Eli Lake, Columnist

Trump Evangelizes for American Exceptionalism

His foreign policy platform was "America First," but his UN speech hints at a neocon conversion.

September 19, 2017 at 7:51 PM UTC

Eli Lake is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering national security and foreign policy. He was the senior national security correspondent for the Daily Beast and covered national security and intelligence for the Washington Times, the New York Sun and UPI.

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If you want to get a sense of the enduring power of American exceptionalism, watch President Donald Trump's address Tuesday to the United Nations General Assembly. Here we got a clear message from the candidate whose foreign policy platform was "America first": He implored the regimes of weaker rogues to clean up their acts, or else.

The president threatened total destruction for North Korea. Its leader, whom Trump called "rocket man," is on a "suicide mission for himself and for his regime," Trump warned. "The United States is ready, willing and able, but hopefully this will not be necessary."