Kim Jong-who? Photo: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

Last week, amid reports that President Trump wasn’t doing much studying for his historic summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, he claims that formal briefings are unnecessary. “It’s about attitude, it’s about willingness to get things done,” he explained.

Before making an early exit from the G7 summit in Canada on Saturday, Trump cast his meeting with Kim as a kind of first date, saying, “We will have seen each other. Hopefully we will have liked each other, and we’ll start that process.” And how will he be able to tell if it’s meant to be? As a master deal-maker, he’ll just know.

“I think within the first minute, I’ll know,” Trump said, “just, my touch, my feel — that’s what I do.”

Despite this emphasis on first impressions, Trump began the Singapore summit by signaling to Kim that he’s the kind of guy who refuses to put his phone down during dinner, and can’t stop talking about his ex.

After a 24-hour break from Twitter as he traveled to Singapore and settled into his hotel, around 9 a.m. local time on Monday (Sunday night in the U.S.), Trump threw some more punches at Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, continuing his trade-related feud with the United States’ closest allies.

Fair Trade is now to be called Fool Trade if it is not Reciprocal. According to a Canada release, they make almost 100 Billion Dollars in Trade with U.S. (guess they were bragging and got caught!). Minimum is 17B. Tax Dairy from us at 270%. Then Justin acts hurt when called out! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2018

Why should I, as President of the United States, allow countries to continue to make Massive Trade Surpluses, as they have for decades, while our Farmers, Workers & Taxpayers have such a big and unfair price to pay? Not fair to the PEOPLE of America! $800 Billion Trade Deficit... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2018

....And add to that the fact that the U.S. pays close to the entire cost of NATO-protecting many of these same countries that rip us off on Trade (they pay only a fraction of the cost-and laugh!). The European Union had a $151 Billion Surplus-should pay much more for Military! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2018

....Germany pays 1% (slowly) of GDP towards NATO, while we pay 4% of a MUCH larger GDP. Does anybody believe that makes sense? We protect Europe (which is good) at great financial loss, and then get unfairly clobbered on Trade. Change is coming! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2018

As Trump was trying to make “fool trade” happen, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted a series of photos showing State Department officials meeting with foreign diplomats and generally behaving like normal White House officials headed into a high-stakes summit.

Early pre-brief with my @StateDept team. Amb Kim meets with #DPRK today. We remain committed to the complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula pic.twitter.com/ybtrMJuqK8 — Secretary Pompeo (@SecPompeo) June 11, 2018

Finally, Trump shifted his attention to the matter at hand, tweeting that he’s excited to be in Singapore for the Kim meeting:

Great to be in Singapore, excitement in the air! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2018

But before heading off to meet with Singaporean prime minister Lee Hsien Loong, Trump returned to his trade war:

Sorry, we cannot let our friends, or enemies, take advantage of us on Trade anymore. We must put the American worker first! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 11, 2018

During his meeting with Lee, Trump remarked, “We’ve got a very interesting meeting in particular tomorrow. I think things could work out very nicely.”

But if they don’t, we’ll know who to blame: not Trump’s lack of preparation, but our neighbor to the north. Stupid sexy Trudeau!