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Trump takes his show of weakness on the road

Chris Brennan   Paste BN

Let’s start today’s newsletter with a news haiku:

“Inconclusive” is

no where close to the same as

“obliterated.”

President Donald Trump took his show of weakness on the road this week to a NATO meeting in Europe, where the world’s most powerful man and commander in chief of a mighty military could not stop himself from pretending to be a victim.

Trump used a platform about world security to whine about accurate reporting – first scooped by CNN, then matched by others – about a report from the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency that suggested the American bombs dropped on Iranian nuclear facilities on June 21 set that country’s program back by a few months.

Trump, of course, had declared victory before the dust settled, pronouncing the nuclear facilities had been “obliterated.” Speaking at NATO on June 25, he said intelligence reports on the results of the bombings were “inconclusive” but then again insisted the targets were obliterated.

Inconclusive or obliterated? Both could be on target. But the second claim can’t be certain – for now – if the first one is accurate. And Trump said both.

In such moments of cognitive dissonance, Trump’s go-to tactic is to blame the media. And that’s just what he did at the NATO meeting, lashing out at reporters and outlets, calling them “scum” for accurately reporting what his own administration had deduced.

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Is there a more effective way to look weak on the world stage? Turns out, there is. And Trump found it, attempting to use America’s military as human shields for his own thin skin.

Trump tried to claim that media reports about his administration’s early conclusions were somehow demeaning attacks on the performance of our military. If that were true, then the Trump administration’s own conclusions would also be attacks on our military.

That’s not true, of course, just like Trump’s claims about the media were just thin cover for his petulance.

This is as pathetic as it is predictable. In the absence of evidence, Trump always rushes in with rhetoric. And, even if evidence later contradicts his rhetoric, Trump sticks to his original story because he knows it will have also stuck with people who back whatever he says. That allows him to dismiss anyone who points to the evidence as cranks pushing “fake news.”

In this situation, it’s a good idea to examine motivation.

Trump wants an unchallenged success because he pines for international acclaim. But what motivation could the DIA have, beyond an early and accurate assessment? There’s plenty of upside for Trump to misrepresent the results, but not much motivation for DIA to do so.

Here's what else we're writing about this week:

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