Bearing Witness to Trump Week 24

Week of July 2 – 8, 2017

Trump travels to the G-20 meeting in Europe where he spends 2 hours with Putin, twice as long as planned. We all wonder whether he berated or congratulated them on Russia’s crackdown on dissidents, human rights, the press, and American elections.

G-20 meetings become a family affair as Trump allows his daughter Ivanka and wife Melania to sit in and participate in official business. Meanwhile, world leaders lined up against the U.S. policies on climate change and trade. We have now become the outliers with China and other countries taking the political, economic, and even moral lead on climate change.

The U.S. Ethics Chief Walter Shaub resigned this past week out of frustration over pressing Trump on divest the White House from his business empire.

As the war on the freedom of the press continues, the White House closed press briefings to cameras this past week.

The Trump’s demand of all voter registrations across the country reveals that the information will go to Vice President Pence’s office and staff. Yes, I am sure that is secure from political hacking.

Trump threatens North Korea with severe options including preemptive military strikes. Nothing like stoking a war fever to distract the public from the scandals of his administration. With such huge egos of little boys so easily offended on both sides, we could so easily stumble into an unintentional war on the Korean Peninsula. God help us.

The NYT has an OpEd piece of all the lies that Trump has told since taking office. It takes a whole full-page. Must reading for the history books at https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/23/opinion/trumps-lies.html.

The above news items have been taken from a number of international, national, regional, and local news media sources, both print and digital. Additional editorial opinions and comments about these news items are those of this author.