The president of the United States, on his blog this morning (all capitalization, punctuation, and missing/wrong words verbatim):

I have always been a big fan of Tim Cook, and likewise, Steve Jobs, but if Steve was not taken from the Planet Earth so young, and ran the company instead of Tim, the company would have done well, but nowhere near as well as it has under Tim. For me it began with a phone call from Tim at the beginning of my First Term. He had a fairly large problem that only I, as President, could fix. Most people would have paid millions of dollars to a consultant, who I probably would not have known, but who would say that he knew me well. The fees would be paid but the job would not have gotten done. When I got the call I said, wow, it’s Tim Apple (Cook!) calling, how big is that? I was very impressed with myself to have the head of Apple calling to “kiss my ass.” Anyway, he explained his problem, a tough one it was, I felt he was right and got it taken care of, quickly and effectively. That was the beginning of a long and very nice relationship. During my five years as President, Tim would call me, but never too much, and I would help him where I could. Years latter, after 3 or 4 BIG HELPS, I started to say to people, anyone who would listen, that this guy is an amazing manager and leader. He makes these calls to me, I help him out (but not always, because he will, on occasion, be too aggressive in his ask!), and he gets the job done, QUICKLY, without a dime being given to those very expensive (millions of dollars!) consultants around town who sometimes get it done, and sometimes don’t. Anyway, Tim Cook had an AMAZING career, almost incomparable, and will go on and continue to do great work for Apple, and whatever else he chooses to work on. Quite simply, Tim Cook is an incredible guy!!! President DONALD J. TRUMP

Matthew Yglesias, on Twitter/X, first:

You can see in Trump’s take on Tim Cook what he really likes about tariffs, which is nothing to do with economics and everything about how it makes business leaders dependent on his goodwill.

and second:

Also appreciate that Trump threw in a hot take about Apple being better off without Steve Jobs.

The man loves to post!

Yglesias is exactly right re: Trump’s obsession with tariffs. There is zero underlying economic philosophy behind them. He likes tariffs because he sees them as a way to exert political power. I’d add only that Yglesias is being a tad deferential/euphemistic when he says “makes business leaders dependent on his goodwill”. Trump himself used the right phrase to describe why he likes tariffs — they get business leaders to “kiss his ass”. Trump’s own words.

Yglesias’s second point is directly related to the first. There’s no evidence that Trump and Jobs ever met, personally, but Trump admired Jobs and has an intuitive understanding that Jobs would not have kissed his ass, and to Trump, that’s the most important thing about Cook. Rightly or wrongly, Cook took/takes that one for the team. Jobs wouldn’t have (and, if he had lived, would have probably sent COO Tim Cook to do it), and Trump knows it.

Lastly, hat tip to Trump for the self-deprecating reference to his having mistakenly addressed Cook as “Tim Apple” at a public meeting back in 2019. He’s still funny when he’s in the right mood.

Bonus: Mekka Okereke color-coded each sentence of Trump’s post in four categories: (1) praise for Cook; (2) belittling other people; (3) self glorification; and (4) putting his own name in all caps.