On Monday evening, America was subjected to two interviews on Fox News, one of which was mildly interesting and the other was downright bizarre or fall-in-the-floor funny, depending on whether you’ve managed to retain your sense of humor amid Donald Trump’s latest push to alienate U.S. allies and ingratiate himself to the Kremlin.
Chris Wallace sat down with Vladimir Putin, for an interview that, at times, was a bit awkward – some called it “combative” (that’s how Fox characterized it). Wallace did ask some ostensibly “tough” questions, but at the same time, Putin deftly sidestepped them with a combination of deflection, aloofness and, of course, derision. Some journalists praised Wallace for “giving Putin the grilling Trump won’t“, and while I suppose we should thank Chris for his efforts, there really isn’t much point in conducting nationally televised interviews with a KGB agent.
Trump, meanwhile, was interviewed by Sean Hannity (with whom the President used to a share a lawyer). It was a predictably wild affair.
For one thing, Trump told Hannity that when it comes to the “no collusion, no pee tape” narrative, Sean and “Tucker standing right over there” (an apparent reference to Tucker Carlson, panda expert) are some of the “people who get it.” Here’s that clip:
Trump went on to explain why his predecessor was wrong to describe global warming as America’s biggest problem. Specifically, Trump said “nuclear warming” is the bigger issue and he even quantified how much bigger (“a factor of about five million”):
So concerned about “nuclear warming” is Trump, that he told Rex Tillerson he wanted a “tenfold” increase in America’s nuclear arsenal just because he didn’t like the look of a downward sloping line on a chart.
Hannity subsequently got him going on the “witch hunt” and Trump was more than happy to explain, for the thousandth time, how a nefarious cabal of deep state actors “drove a phony wedge” in U.S.-Russia relations.
“It’s a phony witch hunt, rigged deal”, Trump continued.
Later, Hannity and Trump debated the relative merits of the case against Paul Manafort who, according to Trump, is “really is a nice man” but who is now being treated “like Al Capone!”
Finally, as to how he thinks the summit with Putin went and what the prospects for U.S.-Russian relations are going forward, Trump said the following:
It was great today. But I think it was really bad five hours ago. I think we really had a potential problem.
Mr. President, we still have a “really potential problem” here.
I still hate commies. I must be a snowflake.
It has come to the point that I become ill just hearing his voice.