China Mocks Trump’s Twitter ‘kingdom’

• China Mocks Trump’s Twitter ‘kingdom’

The state-run Chinese media has continued to put on a brave front in the face of what appears will be a potentially very aggressive Trump administration.

It said that once Trump officially takes over on January 20, he won’t have much room for “personal initiative” – read ‘caprice’ – in the White House like he does now in his Twitter “kingdom”.

“Trump will face a number of thorny issues after taking office, some of which are left by Obama, and some are a result of his provocation to the norms.

Trump will have less room for his personal initiative in the White House than in his Twitter “kingdom,” wrote Global Times in an editorial today.

The Chinese news outlet noted that Trump, yesterday, mentioned China six times on four issues.

The US President-elect spoke appreciatively of Jack Ma, Alibaba founder. But that’s the only positive thing he had to say about China, which remained for Trump almost a personal bugbear – quite unlike Russia.

Trump said the US is losing hundreds of billions of dollars every year due to a trade imbalance with China, Japan, Mexico and other countries.

He said China has taken advantage of us economically, totally advantage of us” in the South China Sea.

Trump also believed all countries, including and especially China, “will respect us far more, far more than they do under past administrations.”

Global Times said after Trump is sworn in, “he will be responsible for every US issue” and face “scorching” public opinion, from a public and media that “still finds it hard to accept the fact that Trump has been elected as their new president.”

The Chinese news outlet called Trump’s Twitter account “a super media in the world”, but added that US mainstream media “won’t stop taming his rhetoric.”

“Trump is expected to be more cautious after he takes office where he will review all affairs, especially US diplomacy that requires second thoughts.

Trump’s first news conference after his presidential victory has shown that he will have huge challenges when he settles into the White House,” the Global Times editorial said.

It will be difficult for him “to be an unrestrained president”, it hoped.