Trump dashes all hopes - Bombastic and unhinged

THE phrase, “campaign in poetry, govern in prose” attributed to New York governor Mario Cuomo, has been turned on its head by the US President-elect Donald Trump.

Any hope that between his defeat of Hillary Clinton last November and assuming the most powerful office in the world on January 20 he might have acquired a presidential status were dashed yesterday during the first press conference he gave since his election.

Mr Trump was as combative, bombastic and as apparently unhinged as ever, accusing his country’s intelligence agencies of publishing false allegations about him and comparing their activities to propogandists in Nazi Germany.

He refused to answer questions from a CNN reporter, describing the network as “fake news”, and repeated his plan to build a wall between the US and Mexico.

More worrying from an Irish viewpoint was his stated intention as president to force American pharmaceutical companies to bring their manufacturing bases back to the US. If that happens, it could have serious repercussions for American drug companies operating in Ireland.

He has already bullied the Ford motor Company into cancelling a $1.6bn (€1.5bn) investment in Mexico.“There will be a major border tax on these companies that are leaving and getting away with murder,” Mr Trump declared, indicating that he intends to govern not in prose but in nursery rhymes.