United States

As reported yesterday, Mexico is not at all looking forward to starting the process of renegotiating NAFTA with Donald Trump, explicitly warning the US that "there are very clear red lines that must be drawn from the start." What these lines are will be explained by Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo and Foreign Affairs Secretary Luis Videgaray who are both meeting with US officials in Washington on Wednesday and Thursday, setting the stage with next week's visit from Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto.

Authored by Alastair Crooke, originally posted at The Automatic Earth blog,

Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

It's your choice, America--you can keep your cartels and the captured government that enables and protects them, or you can fix what's broken and unaffordable.

In the latest surprise to come from the Trump administration, the NYT reports that in the Trump administration is preparing a set of executive orders aimed at isolating the US and which would allow the United States to "drastically reduce" its role and involvement in the United Nations and other international organizations, "as well as begin a process to review and potentially abrogate certain forms of multilateral treaties, officials said." The order calls for then enacting “at least a 40% overall decrease” in remaining United States funding toward international organizations.