'12-year-old': Profile shows Trump is in an 'adult fantasy camp' as he grows more childish
Donald Trump was accused of acting like a “12-year-old boy” living in a fantasy land during his second term in a brutal profile from Politico’s Jonathan Martin on Thursday morning.
According to the longtime White House correspondent, the largest difference between the president’s first term and his second go-around in the Oval Office has been his overriding lack of seriousness about his job, with Martin writing, “... he’s turned the office into an adult fantasy camp, a Tom Hanks-in-Big, ice-cream-for-dinner escapade posing as a presidency.”
Pointing to the president’s lackadaisical attempt to help Republicans in the House keep a pivotal seat this week, Martin claimed that Trump couldn’t be bothered because he's having too much fun doing nothing but playing at being president in the White House.
“Why can’t he be bothered to show up in a blood-red House district when base turnout is vital to his party’s majority, which is so threadbare it may not survive this Congress?” he asked before answering, “The answer is that Trump is living his best life in this second and final turn in the White House.”
“The brazen corruption, near-daily vulgarity and handing out pardons like lollipops is impossible to ignore and deserves the scorn of history. How the president is spending much of his time reveals his flippant attitude toward his second term. This is free-range Trump. And the country has never seen such an indulgent head of state,” the journalist wrote before adding, “There’s fun trips, lots of screen time, playing with toys, reliable kids’ menus and cool gifts under the tree — no socks or trapper keepers. Yet, as with all children, there are also outbursts in the middle of restaurants. Or in this case, the Cabinet Room.”
Pointing to Trump’s increasing penchant for leaving the White House to flit around the country to attend sporting events, he noted that “Trump’s cavorting goes well past sports” as he seeks to hang out with celebrities.
“He has no more interest in open government than any pre-adolescent would, but he does like attention,” Martin wrote. “That’s why the cameras are brought in nearly every day, for whatever executive order he is ostensibly there to promote or a foreign leader whose name he can’t always summon. The point is to see himself on TV.”
The Politico columnist pointed out Republicans should expect more out of Trump. "Even the most acute case of arrested development can’t slow age. And the older one gets, the more they reflect their true selves. Trump will be 80 next year. Why would Republicans think he’d grow up now?” he asked.
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