I think Macron is jockeying to be the leader of the free world

[lunatica]

On the one hand he always kisses Trump, literally and figuratively, and Trump loves it. On the other he invites Iran’s Foreign Minister to meet with France’s Foreign Minister at the same time Trump is in town for the G7 summit.

So to me it looks like he encourages Trump to be Trump-on-steroids in order to weaken US power while taking the initiative as a peacemaker to establish himself, as well as France, as the world’s broker for peace.

That makes sense in view of his actions. He seems awful supportive of and friendly to Trump, doing the French double cheek kissing that the French do with their friends. It’s not something one normally does with just anybody and certainly not as the country’s leader with other country’s leaders. And it’s definitely not an American custom and Trump only does it with Macron. Trump eats it up, probably believing Macron is publicly kissing his ass to show how much he admires Trump.

[dchill]

1. Shouldn't take much.

[hlthe2b]

2. Smart enough to deal with Trump's narcissism so have at it, Macron.

[Me.]

3. Somebody Needs To Do The Job

[elleng]

4. You may be right;

as to 'double cheek kissing,' not so much.

A Guide to Kissing Etiquette Around the World

https://www.cntraveler.com/story/a-guide-to-kissing-etiquette-around-the-world

[BlueMTexpat]

5. He may be ...

and god knows that someone needs to be since 45 has certainly abdicated that role for the US.

But Macron has too many problems to address at home for him to take on such a role alone. It is better done as a consortium, e.g., the EU, which can present a united front ... although there are fractures there as well.

[lunatica]

6. Perhaps there is an unwritten agreement among the EU leaders

Macron seems to have escaped Trump’s insults while others haven’t, so it would be natural for him to play the role.

[BlueMTexpat]

8. Well, he is the host of this

meeting, so he likely feels the responsibility more heavily.

[former9thward]

7. When Napoleon retreated from Russia it marked the end of France being a world leader.

That was 1812. To be a world leader (free world or not) a nation needs a world class military and the will to use it. France has neither. Its time in the sun has come and gone.

[lunatica]

14. I think individual military might as a prerequisite may be coming to an end.

If the EU build up a multi nation military in response to Trump’s destabilizing criticism of NATO and embracing Putin the power dynamics will shift. It’s possible that the future will have power alliances instead of single countries being superpowers.

I’ve felt for a while that things are changing so much that the 20th Century May be the last time any one country can wield world power. The fact that Russia could so easily mess with our elections that they put Trump in office over the people’s real choice is significant in that no shots were fired. No armies were used, no invasion happened. All of this is a significant historic development that augurs a new world dynamic.

[former9thward]

21. I don't believe the Russia election CT.

Mueller dismissed it and no one has given any evidence a single vote was changed. The EU will never have a multi nation military. Since the end of WW II almost all the EU nations have retreated from any world conflict. One of the reasons we have such a huge defense budget is to defend Europe. This has made it impossible to adequately fund U.S. social programs while European nations look down on us while spending almost nothing on their own defense.

[lunatica]

22. My understanding is that Mueller did not dismiss Putin's medling

and he actually warned it was ongoing right now.

[former9thward]

23. Mueller said no votes were changed.

Of course Russia is meddling. They have spent money in our elections since 1948 when they financed Henry Wallace's split from the Democratic party. We spend money meddling in Russian elections as well as many other countries. Maybe we should all stop?

[applegrove]

9. Maybe the leader of the free world will be the best liberal democratic leader from

here on in and not always the President of the USA?

[lunatica]

10. I've wished for that for a long time

Maybe the age of Superpowers is over. But perhaps it’s not time for that yet. China may be the next Superpower.

[applegrove]

15. But the Chinese aren't democracy so they will never lead liberal democracy.

[lunatica]

16. I was thinking of countries as superpowers only in that response.

Not as what kind of governments they have.

[applegrove]

17. Yes. China will be a superpower. America will come back after Trump.

[roamer65]

19. Not as a unified republic.

Those days are gone.

[applegrove]

20. No it will be unified. It will.

[Celerity]

32. there is one main way it could become placed on the road to a real breakup

Rump is reelected, the Rethugs hold the Senate, and Rump takes the SCOTUS to 7-2 or even 8-1 (if Stomayor's already bad diabetes worsens to the point she has to step down or worse). I think Clarence Thomas might also retire and let a 40-something be plugged in to, so you are looking at perhaps 15 to 20 years of a HARD RW SCOTUS, barring a sudden death.

At that point, if the SCOTUS has cases brought to it that they rule the wrong way on, you could see a damn near complete rollback of all post-Brown v Board civil rights gains, maybe even Board itself. I am talking an attempt to not just go states' rights route, but to try and ram their entire agenda down all upon 50 states, by a combo of judicial rulings backed up by the next Rethug goon POTUS (especially if they have control of Congress at that point as well). At some point, probably starting in the 2030's, the bluest of blue larger states (smaller ones maybe too) will say enough is enough, we are not going to live under a theocracy, and start to seriously plan succession.

You take away most all civil rights and the Ruby Red states are going to make life HELL on Earth for any type of minority group, that is now at least partially protected. It can get really ugly really quickly after the core of civil rights is rolled back.

By the 2030's, the Senate will also be so skewed that 30% of the poulation will control 70% of the seats, and a RW SCOTUS can really do damage in terms of election laws to try and aid the Rethugs to grab and keep a lot of thsoe smaller states, which are on average, much more white, less educated, older, poorer, more fundie, more RW, more reactionary that the other 70% of the population. The only way to fight that is to add new states like PR and Dc and maybe split California into 2, thus yielding 6 new Democratic Senators.

IF Rump goes down, the SCOTUS will just be frozen in time (and probably shrink in size as RBG, Breyer, and maybe even Sotomayor die or retire) until the Rethugs have Senate control taken away from them. Moscow Mitch and his successor, if they are still majority leaders, will simply not even give a Democratic president's nominees a hearing. They will sit on it for 8 years if they have to.

[greatauntoftriplets]

11. Works for me.

[Yavin4]

12. Nature abhors a vaccum. n/t

[Norbert]

13. He will be leader of the free world...

once Angels Merkel retires.

[roamer65]

18. Even if he's the long awaited AntiChrist...

he’s got my vote of support. Viva Macron.

[vapor2]

24. Leader of the Free World

CLEARLY our weak, inept, narcissistic president is not interested and also unfit to be leader of the Free World. He is a disgrace on the world stage period.

[lunatica]

25. Welcome to DU

You’re right. Clearly he’s inept to run anything of value to the world. He has diminished us badly all in a mere two years.

[empedocles]

26. . . . 'Clearly our weak, inept, narcissistic, [CORRUPT], president . . . '

[Totally Tunsie]

27. He can take the lead for now.

We'll recoup once we get our next Democratic president.

[lunatica]

29. I know we'll recoup

Especially under a Democratic Presidency. I do hope we learn a lesson in humility from Trump though. We are only as good as who we put in office. We’ve seen what a mere two years have done to us so we better pay attention.

[SWBTATTReg]

28. A narcissist is easy to fool. Why did the russians pick rump to use as their vehicle to insert a ..

5th column into the WH? Unfortunately (for us, fortunately) for the Russians, rump is just plain too stupid to work for their needs and wants, and is just plain too narcissist/full of himself.

[patphil]

30. He might as well, the position is vacant right now.

[BlueIdaho]

31. I would argue that until recently the world leader was Germany's Merkle.

But with Germany’s recent economic troubles - there’s now room at the top. I say more power to Macron, it’s obvious Trumpsky has no grasp of the job.

[trof]

33. Macron is running rings around Donnie Two-Scoops, and the dotard doesn't even have a clue.