Thursday, April 13, 2017

Bad Lessons

Our on the job trainee, has learned two bad lessons.  During the campaign Trump ate crowd noise, and sucked on polls.  As president he has learned that bombs are shiny objects that distract the media, and give him a poll bounce.  He has also learned, much to no one's surprise, but his own, that diplomacy is hard.

Expect more bombs, and muddled diplomacy.  After nearly 100 days in office, his State Department is staffed at the same level as Albania, and less than 1/10th the level of China.  As Rachel Maddow pointed out, this lead to a remarkable display of ineptitude in Trump's crucial meeting with Chinese premier Xi Jinping.  The Chinese prepared the typical multi-page meeting report, detailing all items discussed, and areas of agreement.  The US report was one paragraph, essentially saying it was a productive meeting.  Any future disputes will, of necessity, rely on the Chinese report. Sad!

Trump's attempt to pole vault into history, will land on shrapnel and missed opportunities.

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