No doubt, Trump-haters will call it "punching down" and "unpresidential," but I call it making Alinsky work for us.  Yesterday, during a press conference at the U.N., President Trump referred to CNN anchor Chris Cuomo as "Fredo," a Godfather-referencing nickname that has in the past driven him to threaten violence.

Scott Morefield of The Daily Caller picked up on the jibe:

Responding to a reporter's question about Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani's performance on the Ukraine issue, the president referred to Rudy's wild "Cuomo Prime Time" interview last Thursday before slamming CNN as "fake news." He then turned his attention to the CNN anchor who conducted the interview.

"I don't watch CNN because it is fake news," said Trump. "But I watched Rudy take apart Fredo. Fredo's performance was incompetent. Rudy took him apart. The press doesn't give him credit, because they take little tiny snippets wherever Rudy was a little bit, if he mispronounces a word they'll show that. They won't show the whole. Rudy Giuliani took Fredo to the cleaners. First time I've watched CNN in a long time. I hate to watch because it's so fake."

The president is applying Saul Alinksy's Rules for Radicals to his enemy.  Specifically, Rule #5:

"Ridicule is man's most potent weapon."

And even more importantly, Rule #13:

"Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it."

The enemy is the Trump-hating media.  In Chris Cuomo, he has the perfect target to personalize their flaws.  Cuomo is the son and brother of New York governors, a Democrat political dynasty that holds disproportionate sway over the media.  The grandees of the media are centered in New York and think everything there is more important than who lives or what happens in flyover country.  Cuomo is not that bright, and combative to boot.  Talk about someone easy to polarize — pushy, aggressive New Yorkers do not win many national popularity contests.  "I am not at all like Fredo" is not much of a rebuttal.

CNN, which has lost a huge share of its audience, is a wounded wildebeest on the Serengeti when it comes to Trump's media antagonists.  Making Fredo the hallmark of the network perfectly ensnares it in its own conceit of pandering to and employing the offspring of the Democrat establishment.

As for Chris Cuomo, he had better get used to being known as Fredo.  It will be with him for the rest of his life and beyond.

Photo credit: YouTube screen grab.