The Supreme Toddler: Rise of the Infantile Leader - Opinion
On Sunday, when millions of people in the Middle East were trying to understand whether to prepare for a deal with Iran or a return to the shelters, U.S. President Donald Trump issued an important update: an embarrassing image, created by artificial intelligence, showing Iranian ships on fire and captioned "Adios." A few hours later, he deepened the strategic discussion with an image of a bomb and one of his catchphrases: "Thank you for your attention to this matter." And if this were not enough to instill confidence regarding the situation, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was quick to kowtow with a cringe-inducing AI image of his own, a poster showing both leaders standing tall, Israeli and U.S. flags in the background, with the message, "Iran will never have a nuclear weapon." A strong leader knows how to write an AI prompt that will deter enemies!
This is a perfect snapshot of the era: Leaders who are waging a critical war are behaving like little children. Instead of statesmanship they offer shitposting, online content of aggressively, ironically and trollishly poor quality. Shitposts are generally deliberately designed to derail discussions or cause the biggest reaction with the least effort. This style, which has gradually become a political norm, represents the worrisome rise of the infantile leader. Trump's and Netanyahu's shitposting isn't a childish deviation from serious policy; it's how an absence of policy disguises itself as diplomatic daring. The infantile leader not only acts like an overgrown baby, he invites the public to exist within a childish consciousness: without complexity, without responsibility, without consequences. Only foolish images of lions and explosions.
In his book "The Toddler in Chief: What Donald Trump Teaches Us About the Modern Presidency," written during Trump's first term, political scientist Daniel Drezner shows that even the president's close associates describe him as a little boy: lacking boundaries, impulsive, in-your-face, prone to rage attacks and addicted to screens. In spite of that he is perceived as being a strong leader, because many insist on believing that his impulses are actually a strategy.
Every tantrum is interpreted in depth: He's driving the elites crazy, poking a finger into the eye of the leftists, deceiving the enemy or shattering an outdated consensus. Drezner, in response, quotes a former senior official in the Trump administration who mocked the claim that the president "plays three-dimensional chess," and explained: "In most cases he simply eats the [chess] pieces."
Like childhood illnesses, the infantile style of leadership is very contagious. It shows other leaders that statesmanship can be replaced with trolling, without paying a price, and trains the public to consider uninhibited indulgence as a governing strategy. Netanyahu has also understood that in the present era, infantility pays. He has always engaged in incitement and divisiveness, but in the past he wrapped this policy in a veneer of seriousness: Mr. Security, with his polished English and his impressive speeches.
In his declining years, of all times, surrounded by incompetent ministers and corrupt advisers such as Yonatan Urich and Topaz Luk, he is willing to degrade himself with childish social media jokes. Sharing the video clip "Mom, Dad, I'm a Bibi-ist" instead of a holiday greeting is a representative example: politics whose entire purpose is to annoy and to whine.
Whereas Trump is the soul of a toddler trapped in an old man's body, Netanyahu is a cynical, calculating politician. It's no coincidence that he adopted the infantile style. This tone suits the present public atmosphere, which has regressed to the consciousness of a child having a tantrum. All of Israel is behaving more and more like an infantile country: It doesn't control its impulses, it refuses to accept criticism or to respect boundaries and struggles to understand the connection between actions and consequences.
The danger isn't that Trump has infected Netanyahu with infantilism. The danger is that this style strengthens a new political type: a leader who isn't required to pretend that he's a responsible adult. In such a situation, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir is the natural successor. Netanyahu doesn't want Ben-Gvir as a cabinet member; if he continues to turn politics into preschool, he'll end up getting him as a prime minister.