Donald Trump complains about his office and ponders war with North Korea


Trump: “I Thought It Would Be Easier”

In one of a series of interviews trying to spin some success from his first 100 days in office, Donald Trump complains about the difficulty of being President.

Trump told Reuters, “I loved my previous life. I had so many things going. This is more work than in my previous life. I thought it would be easier.”

However, much of Trump’s focus in the interview remained on his November victory over Hillary Clinton. In the midst of a discussion about China’s President Xi Jinping, Trump handed out copies of the result from the Electoral College.:

Here, you can take that, that’s the final map of the numbers. It’s pretty good, right? The red is obviously us.

When he returned to current issues, Trump envisaged the possibility of war: “There is a chance that we could end up having a major, major conflict with North Korea. Absolutely.”

He continued, “We’d love to solve things diplomatically but it’s very difficult.”

Trump did not explore what that diplomacy might entail. Instead, he shifted to a demand on South Korea to pay the cost of the U.S. THAAD anti-missile defense system, which he estimated at $1 billion, and said he would renegotiate or terminate a US free trade pact with Seoul because of a deep American trade deficit.

Trump ventured that he could make a breakthrough in the Middle East: “It’s a possibility, we’re talking to both. It’s a possibility, but I want to see peace with Israel and the Palestinians. There is no reason there’s not peace between Israel and the Palestinians – none whatsoever.”

And he was nonchalant about the prospect of the Federal Government’s closure if the Administration fails to agree an emergency funding measure with Congress:

If there’s closure, there’s closure. We’ll see what happens. If there’s a shutdown it’s the Democrats’ fault. Not our fault. It’s the Democrats’ fault. Maybe they’d like to see a shutdown.

TOP PHOTO by Carlos Berria/Reuters