why does trump need augurs (like scop) to divine a cogent narrative. trump obviously can't and none in his administration can.
the simple explanation; trump is spiteful (e.g. all the references to obama, biden), vance a toadie (unreal, the petulance) , and they can only talk in terms of "deals", TV soap opera trash dialogue. zelensky argues that deals need guarantees. all that is in that 10 minute video, for all to see. clear as day. and we've have observed, with the the same clarity, similar displays (maybe of lesser intensity) the last 10 years or so.
the 4d chess explanation; scop needs to come along (sorry scop to pull you in!, I like your optimism), and we need to trust there's a deep bench actually acting with any sort of cohesive purpose on that vision. unlike the simple explanation, there's very little evidence. usa foreign policy is untethered now, only thing left to do is reading the flight of the birds.
i want to believe, but there is a ton of posthoc rationalizing going on the trump side. it was like this after 2016, a different stable time, after 8 years of blissfully dreadfully boring obama stability. it is not such a time now.
Trump speaks very, very plainly. He is certainly discursive. He most certainly goes back and forth on a few things, sometimes because he changes his mind other times because he is negotiating/trolling/etc.
But the main problem isn't that he needs "augors", it's that you have an entire media complex that is constantly misrepresenting what he says in the most negative possible light. People listen to what he says and then immediately apply a filter of the most negative interpretation possible. Or they outright lie.
Did Trump call white supremecists very fine people? Did he tell people to drink bleach? The list goes on...
Meanwhile, what was the main "instability" of trump's first 24 months? Ah, yes, the Russiagate hoax where any day now a smoking gun was coming. Hoax after hoax after hoax.
Re Obama's blissful years:
- Occupy wall st fades away, no real reform
- Stagnating economy
- Arab spring waffles
- Chinese aggression in Taiwan sea
- Putin annexes Crimea
- ISIS is born and terrorist attacks become a regular part of the news cycle
- Unprecedented union of DOJ w/ president (Eric Holder says "I'm Obama's wingman")
- IRS targeting conservatives
- Tan suit (lol)
Compare all that to Trump going into 2020 whereforeign policy wasn't even part of the debates.
