Power officially transferred from one president to the next on Friday. With the new administration comes a seemingly new era. However, there are questions as to how presidential the new President of the United States –-Donald J. Trump — is. In his Inaugural Address, President Trump established himself as a nationalist hero of the United States. It is out with the old and in with the new. “This American carnage stops right here and stops right now,” he said. He also stated that the United States would now be operating under a zero-sum policy of “America First.” Reminiscent of imperialism, his new policy implies that there are limited resources in the world and that the best outcome for the United States is to take as large a piece of the pie as possible. It is aggressive and selfish. And it points to the toddler inside Trump. Toddlers are known for their inability to share and the extent to which they will go to protect their possessions. Like Trump, toddlers do not see the benefits of letting others have anything. They operate under the policy of Toddler First.

Under the Toddler First policy, there is only one vision—Trump’s vision to make America great again. Anything that opposes this vision is subject to criticism or denial. 

“You are the single biggest liar,” Trump said, addressing Ted Cruz in a primary debate. “You probably are worse than Jeb Bush.” 

During the second presidential debate Trump indicated that the reason Secretary Hillary Clinton thought it was “awfully good that someone with the temperament of Donald Trump is not in charge of the law in our country” was that she would “be in jail.” More recently on Twitter, Trump dismissed Meryl Streep’s criticism by calling her “one of the most over-rated actresses in Hollywood” and Representative John Lewis by saying he “should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart … All talk, talk, talk – no action or results. Sad!” 

Trump has appointed himself as “Chief of Truth” by calling CNN fake news and questioning whether former CIA Director John Brennan was the “leaker of fake news.”

By undermining the press and the intelligence agency while simultaneously branding himself as the nationalist champion of the people, Trump has established an autocratic aura about himself. In other words, Trump is the golden success at the center of the universe, the egotistical toddler. 

According to him, it is oxymoronic to rationally stand against him. But what exactly does President Trump stand for? Under this new administration, do we profit with Trump, do we fight Trump’s wars, do we enjoy our liberties, or do we sell ourselves a dreamlike rhetoric of fanatical patriotism? With the toddler in control of the military, intelligence agencies, an aligned Congress, and the press, he is certainly already one of the most powerful presidents in history. But the fate of the playground, the United States, remains in question.