The United States stands on the brink of war with North Korea. As Vice President Pence said yesterday, the “era of strategic patience is over.” But it’s becoming increasingly clear that President Trump might not know the name of North Korea’s leader. Seriously.
President Trump isn’t fond of details, at least outside of his golf courses. He’s always seen himself as more of a big picture guy. So it may not be altogether surprising that Trump doesn’t know the name of the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un. But he should. Trump is, after all, claiming that all options are on the table, not ruling out military intervention in the near future.
How do we know that Trump might not know the North Korean dictator’s name? Yesterday, President Trump referred to Kim Jong-un as “this gentleman” twice, and seemed to be confused about the fact that President Bill Clinton was dealing with his father, Kim Jong-il.
Fox News asked Trump about his plans for the Korean peninsula. But his response revealed that not only might he be forgetting Kim Jong-un’s name, he may be confusing the very alive Kim Jong-un with the very dead Kim Jong-il.
From Trump’s talk with Fox News at the White House:
I hope things work out well. I hope there’s going to be peace, but you know, they’ve been talking with this gentleman for a long time. You read Clinton’s book, he said, ‘Oh we made such a great peace deal,’ and it was a joke. You look at different things over the years with President Obama. Everybody’s been outplayed. They’ve all been outplayed by this gentleman and we’ll see what happens. But I just don’t telegraph my moves.
Watch the video for yourself:
Yes, President Trump said that he doesn’t “want to telegraph what I’m doing or what I’m thinking.” Which might be for the best if what he’s thinking is that Kim Jong-il is still in power.
This slip-up was only the most recent comment that caused confusion about whether Trump is all there mentally. The president had to be corrected when recounting the story of his recent strike on Syria.
“So what happens is I said we’ve just launched 59 missiles heading to Iraq and I wanted you to know this. And [Xi] was eating his cake. And he was silent,” Trump told a giddy Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo. But she quickly corrected him, saying that the missiles had been launched at Syria.
We’re going to go to war because Trump can’t remember what country we’re supposed to be at war with, aren’t we?