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China rejects North Korean coal shipments, buying American instead

The Chinese are returning shipments of coal back to the rogue nation. Following repeated missile tests that drew international criticism, China banned all imports of North Korean coal on Feb. 26, cutting off the country’s most important export product.

China is now going to import American coal. If North Korea has lost China, then it is probably close to the time when North Korea tells Dear Leader, “So long, farewell!”

http://legalinsurrection.com/2017/04/china-rejects-north-korean-coal-shipments-buying-american-instead/

Trump knows how to cut a deal, sho nuff. This will be great for American miners, and will put N. Korea on it's last legs, all in one fell swoop, eh?

Next up...The assahola of Iran.

If not politics, did you expect climate change to become religions new Jesus?

POSTED: 07/02/09, 12:01 AM EDT

LAST month, hundreds of thousands of Iranians took to the streets to protest a rigged presidential election. Our president was extremely cautious in his initial criticism of the Iranian government's fierce crackdown against the protestors. At first, President Obama said that the United States -- given our history in Iran -- should not be "meddling" in the country's internal affairs.

Finally, as both the crowds in the Iranian streets and violence against them increased over the next several days, Obama conceded that he was "appalled" at the clerics' repression.

Unfortunately, Obama's policy is a lose/lose proposition that will please neither side in Iran. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, isn't going to suddenly embrace the U.S. because of Obama's more charismatic approach, much less stop subsidizing terrorists and developing a nuclear arsenal.

Meanwhile, authoritarians in China, North Korea, Russia, the Middle East and South America may draw two conclusions: One, the United States does not much care much what other regimes do to their own people. Two, a new America will overlook almost anything in order just to get along with these authoritarians.

And that axiomatic formulation is used by both types (1) and (2) above.

He specialized in cowardice, retreat, and surrender.

Every Day is Opposite Day

There’s a misconception that Donald Trump reversed course when he ordered a missile attack on the Syrian airbase from which Assad’s chemical attack was launched. In reality, Trump remained on the same course he’s been on since the earliest days of his candidacy.

Yes, he ran as an anti-globalist who repeatedly called for the US to stay out of the Syrian conflict. And yes, just days ago his administration made it quite clear that removing Assad was no longer America’s policy. But these policy positions are not what drives Donald Trump. He answers to a higher calling, and in terms of that calling, his decision to order the attack on the Syrian airbase was entirely consistent.

Trump’s ultimate motivation is to do the opposite of Obama. And he never veers from the course.

In 2013, Assad launched a chemical attack. Obama did not answer with a direct military response. In 2017, Assad launched a chemical attack. Trump did what he always does. The opposite of Obama. As Politico’s Susan Glaser explains: “When faced with a choice, the best way to understand what Trump will do is to expect he will opt to differentiate himself as much as possible from his predecessor.”

Obama first days in office were spent attempting to heal a growing rift with Muslim countries. Trump’s were spent on a bizarre and wildly unnecessary Muslim ban. Obama got healthcare passed. Trump put all his political capital on the line in an effort to repeal it. Of course he didn’t have a reasonable alternative ready to replace Obamacare. It’s not the new policy he cares about. It’s all about undoing the old one. It’s about being the unObama.

Obama had a particulary bad relationship with Netanyahu. Obama did not get along at all with Putin. Trump reached out to both of those leaders with extreme vigor.

Trump’s executive order binge represents his signature (and arguably, only) achievements during his first eleven weeks in office. And each of those orders had one, and only one, ideological commonality. They undid what Obama did.

Obama was America’s first black president. Trump picked Jeff Sessions to be his attorney general. Seeing the trend?

It’s not about destroying the environment, denying science, being anti-choice, or wanting fewer people to have healthcare. It’s an obsession with being the opposite of Obama.

Think about it. The guy is against clean air and water and for coal. Even coal people aren’t as pumped about coal as Trump.

In one of his administration’s sickest international displays (and that’s saying something), Trump’s initial response to Syria’s chemical attack was to blame Obama and to describe the incident as a “consequence of the past administration’s weakness and irresolution.” Even in his brief remarks announcing his Syrian strike, Trump couldn’t resist contrasting himself with his predecessor. “Years of previous attempts at changing Assad’s behavior have all failed and failed very dramatically.”

We’ll see if putting a few dents in a largely abandoned airfield changes Assad’s behavior. I hope it does. But one thing I’m sure of is that it won’t change Trump’s. The world’s most unpredictable leader will maintain one area of total predictability. He’ll try to be the opposite of Obama.

And sadly for America, thus far he’s been able to achieve that goal.

Yup. And the unspoken, largely denied motivation a lot of his otherwise sane followers have for voting for and supporting Trump is animus against Obama. Logic be damned - issues, we don't care about no steenking issues. Is he not doing what Obama did? That's all they care about.

That was a flea market in Texas?

If he fires Bannon, Trump should prepare for war. The information warfare architecture Bannon built with the money of Robert and Rebekah Mercer is already restive and nervous that Trump has been co-opted by (((them))) and lured into being a more conventional president.

Everything is relative, but there is absolutely no reason to think we are remotely close to an armed conflict with Russia.

Gee I really miss Obama. The guy was a saint, compared to the fat pig now sullying the white house.