Donald Trump made an “embarrassing” mistake at the United Nations.
The Daily Show annihilated Trump,80, for his address at the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, where he took his unconvincing defense of artificial intelligence to a new audience, despite dire warnings from scientists and tech tycoons.
In a fresh attempt to convince the world that AI poses no dangers, the president announced, “From this point forward, all of United States documents, and hopefully the world’s, will be changed to use the much more accurate term ‘super’ as opposed to ‘artificial.’”
“Welcome to the new world of super intelligence,” he declared.
The Daily Show’s Desi Lydic quipped, “I mean, that’s a relief. Here, I was scared of artificial intelligence, but now I’d be honored to be murdered by super intelligence. Problem solved. Woo!”
The Comedy Central show panned once again to Trump, as he touted his rebranding of AI. “So it’s super intelligence. In other words, welcome to the new world of super intelligence-dash-SI.”
“Did you just say ‘dash SI’?” Lydic exclaimed. “Speaking of super intelligence, congrats on reading the punctuation on the prompter.”
“Also, nobody’s going to say ‘SI.’ That’s already what we call Sports Illustrated. It’s taken. You, of all people, should respect Sports Illustrated,” she said, addressing Trump. “The swimsuit issue is your favorite book.”
It was not Trump’s first teleprompter mishap at the U.N. After his visit to U.N. HQ last year, the president demanded an inquiry into what he called a “triple sabotage” after an escalator he was traveling on stopped abruptly, his teleprompter malfunctioned, and there was an audio issue in the hall while he spoke.
Lydic said Trump’s performance at this year’s General Assembly was “so embarrassing for America”: “We’re all used to Trump’s weird obsession with rebranding things. But this is in front of the world.”
“It’s the geopolitical version of your dad walking around in his underwear when your friends are over,” she concluded. “‘Oh my God, Dad! Trinidad and Tobago can see your butt crack.’”
World leaders and delegates did not receive Trump’s remarks well. At best, some looked bored, like a delegate from Bosnia and Herzegovina who was caught rubbing his eyes. At worst, people even walked out, like Cuban officials who didn’t bother to remain in the room after Trump declared Cuba a “failed state.”
Trump’s attempt to rebrand AI comes amid mounting calls for government regulation of the industry and warnings from AI experts and researchers that out-of-control AI bots could pose an existential threat to humanity.
