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#17 | Posted by madbomber at 2026-06-04 03:46 PM
Donny is out of his element. That's not a decision he is capable of making.
He is entirely in his element of a lifetime of making decisions he is incapable and unfit to make... and blaming everyone else for consequences.
www.latimes.com - Trump is stuck between two realities. Neither serves the American people - Jonah Goldberg, LAT / Dispatch, 2026-06-02
|------- ... In the contest of wills, Trump blinked.
The Iranian regime's tolerance for punishment proved - so far - to be greater than Trump's and that of our gulf allies. Militarily we could finish the job, but that would require ground troops and much greater economic turmoil. In a conflict Trump launched unilaterally without the prior support of Congress, NATO or the American people, Trump doesn't have the political capital for that.
But that's only half the problem. Trump wants the war over, but he doesn't want to pay - militarily, economically, politically - what that would cost. So he wants to make a deal that ends it. But there is no deal available that wouldn't come at an equally undesirable cost. Any deal that looks like what President Obama struck with the Iranians would be too embarrassing to bear. But the Iranians are convinced that they can get just such a deal, and they're willing to drag things out as long as it takes.
The result: Trump's in a box of his own making. He thinks he can talk his way out by simply asserting a reality that doesn't exist. When the financial markets get nervous, he announces a breakthrough that is, at best, a possibility. When the Iranians agree to a deal that looks similar to one Obama might negotiate, Trump goes back to his threats.
It can't go on forever. But I'm sure it'll last until long after this column is forgotten.
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What will be the next distraction from the previous distraction? Cuba ? 250th aka "celebration of Don"? FIFA World Cup? Next rerun episode of Presidential Apprentice picking fights with Greenland, Canada, Mexico, India...?
Meanwhile, Trump continues his full retreat from the "Western front" : www.politico.com - Pentagon likely to cancel missile deal with Germany over fears of Russia - 2026-06-04
|------- The Pentagon is expected to cancel a plan to send Tomahawk missiles to Germany partly because officials are concerned Russia will view it as an escalation, a startling reversal of a long-planned agreement with one of America's biggest allies. ... -------|
"De-escalation / de-escalate" were the often-repeated words of Biden administration officials.
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