”

In many ways, Trump’s “America First” message is one that Beijing understands. Since taking office in 2012, Xi has aimed to return China to a dominant role in Asia, a strategy he touted as the “Chinese Dream.”

In doing so, Xi has sought to elbow the United States and other global powers out of what Beijing considers China’s sovereign claims, which its leaders call “core interests.” Among them are the South China Sea, a crucial shipping corridor over which China has asserted maritime control, and Taiwan, the target of an intensifying campaign by Beijing to isolate the island diplomatically.

At the same time, China has signaled it would do business with other nations without calling for reforms of their style of governance or pressuring them on human rights.

China unveiled a trade agreement in Southeast Asia called the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, which lacks the type of labor and environmental protections that marked the TPP, envisioned as a higher-standard, 12-nation agreement, sans China, to reduce tariffs and establish new regulatory structures.

Chinese leaders also launched an ambitious “Belt and Road” foreign investment program aimed at distributing tens of billions of dollars in infrastructure loans to countries, drawing them into Beijing’s political sphere.

The other countries “do not necessarily want Chinese influence,” said Bonnie Glaser, a China analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “But if there’s not an alternative, they will take the risk of longer-term economic dependence and maybe even growing debt in order to get the short-term benefits. I worry about that.”

In recent months, nations have wrestled with the consequences of accepting China’s economic largesse. Malaysia canceled two giant projects funded with Chinese cash over fears that they would bankrupt the country. By contrast, El Salvador, eager to cash in with Beijing, severed diplomatic relations with Taiwan — drawing a rebuke from the White House.

“Countries seeking to establish or expand relations with China in order to attract state-directed investment . . . may be disappointed over the long run,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said. “Around the world, ­governments are waking up to the fact that China’s economic inducements facilitate economic dependency and domination, not partnership.”

But analysts said it will be difficult for the admin­istration to pressure other ­countries into turning away from China.

Several weeks ago, the State Department temporarily recalled three ambassadors from Latin America countries that cut relations with Taiwan. That came as Xi was playing host to the leaders of 53 African nations in Beijing and pledging a new $60 billion investment and loan package for the continent.

“They’ll have a hard time pushing countries to make a choice,” said Brian Klein, a former State Department official who served in China and India. “China’s throwing around a lot of money.”

White House allies praised the harder line Trump has taken with Beijing. Daniel Blumenthal, an Asia policy official at the Pentagon in the George W. Bush administration, complimented the administration for strengthening security ties with Japan and confronting the North Korean nuclear threat.

On human rights, however, Blumenthal said Trump had missed an opportunity by failing to condemn the imprisonment of an estimated 1 million Uighur Muslims languishing in “reeducation camps” in western China. The president also has said nothing in public about the persecution of more than 600,000 Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, which the United Nations labeled “ethnic cleansing.”

“The Chinese want to do a lot of business and diplomacy in Muslim-majority countries, and if you highlight a massive abuse of human rights, China would have to answer to that,” said Blumenthal, now a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

For countries assessing how to engage with the two economic behemoths, the uncertainty rests in the open question of whether Trump’s trade war is a tactical play to boost U.S. exports or a more strategic effort to punish China and make the American economy less reliant on its rival, said David Dollar, a Brookings Institution scholar.

On Fox News on Sunday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the administration is determined to force China “to behave in a way that if you want to be a power, a global power,” the country must respect “the fundamental principles of trade around the world — fairness, reciprocity.”

But Dollar, who served as a Treasury Department emissary to China from 2009 to 2013, said: “I don’t think the administration knows clearly what it’s doing. Other countries are confused. We’ve launched a lot of trade measures against other countries and sent a signal of withdrawal from the world.”

 

[AmazonGrace]

Bad news for chocolate lovers: 

 

[47of74]

10 hours ago, Destiny said:

Oh for fuck’s sake you guys. Sorry for just a tweet instead of a real story, but i don’t have a lot of time and I read the story on Spanish language media. If you click on the twitter story, there’s a lot more to the rant than just that. 

Like that orange fuck knows what the fuck he is doing?

Quote

President Trump on Monday declared himself an "absolute no" on the question of statehood for Puerto Rico as long as critics such as San Juan's mayor remain in office, the latest broadside in his feud with members of the U.S. territory's leadership.

Gov. Ricardo Rosselló, an advocate of statehood for the island, said Mr. Trump's remarks had trivialized the statehood process because of political differences.

"The president said he is not in favor of statehood for the people of Puerto Rico based on a personal feud with a local mayor. This is an insensitive, disrespectful comment to over 3 million Americans who live in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico," Rosselló said.

He also questioned how the president of the United States could be at the U.N. General Assembly promoting democracy around the world while "in his own home there is the oldest and most populated colonial system in the world."

 

[Rachel333]

"The likes of which have never been seen before!" I thought the nineteen woman who accused you of sexual assault were all lying?

[AmazonGrace]

When he posted that earlier it said, False Acquisitions.

[thoughtful]

1 hour ago, AmazonGrace said:

When he posted that earlier it said, False Acquisitions.

Melted Velveeta Boy likes to whine that he is a victim. In this case, though, I think he was -- a victim of autocorrect.

Autocorrect may have a point, though -- I bet he's acquired a lot of stuff he didn't deserve. Like, for example, all of the jobs he's ever had.

[AmazonGrace]

Can we avoid World War III? 

United Nations laughed at Trump bragging about his awesomeness

 

[thoughtful]

41 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

 

 

 I'm disappointed nobody said "Oh, my God!" as that woman in church did when Jill Rodrigues announced her umpteenth pregnancy.

I bet he thought he was displaying modesty by putting in that "almost."

I may be reading too much into his expression, but I think there's anger under that wry smile.

[AmazonGrace]

 

 

It seems like"but that's okay" is one of his tells he's not okay with whatever it is

More UN videos

[47of74]

Yeah I love that fuckhead got laughed at to his face.  That's what happens when that orange fuck steps outside his comfort bubble that's filled with Branch Trumpvidians.

[AnywhereButHere]

Wait - What? Rumors of Rosenstein's firing/quitting aren't distracting anyone from Kavanaugh? Or Kavanaugh isn't distracting from Rosenstein? The hurricane didn't distract from either of them? What am I to do?

Oh - I know. I'll go before the UN and tout isolationism and say how great we are. Oh, and shit on Iran. That'll do it!

[AmazonGrace]

At least nobody's talking about jailed toddlers and Anonymous op ed anymore.  

 

[47of74]

I noticed Spanky McToadstool wasn’t doing that stupid fist pumping in the way in like he did at the PA memorial. Of course he had to speak to people who weren’t Branch Trumpvidians and who were brown people.

[hoipolloi]

2 hours ago, AnywhereButHere said:

Oh - I know. I'll go before the UN and tout isolationism and say how great we are. Oh, and shit on Iran. That'll do it!

And then I'll blow some neo-Nazi & fundie dogwhistles:

Globalism = Jews in Bannon-speak. 

Doctrine of Patriotism = Spurgeon's 1902 speech in which he said: 

Quote

Let us have loyalty, by all means, but, chiefly, loyalty to Christ! Let us have true patriotism, but, especially that patriotism which consists in love to "the land of the living" of which Christ is the one King and Ruler.

 

[Cartmann99]

2 hours ago, AnywhereButHere said:

Wait - What? Rumors of Rosenstein's firing/quitting aren't distracting anyone from Kavanaugh? Or Kavanaugh isn't distracting from Rosenstein? The hurricane didn't distract from either of them? What am I to do?

Oh - I know. I'll go before the UN and tout isolationism and say how great we are. Oh, and shit on Iran. That'll do it!

Just be glad he didn't whip out Little Donnie. 

[AmazonGrace]

Wherein Daniel Dale points out that whether border apprehensions are up or down, Trump brags about it either way because it proves he's great.

[JMarie]

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2018/09/25/trump-attacks-second-kavanaugh-accuser-she-was-totally-inebriated-and-all-messed-up/23541548/

Quote

Two women have publicly accused Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct. The first, Christine Blasey Ford, said that Kavanaugh attempted to rape her at a party in suburban Maryland when they were teenagers. The second, Deborah Ramirez, alleges that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her during a dorm-room party when they were both freshmen at Yale. (She had been drinking at the time of the alleged incident.)

Quote

Trump dismissed Ramirez’s allegations as part of what he called a “con game.”

“She said well it might not be him, and there were gaps, and she was totally inebriated and all messed up,” the president said. “She doesn’t know it was him but it might have been him and ‘Oh gee let’s not make him a Supreme Court judge because of that.‘”

“The second accuser doesn’t even know, she thinks maybe it could have been him, maybe not,” Trump fumed. “Admits she was drunk. She admits time lapses, this is a person, and this is a series of statements that is going to take one of the most talented intellects from a judicial standpoint in our country – keep him off the U.S. Supreme Court? He has the chance to be one of the greatest justices in the United States Supreme Court. What a shame.”

Trump is going to be soooo pissed off if Kavanaugh doesn't make it to the Supreme Court.

[AmazonGrace]

Trump: I totally meant to do that 

 

[Dandruff]

5 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Trump: I totally meant to do that 

 

What was great?  If it was the laughter, then wouldn't he have said "and it was great" vs. "but it was great"?  And if he thought they were laughing with him, vs. at him, wouldn't he have been laughing too?

[GreyhoundFan]

A good one from Dana Milbank: "Trump is the laughingstock of the world"

Spoiler

Promise made, promise kept.

“The world is laughing at us,” Donald Trump often said during the campaign.

The claim was not obviously true then, but Trump has made it so. The world is now laughing at us — specifically, at our president.

“In less than two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country,” Trump boasted, in typical fashion, to world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday. “So true,” he added, as if addressing a campaign rally.

The world leaders chuckled at the braggart before them.

“Didn’t expect that reaction,” Trump acknowledged, “but that’s okay.”

In fairness to those who chortled, Trump’s speech was funny, in a way: a kind of rhetorical blitzkrieg. Trump spoke as though he had accepted a dare to see how much of the world he could offend in the span of a 35-minute address. It felt as though Triumph the Insult Comic Dog had been unleashed in the General Assembly.

Not only did Trump criticize the usual suspects — Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and particularly Iran — but he also attacked China, the 15-nation Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, the 164-nation World Trade Organization, the U.N. Human Rights Council, Germany, the International Criminal Court, socialist countries (what did the Scandinavians ever do to him?), and the United Nations’ two-month-old Global Compact on Migration. He threatened recipients of U.S. foreign aid — almost all of South America, Africa, Eastern Europe and South Asia — and reiterated his vow to cut payments for peacekeeping.

By the end of the barrage, he had taunted nations that are home to perhaps 90 percent of the world’s population. Billions of people dissed in half an hour? Even for Trump that’s huge.

“The United States will not be taken advantage of any longer,” proclaimed the leader of the richest nation on Earth. “America will never apologize for protecting its citizens,” he said of his protectionist trade policies.

Each time he used the word “global,” it was as an epithet, disparaging the very principle on which the world body was founded amid the ashes of World War II. America rejects “global governance, control and domination,” he said, and “we will never surrender America’s sovereignty to an unelected, unaccountable global bureaucracy,” and “we reject the ideology of globalism and we embrace the doctrine of patriotism.”

He stuck to his teleprompter, squinting and using a sing-song delivery to read the words adviser Stephen Miller had written for him, adding occasional banal grace notes: “Far greater!” “Just can’t do it!” “Not good!” The foreign leaders in the room shook their heads, shrugged, smiled and whispered to each other. They applauded other leaders when introduced and during their addresses; Trump didn’t get any (except at the moment when they were laughing at him) until the polite ovation when he finished.

But this address was for domestic consumption, a campaign speech against the world to appeal to his nationalist base. Trump already alienated the world; Tuesday alone brought reports that Europe was devising ways around U.S. sanctions on Iran, Chinese state media was whipping up popular sentiment to fight the trade war Trump started, and the administration was about to miss the deadline for a trade agreement with Canada and Mexico. Trump’s speech did to the world what he does to domestic opponents: name-calling and humiliation.

OPEC: “We defend many of these nations for nothing and then they take advantage of us.”

Trade: “We will no longer tolerate such abuse.”

Mexico: “We’ve started the construction of a major border wall.” (Congress just sent him a spending bill without funds for the wall.)

The Human Rights Council: “a grave embarrassment.”

Germany: “will become totally dependent on Russian energy.”

The WTO: Member countries “rig the system in their favor.”

The ICC: “has no jurisdiction, no legitimacy and no authority.”

Socialism: “It has produced suffering, corruption and decay . . . incursion and oppression. All nations of the world should resist socialism and the misery that it brings to everyone.”

While trashing these and other institutions, Trump hailed the “courage” of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and praised the nationalist governments of Poland and Israel, both of which have made recent moves to restrict democracy. He offered no criticism, and barely a mention, of Russia.

Trump, rejecting the U.N. plan to address the migrant crisis, instead suggested that other nations embrace a familiar-sounding theme. “Make Their Countries Great Again,” he proposed.

MTCGA!

An American president, devoting half an hour before the world body to insulting friend and foe alike and trashing all efforts at international cooperation? Sad.

The same American president then suggesting that the solution to the world’s problems is for other nations to adopt his campaign slogan? Now that’s funny.