Keller @ Large: President Trump's Calculated Cyberbullying

BOSTON (CBS) - Bullying has always been part of human nature, but in the age of the internet and the smartphone, it's become much easier to harass, humiliate and intimidate someone. This has made bullying more ubiquitous than ever in the lives of our kids, as First Lady Melania Trump pointed out in remarks Monday to a conference on cyberbullying.

"In today's global society, social media is an inevitable part of our children's daily lives. It can be used in many positive ways, but can also be destructive and harmful when used incorrectly," she said.

Of course, any comments on this from Mrs. Trump are inevitably greeted with comments about her husband's prodigious use of social media to bully others, and there's no denying the president's long track record of using his power and high profile to punish, ridicule and manipulate others.

But instead of wallowing in the glaring contrast between the First Lady's condemnation of cyberbullying and her husband's addiction to it, consider the practical application of the most recent wave of presidential bullying.

It's pretty clear Mr. Trump is expecting special counsel Robert Mueller to issue, maybe sooner than later, a report that won't be flattering. He wants to prepare his core supporters and anyone else he can persuade to reflexively reject those findings. And so he puts out name-calling tweets like this one:

This is calculated bullying with a specific purpose. And if it works, Mrs. Trump's anti-bullying crusade will become a much harder slog.

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