"...the key variable at play here is Donald Trump’s knowledge, experience, and interest about different subject matters."
Let's look at that sentence again...do you see anything that strikes you - I mean, really grabs you?
How about "knowledge, experience, and interest"? Parse that, and one readily grasps than minus ANY knowledge whatsoever, "experience and interest" are nugatory irrelevancies, and for tRump, it's all about "gut feelings", and we've seen - and yet again are seeing - how well that's working out. His monumental ignorance regarding "different subject matters" is legendary, and why expend any more effort in portraying him other than a dangerous ignoramus, full stop.
Professor Daniel W. Drezner and Professor Henry Farrell: What an engaging and refreshing friendship between experts at Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Tuft) and the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS-JHU)!
You encapsulate it so very well, you BOTH, here:
"[Henry] Farrell proposes an alternative explanation:
"My theory of Trump is different. Building on Padgett and Ansell’s classic account of the court of Cosimo de Medici, I argued back in 2016 that Trump didn’t have goals in the usual sense of the term. Instead, his motivation was to maneuver everyone else so that they had to keep on paying attention to him….
"This is a very different theory of Trump, which has some consequences for what his foreign policy may be. It suggests that his approach is not transactional but personalist. He doesn’t really care about goals in the ordinary sense of the term. All he cares about is getting other people to pay attention to him, and ideally to show him obeisance. The policies he adopts at any point in time will be the policies that allow him to strengthen his personal authority and dominance, while weakening the authority and dominance of others….
"My alternative account instead suggests that we will see less constancy in foreign policy. It argues that the most important source of chaos in Trump’s first administration was not the battle between Trump and his underlings, but Trump himself, as he constantly shifted policy, depending on who he had last talked to, and what seemed most likely at any moment to confound and vex his opponents. Now that the restraints are much weaker, we will see that the only constant is Trump’s wish to burnish his self regard, and to ensure that he is always at the center of the spider web.
"Now as someone who has written at length about the ways in which Donald Trump practices an immature leadership style, it is difficult for me to disagree with Farrell’s argument. Trump is someone who possesses a short attention span, displays oppositional behavior, and craves drama. One can see why this would lead Farrell to conclude that inconstancy will be the one constant of Trump 2.0."
And:
"Trump telling RFK Jr. to “go wild on health,” for example, is a sign that Trump does not give a flying fig about health. It bores him. In these areas, Trump remains an inexperienced and uninformed president who mostly wants his underlings to display fealty to him. "
A lot of learning here poured upon a loathsome cockroach in the kitchen, where, unfortunately, the cockroach is bloated to the size of the President of the United States, and the kitchen is enlarged on the scale of America and the Free World.
Interesting analysis. But your comment at the end, “We will have the next few years to empirically determine the answer,” is hugely depressing, because the “next few years” could well see the destruction of our democracy and countless other personal and financial harms to its citizens. I’d rather not go through that empirical study.
Good article Daniel. I laughed though when I read Farrell's quote "My theory of Trump is different. Building on Padgett and Ansell’s classic account of the court of Cosimo de Medici, I argued..." How about Trump's first term? Do we really need to go back to the Fifteenth century?
"...the key variable at play here is Donald Trump’s knowledge, experience, and interest about different subject matters."
Let's look at that sentence again...do you see anything that strikes you - I mean, really grabs you?
How about "knowledge, experience, and interest"? Parse that, and one readily grasps than minus ANY knowledge whatsoever, "experience and interest" are nugatory irrelevancies, and for tRump, it's all about "gut feelings", and we've seen - and yet again are seeing - how well that's working out. His monumental ignorance regarding "different subject matters" is legendary, and why expend any more effort in portraying him other than a dangerous ignoramus, full stop.
Professor Daniel W. Drezner and Professor Henry Farrell: What an engaging and refreshing friendship between experts at Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Tuft) and the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS-JHU)!
You encapsulate it so very well, you BOTH, here:
"[Henry] Farrell proposes an alternative explanation:
"My theory of Trump is different. Building on Padgett and Ansell’s classic account of the court of Cosimo de Medici, I argued back in 2016 that Trump didn’t have goals in the usual sense of the term. Instead, his motivation was to maneuver everyone else so that they had to keep on paying attention to him….
"This is a very different theory of Trump, which has some consequences for what his foreign policy may be. It suggests that his approach is not transactional but personalist. He doesn’t really care about goals in the ordinary sense of the term. All he cares about is getting other people to pay attention to him, and ideally to show him obeisance. The policies he adopts at any point in time will be the policies that allow him to strengthen his personal authority and dominance, while weakening the authority and dominance of others….
"My alternative account instead suggests that we will see less constancy in foreign policy. It argues that the most important source of chaos in Trump’s first administration was not the battle between Trump and his underlings, but Trump himself, as he constantly shifted policy, depending on who he had last talked to, and what seemed most likely at any moment to confound and vex his opponents. Now that the restraints are much weaker, we will see that the only constant is Trump’s wish to burnish his self regard, and to ensure that he is always at the center of the spider web.
"Now as someone who has written at length about the ways in which Donald Trump practices an immature leadership style, it is difficult for me to disagree with Farrell’s argument. Trump is someone who possesses a short attention span, displays oppositional behavior, and craves drama. One can see why this would lead Farrell to conclude that inconstancy will be the one constant of Trump 2.0."
And:
"Trump telling RFK Jr. to “go wild on health,” for example, is a sign that Trump does not give a flying fig about health. It bores him. In these areas, Trump remains an inexperienced and uninformed president who mostly wants his underlings to display fealty to him. "
A lot of learning here poured upon a loathsome cockroach in the kitchen, where, unfortunately, the cockroach is bloated to the size of the President of the United States, and the kitchen is enlarged on the scale of America and the Free World.
A cockroach with outsized influence.
Interesting analysis. But your comment at the end, “We will have the next few years to empirically determine the answer,” is hugely depressing, because the “next few years” could well see the destruction of our democracy and countless other personal and financial harms to its citizens. I’d rather not go through that empirical study.
Good article Daniel. I laughed though when I read Farrell's quote "My theory of Trump is different. Building on Padgett and Ansell’s classic account of the court of Cosimo de Medici, I argued..." How about Trump's first term? Do we really need to go back to the Fifteenth century?