Noting President Trump’s Asian Strategy. [High Profile, but Under-reported] •A firm open hand •leveraging new policy •structured around personal trust •building modern alliances:

♦February 10th – President Trump hosted Japanese Prime Minister Abe at the White House and at Mar-a-Lago, w/both spouses, to discuss regional issues (including N-Korea).

♦February 27th – President Trump and Chinese State Councilor Yang Jiechi meet in the White House Oval Office to discuss regional issues (including N-Korea).

♦March 15th – Secretary of State Rex Tillerson visits Japan, South Korea and China to follow up on February’s conversations and discuss the forward path (including N-Korea).

♦April 6th and 7th – President Trump hosts Chinese President Xi Jinping in Mar-a-Lago where they discussed all of the critical bilateral and regional issues (including N-Korea).

♦April 15th – Vice President Pence arrives in Asia for a ten day visit; positioned as the steady, stable and reliable administration policy closer (including N-Korea).

The White House (Trump) approach and results so far have been stunningly effective.

There have been more consequential Asia-Pacific/U.S. results (trade, economics and security) in the past two months than in the prior ten years. The stunningly successful and deliberate strategy continues today with Vice President Mike Pence in Japan.

(more…)

That’s weird.  (Hat Tip GWP) The Democrat candidate running to represent Georgia’s 6th congressional district doesn’t even live in the district and can’t vote for himself.

.

(more…)

It’s not on the official public press release page yet, however several media are reporting a call between President Trump and President Erdogan.

(click to enlarge)

Taken in the abstract it’s disconcerting for President Trump to be congratulating Erdogan on the controversial referendum. However, I had a sense this was going to happen because Press Secretary Sean Spicer really FUBAR’d a diplomatic protocol earlier in the day when questioned about yesterday’s election result in Turkey.

(more…)

HatTip Newsbusters – Generation Z continues to highlight their rebellious tendencies. During a live CNN report in the 11 am ET hour, a young chap photobombed CNN correspondent Jim Acosta and appeared to mouth “fake news” at the camera, twice.

(more…)

During a February interview which broadcast just before the Superbowl, President Trump recalled riding with former President Barack Obama to the Inauguration on Jan. 20 when he asked Obama to list the three greatest issues America was facing.

[…] “I asked him what you think our biggest problem is and he told me,” Trump said, recalling the limousine ride to the U.S. Capitol with Obama.

“I can’t tell you,” Trump said after O’Reilly interrupted to ask about specifics. “But it’s a problem, its a military problem with a certain place. No, it’s not China. But it is – he did mention, cause I did ask him what would you say our number one, two, three problems are and the number one problem that he felt – I was a little bit surprised, but I fully understand.” (link)

Almost every mainstream political pundit and political observer believes the concerning country within that conversation was North Korea. Indeed, if you were to evaluate the comment in isolation, against the backdrop of world media headlines, N-Korea seemingly becomes a natural conclusion.

However, CTH does not believe North Korea was the country of concern. President Obama viewed and acted upon all foreign affairs through the prism of ideological belief. Every action taken by the Obama administration was in furtherance of an ideological world-view that was personal to the small circle of like-minded fellow travelers.

(more…)

Vice-President Mike Pence continues his 10-day trip to Asia with a day-two visit to the DMZ and discussions with interim South Korean President Hwang.  VP Pence delivered remarks during a meeting with President Hwang:

[Transcript] THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Good afternoon. Ahn-young Ha-shim-nika.

To Acting President Hwang Kyo-ahn, thank you for the kind words and the hospitality you have shown me and my family in welcoming us to the Republic of Korea, my very first stop in the Asia Pacific as Vice President of the United States.

(more…)

FYI – [A background detail] President Trump is currently meeting with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in the White House for an in-person debrief following T-Rex’s G-7 trip to Italy and later visit to Moscow where the Secretary met Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov for 5 hours and Russian President Vladimir Putin for more than two hours.

At 2:00pm Press Secretary Sean Spicer is anticipated to give the latest White House Press Briefing:

(more…)

The President Trump first family celebrate Easter at the White House with the annual Easter Egg Roll festivities:

(more…)

Turkish President Recep Erdogan is quick to declare victory today, albeit by a narrow margin, as a national referendum to consolidate power passes during a national vote.

[…]  The 18 constitutional amendments that will come into effect after the next election, scheduled for 2019, will abolish the office of the prime minister and hand sweeping executive powers to the president. –link–

Having watched the Erdogan objectives play out over the past six to eight years the approach he has taken has been highly effective.

Erdogan essentially imported a base of support consisting of mostly Muslim Brotherhood political supporters to aid his desire to transform Turkey from a secular nation into a more Islamic dictatorial endeavor.

He may never fully achieve the goal of recreating the Ottoman Empire, but that doesn’t mean there is going to be anything less than toxic turmoil ahead for Turkey and the EU as his endeavors continue to be successful.

A decade or two from now when our children look back upon the period from 2010 to 2020 there will be a rather obvious similarity between the rise of Erdogan to power and the rise of Libya’s Muamar Qaddafi.

Both power-hungry nuts utilized immigration to construct their objectives, and both were national gatekeepers. Qaddafi held power over Europe via the North African migration gate, and Erdogan gaining power over Europe through the use of the Mid-East gate.

(more…)

Cleveland Police are urgently searching for a man named Steve Stevens who has killed at least one victim during a live Facebook broadcast, and claims to have killed more than a dozen more.

The suspect is a black male named Steve Stephens.  He is approximately 6′ 1″ and is considered armed and dangerous.  He was last seen driving a white ford Fusion and wearing a dark, striped polo shirt.

A video posted Sunday to a Facebook account apparently belonging to Stephens shows the man filming walk up to an older man and, after asking him a question, shooting him. The video, which was posted about 2 p.m. ET and was later taken down, is captioned, in part, “Easter day slaughter.”  The broadcast victims’ family has been identified and they are devastated.

(Via Fox News) […] The Sunday shooting occurred just south of Interstate 90 in the Glenville neighborhood. Stephens also posted another video of himself talking on the phone about at least 13 other alleged murders he says he’s committed. He said at one point he “messed up.”

(more…)