President motivated by praise, not ideology

the president was ecstatic over the favorable coverage he received for his “bipartisanship.”

“I got a call early this morning,” Schumer told the New York Times. “He said, ‘This was so great!’ Here’s what he said: ‘Do you watch Fox News?’ I said, ‘Not really.’ ‘They’re praising you!’ Meaning me. But he said, ‘And your stations’ — I guess meaning MSNBC and CNN — ‘are praising me! This is great!’”

Despite his “fake news” refrain, Trump doesn’t hate the mainstream media the way his most ardent supporters do. They sincerely believe it’s a hostile opponent in the culture war, while Trump’s anger is more that of a jilted lover. His whole life has been marked by an obsession with publicity.

The widespread animosity toward the GOP leadership among many Trump supporters only fuels the delusion that Trump can do no wrong. “Punishing” House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is now its own reward because they are part of the “globalist swamp” Trump was elected to drain.

In his “60 Minutes” interview, former White House strategist Steve Bannon insisted that the establishment is “trying to nullify the 2016 election.” Never mind that the House has passed most of Trump’s agenda (Obamacare repeal and replace, funding the wall, etc). Bannon is working on the assumption that Trump has a mandate for Bannon’s potted theories of “economic nationalism.”

The truth is that Trump’s real mandate was to be “not Hillary Clinton” — and he fulfilled it on Day 1. With the exception of appointing conservative judges, all of Trump’s other scattershot policies earned only partial support from GOP voters, which is why Ryan and most other Republicans over-performed Trump in the election.

The other truth is that Trump craves praise more than he cares about implementing his defenestrated strategist’s political fantasies. And his supporters want Trump “wins” more than conservative ones, which is why we can expect more of what we saw last week.