Trump’s much-promoted first 60 Minutes interview as president went just about as well as expected, with lines like “[With climate change] something’s changing and it’ll change back again,” “I don’t want to pledge. If I pledge, I’ll pledge,” and “I’m not a baby. I know these things.”
Perhaps the best summary of Trump’s interview boils down to “Lesley, it’s okay. In the meantime, I’m president — and you’re not.”
In answering question after question, on everything from climate change to Russia’s influence of the election to his relationship with Kim Jong Un, Trump was combative, argumentative, and utterly self-absorbed.
Remember George W. Bush saying his biggest regret was the Iraq War, and Obama saying his was not going farther to push gun control? Trump’s isn’t anything he actually did. It’s that he can’t force the press doesn’t praise his every move.
‘The press treats me terribly. I thought very strongly that, you know, the one great thing will happen is the press will start treating me great. Lesley, they treat me worse. They got worse instead of better. Very dishonest. … I regret that the press treats me so badly.’
Self-awareness and humility are not exactly Trump’s strong suits.
He admitted that his friend and “love,” Kim Jong Un, has a bloody record of human rights abuses, “Sure. I know all these things. I mean — I’m not a baby. I know these things,” and that Putin meddled in the 2016 elections “They — they meddled. But I think China meddled too,” but at no time admitted he had been wrong or misjudged anything or that cozying up to strongman dictators is a bad thing.
In the end, it all came back down to that one quote. “I’m president, and you’re not.”
Featured image screenshot via YouTube
