I admit to some puzzlement about the Trump-Putin summit scheduled for July 12.

 

For one thing: why (really) are they having one? Usually a summit takes place between adversaries in an attempt to mitigate a negative relationship. But Trump and Putin are BFFs: what is there to mitigate?

 

And why has there been so little discussion about it from the White House – when you consider the amount of advance puffery about the Trump-Kim meeting? And why was this meeting arranged so hastily?

 

One possibility that seems to be totally ignored: could the major (actual) agenda concern the planning of disruptions for the 2018 elections? And maybe even 2020? I certainly wouldn’t put either of those past either of them. We would have no way of knowing – until it was too late.

 

Not entirely unrelated thoughtlet: Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan should be careful if they find themselves in a Japanese restaurant: don’t eat the sushi if it’s glowing.