U.S. Denies Report that Secretary of State Tillerson was too tired to meet South Korean Counterparts

I would not doubt that there were State Department staffers and diplomats well-versed in the dynamics of South/North Korea/Chinese relationships, who would have been willing to assist Tillerson on his Asian visit. But in the end, it was President Xi who seemed the calming force to Tillerson's shaky saber rattling against North Korea.

Tillerson ends China trip with warm words from President Xi

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-tillerson-asia-china-idUSKBN16Q038

http://www.scmp.com/news/asia/diplomacy/article/2080145/us-denies-report-secretary-state-rex-tillerson-was-too-tired

US denies report Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was too tired to meet South Korean counterparts

Tillerson broke with decades of tradition by opting not to take any accredited reporters with him on the Asia trip apart from one journalist from a conservative publication.

I found this excerpt of a Tillerson interview on DailyKos, where he explains his lack-of-press policy.

It is a remarkably self-centered and arrogant statement which is utterly devoid of any sense that he is a public servant, or that the purpose of the press is to inform the citizenry (his employers) of what he's doing on their behalf.

(EM below is Erin McPike - the sole bootlicking lackey reporter granted access to Tillerson on this trip.)

=============================================================

EM: Right so your answer is you don’t intend to change this model for your next trip.

RT: It’s gonna be trip dependent. It doesn’t
mean we won’t, but we’re gonna look at every trip in terms of what my
needs are. Look my ... First and foremost is what is my mission and why
am I going? How can I best accomplish that mission? What’s the most
effective way for me to do that? I’m not a big media press access person. I personally don’t need it.
I understand it’s important to get the message of what we’re doing out,
but I also think there’s only a purpose in getting the message out when
there’s something to be done. And so we have a lot of work to
do, and when we’re ready to talk about what we’re trying to do, I will
be available to talk to people. But doing daily availability, I don’t
have this appetite or hunger to be that, have a lot of things, have a
lot of quotes in the paper or be more visible with the media. I
view that the relationship that I want to have with the media, is the
media is very important to help me communicate not just to the American
people, but to others in the world that are listening. And when I have
something important and useful to say, I know where everybody is and I
know how to go out there and say it. But if I don’t because we’re still
formulating and we’re still deciding what we’re going to do, there is
not going to be a lot to say. And I know that you’ve asked me a lot of
questions here that I didn’t answer, and I’m not answering them because
we have some very, very complex strategic issues to make our way through
with important countries around the world, and we’re not going to get
through them by just messaging through the media. We get through them in
face-to-face meetings behind closed doors. We can be very frank, open,
and honest with one another and then we’ll go out and we’ll have
something to share about that, but the truth of the matter is, all of
the tactics and all of the things were going to do you will know them
after they’ve happened.

Sounds like a CEO of a large corporation. He'll take questions from investors and analysts on calls four times a year.

dave said:

Sounds like a CEO of a large corporation. He'll take questions from investors and analysts on calls four times a year.

Spot on! I saw somewhere that Jake Tapper has tried to call him out on this... Or perhaps the more current wording: I'm hearing all over...

Best Regards,

Ron Carter

Pence is apparently a co-owner or relative of an owner of McPike's publisher....but you knew that, I'm sure. That was mentioned in the BBC and Guardian articles on Tillerson's "explanation" (whinge) about 10hours ago.

(Sorry, its late evening, I'm going to bed soon, can't think)