The Trump transition continues to be an embarrassing mess. Today, Trump is holding his first meeting with a foreign leader since being elected. And he’s going into it completely unprepared. The Washington Post reports:
The 5 p.m. session with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Trump’s first with a foreign leader since the election, has raised questions among some in Washington’s foreign policy community because Trump has apparently not been briefed by the State Department. Officials said Wednesday that the transition team has not reached out to State.
A former State Department official said such a meeting with a foreign leader would normally be preceded by numerous briefings from key diplomats, which is considered especially important here because the Japanese are concerned about comments Trump made on the campaign trail. …
“The world does not stop for the transition,’’ said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak freely. Trump “would want an intelligence briefing. You’d probably want to get briefed on what’s what happening in the region.’’
Face it, Trump transition team: You’re mired!
I would love to be a fly on that wall.
I am also sure that the Trump team’s approving words about those Japanese-American internment camps of WWII have also reached Japan as well. Not to mention Steve “too many Asian CEOs in Silicon Valley” Bannon too.
This is not going to end well.
http://67.media.tumblr.com/a8acf469e32fb1cc9cca3075740c3274/tumblr_ntyw2l1txz1unx10go1_500.gif
Trump is approaching this presidency like a student who didn’t study and is planning to just sort of bluff through the test.
I’m sure you’re mistaken. Trump tweeted that the transition is going “so smoothly.” I believe it’s the biggest, most beautiful transition ever.
The Dunning-Krueger effect has shielded Trump up until now.
Now, when reading this, I have no problem imagining Trump crying his eyes out in his be-gilded penthouse bedroom at night wondering how the FUCK he is going to get out of THIS one.
This could end very badly. If Trump says or does the wrong thing, because he has no idea what our current relationship with Japan is, or any ongoing diplomatic issues or work, well, I don’t know…I don’t really want to think about it. Things are not going well.
@dreemr–he’s a narcissist. He’ll blame everyone in the world before he takes any blame himself or believes that he has done anything wrong. I’m sure he’s got it settled that it’s some Washington insider’s fault that his transition team isn’t holding together plus Chris Christie probably screwed him on purpose because he was always on Clinton’s side and some underling hasn’t yet prepared good enough briefing notes for him. And his supporters will swallow it, too.
I imagine the Japanese government wasn’t too impressed with Trump’s attitude to North Korea (I.e. Give everyone in the region nuclear weapons and SEE WHAT HAPPENS).
Perhaps one of these world leaders will be kind enough to discreetly mention to Trump that he should get some competent help and also consult with the State Department. Not that they should feel obligated, of course, but maybe some head of state will take pity upon the Mired One.
Then again, other nations will probably start telling us: “Go home, United States, you’re drunk!”
If Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wasn’t saying shit about Trump to his face in Japanese while smiling, he is a better man than I would be.
Dear Rest of the World:
We are so sorry. Please don’t hate us. Most of us don’t want him; he’s just getting in because of an antiquated quirk of our election system.
Love,
The American People
P.S. Please don’t hate us.
Is this going to be recorded? Please, God, let this be recorded for all posterity. I do feel a little bad for my Schadenfreude at this junction; none of this is going to bode well for either of the countries these men represent. It’s probably also not going to be the last American ally Trump will piss off.
This. Is. Why. You. Don’t. Elect. Outsiders!
Yes. Please. More of this, rest of the world. Our country may grade him on a curve and not hold him accountable for his shitty ideas but the rest of the world will not be so kind. I hope other countries can call him out on every inch. Especially the countries he’s been taunting for over a year.
How many allies has he pissed off by now?
Japan – Speaking approvingly of internment camps
Mexico- Demanding they pay for a,giant wall, calling them rapists
UK – Reaching out to Nigel Farage instead of Teresa Nay, imposing his resorts on an unwilling Scottish populace
I’m guessing Israel is aware of his anti-Semitic support base and Saudi Arabia knows about the Muslim registry.
All before even taking office! Lovely.
I can’t be the only one who thinks Trump was so focused on WINNING!!! that he didn’t consider the actual workload of this 24/7 job he has now for the next 4+ years. I’m finding his incompetency hilarious. I suppose my humor about it is helped out by the fact that, so far, he hasn’t done anything devastating. NEWLY devastating. Oh, you know what I mean. He’s a walking cliche of most things gross about humans and too narcissistic to know what he doesn’t know. It will be good entertainment until he does or says something truly bad. Again.
You’ll like this article.
@AliBoBali
I don’t even think he thought he would win. Sure, he wanted the ego boost, but I really think he was just shit talking because he liked all the people screaming his name. He never really considered what being president actually entails.
The issue here is that he is already doing bad things – specifically, damaging the US’ foreign relations and destabilizing the country. I’m not American, but unfortunately there are a lot of regions in the world which sorta depend on America being stable and ready to deal with bs and I happen to live in one of them (in my case – Russian bs).
But yeah, I do laugh about his predicament as much as I can. Because all of this would be a phenomenal comedy, if it weren’t really happening.
@SFHC
aaaaaaand that just made my day 😀 I love how “official” the declaration is.
@SFHC
Are you still playing Shuffle?
So… I was just thinking. How many “Muslims” are going to get in big trouble for not being “registered”, when the only reason to suspect that they might be Muslim is a vaguely middle eastern appearance?
How many Native Americans and Pacific Islanders are going to get deported to Mexico because they look vaguely Hispanic?
How many people in both categories will get overlooked because they look mostly white and have American-sounding names? Or for that matter, black Muslims who don’t stand out as such?
Even if they were in the right, I’d expect the whole thing to be a clusterfuck of epic proportions.
@WWTH
You can add Germany to the list, after he talked about how America under Clinton would be like Germany under Merkel. Believe me, it was not meant as a compliment, and in turn, he has a 4% approval rating over here, IIRC. Also, he has already irritated various European countries in general with the hints of ignoring Article 5 of NATO should Russia get too close for comfort.
Anyone remember Lexx? I think Trump’s meeting will go something like this:
There was a bit of a thing here where people would quickly edit the Wikipedia pages of celebrities when they died to catch out lazy journalists.
I’d love it if people did that to Trump.
“I salute Mr Abe’s many achievements; such as reducing inflation, increasing productivity and writing the theme tune to ‘Button Moon'”