Trump Accidentally Reveals What He Really Thinks of MAGA Voters
That’s just not sustainable. To see why, just look at the gyrations of JD Vance. Asked this week to reconcile his support for Trump’s war with his long-stated suspicions of previous foreign entanglements, Vance said: “One big difference is that we have a smart president, whereas in the past, we’ve had dumb presidents.” Trump, said Vance, will avoid the “mistakes of the past.” Vance has also said: “Now we have a president who knows how to accomplish America’s national security objectives” and won’t get sucked into “some long, drawn-out thing.”
Vance’s argument, then, is that the “smart” Trump has defined a precise objective—the dismantling of Iran’s nuclear program, as Vance puts it—and is now using overwhelming force to accomplish this immaculately. Trump will get out before falling victim to the sort of quagmire that befell “dumb presidents.”
But this is not faithful to Vance’s previous positions, no matter how hard he tries to make it so.