Trump's Meryl Streep attack shows just how petty America's new president is
When Meryl Streep presented a piece of her broken heart at the Golden Globes 2017 without naming anyone, almost everyone, everywhere knew how the man at the centre of her attack would react — of course, with his trademark strategy — name-calling.
Reacting to her speech, which he initially said he hadn't seen, the US president-elect called Streep one of the most overrated actresses in Hollywood.
Meryl Streep, one of the most over-rated actresses in Hollywood, doesn't know me but attacked last night at the Golden Globes. She is a.....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017
Trump has proved how right Streep and all those "liberal movie people" are.
"There was one performance this year that stunned me. It sank its hooks in my heart. Not because it was good. There was nothing good about it. But it was effective and it did its job. It made its intended audience laugh and show their teeth. It was that moment when the person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter. Someone he outranked in privilege, power and the capacity to fight back," Streep said in her speech that focused on the incident when Trump imitated a disabled reporter.
A much-stung Trump screamed: "For the 100th time, I never "mocked" a disabled reporter (would never do that)..."
"groveling" when he totally changed a 16 year old story that he had written in order to make me look bad. Just more very dishonest media!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017
Trump first responded to the speech in a brief interview with The New York Times shortly after the Golden Globes. Although he said he had not seen Streep's speech or any other part of the show, he dismissed her as “a Hillary lover” and said that he was “not surprised” to be attacked by “liberal movie people”.
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'Who are we, and what is Hollywood anyway?' [Photo: DailyO] |
Trump was back with his "instinct to humiliate" (that broke Streep's heart) on Twitter and sounded every bit of that demagogue he is being accused of.
In her passionate speech, while accepting the Cecil B. DeMille lifetime achievement award, Streep urged the press to address "every outrage". “That’s why our founders enshrined the press and its freedom in our Constitution. So I only ask the famously well-heeled Hollywood Foreign Press and all of us in our community to join me in supporting the Committee to protect journalists because we are going to need them going forward and they’ll need us to safeguard the truth,” she said.
Not long after, Trump slammed the “dishonest media”, with a tweet around the same time the awards ceremony ended.
Dishonest media says Mexico won't be paying for the wall if they pay a little later so the wall can be built more quickly. Media is fake!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2017
He was reportedly referring to the media’s coverage of his January 6 tweet, in which he slammed the "dishonest media" for not reporting that “any money spent on building the Great Wall (for sake of speed), will be paid back by Mexico later!”. His new move on the Mexico wall was criticised as something "Mr Trump somehow forgot to mention during the campaign".
During his presidential campaign Trump made the Mexican border wall one of his main poll planks with repeated claims that he would make Mexico pay for the wall. Mexican officials, however, have strongly stated that the country has no intention of ever paying for it.