Trump calls Norwegian finance minister to demand Nobel Peace Prize
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For me, this fairly trivial scandal — although as always imagine if Biden/Hillary/ etc. — is pretty much a perfect encapsulation of a very key fact about Donald Trump, which is that — no hypebole — he has the emotional development of a small child. Like maybe three years old:
When U.S. President Donald Trump called Norway’s finance minister last month to discuss tariffs, he also told him he wanted the Nobel Peace Prize, Norwegian business daily Dagens Naeringsliv reported on Thursday.
Several countries including Israel, Pakistan and Cambodia have nominated Trump for brokering peace agreements or ceasefires, and he has said he deserves the Norwegian-bestowed accolade that four White House predecessors received.
“Out of the blue, while Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg was walking down the street in Oslo, Donald Trump called,” Dagens Naeringsliv reported, citing unnamed sources.
“He wanted the Nobel Prize – and to discuss tariffs.”
In a comment to Reuters, Stoltenberg said the call was to discuss tariffs and economic cooperation ahead of Trump’s call with Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Stoere. “I will not go into further detail about the content of the conversation,” he added.
Several White House officials, including U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer were on the call, Stoltenberg added.
The fact that a bunch of people were on the call confirms this story is accurate, as otherwise his minions would have issued furious denials.
Let’s review here:
(1) Trump, who is possibly the most famous person in the world at the moment other than maybe Ariana Grande, desperately wants this stupid-ass award. All awards of this type are stupid, and the Nobel Peace Prize is an especially stupid one, given the previous winners — a list which recalls Talleyrand’s remark that he was going to create so many noble titles that it would be a disgrace both not to have and to have one. How fucking childish do you have to be to really care about this kind of thing? I mean this as a serious question. Look I get it: a lot of people are like this. But almost all of them on some level feel at least a little embarrassed about caring so much about stupid-ass awards and accolades and all that dust in the wind crap, since caring about those things just reveals how narcissistic and childish one still is, despite all attempt to achieve Aurelian equanimity and Buddha nature.
Not Trump! He really really really wants this award, even more than he wanted the Michigan Man of the Year awardl, which doesn’t even exist, but which he loves to remind people he won — he, Donald Trump, the bestest and most important and greatest person in the whole world, was Michigan’s Man of the Year, and now he’s going to a Nobel Peace Prize Winner, which is a really prestigious and important award that everyone cares very much about, and he is going to get it, because we wants it precious yes and we shall have it gollum.
(2) The whole key to the public presentation of the self in regard to this kind of thing — this kind of thing being stupid ass awards like Nobels and Pulitzers and Oscars, and Grammys for Best New Artist in Country Electronica Hip Hop — is to pretend that you don’t actually care about the award. It’s not done as the Brits say. But not Trump! He’s a toddler screaming that he wants that cookie now, not two minutes from now, because Maddie got one, and so it’s UNFAIR if he doesn’t get one too.
(3) Maddie in this case is Barack Obama, and it drives Trump completely insane both that they gave THE MOST PRESTIGIOUS AWARD IN THE WORLD TO THAT [clang] and that giving it to him was a joke. And yes it WAS a joke, which to any halfway normal person just might suggest that lusting so publicly after a joke of an award is incredibly pathetic. But we are, to quote Marcellus Wallace, pretty fucking far from halfway normal.
I don’t know why, but this one thing, possibly more than any other single incident, drives home to me with special force what a completely fucked up person Donald J. Trump really is at the core of the howling void where his soul is supposed to be, and how fucked we all are as a consequence of the unfortunate series of events that put him where his now.
Sorry for all the swears. I will try to be thankful for the small things today.