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Before the President talks with an important foreign leader, he is given a set of briefing notes, as he was prior to having his recent conversation with Vladimir Putin. With respect to the election outcome, the briefing notes said DO NOT CONGRATULATE in capital letters. So what does Trump do? Congratulates Putin, of course.

Now there are a couple of interesting things about this. Obviously Trump either ignored, misread or did not read the DO NOT CONGRATULATE instructions. But what is really significant is that the information about what was on the notes was leaked. To me, this indicates two things: One, the person who leaked was really pissed off. Two, whoever leaked the notes thought it was important enough to risk being fired, as they will almost assuredly will be if their identity is discovered. This came out because that person thought it was significant.

For me this comes down to Trump's motivation, and I find a hard time finding a good reason for him to ignore the admonishment not to congratulate Putin. The Russian election was a sham. People were caught stuffing ballot boxes on camera. Putin had to approve the list of the candidates that would run against him. But again, Trump congratulated him. Trump made a totally unsubstantiated claim that between 3-5 million illegal votes were cast in the 2016 U.S. election, even setting up a commission to investigate the matter. But when there is video of people stuffing ballot boxes in Russia, he is silent.

Look at it this way: the simple, expedient thing would have been to follow instructions and not congratulate Putin. Trump is being investigated with regard to Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump says it's a Witch Hunt, but where is his leadership against the threat of Russian interference in the 2018 elections? Why congratulate Putin when specifically asked NOT to do so? In addition, Trump said he and Putin would be meeting soon, something that surprised his advisors. How does this make sense, OTHER than Trump is altering our relations with Russia for some unknown reason.

Investigate, Mr. Mueller, investigate.

So many notes. What's a Kremlin Candidate to do? Congratulate his master or read some boring old note? It was a Trump brainer

MeDotOrg wrote:With respect to the election outcome, the briefing notes said DO NOT CONGRATULATE in capital letters. . . the simple, expedient thing would have been to follow instructions and not congratulate Putin.

I'm not very comfortable with the notion that the President of the United States has to "follow instructions" from someone who writes briefing notes.

Why congratulate Putin when specifically asked NOT to do so?

'Cause he's the President of the United States of America?

Dr. Shades wrote:

MeDotOrg wrote:Why congratulate Putin when specifically asked NOT to do so?

'Cause he's the President of the United States of America?

Wrong! Because he's afraid of Putin because Putin has the goods on him. If you don't know that by now, then you haven't been paying attention.

Dr. Shades wrote:I'm not very comfortable with the notion that the President of the United States has to "follow instructions" from someone who writes briefing notes.

No one is suggesting he has to. It's just good advice, and I suspect with past presidents it may not have been written because they would be smart enough to know it is a bad idea. Maybe Putin insisted Trump congratulate him.

Themis wrote:

Dr. Shades wrote:I'm not very comfortable with the notion that the President of the United States has to "follow instructions" from someone who writes briefing notes.

No one is suggesting he has to. It's just good advice, and I suspect with past presidents it may not have been written because they would be smart enough to know it is a bad idea. Maybe Putin insisted Trump congratulate him.

What did Putin have on Obama to induce his congratulatory call in 2012?

Bach wrote:What did Putin have on Obama to induce his congratulatory call in 2012?

Sources say that Russia had a picture of Obama making sweet love to a Newt Gingrich lookalike.

Of course, lesser pundits seem to think that it was perhaps a hope to follow up with another Treaty like that of START, or maybe a need for Russia to continue being a major player in UN resolutions sanctioning Iran, or because there was a chance to partner with Russia to override China’s Syrian UN veto, or maybe it was because of Russia joining the WTO, or it was a diplomatic maneuver based on the need for Russia to back the 2012 UN Resolution on NK.

If only such dolts could see past the fluoride brainwashing of the Muslim socialist and his pedophile pizza comrades.

Dr. Shades wrote:

MeDotOrg wrote:With respect to the election outcome, the briefing notes said DO NOT CONGRATULATE in capital letters. . . the simple, expedient thing would have been to follow instructions and not congratulate Putin.

I'm not very comfortable with the notion that the President of the United States has to "follow instructions" from someone who writes briefing notes.

Why congratulate Putin when specifically asked NOT to do so?

'Cause he's the President of the United States of America?

If you are comfortable with the idea that the foreign policy of the United States is not carefully orchestrated, but rather spontaneously emerged fully formed from the mind of whatever person happens to be in the White House, then I think we have a difference of opinion about what is best for this country.

One of the damages the Trump administration's cavalier attitude towards previous agreements is doing to the United States is that countries are increasingly seeing the United States as an unreliable partner, whose policies can flipped on the whims of the President. This points to one of Trump's greatest weaknesses: He lives in the transactional now. He will say whatever it takes to win the moment, without thinking of the long term consequences.

MeDotOrg wrote:One of the damages the Trump administration's cavalier attitude towards previous agreements is doing to the United States is that countries are increasingly seeing the United States as an unreliable partner, whose policies can flipped on the whims of the President. This points to one of Trump's greatest weaknesses: He lives in the transactional now. He will say whatever it takes to win the moment, without thinking of the long term consequences.

There is so much ignorance, binder vision and naïveness in this statement one wonders where to start. I certainly don't have the posting time as everyone else here but ——. One might want to start with where Obama policy took us w allies and partners arounnd the world. Putin and the Ayaltolla played Obama like a fiddle. All world leaders knew he was a pussy and lacked any real world experience. And all world leaders saw his courage and resolve when he drew the “infamous chemical weapon red line in Syria”. But he made up for it with billions in cash to Iran!!

Please get an education (as I doubt you have any experience) in understanding the concept of dealing from strength (including fear) as opposed to “bowing for friendship” as our former “no balls” prez was very pathetically successful in doing.

MeDotOrg wrote:One of the damages the Trump administration's cavalier attitude towards previous agreements is doing to the United States is that countries are increasingly seeing the United States as an unreliable partner, whose policies can flipped on the whims of the President. This points to one of Trump's greatest weaknesses: He lives in the transactional now. He will say whatever it takes to win the moment, without thinking of the long term consequences.

Speaking of "getting an education" I did attend a presentation with Mark Copelovitch recently. He is an intentionally respected scholar of international relations with a focus on global financial governance.

He returned to this theme over and over again with a lot of detailed arguments aimed at supporting the idea that the Trump admin is undermining international trust in US participation in institutions that function to ensure US hegemonic power. This is a common belief that you'll find no shortage of writing on. What was interesting to me is when he argued that the Bush administration had already badly damaged intentional trust in US commitments, but the Obama admin somewhat successfully tried to cast this as an aberration against a stable backdrop. The problem with the Trump admin, he argued, was that you can no longer play the aberration card. No matter who is elected in 2020, 2024, etc. other nations have to act as though another Donald Trump could be elected just around the corner. He surmised that you'd need about a generation of that not happening to really undo damage being done at the moment, but the US position could be badly weakened by the time 20 years pass given the rise of other economies.

This doesn't speak to Trump gutting the state department, undermining the prestige of high level civil service posts for capable experts, etc. This observation is just focused on US reliability in its participation of the international order that largely was designed by the US.