Opinion

The thing that’s always stood out to me about Donald Trump, besides his cruelty and utter incompetence, is that he’s just so sad and hostile. He comes across as a man who has never experienced a legitimately cheerful moment, aside from the schadenfreude he appears to derive from the misery he inflicts on others.

Take his behavior at the G7 summit this week. He secreted the vibe of a man hellbent on taking revenge against those around him, and all of the other world leaders took note. At this event, and similar to previous ones, he was treated as if he had the plague while, at the same time, seeming disconnected from the moment.

In one of his most astonishingly oblivious moments, President Donald Trump may have revealed more about himself — his honest, true beliefs regarding his “talents” and place in history — than at any point in his public life. During an interview with Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman for their forthcoming book, Trump proudly offered what he called an “expert historian’s” impression of his raw fortitude. As you might guess, Trump bragged he topped a list of history’s most powerful rulers.

Now, that cringe you already feel is more than warranted. Presidents and other leaders are rarely measured by raw power alone. Nixon was an extremely powerful president in many ways, and you know how that played out. But everyone understands that this particular president sees power for power’s sake as the gold standard — the measure of the job. Prepare for that cringe to evolve into rage upon learning of the leaders he “trumps,” so to speak. “Our” president believes he tops a list that includes Attila the Hun, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Stalin, Mao, and Hitler.

If you sat down and tried to invent the worst possible person to put in charge of negotiating with the Islamic Republic of Iran — and obviously Donald Trump doesn’t count — you'd have no recourse but to choose JD Vance.

If you didn’t know, and he takes every single opportunity to tell you, he’s the vice president of the United States. And your worst expectations will be met, because he’s leading the way when it comes to negotiating with the wily and wicked Iranian government.

Many of us have spent years convincing ourselves that President Donald Trump was one scandal away, one slip of the tongue, one fall on Air Force One, one essential predicate from ouster based on a buffet of underlying reasons, any one of which would take down a normal president.

Fair warning, but here comes another prediction, and this one promises something different, something both new and tangible — actually, a few somethings.

For the first time in 53 years — and for the first time in many of our lifetimes — the New York Knickerbockers are world champions.

They achieved the ultimate goal in sports and now stand alone atop basketball's Mount Olympus.

Speculating on the basis for President Donald Trump's political and personnel moves is done only at one's peril. The man's mind, always a complex mix of paranoia, confidence, and confusion, is never linear, always leveraged, all in his personal favor.

Despite that reality, it is gravely important to speculate on the reasons that Trump would take on virtually the entirety of the GOP Senate Caucus to install Bill Pulte as acting Director of National Intelligence (DNI), doing so after pulling Pulte's original nomination to quell GOP outcry — in favor of the more experienced Jay Clayton.

Overcompensation is a hell of a thing.

Donald Trump knows he’s not universally beloved or widely respected like Barack Obama and Joe Biden are, and his entire miserable existence is one of constantly trying to make up for everything he wishes he had. Which is why he’s always making things up about himself that he wishes were real.

Why, oh why does everyone jump through hoops when Donald Trump announces yet another deal with Iran? It’s become such a joke that when “breaking news” notifications pop up on my phone these days, I always say to myself, “Trump’s touting another Iran deal.”

Only a fool would believe Trump when he says a deal is “complete.” Because once again, the man who wrote The Art of the Deal, or more accurately, paid Tony Schwartz to write it, says a deal is done. It is set to be signed this Friday in Geneva, and the entire world is responding the way it always does: by believing something Trump says and breathing yet another sigh of relief.