Trump failed as a cruel insurrectionist so now wants another chance to ruin democracy

Echo opinion published in The New York times by Caroline Fredrickson*:

Almost daily headlines are now describing what Donald Trump will do if re-elected: the mass deportations, the pardons handed out to his friends and golf buddies, the Justice Department settling scores and waging personal vendettas. The former president even promised violence if the election goes against him, warning that it could be a “blood bath.” But, as worrying as these dangerous prospects are, they are far from the biggest threats he poses. 

What we must fear most is Trump transforming our government into a modern-day Tammany Hall, installing a kleptocratic leadership that will be difficult if not impossible to dislodge.

I do not discount the possibility of state-sponsored violence, and I worry deeply about the politicization of the civil service. But those are, for the most part, threats and theories, and while they need to be taken seriously, people should be paying more attention to a far more likely reality: that Trump will spend much of his time in office enriching himself. He failed, spectacularly, as an insurrectionist and as a disrupter of the civil service, and his clownish and chaotic style may well lead to failure again — but he has succeeded time and time again in the art of the steal. If his grift continues into a second term, it will not only contribute to the fraying trust Americans have in their institutions, but also impair our ability to lead the world through a series of escalating crises.

Recall how Trump operated in his first term. Not only did he keep his stake in more than a hundred businesses, he made it a practice to visit his properties around the country, forcing taxpayers to pay for rooms and amenities at Trump hotels for the Secret Service and other staff members who accompanied him — money that went straight into his bank accounts and those of his business partners. Those interested in currying favor with the president, from foreign governments to would-be government contractors, knew to spend money at his hotels and golf clubs. According to internal Trump hotel documents, T-Mobile executives spent over $195,000 at the Trump Washington Hotel, after announcing a planned merger with Sprint in April 2018. Two years later, the merger was approved.

Government, like fish, rots from the head down. Mr. Trump’s example freed up cabinet members to award huge contracts to their friends, business associates and political allies, while others ran their departments like personal fiefs. After the State Department’s inspector general was fired, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s use of official trips for clandestine meetings with conservative donors and his family’s alleged misuse of staff members for tasks like walking his dog, picking up his wife from the airport and fetching his takeout came to light. And, in addition to being accused of improperly accepting gifts from those seeking influence, several other cabinet members were alleged to have used government funds for private travel. These may seem like banal infractions, but taken together, they are a reflection of who Mr. Trump is and how he governs.

Throughout his life, through Trump-branded (failed ❗) wine, chocolate bars, sneakers, NFTs, (ugly❗) ties, MAGA (junk) paraphernalia, a $59.99 Bible (of all things 😳) and, most recently, his Truth Social meme stock ploy, he has shown an unstoppable drive to enrich himself at all costs. He sees politics, like business, as a zero-sum game in which he wins only if someone else loses. These are the instincts that drive corruption, kleptocracy and grift. And, if past is prologue, we’re looking at a much more damaging sequel.

In a second term, Trump will have more freedom and power to undertake grift. He has already vowed to use pardons to protect supporters and possibly even himself from efforts to curb corruption (which may explain the nonchalance with which his son-in-law Jared Kushner has greeted criticism about the conflicts of interest raised by his recent real estate investments in Serbia and Albania, as well as the Saudi, Qatari and Emirati investments in his wealth fund). And, he and his political advisers are building a deep bench of committed and loyal employees who intend to corrode and potentially destroy mechanisms of accountability in government, paving the way for kleptocratic leaders to entrench themselves in the bureaucracy where many would be able to remain past Mr. Trump’s term. And the mere presence of a phalanx of unquestioning lieutenants in the civil service will ensure that other civil servants fear retribution for objecting to the self-enrichment.

Naturally, I worry about other things, too, particularly the possibility of political violence. Indeed, Trump could well claim he (Ugh❗) won the election, no matter the vote count, and call on his supporters to rise up to ensure his takeover. 

In a second term, Trump will have more freedom and power to undertake grift.

Even before the votes are cast, his supporters are threatening election officials, judicial officials and state legislators, trying to intimidate them into either helping Mr. Trump or stepping aside to be replaced by Trumpists.

But legal, law enforcement and security obstacles are still in place to slow down or stop these efforts. We must remember that this time around, President Biden will still be president, able to control the military and federal law enforcement, and Congress has amended the outdated and vague Electoral Count Act to make it much harder for Mr. Trump’s congressional allies to contest a Trump loss in the electoral college or on Capitol Hill.

No such guardrails exist to curb Trumpian corruption. The Supreme Court, itself corrupt, has made it virtually impossible to prosecute even the most blatant corruption by government officials.

In a kleptocracy, corruption is a feature, not a bug, where politicians apply the law inconsistently, favoring friends and punishing enemies. By controlling government assets and handing them out to friends and family — and dangling possibilities in front of would-be supporters — as well as using politically motivated prosecutions, kleptocrats cement their control of government and disempower opponents. We need only recall Russia’s erstwhile effort to create a democracy: It quickly drained away into the pockets of Vladimir Putin and his oligarchs, leading to the hopelessness and acquiescence of Russian citizens once they realized they could no longer change their situation through democratic means.

Now we face that danger at home. If Mr. Trump wins, America will have a leader invested in his own personal power, both financial and punitive, and supported by a much more capable team. When lucrative contracts are handed out to Trumpist loyalists regardless of merit and dissident voices are targeted and silenced, America’s leadership on the global stage will dissolve when it’s needed most.

The consequences will echo for generations if we lack the ability and the will to attack problems like climate change, mass migration, a new space race and multiple wars. Nothing of substance will be done, Mr. Trump’s cronies will continue to act with impunity, and millions of Americans — already worried that elites are held to a different standard than regular people are — will lose even more confidence in their government, convinced that everyone in Washington is out for himself.

This combination of passivity on the one hand and impunity on the other could be fatal for our democracy. 

This is the true danger Mr. Trump poses.

*Caroline Fredrickson is an adviser at the Open Markets Institute, a senior fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice and a visiting professor of law at Georgetown University.

Trumpzis in the White House- look-a-like

Herman Goring - Nazi leader

Secretary of State and Donald Trump loyalist mouthpiece Mike Pompeo look a lot like Herman Goring
Goring: January 12, 1893 – October 15, 1946 was a German political and military leader as well as one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party (NSDAP), which ruled Germany from 1933 to 1945. He died by suicide. 

Gordon Sondland impeachment testimony- zero interest in taking a fall for a crime boss

Echo opinion syndicated column by Dick Polman*. 

Do you remember the climax in the Agatha Christie novel, "Murder On The Orient Express?". 

 It turned out, all the murder suspects were guilty.

And, as Donald Trump's hand picked ambassador, Gordon Sondland, publicly declared during the House impeachment hearing, that all the suspects in the illegal scheme to squeeze Ukraine for fake Biden dirt are guilty. Starting at the very top, with Trump. (IMO, evidence to support this illegal scheme is evident.)

And, Sondland is certainly a credible guy, right? After all, Trump recently praised him as, "a really good man and great American."

https://www.thenation.com/article/gordon-sondland-dean-impeachment/
Gordon Sondland

Here's what the good man and great American Sondland told Congerss: "Everyone was in the loop." In fact, the whole mission was about how to "make the boss happy." And, if it made the boss happy to hold back taxpayer-financed military aid from an ally fighting Russian aggression, until the ally agreed to launch bogus investigations of the Bidens, then fine. In Sondland's explosive words, "Was there a quid pro pro? The answer is yes....We followed the president's orders."

Translation: I paid a million bucks to get myself an abassadorship, and never imagined I'd get sucked into something like this. There's no way I'm gonna take the fall. If that happens, I'm gonna take everyone down with me- starting with Trump.

Sondland's sworn testimony is more delicious than a chocolate sundae. Historians will look back on the day when Sondland testified as being conclusive proof that Donald Trump blatantly abused his office, pursuing his own personal inerests and solicited collusions with a foreign government, all at the expense of our national security. And, as Sondland testified, "everyone was in the loop" on the impeachable act.

Moreover, Sondland fingured Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, ex-national security advisor John Bolton, acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and of course he fingered Rudy Giuliani. In short, "everyone knew what we were doing and why."
Am I overracting? I'll yield the floor to Ken Starr, the conservative Clinton-hunting special prosecutor. On Fox News, Wednesday, he said, "Articles of impeachment are being drawn up if they haven't alreay been drawn up....This obvioiusly has been one of those bombshell days."

Sondland also blew up two desperate Republican defenses. The mantra of "no quid prop quo" is dead. The notion that Rudy and a handful of confederates, "went rogue," and that Trump had no role in the scheme for fake Biden dirt, is buried.

Now, here is the fun part. Sonland was quizzed about his cellphone conversation with Trump on July 26. Sondland was at a Kiev eatery when a foreigh service official, David Holmes, has already sated in a sworn deposition that he was with Sondland at the time, that he overherard Trump's end of the conversation (because Trump was speaking so loudly), and that Trump specifically asked Sondland for an assurance that Ukraine would indeed launch a Biden dirt investigation.

Sondland today: "I have no reason to doubt that the conversation included the subject of investigation." And, "I have no reason to doubt" Holmes' recollection about the cellphone call.

As a matter of fact, Holmes, in his deposition, said that Sondland assured Trump that Ukraine's president was ready to play ball- and, that, in fact, "he loves your ass".

Sondland was asked whether he really said that. His response: "It sounds like something I would say." He and Trump talked frequently, and liked to engage "in Trumpspeak," which featured "a lot of four-letter words"- or, in the cse of ass, "a three letter word."

(So, they spoke a lot? But, didn't Trump say that "I hardly know the gentleman"?)

Looking back, Sondland now laments: "I really regret that the Ukrainians were placed in that predicament."  It's nice that he feels compelled to voice remores. And, it's amazing how his memory keeps getting better as the noose keeps tightening.  Luckily for us, Sondland as zero interest in taking the fall for a crime boss.

Indeed, Trump knows how that game works.  Last year he told Fox News: I know all about flipping. For 30, 40 years, I've been watching flippers."  

In Trumpspeak, Wednesday's flipper is beautiful.  

*Dick Polman, is a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the Univeristy of Pennsylvania. 

Impeachment witnesses were brave and credible - out did cowardly colleagues who will not yet submit "under oath"

"...everybody was in the loop, including the vice-president (Mike Pence), the secretary of state (Mike Pompeo) and White House acting Chief of Staff (Mick Mulvaney)..."- Fiona Hill.

The impeachment witnesses are the silver lining to this embarrassing chapter in our history

Echo opinion by Kathleen Parker published in the Bangor Daily News, a Maine newspaper.

Former White House national security aide Fiona Hill testified under oath before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington during a public impeachment hearing of Donald Trump's illegal efforts to tie U.S. aid for Ukraine to investigations of his political opponents.

After fidgeting through five days of public hearings, a dozen witnesses and countless political pontificators, Americans should be gratified by the quality of the people who testified and who actually do the nation’s work abroad.

If there was a silver lining to an otherwise embarrassing chapter in our history, it was that we were able to meet and hear from those whose names aren’t well known except to their colleagues. To listen and observe was to have one’s faith restored in America’s image despite the withering damage suffered these past few years.

One after another, the men and women who testified, subjecting themselves to the sometimes-scurrilous scrutiny of political profilers, maintained their focus and their cool. It was grating to hear the screech of Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, whose raised voice surely signaled a stretch-and-restroom break for many viewers. While we’re on the subject, can’t the man put on a blazer? Jordan appeared without one, putting in mind a teenager who refuses to play by his parents’ rules.

May I remind him and others that dress codes are intended to show respect for the occasion and for others in attendance. Surely, our congressional leaders owe their constituents — and, in this case, the process — the small personal sacrifice of dressing appropriately. To do otherwise is to telegraph to the world that you think you’re more important than everyone else. Jordan also proved that age and maturity can be mutually exclusive.

There, I got that off my chest. (Parents may clip for personal use.)

Quite apart from the question of whether Trump should be impeached, viewers of the hearings were privy to history and were beneficiaries of a primer on current events. Often lost in the drama of the impeachment proceedings is the profound importance of Ukraine as a buffer to a resurgent Russian empire. 

Trump’s withholding of $400 million in military funding from Ukraine during its war with Russia — pending assurances that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would at least say he’d investigate the Biden’s involvement with the gas company Burisma — put Ukrainian lives at risk and signaled to Russia that U.S. support of Ukraine was credibly iffy.

One of the pivotal questions during the hearings was whether America’s diplomatic corps understood that “Burisma” was actually code for the “Bidens,” meaning political rival Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who was employed by Burisma. Only two witnesses claimed not to have known about the connection. One was Kurt Volker, a former envoy to Ukraine, who later said he should have caught on sooner. The other was U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, whose claim was deemed “not credible” by witness Fiona Hill, the National Security Council’s former senior director for Europe and Russia, and a standout in the lineup of witnesses.

At several junctures, Hill schooled House Intelligence Committee members about the significance of Ukraine and the perils of advancing the false claim that Ukraine and not Russia had interfered with the 2016 election. “This is a fictional narrative that has been perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves,” she said. Critical of partisan rancor, she beseeched members to “not promote politically driven falsehoods that so clearly advance Russian interests.”

As for the inferred quid pro quo between Trump and Zelensky, Hill confirmed Sondland’s earlier testimony that “everybody was in the loop,” including the vice president, the secretary of state and the White House acting chief of staff.

While true that the administration under pressure did release the military-aid funds, without Zelensky’s public announcement of an investigation, which Trump had specifically requested, his intentions alone created problems for those serving in Ukraine. In Hill’s words: “[Sondland] was being involved in a domestic political errand. And we were being involved in national security, foreign policy. And those two things had just diverged.”

Whether Donald Trump is impeached remains to be seen. But the shame of his highly irregular behavior in seeking political favors from a foreign entity is softened somewhat by the pride one can feel in our diplomats, experts and fact witnesses to whom we are beholden for their good grace.

Kathleen Parker is a columnist for The Washington Post. 

Hill’s testimony jibed with earlier testimony by acting Ukraine Ambassador William Taylor that there was a regular policy executed by the diplomatic corps and a “highly irregular” policy run by Rudy “Hand Grenade” Giuliani, whose legacy as former New York City mayor, we should note, has definitively expired.

Ambassador William Taylor testified under oath

Republicans are apparantly allergic to people who tell the truth. 

Secretary Pompeo "Attention!"  Shame on (West Point graduate!) Pompeo for being silent about the credibility of the respected Ambassador Taylor.  

Ambassador William Taylor testified to Congress under oath

In fact, telling the truth while under oath obviously drives them certifiably crazy. When a respected foreign service diplomat like Ambassador William Taylor is brave enough to give lawful testimony to Congress while under oath, this bravery should be praised. Instead, because the information provided happens to be "truth", the Republicans act like there is something infectious about the honesty. Shame on Republicans!  They should demand for Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani to testify under oath.

In fact, Donald Trump is is a liar in chief!

This echo opinion by the author Scott Torrow was published in the Arizona Tuscon Star:

The following column is the opinion and analysis of the writer.
National Opinion: Political hacks? Not even close. US Foreign Service officers deserve better than White House attacks, writes Scott Turow.

The chaotic White House lashed out at respected diplomat William Taylor (who spoke while under oath!) after his credible testimony in the House impeachment investigation this week. Its reaction was unequivocal, insulting — and dead wrong.
Taylor, acting ambassador to Ukraine, explained in careful detail that he saw Donald Trump's tie of military aid to a public commitment by the Ukrainian president to investigate Joe Biden, contradicting Trump’s claims that there was no quid pro quo in the conversations.

Trump officials quickly trash-talked Taylor, saying his testimony was part of “a coordinated smear campaign from … unelected bureaucrats waging war on the Constitution.” This was in line with the reaction last week of acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, who dismissed earlier testimony from the likes of veteran diplomats Marie Yovanovitch and George Kent as coming from “mostly career bureaucrats who are saying, ‘You know what, I don’t like President Trump’s politics, so I’m going to participate in this witch hunt that they are undertaking on the Hill.’”

I don’t know any more about diplomats Taylor, Yovanovitch and Kent than I’ve read. But I have observed firsthand the rigorously nonpartisan culture in our Foreign Service, which is not well-understood by most Americans. For more than a decade, I have occasionally traveled overseas as part of the State Department’s U.S. Speakers Program. Why me? For many years now, under administrations of both political parties, the United States has fostered the rule of law abroad. The State Department apparently thought an American novelist and lawyer, who writes about the law and whose books have been frequently made into movies, might offer a more engaging approach to that topic for a foreign audience than, say, a law professor. Since 2008, I have been dispatched to, among other places, Argentina, Austria, China, the Czech Republic, the Republic of Georgia, Israel and Russia.

One of the biggest revelations to me on these trips has been meeting dozens of officers of the U.S. Foreign Service. To a person, they struck me as remarkable, both for the depth of their intelligence and their devotion to our country. 

We routinely honor the members of our armed services. But our Foreign Service officers are entitled to almost the same level of veneration. Thirteen thousand serve at 256 posts around the world, implementing U.S. foreign policy and helping Americans abroad. Their careers frequently keep them far from home and family, often in unglamorous or even dangerous locations. Chris Stevens, our ambassador to Libya, had been a Foreign Service officer for more than a decade when he was killed in the infamous Benghazi attack in 2012.

Entry into the Foreign Service is highly competitive, involving written and then oral exams. Only 1 in 10 candidates is ultimately hired. And the competition does not end then. There are annual ratings and an up-or-out promotion system. At the top level is the Senior Foreign Service, requiring a presidential appointment, the rank occupied by Taylor and Yovanovitch. Senior officers sometimes become U.S. ambassadors, especially in locations like Ukraine, where expertise in local affairs is essential in representing us.

FSOs implement the policies determined in Washington, whether or not they agree with them. They know that over the course of their careers they will serve under Democrats and Republicans, and that it would inevitably be detrimental to their advancement to be outwardly identified with either party. On the job, they express no political opinions.

I happened to be in Israel on one of these trips, in December 2016, when the Trump administration announced it would move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Congress had mandated this change in 1995, but previous administrations had deferred what was widely regarded as an inflammatory action. To the FSOs in Tel Aviv, the announcement meant they would have to move, uproot their families and work every day at a site that would be a top potential terrorist target. But I heard nothing critical from anyone. They accepted the right of a new administration to make new policy.

That is the professional culture of Taylor, Yovanovitch and Kent. Taylor is a graduate of West Point and a Vietnam combat veteran who has a graduate degree from Harvard. He served in foreign service assignments to the Middle East before becoming ambassador to Ukraine under President George W. Bush. He returned from retirement last summer to become acting ambassador there at the request of the White House. Yovanovitch, a Princeton graduate, joined the Foreign Service in 1980. Bush nominated her to be our ambassador first to Kyrgyzstan, then Armenia, before President Barack Obama chose her to serve in Ukraine. Kent, a deputy assistant secretary of state, joined the Foreign Service in 1992, with degrees from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and Harvard.

The three have been described by colleagues as discreet, meticulous and down the middle. Kent, for example, not only testified about the Trump administration’s machinations in Ukraine. He also reportedly said he’d told Biden’s staff in 2015 that Biden’s son’s role with Burisma, a Ukraine energy company, created the appearance of a conflict of interest.

The Trump administration’s effort to dismiss these three as political hacks and “bureaucrats,” implying that they are mere paper-pushers who stepped from obscurity only to smear the president, ignores the truth that they are all front-line diplomats who have served American interests abroad for decades under both political parties. Like their thousands of colleagues in the Foreign Service, they are entitled to our thanks and respect, not vilification by the White House.
Scott Turow is the Chicago-based author of “Presumed Innocent” and “The Last Trial,” which will be published next May. He wrote this for the Chicago Tribune

Genocide is now attributed to the Donald Trump legacy- Mike Pompeo: "Attention!"

Trump’s withdrawal (aka "retreat") virtually guarantees the reemergence of a cohesive ISIS (The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, officially known as the Islamic State -it does not really exist-and also known by its Arabic-language acronym Daesh, is a Salafi jihadist ... Wikipedia.)

Donald Trump surrendered in North Syria and left the Kurds at risk for genocide.

My "big question" to Secretary Mike Pompeo is this: How can you pretend to the American Secretary of State when you act like what your intention is to be elected a Senator from Kansas? Even more to the point, why aren't you doing something to help save the loyal Kurds who are now living in the jasw of genocide like the Armenians of over a century ago.

Armenian genocide (1914-1923)- was carried out during and after World War I and implemented in two phases—the wholesale killing of the able-bodied male population through massacre and subjection of army conscripts to forced labour, followed by the deportation of women, children, the elderly, and the infirm on death marches leading to the Syrian Desert.

Kurdish genocide killing with chemical weapons

Kurd genocide - With so many different ethnic groups living in one region and straddling several borders, the north central Kurdish area of the Middle East has been a continuous battle ground amongst and between the nation-states of Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria.

By Andrew Malcolm published in the Kansas.com Wichita Eagle 

Throughout the history of this area, the Kurds have revolted against the Turks, Arabs and the Persians in trying to establish an autonomous or independent state but have always been defeated. In defeat, they’ve pressed for some degree of autonomy which was granted, but inevitably revoked. Cyclically, the Kurds re-organized, rearmed and revolted and were again forcibly put down.

Trump’s withdrawal virtually guarantees the reemergence of a cohesive ISIS.

Echo opinion published in The Witichta Eagle

As if Donald Trump didn’t face enough trouble of his own (impeachment coming!) making, he announced 10 days ago what appeared to be a peremptory withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria.

The decision ignited an immediate domestic firestorm because it gave the green light to Turkey’s aspiring dictator, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, to invade Syria and attack the Kurdish forces who had demolished the ISIS caliphate under American tutelage and air power. Erdogan regards Kurds as terrorists, which they are elsewhere. So, his forces moved within hours.

And Trump’s (retreat!) withdrawal virtually guarantees the reemergence of a cohesive ISIS.

Americans have come to realize that Trump is a transactional president, meaning his decisions almost always involve some kind of deal of convenience, not adherence to any particular code or philosophy. This can be quite convenient, self-serving and, in this case, immoral.

What shocked many was Trump’s cold-hearted abandonment of the Kurdish troops who’d done virtually 100% of the deadly fighting to fulfill his loud campaign vow to crush ISIS, and do it quickly.

The U.S. departure leaves another vacuum with ominous implications for the tumultuous area’s future. While Trump’s pullback betrayal surprised aides and military commanders, the bipartisan blowback appeared to surprise Trump. And he went on the defensive.

“We have to bring our people back home,” he said. That’s a campaign message resonating with many Americans tired of costly foreign military involvements. The trouble with that message is the U.S. had only 1,000 special operators in Syria. They’re leaving Syria. They’re not coming home. They’ve simply moved elsewhere.

Trump wrapped his decision in another popular message: “We are getting out of the endless wars.” If U.S. involvement in Syria has been a war, we need more like it. It was a proxy military operation.

The American Special Forces gave intel and strategic advice to Kurdish commanders and, when necessary, called in aggressive air cover from the Incirlik air base in – wait for this, too – Turkey.

Kurds did the dirty, deadly work of annihilating the ISIS caliphate before its terrorist tentacles could do much U.S. damage. In that fight, Kurdish forces lost 11,000 men and women during the last three years. That’s four times U.S. losses in 18 years of Afghanistan fighting.

Then, five days after his Syria withdrawal announcement, Trump blithely dispatched 2,000 additional U.S. troops away from home to Saudi Arabia, another foreign military involvement with no end date, to discourage Iranian adventures. Trump said that transaction was OK with him because the Saudis will finance it.

As Turkey’s troops and proxies bombarded Kurdish forces in northern Syria and killed Kurds, Trump then sought to downplay Kurds’ achievements at our behest. He said they hated ISIS anyway. But isn’t that the art of a good deal, both partners getting something they want?

And Trump also claimed the U.S. owes Kurds little, with a completely cockamamie statement that they were not U.S. allies in World War II. That actually is quite true. Of course, neither was Japan nor Germany, now close U.S. allies for mutually beneficial reasons.

As further cover, Trump said he threatened Erdogan (the name means “born a brave warrior”) to lay waste to Turkey’s economy if he harmed the Kurds. Let’s see now if that vow becomes Trump’s Syrian red line, as empty as former President Barack Obama’s on Syria’s chemical weapons.

In a photo op, Trump signed an executive order giving himself the power to impose “serious” economic sanctions on Turkey, the kind of popular political punishments that have not changed anyone’s behavior in Russia, Iran or Venezuela in recent years.

Trump’s Syrian withdrawal decision came immediately after a phone conversation with the Turkish strongman. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, Trump’s sudden Syria withdrawal announcement last December also followed a phone chat with Erdogan. That hasty decision, later ignored by Trump himself, prompted the resignation of Defense Secretary James Mattis, who’s written that great powers cannot survive without strong allies.

Being unpredictable like Trump can be helpful when confronting opponents. With allies, not so much. They value reliability and trust, actions not words. Which is why the U.S. could rely on NATO allies post-9/11 to join the hunt for Taliban and al Qaeda, the only time in NATO’s 70-year history that its mutual defense clause has been invoked.

Trump has said that NATO is obsolete. He’s also praised it for following his advice on strategy and vowed support. Allies wonder which presidential opinion is real and enduring, if either.

Despite his belated professed public support for Kurds in the path of Erdogan’s modern military, Trump’s actions cutting them loose are bound to raise questions in the minds of local loyalists helping U.S. military or diplomats elsewhere. Or those asked to in the future.

If, for instance, I was a dedicated Afghan interpreter for the U.S. as Trump resumes talks with the Taliban to withdraw American troops after 6,585 days of that endless war, I’d be completing my own transactional deal right about now: packing up my family to exit the country, too.

---

Falling in love with love and Kim Jung Un

If this were a Ripley's feature we'd be saying "Believe it Or Not".

Trump’s fawning over North Korean tyrant is a national security issue ~ Editorial echo published in the Nevada newspaper The Las Vegas Sun (with MaineWriter prologue: Falling in Love With Love is Falling for Make Believe by Frank Sinatra)

Falling in Love With LoveCaring too much is juvenile fancy
Learning to trust is just
For children in school
I fell in love with love one night
When the moon was full
I was unwise with eyes
Unable to see

Donald Trump says he and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un “fell in love” after their meeting this summer, which is incredible when you think about the kind of people Trump has vilified.

That group would include Democrats, the media, women, the European Union, Canadians, immigrants and many, many others~ including the National Football League and Mexicans.

So let’s see, on one hand there’s the leader of a nation that is attacking the U.S. in cyberspace, is working to disrupt our elections, starved its own people and condemned entire families to lifetimes of hard labor in gulags.

On the other are individuals who are loyal to democratic values but simply disagree with Trump on his approach and behavior.

Trump loves one and hates the others.

From this, there’s an important lesson we should all understand: Our enemies don’t need to threaten us with weapons. Instead, all they need to do is weaponize praise for Trump.

Trump’s gushing toward Kim will have a direct impact on U.S. efforts to push North Korea toward denuclearization.

For Kim, it’s a clear sign that Trump won’t be inclined to take a hard line in negotiations, which only threatens to strengthen North Korea’s resistance to abandoning its nuclear weapons program.

The timing of Trump’s remarks couldn’t have been worse, either, given that he made them on the same day North Korea’s foreign minister told the United Nations that there was “no way” his country would give up its nukes unless the U.S. eased its sanctions.

Ri Yong Ho told the General Assembly that North Korea had taken such “significant goodwill measures” as dismantling its nuclear test site and stopping missile tests but had seen no “corresponding response” from the U.S.

“Without any trust in the U.S., there will be no confidence in our national security — and under such circumstances, there is no way we will unilaterally disarm ourselves first,” he said.

Now, with Trump expressing his man-crush for Kim, why wouldn’t North Korea strengthen its demand to an end of sanctions? Trump can correctly say that his administration has not given ground on sanctions, and that he backed off from sending U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to North Korea because there had been insufficient progress in negotiations, but meanwhile his glowing words about Kim can only boost North Korea’s resolve.

So much for the art of the deal, at least on Trump’s end. Kim, on the other hand, appears to have played Trump magnificently, no doubt by stroking his ego and feeding his narcissism.

Trump would love for Americans to believe that he and Kim have formed a bond of trust that has made the world a safer place, as Trump famously declared when he tweeted “There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea” after his June meeting with Kim.

That wasn’t true then and isn’t true now. And as long as Trump keeps blowing kisses at Kim, there’s no reason to believe North Korea will respond to any pressure to move forward.

No doubt, Trump’s supporters will say he’s being brilliant somehow, perhaps by suggesting he’s keeping friends close and enemies closer. Or maybe they’ll turn to the old excuse for his behavior, and say Americans shouldn’t focus on Trump’s words but rather the actions his administration is taking.

But it’s clearly evident that Trump trembles with pleasure at praise from any enemy. All someone like Kim or Vladimir Putin needs to do is fluff his ego and feed his narcissism with the most florid and preposterous praise, and he responds like a puppy.

Trump’s neediness puts our national security at profound risk, and his behavior toward Kim demonstrates this as starkly as anything could. Never have we had a president so easily manipulated.