By Jim MANNION
US President-elect Donald Trump on Friday shrugged off the strikingly divergent positions his cabinet picks have taken on Russia, torture, and a host of other issues, saying he wanted them to express their own ideas.
"All of my Cabinet nominee (sic) are looking good and doing a great job," he said in an early morning tweet exactly one week before he takes office. "I want them to be themselves and express their own thoughts, not mine!"
The views of his nominees -- on public display in Senate confirmation hearings this week -- have often contradicted Trump's most incendiary pledges made during the presidential campaign.
They have variously warned of the threat posed by Russia, hailed NATO, repudiated torture, defended the US intelligence community and cautioned against withdrawing from the Iran nuclear treaty and the Paris Climate Accord.
On virtually every controversial foreign policy stance that Trump took during the campaign, the nominees hedged and backtracked and sought to assure senators that they shared the consensus that has shaped Western strategic thinking and institutions since World War II.
Read the full story at SpaceDaily