User Tag List

+ Reply to Thread
Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 13

Thread: From pandering to Putin to abusing allies & ignoring, Trump's phone calls alarm

  1. #1
    Points: 33,557, Level: 44
    Level completed: 74%, Points required for next Level: 393
    Overall activity: 0.2%
    Achievements:
    SocialCreated Album pictures25000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Leanne778's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    1292
    Join Date
    Feb 2020
    Posts
    6,399
    Points
    33,557
    Level
    44
    Thanks Given
    3,769
    Thanked 1,287x in 1,046 Posts
    Mentioned
    328 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)

    From pandering to Putin to abusing allies & ignoring, Trump's phone calls alarm

    From pandering to Putin to abusing allies and ignoring his own advisers, Trump's phone calls alarm US officials

    He is so inept, so egotistical, lying narcissist. He can't handle phone calls, he can't handle presidential briefings, he can't handle press conferences.....he's f'd up this country so much, we are never going to be the same.


    In hundreds of highly classified phone calls with foreign heads of state, President Donald Trump was so consistently unprepared for discussion of serious issues, so often outplayed in his conversations with powerful leaders like Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Erdogan, and so abusive to leaders of America's principal allies, that the calls helped convince some senior US officials -- including his former secretaries of state and defense, two national security advisers and his longest-serving chief of staff -- that the President himself posed a danger to the national security of the United States, according to White House and intelligence officials intimately familiar with the contents of the conversations.

    The calls caused former top Trump deputies -- including national security advisers H.R. McMaster and John Bolton, Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and White House chief of staff John Kelly, as well as intelligence officials -- to conclude that the President was often "delusional," as two sources put it, in his dealings with foreign leaders. The sources said there was little evidence that the President became more skillful or competent in his telephone conversations with most heads of state over time. Rather, he continued to believe that he could either charm, jawbone or bully almost any foreign leader into capitulating to his will, and often pursued goals more attuned to his own agenda than what many of his senior advisers considered the national interest.

    These officials' concerns about the calls, and particularly Trump's deference to Putin, take on new resonance with reports the President may have learned in March that Russia had offered the Taliban bounties to kill US troops in Afghanistan -- and yet took no action. CNN's sources said there were calls between Putin and Trump about Trump's desire to end the American military presence in Afghanistan but they mentioned no discussion of the supposed Taliban bounties.
    By far the greatest number of Trump's telephone discussions with an individual head of state were with Erdogan, who sometimes phoned the White House at least twice a week and was put through directly to the President on standing orders from Trump, according to the sources. Meanwhile, the President regularly bullied and demeaned the leaders of America's principal allies, especially two women: telling Prime Minister Theresa May of the United Kingdom she was weak and lacked courage; and telling German Chancellor Angela Merkel that she was "stupid." Trump incessantly boasted to his fellow heads of state, including Saudi Arabia's autocratic royal heir Mohammed bin Salman and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, about his own wealth, genius, "great" accomplishments as President, and the "idiocy" of his Oval Office predecessors, according to the sources.
    In his conversations with both Putin and Erdogan, Trump took special delight in trashing former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama and suggested that dealing directly with him -- Trump -- would be far more fruitful than during previous administrations. "They didn't know BS," he said of Bush and Obama -- one of several derisive tropes the sources said he favored when discussing his predecessors with the Turkish and Russian leaders.

    The full, detailed picture drawn by CNN's sources of Trump's phone calls with foreign leaders is consistent with the basic tenor and some substantive elements of a limited number of calls described by former national security adviser John Bolton in his book, "The Room Where It Happened." But the calls described to CNN cover a far longer period than Bolton's tenure, are much more comprehensive — and seemingly more damning -- in their sweep. Like Bolton, CNN's sources said that the President seemed to continually conflate his own personal interests -- especially for purposes of re-election and revenge against perceived critics and political enemies -- with the national interest. One person familiar with almost all the conversations with the leaders of Russia, Turkey, Canada, Australia and western Europe described the calls cumulatively as 'abominations' so grievous to US national security interests that if members of Congress heard from witnesses to the actual conversations or read the texts and contemporaneous notes, even many senior Republican members would no longer be able to retain confidence in the President.



    https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/29/polit...rns/index.html

  2. The Following User Says Thank You to Leanne778 For This Useful Post:

    IMPress Polly (06-29-2020)

  3. #2
    Points: 33,557, Level: 44
    Level completed: 74%, Points required for next Level: 393
    Overall activity: 0.2%
    Achievements:
    SocialCreated Album pictures25000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Leanne778's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    1292
    Join Date
    Feb 2020
    Posts
    6,399
    Points
    33,557
    Level
    44
    Thanks Given
    3,769
    Thanked 1,287x in 1,046 Posts
    Mentioned
    328 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I have to post the second part of this article, link above....

    Attacking key ally leaders -- especially women


    The insidious effect of the conversations comes from Trump's tone, his raging outbursts at allies while fawning over authoritarian strongmen, his ignorance of history and lack of preparation as much as it does from the troubling substance, according to the sources. While in office, then- Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats expressed worry to subordinates that Trump's telephone discussions were undermining the coherent conduct of foreign relations and American objectives around the globe, one of CNN's sources said. And in recent weeks, former chief of staff Kelly has mentioned the damaging impact of the President's calls on US national security to several individuals in private.
    Two sources compared many of the President's conversations with foreign leaders to Trump's recent press "briefings" on the coronavirus pandemic: free form, fact-deficient stream-of-consciousness ramblings, full of fantasy and off-the-wall pronouncements based on his intuitions, guesswork, the opinions of Fox News TV hosts and social media misinformation.
    In addition to Merkel and May, the sources said, Trump regularly bullied and disparaged other leaders of the western alliance during his phone conversations -- including French President Emmanuel Macron, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison -- in the same hostile and aggressive way he discussed the coronavirus with some of America's governors.

    Next to Erdogan, no foreign leader initiated more calls with Trump than Macron, the sources said, with the French President often trying to convince Trump to change course on environmental and security policy matters -- including climate change and US withdrawal from the Iranian multilateral nuclear accord.
    Macron usually got "nowhere" on substantive matters, while Trump became irritated at the French President's stream of requests and subjected him to self-serving harangues and lectures that were described by one source as personalized verbal "whippings," especially about France and other countries not meeting NATO spending targets, their liberal immigration policies or their trade imbalances with the US.
    But his most vicious attacks, said the sources, were aimed at women heads of state. In conversations with both May and Merkel, the President demeaned and denigrated them in diatribes described as "near-sadistic" by one of the sources and confirmed by others. "Some of the things he said to Angela Merkel are just unbelievable: he called her 'stupid,' and accused her of being in the pocket of the Russians ... He's toughest [in the phone calls] with those he looks at as weaklings and weakest with the ones he ought to be tough with."

  4. #3
    Original Ranter
    Points: 297,687, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 42.0%
    Achievements:
    SocialRecommendation Second ClassOverdrive50000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Mister D's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    416525
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Posts
    117,863
    Points
    297,687
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    25,298
    Thanked 53,470x in 36,445 Posts
    Mentioned
    1102 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    No, you really don't. Do you not understand fair use?
    Whoever criticizes capitalism, while approving immigration, whose working class is its first victim, had better shut up. Whoever criticizes immigration, while remaining silent about capitalism, should do the same.


    ~Alain de Benoist


  5. The Following User Says Thank You to Mister D For This Useful Post:

    Peter1469 (06-30-2020)

  6. #4
    Points: 33,557, Level: 44
    Level completed: 74%, Points required for next Level: 393
    Overall activity: 0.2%
    Achievements:
    SocialCreated Album pictures25000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Leanne778's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    1292
    Join Date
    Feb 2020
    Posts
    6,399
    Points
    33,557
    Level
    44
    Thanks Given
    3,769
    Thanked 1,287x in 1,046 Posts
    Mentioned
    328 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Mister D View Post
    No, you really don't. Do you not understand fair use?

    So what? I posted from an article. Everyone does it. Pffft. Even better, that's the only comment you have? Wow.

  7. #5
    Points: 84,470, Level: 70
    Level completed: 85%, Points required for next Level: 380
    Overall activity: 43.0%
    Achievements:
    Veteran50000 Experience Points
    testsubjectalpha's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    9014
    Join Date
    Jan 2019
    Posts
    29,329
    Points
    84,470
    Level
    70
    Thanks Given
    214
    Thanked 9,011x in 6,832 Posts
    Mentioned
    84 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I thought you were going to say some educational institution advisor told you what to think. Hmmm. I guess you did. Snowflake.




    Quote Originally Posted by Leanne778 View Post
    So what? I posted from an article. Everyone does it. Pffft. Even better, that's the only comment you have? Wow.
    "The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government - lest it come to dominate our lives and interests." - Patrick Henry

  8. #6
    Original Ranter
    Points: 297,687, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 42.0%
    Achievements:
    SocialRecommendation Second ClassOverdrive50000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Mister D's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    416525
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Posts
    117,863
    Points
    297,687
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    25,298
    Thanked 53,470x in 36,445 Posts
    Mentioned
    1102 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Leanne778 View Post
    So what? I posted from an article. Everyone does it. Pffft. Even better, that's the only comment you have? Wow.
    So obey the rules and, no, only a handful of idiots do it.

    It's trash. I'm not interested.
    Whoever criticizes capitalism, while approving immigration, whose working class is its first victim, had better shut up. Whoever criticizes immigration, while remaining silent about capitalism, should do the same.


    ~Alain de Benoist


  9. #7
    Points: 33,557, Level: 44
    Level completed: 74%, Points required for next Level: 393
    Overall activity: 0.2%
    Achievements:
    SocialCreated Album pictures25000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Leanne778's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    1292
    Join Date
    Feb 2020
    Posts
    6,399
    Points
    33,557
    Level
    44
    Thanks Given
    3,769
    Thanked 1,287x in 1,046 Posts
    Mentioned
    328 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Mister D View Post
    So obey the rules and, no, only a handful of idiots do it.

    It's trash. I'm not interested.

    Whatever floats your boat. Just because it doesn't show Trump as a god that's why. We all know this is how he is and always will be. You know it and I know it. Deal with it. It's your President.

    EDITED TO ADD: But if it was Reason's 2 page length post quoting an article with his comments you wouldn't have said a thing.

  10. #8
    Original Ranter
    Points: 297,687, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 42.0%
    Achievements:
    SocialRecommendation Second ClassOverdrive50000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Mister D's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    416525
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Posts
    117,863
    Points
    297,687
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    25,298
    Thanked 53,470x in 36,445 Posts
    Mentioned
    1102 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Leanne778 View Post
    Whatever floats your boat. Just because it doesn't show Trump as a god that's why. We all know this is how he is and always will be. You know it and I know it. Deal with it. It's your President.

    EDITED TO ADD: But if it was Reason's 2 page length post quoting an article with his comments you wouldn't have said a thing.
    Yeah, that's it. Sigh...

    Reason is a fraud. I have said that multiple times. I don't engage him. You're just an idiot.
    Whoever criticizes capitalism, while approving immigration, whose working class is its first victim, had better shut up. Whoever criticizes immigration, while remaining silent about capitalism, should do the same.


    ~Alain de Benoist


  11. The Following User Says Thank You to Mister D For This Useful Post:

    Peter1469 (06-30-2020)

  12. #9
    Points: 33,557, Level: 44
    Level completed: 74%, Points required for next Level: 393
    Overall activity: 0.2%
    Achievements:
    SocialCreated Album pictures25000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Leanne778's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    1292
    Join Date
    Feb 2020
    Posts
    6,399
    Points
    33,557
    Level
    44
    Thanks Given
    3,769
    Thanked 1,287x in 1,046 Posts
    Mentioned
    328 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Mister D View Post
    Yeah, that's it. Sigh...

    Reason is a fraud. I have said that multiple times. I don't engage him. You're just an idiot.
    Whatever.

  13. #10
    Original Ranter
    Points: 297,687, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 42.0%
    Achievements:
    SocialRecommendation Second ClassOverdrive50000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Mister D's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    416525
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Posts
    117,863
    Points
    297,687
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    25,298
    Thanked 53,470x in 36,445 Posts
    Mentioned
    1102 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Leanne778 View Post
    Whatever.
    Yeah, pretty much.
    Whoever criticizes capitalism, while approving immigration, whose working class is its first victim, had better shut up. Whoever criticizes immigration, while remaining silent about capitalism, should do the same.


    ~Alain de Benoist


+ Reply to Thread

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts