OPINION:
Dennis Rodman, self-described friend of Kim Jong-un, gave an emotionally charged and tear-filled testimony to CNN about President Donald Trump’s political and diplomatic successes in North Korea — but what was more remarkable than the wild ride of this televised interview was this little nugget offered in between the cries: Barack Obama “didn’t even give me the time of day.”
Focus on that, because it’s the most important part of the interview. It highlights a Trump victory snatched from the mouth of an Obama defeat.
Rodman, remember, made several trips to North Korea during Obama’s White House tenure, at one point telling the world he was Kim’s bestie and that the guy really wasn’t that bad — just misunderstood, maybe. Rodman suffered much criticism for his friendship; on CNN, in fact, he outright wept telling of how he was persecuted to the point where he couldn’t even go home.
But at the time, while Obama was in office, Rodman said his whole focus was on bringing diplomacy to U.S.-North Korea table, and on forging friendlier relations between the White House and Kim.
“I asked [Obama],’ Rodman said, to CNN’s Chris Cuomo, Mediaite reported, “I said, ’I have something to say from North Korea,’ and he just brushed me off. But that didn’t deter me. I still kept going back. Kept going back. I showed my loyalty and my trustworthiness to this country. I said to everybody, the door will open.”
But Obama “didn’t even give me the time of day,” Rodman told Cuomo.
Think about that for a second.
Barack Obama, the left’s king of diplomacy, the liberal’s Nobel Peace Prize winner of the century, the progressive-slash-socialist smooth-talking, soothing sayer of all-things-right-and-just — this Obama turned a blind eye to Rodman’s personal knowledge of Kim and insider whisperings. Obama turned a blind eye to what Rodman was trying to pass along from Kim.
“When I went home,” Rodman said, “I got so many death threats. I couldn’t even go home. I couldn’t even go home. I had to hide out for 30 days. But I kept my head up, brother. I knew things were going to change. I knew it, I was the only one. I never had no one to hear me, no one to see me. But I took those bullets, I took all of that.”
And today?
Today, as Trump and Kim kicked off a historic meeting and bit of deal-making?
“Today is a great day for everybody,” Rodman said.
Even Cuomo agreed: “It is a great day, it’s a historic day.”
Indeed. Trump has once again succeeded where Obama failed.
Trump has once again put to shame the naysayers who hold Obama as the standard of diplomacy, as the standard of foreign affairs wheeling and dealing. Obviously, Trump’s winning on both counts.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley.
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