Ex-basketball player Dennis Rodman is going to Singapore with President Trump’s delegation next week, maybe, according to a piece in the New York Post. With information from “sources”, it is reported that Rodman fits the bill as a goodwill ambassador ( a sports ambassador, if you will) who can be useful to help move diplomatic talks along.
The Worm and little Rocket Man already have a bromance going so, and as crazy as it sounds, Rodman may be a natural addition to the team. As a matter of fact, Rodman claims credit for getting the two men to come together in the first place while feigning modesty of the role he played. During a visit in June 2017, Rodman gave Kim a copy of Trump’s best-selling book, “The Art of the Deal” as a birthday gift because Kim “didn’t understand the president.”
“I think [Kim] didn’t realize who Donald Trump was at that time, I guess, until he started to read the book and started to get to understand him. Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un are pretty much the same,” Rodman told the website.
“I don’t want to take all the credit. I don’t want to sit there and say, ‘I did this, I did that.’ That’s not my intention,” Rodman told the website.
“My intention was to go over and be a sports ambassador to North Korea so people understand how the people are in North Korea. I think that has resonated to this whole point now.”
The Hall of Famer may just be garnering support for a promotional stunt for a company sponsoring his trip. Washington Post reports that a White House correspondent for One America News Network will go to promote PotCoin. Oh.
That’s according to Trey Yingst, the chief White House correspondent for the One America News Network, which reported Tuesday that Rodman’s presence in Singapore would, indeed, be “focused on promoting” the company, which describes itself as a “community-based cryptocurrency for legalized marijuana.” Yingst cited a source close to Rodman in confirming the five-time NBA champion’s travel plans, a development first reported by the New York Post.
Color me surprised. Rodman’s intentions may be good but the guy is an alumnus of Trump’s former reality show on NBC, The Apprentice, with the participation of two seasons under his belt. Since 2013, he has enjoyed the publicity of dribbling onto the world stage chatting about how great his relationship with Kim is, given the common denominator of basketball. His total number of trips to North Korea rests now at five. He refers to Kim as a “big kid” with whom he talks about basketball.
“We always talk about basketball, that’s all we talk about is basketball. No politics, no nothing about America against North Korea, we don’t talk about stuff like that. It’s always very light.
Funny. I’m old enough to remember that Rodman was loudly denounced when he first began to travel to North Korea. When he began this bromance, conservative Americans, in particular, torched him for cozying up with the brutal North Korean dictator. Americans labeled his outreach as normalizing Kim in the eyes of the world. Rodman brought along other basketball players, though, and always said it was about bridge-building through a mutual love of the game.
“(It’s) not my job” to talk human rights, he said Monday. “This game is for his birthday, and hopefully this opens the doors and we can actually talk about certain things and we can do certain things. But I’m not going to sit there and go ‘hey, guy, you’re doing the wrong thing.’ It’s not the right thing to do, he’s my friend first. .. I love him,” Rodman said.
Rodman’s travel schedule isn’t confirmed as of yet, so it may all be for nothing, but he has certainly indicated he’s on board if he gets the go-ahead and he’s happy people may look at his participation in a favorable light.
As for Rodman possibly making an appearance, “He’s talked about it, but no final trip or plans have been made,” a representative for Rodman, Darren Prince, told the paper. Prince said that although it “seemed like everyone [in the U.S.] turned on” his client after he first visited North Korea, “now things seem to be happening, so he’s just happy it’s happening.”
Heads up, John Bolton. Dennis Rodman is at the ready.
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