CHINA/FOREIGN AFFAIRS/RUSSIA/SYRIA/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/TWITTER: “President Trump’s fusillade of tweets about Syria, Russia and China this week set a new standard for contradictory and inconsistent positions in Mr. Trump’s approach to war, trade and relations with adversaries. The president promised never to telegraph military action against an enemy, yet all but showcased a coming missile strike on Syria. He threatened Russia and called its relations with the United States worse than during the Cold War, yet blamed the ill will not on Moscow but on the special counsel investigation. He praised President Xi Jinping of China for his ‘enlightenment’ on trade in a highly anticipated speech, but in it Mr. Xi actually offered little to change what Mr. Trump has called decades of predatory practices by Beijing. Mr. Trump might argue, like Ralph Waldo Emerson, that ‘a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.’ But the latest reversals and back flips were so jarring that they left foreign officials more bewildered than usual about Mr. Trump’s next moves.”
–Mark Landler, “Trump’s Tweets on Syria, Russia and China: The Triumph of Contradiction,” The New York Times online, April 11, 2018