Op-ed: 
Negotiations on Hold...But for How Long 
By: Diane Sori / The Patriot Factor / Right Side Patriots on American Political Radio

“Sometimes you have to walk.”
- President Donald Trump's words after the failed Vietnam Summit

It was a summit too many expected too much from...68 years of animosity cannot be expected to end overnight... yet it was a summit that saw truly unrealistic demands being made by one country's leader while the other country's leader held strong by simply walking away. After all, the demands that were made were at best but a bad joke.

So by now we all know that the Vietnam Summit between President Trump and North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un...their second summit in under a year...ended with no agreement being reached regrading denuclearization in exchange for sanctions being lifted. And even though President Trump stated that no fair proposals were made, and with Kim Jong-un of course countering that fair proposals were indeed made but not accepted, thankfully no harsh words of personal condemnation were made by either man.

Simply, President Trump turned his back on negotiations going nowhere and walked away with both a luncheon and the hoped for photo-op signing ceremony being cancelled...a signing ceremony that was to be like last years truly historic diplomatic breakthrough where both Trump and Kim Jong-un signed a document in Singapore agreeing to work towards the "complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula." 
 

Seems the North Korean dictator had his fingers crossed behind his back or at the very least sneakily and ever so calculatedly misled the world...as some of us always expected he would do.

And how right President Trump was to simply walk away because Kim Jong-un not only wanted Trump to lift all...yes all...international sanctions against his country in exchange for the dismantling of his main Yongbyon nuclear facility...one of many nuclear facilities...but Kim Jong-un wanted...demanded...those sanctions be lifted before he would even entertain the prospect of committing to total denuclearization...with total meaning the shutting down of secretive missile and warhead programs as well.

Unacceptable for sure, especially when President Trump simply asked Kim Jong-un to please do more regarding his “intentions to denuclearize,” with Kim's answer being that he was “unprepared to do that” at this point in time. This left our president with no other choice but to end these “dog and pony show” negotiations post-haste while at the same time wisely choosing to end the talks on a somewhat amicable note. This allowed Trump to leave Hanoi and fly back to Washington with the door open for possible future talks between the two men...two men who obviously live in what amounts to being two totally different whelms of both reality and truth.

And by the simple act of Trump's turning his back and walking away...for he is no enemy condoner nor placator as was his predecessor nor will he make what he truly knows is a very bad deal simply to say he made a deal...President Trump actually, but obviously not intentionally, publicly humiliated the man he once referred to as “little rocket man.” I guess Kim Jong-un forgot that while he was making his unreasonable demands that it's we...the United States of America...who call the shots not him. 
 

So what was Kim Jong-un left to do but to try and “save face”...something very important in oriental culture...and he tried to do so by claiming that it was President Trump alone who made an realistic proposal about lifting the sanctions. In fact, adding to Kim's words and in a rare press conference, North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho stated that the original deal put forth at last summer's summit in Singapore was that if even “some of the sanctions” were lifted only then would his country close its Yongbyon nuclear facility. 

Continuing on, Ri Yong Ho added that Kim Jong-un was ready to offer "in writing" a permanent halt of the country’s nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile tests, and that Washington had wasted an opportunity that “may not come again.”

But we all know or should know that is simply not true as President Trump has always stated that all...as in each and every one...of North Korea's nuclear facilities must be fully dismantled or in the process of being dismantled before any sanctions are lifted, and he has not and will not rightfully waiver from that. 

America first for President Donald J. Trump...always has been...always will be...and was proven by his walking away.

  

So while this newest summit did indeed start on a high note, what with Kim Jong-un alluding during a question-and-answer session that he is "ready to denuclearize," and that, “If I’m not willing to do that, I won’t be here right now,” Kim Jong-un also for the first time answered a U.S. reporter's questions about not only his outlook for this summit...where he stated that, "It's too early to say. I won't make predictions. But I instinctively feel that a good outcome will be produced"...but also answered when asked if he was willing to allow the U.S. to open an office in Pyongyang. Saying, "I think that is something which is welcomable"...left President Trump to state that, "We're in position to do something very special.”

But, unfortunately, as we all know, sometimes things that start off good can end very badly, and this summit was one such thing for in the end it was all about lifting sanctions not about denuclearization, and thus came crashing to a screeching halt.

And that halt led Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who was in Hanoi with President Trump, to say, “We were hoping we could take another big swing when the two leaders got together”...and "We the People" were hoping that as well. Also saying that “lower-level diplomacy between the two sides could resume quickly,” directly led North Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui to tell reporters that, “Mr. Kim was finding it difficult to understand why the U.S. left the talks,” and that the "young North Korean leader may have lost his will” to continue the talks. 

I guess citing age does have its advantages when one is being pushed into a corner...or so Kim Jong-un thinks.

So where does that leave our two countries at this point in time? First, we must give President Trump high praise for his not backing down or acquiescing to the rogue nation's leader just to keep him at the negotiation table. Second, with Kim Jong-un being pressured not just from the U.S. but from many of the world's nations...nations who are also telling him to dismantle his nuclear weapons program...it's that very international pressure that actually protects us and our allies from seeing a mushroom cloud appear over any of our respective countries.

And to give up that collective pressure before Kim Jong-un does capitulate and gives up his nuclear ambitions... which in the end he will ultimately be forced to do as his country is on the verge of total economic collapse...that giving up would put America, the world, and especially South Koreans...at risk.

How so for South Korea...South Korea desperately wants an actual formal "in writing" end to the Korean War as well as to begin constructive and lasting inter-Korean relations...family reunification most especially...and they believe that can only be accomplished by seeing a nuclear disarmament deal being both secured and put into effect between Washington and Pyongyang. It is as simple as that.

So as this summit ended not as expected, the political fallout here at home continues to ratchet up but surprisingly Congressional leaders, including some key Democrats, are praising President Trump in a surprising show of bipartisanship...but with some caveats that is.

Republicans are rightfully heralding Trump's decision to walk away, with Sen. Lindsey Graham retweeting Trump's, “it's better to walk away than sign a bad deal,” and with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell saying that, “President Trump should be commended for walking away when it became clear insufficient progress has been made on denuclearization.” And McConnell also said that it was “smart" to meet with Kim Jong-un in both Singapore and Vietnam to show him the "economic prosperity" that is possible for his country if North Korea abandons its nuclear and missile programs.

And on the Democrat side there's Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who is usually out for Trump's blood, saying that President Trump surely “did the right thing by walking away and not cutting a poor deal for the sake of a photo op.” Then there's former Vice-President Joe Biden who while speaking at the University of Nebraska said that, “The president did the right thing by walking away." Even Obama's infamous National Security Advisor Susan Rice, also no fan of President Trump, stated in an NPR interview that, "For the United States to have agreed to lift all sanctions in the absence of real and complete denuclearization would have been a tremendous mistake."

But the infamous Nancy Pelosi played it both ways by first saying, “Mr. Trump was right not to take a bad deal,” but added that Mr. Kim was the “big winner” for having secured two personal summits with an American president and easing his country’s “pariah status” without having made any significant concessions. 
 
Can't let your hatred for President Trump go can you Nancy...Hillary lost...please for our country's sake get over it already.

In fact, some on both sides of the political aisle have said that President Trump actually “enhanced his bargaining position” by showing both the North Koreans and all the world that he was more than willing to risk short-term setbacks to achieve positive long-term goals...paramount of which is North Korea's total denuclearization. And what many seem to forget is that there needs to be not just a beginning, but a middle, and an end to diplomacy before any final and lasting agreement can be reached.

So while both sides are now licking their wounds, so to speak, after having returned to their respective home countries, they need to access the damages done by a summit gone bust. And as far as President Trump is concerned the only faux par...the only mistake...I believe he made was in taking Kim Jong-un's word that he did not know about the brutal treatment received by Otto Warmbier, the American college student who in 2016 was "detained"...jailed actually...in North Korea only to be returned to the U.S. in a coma in 2017, and who died soon afterward. Saying he will "take [Kim] at his word" that he was unaware of the torture was surely not a wise thing for our president to say about a man who for sport routinely murders his own people...that man's word should never be trusted nor believed.

But I wonder though if President Trump, the very man who secured Otto Warmbier's release, truly believes Kim Jong-un or was he somehow told to say what he said in order to keep the negotiations on track...only time will tell I guess.

And as for Kim Jong-un, even he has to know that it would make no sense for North Korea to exit negotiations at this stage of the game, or to start making threats, or even resume provocative acts like launching missiles into the Sea of Japan. His country's economy is in serious trouble, truly on the verge of collapse, and his people are starving...and starving people can only take so much before even they will start to fight back. And dare Kim Jong-un forget public perception for to act up now would only prove to the world that President Trump was correct for not trusting Kim’s assertions of his good intentions and improved behavior.

And while he cannot show outward weakness per se...he must “save face” after all...Kim Jong-un has not yet said "no" to another chance for negotiations...negotiations that have not been shutdown just sidetracked for awhile. And things can surely get back on track if only Kim would both stop lying and stop taking his "marching orders" from China. Kim Jong-un must instead start listening to the U.S., for on some level even he knows that his and North Korea's only hope for the future lies with America and with President Trump, and not with a country who would throw him under the proverbial bus if need and necessity be.

It cannot be said any clearer or more directly than that.

Copyright @ 2019 Diane Sori / The Patriot Factor / All Rights Reserved.

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For more political commentary please visit my RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS partner Craig Andresen's blog The National Patriot to read his latest article For Liberals...Truth is the New Hate Speech.

*************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************  RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS...LIVE!

Tuesday, March 5th from 7 to 9pm EST on American Political Radio, RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS Craig Andresen and Diane Sori discuss 'Negotiations on Hold...But for How Long'; 'For Liberals...Truth is the New Hate Speech'; and important news of the day.

Hope you can tune in at: http://listen.samcloud.com/w/73891/American-Political-Radio#history...or on Tune-In at: https://tunein.com/radio/American-Political-Radio-s273246/

Op-ed: 
25 Years vs. 500 Days  
By: Diane Sori and Craig Andresen / Right Side Patriots on American Political Radio

It's been almost 70 years...70 long years of animosity and mistrust and it all came to an end on Tuesday, June 12th at around 2:30 am EST when President Donald J. Trump and North Korean Chairman Kim Jong-un signed a document at the Singapore Summit putting the past behind, together signaling a new day not just for our two nations but for the world as well.

And getting to that new day has seen many bumps along the way but the fact is we're here now. And some are still in awe as to how we got here...and what took so long...but to understand that we must visit the past to truly appreciate the great possibilities the future now holds.

Let's start with the fact that U.S. policy towards North Korea has always been to “deter conflict” on the peninsula, prevent North Korea from developing both nuclear weapons and its corresponding delivery systems, and more recently forcing the North to improve its human rights record. At the same time North Korea wanted the removal of U.S. forces from South Korea, wanted to be recognized as a nuclear power and world “player,” and sought food and energy assistance via sanctions relief.

And while in the past there have been a few back channel communications via the DPRK Mission to the U.N., there have been no formal diplomatic contacts between the U.S. and North Korea since April 2012, with the collapse of the 'Leap Day Agreement' (LDA)...until Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met secretly with Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang this past Easter Sunday.

But what was the 'Leap Day Agreement' and why did it collapse? The LDA was simply a “backdoor agreement” that saw North Korea agreeing to a moratorium on nuclear tests, long-range missile launches, and uranium enrichment activity at Yongbyon while also allowing IAEA inspectors to monitor the moratorium on said uranium enrichment. In return, the U.S. agreed to provide North Korea with 240,000 metric tons of food aid. However, said agreement went by the wayside when on April 13, 2012 North Korea launched its Kwangmyongsong-3 satellite to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Kim Il-sung.

And basically dead silence until then, but to understand the true complexities of a situation that did not end until Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un shook hands on a stage in Singapore, one must go back to where it all began... back to the end of World War II when Korea was divided into two “spheres of influence” along the 38th parallel with the U.S. controlling south of the line and Russia controlling the north, later on ceding their “influence” to China. Then on June 25, 1950 after the Soviets boycotted the U.N. Security Council over their decision to exclude China from membership, then-U.S. President Harry Truman secured a resolution to use force against North Korea after the North Korean Communist army...equipped with Soviet weapons...crossed the 38th parallel and invaded the south in an attempt to take the entire peninsula as their own.

And so the Korean War began.

By the time the war...the “police action” as we called it... ended on July 27, 1953 after then-President Dwight D. Eisenhower threatening to use nuclear weapons to end what was a stalemate...three million North Koreans, one million Chinese, 58,000 American soldiers, and close to one thousand British troops lay dead. However, while Communist expansion was halted to some degree and many prisoners were exchanged, no official peace treaty between the two Korea's was signed, instead a supposedly in good faith “armistice”...an armistice which was supposed to lead to eventual talks to end the political discourse... created the Korean 'Demilitarized Zone' which officially separated North and South Korea, and does so to this day.

And while some claim the creating of such a zone was ground zero of the Cold War...it was not...what it did do was set policy for future American presidents in their dealings with North Korea...especially in regards to capitulation which remains a touch point with Kim Jong-un. And know that any discussions between our country and North Korea must allow Kim Jong-un to “save face” with total capitulation not an option. That's why Kim is pushing so hard for an official peace treaty to be put in place between the two Koreas, because he deems a peace treaty as a necessary formality to the achievement of security on the peninsula...security for his regime most especially...security without capitulation.

In fact, back in 1974 in a letter to Congress, then leader Kim Il-sung publicly invited the U.S. to join negotiations for a peace treaty to replace the armistice. Neither the Nixon nor the Ford administrations responded to this request, and when Kim Il-sung again raised the idea of working on a peace treaty with Jimmy Carter as usual nothing was done...in fact Carter wanted to withdraw American forces from South Korea thus leaving the South ripe for North Korea's picking. Talk about capitulation...for the wrong side that is.

And while our beloved Ronald Reagan increased U.S. troop numbers in the South in an effort to keep North Korea in check, he for whatever reason was philosophically opposed to a peace treaty. And while his successor, George H.W. Bush, withdrew nuclear weapons deployed abroad and reduced U.S. troop numbers in South Korea somewhat, he too did not seriously consider negotiating a peace treaty...thankfully President Trump does.

And then there's President Bill Clinton, who actually visited North Korea in 2009, and here is where all really goes down hill for here is where capitulation sadly becomes America's middle name. Remember, Lyndon Johnson already capitulated to the North in 1968 with that shameful admission of spying so as to secure the release of the captured USS Pueblo crew. But now to make matters worse than just admitting things that were not true, comes Billy-Boy Clinton throwing money at a problem which allowed North Korea to become even more embolden as we see capitulation...on our part...becoming the rule of the day.

Let's start with the fact that Bill Clinton did broker a deal with North Korea in October 1994 over its threat to go nuclear. Negotiating a deal known as the 'Joint Framework Agreement' in which the North promised it would freeze and eventually dismantle its graphite-moderated reactors and related facilities in exchange for alternative energy, economic, and diplomatic benefits...including two light-water reactors which were believed to be more difficult to use to make weapons than North Korea's already in existence plutonium reactor. However, what this $4 billion deal actually was, was the ultimate capitulation known as bribery in the sense that sanctions against the North would be lifted as soon North Korea signed on the dotted line thus allowing money to flow back into a country who leaders could not be trusted to keep their word or honor any agreement signed.

And of course this agreement failed...and thankfully it did...with North Korea now seeing itself as being listed as a “rouge regime” under George W. Bush after admitting they had been secretly conducting a nuclear-weapons program for several years. Now withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty...a treaty whose intent they had no intention of following anyway...North Korea now revved up it's nuclear program.

And that brings us to Barack HUSSEIN Obama and his dealings...or should I say capitulation...in regards to North Korea...with capitulation in this case being his usual weak stance of leading from behind. Remember, throughout his presidency Obama criticized North Korea for testing nuclear weapons and starving his own people all while he begged China to step in to help him tone down North Korea's rhetoric and aggression. Begging... the leader of the world's strongest nation could not handle North Korea's continuing threats against the U.S. all by his lonesome it seems. If that's not capitulation we don't know what is...if that's not failed diplomacy bordering on cowardliness we don't know what is.

Now as for President Trump, we see in him a strong leader who not only leads from the front, but a leader who calls all the shots. Deeply affected by the death of Otto Warmbier...the young man held by the North Koreans for stealing a souvenir poster...the young man released by his captures solely so his death wouldn't happen on their soil...Otto's death set in motion the chain of events that led up to two once adversaries shaking hands with the above stated promise to leave the past behind helping to set the doomsday clock back a bit.

And the plight of Otto Warmbier was only the beginning of the 500 days, but it clearly set the tone for the event that would make history.

From President Trump’s first days in office and following his campaign promises to get tough on North Korea, the president embarked in a war of words and actions that turned the tide in the long stalemate between the two countries.

To fully understand the president’s first 500 days with regards to North Korea, one really needs to go back to the 2016 campaign where in a debate then candidate Donald Trump called North Korea’s regime leader, Chairman Kim Jong-un a maniac. “Nobody ever mentions North Korea, where you have this maniac sitting there, and he actually has nuclear weapons and somebody better start thinking about North Korea and perhaps a couple of other places. But certainly North Korea.”

Even before becoming a presidential candidate back in 2013, citizen Donald Trump had North Korea on his mind, tweeting in 2013, “North Korea is reliant on China. China could solve this problem easily if they wanted to but they have no respect for our leaders,” adding a month later in April 2013, “North Korea can’t survive, or even eat, without the help of China.”

And even before that Donald Trump had a clear and unobstructed view of North Korea when he told Tim Russert in an interview, "Do you want to do it in five years when they have warheads all over the place, every one of them pointing to New York City, to Washington and every one of us, is that when you want to do it, or do you want to do something now?” Trump said. “You'd better do it now. And if they think you're serious...they'll negotiate and it'll never come to that.”

But one could look at April 2013 as the moment Donald Trump set the tone for his first 500 days in office when via a tweet he warned Obama, “Our President must be very careful with the 28 year old whack job in North Korea. At some point we may have to get very tough-blatant threats.” And just months before the 2016 election candidate Trump floated that he would be willing to hold talks with the North Korean regime leader, and when the inevitable blow back came his way Trump’s response was classic Trump...“What the hell is wrong with speaking? It’s called opening a dialogue.”

The rhetoric by now is well known, referring to Kim Jong-un as the “little rocket man,” making it known that as president, Trump had a bigger red button on his desk that worked better than the one on the North Korean leader’s desk. Telling the world a year ago, in June of 2017 that the “era of strategic patience with the North Korean regime has failed,” and then on August 8, 2017 amid the “little rocket man’s” continuation of firing ballistic missiles over the heads of our allies in the region, President Trump issued a dire warning...“fire, fury and frankly power, the likes of which this world has never seen before.” The President then added..."Let’s see what [Kim] does with Guam. He does something in Guam, it will be an event the likes of which nobody has seen before – what will happen in North Korea.”

The escalating rhetoric had the mainstream media spreading fears of a nuclear war with North Korea and questioning President Trump’s fitness for the office because of it, but what they didn’t realize or want to admit, was that there was a method to that rhetoric, and that Trump was right to use it.

As a businessman, Donald Trump often had to get tough with those unwilling to make a deal, and as the president he understood the only tone that a rogue dictator like Kim Jung-un would respect is strength. If President Trump really wanted to bring North Korea to the table he would first have to get the attention of North Korea's leader... something no president over the past quarter of a century had been able to do...and President Trump knew exactly how to do it.

President Trump knew that the one and only way to deal with Kim Jong-un was face-to-face. Kim wasn’t going to respect the prospect of meetings between underlings...as in Secretaries of State or U.N. Ambassadors...it would have to be the two leaders themselves or it would simply be a repeat of the last 25 years.

Also, from his first day in office, President Trump knew what his predecessors either couldn’t bring themselves to embrace or in the case of Obama, steadfastly refused to acknowledge...acknowledge that the U.S. had the upper hand. President Trump knew that the U.S. could put trade pressure on China and promise to ease some of that pressure should China take steps to pressure Kim Jong-un...and militarily Trump knew that North Korea was no match for U.S. might.

Previous presidents, both the Bush's and Bill Clinton, had worried far too much about the optics of meeting one on one with any North Korean leader, and feared the political fallout should they even suggest such a thing. So their answer to North Korea was a decade’s long series of bribes and payoffs that North Korea gladly took advantage of and had no respect for. Obama even sent then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton over for a handshake knowing it was but a facade, and that North Korea was aiding and abetting his pals in Iran with their nuclear weapons program. Obama didn’t want to do anything against or with North Korea as long as North Korea was assisting Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

President Trump knew that as businessman Trump, if he and in this case the U.S. held the upper hand, that great risks often produce great rewards, and setting up a one-on-one, face-to-face meeting with Kim Jong-un was a great risk...but that if done right, it could result in great rewards.

President Trump knew that he and only he had to be in complete control of any such meeting or summit, and he made absolutely sure of it with one last volley of rhetoric when he called the now arranged summit off on May 24th of this year...and Kim Jong-un sent his top envoy, Kim Yong-chol, to the White House begging for the summit to be put back on the calendar.

Just eight days after pulling the plug on the June 12th summit, President Trump, then firmly in control of the entire situation, announced that he would travel to Singapore and meet with Kim Jong-un on June 12th.

In a mere 500 days, President Trump used every tool at his disposal combined with a firm knowledge that the U.S. held the upper hand, and accomplished what no other president since the dawn of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program had been able to do...he brought the North Korean leader to the table and opened an official dialogue...face-to-face...that was to say at the very least...historic.

This of course leaves the question…what can we expect going forward from this point?

To begin, we do not expect North Korea to change overnight is completely unrealistic and we don’t believe that President Trump believes they will, but we do expect some positive actions in a relatively short period of time.

There is a great deal of work to be done setting up the ground rules for what is expected or desired from North Korea. Remember, what was signed on June 12th by President Trump and Chairman Kim Jong-un was only a document...a declaration to begin the process of desired changes. It was not a “deal” per se as many mainstream media sources are trying to portray it.

We expect Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to be meeting soon with his North Korean counterpart to begin hammering out details which will include the close oversight of the dismantling of the North Korean nuclear weapons program. Such oversight will likely include officials from the IAEA, South Korea, and from the United States as well.

Before the dismantling can begin it will be necessary to send in investigators to verify exactly what North Korea has and where they have it, closely monitoring the situation to make sure elements of their nuclear weapons program aren’t being moved and hidden away from such inspectors...something the George W. Bush administration accused North Korea of doing. And North Korea's response...they kicking out the international inspectors that had already been sent in under the Clinton administration.

It’s not so much a matter of “trust but verify” as it is a matter of “don’t trust and oversee the operations like a hawk.”

We also expect President Trump to insist on key changes to North Korea’s human rights situation, as in accounting for all Japanese citizens held in North Korea along with their immediate release, and possibly the release of all political prisoners held by the rogue nation’s regime. That is something Kim Jong-un could do almost immediately as a sign of good faith, and it would signal to the world that the North Korean leader is serious about making wholesale changes in his country.

It is also likely that President Trump will seek assistance from China in moving North Korea to some form of what they currently call their economic system...as in a "socialist market economy”...with some elements of capitalism involved in exchange for loosening trade tariffs, a move we believe would benefit China as well as North Korea by beginning the process of making North Korea less of a drain on the Chinese government and economy.

And if Kim Jong-un is serious and truly wants change, complete denuclearization...as per the experts...could be accomplished in as little as two years ten years tops, but a quantum shift in his country’s ideology remains undetermined at this point in time.

One thing not many are talking about is the oversight needed to prevent North Korea’s nuclear scientists and engineers from drifting to rogue nations like Iran once North Korea’s nuclear weapons program comes to a halt. We’re talking about thousands of highly specialized personnel who have been trained to do nothing but produce nuclear weapons and along with their corresponding delivery systems. The last thing we want...the last thing President Trump wants...is to have those people lured into the clutches of the mullahs where they would expedite the nuclear weapons capabilities of Iran or any islamist group.

Along those same lines also falls North Korea’s nuclear weapons documents, potentially millions of them which, if they haven’t already shared them with Iran, and we most surely believe they have, would also fetch a staggering price on the terrorist open market. Those documents will be much harder to keep under wraps than will be the dismantling of the North Korean nuclear weapons and sites themselves.

Yet when all is said and done the bottom is that right now North Korea is a nuclear nation but it is the U.S....it is President Donald J. Trump...who is negotiating from a position of strength. President Trump should relish in the opportunity to do what his predecessors have failed to do in his offering North Korea what amounts to peace for denuclearization thus welcoming them out of isolation and into the 21st century. If President Trump can have accomplished in just 500 days what his predecessors couldn’t accomplish in the previous 25 years, he will go down in the annuls of history as one of the greatest American presidents of all time.
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Below is the 4-minute video 'The Future Remains To Be Written' that President Trump brought with him to the Singapore Summit that he showed to Kim Jung-un.


Copyright © 2018 Diane Sori and Craig Andresen / Right Side Patriots / Investigative Reports / All rights reserved.

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RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS...LIVE! 

Today, Friday, June 15th from 7 to 9pm EST on American Political Radio, RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS Craig Andresen and Diane Sori discuss their Special Report '25 Years vs. 500 Days'; and important news of the day.

Hope you can tune in at: http://listen.samcloud.com/w/73891/American-Political-Radio#history

(Almost) Daily Meme

Op-ed:

An Interesting Past Few Months Indeed

By: Diane Sori / The Patriot Factor / Right Side Patriots on American Political Radio

What a past few months it has been for both our country and our president as together domestic and foreign policy affairs have taken center stage...sometimes even overlapping each other on the same day.

Briefly, on the domestic front our economy continues to thrive under President Trump's leadership as jobs numbers are the best they've been since the year 2000, especially with the unemployment rate hitting a low of 3.9% as the jobs market becomes even more competitive then it ever was during the Obama years...a very good thing indeed. And American companies based overseas are finally returning home with once overburdening regulations now being lifted; wages are increasing across the board with folks now seeing more monies in their weekly paychecks thanks to Trump's new 'Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017'; and most importantly of all folks are not just saving their monies earned but they are spending again...putting capital back into the economy...fueling it ever upward reaching numbers unseen in years.

And lest we forget that last week President Trump signed a bipartisan bill that “rewrites”... as in dismantles...parts of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, Obama's disastrous financial regulation overhaul enacted, he claimed, in response to the 2008 financial crisis. This newly signed bill will now exempt dozens of our nation's smaller banks from both “overly aggressive” strict federal regulations and Federal Reserve oversight....another very good thing for both the economy and we taxpayers as it helps aid smaller banks and credit unions in expanding the types of mortgages they can offer, so critical in our country's more rural and less cosmopolitan areas.

Such positive changes our economy has seen in just the short year and a half Donald Trump has been president for America now has at its helm a man...a commander-in-chief...who truly understands how business works...as in the “business of government”...with that understanding going way beyond simple Economics 101.

On the foreign affairs front...a front that has so dominated the news...President Trump let the whole world know that America's bond with Israel is stronger than ever before as he threw all condemnation to the wayside and moved our United States Embassy to Jerusalem, thus officially now recognizing the "Holy City" as the today, tomorrow, and forever undivided capital of the Jewish State...and other sovereign nations are following suit. And Trump is also seriously considering recognizing the Golan Heights as Israeli territory... territory it rightfully captured 51-years ago during the Arab-started, six day Yom Kippur War. According to Israeli Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz, "American recognition of Israel's sovereignty over the Golan is the best answer to Iran's attempts to establish a military front against Israel." And how very right Yisrael Katz is for no nation needs the proverbial wolf sitting at its door.

And speaking of Iran, let's dare not forget that President Trump pulled us out of Obama's very bad nuclear deal...a deal that saw the enemy being emboldened by a former president truly not on America's side. Rightfully telling the world that Iran breached the deal time and time again... and that even their entering into the said deal was based upon a lie...what President Trump actually did was show our 'supposed' allies who not only is the boss but who is calling the shots. And these 'supposed' allies...Great Britain, France, and Germany...proved themselves to be anything but as they chose to show the world that they are standing strong not with America but with America's...and of course Israel's...enemy Iran.

Saying that they will remain in this farce of a nuclear deal, know this will be remembered by President Trump when these once allies come crying to us...in the very near future I might add...that the still ongoing and seemingly never ending muslim invasion of Europe has gotten out of hand. You know what...too damn bad for the days of stabbing the United States...let alone Israel...in the back are now over.

And also on the foreign affairs front...in fact dominating the current news cycle I might add...is everything North Korea. The Hermit Kingdom as it's commonly known, North Korea is not a kingdom but a brutal dictatorial regime run by a mad man-child of sorts...a mad man-child not unlike a whimpering "snowflake” hyped up on liberal propaganda times ten. But this very dangerous “snowflake” has nukes ready to lift off with just the push of a button that rests in one of his hands all while he tries to fool the world into believing that he'll give them all up for the salvaging of his country's economy. Simply he won't...it cannot be said any plainer than that.

And President Trump knows this well with his mastery of the “art of the deal” now coming into play. And while some world leaders have been fooled into believing this pathological liar wants nothing but peace, its they who have closed their eyes to the fact that Kim Jong-un is actually in partnership with Iran...as in Iran supplies North Korea with long range ballistic missiles needed to deliver their nuclear payload, and Iran gets enriched uranium stamped 'Made in North Korea' in return.

In fact, as per a learned team of multi-national weapons researchers who very closely monitor both Iranian state television and satellite imagery, Iran is and always has continued to operate a secret missile research facility which goes directly against terms of the nuclear deal they a bit to eagerly agreed to abide by. And with experts like Michael Elleman, a missile expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, now believing this facility to be involved in long-range missile technology with a specific focus on advanced rocket engines and rocket fuel, the facility in question actually appears in imagery to be built to house larger type missiles...ICBM missiles most likely...something North Korea so desperately needs as their missiles keep blowing up or missing their test targets completely.

And know that my above said presumed “trade” has in most probability already been completed...to some degree at least...so there would be no reason not for Kim Jong-un to extend his hand in supposed friendship...what has he got to lose. Feigning wanting to bring the two Korea's together as one, feigning wanting to come to the negotiating table with President Trump, the mad man-child is playing to the cameras alone for what is Kim Jong-un but a “bad actor” trying to both steal the lead and directorship of what in reality is a Donald J. Trump written, orchestrated, and directed play.

How so...it all started in 2017 when North Korea tested more than a dozen missiles setting off a very heated exchange between President Trump and Kim Jong-un whom he loved to call “Little Rocket Man.” Culminating last November when North Korea claimed it had in its possession a nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) that could now reach the entirety of the continental U.S., suddenly and quite unexpectedly, the North basically invited itself to the 2018 Winter Olympics to be held in Seoul, South Korea. And then this past March, just a few months ago, a ten-strong delegation from Seoul...a delegation led by South Korea's National Security Office head Chung Eui-yong...visited Pyongyang where it was publicly stating that Kim Jong-un was willing to discuss the fate of his nuclear arsenal with the United States as well as expressing a readiness to suspend both nuclear and missile tests during such talks...with fingers most likely crossed behind their backs as, I believe, North Korea already had all they needed to carry out such an attack.

Then on March 9th, President Trump decided to not just play the game but to own the game outright as well as he accepted the “Little Rocket Man's” now formal invitation to meet. And while at the end of the month Kim Jong-un made an unannounced visit to Beijing where he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in an attempt to strengthen what he saw as his leverage ahead of negotiations with Trump, whatever was worked out with President Xi has not served Kim Jong-un well in the long run as China remains more than a bit concerned about any shift in the balance of power on the Korean peninsula.

And while this past Easter Sunday new but then still unconfirmed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met secretly with Kim Jong-un in North Korea, where after the meeting he said, "a good relationship was formed" heading into the highly anticipated what came to be known as the NOKO Summit. And while just days later North Korea announced that it had suspended nuclear and long-range missile tests with plans in the works to close its nuclear test site as part of a shift in its national focus to improving the North's failing economy, a red flag of sorts was raised...a red flag it seems few paid attention to as no all-important timetable for said plans to be carried out was even remotely alluded to. But the “Little Rocket Man” played the game well for on May 9th now Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made an unannounced one-day trip to Pyongyang to prepare for the planned NOKO Summit, and to everyone's surprise returned home with the three American hostages North Korea had held.

So with Kim Jong-un's successful nothing but a publicity stunt, hopes were high that a summit would truly take place, and on May 10th President Trump announced he would meet with Kim Jong-un in Singapore on June 12th. And while Trump tweeted that, "We will both try to make it a very special moment for World Peace!"...his and the world's hopes for peace proved to be a bit short lived for just last week President Trump rightfully called off the planned NOKO summit...called it off because of “tremendous anger” and “escalating frustration and newly antagonistic rhetoric” displayed by the North over comments made by Trump aides regarding U.S. expectations for North Korea's required "denuclearization." Calling said cancellation a "tremendous setback" for peace, Trump also let it be known that the U.S. military is ready and more than able to respond to any and all "foolish or reckless acts" by the North.

But know that President Trump is one very smart man who with his cancellation actually checkmated, if you will, the “Little Rocket Man.” Thinking he had the upper hand what with his believing that China was on his side, Kim Jong-un never expected Trump to pull out. Thinking “saving face” alone would assure that Trump attended the summit no matter any of North Korean actions taken, Kim Jong-un could not see that he had all along been played by Donald Trump...played to such a degree that Trump pushed him into a corner where he, not the U.S., was held responsible for the collapse of the NOKO Summit.

So where do we stand now as I write this article what with Trump's cleverly manipulated flip-flopping having already taken place...a flip-flop that was really crafted diplomacy at its very best...coupled with it being an unprecedented negotiating tactic in action. What we do know is that last Friday, President Trump “welcomed” North Korea's as expected response to hopefully still meet even after his abrupt public withdrawal from the NOKO Summit, as well as to the official withdrawal letter he himself wrote. Followed in less than a day with Trump saying that, "we're talking to them now," there is a strong possibility that the summit could still take place on the original June 12th date, but know it will take place on Trump's terms not on Kim Jong-un's.

But most importantly of all is that President Trump surely let the world know that while "Everybody plays games," not everybody controls those games as well as he does nor does any country have a leader with the needed leverage, strength, and courage to do what he did...as in simply to walk away.

So when all is said and done it truly has been an interesting few months both for our country and for President Trump with promises of even more interesting happenings to come. Some of those happenings will be good of course and some as to be expected not so much, but whatever happens know that in President Donald J. Trump once again America has a strong man at the helm...a man not unlike our beloved Ronald Reagan...a man who not only leads from “the front” but who puts America first not last. And what a welcome change that is.

Copyright @ 2018 Diane Sori / The Patriot Factor / All Rights Reserved. 

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For more political commentary please visit my RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS partner Craig Andresen's blog     The National Patriot to read his latest article Respect For the Law and Those Who Enforce It

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RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS...LIVE!

Today, Tuesday, May 29th from 7 to 9pm EST on American Political Radio, RIGHT SIDE PATRIOTS Craig Andresen and Diane Sori discuss 'An Interesting Past Few Months Indeed'; 'Respect For the Law and Those Who Enforce It'; and important news of the day.

Hope you can tune in at: http://listen.samcloud.com/w/73891/American-Political-Radio#history