As White House resident Trump jets off to Mar-a-Lago-of-course to meet with the Chinese president, he sounds about as prepared as you might expect.
President Donald Trump said Thursday morning that “nobody really knows” what will happen at his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, where he said issues surrounding trade and North Korea’s recent missile test are expected to be on the table.
One tic of Donald Trump's various pronouncements you should be aware of, by now: When Donald Trump says "nobody knows" a thing, that means Donald Trump, personally, does not know the thing. When Donald Trump says "everybody knows" a thing, that means Donald Trump had a dream last night roughly approximating the thing and, he presumes, that must mean that everybody else had that same dream too.
“Well, it's going to be very interesting. Nobody really knows,” Trump told Fox News’ Pete Hegseth in an impromptu interview on “Fox & Friends,” the president’s preferred morning news show.
From this sentence we have learned two things. First, that Donald Trump doesn't know what will be happening in the meeting he is currently on his way toward. Second, that Donald Trump is a fan of the Fox News program tailored specifically toward stupid people and stay-at-home pets. We have often referred to Fox & Friends as the lead paint of news; it stands to reason that Trump would prefer licking that particular windowsill, rather than any of the others.
“We have not been treated fairly on trade for many, many years. No president's taken care of that the way they should have. And we have a big problem with North Korea; we're going to see what happens.”
Ah ha! So there is some notion of what "will happen" during the meeting; Donald Trump may, possibly, bring up two key issues in U.S.-China relations, both presented in the stupidest way possible. On trade, he will apparently repeat a campaign talking point at President Xi Jinping, which is sure to impress his fellow world leader. On North Korea, we learn that a belligerent nuclear power continuing to design and fire off more and more advanced nuclear-capable missiles is a "big problem," which to be fair is about as much detail as the average Fox & Friends viewer desires or can process.
So there you have it. What will be discussed? Things. What will be the outcome of discussing those things? Hell if anybody "knows"; while the State Department and other diplomats generally reserve top-level meetings for discussions in which the broader strokes have already been laid out, on the American side few such attendees will even be present.
Instead, the effort will be led by oil magnate Rex Tillerson, sans staff, and son-in-law Jared Kushner. And it seems it will go down much like Trump's meeting with German leader Angela Merkel, in which Trump will say in private a few of the things he said to red-faced applause during his campaign rallies and then look on in sullen silence as his counterpart ignores those things and moves the hell on with his or her life.
“Well, we're going to see what happens, Pete,” Trump said of anticipated talks on North Korea. “But I will tell you, we'll be in there pitching, and I think we’re going to do very well.”
Oh dear God. He sounds like he's trying to sell China a used car.