Geen week gaat voorbij zonder Twitter kwakkel van Donald Trump. Deze week was het zijn kritiek op de politiek-geladen uitspraak van Meryl Streep tijdens de Golden Globes. Zijn overdreven en vulgaire taalgebruik zou gebaseerd zijn op eigen zwakte, zo schrijft Eugene Robinson in The Washington Post.1Eugene Robinson, What Trump is really saying in his tweets: I’m weak, Washington Post, 9 januari 2017.
Streep was hardly the first critic to attack Trump for that “performance,” and she won’t be the last. But Trump must have stewed about it all night, because he rose to tweet his response early in the morning, calling her “over-rated” and “a Hillary flunky who lost big.”
I don’t have to defend Streep or Kovaleski — both can take care of themselves. But Trump’s knee-jerk reaction is worthy of comment because it is so typical. The man who is about to become president is enveloped by a shell of self-regard that at first seems armor-like but turns out to be delicate and brittle.
[…] He shows nothing but high regard for anyone who says anything nice about him. Thus he calls Russian President Vladimir Putin “very smart” and quotes him approvingly, despite the fact that intelligence officials say Russia actively meddled in our electoral process.
I don’t believe Trump’s tweets are part of some sophisticated strategy to draw attention from other events and topics. To me, this looks like simple action and reaction. When someone criticizes him publicly in a way that threatens his stature, he seems compelled to hit back. He can’t seem to ignore any slight.
That’s a sign of weakness, not strength — as Putin and other world leaders surely have figured out.