The hypocrisy and blind partisanship that is tearing our country apart was on display Sunday, when Democrats ripped into President Donald Trump for sucking up to North Korea’s murderous dictator Kim Jong Un, while Republicans lavished praise on Trump for stepping onto North Korean soil.

Just a few years ago, these roles were reversed, when Republicans heaped scorn on then-President Barack Obama for reaching out to Iran’s president in a phone call (2013) and for visiting Cuba and taking in a baseball game with Raul Castro (2016). Obama setting foot onto Cuban soil was clearly a sign of weakness and capitulation, Republican leaders and Fox News thundered.

Ever since Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote a letter to Adolph Hitler in 1938 appealing for peace in Europe (fact check: It didn’t work), presidents have communicated with enemies.

At its essence, there’s nothing wrong with this, for history shows that one-time bitter enemies — Germany, Japan Vietnam — can one day be friends. We bombed these countries to hell, we nuked Japan!—and yet we’re all friends now.

Why can’t we be friends?

So who’s to say that, improbable as it sounds now, that Iran, Cuba and North Korea cannot one day be our friends? Iran and Cuba used to be American allies, by the way. We can’t do anything about yesterday, as Lyndon Johnson used to say. But tomorrow is always ours to shape.

And so just as I thought it was OK for Obama to visit Cuba, I’m also supportive of Trump stepping over the line in the DMZ to shake Kim’s hand. Kim is a ruthless butcher, but so were the Castros, and so are the mullahs in Tehran.

All this aside, the thing I don’t like about Trump is the sucking up and toadying to these murderers, which he has taken to a new level. His eagerness—his need—to be liked is embarrassing and degrading.

Case in point: You probably don’t watch Russian TV, as I sometimes do (I worked in Moscow for many years). So on Saturday you missed how it made fun of Trump (it often does and not in a good way) because he was seen sucking on a breath mint while waiting for Vladimir Putin to show up for their G-20 meeting in Japan. Trump wanted to make a good impression, and boy, he sure did. More on that in a second.

Putin, Trump’s supporters have trouble admitting, is a brutal dictator, a once-and-forever KGB operative, who has called the collapse of the Soviet Union one of the great catastrophes of the 20th century.

His regime has attacked its neighbors, been accused of shooting down a civilian airliner, suspected in the murder of countless journalists and meddled in America’s 2016 election—with the goal of helping installing Trump in the White House.

Breath mints for Putin

Clearly, if you’re Donald Trump, this is someone you want to cozy up to, so of course breath mints.

Which is why Trump, the needy 73-year old with an egg-shell fragile ego, praised Putin every which way. He’s a “great guy,” he gushed to a Russia 24 reporter. A “terrific person.”

And, throwing U.S. intelligence agencies under the bus like he did last year in Helsinki, he repeated his belief in Putin’s denial about rigging the election. The two also shared a laugh about getting rid of journalists — on, no less, the first anniversary of the massacre at a Maryland newspaper which took five lives.

On China — where the trade war that Trump promised would be “easy to win” drags on — Trump gave in to Chinese demands on several fronts.

It was only a few weeks ago that the president, citing national security concerns, decided that Huawei, the giant high-tech giant, would be barred from buying equipment from American companies. But after a stiff Chinese demand — lift the Huawei ban or no trade deal — Trump eased up a bit.

“U.S. companies can sell their equipment to Huawei,” he said, though export bans will remain for products with clear national-security implications.

This partial concession has drawn the ire of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

“Huawei is one of few potent levers we have to make China play fair on trade. If President Trump backs off, as it appears he is doing, it will dramatically undercut our ability to change China’s unfair trades practices,” said Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer. And Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio is threatening legislation to keep the pressure on Huawei.

Trump also backed off on his threat to (tax American consumers) by hitting China with more tariffs. As a reminder, the New York Federal Reserve has estimated that Trump’s tariffs thus far have cost the average American household $831—a de facto tax hike by Trump.

Meantime, what do we get in return? A Chinese promise to start buying large amounts of American farm products. The same products they were already buying before the trade war began — and before American taxpayers had to cough up billions to bail out farmers who lost their hard-won export markets.

This is akin to an arsonist setting your house on fire, then giving you a hose, and then demanding gratitude for putting out the fire.

Trump mocks American values

By cozying up to dictators and despots, Trump also mocks one of the founding tenants of America: Human rights. He couldn’t care less, for example, that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman oversees a brutal regime that executes opponents at a rapid clip, including the recent beheading of a young man who had been arrested as he was preparing to begin studies at Western Michigan University. Mujtaba al-Sweikat’s “crime?” He allegedly attended a pro-democracy rally.

The prince, known by his initials MBS, was also connected to the now infamous October assassination and dismembering of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

And yet, the president called it an “honor” to meet MBS. “You have done a spectacular job,” Trump raved, calling the brutal killer “a friend of mine”.

Trump’s praise of North Korea’s Kim was similarly sickening.

It’s a “great honor,” as he said, to meet Kim. Why is it an honor to step into a repressive communist dictatorship and shake hands with a man who butchers his own people? Why is it an honor to meet Saudi Arabia’s MBS? Why the never ending sucking up to Putin? Why is Xi Jinping your friend?

Duty or responsibility in the pursuit of American national interests, perhaps. But honor? No. The president’s behavior in the world stage this weekend was embarrassing and degrading.