Lots of backslapping, handshaking – but not deal making
Donald Trump has a new best friend.
He flew all the way to Singapore to strike up a bromance with Kim Jong-un – the North Korean tyrant with nuclear weapons at the ready.
The entire world watched as Trump and his little buddy shook hands, patted each other on the back, shook hands and patted each other on the back again, and on and on and on.
It was an oh-so-carefully staged, high stakes, made-for-TV moment in world history.
Would Trump get Kim to abandon his nukes? Would Kim get Trump to stop calling him “Little Rocket Man.”
Well, no on the former – but yes on the latter.
As it happened, both men signed a 460-word agreement filled with vague aspirations about peace and “denuclearization.”
After the glad-handing ended, Trump needed to gloat, so he held a news conference.
Trump let the media know that he’s mighty impressed with Kim.
“He’s got a great personality. He’s a funny guy. He’s very smart, he’s a great negotiator,” Trump told reporters.
It’s as if nobody had told him that Kim isn’t very funny when it comes to dealing with the estimated 150,000 to 200,000 people languishing (or tortured) in North Korean prisons.
Or, when Trump claims his North Korean counterpart “loves his people,” he’s overlooking the fact that a 2014 United Nations report clearly states North Korea continually commits “crimes against humanity.”
Perhaps, when Trump told reporters that Kim is “very talented,” he didn’t take into account that the United Nations report notes that among Kim’s talents are: “extermination, murder, enslavement, torture and imprisonment.”
The president claims he did bring up Kim’s record of human rights abuses – but only briefly.
Instead, he announced to Kim that the U.S. won’t be engaging in any upcoming joint military exercises (Trump calls them “war games”) with South Korea’s forces.
A shocker. At least to the hierarchy of the U.S. military, and the leaders of South Korea.
Neither knew anything about that plan, until Trump blurted it out during that news conference.
Those exercises have long been a show of strength that are meant as a psychological deterrent to Kim and his itchy trigger-finger.
According to Trump, they’re simply too expensive, and (get ready for this one), “provocative.”
That’s just who Donald Trump is – ever the showman, never the statesman.
Back at Fox News (the Trump News Network), they’re already thinking of ways to carve Trump’s likeness – with him holding a Nobel Peace Prize – into Mount Rushmore.
His fellow Republicans, many of them, at least, are twisting themselves into pretzels by trying to applaud him for meeting with Kim, while they attacked Barack Obama when he proposed doing the very same thing when he first ran for office.
But in many other places, they might want him fitted for a strait jacket.
The members of the G-7 (which should have been called G-7ish) who were faced with Trump’s wrath during the days before he met with Kim Jong-un, are befuddled by his arrogance.
While he’s made peace with a sworn enemy of the United States, he’s calling the leader of our closest ally – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau – “weak” and “dishonest.”
All Trudeau did was stand up to Trump, by saying that his tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum products is “kind of insulting,” and Trump erupted like Trudeau had ripped a cheeseburger from his hands.
It’s a safe bet that Trump won’t be doing much handshaking or backslapping with Trudeau for a while.
Trump much prefers rollicking with bloodthirsty despots.
Since he’s been back home, Trump has declared, “There is no longer a nuclear threat from North Korea.”
We’ll have to wait to see if that statement is true.
In the meantime, the president is currently planning another high-level meeting.
I’m told, in December, he’s going to meet the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. That is, unless somebody tells him the Grinch didn’t really steal Christmas.
And more importantly, that the Grinch never existed in the first place.
Edward A. Owens is a multi-Emmy Award winner, former reporter and anchor for Entertainment Tonight and 20-year TV news veteran. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.