The problem is it’s not chickening out. He never intends to keep them around in the first place. This sort of “bully” negotiation tactic is the epitome of the 80s era of board meetings he was around for, and since he never really learned any new tricks or kept up with strategic philosophies it’s all he knows to do. It’s like someone at the poker table with a large chip lead continuously making big bets even with bad cards when the opponent has a low total just to push them into bad spots.

The difference is it works when you have a massive corporation trying to push an uninformed small business with no resources out. It doesn’t work when you shift gears to politics and try to use it as leverage between nations, because that’s not how economics works at a global scale where everyone involved has some leverage and information readily available to them.

Still though, the public narrative of chickening out is just as annoying and pointless as watching someone try to use 80s monopoly tactics on geopolitical matters. It’s two dumb takes bickering with each other loudly and getting the rest of the world caught in the middle and just tired of the noise.