what s clear after day today is that donald trump is not only not sucking up to putin, he is trying to disrupt germany s cozy relationship with russia. he is doing what friends often do with friends who have gotten off track. he is having a frank and brutally honest conversation with them in hopes of righting their course and repairing the relationship. german chancellor angela merkel reacted to trump s suggestion that germany is captive to russia this way. [ speaking foreign language ]. laura: you re not going to be independent for long when putin decides to shut down that gas line. did you hear an answer to
you sum it up and here s the conditions they are presenting to the united states. our population, for historical reasons or whatever, doesn t really like you anymore. but we want you to protect us from russia which we just cut a 30-year, 400 billion-dollar deal with. and by the way, in a recent german poll, germans have a more favorable perception of vladimir putin than they do of donald trump. that s not a sustainable matrix. it just won t work. laura: you need to bring dr. phil in. you need real marriage counseling for that relationship. i want to play some of the republicans criticism. they had a resolution in the senate. 97-2 supporting the nato alliance today, seen by many as a rebuke to this president. specifically republican criticism of where trump is on things like trade and nato. let s watch. i subscribed to the view that we should not be criticizing our president while he s overseas, but let me say couple things.
here in london, i can tell you people are taking what president trump is saying very, very seriously because the united kingdom is one of those few nato member countries that does meet its 2% gdp and we want everyone else to do the same in terms of defense spending. laura: which is in part why theresa may was so muted in her reaction to this, not only her problems at home but these numbers don t look great for european contributions to the military budget of nato. let s check it out. here are the countries that actually meet the 2%. we have the united kingdom, united states, estonia, greece, and my half polish side says poland. go, poland. everybody else can t make it. you don t even have germany with all its money, including the money it s making off this russian pipeline deal. we have to wait until 2024 get 2%? most americans watching this
laura: as we mentioned, the left is going absolutely berserk over trump s challenge nato countries to contribute their fair share to their own defense. another novel concept. it s undeniable that nato is important, but why should it be off-limits from criticism from a u.s. president? what about germany? doesn t europe s largest economy have a responsibility to lead rather than just complain? joining me now is one of the true sages of history and international relations, victor davis hanson from the hoover institution. i ve been dying to talk to you all day about this. i am always in a good mood when the globalists on the other cable networks with fewer viewers are all upset. they are grim faced, they can t stand the fact that the old order is being shaken up. is this a dangerous moment for nato and the alliance of nato with a u.s. president reading them the riot act? no, i think nato goes through a lot of iterations. 73 years after world war ii, 69
funded by russian business interests and make russia and maybe even putin himself billions of dollars in emergency profits. presumably that s enough money to mean that germany can finally pay all the money into nato dues that it actually owes. two world wars and the cold war. how can you be together when a country is getting its energy from a person you want protection against or a group you want protection against? we stand together in dealing with russia we are stronger. i think what we have seen is you are making russia richer. laura: remember, both russia makes a lot of money off this and german interests make a lot of money off these pipeline projects there. as you can see, the nato chief responded to trump s very specific concerns with a flurry of generalities punctuated by banalities. not very convincing. trump is right.