April 21, 2017

"White House officials said Mr. Trump took a personal interest in her case.... 'He just said, "Let’s bring her home."'"

From the NYT report, "American Aid Worker, Release Secured by Trump Officials, Leaves Egypt."

This article, new today, appears in the print edition not on the front page, but on page 10. On the home page of the web edition, it's hard to find. I did a search for the woman's name and found nothing, then for "Egypt," and found the headline tucked away... do you see it?



It's not under "World" or "U.S." but "Politics" — politics? — sandwiched between "Right and Left: Partisan Writing You Shouldn’t Miss" and "Jeff Sessions Dismisses Hawaii as ‘an Island in the Pacific.’"

By contrast, the Washington Post home page has the story at the top of the home page, with the woman's name, Aya Hijazi, in clear print:



The visual effect is a triad of bold females challenging the powers that be: 1. There's "Aya Hijazi, a charity worker... incarcerated without trial on charges that were widely derided." 2. There's that "Fearless Girl" sculpture we've been talking about. (It's not a new story, so it seems especially conscious to put the story front and center today. (The article has an interesting feminist angle: The male artist expresses pain that his bull — against his original intent — has become a symbol of male chauvinism.)) 3. There's Marie Le Pen, boosted by the latest Paris terrorist attack.

It's hard — isn't it? — for the liberal media to give President Trump credit for anything, but they should gracefully give him the credit he genuinely deserves. Imagine what the NYT would look like if President Obama had brought Aya Hijazi home! Trump was portrayed in a negative light for cozying up to Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi, but the Obama administration tried and failed to bring Hijazi home. From WaPo:
It was not until Trump moved to reset U.S. relations with Egypt by embracing Sissi at the White House on April 3 — he publicly hailed the autocrat’s leadership as “fantastic” and offered the U.S. government’s “strong backing” — that Egypt’s posture changed. Last Sunday, a court in Cairo dropped all charges against Hijazi and the others.
Let's talk about which is better, Obama's words or Trump's words? Do Trump's words seem ridiculous and clownish — calling Sissi "fantastic" — when we see that Trump got results?

WaPo prods us to think of the Trump administration in terms of "confusion" (it's the old "chaos" template, that alternates with "evil" in the elite media's coverage of Trump):
What the White House plans to celebrate as vindication of its early diplomacy comes at the end of a week in which the administration has combated charges of foreign policy confusion. Although the president received wide praise for his decision to punish Syria for its presumed chemical weapons attack with a barrage of cruise missiles, the administration has been criticized for contradictions over policy toward Syria and Turkey, and misstatements on the U.S. response to North Korea’s weapons activity.
Successful action is camouflaged in verbiage about things that have been said. Some of his words may sound like confusion, but that doesn't mean Trump is confused about what he is saying. Maybe he knows how to use words. There's an awful lot of evidence that he does. You can look down on him and call him confused, but when the results come in, you ought to question your analysis of what he is doing with words.

Toward the end of the WaPo article:
The senior Trump administration official said the agreement for Hijazi’s release was the product of Trump’s “discreet diplomacy” — meaning the president’s efforts to cultivate warm relations with strongmen such as Sissi and Chinese President Xi Jinping, in part by avoiding public pronouncements on human rights that might alienate the foreign governments.
Discreet. Consider the notion that Trump is discreet

67 comments:

AllenS said...

Only one word is needed: Winning.

whitney said...

The left has consistently underestimated him. It's why he so easily makes fools of them time and time again

I'm Full of Soup said...

Trump can never be as spohisticated nor as shrewd as the typical NYT journolister.

MartyH said...

Obama is a bowler. He marches up to the line, swings his arm back and lobs the ball down the lane with a loud "thunk". He then turns around and walks back by the scorer's table, where he may watch to see how many pins he knocked down. Everything is determined by the path and spin of the ball when it leaves his hand. He'll hit the reset button if he's not happy with the result.

Trump is a sweeper in a curling match. He knows where he wants the stone to go and he furiously uses his broom to clear a path for it. He swears at the stone and calls it names. But as long as that stone has the slightest bit of momentum he is going to try to get it to where he wants it to go.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Mainstream pro-democrat hack press. They are hacks.

Tommy Duncan said...

Results matter.

Results matter more than appearances.

Results matter more than nuance.

Results matter more than perfect consistency.

Results matter more to this President than ideology.

exhelodrvr1 said...

The concept of giving him the credit he deserves terrifies them, because they know that is a step on the road to admitting their worldview is bogus. Just like the article about the book of Pres. Bush's paintings.

Anonymous said...

Good work Donald!

Big Mike said...

You can look down on him and call him confused, but when the results come in, you ought to question your analysis of what he is doing with words.

Yes you should. Every day the news organizations become further detached from reality and from the people who pay to read what they write. I subscribed to the Post for well over forty years, but these days I only read articles that Althouse links to, and not even all of them.

Rumpletweezer said...

Many on the left have placed themselves in the position where they cannot conceive of giving Trump credit for anything. That won't serve them well for the next four or eight years.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Trump had a tweet critical of Egypt in 2003 so of course the chaos template should be applied to this story.

dreams said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
dreams said...

"It's hard — isn't it? — for the liberal media to give President Trump credit for anything, but they should gracefully give him the credit he genuinely deserves."

Because we're in a civil war?

"The choices of this civil war are painfully clear.

We can have a system of government based around the Constitution with democratically elected representatives. Or we can have one based on the ideological principles of the left in which all laws and processes, including elections and the Constitution, are fig leaves for enforcing social justice.

But we cannot have both.

Some civil wars happen when a political conflict can’t be resolved at the political level. The really bad ones happen when an irresolvable political conflict combines with an irresolvable cultural conflict.

That is what we have now."

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/266197/civil-war-here-daniel-greenfield

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...Let's talk about which is better, Obama's words or Trump's words? Do Trump's words seem ridiculous and clownish — calling Sissi "fantastic" — when we see that Trump got results?

That's an easy one to crack, Professor. The Media is Left, and what matters to the Left is intentions. Obama's intentions were to heal the world (slow the rise of the oceans, etc) and so whatever actions he took, however ineffectual, were praiseworthy. Accomplishing this or that was beside the point--he INTENDED good things, therefore he must be praised. Nobel Peace Prize--remember?! He got that not for doing anything, but for BEING a guy who INTENDED to do stuff. That was enough.

Trump, of course, INTENDS to be a non-Lefty President. He intends to accomplish any number of things the Left opposes. Even when he accomplishes something the Left might otherwise applaud, like helping free an aid worker, he's doing that with the INTENTION of furthering his own ends, and therefore even those actions cannot be praised. To give Trump credit for something is to assist him, and since he intends to do some things the Left doesn't like (whether he plausibly can accomplish those things or not) they have to avoid giving that credit.

I'm using "Left" broadly here; I'll be a similar dynamic is at play with a similar sentiment (to deny Trump proper credit and/or to change the subject to a Trump problem) among even some lifelong Republican types.

MaxedOutMama said...

Three years in an Egyptian prison is a loooong time. I'm so glad she and the others (why don't we know their names?) are home.

Perhaps it is simply that the NYT cannot cope with the cognitive dissonance that the Trump admin would go to bat for (and send a plane for) a person with a Muslim sounding name, much less her (shudder) Egyptian husband.

Because as all good NYT readers, Madelaine Albright, and Ninth Circuit judges know, Trump's administration is about putting all the Muslims in box cars and flinging them into an active volcano crater. If you live in Seattle, you immediately realized after the MOAB deployment in Afghanistan that the volcano will be Mount St. Helens, and that is the second designated MOAB target. Which is yet another way that Trump intends to jump-start global warming in order to make the seas rise and flood all the coastal territories where people did not vote for him.

So obviously all this did not happen, and if the NYT were to publicize this too heavily, the cases of NYC cognitive dissonance would flood the mental hospitals and psychiatric clinics to the point of crisis. Nor would de Blasio would not be able to address due to his long wait for assistance at his shrink's office, because Madelaine Albright would be refusing to get off the couch.

They've gone so far down the rabbit-hole that the sunlight can no longer penetrate, and is seen as threatening.

dreams said...

"It's hard — isn't it? — for the liberal media to give President Trump credit for anything, but they should gracefully give him the credit he genuinely deserves."

Because we're in a war.

"A civil war has begun.

This civil war is very different than the last one. There are no cannons or cavalry charges. The left doesn’t want to secede. It wants to rule. Political conflicts become civil wars when one side refuses to accept the existing authority. The left has rejected all forms of authority that it doesn’t control.

The left has rejected the outcome of the last two presidential elections won by Republicans. It has rejected the judicial authority of the Supreme Court when it decisions don’t accord with its agenda. It rejects the legislative authority of Congress when it is not dominated by the left.

It rejected the Constitution so long ago that it hardly bears mentioning."

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/266197/civil-war-here-daniel-greenfield

MikeR said...

ISIS is hacking the French election, trying to get Le Pen elected!

traditionalguy said...

The wonder is how easilyObama sneakily arranged to destroy our oldest and best ally in the middleast under a Media cover called Arab Spring.

The Egyptians were smart enough to resist Obama and survive until
The USA got back into business of being a strong ally again.

And Evil
Queen Hillary was all in for destroying the Pax Americana world for personal
loot and fame. Trump will get his statue for stopping her.

MaxedOutMama said...

I'm so glad for this poor lady. Here is a HuffPo article from 2014 about her:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brian-dooley/state-department-should-s_b_12015326.html

stlcdr said...

Marine not Marie. An interesting name, to be sure.

Oh, and what they said.

Sprezzatura said...

So this is what winning (for us) looks like?

What does it look like from the Egyptian gov POV and Egyptian people's POV?

IOW, who got a better deal: us getting a gal v E gov getting US appeasement (and, of course, the never ending dough infusions).

If you're willing to overpay, you can always close a deal. That's not a good thing, imho. Presumably cons are able to identify a situation where they'd say a deal wasn't worth the price paid. Sounds familiar, right?



And, what does POTUS appeasement of Erdogan look like from his POV and the POV of the Turks? Who got the best of that deal? Overpaying and getting ripped off isn't good deal arting.

dreams said...

Trump is definitely a doer.

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...

Leading from the front?

Greg Hlatky said...

The left has rejected the outcome of the last two presidential elections won by Republicans.

Actually, the last three.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"If you're willing to overpay, you can always close a deal.

Define "overpay" in relation to an innocent woman in an Egyptian prison cell. Try not to be a slimeball while doing so.

Amadeus 48 said...

Dan Henninger's column in the Wall Street Journal this week has an interesting take on Trump's recent foreign policy actions: courtesy of Mattis and McMaster's experience with the various Sunni tribes in Iraq, the US is trying to rebuild relations with historic allies (Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Israel, etc.) in the Middle East instead of trying to placate historic enemies (Iran, Russia, Assad). Hence, the embrace of al-Sissi, the congratulatory call to Erdogan, the re-embrace of Israel, and the rockets fired at Assad's air base. None of Trump or the leaders of Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, or Israel would be in line for Humanitarian of the Year awards, but they will do more to restore peace to the Middle East than legions of do-gooders from NGOs and various UN agencies.
In other words, realism has been rescued from the clutches of the idealism promoted by Bush 43 and Obama (which gave us the Iraq invasion, Morsi in Egypt, the fiasco in Libya, and an Iran ready to become a nuclear power).
The Washington Post and the New York Times need to regain their senses and start to report on what is really happening.

Michael K said...

they know that is a step on the road to admitting their worldview is bogus. Just like the article about the book of Pres. Bush's paintings.

Yes and look how the thread about the Bush painting book deteriorated here.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

3rdGradePB_GoodPerson said...If you're willing to overpay, you can always close a deal. That's not a good thing, imho

But enough about Obama's fabulous Iran deal, right? You know one the reasons Obama's admin didn't make a bigger stink about Russian bad behavior was so they could keep Russia on board with that terrific, historic Iran deal, don't you? (The other reason was they assumed Clinton would win anyway!)

Geez, what do you guys think the foreign policy legacy of the last Admin (Obama & SecState Clinton) actually is? Lots of good deals that actually produced or will produce good outcomes?

Sprezzatura said...

Hood,

I knew some of y'all could remember.

President-Mom-Jeans said...

""If you're willing to overpay, you can always close a deal."

I think perhaps 3rd Grade PB Dumb Cunt should spend some time in an egyptian prison cell and we can speculate on what would be an overpayment. I'd say it would be a good deal if we paid them a modest sum to keep him.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

3rdGradePB_GoodPerson said...And, what does POTUS appeasement of Erdogan look like from his POV and the POV of the Turks? Who got the best of that deal?

Are we considering the POV of the common person "on the ground" in the Middle East again? Seems like we took an 8 year break from doing that, huh?
How did the last Admin's decision not to support the "green revolution" in Iran look from the POV of that region? How did the last Admin's full support of a pretty brutal war against Houthis (and others) in the Yemen area look, especially given the seemingly-high civilian death count, etc? I remember the smart Left people telling me that the 9/11 attacks were just "chickens coming home to roost" over US support of Saudi Arabia (and stationing troops in counties w/Muslim holy sites), but somehow the Obama Admin's full fledged support of Saudi actions/fights now is...consequence free, I guess. Same-same for the many, many drone strikes (and wedding-bombings, etc)--back when a Republican was President I was assured that collateral damage and/or killing terrorists was horrible because doing so "only creates more people who hate us," but when the Obama Admin killed thousands around the globe in exactly those same ways I guess somehow that dynamic doesn't apply.
I could go on, but let's just say I find this alleged sudden concern with the POV of other nations and their peoples a bit too convenient.

holdfast said...

Compared to the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Sissi is absolutely "fantastic". The man has guts - I just hope we don't have from see the sprayed out on a Cairo street.

It's funny how Hollywood hates Trump so much, when his weird speech patterns are pure Hollywood.

Matt Sablan said...

I remember how much praise Bill Clinton got for negotiating people's release. Potentially literally saving someone's life should probably get at least faint praise, even if you plan to damn the person with it.

Dude1394 said...

The New York Times. All the democrat propaganda that is fit to print.

Sprezzatura said...

Plus, Hood, ya forgot that the US used at least 26,171 bombs in 2016. And, your earlier BHO deal list left off the swaps.

It's good that y'all still remember that long-term effectiveness of dropping bombs and POTUS deals were worthy of questioning. Presumably such questioning is still viable. Right?

Matt Sablan said...

"Define "overpay" in relation to an innocent woman in an Egyptian prison cell. Try not to be a slimeball while doing so."

-- The same people who thought "we can't leave a man behind, no matter the price!" with Berghdal will be the first to say "Trump gave too much to save this woman."

HoodlumDoodlum said...

3rdGradePB_GoodPerson said...It's good that y'all still remember that long-term effectiveness of dropping bombs and POTUS deals were worthy of questioning. Presumably such questioning is still viable. Right?

So those tactics were worthy of questioning the whole time, it's just a complete coincidence that they weren't actually questioned while a Democrat was President...is that it?
We should make a list of the things that suddenly matter again. I mean, obviously hard-hitting journalism, investigative reporting, etc are back, homelessness is a problem, veteran's healthcare is a big issue--this might be a long list!
Thousands and thousands of bombs dropped, thousands of drone strikes (including against US citizens living abroad), etc--it was all "worthy of questioning," apparently, but the Media just never go around to it. They were busy, I guess. You were there the whole time, though, PB, marching in the streets. Code Pink's still around, I bet.
Ooh! I bet an anti-war person's going to be granted "absolute moral authority" again now that the President is a Republican! That'll be good to see again.

TosaGuy said...

NYT Sports tried to take on Trump on Twitter regarding the New England Patriots White House visit and lost.

They put up a photo from when the team visited Obama and when visiting Trump. There were way more people in the Obama picture than the Trump picture and the NYT tried to make a big deal out of it.

The New England Patriots countered on Twitter that the Obama picture showed team staff with the players and the Trump photo only showed players. The team then showed a picture that included team staff and it was pretty much the same as the Obama picture.

MadisonMan said...

The Comments section at the Post Article: Heads Exploding. So many "But but but"s

Sam L. said...

These are today's additional reasons for me to distrust the NYT and WaPo.

Drago said...

3rdgrader: "It's good that y'all still remember that long-term effectiveness of dropping bombs and POTUS deals were worthy of questioning."

Its a shame you and your pals forgot that long-term effectiveness of dropping bombs and POTUS deals were worthy of questioning for 8 years.

Thanks for "waking" up, suddenly, out of the blue, right around Jan 20, 2017.

Better late than never. Perhaps you'll have a chance to doze off again in starting in Jan of 2021.

3rdgrader: "Presumably such questioning is still viable."

"viable"?

Questioning is still viable? Did you happen to see a dictionary flipped open to a page and thought, what the heck, why don't I just use one of those words?

LOL

Thanks for playing.

Anonymous said...

I give full credit to Trump. May he be forever remembered for this act of kindness. Now let's see how he does getting these two released from Iran. I wish him luck, as I doubt he'll be having a warm reception for the leader of Iran, especially with the latest tough talk about the Iran Nuclear Deal.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/04/20/family-iranian-americans-held-in-iran-appealing-to-trump-for-help.html

"Amid new tensions between the Trump administration and Iran over the status of the nuclear agreement, the Namazis’ attorney said they are “convenient hostages” that Iran is using as “leverage with the United States” -- and noted the previous administration pushed for their release.

“The bottom line is President Obama failed to secure the release of Siamak Namazi and Baquer Namazi,” said Jared Genser, the Namazis’ attorney. “The question of course now is what's going to happen in the Trump administration.”

Genser said the family is encouraged because in October, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump tweeted of the Namazis’ arrests, “Well, Iran has done it again. Taken two of our people and asking for a fortune for their release. This doesn't happen if I'm president!”

Now, the Namazis are holding Trump to that promise. Like the Obama administration, Trump officials have raised the Namazi case."

Pookie Number 2 said...

Presumably such questioning is still viable. Right?

Of course. And the questions can be valid (which is probably the word you meant) even if the motivation to ask them is pure partisan hypocrisy, as it appears to be in your case. So knock yourself out.

buwaya said...

It is indeed a civil war, and the time for guns may come.
Its a tribal-ideological struggle between two diverse coalitions.
The US is fatally split, like Europe in the Reformation, to the extent that each side cannot see the other as human. The others are alien monsters.
Nothing matters to the likes of the WaPo other than to direct fire on the other.

Marty Keller said...

"Although the president received wide praise for his decision to punish Syria for its presumed chemical weapons attack with a barrage of cruise missiles, the administration has been criticized for contradictions over policy toward Syria and Turkey, and misstatements on the U.S. response to North Korea’s weapons activity."

More tedious preciousness from the ignoranti of our MSM overlords masquerading as "journalism." The author/editor team presumes that "we," the readers, share their beliefs and therefore they do not have to undertake the difficult task of specifying exactly who are those indulging in "wide praise" or offering criticism "for contradictions." Weird, no, for those who share the postmodern devotion to the "no objective truth" lunacy to just presume that theirs is the appropriate truth?

Power to the correct people.

Gk1 said...

There was a time even during the G.W Bush term where at least the Washpo was measured in its criticism of everything bush, but jebus they are off the rails now. Any club they can use to hit trump they never hesitate to use even if it contradicts another story one column over in the same paper.

Michael K said...

I wish him luck, as I doubt he'll be having a warm reception for the leader of Iran, especially with the latest tough talk about the Iran Nuclear Deal.

Yes, making nice with Iran accomplishes quite a bit. Right ?

Alcibiades said...

I think Sisi is fantastic. Without him, the Muslim Brotherhood would still be ruling in Egypt and the place would be an utter pit. He's a sane leader in a difficult spot. God forbid the day that anything bad happens to him.

traditionalguy said...

Egypt has a great tradition of governance. It started 5000 years ago. Even the Arab Muslims were never able to exterminate the oldest Christian Church on earth, because Copts had the brain power that ran the place.

And the US Military has trained Egypt's Military into 40 years of a close bond between The officers and men of the USA and Egyptian forces, including Annual maneuvers and secret bases. Sisi is one of ours.

Obama probably wanted to destroy Egypt almost more than he wanted to destroy the USA. His level of sudden betrayal of this ally was a shock that the Egyptians are only now slowly recovering from. A Real American Leader is back.

Roy Lofquist said...

"Don't worry Jim, if that question comes up, I'll just confuse them."

To Press Secretary Jim Hagerty who pleaded with Eisenhower not to answer any press conference questions about the delicate Formosan Strait crisis, March 23, 1955. (Eisenhower was, indeed, asked if using atomic weapons on China was an option. He delivered a long, confusing reply which was effectively indecipherable.)

Larry J said...

The NYT buried the story because it shows Trump succeeding at something that Obama failed to accomplish in almost three years.

Kirk Parker said...

Prez Mom-J,

I can't imagine a "modest sum" would be nearly enough to keep the Egyptians happy with having to put up with PBJ.

Sebastian said...

Most of us here judge claims on their truth value. That doesn't work with Trump: truth is optional. Words are tools. Whether fantastic is fantastic is beside the point: the point is mainly to clear a path. Next month, Trump can just as easily turn around and call his Egyptian pal a loser.

Michael K said...

Meanwhile, Obama's model country Venezuela is not doing too well.

Watch the video the woman is taking of the goons shooting people in the street until they shoot her.

Martin said...

Of course Trump is discreet, you don't do big, multi-year real estate projects in Manhattan without knowing when to talk and when to not talk, and what to say or avoid, when you do talk..

Which implies that when he says something it is usually for a reason, and rather than just calling HIM stupid because THEY don't understand, our lazy, bien pensant media and chattering classes should try to figure out what is really going on. If most things are negotiations, which seems to be a big part of Trump's world-view, and government and intergovernmental relations are ongoing and never really end, then everything he says should be viewed as possibly a matter of positioning for the next negotiation session. "Truth" enters into it in that too much untruth undermines credibility and defeats the purpose. But everything is interconnected and part of bigger, deeper agendas.

It's called being an adult who is responsible for a large organization or group of people. Something that most journos and academics and celebrities have no experience or even conception of. Not that this stops them from having (worthless) opinions.

I write all that having just received the latest issue of "Foreign Affairs" and being once again gobsmacked at how stupid most of those geniuses keep proving themselves to be, on almost anything Trump-related, which is now quite a lot.

hombre said...

National Enquirer is a newspaper and comparison to WaPo and NYT proves it. The mass leftmedia has done enormous damage to this country. They have combined with the "progressive" education system to keep our nation ignorant. Now they are trying to render us blind.

MRC survey found 89% of MSM coverage was anti-Trump. I believe their journalism is seditious and is reflected by the seditious behavior of the minions of the left in the streets, Democrat politicians at the federal and local levels and leftist judges.

khesanh0802 said...

It is interesting to watch the lefty commenters moving the goal posts both here and at the WSJ. Trump brings home a citizen after three ineffectual years of Obama. The lefties: "But he's an asshole!". Trump administration turns down Exxon's bid for special exemption from Russian sanctions. The lefties: "But he's an asshole!" It really is tiresome.

khesanh0802 said...

I think the Dems don't have the energy or the leadership to conduct a civil war. I think most Republicans/Trump supporters recognize that the Dems are human - fallible, self- pitying and foolish right now - but we realize that they will not be crazy forever; they will ultimately work through their grief. The longer it takes the better.

khesanh0802 said...

@Inga There is a similar story in WSJ about a British woman jailed by Iran. I question the judgement of any private citizen of Iranian extraction who travels to Iran. How many is this over the last 10 years that the Iranians have arrested?

Here is the State Department's Iran current travel warning:

"The Department of State warns U.S. citizens of the risks of travel to Iran. This replaces the Travel Warning for Iran dated March 14, 2016, to reiterate and highlight the risk of arrest and detention of U.S. citizens, particularly dual national Iranian-Americans. Foreigners, in particular dual nationals of Iran and Western countries including the United States, continue to be detained or prevented from leaving Iran. U.S. citizens traveling to Iran should very carefully weigh the risks of travel and consider postponing their travel. U.S. citizens residing in Iran should closely follow media reports, monitor local conditions, and evaluate the risks of remaining in the country."

In plain English: "Don't go and, if you are there, get out".

Expecting Trump to answer for individuals' stupidity is foolish.

Drago said...

Trump got an American released from prison.

Just like Hitler.

sdharms said...

Sisi has faults. We don't have to live with him. Let the Egyptians handle it. Yes, Trump got results. Can he get some people released who are held by Iran. ? My money says yes.

Larry J said...

Democrats don't want to be judged on results because most of the time, the results of their actions are terrible (e.g. ObamaCare). They want to be judged on their intensions (their words), not their results. So when Trump gets good results but doesn't use the same flowery rhetoric of the Left, they criticize him.

soleproprietorPatriot said...

If I need to learn about confusion, I'll read Shattered, the autopsy of Hillary's failed campaign.

Jose_K said...

It is almost like he dealt with e the Taliban for a traitor

wildswan said...

I think current diplomacy under Trump is more like 19C diplomacy among the European great powers and nations than like post WW II diplomacy between two superpowers fighting by trying to gain the allegiance of undeveloped nations. Most nations aren't undeveloped any more and there are more than two great powers. It is all about negotiation among powers as in 19C, although the great powers aren't exclusively European so that's different. But anyhow, Trump and his Cabinet and the military see Egypt, China, Turkey, others, as powers. The snowflake left still sees anybody but us as pathetic, marginalized, intersectionalized, whimpering victims of colonialism. To whom we can condescend safely: "Oh, let the kiddies play with the bomb, it's still wrapped, they'll never get the plastic off."

Thucydides is better guide as to how nations are acting right now and how Trump might act than Franz Fanon, Obama's guide or Edward Said, the Wapo's clue through the labyrinth.

Sample:

Thucydides 1.34.3
[3] And let their conduct towards us who are their kindred be a warning to you not to be misled by their deceit, nor to yield to their direct requests; concessions to adversaries only end in self-reproach, and the more strictly they are avoided the greater will be the chance of security.


Thuc. 1.36.1
whatever your fears, your strength will be formidable to your antagonists; on the other, whatever the confidence you derive from refusing to receive us, your weakness will have no terrors for a strong enemy.

dhughes609 said...

Please let the press continue their bashing. Harry Truman:“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.” Go Trump! I'll quietly smile while MAGA happens.

jamesleetn said...

I'm not tired of winning yet............in fact,I think I'm getting used to it. Let's don't go back to the old ways.