Source: The Dispatch
by Jonah Goldberg
“One of the funniest things about the Trump era is how people have realized how to appeal to Trump’s conception of self-interest. That’s why everyone is giving him awards and gold statues: He’s a sucker for flattery and praise, and he’s incapable of grasping how small it makes him look. Donald Trump has a similar challenge understanding the Iranians because he thinks everyone eventually just wants a ‘deal.’ That assumption worked out for him pretty well — so far — in Venezuela, because the Maduro regime was basically just a bunch of mobsters pretending to be socialists. But the Iranians want different things because they believe different things. And they are willing to watch a lot of the world burn to get them. In fact, they’re willing to light the matches.” (03/27/26)
https://thedispatch.com/newsletter/gfile/trump-iran-war-partisanship/