The discussion of President Trump's by-now-notorious handshakes will be a study for future scholars, if there are any. French President Emmanuel Macron is not an especially tall man, but he has apparently worked on his grip so as to discomfit the American President, at least whilst seated. (Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, tall and rather fit, has done the best at blocking Trump's peculiar use of what should be a friendly greeting as a dominance display.) You can tell by the straightened state of Trump's grin that he feels this grip in the central vicinity of his man-spread.
Well done, Macron! I have to say, this particular silver-back primate thing Trump does annoys me because it is so transparently a dominance thing. It is without subtlety or chill. It is all brittle manhood and schoolyard bully. Shake hands like an adult, Trump! So embarrassing. (Was he raised indoors by people?)
But this is just a symbol of his general world-stage awkwardness. He also muscled Montenegro PM Dusko Markovic out of his way, lumbering to the front of a photo line-up. (Was this political or just how Trump usually treats other people when there are cameras? One can scarcely answer.) He belabored a point that hasn't actually got any ground regarding US taxpayers somehow being out of pocket regarding NATO allies not quite paying quite what they should on defense spending (2% of GDP). But the language he uses is way inexact and our allies think he's a tool for bringing it up, actually.
Trump seems to be aware he isn't greatly loved (I would say Brussels underscored that for him) in Europe and he has his weird talk about trade (Globalization from say, the late 1980's to present, seems to have missed him, huh? What he knows about manufacturing I could shove in my navel and still have room for a blue whale.) that seems about vengeance rather than economic realities (probably because former President Obama had a better crowd than him. That Vienna-sausage-fingered struggle is apparently all too real.)
I found him embarrassing and ill-suited to the world stage. But keep in mind, this is Trump just doing diplomatic pose-downs in a controlled environment that doesn't encourage his discomfiture. He isn't taking the kinds of questions we have for him right here in the US. And as he keeps right on tripping, I know questions continue to pile up.
1 comment:
If I'm not mistaken, he hasn't done a single press conference on this trip. Probably unprecedented. Just an eternal embarrassment. He should just stay home or better yet, resign (even though Dense would be no better on policy).
Post a Comment