President Trump participates in a dinner hosted by Lee Jae-myung, the President of the Republic of Korea.

PRESIDENT TRUMP – South Korea has agreed to pay the USA 350 Billion Dollars for a lowering of the Tariff’s charged against them by the United States. Additionally, they have agreed to buy our Oil and Gas in vast quantities, and investments into our Country by wealthy South Korean Companies and Businessmen will exceed 600 Billion Dollars. Our Military Alliance is stronger than ever before and, based on that, I have given them approval to build a Nuclear Powered Submarine, rather than the old fashioned, and far less nimble, diesel powered Submarines that they have now. A great trip, with a great President of South Korea! (link)

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South Korea is 13 hours ahead of U.S. Eastern Time.  At 5:23pm Wed Eastern / 6:23am Thur local, President Trump sent the following message:

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President Trump delivers the keynote address at the Asia Pacific Economic Council (APEC) CEO’s luncheon.

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President Trump arrives in South Korea to attend trade discussions and the APEC summit.

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President Trump delivers remarks to the media press pool and answers questions from the traveling group as they depart Japan on the way to South Korea and the APEC summit.

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In an effort to keep the Daily Open Thread a little more open topic we are going to start a new daily thread for “Presidential Politics”. Please use this thread to post anything relating to the Donald Trump Administration and Presidency.

This thread will refresh daily and appear above the Open Discussion Thread.

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Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL.

For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †

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Oh, this is funny…. 

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Think big picture. Think strategically, like Donald Trump.  He’s trying to push Canada into a desperation play where they strike trade deals with China, knowing he’s holding a USA deal with Chairman Xi in his back pocket that will undercut Canada completely.  Watch.

The Free Trade Agreements being made for the USA all over Southeast and Central Asia are stunning.  After over $500 billion in deals made in Japan, President Trump and team now head to South Korea.

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The House Oversight and Reform Committee has released a 100-page report [pdf HERE] highlighting how people around Joe Biden hid information about his cognitive incapacity and worked around the issue using his autopen signature to authorize presidential actions.

The House committee has released the video and transcript of all the witnesses questioned during their investigation [SEE HERE] to support their contention and referral to the Dept of Justice for a criminal investigation of the events.

WASHINGTON—Today, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released a staff report titled “The Biden Autopen Presidency: Decline, Delusion, and Deception in the White House.” The report exposes how President Joe Biden’s top advisors, political operatives, and personal physician concealed the President’s mental and physical decline from the American people. The findings reveal that as President Biden’s condition deteriorated, his aides exercised presidential authority and facilitated executive actions without his direct authorization, including misusing the autopen and failing to properly document decision-making processes. 

Following the findings of its investigation, the Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) sent a letter to the U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi requesting the U.S. Department of Justice conduct a comprehensive review of all executive actions taken during the Biden presidency and scrutinize key Biden aides—Dr. Kevin O’Connor, Annie Tomasini, and Anthony Bernal—who pleaded the Fifth Amendment during the investigation. Chairman Comer also sent a letter to the District of Columbia Board of Medicine seeking its review of actions taken by Dr. O’Connor to determine any potential wrongdoing in his medical care of the former president. (more)

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For those who have followed along with the U.S-Canada trade positioning, the current status of conflict between the Trump administration and the government of Canada is not surprising.  {GO DEEP} Going all the way back to the replacement of NAFTA, with the USMCA, President Trump always said he did not favor multilateral trade deals with multiple countries; instead, he preferred bilateral free trade agreements.

Some people have construed the bilateral preference of President Trump to be the elimination of globalism in favor of nationalism in trade agreements.

While the outcome of the Trump approach indeed aligns with that theme, it is not specifically the objective of President Trump to eliminate global trade, but rather to focus on specific interests in trade that benefit the unique nature of each party involved.

As a result, the USMCA -or CUSMA as said in Canada- is not in alignment with a bilateral free trade agreement, and the conflicted differences between trade with Mexico and trade with Canada are an outcome of this dynamic.  The solution is simply to eliminate the multilateral in favor of the bilateral approach.  This is the objective of President Trump as expressed.

That said, the USMCA covers approximately 60% of U.S-Canada trade, and the remaining 40% is being debated and argued.  President Trump would prefer to just deal with 100% of the trade sectors in one free trade agreement; hence, his ambivalence until the USMCA is dissolved.

Canada, on the other hand, continues to demand that all trade conflicts be resolved without opening up the entire USMCA. Again, another conflict. Canada is like the dependent spouse in a divorce arguing for child support payments when the “children” are in their twenties.

The current status is President Trump pulling back completely from discussions with Canada, while the various provincial Premiers and Prime Minister Mark Carney antagonize over the issue.

At a certain point, when the entire national economic plan of Canada is based on “Donald Trump bad”, and all political messaging internally is to proclaim they have no alternative policy positions, the Canadians might not realize it, but they are confirming complete and total dependency on the nation Donald Trump represents.

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