monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

South Korea says it has not received a response from Pyongyang on a summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump.

In a surprise development, Mr Trump on Friday accepted North Korea's invitation to direct talks.

South Korean officials said Mr Kim was prepared to give up his nuclear weapons.

Details on the planned talks remain vague, with no agreement yet on the location or agenda.

Analysts are sceptical about what can be achieved through talks given the complexity of the issues involved.

"We have not seen nor received an official response from the North Korean regime regarding the North Korea-US summit," a spokesman for the South Korean Ministry of Unification said on Monday.

Trump stumped alongside Saccone on Saturday, blasting “Lamb the sham” and pushing for support of Saccone because “the world is watching.” But he barely mentioned the candidate he was ostensibly there to back, instead spending most of his speech attacking his own possible 2020 opponents and the media...

Russia is using Western democratic norms to divide Western countries. Boosting government transparency and ensuring stability in institutions also could be proactive policy steps, and this would mean fewer opportunities to divide populations on issues. Stable institutions and the population’s trust in its government can help thwart influence campaigns, and ultimately make Russian cyber and information operations inconsequential to Western political discourse.

President Donald Trump's campaign to discredit the news media has spread to officials at all levels of government, who are echoing his use of the term "fake news" as a weapon against unflattering stories.

It's become ubiquitous as a signal to a politician's supporters to ignore legitimate reporting and hard questions, as a smear of the beleaguered and dwindling local press corps, and as a way for conservatives to push back against what they call biased stories.

(Bloomberg) -- Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into whether President Donald Trump obstructed justice is said to be close to completion, but he may set it aside while he finishes other key parts of his probe, such as possible collusion and the hacking of Democrats, according to current and former U.S. officials.

That’s because Mueller may calculate that if he tries to bring charges in the obstruction case -- the part that may hit closest to Trump personally -- witnesses may become less cooperative in other parts of the probe, or the president may move to shut it down altogether.

[...]
The idea of taking pride in being called a racist is not something most people in the mainstream have embraced. There is a polling that suggests being a racist is still viewed poorly.

A recent poll suggests most Americans think Trump, who is experiencing low approval ratings, is a racist. Nearly six in 10 — 57 percent — of adults say America’s top politician is a racist, according to the poll.

While Trump has a four-decade history of actions and comments that many interpret as being discriminatory toward people of color, he has denied he is a racist on multiple occasions.

The fact that Trump rejects the label himself and goes as far as calling himself “the least racist person” suggests he and his U.S. followers who may share some of the politics of the French National Front may not be embracing the label anytime soon.

Whether populists in America, drawn to Trump’s policies on immigration, race and other issues related to diversity, officially embrace the “racist” label or not may be irrelevant. It appears a growing number of conservative Americans are embracing the worldview that Bannon — and even the president — perpetuate and defend.
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They are all racist,

Marine Le Pen

that harks back to Nazi-supporting and extremest right organisations, or had picked it deliberately.

LePen's daughter is very active and will carry on for her mother, and her immigration stance. They are hated because they speak the truth about Islam.