Good morning, Donald! Hard to believe it's already Wednesday. Let's wrap up your Independence Day tweets and dive into the rest of the summer …
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► Gas prices are the lowest in the U.S. in over ten years! I would like to see them go even lower. [1]
Alas, Donald, at the present it doesn't look like they will be going much lower, as wholesale gas prices have been creeping up [2]. On the other hand, that's probably good news for folk working in the oil industry.
Of course, chances are this is just a lead in for "we need to open up more shorelines and federal lands to oil exploration and production so we can pump more oil and drive gas prices down even further" policy from you. I hope you prove me wrong, Donald.
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Your Social Media Minions tweeted about a Wall Street Journal article:
► 'Ivanka Trump Replies on Paid Family Leave' via @WSJ [5]
All I can say about the article, Donald, was that if it had been penned, word for word, by Hillary Clinton, the GOP would be climbing all over itself with shouts of "socialism" and "killing jobs" and "unfunded mandate on the states" and "tax & spend" and "European-style social meddling that will hurt small businesses and lead to a weaker economy." And you would have been calling her "Crazy Hillary" over it.
I'll be curious to see how much you actually push for this proposal. It was referenced in your budget bullets [6], and a more limited version was suggested by you during the campaign. I presume your daughter is actually chatting you up about it. It would be wildly popular, no matter that it's a government-paid program, and that might be enough to attract you into it. Or it may simply be used as a bargaining chip for other matters.
We'll see.
And all that said, gosh, wouldn't it be nice if we weren't the only G-20 country that had no paid family leave policy, even just a bottom-of-the-barrel one? Pull it off, Donald, and I might have to give you an honest round of applause.
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► The United States made some of the worst Trade Deals in world history.Why should we continue these deals with countries that do not help us? [3P]
You know, Donald, you keep saying that, but we haven't actually seen much in the way of new trade deal negotiations. I mean, the rhetoric is fine, but let's see some actual action.
► Trade between China and North Korea grew almost 40% in the first quarter. So much for China working with us – but we had to give it a try! [4P]
We did?
I mean, since you got into office, you've been cajoling the Chinese about North Korea, and you've been reporting about all the fine meetings you've had with them and their promises of support. And now … well, looks like that was a bust.
What would you have said to President Obama shrugging his shoulders after China apparently shined us on, and saying, "we had to give it a try"? Yeah, that's kind of what I thought, Donald.
Oh, meanwhile, Russia and China are getting closer together in alliance regarding North Korea [7], since US/China policy has been so irregular (just in the last six months). And now they're both jointly condemning your saber-rattling as much as Kim's.
Maybe you can chat about it with Vladimir when you meet him in Germany.
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Your Social Media Minions also tweeted about …
… your celebrating the Fourth with a "big crowd" of military families at the White House.
… a picture of the White House illuminated in Red, White, and Blue. [P]
… your trip to Poland and then Germany for the G-20 (where you'll have a little side tete-a-tete with Putin).
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[1] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/882327018070790144
[2] http://money.cnn.com/2017/07/03/news/economy/gas-prices/index.html
[3] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/882558219285131265
[4] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/882560030884716544
[5] https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/882575289968201729, linked to article https://www.wsj.com/articles/paid-family-leave-is-a-good-national-policy-1499184292
[6] http://fortune.com/2017/05/19/trump-ivanka-paid-family-leave-budget/?iid=sr-link1
[7] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jul/05/trump-north-korea-strategy-china-russia
[P] So Presidential, they had to be on both @RealDonaldTrump and @POTUS.
