U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s attempt at shuttle diplomacy with Russia to salvage a pre-U.S.-bombing-in-Syria thaw in relations has failed. Fresh from talks with G7 nations in Lucca, Italy—where Tillerson was unable to deliver “clarity” about current and future U.S. policy in Syria—the U.S.’s top diplomatic envoy came into a blistering critique of the United States by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov about recent Trump administration actions and statements that Lavrov said have eroded trust in working with the United States “across the whole spectrum of bilateral and multilateral affairs.”
The rapid downward spiral in U.S.-Russia relations mirrors an open breach at home between Trump and his political base—including some of his staunchest supporters—who believe their erstwhile hero has been “captured” by a cabal of military-globalist “advisers,” and, being himself politically naïve, is being manipulated into spheres and issues he had no intention of getting in involved in.
Leid Stories asks: Is Donald Trump is a captive president?