Wednesday, February 6, 2019
Donald Trump’s 20 Biggest Follies
By Dr. Rodrigue
Tremblay
(Author of the
books “The
Code for Global Ethics”, and “The
New American Empire”)
American
President Donald Trump
has done a lot of unheard-of things since his 2016 election, most of them
have been controversial and some have been utterly scandalous. The latest one
to date was his shutting down of part of the U.S. government for 35 long days,
on a whim, with the intention of bullying the newly elected Democratic majority
of the House of Representatives. However, this time he hit a wall—a democratic
wall—as House Speaker Nancy
Pelosi called his bluff and defeated him at his own game.
But the list of
Trump’s ineptitudes
is very long, and we tend to forget previous ones as the next one hits the
headlines. For the record, here are 20 among his more damning ones.
1. Donald Trump has been accused of having cheated to
get elected
Many suspect that
the rise of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency has been tainted by fraud. This
was made clearer on August 21, 2018, when his campaign manager, Paul Manafort, was
convicted on eight felony counts, in a Virginia courtroom.
The
confessions made by Mr. Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, who has pleaded
guilty to eight felony
charges in a New York courtroom, are possibly even more damaging. Mr.
Cohen, Trump’s enabler and “fixer”, also confessed under oath that he had
openly violated U.S. campaign laws, with the coordination and under the
direction of Mr. Trump, besides having arranged illicit
payments to two women to keep them silent on damaging revelations about
Mr. Trump, with the explicit purpose of influencing the results of the November
2016 American presidential election. Cohen has also confessed that he paid a
company to rig
online polls with the purpose of influencing the electorate, at "the direction of and for the sole benefit of" Donald
Trump.
2.
Donald Trump has surrounded himself with
ideologues and incompetent yes-men and he runs a disorganized administration
The background:
When hotel and casino mogul Donald Trump entered politics, he had no experience in public office or
in government. This is not an insurmountable liability if such a person can
surround himself with knowledgeable and experienced people. In Donald Trump’s
case, he did exactly the reverse. He did not tolerate for very long competent
people around him and he ended up attracting only people with no reputation to
lose but who could flatter his clinical narcissism.
Indeed, Donald
Trump has fired or forced to resign experienced and competent people (Exxon
President Rex Tlllerson, General James Mattis, general H.R. McMaster, economist
Gary Cohn, etc.) who were ready to serve their
country but who were not ready to swear allegiance to a mafia-like boss.
Because Donald Trump was on the lookout for people who would only work for
himself and could contribute to his aggrandizement, he finally succeeded in
attracting clones of himself, essentially sycophants of the likes of Stephen
Miller, Jared Kushner, John Bolton, Mike Pompeo, Peter Navarro, etc.
Thereafter, he
has run a government mired in chaos, dysfunction, improvisation and
irresponsibility, even boasting that he trusted his “guts”
above everything else, while shamelessly pursuing his own private interests,
political and financial, in making important public policies. As a result, Donald
Trump has made a travesty of the American presidency. — This is not how a
democratic government ought to function. It must exhibit competence, trust,
inspire confidence, show integrity and honesty, and be devoted to the pursuit
of the common good.
According to an
author who has served in Trump’s White House and who has witnessed first-hand the chaos, the
disorganization and the daily intrigues in and around the Oval Office, the
current U.S. President has surrounded himself with a team
of vipers. In the final
analysis, it may be New York Times renowned economist Paul Krugman who best
summarized the situation when he branded the Trump administration as a team
of morons, under the
direction of an undignified, unprepared and incompetent president.
3. Donald Trump‘s relations with other politicians,
journalists, personalities and some foreign leaders have been marred by
insults, lies and threats
The list of persons and places that a boorish Donald
Trump has insulted verbally or on Twitter, since taking office, is very long.
Indeed, he is a champion in the art of insultery
to the point of childishness, sometimes using crude and offensive language. As of last December, the New York Times has estimated
that he has insulted some 551
politicians, journalists, personalities, heads of state and places. He does
not seem to have any decency or restraint in dealing with people. And
ironically, when someone throws an insult at him, he makes a terrible fuss
about it.
Here are only a
few examples:
Donald Trump
insulted his Democratic presidential adversary, Hillary Clinton, by calling her
“crooked” and “shrill”. Trump, who found a way to avoid being drafted in the
army to go to Vietnam, declared the late Senator John McCain “not being a hero”
because he had been captured, even though the latter spent five years in a
Vietnamese jail as an American combat man.
Donald Trump has
insulted scores of personalities. He has
lashed out at famous actress Meryl Streep, calling her an "overrated actress”. He called NBA
football player Lebron
James “stupid” and he has repeated that insult to many other persons.
Trump has called
the President of North Korea Kim Jong-Un “short and fat”. He called Canada’s
Prime Minister Justin
Trudeau “very dishonest and weak”. He insulted German Chancellor Angela Merkel by saying that
she “was ruining Germany” and that “the German people will throw her out”.
During a visit to France, Trump found a way to insult his host, French
President Emmanuel Macron, saying that it was “very insulting” for him (Macron)
to suggest that Europe should have a European army, etc.
Donald Trump has
even found a way to insult the population of an entire continent. In January
2018, he branded African nations
as “shithole countries”! Need we say more?
4. Donald Trump has violated time and again the Free
Press Guarantee enshrined in the U.S. Constitution
Amendment I. Congress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the
free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or
the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the
government for a redress of grievances. [The U.S. Constitution]
Trump has often
violated the Free Press Guarantee in the U.S. Constitution by lying constantly
to journalists, by abusing them with false accusations and by encouraging
distrust and even hatred of professional journalists, and by constantly
disregarding veracity. More generally speaking, Donald Trump, as an individual,
does not know nor understand history and the way a democratic government
functions under a constitution, and his incoherent statements on these topics
are a fair reflection of such ignorance and disability.
Through his
statements and by his behavior, Donald Trump resembles more and more Turkey’s de facto dictator Recep Erdoğan.
He has stirred up violence against journalists, because they do not think like
him or do not praise him enough.
Trump does not
seem to have any decency and any limits when his personal interests are at
stake. According to his biographers,
that is what he has done all
his life.
5. In 2017, Trump bombed the country of Syria on false
flag information
As a show of
force, Donald Trump launched a bombing attack against the country of Syria,
on Friday morning, April 7, 2017, under the spurious pretext that the
inhabitants of a Syrian town had been the victims of a chemical attack. All
this, not only in the absence of proof but also after there were numerous indications
that such an attack was a false
flag operation that had been staged by U.S.-backed Islamist rebels
to embarrass the Syrian government, to blame Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, to manipulate the American
president and to hoodwink the American public.
Nevertheless, thinking only about his own persona and wanting a PR show
as a “strong man”, Trump launched an illegal military attack against the
sovereign country of Syria, under false pretenses, just as George W. Bush had
done in 2003 against the country of Iraq.
—In Washington DC, under the influence of money and neo-conservatives in the
formulation of U.S. foreign policy, « plus ça change, plus c’est pareil »!
6. Trump has stirred more hatred and created more
problems in the Middle East, especially in Syria, in Palestine and in Yemen
US President
Donald Trump, flanked by Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L),
delivers remarks after a wreath-laying at the Yad Vashem holocaust memorial in
Jerusalem on 23 May, 2017
By acquiescing to
demands from his Zionist campaign donors, especially casino mogul Sheldon
Adelson, to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and to
cancel the Iran nuclear deal, Donald Trump has fulfilled his main campaign
promises to them. For Trump, U.S. foreign policies seem to be for sale to the
highest campaign bidders, whatever the consequences.
And, to make sure
that this would be the case, Trump designated Jared Kushner, his son-in-law and
a fervent Zionist, to frame American foreign policy in the Middle East, in
association with neocon John Bolton. It is no wonder that the Middle East is a
daily human tragedy, with refugees fleeing in droves to Europe.
More generally,
it can be said that the U.S. government under Donald Trump, as it was also the
case under George W. Bush and previous American presidents since WWII, has an
unchecked hubristic complex, and thinks it has a god-given right to meddle in other
sovereign countries’ domestic affairs.
In pursuing his
own private financial interests, even while in government, Donald Trump has
been accused of soliciting favors from foreign
governments.
The entire issue
of complicity of conspiracy with foreign governments will most likely be
front-page news when the report by the special counsel Robert Mueller’s
investigation is made public.
8. Trump has befriended foreign dictators and despots
while attacking allies and foreign democratic leaders
With
his autocratic style of government, Donald Trump has been more at ease with
foreign dictators than with democratic leaders. The list of strongmen
and despots he has befriended
and endorsed is long. Equally long is the list of democratic leaders and
countries he
has insulted and snubbed.
Trump
has distanced himself from other democratic countries, in particular when he abandoned the Trans-Pacific Partnership
trade deal and when he pulled
out of a global climate agreement.
9. Trump has extended huge tax reductions to
corporations and rich individuals, who in turn bought stock shares and created
a stock market bubble
Possibly the Trump administration’s biggest economic
and social blunder was the huge tax bonanza given to large corporations and
super rich individuals, thus exacerbating income and wealth inequalities in the
United States. Such large tax reductions are pushing the federal fiscal deficit
above $1 trillion a year, thus saddling future generations with a huge public
debt.
This is more surprising if one considers that during the 2016 political campaign,
presidential candidate Donald Trump
promised he would eliminate
the U.S. public debt in eight years. — In fact, Trump did just the reverse.
As a result of Trump’s fiscal policies, it is estimated that his administration
will add $8.3 trillion to the public debt during his first term. Meanwhile, the
U.S. public debt will balloon to a total of $25 trillion. There is a term for
that and it is called fiscal irresponsibility and campaign promise cynicism.
In the year 2018, for example, the S&P 500
companies (Qualcomm,
Apple, Oracle,
etc.) used their Trump
tax cut bonuses to spend an estimated staggering $770 billion to buy
back their own shares, thus contributing to generating a stock market bubble.
For CEOs, whose compensation is tied to the stock price because it makes the stock more
valuable, this was the
best of times, i.e. high salaries and lower taxes.
Many small investors, however, who bought at the top
of the market, will be singled out to lose a lot of their savings when the
stock market bubble bursts, while workers’ real wages are still lingering.
10. Trump has implemented pro-cyclical economic
policies that will worsen the next economic downturn and hurt the poorest
Americans
Through large tax
cuts and large increases in deficits and debt, the Trump administration has
pursued a pro-cyclical
fiscal policy at the top of the business cycle, when economic growth is
positive and unemployment is low. In so doing, this is likely to reduce the
federal government’s capability to fight the next recession.
With wise fiscal
policy, the public budget
deficit usually falls during economic upswings and rises during downswings of
the economy. For short-term political considerations, the Trump administration
has done the contrary. If the next recession is unusually severe, people will
know whom to blame.
11. Donald Trump has bullied the Fed, thus endangering
its independence and its credibility
Donald Trump has
made disparaging and damaging remarks
about the Fed and its Chairman, thus endangering the Fed’s independence and
credibility internationally. A central bank has no responsibility to cater to
politicians’ short-term political interests. Its sole responsibility is to
stabilize the economy, smooth the business cycle, avoid financial bubbles and
prevent inflation.
As mentioned
above, the Trump administration has pursued a pro-cyclical fiscal policy,
increasing deficits and the public debt at the top of the business cycle,
besides feeding a stock market price bubble. Such a policy can temporarily
stimulate economic growth, but at the expense of higher inflation and lower
growth later on. Thereafter, the Fed was placed in a difficult position and it
felt obligated to adopt a monetary policy of adjusting upward extraordinary low
interest rates. Indeed, negative real interest rates, i.e. when market
short-term interest rates are lower than inflation rates, can result in
unviable investments and encourage risky speculation.
The Fed has
embarked on a policy of slowly reducing its bloated
balance sheet, a result of the financial crisis of 2008, when the
central bank bought mortgage bonds from the banks (Fed’s assets) and when it
increased the banks’ reserves (Fed’s liabilities) to prevent the largest banks
from failing. This means a gradual adjustment of short-term interest rates
upward. What has been unusual was Trump’s attempt to attack the independence of
the Federal Reserve System and to undermine its reputation.
12. Trump’s known numerous instances of sexual
misconduct and legal entanglements thereof have been an albatross around his
neck, which has impaired his credibility
There have been
many instances when Donald Trump has publicly degraded women. There also have
been numerous assertions of sexual
misconduct made about Mr. Trump. Nobody expects a politician to be a
saint. However, because the person in the White House used to be looked upon as
a model for American youth, his character and his behavior count. Instead,
Donald Trump has projected a personal image of depravation.
13. Trump’s penchant for abuse of power, and
autocratic and demagogic government, could lead to a constitutional crisis
Even before his
official inauguration on January 22, 2017, Donald Trump projected himself as a de facto American would-be
dictator who has utter contempt for
the sanctity of the division of powers
(the system of Checks and Balances) inscribed in the U.S. Constitution (Article 1). His first instinct was to govern by decree, with as
little congressional input as possible.
In the past,
other American presidents have attempted to concentrate power in the Oval
Office. One thinks of Andrew Johnson in the 19th Century, and Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton in
the 20th Century. They were all politicians who tried to stretch the
U.S. Constitution in their favor. But none has strained American democratic
institutions as Donald Trump has done. Trump seems to have a profound
disrespect for American institutions.
14. Donald Trump has been a factor of division and of
polarization in the United States
With his tactic
of confrontation and through his incendiary speeches, his attacks ad hominem,
his tantrums and his bullying tactics toward Congress and toward American
celebrities, Donald Trump has divided
and polarized the United States and widened
divisions among the public like no other politician before. Indeed, it
is a safe to say that with Donald Trump in the White House, the United States
is more divided than ever.
15. Trump’s inhumanity and lack of compassion towards
immigrant children is appalling
Every country has
the right to defend its borders against illegal immigration. Nowadays, human
traffickers encourage fake refugees to bypass the legal immigration system.
This is a problem in Europe but also in North America. But there are humane
ways and inhuman ways to deal with such a problem.
On that score,
the Trump administration has pursued a reprehensible family
separation policy for children of immigrants who have entered the U.S.
illegally. Maybe fake refugees should have their requests analyzed before being
allowed to enter the country. But separating children from their parents is
uncivilized.
Indeed, a
majority of Americans have decried such a policy of establishing detention
camps for children. In so doing, the Trump administration has demonstrated a
frightening absence of moral probity and compassion.
Americans in
general are more moral and ethical than the Trump administration and its family-separation policy. Various polls have shown that such a policy is
unpopular, with about two-thirds of Americans opposing it.
Donald Trump has
also played political games with the lives of the so called DACA
children, i.e. children who
were allowed in the United States when they were at a very young age, after
natural and political disasters in their countries (in Haiti and in some other
countries), and who have since grown up and worked as Americans. Many of these children are now young adults who speak
only English and have no memory of or connection to their country of birth—but
they have been threatened with deportation by the Trump administration.
There are about
800,000 young adults in that precarious situation. They are called DREAMers because of a proposed act,
the DREAM Act, which would have provided a conditional pathway to U.S.
citizenship or legal residency to a certain number of them, in order to allow
them to go to college, to be employed and/or to serve in the military, while
maintaining a good record. A large proportion of Americans, in fact 82 percent
according to a CNN poll, would support such a humanist
approach to a very specific human problem.
However,
on Saturday January 19, 2019, President Trump tried to bargain
the fate
of these young adults in exchange for $5.7 billion, if the Democratically-controlled
House of Representatives voted funds for his project of building a steel wall
between the United States and Mexico. This is tantamount to placing narrow
political interests above the fate of young people who find themselves in a very
precarious situation.
16. Trump’s promise to fight political corruption in
Washington D.C. has been an empty promise
The
promise that Donald Trump made while on the campaign trail to fight political
corruption—to
drain the Washington corruption swamp, as he said—has fallen flat. In fact, he
has done anything but drain
that swamp. Trump
has been accused of having indulged in political corruption by accepting huge
sums of money from lobbyists, thus placing himself in conflicts
of interest.
His position on
conflicts of interest since the beginning of his mandate has raised a lot of
suspicion. He does not seem to be able to separate the affairs of the state
from his personal affairs. Trump
has surrounded himself with family members and he has
appointed advisers who’ve been accused of conflicts of interest, many of whom
have either been convicted or pleaded guilty, etc.
He has gone as far as giving the keys of
the Pentagon to the arms industry in
naming a Boeing executive as the acting secretary of the Department of Defense.
—What he has done is to simply reorganize corruption to his own advantage.
17. Trump has ignored the problems related to global
warming
The phenomenon of
a warming planet may be the biggest challenge facing humanity in the future. It
has been observed that summers are warmer and winters are colder, both in the
Northern and Southern hemispheres.
Some believe that a slight increase in
the tilt of the
Earth's axis toward the Sun
could play a role. Indeed, many people think that because of this increase the observed temperature changes can be
caused by the Earth being closer to the Sun in summer and farther from the Sun
in winter. Others place more emphasis on a rise in the level of the gas
CO2 and other heat-trapping
gases in the atmosphere, creating a greenhouse effect, for the observed
warming of the climate.
Whatever the causes or combination of
causes, the Earth’s warming and its consequences are undeniable. The year 2018
was the Earth’s fourth warmest
on record. Indeed, the world suffered last year
from severe heat waves that killed people, from extreme rain that created huge flooding, and from drought that destroyed crops.
Nevertheless, the Trump administration
has been oblivious to the problem, and has even denied that the Earth’s warming
could be a problem. Rather than acting, the Trump administration has made
matters worse by reducing
regulation to control pollution
and by making it easier for companies to pollute.
A new
poll, however, reveals that Americans are
increasingly worried about global warming. It is the children of today and of
tomorrow who will pay for the heedlessness and irresponsibility of the Trump
administration.
18. Trump has started a
trade war and a new arms race, which could have negative consequences for
global prosperity and for world peace
There is presently an intense technological competition around the fifth-generation
(5G) chipset, which is bound to influence the global smartphone
industry, telecommunications and cellular networks in the future. Many
governments, not the least the U.S. government, are worried that Chinese
companies such as Huawei
could dominate that next-generation technology.
The Trump administration fears that the Chinese
advances in that field could make it possible for the Chinese government to spy
on other countries. For example, it has imposed restrictions
and sanctions on Huawei and barred that company and other Chinese
companies from installing telecommunications equipment in the United States.
The Chinese company has also been accused of “violating American
extraterritorial sanctions against the country of Iran” and of
“stealing trade secrets” from an American partner.
No country should be allowed to impose its domestic laws on other
countries. When this is the case, we have to talk about imperialism.
However, a country has always the right to protect its own companies against
industrial espionage.
In the final analysis, nobody can understand the rationale behind the
trade war that the Trump administration has initiated against China without
understanding the technological conflict that is going on.
Similarly, the
Trump administration has launched a new
arms race against Russia and China, both in space and in Europe, which could degenerate into a military
conflict. It has also placed nuclear missiles in countries bordering Russia, a
provocation, thus openly threatening Russia’s security. If it were the reverse,
the United States would surely object to having Russian nuclear missiles in a
neighboring country. As a matter of fact, this was precisely the basis of the Cuban
missile crisis of October 1962, under President John F. Kennedy. —If Nikita Khrushchev was wrong, in 1962, in provoking the United States,
Donald Trump, in 2019, is wrong in provoking Russia.
19. Donald Trump gambled with the fate of humanity
with his decision to unilaterally cancel the Intermediate-Range
Nuclear Forces Treaty
When Donald Trump
announced, in October 2018 and when this was officially confirmed on Friday,
February 1, 2019 that, without consultation with European allies, his
administration is unilaterally withdrawing from the Intermediate-Range
Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty), he opened a huge Pandora Box from which a lot of
human misery could come out. That important treaty was first signed in December
1987 by Republican President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev. One
of its objectives was to make sure that Europe would not become the theater of
a disastrous nuclear war. But Trump does not care: “Après moi le déluge“.
That reckless
decision has been called Trump’s
Nuclear Folly as it indicates that allies don’t count for the Trump
administration. It seems that Trump and his neocon advisors want a war with
Russia. First, they place nuclear missiles in countries bordering Russia; then
they get out of a nuclear treaty to prevent a nuclear war in Europe. Pitiful!
20. The biggest folly of all is to enter politics when
one is inexperienced and incompetent
The list of
Donald Trump’s very close associates and aides who have worked with him and who
have declared him to be a “man-child”,
a “moron” or an “idiot”, and to be unfit to be U.S. president, is very long.
This is most unusual and most relevant.
The first person
to call Donald Trump a “moron” was the former president of Exxon and Trump’s
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Indeed, NBC
News reported that Mr. Tillerson made the devastating comment after a
meeting at the Pentagon, on July 20, 2017, with other members of Trump’s national security team and Cabinet
officials.
Then followed a
string of similar disparaging assessments of Trump’s character and
capabilities. Veteran journalist Bob Woodward, in his 2018 book
“Fear:
Trump in the White House”,
has documented the chaos and disrepute that Donald Trump brought into the
American White House: His own first chief of staff Reince Priebus called him an “idiot”. Trump’s second chief of staff, General John Kelly, has also
called him “an idiot”, and he added that he was “unhinged”! —Mind you, these are experienced people who worked with
Donald Trump on a daily basis. Now it is reported that Trump has chosen his
son-in-law, Jared
Kushner,
to be his de facto chief of staff,
thus turning the White House into an exclusively family enterprise.
Also,
Defense Secretary General James Mattis has declared that Donald Trump had the
understanding of “a fifth- or sixth-grader”. Such a severe assessment coming
from a retired United States
Marine Corps general, who served
in the Persian Gulf War, the War in Afghanistan, and the Iraq War. Such an
evaluation cannot be brushed aside.
Another
noteworthy book,
by Michael Wolff, entitled “Fire and Fury”,
disclosed other negative assessments of Mr. Trump by his close associates. For
example, it reveals that Treasury
Secretary Steven Mnuchin has also called Trump an “idiot”; that former national
security adviser, general H.R. McMaster, has referred to the president as a
“dope”; and that Trump’s former economic adviser Gary Cohn has said that Donald
Trump is “dumb as s***”!
A former FBI counterintelligence officer
who now lectures at Yale University, Ms Asha Rangappa has concluded, in a piece for Politico,
that Mr. Trump cannot distinguish fact
from fiction. For a head of state,
this is a huge liability!
On his part,
former FBI Director James Comey, a man who has seen a lot, went one step
further and he has said that Mr. Trump has the character of a “Mob
boss”.
— Does one not get
the picture!
Conclusion
Let us remind
ourselves of the fact that Donald Trump is the only post WWII American
president who has never been able to rally 50 percent or more of the American
people behind him. Not only was he elected in 2016 with some 3,000,000 fewer
votes than his main opponent, Hillary Clinton, but his approval ratings have
always been below 50 percent, ranging between 34 and 44 percent.
Trump’s
basic unpopularity
has been
undeniable and persistent, to the point of making him an illegitimate
president.
And there are profound
reasons for that, as outlined above.
That may also be
why a 57 percent majority of Americans do not want Donald Trump to run for
re-election in 2020, according to a 2019 January
poll. —They seem to
have had enough!
_______________________________________________
International
economist Dr. Rodrigue Tremblay is the author of the book “The
Code for Global Ethics, Ten Humanist Principles”, of the book “The
New American Empire”, and the recent book, in French « La
régression tranquille du Québec, 1980-2018 ».
Please visit Dr.
Tremblay’s site:
Posted,
Wednesday, February 6, 2019, at 8:30 am
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COMMENTS
Donald Trump’s 20 Biggest Follies
Les 20 plus grandes folies de Donald Trump
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Comments (6)
***N.B. Comments are the sole responsibility of their authors.
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New
The Mad-dogs of Nuclear Armaments — USA and Russia.
Posted, Sunday, February 3, 2019, 14h35
Let us consider a very serious matter. It is the existence of weapons of mass destruction and the potential annihilation of our species. More particularly, the focus is on the conduct of the United States of America and Russia.
Context and a quick grasp of the motivating factors for production of these weapons can be gleaned by listening to President Eisenhower’s warning from the 1960s and then considering the stark clarity of the words of George Kennan (he was the US architect of the ‘Cold War’):
“Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial establishment would have to go on, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.” ― George F. Kennan
…
The idea and objective of International Law is to provide a framework and set of international rules for nations and persons to conduct international relations by abiding by same (The rule of International Law). The UN Charter and Treaties are just two demonstrable examples of International Law's intention as to how it is intended to work. It is not a perfect system, but without it (or something close to it in place) —then what is the option for intended civilized and peaceful dispute resolution —brute force —or —war?
Thus, post World War II, not only the United Nations, but a series of Laws and Treaties, such as the Geneva Conventions, set out to establish the legal new architecture for the world. In the specific context of nuclear weapons the following can be noted:
The Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM Treaty or ABMT) was signed in 1972 between the US and the then Soviet Union. The terms of the Treaty permitted each side to be limited to two ABM complexes —and —each complex was further limited to 100 anti-ballistic missiles.
In 2002 the US already had destabilized the nuclear balance when they decided to get out of the ABM Treaty. In 2002, and when you look at a map, the United States was putting missile defense bases all around Eurasia, creating a feeling of encirclement in Russia and China.
The US ideology was to put sovereignty above international law, and they wanted to have a totally free hand to keep their supremacy in the world as long as possible, and these Treaties were constraining them.
The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) collapsed; it had been established in 1987 between the then Soviet Union and the US at a time when Gorbachov and Reagan were leaders of their respective countries. The broad objective, as with the 1972 Treaty, was arms-control. The INF Treaty sought to eliminate all land-based ballistic and cruise missiles and the launchers for such missiles.
Citing Russian non-compliance as the reason for withdrawal, on the 20th October 2018, President Donald Trump announced that the US was withdrawing.
It is not hard to discern the pattern of attempted rationalization, by way of blaming deviation and/or violations to justify withdrawal. Yet, withdrawal, defeats the long-term objective of an intended symmetrical containment under International Treaties.
It is also not hard to discern from the withdrawals, that one nation is seeking superiority and dominance; by placing emphasis on its “exceptionalism” in preference for assertive sovereignty over co-operative submission to international law.
The waste of global resources and corresponding stupidity should also be noted. That approach places us (all human beings on planet earth) at risk.
What logical, rational —or —in any way sensible route is it for a nation to squander so much resources on building these nuclear weapons; when —it is known by both sides that direct use, the US against Russia or vice versa is guaranteed Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD)?
Courtenay
New
Excellent Article on Trump.
Posted, Sunday, February 3, 2019, 15h21
Excellent article on Trump —It is well researched & factual, to the point. The only think I have a reservation is the part on global warming, conveniently changed to climate change.
But that is another story with jury still out on that one.
We have also in Canada a Prime Minister who is also unstable & not very a statesman like, especially as related to his human rights and international politics. Canada trumpets to the world to be a champion of human rights but when it comes to Israeli treatment of Palestinians, we say nothing and support the tyrannical regime regardless. —Does not this looks like US policy and the people funding this are the same on both sides of the border.
Other thing is the idea of supporting the self-proclaimed Venezuelan ”president“, which reminds me of a Ukraine repeat!
I extend my appreciation to the author for his excellent writing on those controversial topics.
Ludvik
New
Russia Gate VS Israel Gate!
Posted, Monday, February 4, 2019, 06 h 06
Trumps presidency is not Russia gate but rather it is Israeli gate 100%. That’s it in a nutshell albeit your outline was interesting.
Tom
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Answer by R. T.:
I agree with your statement. Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election is most likely peanuts compare to Israel’s involvement in all American elections. I have written about that before. See here:
Nouveau
Superbe analyse.
Mis en ligne, lundi, le 4 février 2019, 08 h 07
Superbe cette analyse de parcours de Trump !
Josée
New
Trump had no experience in government.
Posted Tues. February 5, 2019, 11:01 pm
Trump had no experience in government before he won the 2016 Republican nomination. He was just a popular TV reality star who branded his name on every piece of real estate he built. He wasn't even that successful in business, going bankrupt more than once. He's a lazy-bones, too, rarely hitting the Oval Office until 11.30 am, according to Axios, which obtained his daily schedules. His approval ratings may never again cross 40%. If President Trump runs again, he certainly looks beatable.
The latest self-deluded billionaire to be fooled by this magical thinking is Howard Schultz, the former CEO of Starbucks. He's out hawking a book in hopes of boosting his name recognition and telling interviewers he's "strongly considering" a presidential run as an independent.
Lance
Nouveau
Les articles du prof. Tremblay sont instructifs et factuels.
Mis en ligne, lundi, le 4 février 2019, 16 h 12
C'est toujours intéressant de lire les articles du prof. Tremblay parce que, premièrement, ils sont instructifs et factuels (ses affirmations reposent pratiquement toujours sur des faits vérifiables), et aussi parce qu'ils sont très bien écrits.
René
New
Confused About our Existence!
Posted, Sunday, February 10, 2019, 06 h 44
As famous biologist Edward O. Wilson so eloquently said:
“Humanity today is like a walking dreamer, caught between the fantasies of sleep and the chaos of the real world. The mind seeks but cannot find the precise place and hour. We have created a Star Wars civilization, with Stone Age emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. We thrash about. We are terribly confused by the mere fact of our existence, and a danger to ourselves and to the rest of life.” (“The Social Conquest of Earth”, 2012), …
The real world of the U.K., the U.S. and the entire planet needs to move on to a better place.
Courtenay
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© 2019 by Dr.
Rodrigue Tremblay