Macron’s Training Montage Meets an Unscheduled Sparring Partner

President Macron has clearly been putting in the hours. The jogging with marines, the punchbag work, the aviator sunglasses [1] 

There was a voluntary military service programme for 18-year-olds, €36 billion in new defence spending, troops deployed to Greenland, and a Davos address warning that Europe “prefers respect to bullies.” To remain free, he declared from the Istres air base, “one must be feared.” The man was in peak political shape. You could almost hear the training montage music swelling in the background.

But just as he’s admiring his form in the mirror… WHAM! From stage right comes an unexpected blast of American momentum causing that careful conditioning to crumble. Donald Trump leaked Macron’s private text messages, threatened a 200% tariff on champagne, claimed to have forced France to raise drug prices, and even took aim at Macron’s new Top Gun inspired  persona – “What the hell happened?”. 

It turns out that in the global heavyweight division, you can train as much as you like, but you don’t always see the knockout coming.

Footnotes

[1] Worn to protect a burst blood vessel, though the Top Gun effect was presumably a bonus.