Politics
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- fadein110
Another day, another bizarre Trump handshake.
- Ramanisky21
- what a bag of dickslowimpakt
- maybe DJT and Melanie are swingers and that's why he is such a creep. Just trying to find people in the "lifestyle" to play with.capn_ron
- "STICK SHIFT VRRRRMM VRRRRM VRIRRM VIRRRRRRMMM..." - Trumpkona
- geez that thin arm... who is she?sted
- Brigitte MacronRamanisky2
- oh the french sugar mummy :)sted
- Mentally Ill Don the Conutopian
- Fuck is he playing at? What an arsehole. I bet his wife pulled the plug on that arm tugging shit day one. She looks hard as nails.face_melter
- kona4
WASHINGTON (AP) — For all things Paris, President Donald Trump's go-to guy is Jim.
The way Trump tells it — Jim is a friend who loves Paris and used to visit every year. Yet, as Trump visits the city Thursday for his first time as president, it's unlikely that Jim will be tagging along. Jim doesn't go to Paris anymore. Trump says that's because the city has been infiltrated by foreign extremists.
Whether Jim exists is unclear. Trump has never given his last name. The White House has not responded to a request for comment about who Jim is or whether he is on the trip.
Trump repeatedly talked about the enigmatic Jim while on the campaign trail, but his friend didn't receive widespread attention until Trump became president. For Trump, Jim's story serves as a cautionary tale — a warning that even a place as lovely as Paris can be ruined if leaders are complacent about terrorism.
---
Could he be our Jim?
Name: Jim
Job Title: CD
Salary/Income: 190k/year and some company benefits.This fucking guy. "Believe me." "Everyone agrees." "Jim says Paris is overrun by terrorists."
Imagine if we spoke like that at work while making a pitch.
"Everyone agrees, everyone, the smartest people. Maybe, definitely the smartest people in the world. Ever. Believe me. Everyone agrees this is the best creative ever created. I asked Jim "'how's the creative doing?'" and Jim replied "It's the best creative ever."
Trump sympathisers believe this is ok because Brawndo's got electrolytes you know.
- pmslfadein11
- Maybe it's that plumber guy Sarah Palin invented.Continuity
- Oh, that was Joe. My mistake.Continuity
- Hahaha kona_niko
- dbloc-3
Long but interesting.....
By Crispin Rovere
July 11, 2017This analysis recommends war. It is shocking to put to print. However, with North Korea’s inexorable advance towards developing a nuclear-tipped ICBM, we enter the realm of bad choices. On balance, war on the peninsula is the least bad alternative. There are some months left for a brilliant diplomatic breakthrough that turns North Korea from the brink – these avenues must be energetically and exhaustively pursued. This analysis is presented on the fair assumption that such initiatives will fail.
This strategic assessment assumes one of two possibilities. First, that the U.S. accepts North Korea developing nuclear-tipped ICBMs capable of reaching the continental homeland, thereby allowing Pyongyang to achieve a stable deterrence relationship. Second, the U.S. seeks to disarm North Korea with a major military strike. Related possibilities such as a limited strike are ignored, as this overcomplicates matters and escalation should be assumed in any case.
In each scenario, I provide a range of consequences. Not all futures will come to pass, but some combination of these are a certainty and have a direct cause-and-effect relationship with the chosen course of action.
--- Option One ---
The United States chooses not to act militarily to destroy North Korea’s nuclear program. North Korea successfully conducts a long-range atmospheric nuclear test, conclusively proving its ability to deliver a nuclear weapon to the American homeland. The U.S. is deterred from further intervention, and over the next five to ten years North Korea continues to expand, diversify, and protect it’s growing nuclear arsenal.
- Consequences -
1. Increased North Korean provocation
Having achieved a survivable second-strike capability and a stabilized nuclear deterrence relationship with the U.S., North Korea feels utterly unconstrained with respect to its neighbors. North Korea launches conventional ballistic missiles directly at Japan, killing scores of civilians. Instead of responding with massive force, the U.S. seeks to restrain its ally from escalating, fearful that a collapsing regime will retaliate with nuclear warheads against the United States. North Korea is co-opted into talks, but instead of rolling back it’s nuclear program in exchange for aid, the international community is blackmailed with threats of violence. The spiraling provocations destabilize the region and U.S. influence in Asia drastically recedes.
2. North Korea invades South Korea
Certain that the U.S. will not be able to intervene, North Korea breaks the armistice with a massive invasion of South Korea. North Korea is pushed back beyond the 38th parallel with American help, but not before millions of South Korean citizens lay dead. In Seoul, thousands perish daily as the city remains under constant bombardment. There is overwhelming pressure to push northward in response; however, the U.S. is paralyzed by the fear that a collapsing regime will launch its nuclear weapons against the U.S. In the end, ROK forces invade the north and seize control of the peninsula. At the last, North Korea launches two dozen nuclear missiles into the U.S., devastating several major U.S. cities and killing almost 20 million people. Despite being the victim of large-scale nuclear attack, U.S. options for responding remain elusive, as the North Korean regime is already being toppled.
3. Nuclear proliferation
Realizing that American nuclear assurances are utterly worthless, Japan and South Korea have no choice but to develop their own nuclear deterrent in response to North Korea’s threats and provocations. Australia quickly follows suit. The global non-proliferation regime disintegrates as nuclear weapons spread unfettered across Asia and then the world. North Korea begins openly proliferating nuclear weapons to nations and actors hostile to the U.S. Small states and unstable regimes become nuclear powers. Nuclear weapons are available on the black market, with non-state actors now having ready access to nuclear weapons for the first time.
4. China dominates Asia
In the wake of America being humiliated as a “paper tiger,” U.S. allies exert their independence. South Korea questions the purpose of having U.S. forces stationed on the peninsula, and even Australia wonders what contingencies might arise in which unequivocal U.S. support would be guaranteed. Meanwhile, emboldened by American inaction, China accelerates its military build-up. Efforts to deter Chinese aggression become less effective as Beijing is convinced that America will never risk a showdown. Soon China invades Taiwan, directly challenging U.S. credibility in the Pacific.
5. U.S. and China go to war
After crossing one too many thresholds, the United States is provoked into a massive war with North Korea in a surprise attack. Targeting of nuclear facilities is vastly more difficult as the arsenal has grown and diversified in the intervening years. Miraculously, the military campaign is proving successful despite heavy casualties. America launches a ground invasion, and U.S.-ROK forces quickly capture Pyongyang. Meanwhile, China, whose conventional forces have dramatically improved, decides to intervene. Invading from the north with millions of soldiers, China takes U.S. forces completely by surprise and pushes them back with terrible losses. After capturing Seoul, Beijing makes an offer to the South Korean government that they cannot refuse – a unified Korean Peninsula under Seoul’s authority, but all U.S. forces are to be permanently expelled.
There are other possibilities that fall within the purview of these scenarios, and as noted, not everything will come to pass. However, the decision to accept a North Korean nuclear deterrent is to accept a combination of these outcomes. At the thematic level, it means: increasing North Korean provocation; nuclear weapons proliferation; weakened alliances; emboldened Chinese aggression; and the likelihood of future war waged under less favorable circumstances. Evaluated in its totality, America’s primacy in Asia would be at an end.
--- Option Two ---
U.S. intelligence officials receive evidence that North Korea has successfully miniaturized a nuclear weapon and married it to an ICBM capable of reaching Los Angeles. All diplomatic avenues having been exhausted, President Trump approves the largest military air campaign in modern history. Again, not all the consequences outlined here will eventuate, but given the recommendation for war, a special responsibility exists in ensuring that all credible risks are laid bare.
- Consequences -
1. War (obviously)
North Korea is hit by a massive cyber-attack that disables communications, shuts down the power grid, and cripples command and control chains. Minutes later the sky lights up with massive ordinance as MOABs detonate over North Korean nuclear facilities and launch platforms. Thousands of North Korean artillery pieces are similarly struck, along with all palatial compounds. By the time the attack is generally known in Pyongyang, North Korea’s forces have already been seriously degraded. Eventually, low-level commanders acting under their own initiative commence an un-coordinated retaliatory action primarily targeted at Seoul. The subsequent artillery barrage kills some 30,000 people before the guns are found and destroyed. After these initial setbacks, North Korea is given some time to re-group as the American air campaign focuses obsessively on suspected nuclear sites. 36 hours later North Korea retaliates with a massive ballistic missile bombardment of Japan, killing thousands. Meanwhile, North Korean submarines attack American surface ships, somewhat complicating carrier-based sorties over the peninsula. Using hitherto undetected tunnels, thousands of North Korean troops appear south of the DMZ. They are pushed back with heavy losses on both sides, as huge numbers of marines arrive in preparation for an invasion of the North.
2. Nuclear escalation
Despite every effort, North Korea manages to hit Japan with two nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles in the closing stages of the conflict, killing close to 300,000 civilians. The U.S. responds with low-yield nuclear bunker-busters; however, this is largely tokenistic as North Korea is already lost. This attack shatters world markets already rattled by the conflict, and panic spreads about possibilities of “loose nukes” being smuggled out as the regime collapses. Recriminations occur in the aftermath over who allowed this to happen and what more should have been done to prevent it. Combined with the large numbers of combat casualties, questions over whether the war was worthwhile or necessary precipitates political crises in multiple capitals.
3. Economic crisis
The financial burden of the war is crippling and American economic recovery immediately falters. First, there is the trillion-dollar price tag for the combat operations plus post-war occupation and reconstruction. Regional trade has been smashed in the most economically dynamic region on Earth, and yet despite the slowdown in global trade oil prices skyrocket, intensifying the hardship. The world slides back into yet another deep recession, once again with the United States at its epicenter. Recovery is painstakingly slow as Japan reels from the conflict and Korea commences the generational task of incorporating North Korea. Even China’s recovery is slower than expected as it seeks to manage the millions of North Korean refugees that have poured across the border.
4. Chinese and Russian assertiveness
Aware that they cannot yet challenge the U.S. militarily, China’s intervention is restricted to the far north to stem the flow of refugees and to deter American forces from pushing too close to the border. Nevertheless, China does seek to tie down the U.S. in yet another quagmire by quietly supporting North Korean insurgents, while fortifying their own positions on Korean territory. Beijing also makes clear to Seoul that with the peninsula unified the U.S. should have no long-term role, and that Chinese withdrawal is contingent on America’s own. Meanwhile Russia, scarcely believing it’s good fortune, employs salami tactics to push into the Baltic States, knowing that America can ill-afford a conflict on two continents.
As with Option One, there are other possibilities, but these are matters of degree. One or two additional nuclear weapons could be detonated in allied territory, or North Korea’s military could be less degraded in the initial attack than anticipated. Finally, while the chance of direct Chinese intervention is low given the current military balance, there are ways this could occur and must not be ruled out. Any such intervention would almost certainly escalate into World War III, as Russia would also take advantage of this and invade the Baltic countries overtly. Even if none of this occurs, the U.S. should expect combat losses exceeding a hundred thousand – to say nothing of the millions of North Koreans dead, both military and civilian.
This analysis has rightly focused on the negative consequences of each decision; however, it is necessary to also assess potential benefits. With Option One there are none. But war would: prove that nuclear weapons do not confer unfettered license to threaten world peace, unify an artificially divided people, and extinguish a regime that is an affront to the human race. Moreover, depending on how it progressed, the war could bolster America’s long-term position in Asia by proving America’s ability to sustain high-intensity operations in the Western Pacific and giving China pause.
Despite potential upsides, the prospect of such a conflict should greet no-one with any kind of enthusiasm. And yet, when having to choose between a mutual deterrence relationship with North Korea and war on the peninsula, then the latter is the only viable option.
--------------------------------...
Crispin Rovere is a member of the Australian Labor Party and previous convenor of the ACT ALP International Affairs Policy Committee. Formerly he was a Ph.D. candidate at the ANU's Strategic and Defence Studies Centre (SDSC) and previously worked in Secretariat of the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, and published on nuclear policy. Crispin is the author of The Trump Phenomenon: How One Man Conquered America.
- https://www.youtube.…sted
- and the second part because you like it long:
https://www.youtube.…sted - and before you make any comment just check who's channel is that :)sted
- *whosested
- Ramanisky23
chug away ....
- LOL! I love you Ramkona
- Just doing my part to
Make QBN Great AgainRamanisky2 - Lol, Mr. Denim is having an existential crisis on national television.garbage
- dear god, c'mon, gimme a break!dorf
- Ramanisky22
- Just watching his speech live - what the actual fuck. He must be senile.fadein11
- oh sorry this is it. it's insane lol. his knowledge of history ha. he even said someone had told him about the WWI anniversary - he doesn't give a fuck.fadein11
- the handshake was incredible.fadein11
- Why is Macron licking Trump's ass?oey
- macron hates trump, but what is he supposed to do? punch him in the face? have to act cordial at least.CygnusZero4
- sted1
Let me tell you a little story, and please warn every single person who you know and it is in Budapest for the next few weeks.
So there is a world championships for aquatics sports event what starts tomorrow here in hungary. I don't want to get into how the budget is now 500% because that's some local shit and it isn't the case.
What is actually important and every participant should know is that there will be free wifi for the visitors, journalists etc. And last week some journalists found out that a rassan company will run the network for an incredible amount of money. And you will be able to access it by giving out your social media profile or some personal stuff. Despite the fact that we have much more qualified local companies who can run a network like this securely, and w/o collecting any data. Today the gov. spokesman was asked about this and he told to the Hungarian press in a really doubtful way that they shouldn't use that network.
Few mins ago they sent out a press release that there will be an investigation after the event by the national security agency...And the fun part: This isn't the first time in the last years that our government got caught selling personal data to Russia for some unknown reason. Almost a month ago there was an national consultation with some stupid questions what you can answer online and by mail like: do you hate illegal immigration? And we figured out that the website what they built to answer this questionnaire sends everything back to the rassan Yandex system (not just the stats but your personal info as well like name, dob, email, location). At this time there was some ridiculous explanation that the web agency fucked it up.
- utopian2
Donald Trump, the Angry President, Screams at His TV and Vows He'll Never Stop Tweeting
As Trump tweets his frustrations and "growls" at newscasters from within the confines of his White House, his administration is kept busy trying to hunt down the leakers feeding the numerous Russia investigations, the Daily Beast reported Thursday.
- If he had nothing to hide, he wouldn't need to plug leaks, would he? :)Continuity
- lol
https://www.youtube.…dorf
- Ramanisky22
*AIRHORN
- colin_s2
Real question here - if Trump gets impeached, does his cabinet go as well?
The reason I ask is that Trump is relatively foolish legislatively and hasn't accomplished any real political goals yet - the ban(s) being jammed up in the judiciary at this point, his most effective (evil, as they are) use of the WW has been to appoint people that are rolling back regulations left and right (I'm looking at the EPA specifically).
This is why I worry about Trump being impeached - if a competent dictator was vying for it right now, we'd be in much deeper shit. Trump's incompetence is saving us from falling further faster.
- I don't think Trump is anywhere close to getting impeached...Republic... would suffer the most from this so they will try to avoid it at all cost.yuekit
- The one thing Trump did succeed at was creating this personality cult of people who have convinced themselves he is the one guy standing against the system.yuekit
- Imagine how they would react if "the establishment" of his own party kicked him out... it would destroy the party.yuekit
- I don't think so, either. It'd be nice to see the entire WH disappear, but I don't think anyone would really let that happen.formed
- impeachment may be the only option if scandals continue and some real dirt emerges, it's all v.flakey at the moment.fadein11
- oey0
- Ramanisky24
- hahahaha! so good. sesame street. it's so ridiculous. people don't notice it?oey
- utopian2
Ordered by court to disclose his Russia contacts, Sessions releases blank sheet of paper
What’s he hiding?
What’s he hiding? In response to a court order directing Attorney General Jeff Sessions to disclose the part of his security clearance form detailing his Russia contacts, the Department of Justice released a mostly blank page of paper. The Thursday morning “disclosure” comes in response to a lawsuit from an ethics watchdog group. According to NPR, a “recently-launched ethics watchdog group called American Oversight filed a Freedom of Information Act request in March for sections of the Standard Form 86 [i.e., security clearance] relating to Sessions’ contacts ‘with any official of the Russian government.’” On June 12, a judge ordered the DOJ to comply with the request within 30 days.
- yuekit2
Just in case you thought no one could be that stupid...
Jared Kushner's father (at one time the largest political donor in New Jersey) was sent to prison for hiring a prostitute to blackmail his own brother in law.
He installed a secret camera in the hotel room where they had sex, then mailed the tape to his sister in an attempt to intimidate them into not cooperating in a case the government was drawing up against him for tax fraud and bribing politicians. But they simply turned the tape over to the feds, and the prostitute ended up testifying against him.
- utopian1
- Stupid is as stupid does
#Make Russia Great Again!utopian - Trump Jr should have contacted Hillary, she knows what to do with emails... lolzrobotron3k
- "but emails..." oh robo change the rekkid.fadein11
- hey robo, maybe they should do an investigation into that and see if anything criminal took place ... oh waitmonospaced
- but her emails!pango
- Stupid is as stupid does
- utopian1
What a tremendously great guy he is.
- This is the same Pat Robertson who has previously suggested that Gays with AIDS wear rings to cut and infect others with the virus.BusterBoy
- what's a "dialack?"Krassy
- https://en.wikipedia…dorf
- Between Trout's hair spray and tanning oil and Pat's incontinence the stench in that room must have been almost... biblical.face_melter
- 'But when I painted it, they said why didn't you just stick it on? But when I stuck it on they told me to paint it'.face_melter
- it's amazing how many sentences he can string together with just a few words.inteliboy
- nb1
- "Celebrity Wife Swap: Global Affairs"nb
- the guy in the white skirt did something ugly with the soup. you can see it in his eyessted
- Worst ABBA reunion ever.face_melter
- CygnusZero43
I dont think republicans are that eager to protect trump from impeachment. They never wanted him to begin with. They wanted cruz, kasich, rubio, bush, anyone other than this guy. He forced himself on them. Many republican leaders in the house and senate didnt even go to the RNC because of Trump, and they never endorsed him. He has very little real support in washington. I cant imagine how embarrassed the gop is by trump. They know every single day he is damaging the party.
I think if they can do it, they would impeach him in favor of pence. Of course the problem there is pence has no base, and no personality, so the dems could roll anyone out there in 2020 and likely beat the pants off him. Even trump with russia support and all his big personality, still managed to get millions of less votes.
And people seem to forget, he was very close to losing so many red states. Some red states a dem has not even come close to winning in half a century or longer, hillary was very close to winning, so trumps support was thin to begin with. And now with him basically doing nothing as president, im certain its even thinner.
- omg-4
- quick question: do you think this cartoon is a positive or negative depiction of the white house?kona
- I'm asking you omg.kona
- trump is certainly king of policy nothing burgers and lies.lowimpakt
- lol - please tell me omg didn't think this was pro Trump?fadein11
- @kona. that would depend on your view of the nothing burger.omg
- no, actually, the meaning of the cartoon does NOT change depending on your "view of the nothing burger."monospaced
- it's anti-media leaning.omg
- omg - changing Trump supporter stereotypes since... never.fadein11
- @mono. the burger is everything to a burger joint. if its good, burger joint = good. bad, burger joint = bad.omg
- nothing burger = nothing burger - what don't you get you dumb fuckfadein11
- yeah, like I said, that doesn't change the intended meaning of the cartoon no matter what you thinkmonospaced
- oh my fucking shit omg you literally thought this was pro trump? did you not take a second to view any of Matsons other cartoons?kona
- "do you want lies with that?" is coming from the person working inside the trump white house? how dense are you man?kona
- omglolscruffics
