The European Union is accustomed to crisis. But it is probably safe to say that none of the 28 leaders who are gathering in Malta on Friday expected the crisis that has overtaken the agenda: the United States of America.
Like much of the world, the European Union is struggling to decipher a President Trump who seems every day to be picking a new fight with a new nation, whether friend or foe. Hopes among European leaders that Mr. Trump’s bombastic tone as a candidate would somehow smooth into a more temperate one as commander in chief are dissipating, replaced by a mounting sense of anxiety and puzzlement over how to proceed.
If many foreign leaders expected a Trump administration to push to renegotiate trade deals, or take a tough line on immigration, few anticipated that he would become an equal opportunity offender. He has insulted or humiliated Mexico, Britain, Germany and Iraq; engaged in a war of words with China and Iran; and turned a routine phone call with the prime minister of Australia, a staunch ally, into a minor diplomatic crisis.
With the possible exception of NATO, where he has softened his tone, Mr. Trump has expressed disdain for other multilateral institutions such as the European Union. His praise has been reserved for populists and strongmen, like Nigel Farage, the former leader of the U.K. Independence Party, President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines and, of course, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.
Mr. Trump is convinced that the United States has been played for a patsy by the rest of the world and is vowing to set things straight. “We’re taken advantage of by every nation in the world virtually,” he said on Thursday at a prayer breakfast. “It’s not going to happen anymore.”
“President Donald Trump signed three executive actions this morning, killing the Trans-Pacific partnership, instituting a federal hiring freeze, and restoring the Mexico City policy, which bans federal funds from being used to fund abortions. “We’ve been talking about this for a long time … a great thing for the American worker,” Trump said after signing the order killing former President Obama’s signature trade effort.” –
“Germany’s record on free speech leaves a lot to be desired. Vacillating from one extreme to another, from simulcasting Nazi propaganda to criminalizing Holocaust-denial, it has long struggled to protect the civil liberty of free speech while quelling the tides of authoritarianism. In an attempt to control the recent uptick in xenophobia and racism, largely exacerbated by sudden demographic shifts linked to Berlin’s refugee-intake program, German authorities are now prosecuting arbitrarily-defined “hate speech,” otherwise known as free speech, with what appears to be de facto blasphemy laws. On Wednesday, Chancellor Angela Merkel backed a federal program to monitor and police internet activity on popular social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. ” –
“It has been 
“Former NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen has called on the US to act as the world’s policeman to “counter autocrats like President [Vladimir] Putin.” He made the comments in an editorial for the Wall Street Journal. …
“The agency has been dubbed ‘Catholics In Action’ because the faithful have occupied so many senior positions. But could their dominance be weakening? …The CIA is the best known of the 17 agencies that comprise the American intelligence community. It has earned itself nicknames like “Catholic Intelligence Agency” and “Catholics In Action”. It’s worth exploring why. No official statistics exist on Catholics in the CIA or any other American intelligence agency. But one interesting clue is the relatively high number of Catholics who have served as director of the agency.” –
NEW YORK – The Obama administration is betting on a stealth plan to secure final passage of the massive Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, before Obama leaves office by pushing the bill through Congress in the “lame duck” session between Election Day Nov. 8, and Jan. 6, 2017, the date the new Congress is sworn in, despite growing voter opposition that now has Hillary Clinton joining Donald Trump in opposing the bill.
“WASHINGTON – Now that the European Union will be losing the United Kingdom as a result of the Brexit vote, concerns are growing that the E.U. is seeking to expand intercontinentally with the aim of establishing an “empire.” A week after the British vote on June 23, E.U. Vice President Federica Mogherini released a document outlining the union’s plan for expansion,
Mario Draghi has just pushed the boundaries of central banking further into the realm of globalization, at a time when globalization is on the run.
Despite a packed crisis agenda at the EU Summit, EU High Representative Federica Mogherini presented yesterday to the European Council the EU Global Strategy which she was mandated with by the European Heads of State one year ago. The