The president is beginning his tour of a bunch of Asian countries, and he's already thrown away all his winning cards. The tour will be a bunch of photo ops and not much else.
When he arrives in China, he might have said, "I represent the 12 nations of the TPP. We represent about 40% of the world economy. If you don't stop trading fuel and materials across the N. Korea border that they can use to make nukes and icbms, we in the TPP will greatly reduce our trade with you, in order to reduce trade with N. Korea.
Or he might say, :The South China Sea is international waters that all of the TPP want to use as international waters. Please remove your militarized islands that you have created there, and allow us all free passage."
Or he might say, "Please protect the intellectual property of all TPP members, and protect TPP patents, and written material, or trade with China by TPP members will be greatly reduced."
But he can't because he has thrown away the TPP card. Everyone is now on their own, and many Asian countries can't afford to go it alone against China. No country, including the USA, can compete economically with China alone.
And as far as Russia is concerned, we still don't know what cards he has given to Putin, but clearly the president has given away all his cards there as well. So many that the president is clearly scared to say or do anything that might bother Putin.
A good negotiator? Really?? It's hard to negotiate anything when you don't have any cards. Of course, he might just say, "I'm crazy, do what I say or else." I'm sure every country, everywhere has already tough about that. And that's why they are all simply going to wait until Trump is gone for anything significant.
When he arrives in China, he might have said, "I represent the 12 nations of the TPP. We represent about 40% of the world economy. If you don't stop trading fuel and materials across the N. Korea border that they can use to make nukes and icbms, we in the TPP will greatly reduce our trade with you, in order to reduce trade with N. Korea.
Or he might say, :The South China Sea is international waters that all of the TPP want to use as international waters. Please remove your militarized islands that you have created there, and allow us all free passage."
Or he might say, "Please protect the intellectual property of all TPP members, and protect TPP patents, and written material, or trade with China by TPP members will be greatly reduced."
But he can't because he has thrown away the TPP card. Everyone is now on their own, and many Asian countries can't afford to go it alone against China. No country, including the USA, can compete economically with China alone.
And as far as Russia is concerned, we still don't know what cards he has given to Putin, but clearly the president has given away all his cards there as well. So many that the president is clearly scared to say or do anything that might bother Putin.
A good negotiator? Really?? It's hard to negotiate anything when you don't have any cards. Of course, he might just say, "I'm crazy, do what I say or else." I'm sure every country, everywhere has already tough about that. And that's why they are all simply going to wait until Trump is gone for anything significant.
