Trump Wants to Move On From the Middle East. It’s Not Letting Him.
Reporting from Washington
Iran, the economy: An insurgency that becomes a government is eventually responsible for conditions.
ET
Mr. Trump has survived bad numbers before. I think people enjoy registering disapproval of his leadership, whether they voted for him or not.
But there’s no denying the current erosion of his position. His political problem with Iran is not only that the conflict is dangerous and unresolved, or that his attempts at diplomatic resolution seem half-baked, but that almost six months in, he seems utterly out of his depth, like someone who wouldn’t have gone in there had he understood history or the nature of Iran’s leadership. Another problem: From the beginning, much of Mr. Trump’s political persona was based on his rejection of foreign adventures. Now he’s launched a war of choice that has produced a strategic maze.
Regular people watching all this peripherally, as regular people do, would be thinking: Is this a new forever war? Are we running out of bullets? Endless talks and nothing settled? Gasoline prices up if things drag on?
