Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Edge-]

Remember that poll that showed that Americans somehow think that the US is now viewed better by the international community? The one that had something like 80% of Republicans and somewhere around 60% of independents holding that view?

Yeah well...not so much in reality, which isn't surprising to anyone actually paying attention.

https://www.npr.org/2019/02/28/69916...lup-poll-finds

Worldwide approval of U.S. leadership remains low but relatively stable after a dramatic drop during President Trump's first year in office, while China's rating ticked up to its highest in almost a decade, according to a Gallup poll released Thursday.

The report, which measures how adults in 133 countries feel about the global leadership of the U.S., China, Germany and Russia, shows that U.S. leadership earned a median 31 percent approval rating in 2018, a slight uptick from 30 percent the year before.

Positive international perception of both Chinese and Russian leadership continues to strengthen, according to the report, while Germany, which leads in the rankings, fell just below a 40 percent approval rating for the first time in more than a decade.

The low approval rating for the U.S. "suggests that the doubts sowed in Trump's first year about U.S. commitments abroad have taken root," the Gallup report reads. "In this climate, China's leadership has gained a larger advantage in the 'great power competition,' and the other player, Russia, is now on a more even level with the U.S."

For much of the past decade, the U.S. maintained a lead of more than 10 percentage points over China and Russia in the polls, competing with Germany for the spot of the most well-regarded global leader. That changed in 2017, when the U.S. saw its image abroad fall sharply in the poll.

In the most recent report, the U.S. remained neck and neck with China and Russia. China's approval rating jumped up to 34 percent, while Russia continued its steady upward trend of the past few years and reached its highest rating since 2008, hovering just below the U.S. at 30 percent.

Cool, so the US went from the clear global leader to behind China and just barley ahead of Russia.

THIS ALL SEEMS TO BE GOING FUCKING GREAT GUYS. REAL FUCKING GREAT. Republicans are doing a fantastic job of killing off the US's soft power, which has been immensely beneficial for the US over the decades.

[Breccia]

Cool, so the US went from the clear global leader to behind China and just barley ahead of Russia.

But Trump said the US is respected again! Are you saying Trump lied? Because I'll take that with a grain of salt.

[TotallyGenericName]

Woah, 907 pages. That's intense.

Somehow, I feel like this is just want Trump wants: a bunch of people talking about him.

[NoiseTank13]

Woah, 907 pages. That's intense.

Somehow, I feel like this is just want Trump wants: a bunch of people talking about him.

Do you also use the dumb ass argument of 'saying mean things about Trump got him elected!'?

[Somewhatconcerned]

Imagine the outcry from the GOP if Obama had cozied up to Kim like that. Wow.

[Wyrt]

Imagine the outcry from the GOP if Obama had cozied up to Kim like that. Wow.

Imagine it? We can just look back to 2008 when Obama said he'd be willing to meet with Kim.

[TotallyGenericName]

Do you also use the dumb ass argument of 'saying mean things about Trump got him elected!'?

Um, I’m conservative. It wasn’t really meant to be a slight. Feel free to calm the fuck down.

[Orbitus]

Imagine the outcry from the GOP if Obama had cozied up to Kim like that. Wow.

We don't have to. Look at the videos of Fox News and them going fucking apeshit about Obama even just thinking about going to talking to Kim.

[Dontrike]

Man, what's with Republican officials and cozying up to pedophiles?

They love diddling.

[Mormolyce]

Did he now literally say that he felt a warmth between him and a dictator?

No no, nothing like that. He said he fell in love.

Donald Trump's relationship with Kim Jong-un: 'We fell in love' after 'beautiful letters'

"I was really being tough - and so was he. And we would go back and forth," Mr Trump told a rally in West Virginia.

"And then we fell in love, okay? No, really - he wrote me beautiful letters, and they're great letters," he said.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/201...ove-beautiful/

Also, remember the time the brutal authoritarian Duterte sang a love song for him?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XVjYkChAoA

- - - Updated - - -

Cool, so the US went from the clear global leader to behind China and just barley ahead of Russia.

Hard to imagine how bad you're doing on the world leadership scales when you're behind China.

A largely insular country with almost no impact on global popular culture, with an extremely corrupt and authoritarian goverment up to its eyeballs in human rights violations.

[Skroe]

Um, I’m conservative. It wasn’t really meant to be a slight. Feel free to calm the fuck down.

The only conservatives who support Trump are Vichy-Conservatives. They've become excuse makers for their occupier.

Sincerely,

Someone who has been a politically active conservative and donated thousands of dollars to conservative causes since 2009.

[Breccia]

It's a relatively minor point, because Trump lies all the time about everything, but remember that Trump claimed "Basically, they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, and we couldn't do that. We had to walk away from that."

The State Department gently corrected him. They're at least partially backing NK's side of the story, in that NK wanted sanctions lifted that impacted civilians, and didn't mention sanctions on weapons and weapons tech.

According to a senior official who briefed the media on condition he not be named because he was not authorized to discuss the negotiations publicly, the North Koreans "basically asked for the lifting of all sanctions."

But he acknowledged the North's demand was only for Washington to back the lifting of United Nations Security Council sanctions imposed since March 2016 and didn't include the other resolutions going back a decade more.

What Pyongyang was seeking, he said, was the lifting of sanctions that impede the civilian economy and the people's livelihood — as [NK foreign minister ]Ri had claimed.

The U.N. Security Council has imposed nearly a dozen resolutions targeting North Korea, making it one of the most heavily sanctioned countries in the world. So Kim was indeed seeking a lot of relief — including the lifting of bans on everything from trade in metals, raw materials, luxury goods, seafood, coal exports, refined petroleum imports, raw petroleum imports.

But Kim wasn't looking for the lifting of sanctions on armaments. Those were imposed earlier, from 2006, when the North conducted its first nuclear test.

For Pyongyang, that's a key difference.

Details of the UN sanctions in question can be found here.

For most people, lying to the world about why you walked away from a major peace deal would be kind of important. Won't even break Trump's top 10 for the week.

[Celista]

https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/01/polit...rea/index.html

Funny how Trump keeps siding with foreign leaders with a long history of corruption, rather than Americans.

[Breccia]

Funny how Trump keeps siding with foreign leaders with a long history of corruption, rather than Americans.

How many families that have suffered a major loss has Trump personally insulted now? I know about them and the Gold Star family, and I'm pretty sure the family of the victim murdered by a Nazi marching the street isn't his best friend. Am I missing some?

[Benggaul]

How many families that have suffered a major loss has Trump personally insulted now? I know about them and the Gold Star family, and I'm pretty sure the family of the victim murdered by a Nazi marching the street isn't his best friend. Am I missing some?

The Parkland students aren't too thrilled either. What's sad is that there have been so many atrocities in the two years of his administration you start forgetting the earlier ones with each new outrage he commits.

[Edge-]

https://www.politico.com/magazine/st...council-225442

Now, two years into Trump’s tenure, current and former U.S. officials say they are worried about the long-term damage his administration is still doing to the way such critical decisions are made — with dangerous consequences that are not always easy to perceive. They worry Trump’s presidency has poisoned the relationship between career government staffers and political appointees, threatening the ability of a future president to make decisions based on nonpartisan expertise. Some were relieved after Trump’s first national security adviser, Mike Flynn, was fired; he’s still due for sentencing after getting caught up in the federal investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia. And they were heartened that Trump’s second national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, reinstituted traditional processes during his year at the helm, even if Trump disliked them. But because Trump’s current national security adviser, John Bolton, has largely scuttled those procedures, the fears have resurfaced over the past year.

Politico has a great piece detailing the pure and unbridled chaos and confusion that the Trump administration unleashed on professional, non-partisan staff who simply wanted to do things the right way. This is the kind of shit I've been worried about, Trump is chipping away at key institutions from the inside without anyone outside being able to see it. He's undermining trust amongst his own staff and agencies. He's dangerously reckless and irresponsible, and the damage will last far beyond his presidency.

I still weep for all the institutional knowledge lost as staff resigned or were fired/forced out and either not replaced at all or replaced by people with no experience. Institutional knowledge is the bedrock of any large, successful organization, especially something as complex as the federal government. You can't just write that shit down, that's the kind of shit that's passed from one person to another through working together.

[TotallyGenericName]

The only conservatives who support Trump are Vichy-Conservatives. They've become excuse makers for their occupier.

Sincerely,

Someone who has been a politically active conservative and donated thousands of dollars to conservative causes since 2009.

So dramatic lol

[DarkTZeratul]

https://www.politico.com/magazine/st...council-225442



Politico has a great piece detailing the pure and unbridled chaos and confusion that the Trump administration unleashed on professional, non-partisan staff who simply wanted to do things the right way. This is the kind of shit I've been worried about, Trump is chipping away at key institutions from the inside without anyone outside being able to see it. He's undermining trust amongst his own staff and agencies. He's dangerously reckless and irresponsible, and the damage will last far beyond his presidency.

I still weep for all the institutional knowledge lost as staff resigned or were fired/forced out and either not replaced at all or replaced by people with no experience. Institutional knowledge is the bedrock of any large, successful organization, especially something as complex as the federal government. You can't just write that shit down, that's the kind of shit that's passed from one person to another through working together.

Unfortunately, we've been saying this for months now.

[Edge-]

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8803951.html

So, the US got literally nothing out of this second summit (just like the first one).

What did North Korea get? Well, they already got the suspension of joint military exercises, international recognition, and more propaganda material than they could ever dream of. BUT WAIT THERE IS MORE!

The US is also ending its large scale war game exercises with South Korea.

Man, for being the "master dealmaker" Trump sure gave a whole lot to NK without getting anything back. He's not getting that Peace Prize.

[Breccia]

The US is also ending its large scale war game exercises with South Korea.

Well, if I were South Korea, who recently agreed to pay more for US military aid, then Trump stops holding such exercises as training, then I would probably fail to pay Trump because of breach of contract. Trump does that all the time, valid or otherwise, so why wouldn't SK?