Yonhap News/Newscom via ZUMA
The con being played here is, in its own warped way, magnificent:
Just landed – a long trip, but everybody can now feel much safer than the day I took office. There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea. Meeting with Kim Jong Un was an interesting and very positive experience. North Korea has great potential for the future!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 13, 2018
It’s not just that Trump spent a year threatening war and is now taking credit for war no longer being on the table. It’s more than that: North Korea is no longer even a nuclear threat, full stop. He’s basically claiming that the mere fact of meeting with Donald Trump has mesmerized Kim Jong Un into dismantling his nuclear arsenal.
The reality is that North Korea still has nuclear weapons. They still have ICBMs. They still have centrifuges. They still have testing facilities. And they’ve made no commitments whatsoever—neither explicitly nor in any other way—to so much as slow down their nuke program, let alone abandon it. And yet, their nuclear threat is over. “Sleep well tonight!” Trump says.
Next up: Trump shoots Justin Trudeau on national TV in the Oval Office and declares the Canadian dairy threat over. How will our nation’s news media report it?
