Despite multiple crises happening in America and the release of damaging interviews with Bob Woodward (including details of him lying to the public about a deadly virus) for his new book, Rage, President Donald Trump fired off a celebratory tweet on Thursday morning praising the health of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
“Kim Jong Un is in good health,” Trump tweeted. “Never underestimate him!”
Like many of the president’s tweets, the praise for Kim is spectacularly ill-timed. In addition to revealing that Trump was fully aware of the danger of COVID-19 and deliberately chose to downplay its severity to the public, Woodward’s book also portrayed a concerning relationship between Trump and Kim, which included at least 27 “love letters” between the two men. Via Washington Post:
Trump was taken with Kim’s flattery, Woodward writes, telling the author pridefully that Kim had addressed him as “Excellency.” Trump remarked that he was awestruck meeting Kim for the first time in 2018 in Singapore, thinking to himself, “Holy shi*t,” and finding Kim to be “far beyond smart.” Trump also boasted to Woodward that Kim “tells me everything,” including a graphic account of Kim having his uncle killed.
Trump did not share his letters to Kim — “Those are so top secret,” the president said — but Woodward obtained them independently. He writes that Trump sent Kim a copy of the New York Times featuring a picture of the two men on the front page. “Chairman, great picture of you, big time,” Trump wrote on the paper in marker. (Trump falsely boasted to Woodward: “He never smiled before. I’m the only one he smiles with.”)
With the revelations from Woodward’s book in the air, along with raging wild fires in California, the reactions to Trump praising Kim were swift and fierce.
https://twitter.com/rezaaslan/status/1304083687030497280
190,000 Americans are dead because of you. No offense, but I don’t give a flying fuck about your murderous dictator friend’s health.
— Tony Posnanski (@tonyposnanski) September 10, 2020
https://twitter.com/JRehling/status/1304077573677223936
Trump just loves dictators. They play him like a fiddle but he still keeps on loving them.
— Heidi Krassenstein (@ALampoonLedger) September 10, 2020
https://twitter.com/GimmeObama/status/1304040847277686791
https://twitter.com/clwtweet/status/1304039763205292033
(Via CNN & Washington Post)