QUID PRO QUO

Americans have seldom been praised for their familiarity with foreign languages. Now they have a president who is clueless regarding any form of language skill, including his own.

He has now appropriated the "quid pro quo" hit and as usual claims this was all his doing, like everything else under the sinking American sun. In reality his only inroads into the far abroad vocabulary are incursions in mafia slang or gutter insult.  But this being Trump's territory, the "Quid pro Quo" has  displaced (for how long?) the "No collusion".  Anyway, the vocabulary in the corridors of power is sloppy. 

The vice- president and the secretary of State brought their roadshow to Ankara. After a painful meeting with the Turkish president they claimed that a cease-fire was agreed upon. Such a construction is sophisticated and is supported by a set of internationally recognized rules, unknown maybe to this clueless duo. Hence the Turkish side corrected them and referred to a 'Pause", limited in time.  Nevertheless Trump claimed yet another diplomatic coup, worthy of the Brest-Litovsk  paix/bombe surprise between Germany and Russia in 1918.

There is more to come. The Pollyannas do not want to recognize the writing on the wall... Belshazzar did. True, Pollyanna's creator, Eleanor Porter, was American too, and better stay forgotten.