The President Trump thread . . .

[Roger]

President Trump has a 'humiliating' (the BBC's word) defeat over healthcare changes.
The Bill is pulled because of a lack of support from some Republicans - Pres. Trump tried to force it through but his bluff failed.

Just heard the comment, 'over the last 8 years, all the Republicans had to do was disagree with the Democrats, now they have to learn to agree among themselves'.
Oh Dear ! 'The Art of the Deal'.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/mar/24/republican-healthcare-plan-bill-vote-pulled-obamacare-trump

[Alfie]

I chuckled when I saw this. Seems just about right.

[Roger]

Opinion from Tim Stanley in the DT. Some confusion as to how the rest of the Donald's agenda will be financed now . . . ATM this Presidency is NOT going well !
Obama having a quiet chuckle ?

''On the one hand, the failure of Trumpcare is obviously an embarrassment to the great deal maker. Take this vainglorious tweet from 2014: “Deals are my art form. Other people paint beautifully or write poetry. I like making deals, preferably big deals. That's how I get my kicks.”

On the other hand, this is a defeat that fair-minded people cannot pin exclusively on The Donald. Anything he could've offered the conservatives would've alienated the moderates, and vice versa. And these divisions over Obamacare long predated Trump. The conservative Freedom Caucus, which was primarily to blame for the legislative failure, was a product of the Tea Party revolution and represents a militant, anti-big government attitude that any Republican president would’ve had trouble winning over. Do you think Mitt Romney – dismissed as a "Massachusetts moderate" in 2012 – would’ve done any better? No.

I could go one step further and say that Trump actually benefits from this turn of events. If Obamacare had been repealed, poor and older whites would’ve been among those who would’ve suffered the most – and that’s Trump’s key constituency.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/25/dont-blame-trump-failure-repeal-obamacare-republican-crisis/

Just been up checking on Torquay United ! Back to bed now. Fan dee.

[Roger]

Here we go - a timeworn scenario.
Foreign adventures the antidote to problems at home.
Let's hope DT can get some cooperation from China.
But a major row between President Trump and President Xi is just as likely ?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/apr/02/donald-trump-north-korea-china

[Roger]

Oh Dear ! 59 Tomahawk Cruise missiles fired at a Syrian air base . .
Next up N.Korea and China ?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/07/donald-trump-launches-us-air-strikes-against-assad-regime-syria/

[Alfie]

^ Just for show, to deflect from all his domestic problems.

[Roger]

The World awaits what happens next . . .
How will Russia, China and N. Korea react ?
DT may be a man to scorn but a man to fear too !
From the Guardian today :-

''On Syria, Donald Trump has performed a U-turn so screeching, so dizzying, you can smell the burned rubber from here. Just 72 hours before these airstrikes, his administration was all but flashing a green light at Assad, hinting that he could do what he liked. Pull back further, and the volte-face is even more stunning. For years, Trump was adamant that he would stay out of Syria. Even when chemical weapons were used in August 2013, killing an estimated 1,300 people in Ghouta, Trump was firm: “What will we get for bombing Syria besides more debt and a possible long-term conflict?” he tweeted.
Above all, Trump will relish the comparisons with his predecessor. In 2013, Obama hesitated and havered over Syria’s use of chemical weapons, a Hamlet on the Potomac, his hand eventually stayed, in part, by Ed Miliband’s decision to vote down UK support for military action against Assad. Again, Trump was among those urging Obama to do nothing, further insisting that Obama needed congressional approval.

That scruple, along with everything else, will be forgotten now, as Trump revels in a comparison that, in his view, makes him look more decisive, more macho and even more humane than Obama. As Niblett says: “Trump has upheld a norm which Barack Obama, the great values president, did not.”
But that cannot alter the fact that, even as you welcome the act, its author remains wholly untrustworthy. Trump wanted us to believe he had been moved to action by the pictures of dead children in Khan Sheikhun. But what of all the “beautiful babies” killed away from the TV cameras these last six years, by bombs of a different variety? When they were being slaughtered, Trump was happy to shrug off their deaths, sending his secretary of state and his UN ambassador out just days ago to give Assad the wink that he could carry on as before. It’s not reassuring to think that the American president does not listen to his intelligence briefings or even read the papers, but only acts when a tragedy hits primetime.''

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/apr/07/convenient-u-turn-president-who-cant-be-trusted

[Roger]

As Team DT attempts the hopeless task (IMO) of pressuring Putin's Russia to end support for Assad's embattled Syria, there are ominous noises about N.Korea.

Reported on April 5th. ''Tillerson responded to the test with an a enigmatic statement saying only: “The United States has spoken enough about North Korea. We have no further comment.” A few hours earlier, before news of the new missile launch broke, a senior Trump administration official suggested time was running out for a diplomatic solution. ''

Reported on April 9th. ''The US navy will move a strike group towards the western Pacific Ocean to provide a presence near the Korean peninsula, a US official said on Saturday.
Trump tells Japan 'all options on the table' in face of North Korea provocation. The Carl Vinson strike group, which includes an aircraft carrier, will make its way from Singapore, according to the official, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity.''

DT has just met with President Xi of China. Will Xi be able to rein in N.Korea ?

Just MO but the it looks like the next 'provocation' from N. Korea may be it's last ?
Or it's last may be it's LAST ! President Trump takes pride in his dangerous freedom to press buttons at will.

[Roger]

Here we go then - dangerous days ?

The Telegraph
Syria crisis: Russia raises prospect of war if it is given G7 ultimatum as it mocks Boris Johnson's no-show
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/08/boris-johnson-spearhead-diplomatic-drive-get-russian-forces/

The Guardian
Global Times warns of catastrophic consequences if the US launch a strike against Pyongyang, after navy moves strike group to western Pacific
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/10/syria-strike-designed-to-intimidate-north-korea-chinese-state-newspaper-says

I'm disappointed Boris isn't going - by not talking we push Putin more and more to the margins.

Let's hope for better news soon.

[Alfie]

 

[Roger]

Alfie that is just too damn wicked.
And maybe true.

I did spot a story that N.Korea's next nuclear test is imminent.

[Roger]

I read a report that due to an error yesterday, the US killed 18 friendly fighters in Syria. Now President Trump drops a 10 tonne bomb on IS in Afghanistan.
The largest non-nuclear bomb ever used . .  .

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/13/us-military-drops-mother-bombs-isis-afghanistan/

The World watches the N.Korea situation - has DT managed to secure any help from China - or not ? The US knows exactly where this installation is.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/13/us-may-launch-strike-north-korea-goes-nuclear-weapons-test/

Heaven help all the poor Folks on the wrong end of all this.

[Alfie]

Apparently an MOAB costs USD 16 million and the one yesterday may have killed up to (maximum) 36 ISIS fighters, so that upwards of USD 444,000 per corpse. It was probably much cheaper to kill the 18 killed in friendly fire. Still, plenty more tax dollars where they came from.

[Roger]

It's beginning to feel like the Cuban Missile crisis ?
I remember my Mum then, crying in the car on Exmouth sea front, in a spot I could find now. Hopefully N.K. will back down . .
If not, the Chinese - but they are not known for it.
BTW, these are pretty wild headlines for the Daily T.
The trouble for me is, I understand where Donald T is coming from, but it ain't that simple.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/13/us-may-launch-strike-north-korea-goes-nuclear-weapons-test/

[Roger]

IMO this just about says it all about President Trump :-

''Less than 100 days into this presidency, it is blissfully clear what kind of leader Trump is. He has made the awesome transition from a neophyte candidate into a neophyte president; from a man who bluffed and blustered his way in TV debates to a man who bluffs and blusters his way through international crises.

Here is a small-time businessman who knew nothing about foreign affairs, who has grown into a nuclear-armed president who knows nothing about foreign affairs. He used to fire B-list celebrities on TV; now he just fires off tweets and Tomahawks after watching TV.

To put it mildly, it is troubling for any White House – at a time of high tensions with a rogue nuclear state – to act as dumb or duplicitous as Donald Trump. Machiavelli argued that it is better to be feared than loved. It’s also better to look like something other than a fool.

Because that’s what you look like when you misstate the mission and location of an entire aircraft carrier group: specifically, the USS Carl Vinson, a Nimitz class, nuclear-powered beast of the seas, accompanied by a strike force of two destroyers and a cruiser.''

[Coolkorat]

misstate the mission and location of an entire aircraft carrier group: specifically, the USS Carl Vinson, a Nimitz class, nuclear-powered beast of the seas, accompanied by a strike force of two destroyers and a cruiser.''

Do you think he misstated it, or he was kept in the dark by the Pentagon? On balance he should have known and was probably told, but did not look on a map to see where it was or which direction it was travelling and just assumed it was close by. He is clearly used to being able to say whatever he wants without consequence and cannot moderate his words: Obama, being a lawyer by training, would pause and consider his choice of words very carefully.

China may take this opportunity to 'solve' the problem by dramatically increasing their direct intervention in N Korea, giving them a mandate as a global peacemaker. Catapulted by this, the dispute over control of the South China Sea will become much more complex with the US having been displaced as the regional power. All those nations will be forced to accept China's redrawn map knowing they cannot rely on a strong US for support. Previous US administrations were 'disengaged' from the N Korean issue for very good reasons....

[Roger]

CK, I've been listening to the BBC and on balance, it sounds to me that DT may either have been misled or misunderstood.

But just maybe DT has been clever and played a bit of a bluff, knowing his Armada was due to play with the Australian Navy, (those exercises completed ?), and keeping N.Korea under pressure while China talks to them.

The Press will deride DT at every opportunity.
Probably rightly, but in this case, we may never know.

The main point is, the Armada is imminent and the situation is grave.

[Alfie]

It doesn't seem to matter to Trump the veracity of what comes out of his mouth.

The main point is, the Armada is imminent and the situation is grave.

But is it? Who's word do you have on that? Trumps?   

[Roger]

Imminent - ''coming on soon, about to happen, threatening'.
As per my Penguin Dictionary - cost 12 shillings and sixpence just 5 years ago.
Or 50 maybe.

Alfie I can't recall the USA Official who was talking on the BBC.
But you can call up 'Today' on the www.

It wasn't Trump's word.
Let's see what happens.
But 'grave' understates it really IMHO.

Pass me another 'U' beer !

[Coolkorat]

I stand by my view that China will ride in on 'white knight' mission, quietly remove Kim Jong-un, and start reshaping N Korea. N Korea will be 1000x better. The world will accept China as a great peacemaker. But is the US prepared to accept that the consequence is that it is no longer the major power in Asia? And then S Korea has China as a neighbour, with the historic Chinese position regarding Korea (which dates to the Ming period) coming true. An N Korea controlled by China is vastly more dangerous to S Korea. Will the US be prepared to face up to that threat?

Honestly, it does not bother me if this happens. China seems to be well run, has no expansionist ideas (other than those known) and is pragmatic. From a western perspective, what would be the issue? Dealing with a broadly cooperative China must surely be better than dealing with a Russia controlled by an ex-KGB agent bent on playing out his playbook? Hong Kong seems to be okay. But I wouldn't want to be Taiwan. If I were the US, I'd agitate along the Russian/Chinese border to deflect attention.