One day after Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told US NATO allies they will have to pay up and meet their mandatory quota of 2% of GDP (which only 5 nations currently satisfy, among them the US and Greece), on Thursday the Pentagon's new chief also had some bad news for Russia when he rejected any kind of military collaboration with Russia, despite previous calls by Putin for the West to work with his country on Syria and other issues.
Judging by his ongoing Tweetstorm this morning, in which he first praised the market's performance (it remains to be seen what if anything he will say once stocks tumble under his watch), then dedicated the next four tweets to leakers, fabricated sources, "fake news" and Russia, president Trump does not appears to be in a good mood.
NYT Anti-Trump Jihad
by Stephen Lendman
The Times represents pro-Hillary dark forces militantly against Trump – denigrating him relentlessly, featuring advocacy, not real journalism.
Daily feature stories vilify him, going way beyond justifiable criticism. The self-styled newspaper of record mocks fair and balanced reporting, absent on its pages.
It supports US imperial madness, neoliberal harshness harming the nation’s most vulnerable, and police state targeting of nonbelievers.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson met his Russian counterparty, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, at a G20 summit in Germany in the pair’s first meeting since Tillerson became secretary of state, and comes as a possible Russia-US rapprochement is in the spotlight. Moscow and Washington have much to discuss, Lavrov told Tillerson at their first meeting in Bonn, Germany, on Thursday.
"Mostly, it includes issues addressed by the two presidents during their phone conversation. I think that we could identify parameters of our future cooperation on each of those topics," he stated.
Donald Trump’s Presidential campaign has several different platforms but the most important was his stance on trade. Donald Trump is a protectionist. He views the U.S. foreign trade policy over the last 25 years as a failure. With the passing of NAFTA and other free trade agreements millions of manufacturing jobs that have been eliminated. Donald Trump’s main target for unfair trade practices during the election was China. At one point during the campaign he even claimed that China was raping the U.S.