President Biden slam dunks Donald Trump
Whenever I think of Donald Trump and some boneheaded thing he’s said — a daily exercise because he says something boneheaded every single day — too often I must reach back to my early school days to find a relevant experience by which to compare it. I must do this because Trump’s utterances are seldom of the adult world. They are typically childish, petulant and ignorant, their equivalent lives in the realm of immaturity, the milieu of the spoiled brat and the schoolyard bully.
For example, during a recent rally, Trump told the story of an unidentified foreign leader questioning his threat not to defend NATO members who do not hit the alliance’s economic contribution targets. He claimed that he said he told the unnamed leader that he would encourage Russia to attack such a country.
I doubt the truth of this anecdote, but not the malign and evil will behind it. To no one’s surprise, no foreign leader has stepped forward to corroborate this bullshit. It’s pure braggadocio, but it’s braggadocio born of a fundamental miscomprehension of normal and mature human transactions. It’s the stuff of treachery, egocentrism and cowardice. It’s just another imaginary Trump fable, told with ill-considered boastfulness without context or attribution.
But the message behind it is clear. Trump will double-cross a sacred treaty at will and for any reason. In his immaturity and ignorance, Trump brags about it because he thinks it makes him look strong, when in fact it reveals a deeply flawed character that never grew up, one that achieved putative adulthood along a very twisted path with corrupted, misshapen roots in infancy. It’s a kind of sociological neoteny, the behavioural retention of juvenile features in an adult animal.
In a speech on Tuesday, President Biden condemned Trump’s words. “When America gives its word it means something,” the President proclaimed. “When we make a commitment we keep it. And NATO is a sacred commitment. Donald Trump looks at this as if it’s a burden. When he looks at NATO he doesn’t see the alliance that protects America and the world, he sees a protection racket … because for Trump, principles never matter. Everything is transactional.”
The soul of NATO resides in its Article 5. Article 5 provides that if a NATO signatory is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other member of the Alliance will come to their armed defence. President Biden understands this. Trump doesn’t.
The President reminded us of the one and only time that Article 5 was invoked: “Article 5 has only been invoked once, just once in our history. And it was done to stand with America after we were attacked on 9/11.” For Trump, 9/11 meant nothing except an opportunity to brag and spread his personal brand of bigotry.
In a radio interview on 9/11, as you will recall, Donald Trump said, thanks to the destruction of the Twin Towers, one of his buildings, 40 Wall Street, was now the tallest in lower Manhattan instead of the second tallest. He also lied and said he saw thousands of Muslims cheering the destruction of the Towers. The disgusting insensitivity of those tone deaf statements speaks for themselves. In Trump’s grubby world, only his money, his hate and his ego count for anything. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.