Trump and Macron, soulmates

They squabble because they couldn't be more alike

President Trump and Emmanuel Macron.
(Image credit: Illustrated | LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP via Getty Images, Sashatigar/iStock)

A controversial populist president with a weird family situation hates protesters, whom he has repeatedly accused of undermining the security and prosperity of his country. He has a basically imperial understanding of his office, and clearly relishes all the trappings of being the guy in charge of a centuries-old liberal republic with a proud military history — ceremonies, public meetings with other leaders, big pointless parades with tanks and other hardware. Recently he said something rude about a certain trans-Atlantic military alliance, and his foreign counterpart called his remarks "very nasty."

When Donald Trump rebuked President Emmanuel Macron of France at this week's NATO conference for referring to the organization as "brain dead," he was derided by the same people who usually call him irresponsible for saying any negative about it. This is not necessarily fair. It should be possible to argue simultaneously that NATO should be spoken of reverently because of its heroic stand against Soviet tyranny, for which the United States deserves much of the credit, and that the other member states do not contribute sufficiently to their common defense. But when attempting to explain the words and behavior of this president some bizarre personal motive is usually a safer bet than a principled, albeit complex, set of positions.

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Matthew Walther

Matthew Walther is a national correspondent at The Week. His work has also appeared in First Things, The Spectator of London, The Catholic Herald, National Review, and other publications. He is currently writing a biography of the Rev. Montague Summers. He is also a Robert Novak Journalism Fellow.