Derek Thompson

Sometimes they insist it's not a war.

Marco Rubio, I think, said we had to do this because Israel was going to attack anyway.

And then he said we had to do this because Iran posed a direct threat to the United States.

Sometimes I feel like Trump calls a reporter and says Iran's about to get on the phone and beg for peace.

And sometimes he says, get prepared to fight for weeks or months.

I'm confused.

You're a senator.

Based on what you've been told,

I want to get to where I think you were headed, which is making the war a domestic issue.

But I want to be clear about what I think you're telling me.

You're saying you haven't seen evidence that an attack was imminent.

Absolutely not.

You haven't heard a case for war, and you haven't heard an end goal articulated.

All three?

No evidence.

Mm-hmm.

One of the things I want to talk to you about is democratic messaging.

And I think a key part of that is focus.

With Trump, there's always an oversupply of things that Democrats can criticize.

But I think good messaging isn't about saying everything about everything.