Wednesday, January 30, 2019

The Trump Doctrine


Ross Douthat, The New York Times, Jan. 29, 2019; original article contains links; see also Peter Baker, "A Growing Chorus of Republican Critics for Trump’s Foreign Policy," The New York Times, Jan 30; and also (1)

A chaotic administration’s unexpectedly coherent grand strategy.

uncaptioned image from article

Two years into his presidency Donald Trump has no clear legislative strategy, no policy agenda, no plan for remedying his persistent unpopularity and a path to re-election sufficiently bleak that he’s trying to bait a political naïf, the Starbucks billionaire Howard Schultz, into running as a third-party spoiler. Also, he might be impeached.

Yet at the same time, amid all the domestic chaos and incompetence and political malpractice, this administration continues to act in foreign policy — not tweet obnoxiously, not rage behind the scenes, but act — as though it’s following a serious grand strategy, one sufficiently coherent and plausible and forward-looking that future presidents might reasonably imitate it.

This Trump doctrine, in practice, isn’t the isolationism that he sometimes promised on the campaign trail; nor is it the flailing bellicosity that many of his critics feared. It’s a doctrine of disentanglement, retrenchment and realignment, in which the United States tries to abandon its most idealistic hopes and unrealistic military commitments, narrow its list of potential enemies and consolidate its attempts at influence. The overarching goal isn’t to cede United States primacy or abandon American alliances, as Trump’s opponents often charge; rather, it’s to maintain American primacy on a more manageable footing, while focusing more energy and effort on containing the power and influence of China.

Consider the two administration efforts in the news this week. The first is the White House’s decision to support the opposition leader in Venezuela and build a coalition to undermine the dictatorial Maduro government. The second is the advancing effort to negotiate a deal with the Taliban that would end America’s 17-years-and-counting military commitment in Afghanistan.

If a deal is struck and our forces actually withdraw, Trump’s personal skepticism of the Afghanistan intervention will have helped produce an outcome that large parts of our foreign policy establishment long resisted — an endgame that accepts the possibility of true defeat, a full Taliban takeover, as the price of reducing American commitments and bringing American troops home.

At the same, the Venezuelan effort is striking in its establishment-foreign-policy normalcy. Trying to undermine a left-wing Latin American dictator while talking in flowery language about human rights is the kind of policy you might have expected from a President Marco Rubio (who is, indeed, a prime mover behind the policy), and as Uri Friedman of The Atlantic wrote, the strategy has been advanced in a very un-Trump-y way: With “a well-oiled diplomatic campaign, closely coordinated with allies and rigorously on message.” There’s even a Reagan and George W. Bush hand, Elliott Abrams, on hand to help run the administration’s policy.

To Friedman, this normalcy is strange and dissonant and hypocritical. “Here was a president who preaches America First, who rarely invokes democracy and human rights in his unscripted remarks, who has voiced admiration for dictators such as Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, sticking his neck out to restore democracy in a country that doesn’t usually figure among the top challenges to U.S. interests.”

But in fact the administration’s different approaches can be harmonized. No American president before the end of the Cold War would have found it strange or dissonant to take an interventionist and self-righteous line where Latin America was concerned, while accepting deals with bad actors and wooing autocrats in more far-flung and global theaters.

There is a rhetorical tension, obviously, involved in defending human rights in Venezuela while you ponder a treaty with the Taliban and seek an accommodation with Kim Jong-un or Bashar al-Assad — and Trump is not exactly the master of rhetorical finesse. But from the Monroe Doctrine onward the United States has traditionally treated our hemispheric neighbors differently than Eurasian powers — for the very sound strategic reason that they are close to us and countries like Syria and Afghanistan are not.

This reasoning was abandoned by post-Cold War presidents, and especially by George W. Bush, in the heady days when it appeared that America could project power as easily in Kabul as in the Caribbean. And despite the Iraq disaster most of Bush’s would-be Republican heirs — John McCain and Mitt Romney as well as Rubio and Jeb! — maintained a similarly maximalist posture, in which every theater was supposedly a vital one, every tyrant a potential enemy, and we should be prepared to fight in Afghanistan and Syria and Libya and eastern Ukraine as readily as we would fight for a NATO ally.

Compared with that vision, the Trump doctrine aims for a more limited and sustainable view of American commitments. Along with jihadism it seeks to confront and contain two major state-based enemies, China and Iran, and it takes a harsh line toward their potential allies and clients in the Americas. But it has no nation-building ambitions in the Muslim world, no dreams of pushing NATO into the Caucasus, and in East Asia it’s trying to woo the Kim regime into some kind of bizarre friendship instead of acting like Pyongyang is just as great a long-term danger as its patron in Beijing.

The administration’s official European goals (if not Trump’s behind-the-scenes anti-NATO grumbling) also fit plausibly into its larger framework: Building up a stronger military presence on NATO’s Russia-facing flank while getting other countries to bear more of the military burden is the most plausible way to preserve the Western alliance’s basic purposes while the United States refocuses on China. And in the long run, Trump’s dream (whatever its motivations) of a better working relationship with Russia also fits with a retrench-and-refocus framework — with the major caveat that Putin seems too interested in disruption to make a genuine and cooperative détente imaginable for now.

Let me stress that I don’t think that Trump’s grand strategy is springing fully formed from the president’s own mind (he isn’t scribbling notes about the Monroe Doctrine, I assume), or for that matter anyone else’s; instead it’s emerging organically as a synthesis of his own blustering, quasi-isolationist impulses and the more hawkish and internationalist and status-quo-oriented views of the people working for him. That makes it interesting for future international-relations scholars to study — but also vulnerable to sudden changes of personnel or presidential mood. (If we unleash a ground war in Venezuela tomorrow in a fit of Trumpian pique, you can disregard this column’s analysis.)

And of course it has other vulnerabilities as well. Events often destroy even well-thought-through grand strategies, and every foreign-policy maneuver carries risks. The hawks who fear that jihadism will surge if we pull back from Afghanistan and Syria could be vindicated. So could the institutionalists who fear that Trump’s bluster is damaging our standing and disillusioning our friends, and the human rights activists who regard this administration’s cynicism as a carte blanche for thugs and dictators, and the simple Trump-fearers (like myself) who worry that he could make a truly catastrophic blunder should, say, the North Korea negotiations blow up or a real crisis with Russia or China comes along.

But those of us who fear Trump also need to be honest when he exceeds our expectations. Before his election, I wanted a Republican foreign policy that was less hubristic and more calculating than what most leading G.O.P. politicians were offering, that showed a willingness to limit foreign interventions and conduct diplomatic experiments while also trying to maintain United States primacy in a more multipolar, Chinese-influenced world.

Within certain limits, and with a lot of stumbling and bluster, that’s roughly what Trump has delivered. And however his foreign policy looks by November 2020, I suspect that future administrations of both parties will often find themselves imitating the strategy of his first two years.

Ross Douthat has been an Opinion columnist for The Times since 2009. He is the author of several books, most recently, “To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism.”

Monday, January 28, 2019

Quote for the Day


David Jackson, USA TODAY, usatoday.com, Jan. 28, 2019; see also (1)

Image result for bored
image (not from article) from

Excerpt from article:

[Businessman Howard Schultz:]

"I think, like most people .. I've become bored with President Trump and his tweets."

Found on the Web: In Trump We Trust: E Pluribus Awesome! - Note for a Discussion, "E Pluribus Unum? What Keeps the United States United."


www.amazon.com; hardcover – August 23, 2016



Donald Trump won the presidency by being a one-man wrecking ball against our dysfunctional and corrupt establishment.

Now Ann Coulter, with her unique insight, candor, and sense of humor, makes the definitive case for why we should all join his revolution.

The media have twisted themselves in knots, trying to grasp how Donald Trump won over millions of Americans and what he'll be like as president.

But Ann Coulter isn't puzzled. She knows why Trump was the only one of seventeen GOP contenders who captured the spirit of our time. She gets the power of addressing the pain of the silent majority and saying things the "PC Thought Police" considers unspeakable.

She argues that a bull in the china shop is exactly what we need to make America great again.

In this powerful book, Coulter explains why conservatives, moderates, and even disgruntled Democrats should set aside their doubts and embrace Trump:

·He's putting America first in our trade deals and alliances, rather than pandering to our allies and enemies.

·He's abandoned the GOP's decades-long commitment to a bellicose foreign policy, at a time when the entire country is sick of unnecessary wars.

·He's ended GOP pandering to Hispanic activists with his hard-line policy on immigration. Working class Americans finally have a champion against open borders and cheap foreign labor.

·He's overturned the media's traditional role in setting the agenda and defining who gets to be considered "presidential."

·He's exposed political consultants as grifters and hacks, most of whom don't know real voters from a hole in the ground.

If you're already a Trump fan, Ann Coulter will help you defend and promote your position. If you're not, she might just change your mind.

Saturday, January 26, 2019

[Only in America?] Heinz to give away ketchup caviar as part of sweepstakes for 'Valen-Heinz Day'


Ben Tobin, USA TODAY, Jan. 25, 2019; original article contains a video

If you ever wanted some fancier ketchup of the spherical variety, you'll no longer have to fish around for it.
Ketchup-maker Heinz announced on Twitter that it will be giving out jars of ketchup caviar to 150 lucky winners of a sweepstakes in time for Valentine's Day. Fear not, vegetarians: the "caviar" is actually little pearls of ketchup, not unfertilized salt-cured fish eggs.
"America’s favorite ketchup presents America’s favorite caviar. Reply with #HeinzKetchupCaviar and #Sweeps for the chance to get your hands on one of 150 jars this Valen-HEINZ day," the tweet reads. 





Embedded video

America’s favorite ketchup presents America’s favorite caviar. Reply with and for the chance to get your hands on one of 150 jars this Valen-HEINZ day. No purchase necessary. Rules linked in bio.

The rules of the sweepstakes are simple: reply to the tweet from @HeinzKetchup_US with the hashtags #HeinzKetchupCaviar and #sweeps for a chance to win. Entries must be submitted between Jan. 24 7 a.m. ET and Jan. 28 11:59 p.m. ET, and users must be at least 18 years of age.
The 150 winners will be randomly selected on or about Jan. 29. Each winner will receive one 1.8 ounce jar of the ketchup caviar, which is valued at $5. The total prize value of all prizes awarded is $750.




The responses from Twitter users have ranged from appreciative to sarcastic. One Twitter user speculated on what the ketchup caviar could mean for their breakfast game:





There's noting wrong with putting ketchup on eggs ... if you do it right! Now we can all step-up our breakfast game. Thanks @HeinzKetchup_US

Another Twitter user chose to enter the sweepstakes because they want some "boujee" ketchup:
Even some notable names, such as film and theater star Lin-Manuel Miranda, joined in on the fun:
Follow USA TODAY intern Ben Tobin on Twitter: @TobinBen

Thursday, January 24, 2019

Newfound Fame for Stubbs & Wootton Slippers, the ‘Bumper Sticker for Your Foot’


Katherine Rosman, The New York Times (2017)


Eric Edwards, 32, and a general manager of a bakery in Houston, and Wilbur L. Ross Jr., 79, and the commerce secretary for the Trump administration, have at least one thing in common. They both are devoted clients of the footwear brand Stubbs & Wootton, known for its patterned and embroidered slippers. 
Made in velvet, linen and needlepoint, they are sold custom-made or off the rack and retail from about $450 to $1,000 a pair — available at the Stubbs & Wootton store in Palm Beach, Fla., its shoebox-size shop at the Carlyle hotel on East 76th Street in Manhattan or online. Many of the slippers bear sassy messages. One popular style has an embroidered screw on the right shoe and the letter U on the left. Another style is decorated with wasps.
Mr. Ross was seen wearing a pair of black slippers embroidered with the Commerce Department’s logo at President Trump’s first speech to a joint session of Congress late last month, spotted by eagle-eyed reporters who shared screen grabs on Twitter of the billionaire Mr. Ross’s velvet-clad feet.
Mr. Edwards wore his most recently purchased pair, black velvet with embroidered golden lions, to his best friend’s wedding, held last month during the Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans. To walk the bride down the aisle, he paired the shoes with shredded jeans, an oxford-cloth shirt bought for $6 at a thrift shop and a blue blazer. 
Mr. Edwards is on his 11th pair of Stubbs & Wootton slippers, which he buys new and used and which, he said, deliver more value and style than the $900 Gucci sneakers his friends splurge on. “I’m very image-savvy and I’m very frugal,” he said.
After years of being a wardrobe staple for the lockjaw set from Palm Beach to Newport, Stubbs & Wootton shoes are enjoying a surge in popularity among younger customers drawn to their old-money wryness and Instagram-bait imagery. “I call them emoji shoes,” Mr. Edwards said.
The brand is a big deal on college campuses these days. “It’s a really fun shoe because it’s like a bumper sticker for your foot,” said Grace Wiener, 21, the president of WFUStyle, a fashion club and website run by students at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C.
Late last month she chased down a friend she saw on campus who was wearing Stubbs & Wootton loafers. They were black velvet. The right shoe had DU stitched on it in blue; the left had MB. “It was around midterms and I said to her, ‘I need a picture because that is so how I feel right now.’” Ms. Wiener posted the image on the fashion club’s Instagram. “Feet-selfies” are a big trend, she noted — some are calling them “solefies” — and the graphic slippers stand out. “They add diversity to one’s Instagram feed,” she said.
Perhaps this is not what Percy Steinhart had in mind when he founded the company in Palm Beach in 1993 to create an all-purpose slipper for men and women by adding a dash of contemporary whimsy. Mr. Steinhart, who came to the United States in 1960 when he was 10 as a Cuban exile, had wanted to name the company “Holden & Caulfield,” but “my lawyer told me Salinger would rake me over the coals,” Mr. Steinhart wrote in an email. (He declined to take part in a phone interview, he wrote, “out of respect for my friend and client Wilbur Ross and the office of the secretary of commerce and my political neutrality.”) 
Mr. Steinhart, who said one of his great-grandfathers went to Cuba with Theodore Roosevelt and eventually became United States consul in Havana, settled on the name Stubbs & Wootton, in homage to the English painters George Stubbs and John Wootton. The company website explains why: “Both specialized in painting scenes of gentlemanly sporting whose influence is so fittingly tied to our eternal pursuit of elegance.”
Stubbs & Wootton is soon to open a new store on Madison Avenue in Manhattan, Mr. Steinhart said, and has introduced a line for children. He said it had also added new left-shoe, right-shoe ciphers, like O.B.U.F. (overbred and underfunded) and Q.O.C.D. (quite our class dear).
Jacqueline Paolino, 25, bought her first pair (black velvet embroidered with gold Buddhas), when she visited a friend in Palm Beach earlier this winter while on vacation from Providence, R.I.
She bought a second pair (black velvet with stitched martini and champagne glasses) that she wore last month to the Vanity Fair Oscar party, which she attended with her father, Joseph R. Paolino Jr., a former mayor of Providence.
Her third pair is on order. They are designed in part by Ms. Paolino, who said she was named for Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. Stitched on the left shoe is “Jackie,” rendered in Mrs. Onassis’ handwriting. On the right shoe is a strand of large, dangling faux pearls.
Ms. Paolino is always looking for a stylish flat, having recently given up on high heels. “They get stuck in New England cobblestones,” she said.