In the meantime, while the major news networks are getting the vapors over whether Trump said something rude about women eleven years ago and their utter horror at his refusal to promise to be a better loser than Al Gore was in 2000, the President of the Philippines has announced that his country is breaking away from the United States and realigning with China.



That's right. One of our oldest and best allies in the Pacific Rim has decided to sever ties with the U.S. and ally with China instead. Obama has lost the Philippines.



You'd think someone in the American news industry would take notice. At least, they might pick up on that loud rumbling in Norfolk, Virginia, where General Douglas MacArthur spins like a lathe in his grave.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte announced Thursday that he was “separating” from the United States and embracing China as the new best friend of the Philippines. The 71-year-old president, famous for blunt, often profane rhetoric, announced his country’s realignment in a state visit to Beijing, where he was hailed as China’s new “brother.’’



“Your honors, in this venue, I announce my separation from the United States … both in military, but also economics,’’ Duterte said to thunderous applause at a forum inside the Great Hall of the People, the bastion of the Chinese Communist Party. Without the United States, he said addressing the Chinese audience, “I will be dependent on you.”



During the visit, China and the Philippines are signing agreements for $13.5 billion in trade deals. The Philippines also said China had committed itself to $9 billion in low-interest loans. And the Philippines offered to open negotiations with China over disputed fishing waters in the South China Sea, a surprising change of policy given that an international tribunal in The Hague had ruled in July against China’s claim of historical rights to the waters.



Duterte, who took office July 30, had other choice words for the United States during his Beijing visit. He said that "America has lost now” and suggested that he was also eager to cozy up to Russian President Vladimir Putin. “I’ve realigned myself in your ideological flow and maybe I will also go to Russia to talk to Putin and tell him that there are three of us against the world — China, Philippines and Russia,’’ he said.

Clearly the reader's concerns are misguided. After all, America is the exceptional nation and superpowers need no friends.The American Empire is crumbling, within and without On the plus side, at least Obama lowered the seas and healed the nation's racial scars.

Labels: decline and fall, mailvox