Trump has managed to distract from the Biden memory scandal by threatening Third World War
WASHINGTON, DC – The generosity was almost certainly unintended, but it is increasingly clear that Donald Trump has bestowed upon Joe Biden one of the greatest Valentine’s Day gifts in history.
By threatening to spark a Third World War last Saturday in South Carolina, Trump handed Biden a present that did not need to be wrapped up with a ribbon, and simultaneously spread anxiety throughout governments in Europe which fear that Nato’s defensive shield may now come with an expiry date.
Trump’s insistence that he would actively encourage Russian President Vladimir Putin to attack any Nato ally that is “delinquent” within the alliance is now poised to become a central campaign issue.
Trump’s own words – “I would encourage them to do what the hell they want” – will be making repeat appearances in Biden’s campaign ads as the election campaign heats up. At the White House on Tuesday, the President tore into his presumed opponent like a well-rested lion encountering fresh meat on the veldt.
“Shameful”, “dangerous” and “dumb” were just a few of the adjectives the President lobbed at his predecessor. He accused Trump of sending a “shockingly, frankly un-American signal to the world”, and doubled down on his opportunity by urging Congress to pass additional funding for Ukraine to avoid raising yet more questions about America’s future commitment to the cause of freedom in Europe.
Trump snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Days that were to be dominated by a national conversation about Biden’s faltering memory were instead derailed by a discussion about Trump’s capacity to blow up the world.
That’s not a bad result for a President whose senior lieutenants have reduced themselves to blaming the news media for the flap over Biden’s demonstrable forgetfulness. Given that they cannot tell American voters that their own eyes are deceiving them, the White House is instead blaming the country’s top reporters for Biden’s inability last week to tell the still-alive Angela Merkel and the long-deceased Helmut Kohl apart.
But Trump is, more broadly, in a giving mood, creating various openings for his critics to assail him. As well as prompting a realisation that the country’s post-war allies in Europe urgently need to build up their militaries, lest by next January they can no longer rely on America’s, it is not only in defence policy that he is indicating a scorched-earth approach to government.
Trump’s decision on Monday to endorse a new team to run the Republican National Committee (RNC) is a fresh indicator of his determination to place only demonstrated loyalists of his “Make America Great Again” movement into positions of prominence.
In 2016, when Trump nominated Ronna McDaniel, a niece of Senator Mitt Romney, for the role of RNC chair, Washington viewed her as a far-right extremist, fused at the hip with Trump’s outlook.
Eight years later, he thinks she’s a milquetoast. Determined to drag the party even further to the right, Trump is forcing McDaniel to pay for her perceived weakness by defenestrating her from her $410,000 (£327,000)-a-year position.
Instead, Trump wants election denier Michael Whatley, chair of the Republican Party in North Carolina, to lead the national committee that will organise July’s nominating convention in Milwaukee and write the party’s platform (the American equivalent of an election manifesto, only with fewer cast-iron promises contained within it).
In the unlikely event that Whatley goes wobbly in his commitment to Trump’s agenda, the former president is also nominating his trusted daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, to become the RNC’s co-chair. A former chef, personal trainer and TV producer, Eric Trump’s wife is set to become one of the most powerful people in Republican politics.
If Trump wins in November, this approach – borrowed from the Borgias – will be more widely witnessed. The former president’s advisers say they are already drawing up lists of trusted loyalists who will be tapped to fill roles across the government, from the highest levels of the Cabinet to the lowest reaches of the civil service.
More than eight months before Election Day, Biden now has a fresh opportunity to use Trump’s demonstrable excesses and indiscipline to his advantage, provided he can find some fresh energy and curb his memory lapses.
As Wednesday dawned in America, Trump stretched credibility even further, publishing A Valentine’s Day Letter To My Beautiful Wife. In remarks addressed to the former First Lady Melania Trump, he claimed that “I wouldn’t be the man I am today without your guidance, kindness and warmth”.
In keeping with the spirit of the holiday, the online love letter also includes a “Wait, Before You Go!” pop-up window that allows his most romantic supporters to make a Valentine’s Day financial contribution to his campaign.
