Let’s Take A Meeting

I am not a “meeting” type of guy. How many meetings have you been to where you walk out invigorated and inspired? How many of you have walked out of meeting muttering to yourself “What a waste of time”, or more poetically, “WTF was that about?”?

This past office holiday party I received one of my favorite gifts ever. It was a coffee cup with the saying: This meeting is bullshit on one side of the cup. I carry it to every meeting, waiting for the opportune moment to expose the This meeting is bullshit side, hoping everyone will start laughing and realize that what we are doing is ridiculous and maybe it is more meaningful to all laugh together than meander in bullshit.

All kidding aside (though I do really love that cup!), there have been some meetings that have occurred during The Don’s campaign and tenure in The White House that were dead serious, but according to the people participating in them, were kind of bullshit.

Let’s look at some of the high profile ones.

George Papadopoulus (or as I endearingly have referred to him as, the cousin of the Sesame Street character, Snuffleupagus) met with an Australian Ambassador and over a beer happens to mention that the Russians had Clinton’s emails. The ambassador probably concluded the Pap was just some grandiose wannabe and thought nothing of it. Then when the emails started surfacing, he alerted intelligence officials in the U.S. That was how the Russia investigation started. And even though Pap is in a photo at a meeting in which The Don is present, the administration response was that he was just a “coffee boy.” This coffee boy wound up pleading guilty to the special prosecutor. Currently, he is working with a famous fashion designer and soon will be releasing his t-shirt line: Coffee Boys are Bad. Two of the shirts have been leaked to the press: Baristas Are Not Bullshit and Get Your Joe On.

How about the infamous Trump Tower meeting with Don Jr., Paul Manaforte, Jared Kushner and a cadre of Russians. What’s all the fuss about? What does Don Jr. have to say about it?

Ok, so the adoption thing was bullshit, but aren’t we allowed to meet with some Russians. My dad was raving about Putin and I love my dad and I want him to be proud of me. When he heard I got that meeting he really was proud of me. But when he heard I had no intel on Hillary he was back to treating me like shit. 

What about the Saudi Arabia and Emirates meeting Don Jr.?

So now I have been outed about that, too? Isn’t there any privacy left in this world? That one is ridiculous. I was told I was going to a costume party. I don’t know how those guys wear the stuff all day. And the women: they are so hot. Wait not that way, but because of what they have to wear. But Mike Pence told me they turn in to beasts in the bedroom because all that covering up and oppression has to come out somehow.

How about Jared’s backchannel meeting with Ambassador Kislyak? Such total bullshit that anyone thought this was significant. Doesn’t your heart just break for him? People have such the wrong idea about Jared, thinking the worse, that he is always scheming and looking for ways to bail himself out of his real estate debt. Jared’s explanation for why Citibank lent him $325 million and Apollo, an investment firm, lent him $184 million was that they really like him and that all the uproar is just envy.

Then there is Michael Flynn who was also part of the meeting with Kushner and who had so many conversations with Kislyak that he has him on speed dial. Flynn has also pleaded guilty in the Mueller investigation, but still thinks its bullshit that everyone is so up in arms about his reassurances to Kislyak about removing sanctions against Russia. “This is all such bullshit! Can you believe what happened to me all because I just wanted us to get along?”

Carter Page also took a meeting with Russian government officials in 2016 during the campaign. At first he denied he had the meeting; eventually when he was confronted with evidence that he did meet with them (a copy of an email he sent to someone in the Don’s staff was read to him at a closed door meeting with the House Intelligence Committee), he acknowledged that he did take some meetings. He was so disappointed because he learned nothing; it was all just a pile of bullshit.

Then there was Eric Prince’s meeting in the Seychelle Islands. The United Arab Emirates arranged a secret meeting in January between Blackwater founder Erik Prince and a Russian close to President Vladi­mir Putin as part of an apparent effort to establish a back-channel line of communication between Moscow and The Don. When asked why he was in the Seychelles, Prince’s responded that he went there for the world’s greatest seashells. And how crazy a coincidence was it that a Putin associate happened to be sitting at a bar and started shooting the shit with him? The world is just a crazy place.

And now we come to a meeting that was the meeting for all times. The Don and Kim Jong-Un head to head, but not surprisingly, the meeting was cancelled by The Don. The two lovebirds had a quarrel when The North Korean Leader heard that the NSA head, John Bolton and Vice President Pence, had implied that North Korea would be dealt with by the ‘Libya” method, where Gaddafi gave up his nukes and wound up dead. Not the best way to start your first date.

The Don was kind of cool about the calling off. He even wrote Kim Jong-on a good old- fashioned love letter.

Dear Mr. Chairman:

We greatly appreciate your time, patience, and effort with respect to our recent negotiations and discussions relative to a summit long sought by both parties, which was scheduled to take place on June 12 in Singapore. We were informed that the meeting was requested by North Korea, but that to us is totally irrelevant. I was very much looking forward to being there with you. Sadly, based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement, I feel it is inappropriate, at this time, to have this long-planned meeting. Therefore, please let this letter serve to represent that the Singapore summit, for the good of both parties, but to the detriment of the world, will not take place. You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.

I felt a wonderful dialogue was building up between you and me, and ultimately, it is only the dialogue that matters. Some day, I look very much forward to meeting you. In the meantime, I want to thank you for the release of the hostages who are now home with their families. That was a beautiful gesture and was very much appreciated.

If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit, please do not hesitate to call me or write. The world, and North Korea in particular, has lost a great opportunity for lasting peace and great prosperity and wealth. This missed opportunity is a truly sad moment in history.

Sincerely yours,

Donald J. Trump

President of the United States of America

I practically teared up with the “wonderful dialogue” but the “massive and powerful” nuke part made me feel that the professed love was on a shaky foundation.

The Don continues to hold out hope that they will meet. Before cancelling, he went out of his way to reassure Kim that “He will be safe. He will be happy. His country will be rich,” the president said. Who wouldn’t want to marry a guy like that?

But whether the two leaders meet or not doesn’t really matter, as The U.S. government has already issued a commemorative coin about the summit featuring The Don and “Supreme Leader” Kim Jong-un face-to-face.

In this world of alternative reality, where The Don makes things up every day and his right wing media pals promulgate it as the truth, the coin is proof of the meeting. Given his followers unshakeable loyalty, if he shows them the coin as proof of the meeting they will believe there was a meeting. In fact, those responsible for producing the coin, are already working on a second one: The Don receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.

Rudy Giuliani, the D.C. hawker, will be selling them for $1,000 each. Fox News will air commercials of Rudy proudly displaying the coin, championing The Don as a great man of peace.  The Don’s acolytes can also find the coins on his Rudy’s new website: A Different Kind of Truth.  Now that’s some serious bullshit!