Buried in the Sand Was a Headline That Changed Everything About Trump and Russia

Returning from another long brisk walk on the beach, I’m following my sweetheart Rita heading back toward our condo, The Chalfonte, when I see this scrap of newspaper sticking out of the sand almost as it had its thumb out looking to bum  a ride from me, maybe a read. 

What stopped me in my tracks in the sand was this headline on the worn-out crinkled piece of yellowing newsprint from a newspaper to which I happen to subscribe, The New York Times, but to the digital version.  

Still, it got my attention and made me want to pick it up and give it a read.

I hardly ever see or feel actual newsprint anymore, so I miss holding those precious newspapers in my hands.  So, I picked it up almost as if it were a sacred scroll I had found buried in the sand.  

Once I couldn’t wait to hold newspapers splashing front-page headlines about news stories I had written back when I was a reporter in that City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia, where I graduated from Temple and Penn.  

At night after work, I would go around to the rear of The Philadelphia Inquirer building, then when the newspaper was headquartered on North Broad Street, as I couldn’t wait to see my stories making their rounds into the trucks that would deliver hundreds of thousands of voluminous editions of the daily newspaper throughout the city often with my story’s headline blaring across the front page. 

The headline in The New York Times I picked out of the sand seemed almost to be suggesting the topic for my next blog, the one hopefully you’re reading right now.    

The lead story on this beach edition reported how the United States and Russia had moved to “a head-spinning reset” of their renewed relationship, which sounded great to me, but wasn’t going over well with many of my liberal friends who loathed seeing our President cozying up to a criminal. 

But I can’t help thinking that’s a naïve way to look at Trump’s wheeling and dealing internationally.  

Don’t you want to keep your friends close, but your oligarchy enemies closer?  

Is it foolish to make them smile and sort of like you?  Perhaps even appreciate you? Would their round-the-clock despising you be preferable when they have at their fingertips the same extremely unpleasant nuclear weapons that you have? 

Unsettling

Yes, the talks between senior officials of Russia and the U.S. in Saudi Arabia were unsettling to Ukraine and Europe.

But how do you advance a plan to end the costly war in Ukraine in a way that’s not just fair, but more importantly saves lives, greatly benefits the U.S. and pleases Russia without causing reactions from jitters to outrage?

It’s a tight rope between mega powers Trump walks.  

Fortunately for us, Trump’s more of a sly poker-playing businessman eyeing a giant jackpot combining peace with huge payback chips in the form of rare earth minerals than a programmed diplomat strictly following a set rule of decorum. Sometimes unpredictability may be an asset along with foxy friendliness. That Trumpian smile attached to the right spiel might just be unstoppably contagious!

After more than four hours of talks, Trump’s smart pick for Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said that both sides have agreed to work on a peace settlement for Ukraine as well as to explore “the incredible opportunities that exist to partner with the Russians,” both geopolitically and economically. 

So, those four-plus hours in Saudi Arabia comprised the most extensive negotiations in more than three years between the two global superpowers, not to mention the latest swerve by Trump from punishing Russia for starting the war.

Often in business, rigidity is the pits, and it takes clever swerves here and there for parties to come together to make a monumental deal.