Donald Trump possesses many weapons in his worn arsenal of strong-arm rhetoric, but perhaps the oldest and most reliable one is the motto that no slight should ever go unanswered. The president proved this yet again when he went after the former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, because the man was sane enough to call out his tariffs and predict that all they will achieve is further isolate the United States and give the global market over to China on a silver platter.
Ever since stepping back into office, Trump has made an art out of stepping on the toes of world leaders, using threatening language to signal — nay, shout — that Biden’s era is well and truly over. He thinks being the POTUS entitles him to claim sovereign regions like Greenland, Canada, and even the Gaza Strip, and his brilliant idea to take the “destroyed” economy under Biden and force it into a golden age involves putting tariffs on the imported goods of the country’s most prodigious commercial partners.
Trump’s latest tantrum on social media involved calling the Democrats “out of control” because they didn’t applaud him hard enough during his first address to Congress.
“The Democrats are out of control. They’ve lost their minds,” Trump told the Fox News reporter, lambasting the other party for not standing up and applauding the young cancer survivor whom he honored during his address to Congress. The claim that the Democrats refused to applaud the 13-year-old DJ Daniel has been refuted since, so this is just another one of Trump’s easy lies to the press.
The 47th then followed that up by taking shots at the former Australian prime minister, because he spoke out against Trump’s tariffs and how it will only end up benefitting China. You know, like practically every other economist out there.
“President Xi will aim to be the exact opposite of Trump,” Turnbull said. “Where Trump is chaotic, he will be consistent. Where Trump is rude and abusive, he’ll be respectful. Where Trump is erratic, he will be consistent.”
Trump, in turn, called Turnbull a “weak and ineffective leader” on his Truth social page. And surprise, surprise, he still doesn’t know how apostrophes work.
“Malcolm Turnbull, the former Prime Minister of Australia who was always leading that wonderful country from ‘behind,’ never understood what was going on in China, nor did he have the capacity to do so. I always thought he was a weak and ineffective leader and, obviously, Australian’s agreed with me!”
Are you talking about Australian people, Donald, or some unknown Australian person? This is the kind of stuff you learn in school, but that’s expecting too much from a man whose own venture into private education, aka Trump University, crashed and burned to the tune of a $25 million settlement.
Back to Trump’s post: Does that mean the Americans disagreed with him when they threw him out of the White House in 2020? Oh, right, that election was stolen. It’s amazing the kind of mental gymnastics authoritarians employ to justify their own side of the narrative.
Turnbull didn’t turn the other cheek and landed a verbal blow that will no doubt leave Trump fuming.
“The reality is – if you suck up to bullies, whether it is global affairs, or in the playground, you just get more bullying,” he told ABC, per The Guardian. “I mean, are we just going to become just a conga line of sycophants creeping through the White House, paying homage to this guy and telling him he’s a genius? It’s ludicrous!”
We couldn’t have said it better ourselves, sir.
Published: Mar 10, 2025 12:40 pm