No one has ever accused Donald Trump about being shy when it comes to expressing his disdain for multilateral institutions.
There’s no ambiguity here – his position is that the United States (which, as a reminder, he still runs) is being robbed blind by pretty much everyone and that characterization applies to trade and defense.
And while there’s nothing ambiguous about his aversion to multilateralism, there are plenty of questions as to what motivates that aversion. The cynical among you would suggest he is actively trying to undercut Western hegemony at the behest of the Kremlin and as evidenced by last month’s fractious G-7 meeting in Canada, it’s working.
The rumor mill is alive with talk of a draft bill that seeks to effectively torpedo the WTO and while Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that he isn’t currently “planning anything” on America’s membership, he repeated his (false) assertion that the organization “treats the U.S. very badly.”
As a reminder, this is the reality on that, from a the “Economic Report of the President”, which Trump signed, but undoubtedly didn’t read:
The United States has won 85.7 percent of the cases it has initiated before the WTO since 1995, compared with a global average of 84.4 percent.In contrast, China’s success rate is just 66.7 percent. Most U.S. WTO cases target China (21) and the European Communities (19). When the United States is the respondent, it still wins 25 percent of the time, a rate that is better than the global average rate of 16.6 percent(Mayeda 2017).
Well, on Monday evening, The New York Times was out with a new piece detailing letters Trump sent to NATO allies ahead of next week’s summit in Brussels and as you might imagine, he’s furious – or at least he’s pretending to be furious.
Here’s what Trump told Merkel:
As we discussed during your visit in April, there is growing frustration in the United States that some allies have not stepped up as promised. Continued German underspending on defense undermines the security of the alliance and provides validation for other allies that also do not plan to meet their military spending commitments, because others see you as a role model.
That, just as reports indicate that the U.S. is now considering pulling its troops from Germany. Recall this from a WaPo article out late last week:
The Pentagon is analyzing the cost and impact of a large-scale withdrawal or transfer of American troops stationed in Germany, amid growing tensions between President Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, according to people familiar with the work.
[…]
Word of the assessment has alarmed European officials, who are scrambling to determine whether Trump actually intends to reposition U.S. forces or whether it is merely a negotiating tactic ahead of a NATO summit in Brussels, where Trump is again likely to criticize U.S. allies for what he deems insufficient defense spending.
The Times also notes that Trump sent similarly-worded letters to Justin Trudeau (who Peter Navarro thinks should burn in “hell“) and Erna Solberg of Norway (a country that is not a “shithole”). Here’s an excerpt:
It will become increasingly difficult to justify to American citizens why some countries do not share NATO’s collective security burden while American soldiers continue to sacrifice their lives overseas or come home gravely wounded.
As the Times goes on to write, Trump is hardly the first U.S. President to complain about NATO allies not sticking to their promise to spend 2% of GDP on national defense, but Trump is the first president to “claim that some of the United States’ closest allies are essentially deadbeats who have failed to pay debts to the organization, a fundamental misunderstanding of how it functions.”
Right. But Trump has a “fundamental misunderstanding” of how everything “functions”, including the office of the President and the U.S. Constitution. So it should come as no surprise that he doesn’t understand the nuances of NATO.
And again, it’s not entirely clear what motivates this animosity. Sure, part of it is the political points he wins from the Roseanne base by painting America’s allies with the “pussyfooting freeloaders” brush, but part of it seems to stem from ulterior motives that we can only speculate about.
Or at least we can only speculate until Robert Mueller tells us what’s actually going on here.
Oh, and don’t forget how things went last year when Trump took a tour of NATO’s new headquarters.
Trump, unable to grow in his new job, continues to be the dumb asshole he was his entire life.
In order to justify his existence and make it seem like as if he’s working really really hard for his base, he sets up attacks on everyone and everything his followers think sound so very good to them, or at least enough of them in order to keep Republican lawmakers trapped.
So, every day, he and his mischievous crew of evil malcontents, conjure up boogeyman to attack in order to prove how powerful he is for America and for the morons who believe his lies. It matters not that every attack he makes is based upon provable fabrications and outright falsehoods of the highest order because his following doesn’t give a crap about such things and in fact many regale at the sight of Destructo pathologically lying 24/7 and “getting away with it.”
For now, we live in the evil kingdom of Destructo and nothing will change until either Mueller, Congress, the People or some natural act or event some might attribute to God changes things.
Marty, I talk to God every night about this mess and how it gets more serious every day and we cannot depend upon our group of current Congress to do what needs to be done and get his ass out of the oval office before he really does blow something up.
I then beg God for his help. God said the man is a goon.
The only way to do this is not wait for someone else to foil this fool. We as a nation need to step-up and begin the process of taking away his loyal sycophants, this republican congress. Vote these people out. Talk to your friends and neighbors who want a country that is America, not a dictator led fascist corporate welfare state. Vote and get as many of our majority to vote as well.
It is common for wannabee dictators to create state enemies for the wisest of the voters to be upset and to support more extremist action by the state. Standard operating procedure .Education is the enemy of ignorance.
The ‘stable genius’ wants to create chaos at the NATO heads of state meeting just like he did recently at the G-7
(G-6 +1) in Canada so he can go to his ‘begged for’ meeting with Putin in Helsinki and bathe in Vlady’s adulation for a ‘job well done’ and get a photo op with Russia’s ‘evil genius.’ He’ll then give Putin the Kim praise ‘schtick’ and claim another victory for his great negotiating skills.
Really, if an exact replica of Destructo appeared in an arc of a Superman comic book series doing what he has been doing since he announced he was running and assumed office, would he not be described as “criminally insane?” Would he be described as a foreign agent for the Russians doing whatever he could to undermine America’s most important institutions, its relationship with and among its closest allies and to foment hatred and distrust between among Americans?
As I type this sentence, the free world, Americans, America and America’s long standing institutions has no greater enemy than Donald Trump.
Marty – I completely agree! Congress should all be arrested and jailed for not doing their job.
There must be an amendment to the Constitution written that would in some way allow the citizens of America to override a failure of Congress and remove a President that is not performing on behalf of THIS COUNTRY.
This election was illegal and should be abandoned — there is clear evidence.