David Sanger

But I didn't see any evidence in the course of our encounters that he was substantially different from when I dealt with him in the first term.

And I think that in military operations, he's got to have in the back of his mind the recognition that if one of these goes bad in a big way, that that will be the defining characteristic of his second term.

It is interesting, Terry, that the countries that he picks fights with are countries that really can't fight back in a significant way.

Venezuela would be a good example of this.

The more modest military operations he's had in Syria, mostly against terror groups or in Nigeria or other places where he has just made a show of U.S.

air power.

He is very reluctant to put troops on the ground.

And that's because of the MAGA fear in his base that we're going to get into new forever wars.

And he got elected on the thought that we're not doing this anymore.

And so there's a lot of the base that is pretty concerned that he's spending too much time on foreign affairs, but also that he is risking getting the U.S.

into quagmires that he can't emerge from.

And I think that's one of the biggest limits on him.

But you may remember that during that interview in early January, when I went in with three of my colleagues and we asked him, what is the limit on your power?

And he said, only my own morality.

And we asked him whether or not international law.

was a limit on his power.

And he stopped and he said, well, maybe, but it's really how I define international law.

So here is a president who believes that his powers are almost completely unfettered and who isn't asking Congress for more because he is simply asserting he already has these powers.

So as my colleague Anton Troianovsky and I wrote about a week ago, this is a fascinating experiment in diplomacy without diplomats.

And you're absolutely right.