Tuesday, January 24, 2017

Keeping Tabs on our new Middle Child-in-Chief

     The 45th President of the United States has been sworn in, and a little less than one-quarter of Americans couldn't be happier. A little more than one-quarter, not so much. As for the other half who didn’t even bother to vote... who knows what they’re feeling. But the people have sort of spoken, and Donald Trump is our Middle Child-in-Chief.
     It’s been more than two decades since a Middle Child was President, when the first George Bush was in the Oval Office until 1993. In fact, Mr. Trump will be the 23rd Mid Kid elected, or 24th if you count George Washington. (George was the first born of his father's second marriage, but had two older half brothers.) That means between 52% -54% of American Presidents were Middle Children. But it’s safe to say we’ve never had one like this before.
     Throughout the primary and general election campaigns, candidate Trump’s Middle Child antics were off the charts, featuring repeated name calling, insults, mocking, claims of bias, charges of favoritism, and assorted overall whining. During the transition and first days of his administration, these classic Middle Child moves show no signs of letting up. It’s the kind of behavior that could not only be considered Middle Child-ish, but just downright childish. And to make matters worse, Mr. Trump’s closest adviser also has glaring Middle Child issues. That’s right, new chief White House strategist and senior counselor Stephen Bannon is a Mid Kid, too. Big surprise. A double dose of Middle Child Syndrome in the White House. Just what we needed. Lucky us. (Lucky U.S.?)
     But have no fear, America -- the International Middle Child Union is on the case. Today, we introduce the International Middle Child Union Presidential Middle Child Behavior Monitoring
System, or I.M.C.U.P.M.C.B.M.S. for short. Let’s be clear -- this isn’t about policy or partisanship.
After all, I’m not a political pundit. I’m a Middle Child advocate! My focus will be to analyze Presidential tweets and tantrums from a purely Middle Child perspective, then rate their Middle Childish-ness using my patented Middle Finger scale: one Middle Finger for borderline Middle Child behavior, three for serious signs of Middle Child Syndrome, all the way to five Middle Fingers for severe Middle Child meltdowns.
     From the looks of things, we’re gonna have our fingers full!

Name-calling: a standard Middle Child defense mechanism.
Middle Children don't respond particularly well to being mocked.
Middle Child 101: when in doubt, play the "no fair!" card.
"Oh, sure, you want me to take back the drone you don't want!"
Feeling wronged and cheated is a Middle Child's birthright.
Middle Children aren't used to winning, so it can be hard
to handle, as this trio of Tweets demonstrates.