France's President Macron has made Washington D.C. traffic even worse than it usually is. He hasn't accomplished a whole lot else except getting the foreign policy crowd to dub him the new "Leader of the Free World" after Merkel apparently lost the title.
But Macron isn't the leader of much of anything.
French presidents generally posture to show their independence. It's a tedious ritual that everyone expects. When the leader of France insults you, it means that he needs you. And Macron has been more obsessed with showing up Trump while at the same time clinging to him. The strange relationship isn't so strange if you look at it from the continental angle.
The British draw strength from the Anglo-American bond. But the French want to appear as if they don't need the United States.
But what Macron's attacks on Trump, during a state visit, demonstrated was that he needs Trump very badly. The new "leader of the free world" isn't leading much of anything. The strikes on Syria would have been a hopeless proposition without America. And Trump can change the situation in Iran drastically without ever consulting Macron.
Macron isn't the power player in this relationship. And his posturing doesn't signal strength. It communicates weakness.