I am a citizen of both the U.S. and Denmark. In my personal opinion, given the long series of aggressively disrespectful and historically ignorant statements about European nations and NATO allies coming from Donald Trump and many members of his administration, European nations should unite in demanding that all U.S. military bases in Europe and Greenland be closed and sent packing. Furthermore, I believe European nations should immediately make serious plans to deal economically with China, Canada, and any country other than the U.S. and its business interests.

The U.S. is in massive debt to China and Europe. I would sell the U.S. bonds they hold and call in all U.S. debt. That would be a very real wake-up call for Trump and for all U.S. citizens. Donald Trump is an asinine bully, and only a strong position like the one I suggest will make him behave like a reliable business partner and political ally to those nations who have for so many decades treated the U.S. government with respect and loyalty.

Whatever happens, as a citizen I ask the Danish and Greenland governments to not be fooled by Trump’s intimidatory tactics, to not give the U.S. – or any other country – so much as a square inch of Kalaallit Nunaat.

V.M.

The measles outbreak in South Carolina now stands at 664 cases, more than doubling in a few weeks, officials said this week. The highly contagious virus has also spread onward to North Carolina, Ohio and Washington state, and similar outbreaks are unfurling in Arizona and Utah as well.

The outbreak, which first began in Texas a year ago this week, has spread to most US states – and as the US passes the one-year mark, its measles-elimination status will probably end, a symbol indicating an expected wave of year-round preventable disease. The outbreak has been plagued by misinformation, with Robert F Kennedy Jr, secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services and longtime vaccine critic, framing measles vaccination as a personal choice and promoting unproven treatments.

Greenland isn’t about national security. it’s about a president’s fragile ego, as usual.

“The effect of power and publicity on all men is the aggravation of self, a sort of tumor that ends by killing the victim’s sympathies; a diseased appetite, like a passion for drink or perverted tastes; one can scarcely use expressions too strong to describe the violence of egotism it stimulates.” — Henry Adams, “The Education of Henry Adams”

Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968. The day before, he delivered a speech (it would be his last) at the Church of God in Christ’s headquarters building in Memphis, now generally known as the “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech. About halfway through it, when discussing a court injunction forbidding a planned rally and march on April 8, King had this to say about the first freedoms guaranteed in the Bill of Rights:

“Now about injunctions. We have an injunction and we’re going into court tomorrow morning to fight this illegal, unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America is to be true to what you said on paper. If I lived in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand some of these illegal injunctions. Maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment privileges, because they haven’t committed themselves to that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of press. Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for rights. And so just as I say we aren’t going to let any dogs or water hoses turn us around, we aren’t going to let any injunction turn us around.”