FRANCE/GERMANY/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Donald Trump may have just torched his last real friend in the Western alliance, someone he could have counted on when the going gets tough. In what was supposed to be a frank exchange of views, French President Emmanuel Macron apparently got the full Trump treatment the other day when he tried in a phone call to level with the one world leader who does not support being leveled with, even coming from his closest confidants. And with a succession of battles looming on the trade front, on Iran’s nuclear future, on migration and climate change, not to mention a dicey North Korean summit in Singapore, Trump needs all the friends he can get. Now, Trump seems to be flying entirely solo, as Macron, long an apparently reliable wingman, peels off, reaching a long-awaited, though not unexpected, reconciliation with his principal challenger for European leadership — German chancellor Angela Merkel. Defaulting to confrontation and pique seems to be how two sources familiar with the recent telephone call between Trump and Macron described it to CNN. How is this even possible? What other president could possibly have reacted in this manner to frank criticism from an ally and called it a ‘win?’ The saddest part of all is that Trump apparently failed to even comprehend the context. Macron and Merkel, who herself has had a pretty frosty relationship with Trump, have been getting decidedly chummy themselves recently.”
-David A. Andelman, “Trump torches Macron, his last friend in the G-7,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, June 5, 2018 3:40 am