A Nobel Peace Prize for Trump?

Aforeign - ployees at the State Department on Wednesday, Donald Trump commended them for faithfully performing their most important task -- applauding him.

“I must say that’s more spirit than I’ve heard from the State Department in a long time, many years,” he asserted. “We can say many years and maybe many decades.” He wanted to impress on everyone that their show of devotion was more emphatic and more deserved than that accorded any president in memory.

Trump would have no way of knowing this even if he were a keen student of State Department history, which he is not, and he couldn’t care less whether it’s true. But that’s not important. He never misses a chance to use other people to inflate his achievements and feed his ego.

Those in his presence are often enlisted, willingly or not, as disciples in the cult of personality he has tried to create. The only thing Trump enjoys more than boasting about himself is hearing others brag for him. He treats polite applause, such as what he heard at the State Department, as proof of reverence. But what he really encourages and appreciates is the most extravagant before

shower the boss with plaudits.

the “excellent” health and “incredible cardiac fitness” of the exercise- averse junk food addict he had examined.

That spectacle was evidence of Trump’s talent for reducing everyone around him to nonstop fawning. At a Cabinet meeting

turns

prostrating

themselves.

thanked the president for “the blessing you’ve given us to serve your agenda and the American

Sessions exulted, “It’s an honor to be able to serve you.” - shipful than Mike Pence, who said then, “The greatest privilege of my life is to serve as vice president to the president who’s keeping his word to the American

- can people -- serving Trump.

have adopted the same mindset. At a White House celebration for

have nominated Trump

Prize

for fond hopes

for

a -

worked tirelessly to apply maxi-

end its illicit weapons programs,” they said, thus “bringing peace to the Korean Peninsula.”

Please. A guy who visited his golf properties more than 90 times in his first year in office has not “worked tirelessly” at anything. And it is only a fond hope that he will achieve anything lasting or important in

is some- got it in 2009 -

-- to the surprise - mittee was widely criticized for

tribute so preposterous that he has not said it or would not believe it.

Americans have generally regarded their presidents as fallible humans who deserve endless scrutiny and criticism. Extracting fulsome worship is supposed to be the province of medieval monarchs and communist dictators. But Trump sees the presidency mainly as a way for him to bask in glory.

What the president’s sycophants obviously know is that

the contrary, the less believable the praise is the more welcome he will find it. What Trump wants to know is how far they will go in degrading themselves for his benefit.

The answer? If there is a limit, we haven’t found it yet.