“He judged all the pieces from the attitude of the property entrepreneur he had been earlier than politics,” she wrote of Trump. “Every property may solely be allotted as soon as. If he didn’t get it, another person did. That was additionally how he regarded on the world.”
“For him, all international locations had been in competitors with one another, wherein the success of 1 was the failure of the opposite; he didn’t consider that the prosperity of all may very well be elevated by way of co-operation.”
Merkel’s feedback are notable due to the excessive stage of respect she commanded amongst European political leaders, at the same time as her reign over Germany ended. Her ideas on how greatest to deal with with the ex-president will probably be of notice to politicians making ready for a second Trump time period.
The previous Christian Democratic Union chief discovered the Trump relationship so difficult, she even sought recommendation from Pope Francis on easy methods to cope with him.
“With out naming names, I requested him how he would cope with essentially differing opinions in a bunch of necessary personalities,” Merkel wrote, referring to a dialog across the time Trump was threatening to drag the U.S. out of the Paris local weather settlement. “He understood me instantly and answered me straightforwardly: ‘Bend, bend, bend, however be sure it doesn’t break.’”
“I preferred this picture. I repeated it to him. ‘Bend, bend, bend, however be sure it doesn’t break.’ On this spirit, I’d attempt to remedy my downside with the Paris Settlement and Trump in Hamburg.”