A hard-headed hospital nun who disobeyed doctor’s orders saved the life of Pope Francis some six decades ago when he risked dying of pneumonia, the pope reveals in a new book.
When Francis was studying for the priesthood in Latin America in the 1950s he caught pneumonia, but it was mis-diagnosed by the seminary’s doctor, who thought is was the flu, and one day had to be rushed to hospital “on the point of death,” he says.
A doctor at the hospital realised it was pneumonia and ordered staff to give the young Jorge Mario Bergoglio two types of antibiotics.
But a hospital nun named Cornelia Caraglio, had a different idea.
“As soon as the doctor left (she told the staff) ‘let’s double the dose.’ She certainly was a wise nun. By ordering that the dose be doubled she saved my life,” he said.
Several months later, the future pope returned to hospital to have the upper part of one of his lungs removed because of an infection.
Francis, 81, made the comments in a book-length interview with Spanish priest Fernando Prado called “The Strength of Vocation”, in which he discusses the challenges of being a priest or nun today.
It is due to be published this week in several languages. An advance copy of the Italian version was made available to Reuters.
(Reporting by Philip Pullella Editing by Peter Graff)
An Islamic State group leader involved in the execution of American aid worker Peter Kassig and other Western prisoners was targeted in a strike Sunday by the US-led anti-jihadist coalition in Syria.
Kassig, aged 26 at the time of his death, was among a group of prisoners decapitated by jihadists in November 2014. The mass execution was shown in a video released by the group.
"Coalition forces conducted precision strikes against a senior ISIS member, Abu al Umarayn, and several other ISIS members in the Badiyah Desert, Syria," said Sean Ryan, spokesman for the US-led coalition, in a statement in English.
"Al Umarayn had given indications of posing an imminent threat to coalition forces and he was involved in the killing of American citizen and former U.S. Army Ranger, Peter Kassig", kidnapped in Syria in 2013, he added.
Ryan said he had been also been involved in the execution of several other prisoners.
"Coalition airstrikes continue to disrupt ISIS command and control on the battlefield as we remove key figures from their ranks," he said.
Damascus had earlier Sunday accused the coalition of launching missiles against Syrian army positions, according to the official Sana news agency.
"The American coalition forces launched around 8:00 pm (1800 GMT) this evening several missiles against some positions of our forces in the Ghorab mountains south of Sukhna," causing only "damage to equipment," Sana said, citing a military source.
According to the monitoring Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, coalition forces positioned in the Al-Tanf region fired "more than 14 missiles" at a Syrian army convoy as it was passing through the desert in the far east of Homs province.
"The group was lost in the middle of the desert around 35 kilometres from the Al-Tanf base" of US and British troops, the Observatory's director Rami Abdel Rahmane told AFP.
The United States generally uses this base to launch its strikes against IS jihadists. It has also been used in the past to train Syrian opposition fighters.
Peter Kassig founded a humanitarian organisation in 2012 that trained some 150 civilians to provide medical aid to people in Syria. His group also gave food, cooking supplies, clothing and medicine to the needy.
He took the name Abdul-Rahman after converting to Islam.
Before Kassig's death, his life had been threatened in an earlier video showing the beheading of another aid worker, Briton Alan Henning.
Kassig's mother Paula reached out directly to IS militants to plead for her son's life.
The international coalition intervened in Syria and Iraq in 2014 to fight the expansion of IS after it had taken control of vast swathes of territory straddling the two countries.
Defeated in Iraq, the group still retains territory in some parts of the Syrian desert, particularly in the east of the country, where the coalition continues to fight the jihadists with the support of an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters.
U.S. President Donald Trump said China had agreed to cut import tariffs on American-made cars, buoying shares in BMW and Daimler AG who manufacture in the United States for export to the world’s biggest auto market.
Shares of Chinese car dealers also perked up on hopes that such a move could revitalize the domestic auto market that is poised for its first annual sales contraction in decades amid cooling economic growth and a debilitating U.S.-China trade war.
Trump, fresh from agreeing a 90-day cease-fire in his trade war with China at the meeting of the G20, said on Twitter “China has agreed to reduce and remove tariffs on cars coming into China from the U.S. Currently the tariff is 40%”.
The move, if realized, would bolster U.S. carmakers who were hit hard when China ramped up levies on U.S.-made cars in July as part of a broad package of retaliatory tariffs amid the sprawling trade war between Washington and Beijing.
“If they cancel the extra 25 percent tariff on U.S.-made cars, then we will see positive signs for imported cars,” Wang Cun, director of the China Automobile Dealers Association’s import committee, told reporters in Beijing.
Beijing raised tariffs on U.S. auto imports to 40 percent in July, forcing many carmakers to hike prices in a major hit to the roughly $10 billion worth of passenger vehicles the United States sent to China last year.
That put U.S.-made car brands like Tesla Inc and Ford Motor Co’s Lincoln at a major disadvantage as the move came soon after China slashed auto import tariffs for the wider market to 15 percent from 25 percent.
Trump’s tweet did not give any further detail about the tariff cuts, such as when the deal had been reached or a new level for the Chinese levies.
The White House and U.S. Trade Representative’s (USTR) office did not immediately respond to a request for comment late on Sunday. China’s commerce and finance ministries did not respond to requests for comment on Monday.
SHARES CLIMB
In early European trade on Monday, shares in Germany’s BMW, Volkswagen ASG and Mercedes-Benz parent Daimler rose between 4-7 percent.
In China, listed car dealers such as Grand Automotive, Pangda Automobile Trade and Sinomach Automobile climbed on the news, with some local carmakers falling back.
Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to halt new tariffs during talks in Argentina on Saturday, following months of escalating tensions on trade and other issues.
After a 2-1/2 hour dinner with Xi on Saturday in Buenos Aires, Trump agreed to postpone an increase in the tariff rate on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports to 25 percent from 10 percent that was scheduled for Jan. 1. China agreed to resume purchases of some U.S. farm and energy commodities.
The two sides also agreed to negotiate in the next 90 days over “structural changes” to China’s policies on technology transfers, intellectual property protection, non-tariff barriers, cyber intrusions and theft, services and agriculture.
Major U.S. automakers said they were unaware of the lower tariffs on exports to China.
The automakers have a previously scheduled meeting with USTR on Monday, two people briefed on the matter told Reuters.
The lower tariffs would be a boost to automakers exporting vehicles to China, including Ford and German carmaker BMW, which exports U.S.-built luxury vehicles to China.
It would also be good news for Tesla that has been hit hard by increased tariffs on the electric cars it imports to China.
The U.S. firm, led by billionaire Elon Musk, has said it will cut prices to make its cars “more affordable” and absorb more of the hit from the tariffs. Tesla is also building a local plant in Shanghai to help it avoid steep tariffs.
The United States currently charges tariffs of 27.5 percent on Chinese vehicles. On Wednesday, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said Trump had directed him to examine all available tools to raise U.S. tariffs on Chinese vehicles to the level that China is charging.
Reporting by David Lawder in WASHINGTON and Adam Jourdan in SHANGHAI; Additional reporting by David Shepardson and Yilei Sun; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Christopher Cushing and Himani Sarkar
Hanukkah may be the best known Jewish holiday in the United States. But despite its popularity in the U.S., Hanukkah is ranked one of Judaism’s minor festivals, and nowhere else does it garner such attention. The holiday is mostly a domestic celebration, although special holiday prayers also expand synagogue worship.
So how did Hanukkah attain its special place in America?
Hanukkah’s back story
The word “Hanukkah” means dedication. It commemorates the rededicating of the ancient Temple in Jerusalem in 165 B.C. when Jews – led by a band of brothers called the Maccabees – tossed out statues of Hellenic gods that had been placed there by King Antiochus IV when he conquered Judea. Antiochus aimed to plant Hellenic culture throughout his kingdom, and that included worshipping its gods.
Legend has it that during the dedication, as people prepared to light the Temple’s large oil lamps to signify the presence of God, only a tiny bit of holy oil could be found. Yet, that little bit of oil remained alight for eight days until more could be prepared. Thus, each Hanukkah evening, for eight nights, Jews light a candle, adding an additional one as the holiday progresses throughout the festival.
Hanukkah’s American story
Today, America is home to almost 7 million Jews. But Jews did not always find it easy to be Jewish in America. Until the late 19th century, America’s Jewish population was very small and grew to only as many as 250,000 in 1880. The basic goods of Jewish religious life – such as kosher meat and candles, Torah scrolls, and Jewish calendars – were often hard to find.
Until the late 19th century, basic goods of Jewish life were hard to find in the U.S.
It began with a simple holiday hymn written in 1840 by Penina Moise, a Jewish Sunday school teacher in Charleston, South Carolina. Her evangelical Christian neighbors worked hard to bring the local Jews into the Christian fold. They urged Jews to agree that only by becoming Christian could they attain God’s love and ultimately reach Heaven.
Moise, a famed poet, saw the holiday celebrating dedication to Judaism as an occasion to inspire Jewish dedication despite Christian challenges. Her congregation, Beth Elohim, publicized the hymn by including it in their hymnbook.
This English language hymn expressed a feeling common to many American Jews living as a tiny minority. “Great Arbiter of human fate whose glory ne'er decays,” Moise began the hymn, “To Thee alone we dedicate the song and soul of praise.”
It became a favorite among American Jews and could be heard in congregations around the country for another century.
Shortly after the Civil War, Cincinnati Rabbi Max Lilienthal learned about special Christmas events for children held in some local churches. To adapt them for children in his own congregation, he created a Hanukkah assembly where the holiday’s story was told, blessings and hymns were sung, candles were lighted and sweets were distributed to the children.
His friend, Rabbi Isaac M. Wise, created a similar event for his own congregation. Wise and Lilienthal edited national Jewish magazines where they publicized these innovative Hanukkah assemblies, encouraging other congregations to establish their own.
Lilienthal and Wise also aimed to reform Judaism, streamlining it and emphasizing the rabbi’s role as teacher. Because they felt their changes would help Judaism survive in the modern age, they called themselves “Modern Maccabees.” Through their efforts, special Hanukkah events for children became standard in American synagogues.
20th-century expansion
By 1900, industrial America produced the abundance of goods exchanged each Dec. 25. Christmas’ domestic celebrations and gifts to children provided a shared religious experience to American Christians otherwise separated by denominational divisions. As a home celebration, it sidestepped the theological and institutional loyalties voiced in churches.
For the 2.3 million Jewish immigrants who entered the U.S. between 1881 and 1924, providing their children with gifts in December proved they were becoming American and obtaining a better life.
But by giving those gifts at Hanukkah, instead of adopting Christmas, they also expressed their own ideals of American religious freedom, as well as their own dedication to Judaism.
After World War II, many Jews relocated from urban centers. Suburban Jewish children often comprised small minorities in public schools and found themselves coerced to participate in Christmas assemblies. Teachers, administrators and peers often pressured them to sing Christian hymns and assert statements of Christian faith.
From the 1950s through the 1980s, as Jewish parents argued for their children’s right to freedom from religious coercion, they also embellished Hanukkah. Suburban synagogues expanded their Hanukkah programming.
As I detail in my book, Jewish families embellished domestic Hanukkah celebrations with decorations, nightly gifts and holiday parties to enhance Hanukkah’s impact. In suburbia, Hanukkah’s theme of dedication to Judaism shone with special meaning. Rabbinical associations, national Jewish clubs and advertisers of Hanukkah goods carried the ideas for expanded Hanukkah festivities nationwide.
In the 21st century, Hanukkah accomplishes many tasks. Amid Christmas, it reminds Jews of Jewish dedication. Its domestic celebration enhances Jewish family life. In its similarity to Christmas domestic gift-giving, Hanukkah makes Judaism attractive to children and – according to my college students – relatable to Jews’ Christian neighbors. In many interfaith families, this shared festivity furthers domestic tranquility.
In America, this minor festival has attained major significance.
Thousands turned out on Sunday for a concert in Johannesburg to honor the life of Nelson Mandela, with Beyonce leading an all-star line-up.
The event, held to mark 100 years since the birth of South Africa’s first black president, was organized by advocacy group Global Citizen. It also aimed to highlight the fight against poverty, gender inequality and hunger, causes that Mandela championed.
World Bank President Jim Kim was among a number of political and business leaders attending the event and he announced a $1 billion investment in health and education across Africa in 2019.
“Be-yo-nce! Be-yo-nce!,” chanted a group of ladies as they waited in a long queue to enter Johannesburg’s FNB stadium, where Jay-Z, Usher and Ed Sheeran were also set to perform.
Thousands of fans, some wearing Global Citizen T-shirts and temporary tattoos on their shoulders, cheered, danced and cried at the sight of their favorite artists.
Many fans had been given free tickets in exchange for signing petitions and sending tweets to world leaders, urging them to take action to improve education, water supplies, sanitation, health and other issues.
Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta appeared via video link and pledged to increase his country’s education budget to 30 percent of the total budget.
Richard Branson, also via a recorded video link, announced a $105 million commitment from donors including UK Aid, Virgin Unite and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation towards ending trachoma, a disease that causes blindness.
“I’m from a neighborhood where small kids falling into pit latrines at school or home is a common occurrence,” Lucia Celery, an IT specialist told Reuters. “So to hear such commitments towards issues like sanitation is very encouraging for our society.
“Let their commitments not end here, tonight at this stadium.”
Vodacom Chief Executive Shameless Joosub pledged 500 million rand ($36 million) during the event to fight gender-based violence and enhance sanitation in schools and digital literacy.
Mandela was imprisoned for nearly three decades for his fight against the apartheid regime. He was released in 1990 and led South Africa to its first free elections in 1994. He died on Dec. 5, 2013.
Reporting by Nqobile Dludla; Editing by Susan Fenton
The G20 summit in Argentina failed to hold Russian President Vladimir Putin accountable for his actions with regard to Ukraine, despite significant efforts by German Chancellor Angela Merkel in bilateral meetings, a key Merkel ally said.
“President Putin escaped nearly unscathed with his renewed aggression against Ukraine,” Juergen Hardt, foreign policy spokesman for Merkel’s conservatives in parliament, said in a statement on Monday.
He said Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman missed an opportunity at the event both to provide details about the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and to start to rebuild trust.
Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Michelle Martin
Texas is suing the city of San Antonio for an alleged violation of the state’s new anti-“sanctuary cities” law, in the state’s first enforcement action against a city under the controversial statute.
The lawsuit, filed Friday in Travis County District Court, centers on a December 2017 incident when San Antonio police discovered a trailer carrying 12 individuals from Guatemala who were suspected of being undocumented. The city’s police department charged the driver with smuggling of persons, but released the migrants without involving federal immigration authorities, as the new law requires, according to the state’s lawsuit.
The 2017 "sanctuary cities" law, known as Senate Bill 4, says police departments can't bar their officers from questioning the immigration status of people they detain or arrest. It also punishes local government department heads and elected officials who don’t cooperate with federal immigration "detainers" — requests by agents to turn over immigrants subject to possible deportation
San Antonio’s police department policy states that officers will not refer individuals to Immigration and Customs and Enforcement unless they have a federal deportation warrant. That policy, the Texas lawsuit claims, “prohibits and materially limits the enforcement of immigration laws.”
The lawsuit seeks hefty civil fees from the city, including a $25,500 penalty for nearly every day that the city’s immigration procedures violated state law. The law went into effect Sept. 1, 2017 — meaning those fees could amount to some $11.6 million.
The lawsuit claims that San Antonio Police Chief William McManus “personally called an immigration attorney from an advocacy organization” and released the individuals without running background checks.
“Unfortunately, some municipalities, such as San Antonio, put the safety of police officers and the public at risk by defying state law,” Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a news release.
City Attorney Andy Segovia took issue with Paxton's characterization of events, saying the attorney general was clearly "aimed at furthering a political agenda."
"While we need time to review the complaint, we are fully confident that neither the city nor Chief McManus violated the applicable provisions of [the law]," Segovia said in a statement. "The city has a long history of cooperating with federal authorities and we will continue to do so. The city’s process for handling human smuggling/trafficking incidents was created in coordination with the federal government, and federal officials have not taken issue with our handling of immigration issues."
Paxton’s office has asked the court to issue an injunction requiring the city to comply with the new law, as well as assess major civil penalties against the city, police department and McManus.
Thomas Saenz, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, slammed the lawsuit, claiming it had "three obvious purposes: to intimidate and frighten immigrants in the state of Texas, to pressure Texas localities to violate constitutional rights, and to attract public attention for Paxton from the nativist fringe."
The dollar broadly weakened on Monday as investor demand for riskier assets rose after China and the United States agreed to a ceasefire in their trade war that has shaken global markets.
The White House said on Saturday that President Donald Trump told China’s President Xi Jinping at the G20 talks in Argentina that he would not raise tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods to 25 percent on Jan. 1 as previously announced.
China and the United States will attempt to bridge their differences via new talks aimed at reaching a deal within 90 days.
Riskier currencies such as the Australian dollar and New Zealand dollar rallied 0.75 percent and 0.5 percent, respectively, while safe haven currencies such as the yen weakened in early Asian trade, signalling a clear risk-on move in financial markets.
“The trade truce is definitely risk positive for the markets...we expect dollar safe haven buying to fade and riskier currencies such as the Aussie and kiwi to scale higher,” said Rodrigo Catril, senior currency strategist at NAB.
Catril noted that crosses such as the Aussie/yen and kiwi/yen are likely to see further upside as currency traders react to the truce between the world’s two largest economies.
The dollar index, a gauge of its value versus six major peers, traded down 0.36 percent to 96.92.
The dollar lost 0.55 percent versus the offshore yuan, to quote at 6.9109. In onshore trade, the yuan traded at 6.9164.
The greenback lost 1.2 percent versus the South African rand and 1.4 percent against the Mexican peso as traders shunned the world’s most liquid currency to put on riskier bets.
The safe-haven yen traded marginally lower at 113.45 on Monday. It had hit an intra-day low of 113.85, reflecting the prevailing risk-on mood.
The euro gained 0.3 percent on the yen to 128.84, briefly hitting an intra-day high of 129.37, its highest since Nov. 9.
The euro gained 0.3 percent to $1.1350 amid heavy dollar selling.
However, some analysts warned many issues still have to be resolved for risk sentiment to stay positive in the medium term.
“A lot will depend on developments in the next 90 days, but given the U.S. and China are on different pages, we don’t think the optimism can last. We reiterate trade wars need to be framed in terms of who hurts the least and see the G20 meeting as a stronger win for the U.S.,” said Sue Trinh, head of Asia EM FX strategy at RBC Capital Markets, in a note.
Apart from trade, investor focus will also return to U.S. monetary policy, with the Federal Reserve expected to raise interest rates by 25 basis points later in December, which would be its fourth rate hike this year.
“The developments over the weekend will give the Fed more confidence to raise rates in 2019,” said Michael McCarthy, chief market strategist at CMC markets.
The dollar had come under pressure last week when the market took comments by Fed Chairman Jerome Powell as hinting at a slower pace of rate hikes.
Powell is scheduled to testify before a congressional Joint Economic Committee later this week.
“We believe that Powell has simply toned down his hawkish tilt seen in October, with the Fed on track to deliver a hike, the fourth this year, at the FOMC meeting on 19 December, as well as another four increases in 2019,” Philip Wee, currency strategist at DBS, said in a note.
The British pound gained marginally versus the dollar to $1.2760. Sterling has posted losses for three consecutive weeks as traders bet that British Prime Minister Theresa May will not be able to pass her Brexit deal through Parliament on Dec. 11.
The greenback lost ground versus commodity currencies such as the Canadian dollar and Norwegian crown, as crude oil prices soared on Monday.
The greenback lost 0.52 percent versus the loonie, changing hands at C$1.3215.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday he will give formal notice to the U.S. Congress in the near future to terminate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), giving six months for lawmakers to approve a new trade deal signed on Friday.
“I will be formally terminating NAFTA shortly,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on his way home from Argentina.
“Just so you understand, when I do that - if for any reason we’re unable to make a deal because of Congress then Congress will have a choice” of the new deal or returning to trade rules from before 1994 when NAFTA took effect, he said.
Trump told reporters the trade rules before NAFTA “work very well.” NAFTA allows any country to formally withdraw with six months notice.
Trump, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto signed a new trade agreement on Friday known as the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).
Trump’s decision to set in motion a possible end to largely free trade in North America comes amid some skepticism from Democrats about the new trade deal.
The U.S. landscape will shift significantly in January when Democrats take control of the House of Representatives, after winning mid-term elections in November.
Presumptive incoming Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi described the deal as a “work in progress” that lacks worker and environment protections.
“This is not something where we have a piece of paper we can say yes or no to,” she said at a news conference on Friday, noting that Mexico had yet to pass a law on wages and working conditions.
Other Democrats, backed by unions that oppose the pact, have called for stronger enforcement provisions for new labor and environmental standards, arguing that USMCA’s state-to-state dispute settlement mechanism is too weak.
A 2016 congressional research report said there is a debate over whether a president can withdraw from a trade deal without the consent of Congress, and there is no historical precedent for the unilateral withdrawal from an free trade deal by a president that had been approved by Congress.
The issue could ultimately be decided by the U.S. courts.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said last year that exiting NAFTA without a new deal could devastate American agriculture, cost hundreds of thousands of jobs and “be an economic, political and national-security disaster.”
The leaders of the three countries agreed on a deal in principle to replace NAFTA, which governs more than $1.2 trillion of mutual trade, after acrimonious negotiations concluded on Sept. 30.
Trump had vowed to revamp NAFTA during his 2016 presidential election campaign. He threatened to tear it up and withdraw the United States completely at times during the negotiation, which would have left trade between the three neighbors in disarray.
The three were still bickering over the finer points of the deal just hours before officials were due to sit down and sign it.
Legislators in Canada and Mexico must still approve the pact.
Trump had forced Canada and Mexico to renegotiate the 24-year-old agreement because he said it encouraged U.S. companies to move jobs to low-wage Mexico.
U.S. objections to Canada’s protected internal market for dairy products was a major challenge facing negotiators during the talks, and Trump repeatedly demanded concessions and accused Canada of hurting U.S. farmers.
Reporting by Roberta Rampton aboard Air Force One; writing by David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by Robert Birsel
According to a statement, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said that President Donald Trump asked him to pass a note to North Korea's dictator.
According to CNN's Manu Raju, the note said, “President Trump has a very amicable view of Chairman Kim and that he likes Chairman Kim... As much that he wishes to implement the rest of the agreement with Chairman Kim and that he will make true what Chairman Kim wishes."
Trump hasn't managed to get Kim Jong Un to agree
During a Minnesota rally in June, Trump told the audience, their agreement outlines denuclearization.
“Sentence one says ‘a total denuclearization of North Korea,’” Trump said. “There will be denuclearization. So that’s the real story.”
While it may have been a huge applause line for Trump, it isn't true.
“President Donald J. Trump of the United States of America and Chairman Kim Jong Un of the State Affairs Commission of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) held a first, historic summit in Singapore on June 12, 2018,” the first sentence actually reads.
While it does deal with denuclearization, it doesn't commit North Korea to anything.
“Chairman Kim Jong Un reaffirmed his firm and unwavering commitment to complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” the official statement said.
Not long after, however, it gives the true mandate: “[T]he DPRK commits to work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
In April, Kim agreed to suspend nuclear tests, though he said it was because they didn't need them anymore.
Trump announced that he and Kim would be meeting in 2019 to continue their "talks." It's unclear the point of the note for the dictator, but at least it reaffirmed his feelings for the so-called "Chairman."
"He wrote me beautiful letters and we fell in love, OK?" Trump told a West Virginia audience. "No really. He wrote me beautiful letters.
Conservative Washington Post columnist Max Boot saw the excited high-five and hand-shake between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS). It prompted him to note that it seems as if the "tyrants" of the world are laughing at the American president.
Boot recalled all of the international meetings Trump has attended in the past two years, and each one has a "cringeworthy" moment of humiliation. Surprisingly, that didn't happen this time. Trump kept mostly to himself, canceling meetings for informal conversations. His "deal" with China was to cave on his increase in tariffs, at least for the next 90 days. Boot noted that Trump even said something appropriate when he was told former President George H.W. Bush had died.
Yet, Trump was still the butt of jokes to some, Boot noted.
The iconic handshake reminded Boot of "the classic David Low cartoon after the Nazi-Soviet pact in 1939 showing Hitler and Stalin curtsying to each other, with Hitler saying, 'The scum of the earth, I believe,' and Stalin replying, 'The bloody assassin of the workers, I presume?'"
While the two men aren't exactly Hitler and Stalin, they still have blood on their hands, Boot wrote.
Trump's decision not to meet with Putin over the Ukraine takeover didn't make Trump seem stronger, given that the two spent a dinner together.
"It signals American weakness that will encourage Putin to transgress further," Boot wrote. "Likewise, denying overwhelming evidence of Mohammed bin Salman’s complicity in Khashoggi’s murder signals that Trump isn’t tough enough to hold his ally to account."
MBS spent the G20 "thumbing his nose at the United States" while he laughed with Putin, Boot wrote.
"He was also undercutting one of the chief rationales that Trump offers for his obsequiousness to Mohammed — the Saudis’ opposition to Iran — given that Russia is Iran’s chief ally," he observed.
All Putin must do is giggle at the "two American ships" that couldn't make it through the Kerch Strait. The ships weren't actually from the U.S military, but that's neither here nor there.
All in all, the G20 could have been much worse, Boot argued, but it doesn't matter because they've been laughing for quite some time.
President Donald Trump had two major things he needed to accomplish at the G-20 meeting to keep campaign promises. He accomplished neither of them.
An Axios report walked through two of the major promises the president made this year but have proved to be too much of a slog for him to actually accomplish.
"Trump telegraphed ambivalence about the two issues that have defined his time in politics: China and the wall," Axios said Sunday.
Indeed, Trump has talked tough on China and trade, but when it came down to the final moments, the president caved on many of his issues.
During the 2016 campaign, the president said he would force China to end the years of abuse on American companies. "But China hasn't changed in any meaningful way," Axios said.
The president eased up on the so-called trade war for at least the next 90 days, promising he'd keep the tariffs at 10 percent. In exchange, China said it would crack down on opioids.
Trump's "wall" has been a significant part of his presidency, but it certainly hasn't been built. Indeed, nothing the president promised has been developed. Thanks to budgets signed by Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, however, the border fence is being repaired in places, and Trump has been able to take the credit.
Now, the president is saying that he'll agree to sign a temporary government budget so there's no government shutdown during President George H.W. Bush's funeral.
One concerned "hawk" told Axios that special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation has also caused trouble for the Trump legislative agenda.
"The whole effort with China has been brought to a grinding halt," the source said. "Elections have consequences. The defeat in November leads to compromises in December on the wall and trade — and we haven't yet begun '19."
President Donald Trump spent the end of the week in Buenos Aries, Argentina at the G-20 meeting with other major conferences, but he reportedly doesn't enjoy them. It's for that reason some think the president keeps canceling international assemblages in the wake of the Democratic takeover that happened as a result of the November elections.
A Washington Post report quoted Latin America expert Ted Piccone, saying, “He doesn’t like these meetings, he doesn’t like the format and he doesn’t like multilateralism."
The contemporary meetings are a stark contrast to the president's connectivity to foreign leaders in 2017. In November, the president made one of the longest trips of any president in 25 years as he made his way through Asian countries. Since then, however, Trump skipped three Asia summits, sending Vice President Mike Pence instead.
The choice of Pence was an interesting approach as the president has been questioning the vice president's loyalty. In November, New York Times reported, "in one conversation after another he has asked aides and advisers" if Pence is loyal.
Still, the president's question about Pence's devotion isn't deep enough for the president to take international matters into his own hands.
“Someone said recently that ‘The Apprentice’ was full of twists but no plot,” said Thomas Wright, a Europe expert at the Brookings. “That’s the question of Trump’s foreign policy. There will be twists, but is there a plot, is there a direction?”
Other presidents took a different approach after elections they lost and turned to foreign policy. Trump has done things differently after it became clear his domestic agenda would stall in a divided Republican Congress. The president has tried and failed to erase President Barack Obama's legacy accomplishments with executive orders and failed Congressional bills. What the GOP hasn't stopped, courts have struck down.
So, the president turned to issues like trade and denuclearization efforts for North Korea.
"Foreign affairs analysts said some capitals have grown wary given Trump’s sharp-elbowed performances," The Post said.
“The problem at the moment is he has no agenda,” Wright explained. “He ticked through his bucket list of everything he wanted to do and declared victory on all fronts. What does he do now? They’ve not really thought it through.”
Trump has participated in multilateral summits but he's much more interested in international meetings where he is the focus and can give a speech and be "center stage."
“It’s easy to see which ones Trump himself is driving toward versus the traditional responsibilities of office,” Richard Fontaine, president of the Center for a New American Security told The Post.
It's unclear if the president intends to spend the next two years campaigning for 2020 instead of governing or if he thinks that somehow he'll have more luck passing legislation with Democrats.
