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Wow, I get line by line commentary... nice. Legolas Send a noteboard - 14/06/2018 12:22:12 AM

I hope you don't mind that I really don't see much point in responding in kind, though.

Of course Trump was never going to achieve any very impressive result in just one brief summit, so it's not as if he disappointed people's expectations that badly. But for North Korea, having the summit at all and all the attention and praise from Trump for Kim is a very impressive result in itself. However you look at it, it's curious how a man who's been boasting for such a long time about how good a negotiator he is, gave the other side a big win while getting almost literally nothing out of it. The only way that makes sense is if you're very confident that you will get something bigger down the line as a result - but given North Korea's behaviour in the past, that seems dangerously optimistic. We can't help comparing to the Iran deal and Trump's vehement criticism of that - the way he started off the negotiations with North Korea, it's hard to see how he'd get to even as good a deal as Obama and the others got with Iran, never mind a better one.

The military exercises thing - agreed that there are valid arguments for stopping them, I'm not opposed to stopping them as such. And as I said, just because Trump announced this doesn't mean he can't announce the opposite tomorrow, this could be one of the cases where having a reputation for not living up to your word is actually beneficial. But supposing for a minute that he does stick to that announcement, the problem with that is A) he gives up even more leverage for free, and B) he didn't consult South Korea on it first. Neither of those things will matter in the long run if he somehow achieves lasting peace in Korea, that's true - but they don't appear to make that task any easier.

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So. Trump and the little rocket man. - 13/06/2018 10:09:45 PM 1047 Views
Typical nonsense - 13/06/2018 11:12:19 PM 652 Views
Wow, I get line by line commentary... nice. - 14/06/2018 12:22:12 AM 562 Views
Terrifying if Trump's emotive language is genuine - 13/06/2018 11:27:37 PM 728 Views
Have you ever worked with someone... - 14/06/2018 05:03:19 PM 596 Views
Re: Have you ever worked with someone... - 15/06/2018 09:14:50 PM 696 Views
So less on the article... - 14/06/2018 05:01:26 PM 579 Views
As I said to Cannoli - it's not about what it costs the US, but about what it's worth to North Korea - 14/06/2018 07:26:43 PM 605 Views
Trump doesn't care what Kim and North Korea pretend... - 14/06/2018 07:48:26 PM 572 Views
It certainly seems that way. - 14/06/2018 11:14:58 PM 577 Views
The conservative never-Trumpers hate him as much, if not more, than the liberals. - 14/06/2018 11:36:46 PM 571 Views
As they should. - 15/06/2018 12:02:40 AM 581 Views
What real worlkd gains does Norht Korea get? - 14/06/2018 08:40:32 PM 577 Views
So let them think it... - 14/06/2018 10:21:46 PM 605 Views
Funny how it went from Trump is going to start WWIII to Trump caved - 14/06/2018 07:21:44 PM 627 Views
Um, yes. Trump radically changed his position, so the media descriptions changed too? - 14/06/2018 07:40:37 PM 573 Views
The problem is the media posistion is always the same, Trump is wrong. - 14/06/2018 08:30:38 PM 570 Views
That would be more convincing if you said it in a case where he was right. - 14/06/2018 09:17:43 PM 567 Views
I don't agree... - 14/06/2018 09:37:23 PM 578 Views
I agree with this. - 14/06/2018 10:08:27 PM 604 Views
They're not contradictory - just a bit more subtle than having two binary options. - 14/06/2018 11:01:39 PM 703 Views
Well - 15/06/2018 12:03:41 AM 591 Views
Here you are being too optimistic. Sadly for the US and the world. - 15/06/2018 05:55:14 PM 587 Views
I'm *kinda* with you? - 20/06/2018 04:20:46 PM 597 Views
Ratings are creeping up because of outrage fatigue ? That makes no sense. - 20/06/2018 09:02:17 AM 588 Views
Sure it does. - 22/06/2018 10:02:39 PM 596 Views
It's a start, albeit a very weak start. - 15/06/2018 05:49:27 PM 562 Views
Wouldn't that be ironic? - 15/06/2018 06:03:37 PM 605 Views
Nothing here *NM* - 15/06/2018 09:10:51 PM 355 Views

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