Ok, I agree, there are other still more vulgar words one could use, besides moron or moronic. In French, there is a pretty good word, con, to which we could add conneries to designate what he does. There is no easy translation for conneries; actually there is: idiocies.
The reasoning for what he does is complicated, I think, because it has two faces: he plays to his supporters at home, who are very close to the rightwing supporters, the far right I mean, in Europe, with their bigotries.
But he also plays out to the wider world, or wider republican world, who are largely shocked or enraged or just heavily annoyed. An example is that agreement with iran that was the product of years of negotiation, stopped their nuclear program, and generally satisfied the major players—everyone except Israel that wouldn't really be satisfied with anything short of bombing the nuclear facilities. So trump stopped short of abrogating the agreement, he just said he'd "decertify" it, without ending it. Two audiences, a subterfuge so as to satisfy his voters at home without definitively ending the agreement. He did the same w paris accords, though their, since the accords have no enforcement mechanism, the effect is worse, and the potential dangers to the environment more severe.
Not yet one year in office, and all this so far.
Will we all survive n korea next?
Ou encore plus de conneries?
ken
Kenneth Harrow
Dept of English and Film Studies
http://www.english.msu.edu/people/faculty/kenneth-harrow/
From: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Cornelius Hamelberg <corneliushamelberg@gmail.com>
Reply-To: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Date: Sunday, 8 October 2017 at 19:17
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Memo to Tillerson etc
https://www.amazon.com/Assholes-Theory-Donald-Aaron-James/dp/0385542038
On Sunday, 8 October 2017 17:45:24 UTC+2, Kenneth Harrow wrote:
Thanks for posting this sensible diatribe, Gloria. It is one step from recognizing and defining the moronic qualities in trump, and another big one from answering the question of why people would vote for a moron.
And lastly, having had now a year of his public face as candidate and president, now to ask, why do people still support the moron. Are they morons? Or indifferent? Or do they see their own interests improved under him?
Questions of how narrow our notions of self-interest, or group interest, might be at a time when the interests of all of us are at stake. Think the paris accords, and give me another word besides moron that fits him better; and give me another reason besides narrow self-interest why anyone could possibly buy his actions. For instance, oil interests in maximizing profits, at the expense of the world with global warming. Is that moronic, or what other word is there?
ken
Kenneth Harrow
Dept of English and Film Studies
http://www.english.msu.edu/people/faculty/kenneth-harrow/
From: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of "Emeagwali, Gloria (History)" <emea...@ccsu.edu>
Reply-To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Date: Sunday, 8 October 2017 at 00:29
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Memo to Tillerson etc
Memo to Tillerson About the Moron
By Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Blog
07 October 17
o: Rex Tillerson
From: Robert Reich
Subject: The MoronI can understand why you feel Washington is a place of "petty nonsense," as you said Wednesday when you called a news conference to rebut charges that you called Trump a moron last summer after a meeting of national security officials at the Pentagon.
I'm also reasonably sure you called him a moron, which doesn't make Washington any less petty. You probably called him a moron because almost all of us out here in the rest of America routinely call him that.
But you're right: There are far more important issues than the epithet you likely used to describe your boss.
On the other hand, your calling him a moron wouldn't itself have mushroomed into a headline issue – even in petty Washington – if there weren't deep concerns about the President's state of mind to begin with.
I bet every cabinet secretary has from time to time called his boss a moron. I was a cabinet secretary once, and although I don't recall ever saying Bill Clinton was a moron, I might have thought it, especially when I found out about Monica Lewinsky. But Bill Clinton was no moron.
The reason your moronic comment about Trump made the headlines is that Trump really is a moron, in the sense you probably meant it: He's impulsive, mercurial, often cruel, and pathologically narcissistic. Some psychologists who have studied his behavior have concluded he's a sociopath.
Washington is petty, but it's not nonsensical. It latches on to gaffes only when they reveal something important. As journalist Michael Kinsley once said, "A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth – some obvious truth he isn't supposed to say."
Face it. You are Secretary of State – the nation's chief diplomat – under a president who's dangerously nuts.
Last weekend, for example, Trump publicly said you were wasting your time trying to open talks with North Korea. Does he have a better idea? Any halfway rational president would ask his Secretary of State to try to talk with Kim Jong-Un.
And there's Iran. You and Defense Secretary James Mattis have both stated the nuclear agreement should be retained. That, too, is only rational. The International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran has been honoring the agreement. Without it, Iran would restart its nuclear program.
But Trump is on the verge of decertifying the agreement in order to save face (in the 2016 campaign he called it an "embarrassment to America") and further puncture Barack Obama's legacy. His narcissism is endangering the world.
You tried to mediate the dispute between Qatar and its Arab neighbors. That, too, was the reasonable thing to do.
But then Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner sided with the United Arab Emirates, where they have business interests. Less than one hour after you called for a "calm and thoughtful dialogue" between Qatar and its neighbors, Trump blasted Qatar for financing terrorism. That was also nuts.
You are rightly appalled at Trump's behavior. I can understand why you distanced yourself when Trump blamed "both sides" for violence at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville. And why you were horrified when Trump gave a wildly partisan speech to the Boy Scouts of America, which you once headed.
Given all this, I'm not surprised to hear that you've talked about resigning, but that Mattis and John Kelly, the White House chief of staff, have talked you out of it.
I urge you not to resign. America and the world need sane voices speaking into the ear of our Narcissist-in-Chief.
As Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee and chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee said recently, it's you, Mattis, and Kelly who "help separate our country from chaos." I don't think Corker was referring to chaos abroad.
Let Trump fire you if he wants to. That would further reveal what a moron he is.
But if you really did want to serve the best interests of this nation, there's another option you might want to consider.
Quietly meet with Mattis, Kelly, and Vice President Pence. Come up with a plan for getting most of the cabinet to join in a letter to Congress saying Trump is unable to discharge the duties of his office.
Under the 25th Amendment, that would mean Trump is fired.
...................................................................................................................
Lone Sniper in White House Wounds Secretary of State
By William Boardman, Reader Supported News
04 October 17
Mad Trump firing from golf resort nails Tillerson in Beijing
e're at the point as a country where even the renewed threat of a preemptive nuclear war on North Korea can't compete with media coverage of the latest mass shooting in Las Vegas. What were the odds we'd end up like this?
On October 1, the hint of back-channel contact between the US and North Korea was front page news. While visiting China, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told reporters that the US was exploring the possibility of talks with North Korea in an effort to de-escalate and eventually resolve conflict over North Korea's nuclear weapons program. Tillerson said:
We are probing, so stay tuned. We asked, "Would you like to talk?" We have lines of communication to Pyongyang [the North Korean capital] — we're not in a dark situation, a blackout. We have a couple, three channels open to Pyongyang. We can talk to them. We do talk to them directly through our own channels.
This echoed Donald Trump's 2016 campaign promise to sit down with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, although Tillerson did not mention it. According to The New York Times, "Tillerson said the most important thing was to lower the temperature of the threats being exchanged in recent days between Mr. Kim and President Trump." These included North Korea's threat of an atmospheric test of a hydrogen bomb and Trump's threat of genocide against 25 million Koreans. Tillerson commented dryly:
The whole situation is a bit overheated right now. If North Korea would stop firing its missiles, that would calm things down a lot…. I think everyone would like for it to calm down.
Well not everyone, as it turned out. Tweeting from the hip not a day later, the US sniper-in-chief got off a few rounds:
I told Rex Tillerson, our wonderful Secretary of State, that he is wasting his time trying to negotiate with Little Rocket Man.... Save your energy Rex, we'll do what has to be done!
This, too, made front page news till it was blown away by the Las Vegas massacre. The US Secretary of State looking to calm things down is a soft story and even the President putting nuclear war back on the table has an old news quality that can't compete with fresh blood here and now.
This turn of events prompted the Atlantic to run a story headlined: "Rex Tillerson Must Go." The argument was that Tillerson can't stay after being humiliated like that, since the President's repudiation has destroyed the Secretary of State's credibility. If Tillerson stays, Eliot Cohen argues, he will be reduced to a moral weakling and lickspittle. That assumes he's not one now, and the record is mixed.
Others suggested that Trump and Tillerson are playing good cop, bad cop, an analogy that's hard to apply, since the resulting confusion only leaves North Korea scratching its head. More likely they're playing bad cop, worse cop. Most likely they're not playing anything conceptualized and coordinated. Tillerson seems to be trying to be the grown-up in the room, and Trump is having none of it.
And at about 6 a.m. on October 4, NBC News ran a story with this hopeful headline: "Tillerson's Fury at Trump Required an Intervention From Pence." But it was not a current story, it was a mostly hyped-up report of a July meeting in a secure room in the Pentagon where Tillerson, meeting with top national security officials, called Trump a "moron" and wanted to resign, but the Vice President talked him out of it. That report was based on anonymous sources, some of whom were in the secure room. Now everyone, including Tillerson, denies he called the President a "moron." There has been no denial that the President is a moron. A few hours after the NBC story broke, Tillerson called a news conference to affirm his loyalty to the President. Refusing to address the "moron" element, calling it "petty nonsense," Tillerson said:
I have never considered leaving this post…. I have answered that question repeatedly. For some reason it continues to be mis-reported. There has never been a consideration in my mind to leave. I serve at the appointment of the President and I'm here for as long as the President feels I can be useful to achieving his objectives.
Tillerson has performed as Trump's faithful toady in his adoration of totalitarian Saudi Arabia, his praise for the emerging dictatorship in Turkey, and his support for selling F-16s to the police state of Bahrain. At other times, Tillerson has put on a show of being independent and clearheaded, as in a late August interview where Chris Wallace questioned whether the US still lives by traditional American values:
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson: "I don't believe anyone doubts the American people's values or the commitment of the American government or the government's agencies to advancing those values and defending those values."
Chris Wallace: "And the president's values?"
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson: "The president speaks for himself, Chris."
....................................................................
.........................................................................
Meanwhile at the State Department, Tillerson has gone for months with staff positions unfilled amid reports of the agency functioning uncertainly, with chronic low morale. Tillerson has long endorsed significant budget cuts at State with little public discussion of the reasoning or the consequences. General James Mattis, not Secretary of Defense, once said, "If you don't fund the State Department fully, than I need to buy more ammunition."
Back in March, while visiting Seoul, Tillerson took a hard line on North Korea: "Let me be very clear: The policy of strategic patience has ended. We're exploring a new range of diplomatic, security and economic measures. All options are on the table."
Tillerson just does his job and maybe Exxon gets to drill in the Arctic some day.
Now it all makes a kind of sense, maybe. The policy of strategic patience ended just as South Korea elected a new president committed to talking to the North. The US could lose control of such bi-lateral negotiations. Create enough fear and uncertainty all around and everyone has to buy more military hardware, even unwanted, ineffective missile defense systems. Let the good times roll, right up to the brink of Armageddon, whoo-eee!
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