The Art of a Wink and The Deal

I almost got kicked off my trivia team Saturday night!

I arrived at the Elks Lodge early to find three of my teammates already at our table.  I said “hi” and sat down by Sonny as everyone acknowledged me and continued their animated conversation.

The first sentence I heard was “…And they said on TV that Trump has lied more than seven thousand times since he was elected.”  The other two agreed, and then they were off to criticize the President’s performance at the summit in Vietnam.  “Can you believe that he says he likes Kim Jong-un?” Sonny said. “I mean why doesn’t he call him out for being the killer he is? Why doesn’t he call him on the human rights violations and starving his own people!”  My other teammates were in fast agreement and making similar statements.

Sonny then turned to me and said, “Hey, sorry, we didn’t mean to leave you out of the conversation.”

“Don’t worry, that’s okay,” I said, “I came in on it late.”

“It’s just you were so quiet.  You do agree with us, don’t you?” he asked me, looking me right in the eyes.

“No,” I answered.

His jaw dropped.  I think he was stunned.

“The President’s purpose in going to the summit was to work toward getting an agreement  to denuclearize North Korea,” I said.  “The President is trying to prevent a war.  I don’t think it’s likely that he can ever get an agreement if he goes into the meeting telling Kim Jong-un how horrible he is.”

“Well, maybe if he had done that he would have shamed him into an agreement.  He certainly didn’t get anything done by playing Mr. Nice Guy!”

I nodded.  “As the President said, ‘You have to be willing to walk away from a deal if it’s not a good one.'”

Sonny challenged me as the two teammates looked on, “You didn’t vote for him, did you?”

“Yes,” I said.  “Sonny, you have to understand that not everyone agrees with you.  There are conservatives in the world!”

He was shaking his head.  “But, I’ve known you for twenty years…”

To make a long story short, I didn’t get kicked off the team, but the next two and a half hours felt pretty icy.  Despite the fact that I usually have the winning answers on the team (yes, I’m a best-selling trivia book author), I didn’t feel very welcome.

If Sonny had been interested in having a real conversation, he would have learned that I agree with him: Little Rocket Man really is a cold blooded killer, but there’s a lot more to it than that.

Analysis

If you were watching Fox News on Saturday morning, you saw President Trump speaking for over two hours at the CPAC about everything from the witch hunt and the economy, to the wall, and North Korea.  On the other hand, if  you were watching CNN or MSNBC, you saw “Feel the Bern” Bernie talking about his socialist “solutions” for this country.

However, for whatever reason, my TV was tuned to Fox News.  And sure enough, toward the end of his mostly off-the-cuff speech, President Trump addressed the summit and Jim Jong-un, saying that he and the dictator like each other and have a good relationship, despite the fact he had to walk away from the summit because the deal wasn’t right for the U.S.

Let’s address the question directly:  How can the President like and have a good relationship with a cold blooded murderer?

Answer:  The President has been left in a difficult situation.  The ineptitude of previous Presidents has left him in a difficult situation.  Either he reaches a solution, or the Korean War starts up again.  With the resurgence of the war, there will be hundreds of thousands, if not millions of deaths.

So the President is looking for a deal.  In this deal, the North Koreans give up their nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) programs.  Little Rocket Man avoids death, and has the opportunity to bring his country into this century.

So what if the President walks into the meeting room at the summit, points his finger at the dictator, and screams, “You’re a dirty, murdering piece of scum and deserve to die.  Let’s make a deal!”

Somehow, I don’t think the deal gets made.

But the President is a businessman.  He knows that in order to get a deal, the other person must be made to feel important.  So he metaphorically walks into the conference room with a clothes pin attached to his nose, and treats his opponent with undeserved respect and kindness.  It’s not what he wants to do, but eventually getting a deal means that he has to resort to making Little Rocket Man feel good about himself.

Little Rocket Man does the logical thing.  He says there’s no deal unless the U.S. releases all of the sanctions and lets him keep a good deal of his nuclear program.  President Obama gave in to Iran with everything the Mullahs wanted, so why shouldn’t President Trump give in?  After all, it looks really bad to walk away from a summit without a deal. Surely, the President doesn’t want to subject himself to that embarrassment!

Well, unfortunately for Little Rocket Man, the President wrote a book called The Art of the Deal.  He knows that you can walk away!

But when he gets back to the U.S. and the CPAC, why does President Trump talk about his good relationship with Little Rocket Man?  He’s back in the U.S., so why does’t he call him a killer and absolute scum?

The answer is simple.  More negotiations are yet to come and he can’t say one thing here and another thing there without crashing the deal.

So, when the President talks about how much he likes the Rocket Man, it’s like he’s giving you a wink. The wink is implied, not real, but it lets the audience know that the President knows what he’s doing, despite all appearances.  Just play along.

You’re supposed to understand that this is part of the negotiation process, not a perfect view of reality.  Unfortunately, liberals don’t see the wink.

I don’t think they ever see the wink

But eventually there will be a deal.  The Korean War will end and North Korea will eventually become a part of the world community.

It’s all because our President knows how to wink.

What do you think?

 

— Mr. Evil