Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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This is The Opinions, a show that brings you a mix of voices from New York Times opinion. You've heard the news. Here's what to make of it.
I'm Michelle Cottle. I cover national politics for New York Times Opinion. And this week, I am back with my favorite band of political unpackers, columnists David French and Jamel Bowie. Guys, how's it going? It's going all right.
It's going. It's going, Michelle.
OK, this is not inspiring. I was like, all right. And just going. We'll unpack that later, maybe. But we're going to get down to business. And first up, talk about the war in Iran and President Trump's approach to our allies. And Jamal is going to explain to us what he thinks Trump is really focused on these days. Hint, it's not the war or even White House renovations.
As always, got to note that we're taping this on Thursday. So the specific shape of the chaos will change probably before you all hear us. And with that, let's get down to business. We are moving into the fourth week of America and Israel's war with Iran. There is no end in sight. And from best I can tell, no clear direction of where this is going. Each day we're seeing new attacks on Iran.
Oil prices have spiked. Trump decided he'd fix that by relaxing sanctions on Russia. And surprise, our allies are not super excited to send ships to protect the Strait of Hormuz to help with a war they were not consulted on. So scale of one to 10, guys, how shocked should Trump be that he is getting the cold shoulder from Europe on a lot of this? And where do you think the dynamic is headed?
Jamel, you go first.
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Chapter 2: What are the implications of Trump's approach to American allies?
I can blow this up and look how tough we are here. And this speaks, I think, Jamel's brought this up before. He's got all these toys to play with and he's got all this military might. And we can worry about where this leaves us in broader picture terms for later, which, you know... I mean, what could possibly go wrong? It's the Middle East, right? It always turns out well in the long term.
But so what are we learning about his just view of American power? And also, do we think the White House maybe is learning anything about the gap between how the president views that power and how things actually play out? I mean, do we think anything is sinking in over there?
I'm skeptical. I mean, it's clear to me that the president has a view of American power that's very childish, that's very sort of, we have lots of weapons, we have lots of things that can blow things up, and that's all we really need.
He seems to have also this view that American influence, both American influence and American military and other forms of power, economic power, are inexhaustible resources that you can just call on again and again and again to do what you want. And that isn't true. That is very much not the case.
But there's no indication that anyone in the White House or at least anyone the president will listen to, I'll say that, is capable of explaining to Trump. getting him to understand that they may have already reached up against the limits of what the country can simply do, given the situation, given our deteriorating relationships with our allies, given everything.
It's always been so striking to me that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has these press conferences where he doesn't at all talk in strategic terms about the conflict. It's all kind of, we're going to rain down death upon the enemy, and then why can't you clap harder, clap louder? Which I'll say, beyond being, I think, evidence of someone who
maybe doesn't even understand the difference between strategy and tactics, like setting that aside, there's something actually quite disturbing about the fact that high-level American officials are talking about war as if it were a video game.
Which I hear is not impressing military veterans about this. Like, they're embarrassed by the idea that this is being treated like Call of Duty. Before, David, before you jump back in, I have a question for both of you, which is that I keep hearing that the Trump administration is surprised that this didn't go like Venezuela. That can't be true, right?
Someone tell me that they understood the difference between Venezuela and Iran.
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Chapter 3: How does Trump's leadership style affect U.S. military strategy?
This is what we want, prosperity and stability. And every two years, they come forward and they vote for prosperity and stability according to their best assessment at the time and then sort of recede back and get back in their lives. In the meantime, the activist base never recedes back anywhere, and it just keeps... hammering away at its pet issues.
In this case, the president of the United States and his MAGA activist base have this same pet issue. And so they are hammering away at this when they're about to experience a general election electorate that's going to come forward and say, where is my peace? Where's my prosperity? Where's my stability? And I think they're going to experience a tremendous electoral consequence.
And I feel like, you know, I live in D.C. I feel like I should just go down and stand on the Capitol steps waiting for the Republican lawmakers to come through and just start screaming. He's not on the ballot. He's not going to pay for this. But you guys are really risking getting your butts thumped this year because.
He can get away with things even when he is on the ballot that this team cannot. His team does not do that well when they are answering for what he has been doing. And it just everything we're looking at with the midterms suggests that they are in trouble. trouble and he's not making it better.
I mean, a war in Iran is definitely not what people signed up for, much less all of this weird conspiracy mongering and clinging to 2020, which is just beyond ill. And instead, like they're clogging up some housing bill that the bipartisan housing bill that they were very interested in waving around as an achievement. Nope.
That's just sitting there stuck because he can't quite get past his pet obsession. It just boggles the mind that so much important stuff is going to get left to wither because he is just, he can't let go. Man can't let go.
It's astonishing. The generic ballot right now for Republicans is devastating, right? Like Democrats are up plus eight, plus nine in the generic ballot. Even if the Iran war were not causing a global energy spike, the cost of energy going up, it would be an anchor on the president and the Republican Party. But the fact that, you know,
I drive an electric car, so I'm a little bit, you know, gas prices, don't think about them too much these days, but I do notice them. And I've noticed gas go up like 50 cents in a couple of weeks, right? Like diesel has gone up to like $5 a gallon. And if anything people were voting for, it was cheaper gas.
Yeah.
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