Sunday, June 10, 2018

This Should Give Justin a Needed Boost


Trump advisors went on the Sunday morning US talk shows like scalded cats to denounce Justin Trudeau's handling of the G6+1 leaders summit.
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said Trudeau's comments at a press conference after the G-7 amounted to a "betrayal, while Peter Navarro, a Trump trade official, declared there was a "special place in hell" for foreign leaders who double-crossed Trump.
Fox TV's Larry "Wrong Way" Kudlow obviously got his marching papers. An opponent of tariffs and trade wars, Kudlow has abruptly changed course.
He argued Trudeau's press conference criticisms of Trump's trade tariffs were inappropriate because of Trump's upcoming meeting with Kim, and because they represented a shift from the more cooperative work that had been done to form the communique from the seven nations. 
"You just don't behave that way, OK? It is a betrayal, OK? He is essentially double-crossing — not just double crossing President Trump, but the other members of the G7, who were working together and pulling together this communique," Kudlow said. 
"President Trump played that process in good faith," he continued. "So, I ask you, he gets up in the airplane and leaves. And then Trudeau starts blasting him in a domestic news conference? I'm sorry. It is a betrayal. That is a double-cross."
The even more unhinged Navarro was unleashed on FOX.
Navarro, Trump's top trade adviser, in an appearance on Fox News, declared Trudeau's comments "one of the worst political miscalculations of a Canadian leader in modern Canadian history." 
"There's a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door," Navarro said on "Fox News Sunday."
It sounds like the White House has figured out that Trump's Singapore lapdance with Kim Jong Un isn't going to end well. Blame that on Trudeau.
Kudlow and Navarro asserted that Trudeau's comments were particularly troubling given the timing.

President Trump is set to meet Tuesday morning in Singapore with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Kudlow acknowledged Trump's reaction to Trudeau's comments was "in large part" about the meeting with Kim. 
"POTUS is not going to let a Canadian prime minister push him around," he said. "Kim must not see American weakness." 
"And this is a case where Trudeau -- it was like, I don't know, pouring collateral damage on this whole Korean trip," he continued. "Trudeau made an error. He should take it back. He should pull back on his statements and wish President Trump well in the Korea negotiations." 
Trump did Trudeau a "courtesy" by attending the G7 in Quebec, even when he had "bigger things on his plate in Singapore, Navarro said Sunday.


26 comments:

Lorne said...

Everything revolves around the U.S., eh Mound? I guess Kudlow et al. did not get the memo that American credibility is at an all-time low.

Trailblazer said...

After this weeks news this is required viewing..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L50TyW9a8k

TB

the salamander said...

.. ass kissing Trump pus sacks .. sharing less than half a brain, if that

Jay Farquharson said...

https://www.balloon-juice.com/2018/06/10/stabbed-in-the-back-kudlow-and-navarro/#comment-6902704

Dolchstoßlegende,

I did Nazi that coming,........

Anonymous said...

- Kudlow acknowledged Trump's reaction to Trudeau's comments was "in large part" about the meeting with Kim.
"POTUS is not going to let a Canadian prime minister push him around," he said. "Kim must not see American weakness." -

What a bizzaro gang. I do not think anyone - except Trump - viewed Trudeau’s comments that way. Now the Trump team has drawn attention to Trump’s stupidity and terribly unbalanced mind. Somehow Trudeau finds himself set-up as the cause of the upcoming Kim/Trump summit failure. Wow! How did get here from there. On Air Farce One I guess.

UU

rumleyfips said...

One imagines Kim laughing his ass off.

Toby said...

By now, Trudeau should not be surprised. He has been busily brown-nosing in the hopes that Trump would deal fairly. It's not going to happen. At this point, Trudeau should just let NAFTA drift away.

It was suggested to me that Trudeau and Trump are both playing a game in which the first one to blink loses. Thus, Trudeau has to pretend to keep the NAFTA talks going until Trump pulls out and vice versa.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has had Trumps number since the beginning. "Donald Trump? For her, he is a man who has turned back the historical clock to zero hour and casts doubt on everything that has united the West for decades: NATO, trade agreements and the United Nations. Many in the German government had hoped that Trump wouldn't be so bad once he was actually sworn in. But Merkel is no longer under any illusions. Trump is implementing his campaign promises, no matter how asinine they might be, as if going down a checklist." http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/angela-merkel-clouds-cast-shadow-on-chancellor-s-worldview-a-1211091.html

Trailblazer said...

Merkel and Macron seem to have more confidence in their respective countries than Trudeau or May.
The fractures appearing in Europe leave only China to keep Trump in check.
Trumps meeting with Kim will likely be a failure as Kim has achieved what he want in gaining recognition as an equal state.
Just where, then, will Trump vent his tantrums?

TB

Toby said...

"Just where, then, will Trump vent his tantrums?"

Iran.

The Mound of Sound said...


This is bizarre. Not just Trump but his cabinet reduced to the level of 12 year olds. Mattis is probably hitting the bottle pretty hard this afternoon while Bolton is busy honing his Boy Scout 3-in-1 camp knife.

Jay Farquharson said...

German trade with the US is less than 9% of the German Economy,

Canadian trade with the US is almost 74% of the Canadian economy.

So gald you want to see so many of your friends and neighbors become quickly unemployed.

Trudeau and Freeland are engaged in a careful "dance" to try to keep Treason Tribble Трамп and Putin from blowing up NAFTA, and also trying to ensure that when he does, in toddler's temper tantrum, that the FTAA Trade Rules and WTO Rules minimize the impact in Canada, that we have "allies" in the US, and we win years later in court.

As Softwood Lumber shows, there's not a lot Canada can do, as long as we rely on the US Market.

Anonymous said...

Lame-duck neoliberal globalists like Junior, the Iron Nanny and the Boy Toy think they are "Trump whisperers" when they are on the way out. They think they can humor Trump and get free-trade globalization back on track. They don't understand it's already over. They don't understand that Trump will not be manipulated by their weasel ways.

I was a liberal-progressive for over 25 years. Waited forever for the Liberal party to come to its senses and ditch Mulroney's "far right" free-trade economic ideology. And here it turns out a game-show-host is bringing it to the universe! – while Liberals, Cons and Ford Nation scream the sky is falling!

Trump is bringing balance to trade. He's not looking for an unfair advantage like the Iron Nanny who has a bigger trade surplus than Emperor Xi. (Which has put the entire EU in a hurt-locker according to establishment economists like Paul Krugman and Simon Wren-Lewis.)

He is protecting jobs across North America from entitled upper-crust moochers. (They ship the jobs out, import a flood of foreign labor, then say the jobs were lost to automation! All the "savings" go to the rich pushing inequality even higher.)

He is bringing much higher wages to Latin America reversing the tide of 45 years of unspeakable American Deep-State corruption in the region (to get a hell of a deal on labor and natural resources) that sent a flood of refugees into America.

He is freeing African Americans who lost their freedom to the Clinton's "three strikes" legislation: i.e., non-violent drug offenders who got life sentences for relatively minor crimes. (So Robber Barons could get a good deal private-prison slave labor!)

In short, Trump is the most progressive leader I have seen in all my days wasting time on politics and economics – and he ain't even progressive!

"Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be miserable."

Anonymous said...

Larry "The Insurance Broker" Summers broke down the way these weasels in high places operate to Elizabeth Warren:

"Larry leaned back in his chair and offered me some advice. ... He teed it up this way: I had a choice. I could be an insider or I could be an outsider. Outsiders can say whatever they want. But people on the inside don’t listen to them. Insiders, however, get lots of access and a chance to push their ideas. People — powerful people — listen to what they have to say. But insiders also understand one unbreakable rule. They don’t criticize other insiders.

"I had been warned."

This is what Fake News weasels mean when they say Trump is breaking the unbreakable rule: "attacking his allies."

I've never seen these insiders HATE anyone as much as Trump. Not even close.

Of course, Ford is no Donald Trump. He's an insider. Which is why Canada's Fake Media scrubbed his absurd image going into the Ontario election. (They've been sounding the car alarm ever since Trump started talking about tearing up bad trade deals during the Republican primaries. Looks like their "sobering and depressing" worries turned out to be true.)

(What kind of insurance did Larry broker? Fraud and toxic-asset insurance to all manner of banker during the Clinton and Obama administrations. Made tens of millions in the process. Bankers walked away with trillions. Homeowners, "muppet" investors and taxpayers, on the other hand, lost their shirts. Some call it an "Inside Job". Some call it an economy in "Freefall." Some call it the "Bigger Short." Welcome to the Machine.)

Jay Farquharson said...

You are working late tonight, таварыш.

Toby said...

Jay Farquharson said, "So gald you want to see so many of your friends and neighbors become quickly unemployed."

There was a time, before Free Trade, when employment was better in Canada. We had a 60% Canadian manufacturing content rule. We had and Autopact with the US that worked well. Most if, not all, our household appliances were made in Canada. We had Canadian department stores. BC had a massive forestry industry that actually milled wood (value added) here. We had fish canneries all along the BC coast. Etc. Etc. What has free trade done for working people?

We need international deals of many sorts. These deals need improve standards. What we have seen so far is a lowering or elimination of standards. We have seen a transfer of sovereignty to transnational corporations and a massive transfer of wealth to the rich. We have seen tax havens for the rich and an abuse of foreign workers taking jobs. Most of the good manufacturing jobs have been lost to automation yet the robots aren't taxed so our governments take a hit. Do I need to continue?

Jay Farquharson said...

Dude, I am old.

My first "real" jib at Heede Crane, as a summer High School intern, back in 1978, paid $15.10 an hour.

It was " funny", didn't pass that for income until 1998.

At one point in time, worked three part time minimum wage jobs, and slept on buses, between jobs.

The MSM said my Generation was "lazy",

The reality is, Boomers voted to pull the ladder up after themselves and f*** everbody after them, kids included.

As the Ontario election shows, 42% of the population can't bother to vote, 58% of the registered voters want's something better, but can't agree on what's better, and 40% of the registered voters are willing to vote for the Tigers Eating Your Face Party, because it ain't "their" face, ( hopefully) the Tigers are gonna eat.

Like many places in the world, Canada's become a sad sad place.

Not my Canada, anymore.

My retirement plan is dying on the job, like 23 million other Canadians.

Trailblazer said...

@ Jay F
As Softwood Lumber shows, there's not a lot Canada can do, as long as we rely on the US Market.

The US softwood industry has suffered the same fate as the Canadian one in that the emphasis is on raw log exports; that is on the western coast.

It would seem that NAFTA gave us an American takeover of Canadian companies.
That done the same companies turned to Asia for cheaper retail products and a place to export raw materials.
It has always been a race to the bottom with fast easy profit being the order of the day.
Shareholder dividends have become more important than long term investment.
Trump does not realise that it is capitalism that is failing not just the USA.

TB

the salamander said...

Kudlow - "Kim must not see American weakness." What ?
Kim Jong-UN is meeting an American weakness named Trump !
Sure.. it will be conducted via translators
So should Kim sit in a chair facing away and not look at Trump ?

Kim is meeting a loser who thinks he's a 'dealmaker'
a scoundrel, fraud, serial liar, narcissist, pussy grabber
who's debt is probably held by Russian oligarcs
on behalf of Putin.. The Trump's are locked into debt
unknown amounts of $ but chicken feed to Putin et al
who already comprimised the entire Trump family & enterprises

Putin know Mueller is unravelling the whole shitstorm
and why should he care.. this is candy to Putin

Old man dotard Trump is screwing America
before he goes away. or is sent away and slovenly screecher's like Kudlow
or Pruitt, De Vos, Bannon et al are icing on the cake - wealthy kiss ass trash

I keep pointing out that the prevailing winds shift over North Korea
they blow towards China then towards Russia
Does anyone really think either country will allow nuclear radiation
from some sort of American proactive 'tactical' takeout ?
Trump's 'comprehention' of world politics is laughable
He bankrupted casinos and was bailed out when broke
Follow the money folks.. this guy defines Loserville

Northern PoV said...

Why the tRump temper tantrum?

Why did young Trudeau become the object of a very personal TTT?

And this TTT was taken up and echoed by several of the WH stooges on separate media venues. So it was an "enhanced TTT" ... more like the cabal's assault on the NFL protesters than any of their foreign policy criticism to date.

Many have characterized Trudeau's supposedly offensive remarks as 'standard boilerplate'.

Forget all the clamour about standing up to Kim ... none of that really cuts the mustard in terms of provoking the verbal fireworks of an enhanced/personal TTT.

It was the gift, the hotel picture, from the pretty-socks man. tRump left the G7 feeling ok and agreeing to a milquetoast, boilerplate communique.

Then social media announced that Trudeau was trolled tRump by this gift, the picture of the ancestral brothel. We know that Trump slavishly follows social media. (Someone in the PMO picked a bad gift w/o the right research OR they were trolling tRump, silly kids.)

My guess is tRump blew up over that and the rest is puffery spin.



The Mound of Sound said...

Sal - thanks for steering the conversation back to Kudlow and Navarro.

Northern PoV said...

So ... I had to go to the SCM Post to see this.
http://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy-defence/article/2150117/xi-jinping-sends-unity-message-regional-security-summit

I did find it buried on CNN after a very specific search ("SCO summit")
Their sub-headline:
"As the G7 summit ended with deep divisions over trade, another meeting of global powers was going a lot more smoothly."

While the west was enjoying the kabuki theatre in Charlevoix and on twitter, on the other side of the world, the adults were meeting and engaging in mature diplomacy.

Who are the 'tin pot' dictators now?

Owen Gray said...

Everyone who has ever done business with Trump has his number. Macron and Trudeau -- the new kids on the block -- thought they could do business with him. They have both been schooled.

Jay Farquharson said...

And,..... right over your head

Canadian Softwood won at NAFTA, won at arbitration, won at Court,

American Lumber just bought more US Politicians and Harper caved.

As long as the US was/is the major market for Canadian Softwood, the US get's to make the rules.

Only when the US Market is insignificant to a Canadian Industry, or Canadian exports are critical to a US Industry, can Canada play hardball on trade.

Jay Farquharson said...

Macron and Trudeau though they were dealing with a "Government",

At the G6 everybody learned they were dealing with a 3 year old and a court of enablers.

It's a shame that the 'Murkin system of Checks and Ballances fell with out a whimper to a "L'État, c'est moi" grifter and sexual predator, a horde of deplorables and the Russian Mob.

Anonymous said...

The one thing that Trump does not know is, KIm, Jung-un likes Canadians and he certainly paid attention to the G7 meeting in Quebec. Anyong.

Jay Farquharson said...

The list of things that Trump doesn't know stretches to infinity.