Those last two sentences keep rolling around in my head. Why would anyone propose a deal that is doing serious damage to the west?

I've mentioned this before - not sure if it was here or TMF.

Trump does not agree with the concept of a win-win deal. It's only win-lose. Worse, he sees any deal where the opposing party loses as a win - EVEN IF he also loses. The only important metric is that the other party must lose.

And it's also his personal win - not his businesses (which are always legally separate from him personally), or in this case, the people of the country he "leads".

In this specific deal, he got von der Leyen to accept a 15% tariff on goods exported from the EU to the US, while the EU tariffs on US goods are much lower. In his eyes, he looks strong, so that's a win. She looked weak, so that's a lose. In his deficient view of the world as revolving around him personally, that is a perfect deal. He sees himself as the stronger leader because of this deal, propping up his fragile ego. What happens to the American or European people is irrelevant to him.

--Peter