And yet, he is clearly the submissive one in his relationship with Putin. He is toadying, sycophantic eager to please, unwilling to criticize, and just generally in a lesser position, socially speaking. Militarily and economically, the US is in a stronger position than Russia, but Trump adopts a position of submissiveness when dealing with Putin, despite it going against what seems to be his basic motivating drive. What is going on here?
There are, broadly speaking, two possibilities. Either Trump is unaware that he has been dominated, or he is aware. Let's go through them.
Case 1: Trump thinks he's at least on an even footing with Putin
This may seem insane, but remember, Trump is insane. He also watches a ludicrous amount of Fox News and surrounds himself with his own sycophants who only tell him what he wants to hear. So, he may really be hearing, "yes, sir, Mr. Trump sir! You've got Putin where you want him now, Mr. Trump, sir!" Trump, idiot that he is, might listen to the sycophants around him, watch too much Fox, and think that he is the one in control. Insane? Delusional? Idiotic? Yes. All of these things. Remember, though, that Trump does not have a functioning brain in his head, and he lives in an informational bubble.
I am reminded here of a wonderful scene in the early part of Orson Scott Card's Ender's Shadow. You probably know Ender's Game, from the movie if nothing else. At the risk of being that guy (I'm that guy anyway), the book was better. What was even better was Ender's Shadow, which tells the same story from the perspective of Bean, who was a far more interesting character than Ender. Bean was smarter than Ender, and more pragmatically cold-blooded. Part of that was his pre-battle school experience as a homeless kid in Rotterdam. They survived in gangs. Bean's gang needed a bully to protect them. They found one-- Achilles. The problem with Achilles was that he was smart. Too smart. He started acting in generous ways towards certain members of the gang, but it was to establish dominance patterns. Not everyone got what Achilles was doing, but the end result was establishing his own patterns of relationships over and above those that existed prior. The only one smart enough to see what was going on was Bean. You have to be smart to see this happening. In order to understand the more complex games of social dominance, you have to be smart.
Let's not mince words. Vladimir Putin is far smarter than Donald Trump. It isn't close. Trump may think that they are two "bros" on even footing, but that may be because Trump isn't smart enough to understand social dynamics. A little back-slapping, some flattery, and Trump may simply be blind to his own instinctive lickspittling. In order to see what Achilles is doing, you have to have a brain. Maybe not one as scary-smart as Bean's, but one smarter than Trump's.
This really is plausible.
Case 2: Trump knows he's being submissive
This is where things get scarier. While Case 1 is plausible, Trump's submissive behavior is so blatant that it is difficult to ignore, and what is almost impossible to ignore is that most of the world, and half of the US, look at Trump and think that he is being submissive to Putin. I can't find a way to embed this from youtube, so I'll just describe it. The late, great Phil Hartman starred in one of the all-time classic fake ads on Saturday Night Live many years ago. It was for a luxury car that didn't look like a luxury car. It looked like a piece of crap on the outside, so no one would steal it, but it had all the good stuff on the inside. On the other hand, what about a great paint job on a piece of crap? Which would President Comb-Over choose? He'd go for looks over actual luxury. Why? He cares a lot about the appearance of being on top. So to speak. It isn't the dominance itself, so much as everyone seeing him as being dominant.
Would Donald Trump be OK with a situation in which he, personally, knows that he and Putin are on even terms, or he has an edge on Putin, but the world thinks otherwise? Or, would Trump rather have the world think that he [Trump] is the dominant one while Putin secretly has the edge? Knowing what we know about Trump, the answer is clearly the latter. Truth doesn't matter to Donald Trump. In any context. He is the lying-est liar who ever told a lie. Perception is the only thing that matters to Trump. The fact that he is seen by so many people as submissive to Putin should, itself, drive him nuts. More nuts.
He would have to do something to show or establish dominance, then, right?
Unless... unless...
Unless Putin really does have something on him.
Here's the problem, then. Trump's basic need to establish dominance, or at least appear dominant, should cause him to perform some animalistic dominance display. He has never done so with Putin. He did so with Kim Jong Un, and he has done so with damn near everyone else. Not with Putin. Why is he so submissive? Either he is unaware of his own submissiveness, or Putin has him, but even if it is the former, he should be aware that others see him as submissive, and that should cause him to perform some dominance display. The most plausible explanation for why he hasn't is that Putin really does have something on him.
Or maybe Trump really is so instinctive and stupid that he just doesn't get it. It's amazing how often these things degenerate into "how stupid is Donald Trump?"
