The president wants to buy more land.
On our dime.
“The idea of the U.S. purchasing Greenland has captured the former real-estate developer’s imagination,” began a Wall Street Journal report last week. Donald Trump has asked about it anyway, “with varying degrees of seriousness.”
Grønland — “Kalaallit Nunaat” — is Danish territory now. But the United States does run the Thule Air Base on the glacier-dominated island already. So it might seem . . . natural.
The last major American purchase of territory from another sovereign power was, actually, from the Kingdom of Denmark back in 1917, when the United States obtained the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The notion of buying Greenland was floated back during the Truman administration, too. So there is ample precedent. Which gives Trump a plausible context to advance a destabilizing meme for his upcoming visit to Denmark, where he will no doubt be doing some “negotiating” . . . about more important matters.
And what might those be? Well, matters like the country’s contributions to its own defense. Denmark is low on the list of contributing NATO participants, devoting only 1.7 percent of GDP to defense, not the treaty level of 2 percent.
It’s mainly just amusing, of course — probably even to Trump himself. “It’s just something we’ve talked about,” he’s explained. “We’re very good allies with Denmark. We’ve protected Denmark like we protect large portions of the world, so the concept came up.”
Of course, the U.S. doesn’t need Greenland. And it certainly doesn’t need to spend money it doesn’t have to do so.
Still, there have been and will be more idiotic proposal floated this election season. Plenty.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
Photo from pixabay
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