President Donald Trump is looking awfully weak these days. Just look at Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, who is still attorney general in spite of his boss's recent bizarre public shaming.

The kindergarten aphorism about the relative power of sticks, stones and words is proving true of Sessions, but not so much Trump, whose words are indeed inflicting damage – upon himself.

In case you somehow missed it, the president has spent the last week taking jabs at the nation's top law-enforcement official for having recused himself from the Russia investigation, a move which Trump feels helped lead to the appointment of Robert Mueller, the special counsel. (Never mind that Trump's firing FBI Director James Comey was a much more proximate cause.) Trump started in on Sessions last week in a New York Times interview, saying that Sessions had been "very unfair to the president" by recusing himself; Trump has since called Sessions "beleaguered" and "very weak."

Wednesday Trump lit into him on Twitter for not firing acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe (on the grounds that when McCabe's wife ran for a Virginia state senate seat in 2015, a PAC allied with the governor of that state, who is an old Clinton ally, donated money to her). He's tried everything but following Sessions around the city ringing a bell and yelling, "Shame!"

Trump's created a problem for himself though: Who's more pathetic, the "very weak" attorney general or the hapless president who can't seem to do anything about him? Trump looks very much, to borrow Richard Nixon's phrase, like a "pitiful, helpless giant."

Cartoons on President Donald Trump View All 944 Images

After all, Sessions (and McCabe for that matter) serve at the pleasure of the president. If he thinks one or both of them isn't up to their job, then he has it within his power to do something about it. Of course, Trump firing his attorney general or yet another FBI director would trigger both political and national crises: It would presumably be the next step in the president's efforts to obstruct and ultimately quash the Russia probe. That's why his advisers are reportedly counseling against it and why, presumably, Trump is trying to drive Sessions out by belittling him into quitting instead. Indeed, The Washington Post reported Wednesday that Trump is privately fantasizing about how he could replace Sessions.

Remember that Trump is, as Talking Points Memo's Josh Marshall has repeatedly pointed out, best understood as a practitioner of dominance politics: "the inherent appeal of power and the ability to dominate others," as he put it last year. That approach achieved a measure of political success in the primaries: Bullying Jeb Bush, for example, pays dividends when he flails helplessly in response. Not for nothing did famed anthropologist Jane Goodall compare Trump's behavior to male chimpanzee dominance rituals.

But flinging poop at debate-stage peers to establish yourself at the top of the herd is one thing; when you hold the office once referred to as leader of the free world, the game has changed. Instead of establishing dominance over rivals, Trump at best just comes off as an unhinged jerk and world-class bad boss. And worse – from a purely political point of view – it signals weakness when his target basically ignores him. The eminent presidential scholar Richard Neustadt famously argued that a president's power lies in his ability to persuade; a president having to use his actual statutory powers is a waste and a loss. And Trump can't even persuade one of his cabinet members that it's time to go.

Politico's Josh Gerstein and Josh Dawsey reported Tuesday night that several of Sessions' Senate friends had reached out to him to commiserate and express their support. "Sessions has basically mused back to them he doesn't understand it either – but that he won't quit at the moment," they add. Trump is ranting and fuming while Sessions is … musing? That's what Nixon used to call "cool contempt" – the message that a would-be irritant doesn't even rise to the level of notice. That is a display of power. And Trump is bringing it upon himself: What else is Sessions supposed to do? Lash back?

No, unlike President Thundertweets, Sessions is actually staying focused on his job and advancing his odious agenda. Just this week, for example, the Justice Department filed an amicus brief arguing that federal law doesn't protect against discrimination based on sexual orientation. "The Trump administration's filing is unusual in part because the Justice Department isn't a party in the case, and the department doesn't typically weigh in on private employment lawsuits," Buzzfeed's Dominic Holden reported Wednesday. Oh no, Sessions isn't quitting any time soon.

And indeed, the situation gets worse for Trump: As stories in Politico, The New York Times and The Washington Post illustrate, Trump is managing to rally his party against himself. Republican lawmakers are picking sides in this fight and they're not lining up with their president. "I think Jeff Sessions is doing a good job, and I [firing him] would be incredibly disruptive and make it more difficult for the president to accomplish his agenda," Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn told CNN Wednesday; and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham said that there would be "holy hell to pay" if the president moved against the attorney general.

Trump proclaimed last year that he could shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue without losing support; he may have been right on that score, but crossing Jeff Sessions is apparently a far graver sin. The far-right mediasphere, ordinarily Trump's "Amen!" section, has become agitated; even the dread Matt Drudge is becoming disenchanted with the maximum leader.

On the other hand, Trump seems congenitally averse to actually firing anyone (his "Apprentice" persona notwithstanding), a fact which makes each new spasm of anger at a subordinate less likely to inspire fear than a shrug.