Donald Trump’s role as the “slippered pantaloon”
In William Shakespeare’s play, “As You Like It”, his character Jaques describes the seven roles a man plays in life with his renowned “All the world’s a stage” soliloquy. The seven roles include:
- Infant
- School boy
- Lover
- Soldier
- Justice
- Pantaloon
- Old man
While we all know Donald Trump skipped the role of “soldier” because of his “foot spurs”, we can see great similarities between his real life roles and those described by Jaques.
As Trump exits Washington for Hanoi Vietnam, to meet with North Korea’s dictator, Kim Jong-un, we can see especially close similarities between Trump’s role and that of Shakespeare’s “slippered pantaloon” facing a “world too wide For his shrunk shank… and his big manly voice, Turning again toward childish treble”;
“the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound.”
Trump’s big manly voice has indeed turned toward “a childish treble” as he attempts to explain away “a world too wide” that includes the testimony of his “fixer” lawyer, Michael Cohen and his own treasonous behavior likely to be described in Special Prosecutor, Robert Mueller’s, report to the Attorney General, also soon to be released.
As the New York Times recently described “in the lead-up to the Trump-Kim earlier Singapore meeting”;
“North Korea masterfully probed for its adversary’s weaknesses. And it learned that Mr. Trump, for all his fire-and-fury rhetoric, was not just interested in a deal, but hungry for one.
The critical test came in late May 2018, when North Korean state media ran a scathing statement by a vice minister of foreign affairs that slammed John Bolton, the American national security adviser, (for “reckless remarks”) and mocked Vice President Mike Pence (“what a political dummy he is”). It warned: “We can also make the United States taste an appalling tragedy it has neither experienced nor even imagined up to now.” The next day, Mr. Trump suspended preparations for the summit — only to quickly order them resumed. The North Koreans knew then they had him hooked.”
That’s not the behavior of a President playing a role of Soldier or Justice. It’s a President resigned to the fact that he’s become a mere “slippered pantaloon” powerless to do anything other than accept whatever the dictator pretends to give him.
Trump may believe he’s escaped the glare of Cohen’s testimony and Mueller’s investigation but his escape to a dictatorial state to speak with a dictator only demonstrates he’s become a “slippered pantaloon” putting at risk the safety of the Korean Peninsula and that of all Americans. For the sake of the world Trump needs to move on to his final role as Old man!
