World leaders conclude: Trump is a liability, not a leader

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Seven months into his presidency, his foes have him figured out while America's friends are ducking for cover.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told CNN last week in a conversation about stability in the face of Russian aggression, that what America's NATO allies need right now is predictability: "As long we are strong, as long as we are predictable, we can also engage in political dialogue with Russia to try to avoid escalation and to avoid a new Cold War."

In the aftermath of the awful events in Charlottesville, Virginia, Trump has shown those outside America that he is anything but predictable. His wildly variant public interpretations of violent, anti-Semitic rallies by neo-Nazis and white supremacists and the removal of Confederate statues have caused European leaders to shake their heads in bewilderment.

By one day equating neo-Nazis with civil rights protesters, then days later saying the country has no place for racists before flip-flopping again, he has left international onlookers baffled.

A week later, it seems that neither he nor his White House team has learned anything, as he repeated the same mistakes at a campaign-style rally in Arizona.

This time, he also expressed support for a former local sheriff whose stop and search policies of Latinos has seen him accused of racism -- a charge he denies, which seems good enough for Trump -- and convicted of criminal contempt.

To outsiders, Trump seems to be shunning the American dream in favor of something far more sinister. Britain's former ambassador to the United States, Peter Westmacott, tweeted this in response to the Arizona rally: "Shades of 1933 Germany. And an invitation to autocrats w/o America's checks & balances to play the same game more dangerously. Leadership??"

Trump's America seems to be getting out of kilter. And while friends such as Westmacott voice their fears, America's enemies are gearing up to take advantage.

China sent a swift, stinging rebuke this week to Trump's biggest foreign policy foray since coming to power.

His much-vaunted Afghanistan plan should have marked a moment when the world took Trump seriously.

Alas, the fact it came so soon after the Charlottesville turmoil -- and that he followed it 24 hours later with a 77-minute attack on his enemies -- somewhat spoiled the moment. No one should be surprised that the wait for Trump to make sense of himself and his America is over.

In his Afghanistan speech, Trump reversed course, saying he'd send more troops to the embattled nation. He also threatened Pakistan, saying it has "much to gain" by supporting the United States and had "much to lose by continuing to harbor criminals and terrorists."

Before Pakistan had responded, China -- uncharacteristically -- came to its defense, saying the world needed to do more to recognize that country's fight against terrorism.

Pakistan, which has long played the United States off against China, seized the moment by doubling down on the Chinese comments and refuting Trump's...

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