Nato

NATO’s No-No

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Tickle Me NATO

cjones12072019

Do you remember Trump’s campaign promise to make the world laugh at us to the point that he’d leave NATO summits early in a snit? Me neither.

In fact, Trump claimed that under Obama, the world was laughing at us and his presidency would end it. And then…the world literally laughed in his face.

During a speech before the United Nations, the entire congregation erupted in laughter at him. The reason being, you say stupid shit, people laugh at you. Trump, who was used to speaking before large audiences of stupid people at his hate rallies, claimed he had accomplished more than nearly any other president before him. Later, he claimed they were laughing “with him.” Someone who confuses respect with being manipulated would say something like that.

No, Donald. They’re not laughing with you. The reason the world is laughing at you, and everyone who supports you, is because you’re a ridiculous, stupid human being. You’re orange. Your hair doesn’t resemble anything that would grow on a human scalp. You’re racist. You’re an idiot. You’re a liar. You say stupid shit.

Trump says stupid shit to the point world leaders notice and laugh about it. As Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was caught on a hot mic saying, it makes your staff’s jaws drop to the floor. Trudeau was referring to Trump publicly stating at the last G7 summit that he’d host the next one at one of his crappy, bedbug-ridden golf resorts.

Later, Trump said Trudeau was “two-faced” for the comments. This from a man who throws people under the bus. This from the guy who later claims his indicted campaign manager didn’t work on his campaign very long, or that another indicted staffer was just a coffee boy, or that he barely knows an ambassador who donated a million dollars to his inauguration committee. This from a guy who was recorded by Omarosa stating her firing was a surprise to him. This from a coward who has other people do his firing. This from a guy who has cheated on each of his three wives.

Trump’s hypocrisy was in full swing at this NATO summit without “summit” in the name because an official summit would require a joint statement which Trump would only fuck up.

Trump said the statement that NATO was suffering “brain death” from France’s President Emmanuel Macron was “nasty.” Never mind the fact that Trump has insulted every member of the alliance and called it “obsolete” while cuddling close to Putin. Trump has acted more like a member of the Warsaw Pact than like a member of NATO.

But then again, Trump doesn’t understand NATO as he’s speculated on Brazil becoming a member. NATO stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization and is a European-North American alliance. In case you’re a Republican, Brazil is in SOUTH America and isn’t on the North Atlantic. If anything, Trump should speculate on Ukraine becoming a member of NATO, but that would upset Putin. Instead, he’d rather invite Putin to join the European Union.

The hot mic exchange didn’t just involve Trudeau with underlings. It was between him, Macron, Princess Anne, and even Boris Johnson, who many expected would be a Trump acolyte. What’s next, Boris cracking on Trump’s hair?

Fox News’ Laura Ingraham blared that it’s “great news” other nations are laughing at us because they’re “elite.” OK then. Why wasn’t it “great” when they were supposedly laughing at us during a Democratic administration? It’s hard to spin being laughed at.

I hope Trump being laughed at would be enlightening to his supporters, just as being called out for his lies while seated next to Macron should be. But Trump supporters aren’t capable of enlightenment.

Trump said during his presidential campaign, “We need a President who isn’t a laughingstock to the entire World.” He was right then and maybe it’s another reason to impeach this laughingstock.

When Trump says stupid shit like claiming windmill noise causes cancer, his supporters try to explain it as a joke, which is ironic since they don’t get they are the joke. They voted for the joke. They’re supporting the joke. Trump and his supporters are only inadvertently funny.

America’s stock has gone down since we became a laughingstock. For Trump and his supporters, they literally need laughter translated to understand they are the joke.

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New Book: Tales From The Trumpster Fire

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Stinky Little Friend

cjones07142018

If you’re a Trump supporter and firmly believe he did not collude with, or is indebted in any way to Russia, then your best case scenario is that he’s madly in love with Vladimir Putin. It’s burning and it won’t go away.

Donald Trump is doing Putin’s bidding. He’s argued for Russia to be readmitted to the G-7. He refuses to criticize Putin in regard to any matter. He congratulated him for winning a sham election. He refuses to answer if he’ll recognize Russia’s annexation of Crimea. He freaking gave Russians secrets in the Oval Office.

Trump is going the extra mile to politically weaken Theresa May and Angela Merkel, leaders of two nations Putin has meddled with. He’s trying to destabilize NATO, even questioning “what is it good for?”

On the first morning of the NATO Summit, Trump and his staff had a breakfast meeting with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, where Trump badgered him about Germany purchasing gas from Russia, claiming they were captive and “controlled” by Russia. That brought back memories of his debate with Hillary Clinton, where he projected himself on her by saying she was Putin’s puppet.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, NATO Ambassador Kay Bailey Hutchison, and Chief of Staff John Kelly all appeared uncomfortable sitting through Trump’s boorish tirade. Kelly appeared the most squirmish as he had difficulty sitting still. But, we found out later from the White House that his displeasure wasn’t with the president displaying his ignorance and bullying on an international stage, but with the fact that he didn’t get the Denny’s Grand Slam for breakfast. A statement from the White House, most likely concocted by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, said all he got was pastry and cheese. Why hasn’t someone in Europe figured out how to make a decent cheese yet? Fortunately for Kelly, their next stop is England, who are known for their exceptional cuisine.

Trump doesn’t really care about Germany buying oil from Russia except that they’re not purchasing it from us. Trump was lying, as usual, about the extent of Germany’s dependence on Russian oil. Trump said, “They will be getting between 60 and 70 percent of their energy from Russia and a new pipeline.” The truth is, Germany isn’t that dependent on oil and only gets nine percent of their supply from Russia. If that’s being controlled, then the Canadians have us in a vice grip, who supply 15% of our oil. Another factor in this issue is that trade is an entirely unconnected issue from NATO. What, are we gangsters?

Trump continued his tirade on how the majority of NATO members don’t spend 2% of their GDP on defense. He even said they need to up it to 4%, never mind the fact that we don’t spend that much of our GDP on defense. According to the World Bank, only nine nations in the world spend 4% or more on defense, and they’re all in Africa and the Middle East.

Later, Trump said his bullying got the members to agree to raise their spending to 2%, which means Trump jumped into his time machine (it only goes backward) and went to 2010 when they made that agreement. Also, the agreement is that they’ll meet that goal by 2024, and in case you’re a Republican, it’s still 2018.

Trump said NATO was stronger now than it was two days ago, just like our nuclear stockpile being larger now than before he went into office. Trump took personal credit for the purported spending increase, saying all the NATO allies congratulated him. “Everybody in the room thanked me.” France’s Emmanuel Macron shot that down. He pointed to a communique published Wednesday by NATO: “It confirms the goal of 2 percent by 2024. That’s all.” He also denied that Trump ever threatened to leave NATO.

Trump argues that NATO gets more from us than we get from them, despite the fact the only time the alliance has gone into combat to protect an attacked member was after 9/11 when they joined the U.S. to fight in Afghanistan.

Everyone knows Trump lies. But I’m sure people worldwide don’t pay attention to his dribble on a daily basis, where we in the States are subjected to it with every tweet, from the mundane to the serious, to the absurd. Now, with all of Europe watching the freakish carnival he brought to Brussels, our shame and embarrassment are fully documented for all to see. While Trump Baby is going to fly over London, mainland Europe got to see the real thing in the orange flesh.

Trump doesn’t care about NATO. He doesn’t care about our alliances, the history, or the institutions we help build. He doesn’t care, as the leader of the free world, about being a champion for democratic institutions. His real agenda is to help Putin, and during his trip to Brussels, he was performing for two audiences; his rabid racist base and Putin.

The highlight for Trump during his Eurotrip is his meeting with Putin, who must be enjoying watching his investment pay off. Even Russian state TV was commenting how Trump was accomplishing in two days the destabilization of NATO that they couldn’t do in 70 years.

Discussing the meetings with European leaders beforehand, Trump said hanging out with Putin would be the easiest, and they even plan to be alone and off-the-record. What’s really infuriating about Trump’s obedience and preference for Putin is that he doesn’t even try to hide it.

It’s doubtful Trump actually wants Europe to beef up their military, as that would be a forceful deterrent to Russia. Unless of course, Europe is dumb enough to spend themselves into dissolving their governments, like the USSR did. If our allies actually start spending more on defense, does that mean we, a nation with ten aircraft carriers and plans for a space force, will start spending less?

I seriously doubt Trump has any influence on Europe spending more on their defense. He couldn’t even get John Kelly a croissan’wich.

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How To Lose Friends And Alienate People

cjones05312017

Trump went from the protective bosom of autocracies where protests are banned, women are oppressed, and tyrants dance with swords, to liberal democracies where they don’t buy bullshit.

Trump’s Eurotrip included a summit with our NATO allies and the G7 Summit. Trump was antisocial and stood alone in corners while the rest of world leaders talked to each other. He was the party guest nobody wanted at the party, which is like every party Ted Cruz has ever attended.

Trump scolded the member states of NATO about how they weren’t spending enough on their military, which is easy to say when your nation has 20 aircraft carriers. Trump broke the tradition set by Harry Truman in 1949 and continued by every president since of publicly supporting Article 5. This article affirms that every member of NATO will come to the defense of any member that is under attack. The ironic thing is that the only time Article 5 has been used was after 9/11 when NATO supported the United States in its fight against terrorism.

Also, during the summit it was revealed that British police are withholding classified information from the United States after leaks to the media about the Manchester bombing. This just weeks after Trump shared classified information, from an ally, with the Russians.

And while in Brussels, Belgium Trump said Germany was “very bad, very bad” for the amount of cars it sells in the U.S. Never mind the fact most of the cars are actually built in the U.S. Along with that, Trump still hasn’t learned that he can’t negotiate individually with members of the European Union.

The most memorable moment occurred when Trump physically shoved Dusko Markovic, Prime Minister of Montenegro out of his way so he could be in the front for a group photo. Roughing people up is apparently cool for Republicans this week, whether in Brussels or Montana. Maybe Trump mistook him for a journalist.

During the G7 Summit Trump refused to make a decision on whether or not the United States will stay in the Paris Climate Agreement. Each of the other members, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Canada, France, and Japan reaffirmed their commitment to the agreement and to combat climate change. Trump said he’ll make a decision later in the week when he won’t have to look the other leaders in the eye when he says he’s abandoning the United States’ commitment.

The G7 Summit was held in Sicily and at one point the leaders took a 700 yard walk through Taormina to take a photo together at a piazza. Not Trump. He waited to get a golf cart as his orange skinny legs couldn’t handle the exertion of physically walking. The other members had to wait for the “high energy” Trump before the photo could be taken.

Before the two summits, European leaders and diplomats were coached to keep details to the minimum for Trump’s short attention span, compliment him on his electoral victory, and compare him favorably to President Obama. Trump still had to assert himself as an alpha male bully.

Later, German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated that Europe can’t rely on the United States anymore. German magazine Der Spiegel published a highly-read article titled “It’s time to get rid of Donald Trump.” The article says that Trump is transforming the U.S. into a laughingstock, is a danger to the world, and must be removed from the Oval Office before he does more harm. It also called him a “liar,” a “racist,” and a “cheat,” among other things.

When your dog poops in a friend’s house you apologize, clean it up, and die of embarrassment. Europe, We’re sorry. We’re trying to clean it. We’re embarrassed.

Creative notes: I teased this cartoon on social media by stating I was doing serious research for it. My readers probably assumed I was doing some intensive investigating. I was actually looking up the photos of the G7 members and insults in their native languages…and to spell them correctly. OK, it was kinda intense.

I think I did everything correctly but if not, sorry. I checked each insult with more than one source. I had to ditch a few that I couldn’t be sure of by my sources.

Since you’re probably curious, I’ll run down each insult for you (and to save you from Googling).

Justin Trudeau, Canada: “Hoser.” That’s an easy one. It means you’re foolish and uncultivated.

Emmanuel Macron, France: “Vous avez le cervau d’un sandwich au fromage,” which means “you have the brains of a cheese sandwich.”

Angela Merkel, Germany: “Arsch mit ohren,” which means “ass with ears.”

Paolo Gentiloni, Italy: “Li mortacci tua,” which is an insult to your dead relatives. It’s really bad if you’re Italian.

Shinzo Abe, Japan: “Sekai de ichiban daikirai,” which means “I hate you more than anyone.”

Theresa May, United Kingdom: “Wanker” is just the best way to finish any political cartoon. I don’t think I have to tell you what it means.

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