Meghan McCain and Joy Behar butted heads on ABC’s “The View” Thursday when Behar claimed that President Donald Trump displayed less sanity than Vladimir Putin or Kim Jong Un.
Whoopi Goldberg kicked off the segment by poking fun at President Trump for promising retaliation against Syria despite campaigning on the idea that he would never let the enemy know what was coming.
Behar took it a step further, suggesting that Russian President Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un were more likely to present a “sane” approach to foreign policy than Trump. “Well, we’ve gotten to the point in this world now where we have to rely on the sanity of Kim Jong Un and Putin over the President of the United States. That’s where we’re at. We’re hoping because here’s what the Russian prime minister … one of the guys over there … said, ‘We do not do diplomacy by tweet.’ Thank you! Thank you!”
Cohost Sunny Hostin argued that Trump might not be able to separate his frustration with other issues, such as Stormy Daniels or the Cohen raid, and that might be reflected in his foreign policy.
Meghan McCain pointed out the fact that there were going to be people attacking the president no matter what he did. “There’s no way for him to win though. When he says nothing about Russia, people get angry. When he’s threatening Russia, people get angry. I think we really need to pick our battles. I know it’s like sort of funny to laugh at this, but we’re talking about genocide in Syria.”
McCain then went on to turn the attack on Behar. “My issue is the moral relativism between someone like Kim Jong Un and Putin and President Trump. I think it’s easy to sort of sit here and say that …”
Behar interrupted, “You think that Kim Jong Un is less moral than Trump?”
McCain exploded, “Oh, my God, Putin, the aiding and abetting of Assad right now, the chemical gassing of children, last time I checked America isn’t doing that to anyone.”
Behar tried to interrupt again, but McCain reined herself in and tried to continue the conversation in a calmer tone. She added one caveat, saying, “If you think that Kim Jong Un, Vladimir Putin, Bashar al Assad, and President Trump are all the exact same thing, it’s when you lose all arguments with me, in every way.”