>>To challenge such behaviour would be more in line of my temperament.
>>But someone who has marketed "truthful hyperbole" as one of his strengths might be better advised to the contrary - at least in my book.
>>I do realize that even snippets showing Trump voicing questionable POV are probably cited out of context and perhaps cut so as to worsen the appearance. >>Combating bad intel is hard - but Trump tweeting makes me think he is curently at least as culpable of misdirection.

I see Trump as a bit of a bull. The bull enjoys attending shows and winning awards and spending paddock time with the cows. However, if people insist on staging bull fights, they oughtn't blame the bull if injury results. Current woke narrative is that if you goad the bull for months and then it takes the opportunity to deliver a retaliatory stomping, the bull is an evil disgusting creature and your goading has nothing to do with how awful the bull is.

>>Thinking about "buying Greenland" is ok in my book, but botching it up by making the process public would be stooopid even for people with "dealing skills" measured/located on the left/lower side of the bell curve.

She called the idea ridiculous. He said fair enough, not a lot of point meeting then, carefully prepending a compliment about Denmark to avoid any sense of sting. What's the beef again? I thought the narrative was guffawing that Trump wanted to buy Greenland, which does sound ridiculous to "strong" people who don't know about Seward's Folly, previous US offers to buy Greenland in the 1860s and again after WWII, or Denmark's other sale of the US Virgin Islands to the US.

>>So my estimate is that the whole thing was a red herring affair, perhaps only to skip an unwanted visit or to see himself in the press again. But anybody using such tactics should expect scenarios like your mental exercise as offshoots of own behaviour.

Alternatively, some people think Greenland has minerals, rare earths and geopolitical status the US would be wise to lock down, since China is sniffing around offering free airports they will control. Rebuffed by Denmark, Trump now is talking to Australia about partnering on rare earth refining. Perhaps there's more impetus after the recent 99-year lease of Northern Australian dockland to an Australian company that it now turns out is owned by- the Chinese government. So China now has 100 years of port facility in strategic Northern Australia. The US is going to be cuddling up to Australia quite a lot now, I think. And Denmark is unlikely to want to cede territory to China for at least a little while after calling their US ally's leader ridiculous, so perhaps that's a win too by the bull's estimation.