Trump Rules Out Diplomacy with North Korea
(stephenlendman.org - Home - Stephen Lendman)
Candidate Trump said “I would have no problem speaking to” DPRK leader Kim Jong-un. Last April, he said “(i)f it would be appropriate for me to meet with him, I would absolutely. I would be honored to do it.”
Then came his “fire and fury” remark, along with threatening “all options are on the table,” followed by an August 30 tweet after Pyongyang’s latest ballistic missile test, saying “(t)he US has been talking to North Korea, and paying them extortion money, for 25 years. Talking is not the answer!”
Everyone is still wondering whether Trump is stupid and reckless enough to trigger a nuclear confrontation.
According to a Congressional Research Service Report, Washington supplied North Korea with around $1.3 billion in mostly food and energy aid from 1995 - 2008. It was part of what became failed attempts to consummate a nuclear deal. A 1994 US/North Korea framework agreement collapsed in 2002. Six-party talks begun in 2003 broke down in 2009, following disagreements over verification Pyongyang considered unacceptably intrusive.
Dealings with Washington are never easy for any countries. The US doesn’t negotiate. It demands. North Korea is hesitant about dealing with an untrustworthy country for good reason. In response to reporters asking Defense Secretary Mattis if diplomacy is off the table with Pyongyang, he said: “No. We are never out of diplomatic solutions” before a meeting with his South Korean counterpart, adding:
“We continue to work together, and the minister and I share a responsibility to provide for the protection of our nations, our populations and our interests.”
Sergey Lavrov called potential new sanctions on North Korea “counterproductive and dangerous.” He also warned against a military solution on the peninsula. According to China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, Beijing and Moscow share the same views on resolving contentious issues with Pyongyang, both countries strongly against war and tougher sanctions. When it comes to imposing them, some “relevant sides storm to the front, but when it comes to pushing for peace they hide at the very back,” she said - no ambiguity about what country she means.
On Wednesday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said “(u)nilateral sanctions are not in line with international laws, and are not supported by China.”
“A very important part of Security Council resolutions ... is that we should continue to stick to peaceful and diplomatic means to resolve this issue.”
North Korea has been threatened by America throughout its post-WW II history - why it prioritizes a strong deterrent, the only way US aggression can be prevented, it believes. Will Trump attack North Korea? Will hawkish administration and Pentagon generals choose this option? Launching possible nuclear war on the Korean peninsula would be madness. Given America’s rage for war and dominance, it remains an ominous option.
by Stephen Lendman (stephenlendman.org - Home - Stephen Lendman)
Bashing Trump’s Media Critiques
His agenda is wrongheaded and dangerous on most everything. Given the deplorable state of America’s major media, giving press freedom a bad name, his criticism is justified - with a warning. Digital democracy is threatened - in America and other Western societies. Google removed web sites from its search engine, censored others, suppressing content, a flagrant First Amendment violation. Google and Facebook are at war with digital democracy, featuring managed news misinformation and fake news over the real thing.
Net Neutrality is threatened, letting users access all content without restrictions, limitations, or discrimination, an online level playing field for everyone. Whistleblowers exposing government wrongdoing risk prosecution and imprisonment. Bush/Cheney and Obama were obsessed with secrecy. Trump’s lack of transparency is disturbing.
Dissent in America is endangered. War on freedom post-9/11 risks losing it altogether. Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states:
“Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
Obligations accompany rights. Press freedom isn’t justification for major media abuses. Trump is right about deplorable fake news, including saying the “dishonest media(’s) agenda is not your’s,” and calling the media the “enemy of the American People.”
Former Jordanian UN envoy Prince Zeid bin Ra’ad Zeid al-Hussein is a member of its royal family, the nation hostile to democracy, notorious for human rights abuses, notably lack of free expression, political imprisonments and use of torture. In September 2014, he succeeded Navi Pillay as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, a dismal choice, Hussein operating the same way, serving imperial interests, not principles he’s sworn to uphold.
On Wednesday, he blasted Trump’s anti-media rhetoric. He said calling “news organizations ‘fake’ does tremendous damage, and to refer to individual journalists in this way, I have to ask the question, is this not an incitement for others to attack” them?
If major media operated responsibly, he’d be right. Far from it! Instead of informing readers and viewers, they suppress what’s most important to report and explain. They turned journalism into presstitution. Harsh criticism is warranted. Not according to Hussein, saying:
“It’s really quite amazing when you think that freedom of the press, not only a cornerstone of the Constitution but very much something the United States defended over the years, is now itself under attack from the president himself.”
Journalist AJ Liebling (1904 - 1963) once said “(f)reedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” Conditions are much worse today than decades earlier. Journalism the way it should be is nonexistent except through alternative, independent sources. The Internet is the last free expression space, digital democracy vital to preserve.
Monopolies dominate the media landscape, waging war on truth-telling, not supporting it. Hussein denounced Trump for calling journalists “very, very bad people,” saying it jeopardizes their well-being.
He ignored their appalling misreporting. They’re an embarrassment to legitimate journalism.
They give me plenty to write about in numerous media critiques - the deplorable New York Times my favorite target.
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STEPHEN LENDMAN was born in 1934 in Boston, MA. In 1956, he received a BA from Harvard University. Two years of US Army service followed, then an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in 1960. After working seven years as a marketing research analyst, he joined the Lendman Group family business in 1967. He remained there until retiring at year end 1999. Writing on major world and national issues began in summer 2005. In early 2007, radio hosting followed. Lendman now hosts the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network three times weekly. Distinguished guests are featured. Listen live or archived. Major world and national issues are discussed. Lendman is a 2008 Project Censored winner and 2011 Mexican Journalists Club international journalism award recipient. His new site is at http://stephenlendman.org
Journalist AJ Liebling (1904 – 1963) once said “(f)reedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” Conditions are much worse today than decades earlier. Journalism the way it should be is nonexistent except through alternative, independent sources. The Internet is the last free expression space, digital democracy vital to preserve.
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