My father was fond of the Spanish expression "en los pequeños detalles se ve la persona"--the person is revealed in the small details. Last week, at the summit of the Group of 7 leaders in France, two details revealed two people in two starkly different lights.

The first--who else?--is Donald Trump, the world's most powerful man, yet possibly the world's smallest. Speaking to a journalist, the president claimed that Giorgia Meloni, the right-wing prime minister of Italy, with whom he was once friendly but has since fallen out, "begged me to take a picture with her. She wanted a picture with me so badly," before adding, "I wouldn't have done it, but I felt sorry for her!"

Meloni's response came swiftly. Trump's statement, she said, was "totally invented."

"I don't know why the president of the United States behaves this way toward his own allies," she said in a video posted to social media. "After all, this is not the first time it has happened. I can only say that it's upsetting that he doesn't have the same resolve toward the enemies of the West, toward the enemies of the United States, toward leadership to which he instead proves much more indulgent.

"There is one thing he should remember," she concluded. "I never beg--and neither does Italy."

No prizes here for guessing who's........

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