u/InterestingWind2153

The Chinese has a philosophy of "insulting your enemy when they are strong and flatter them when they are weak".

Back during the Obama era, when Obama visited China, they sort of indirectly insulted Obama. Its because during Obama term, the US were a legitimate threat to them. Here are several reasons:

1. China was a developing country during Obama term

2. All of Western Europe rallied and under the US banners. Obama approval rating with all western European countries were 80+ percent, for both the political class and common people class.

3. Obama himself on a personal level is VERY confident. Notice how he's a fairly mild manner humble person? It takes far more confident to be humble than to be a pompous braggart, the Chinese know this on a deep level. Xi himself always act humble.

Now under Trump, here are several reasons why the US looks pretty weak:

1. The Ukraine/Russia war expose the weakness of western weapons.

2. The Chinese rare earth sanction expose that US cannot manufacture weapons without Chinese rare earth

3. The Iran war, a middling state managed to embarrass the United States with ease.

4. Trump himself is an insecure old man. I actually watched a ton of Chinese drama growing up and there were hosts of literature of pompous pathetic Chinese emperors in the past that act like Trump. Trump is unique for American because America is a young country, but for the Chinese, they have seen this movie before.

So the Chinese both embarrass Trump a little but also flatter the hell out of him. First, Xi refuse to go to the airport to meet Trump. That's intentional. Xi actually went to the airport to personally meet up with Kim Jong-un LOL. When Xi uses the children to celebrate Trump's arrival, its both to flatter him but also to symbolize the fact he's treating Trump like a child.