Wondering on Wednesday (v136)

Well, well, well, another Wednesday has appeared as if by magic on the calendar. 

What do we have to think about tonight? We've got your DoTruKiJoNoKo summit,which surely dropped a whole lot of wondering in my lap, I have to say.

There was the "Baby, you can spy my car" part, where Trump and Kim wandered out to take a look at Trump's limousine, then turned around and wandered back inside. My first thought was that Trump wanted to prove his 'car' was bigger than Kim's, but then I started wondering how long it would take for Trump to start having the Secret Service run alongside Cadillac One the way Kim's security folks trot alongside his car. I mean, after all, we might be getting a $30M parade just because Trump was in France on Bastille Day...

And of course that was the somewhat weird comment about how fast Kim would start de-nuking.  Here's what Trump told Sean Hannity, his personal talking head:

I just think that we are now going to start the process of denuclearization of North Korea. I believe that he's going back and will start it virtually immediately. And he's already indicated that.

So -- I wonder, are we only going to get 'virtual' denuclearization, or will we get the real thing?

And if  denuclearization is going to happen, and once they get a little bit into the process, they won't be able to stop, and we're going to have lots of people around to verify that it's really happening, I wonder (again) why Trump just had us walk away from the Iran deal, which we had been verifying all along?

And what about that whole 'war games' thing? Stopping our joint training exercises with South Korea because they're provocative - and even worse, they're EXPENSIVE! We can save A LOT OF MONEY if we stop training our military, for sure we can. Just ask the Navy, who lost 17 sailors in preventable ship accidents in 2017 alone.

The crew was unprepared for the situation in which they found themselves through a lack of preparation, ineffective command and control, and deficiencies in training and preparations for navigation.

And, I have to wonder, how much could we cut out of the hundreds of billions in additional military spending Trump got in his budget, if we just stopped our war games and practicing and other not fighting all over the world? It's got to be tens of billions of dollars, right?  And we could devote that money to the Wall that Mexico's building for us, right? It's a #winning-#winning situation right there!

And finally, there was The Movie.

Destiny Pictures presents a story of opportunity...  A new story. A new beginning. One of peace. Two men, two leaders, one destiny.

It's got all the kitsch, all the imagery, all the shots of Ego 1 and Ego 2, giant flags and giant pyramids... I mean, the anti-fake news administration pulled out all the stops for their fake movie trailer. No irony there, right?

In the end, could this summit have been anything other than an episode of the Celebrity Apprentice, I wonder?  Dennis Rodman crying in an interview; Trump showing off the toys, all kinds of over the top 'deals' and 'feels' and 'touches' and surprises... the only thing missing was Omarosa. 

Oh darn, she's already been fired.

TGIF 4/27/18

A good week for some, a not-so-good week for others. Let's take a look...

Bill Cosby had a bad week. Well, no -- he had a *really* bad week.
"America's dad" was convicted of three counts of aggravated indecent assault, in an incident that dates back to 2004. He faces up 30 years in prison, although it's extremely unlikely he'll be sentenced to that much time, if he even gets sentenced at all. His attorneys have promised to appeal vigorously. The closing remarks by Cosby's defense team were quite explosive, including a comment about former model Janice Dickinson that literally took my breath away.

Rear Admiral and presidential MD Ronny Lynn Jackson had a bad week, or maybe in the end, he had a good week, I'm not quite sure. Jackson, you'll recall, was president Trump's best choice to run the Veterans Administration after David Shulkin's tenure came to an end. Jackson, like many of Trump's picks for roles in the Administration, seemed unqualified from the beginning, and then it seemed like he was both unqualified and dangerous, as accusations came in about him drinking on the job, over-prescribing opioids, and some mysterious drunk driving accident.  And, we were told, it was veterans who were complaining about him. Trump suggested that Jackson should resign because no one should have to deal with this crap, and that's what happened.

Kim Jung Un had a good week. He was called 'honorable' by the president of the United States, he got to get attention on the world stage for (at least temporarily) ending his nuke and ICBM tests, and he got to go South on vacation to meet with President Moon and make happy talk about peace on the Korean Peninsula.

Trump himself had a week. He called in to Fox & Friends to talk about how he won the 2016 election, and beat Hillary, and got 306 Electoral College votes (how he gets that wrong every time I don't understand); he talked about his Fixer, Michael Cohen, and might have made a mess of everything in that; he babbled on so badly that even the hosts on that show were disgusted and couldn't get him to shut up. Oh - and he said that he had only gotten Melania a nice card for her birthday, because he was too busy. Playing golf and talking to Fox & Friends and tweeting his brains out, I guess.

But Melania, she had a good week.  She successfully planned and executed the Administration's first State Dinner for the President of France, and from all the reports I've seen, it went off without a hitch. And she did it without calling attention to herself for anything other than doing a good job being First Lady.  Her husband could learn a thing or two from her, don't you think?

TGIF.

OrangeVerse XXXIII: The Blessings of Me

The president entertained Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at his private club in Florida recently. Whether he intended to be so entertaining is open to debate, but he surely did not disappoint from a poetic perspective.

I Write the History

Many of the world's great leaders

request to come to Mar-a-Lago and Palm Beach.

They like it; I like it. 

We're comfortable.

We have great relationships.

As you remember, 

we were here and

President Xi of China was here.

And when we do it - 

it was originally built

as the Southern White House.

It was called the Southern White House.

It was given to the

United States and then

Jimmy Carter 

decided it was too expensive

for the United States so

they fortunately gave it back

and I bought it. 

Who would have thought? 

It was a circuitous route but

now it is indeed the 

Southern White House. 

And many

many people want to be here.

Many of the leaders want

to be here. 

They request specifically. 

They Can't Live if Living is Without Me

North Korea

is coming along.

South Korea 

is meeting and has 

plans to meet with

North Korea

to see if they can

end the war.

And they have my blessing on that.

And they've been 

very generous that

without us and

without me in particular

I guess,

you would have to say,

that they wouldn't be

discussing anything

including the Olympics

would have been a failure. 

Instead it was a great success.

They would have had a real problem.

But as you know

North Korea

participated in the Olympics,

and made it -- really, it was

quite an Olympics.

It was quite a success

that would not have happened.

And they do have my blessing

to discuss the end to the war.

People don't realize

the Korean War

has not ended. It's going on

right now. And they are

discussing

an end

to the war. So

subject to a deal

they would certainly

have my blessing.

And they do

have my blessing

to discuss that.

Poll Watch: Looking Back at 2017

In a fascinating look at some of 2017's poll findings, the folks at Pew Research Center put numbers around some of the things we may think we know, or think we see. 

Let's take a look, starting with partisanship. 

If someone asked you about that, would you think that things had gotten worse of late?

You'd be right. According to polls taken in June and July of this year,

The average gap between the views of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents and Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents across 10 political values has increased from 15 percentage points in 1994 to 36 points today. 

And, it seems even when the parties tend to agree with each other, the partisan gap can actually grow; here's just one example.

For the first time, a majority of Republicans (54%) favor acceptance of homosexuality; just 38% did so in 1994. Yet over this period, the increase in the share of Democrats saying homosexuality should be accepted has been much larger (54% to 83%).

Even when they move in the right direction, the Republicans fall further behind... 

What about how the world views America - do you think this has changed in the first year of the Trump Administration? You'd be right if you answered yes.

Looking broadly at global confidence in the US, there was a sharp downturn from the Obama administration (64%) to the Trump administration (22%). There was an even greater shift in the 'no confidence' rate, which went from 23% under Obama to 74% under Trump.

All but two of the 37 countries surveyed noted a decline in confidence in the US president doing the right thing.  The outliers? Israel (+7 for Trump over Obama) - and Russia (+42). No surprise there.  Countries with steep declines in confidence include Germany (-75), South Korea (- 71), France (-70), Spain (-68), Canada (-61) and the UK (-57).

Another interesting finding has to do with the effect of post-secondary education on the country.

Nearly six-in-ten Republicans and Republican leaners (58%) now say colleges have a negative effect. Two years ago, by contrast, 54% of Republicans said colleges were having a positive effect. Democrats and Democratic leaners have consistently held positive views of the effect of colleges on the US: 72% of Democrats and Democratic leaners say this today.

Those negative Republicans? Last year, the number was only 45%.

And the last one we'll look at has to do with the media. Not #fakenews, but opinions on the watchdog role the media plays.

• 70% of US adults believe that criticism from news organizations keeps political leaders from doing things that shouldn't be done; while 28% think that media criticism keeps political leaders from doing their jobs. 
• But in a survey from March of this year, there's a 47 point gap between Democrats and Republicans on this question, with 89% of Dems thinking the watchdog role is a positive and only 42% of Reps believing the same. 
• As recently as early 2016 (January/February), 74% of Democrats and 77% of Republicans shared that same supportive role for the watchdog media!

These days, it's almost hard to imagine there being a time when the Rs were more supportive of the media than the Ds, isn't it? 

There are other interesting findings in the report, including opinions about automation; race and privilege; religions; and living without partners.  It's a great snapshot of this remarkable year, helped in large part because the folks at Pew have asked the same questions over time, some of them for decades.  

I'm thinking it'll be fun to look at these same surveys again next year, to see whether the Trump effect continues, or if things establish a sense of balance - even if it's an out-of-whack version of balance. 

OrangeVerse XIX: Ko-Ko-Ko-rea

The president is on his first official trip to Asia, and from all accounts is making the most of it. Here are some very poetic remarks from one of his joint appearances with South Korean President Moon.

Walking Through the Park, and Reminiscing

It is interesting that
it is one year,
as of tomorrow, that
we had our election victory.
And it was a great victory
and a victory
that made a lot of people
very happy. 

And our country

is doing very well

from the standpoint 

of the economy.

It's doing

record numbers,

record stock market

17-year low...

the lowest unemployment

that we've had in 17 years. 

And we've created

trillions and trillions

of dollars of value

for our country. 

So we're

very happy.

Should Five Percent Appear Too Small

We're now working on

massing tax cuts

for our people.

especially for our companies

which produce jobs

in the middle class. 

And I think that's

going along very well. 

We hope we're

going to be victorious

and get that big tax cut

which the American people want.

So Good, So Good, So Good

I had a great time

at Camp Humphreys today

visiting with

the US and the South Korean troops.

Thank you.

And as we

very easily remember,

because it was so good --

we had lunch together

with the troops.

And we had the option

of having a magnificent restaurant

a beautiful room,

and I said,

let's have it with the troops.

And we were very happy about it.

It's a great facility --

Camp Humphreys

and it really is

a very special place.

Tremendous cost --

a lot of it spent

by your government

to make your

country safe.

And any time you

spend wisely for the military

that's always a good thing

to do.

Feelin Stronger Every Day

And your military is

becoming very strong.

Our military is now

going to be, very soon,

at the strongest level.

We're committed

to spending $700 billion,

and that number may even

go up.

For our military

we're ordering new

jet fighters, new

equipment of virtually

every kind.

We make the

finest equipment

in the world,

and you're buying

a lot of it, 

and we 

appreciate that.

And you'll be buying 

a lot of our

military equipment.

Can't Touch This

There's nobody that

comes close,

whether it's 

the planes,

the missiles,

the ships -- 

anything you want

to talk about --

there's nothing like

what we do

in that sense.

And we appreciate

 your big orders

for military equipment.

Gangman Style

The North Korea situation

will be a discussion

that we will have

front and center.

And hopefully is going

to be very successfully

worked out on that. 

And trade is something

that we always talk;

it's one of

my favorite

subjects. I guess

it's one of the reasons

that I had that 

great

successful

victory

last year

at this time.

So we'll be

discussing

trade

also.