POTUS & UN Have an Empire State of Mind

This week the world’s eyes will be affixed on events in New York City as the world’s leaders gather at the United Nations. President Trump will be speaking at the United Nations and his speech comes at a time when Americans and the entire world are reassessing the United States’s place in the world:

• Is the US in decline?
• Has the US turned isolationist?
• Does Europe still view the US as a key part of NATO?
• Is America still the exemplar for democracy and democratic ideals?
• Is the post World War II Pax Americana coming to an end?

Daily Pnut has many international readers, and we’d like our international readers to share with us how their views of the United States has changed since President Trump has taken office. Please write to us at editor@dailypnut.com with your thoughts. We’ll be sharing your letters in Friday’s edition.

The UN General Assembly, “The World’s Most Tedious Cocktail Party,” Takes Place This Week: The UN General Assembly officially began in New York City last week, but things really get started when the American president arrives. Trump’s first General Assembly will also be the first time that many of the world’s leaders will meet him in person. Trump begins on Monday with a meeting on United Nations reform and over the course of the week, he will meet individually with the leaders of France, Israel, Britain, Jordan, Egypt, the Palestinian Authority, Turkey, Afghanistan, and Ukraine. He will lunch with (relatively) new UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, and on Tuesday, he will deliver his much-anticipated speech to the General Assembly.

Paris Climate Accord Could Be Back On: Trump cabinet officials said on Sunday talk shows that the president might change his mind on pulling the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said his boss is willing to work with partners if the US could construct a set of terms that are fair and balanced for Americans. National Security Adviser, H.R. McMaster said, “He left the door open to re-entering at some later time if there can be a better deal for the United States.” 196 countries reached the accord in 2015, with a goal of limiting global warming to 2 degrees or less by 2100, by pledging to cut carbon dioxide and other emissions from the burning of fossil fuels. The agreement is completely non-binding, each country sets its own goals for reducing greenhouse gasses, and there are no penalties if the goals are not reached, which makes Trump’s declaration that the pact would undermine the US economy and national sovereignty a bit of a head scratcher.

Vaccination Campaign Taking Place As Rohingya Continue to Flee Myanmar: An estimated 410,000 Rohingya have now fled Myanmar to neighboring Bangladesh since August 25, more than doubling the existing Rohingya refugee population. Children account for 60 percent of all refugees, according to preliminary estimates. A vaccination campaign against measles, rubella, and polio is currently being implemented to immunize 150,000 Rohingya children below the age of 15 in refugee settlements. The campaign is being led by Bangladesh’s Ministry of Health with support from UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO).

US To Expand Kabul’s “Green Zone”: After 16 years of an American presence in Kabul, the city’s Green Zone will be expanded over the next two years to include nearly all Western embassies, major government ministries, and NATO and American military headquarters. This expansion is a “stark acknowledgment” that even the city’s central areas are now too difficult to defend from Taliban bombings. This expansion, along with an increase in troops from around 11,000 to 15,000, means the Trump administration’s new strategy for Afghanistan will likely keep the US military in the country well into the 2020s (even by conservative estimates), despite the war’s unpopularity with the American public. The process of turning Kabul into a fortress started years before Barack Obama left office, but Kabul’s security area has been, until now, a “Green Zone-lite” compared to its predecessor in Baghdad. The Green Zone in Baghdad created “an out-of-touch ruling class and Western community, and provided a magnet for protests while just moving enormous bombings elsewhere, further stoking popular discontent with leaders and foreigners.” So…at least we all know what we can expect, or will we act surprised when history, as it so often does, repeats itself?

Trump’s War of Words With Iran: Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had a stern warning for President Trump on Sunday as he exclaimed that Iran would not be bullied by the US and warning Trump to not make a “wrong move.” The statement was in response to Trump’s pronouncement last Thursday that Iran is violating the “spirit” of the 2015 deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), to curb its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. The US maintains separate sanctions against Iran related to its ballistic missile program and allegations that Tehran sponsors terrorism in the region. On Thursday, the US Treasury imposed new restrictions on 11 people and entities, two of which are based in Ukraine, for supporting Iranian actions, including cyber attacks against US financial institutions. Trump has threatened several times to forego the 2015 JCOPA deal, but has yet to settle on a fixed decision. He has until mid-October to decide whether to certify that Iran is in compliance. If he decides against certification, Congress has 60 days to reimpose sanctions.

• Some people can’t get over old dates, but Trump and Hillary Clinton can’t get over 2016. Clinton is very much mad and depressed about the election results. Trump’s antics seem worse than juvenile and Twitter will be forever linked to his presidency.
• Here are the tweets that Trump to block other Twitter users.
• Vanity Fair asks whether Jared Kushner helped “select Facebook targets for the Russians?” The piece is long on assertions and short on facts but clearly the 2016 elections are still on many people’s mind.  
• The 2016 US elections are still on people’s mind but perhaps Ken Burns will have more Americans reflecting on the Vietnam War as the series begins with practically universal acclaim as a heartbreaking worth of staggering achievement.
• The US Military had a technology advantage for decades by owning the night. Is this advantage with having night vision devices coming to an end?
• Steve Bannon’s sartorial preferences of multiple shirts has piqued people’s interest

Cyprus’s Golden Visa Scheme: From the Big Surprise file comes this story of the super rich, including billionaire Russian oligarchs and Ukrainian elites, who are buying European Union passports which give them the right to live and work in Europe. The government of Cyprus has made billions since 2013 selling passports under controversial “golden visa” schemes. A list of the super rich granted Cypriot citizenship was leaked and seen by The Guardian, including prominent businessmen and individuals with considerable political influence. Cyprus’s current citizenship-by-investment scheme requires applicants to place €2m in property or €2.5m in companies or government bonds. There is no language or residency requirement, other than a visit once every seven years. Cyprus sounds more like a country club than a country.

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