What I actually think about Trump
Trump is ending the American empire...does he know that?
Whenever I write about Israel, I immediately hear from people who cannot bear criticism of the state. There’s a similar effect when I talk about Trump. To navigate this moment requires considering things on their own merits—something I know my audience does well. Tribalism is what drove us here; I doubt it will be what gets us out.
Despite the clear incentive for a knee-jerk response to Trump, I have resisted it. Trump, like everyone else, can be judged on his own merits. He certainly has some: he stands outside the standard political oligarchy, and he says things no other politician would dare. I liked the anti-war campaign he delivered—his vocal commitments to avoiding Middle Eastern “adventures” and World War III. To hear it said so explicitly was refreshing. Given the subject matter that launched this Substack, I was also pleased to see Trump engage with RFK Jr.
But here’s the thing: what someone says can be entirely at odds with what they do.
In RFK Jr., we got something we wanted from Trump, but it’s important to understand why we got it. Trump engaged with RFK Jr. for the same reason he engages with anything: it benefited him personally at the time. He saw that RFK Jr. was polling well. He saw that the medical freedom movement had broken into the mainstream and, in that, he saw an opportunity to bring a powerful figure into his fold. He is a savvy political operative, so he seized the moment. The RFK phenomenon became wind in Trump’s sails.
Well, so what? We got RFK, right?
I don’t believe Trump actually cares about medical freedom or health. Do you? This is the man behind Operation Warp Speed. Trump observed he’d gain power by integrating RFK Jr. into his campaign, so he did it. Maybe the medical freedom movement gets something out of the deal, but it was always a transactional power play. The “why” was power, not health or policy.
The why is more important than the what, because understanding motivation gives you predictive power over future actions. As we’ll see, that is a very handy tool for getting people to do what you want.
When Trump campaigned on “no more forever wars,” no more taxes on foreign conflicts, and no more soldiers coming home in boxes, was it because he truly believed it? Or was it because he understood the power of holding that position? While it’s reasonable to assume a candidate might deliver on a promise made so unequivocally, that assumption misses the underlying motive.
Trump’s “why” is almost always rooted in power. That isn’t always a bad thing, but it is consistent. It’s how he has operated since the beginning of his career dealing with the property mafia in New York. Power, the perception of power, and the projection of power are integral to his survival. In this worldview, your integrity, your beliefs, and your actual commitments matter significantly less than the leverage you hold in an interaction.
So, when he told America he was anti-war, he was using that stance to gain power—power he might later trade for something else. When he championed medical freedom, he did so to gain power he could later trade. When he claimed to be the “crypto president,” he did so to gain power he could later trade.
It is easy to get swept up in the excitement. A crypto president? RFK heading health services? No more wars? Yet, each of those groups ultimately ended up disappointed. The crypto president didn’t deliver; he used his influence to make millions selling “Trump tokens.” The medical freedom president previously appointed Alex Azar, a bona fide pharmaceutical executive, as Secretary of Health and Human Services. And now, the “anti-war” president has started a catastrophic war with Iran.
Trump has plunged the planet into a global crisis—the exact thing he promised he wouldn’t do. The exact thing. You can twist and contort this if you must, but the facts remain. He explicitly campaigned on the opposite of what he is now doing. “I can tell you, you’re not gonna have a war with me,” he said repeatedly. “We will demolish the deep state. We will expel the warmongers... those stupid, stupid people. They love seeing people die.”
Another campaign favorite? “We would’ve had a deal with Iran within literally minutes after the election... They were dying to make a deal.” Yet here we are, staring down the barrel of WW3.
He said those things because it was expedient. It got him elected, and getting elected got him power. While Trump claims negotiations weren’t going his way, Omani mediators—key players in the U.S.-Iran nuclear talks—noted that every concession asked of the Iranians had been agreed upon. How does that equate to negotiations failing?
It becomes crystal clear: Trump is not anti-war. He simply recognized the power of the rhetoric. Given what we know now, Trump being “anti-war” is as absurd as a communist buying a water company or a capitalist raising taxes to 100%.
We can use this same model to understand why he launched this war. Did he mistakenly believe it would benefit him in the short term? Did he think it would gain him additional political leverage? This brings us to the fatal flaw at the heart of the Trump presidency.
In markets, an “alpha signal” is a pattern that predicts future movements. In poker, if you discover someone’s “tell,” you can exploit it. When Conor McGregor fought Jose Aldo, McGregor spotted a tell in Aldo’s game and even told journalists about it before the fight. He then ruthlessly exploited it and knocked Aldo out.
Trump has a tell. His game has been obvious for a long time: He has a massive ego, he acts in the short term to increase his power, he craves flattery, and he is wounded when people don’t respect him. These aren’t difficult tells to work out. It means the people surrounding Trump can gain power simply by playing the game. They frame things in ways that motivate him to act. Once you see the tell, he is easy to move into position.
A great, if odd, example is the shoes Trump buys for his hand-picked executives. They are expensive dress shoes he likes; he looks at a staffer’s feet, guesses the size, and has an aide order a pair.
“Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have some. So do Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Trump’s communications director Steven Cheung, deputy chief of staff James Blair and speechwriter Ross Worthington. Fox News personality Sean Hannity and Sen. Lindsey Graham each have a pair.”
Marco Rubio wears these shoes even though they are reportedly too big for him. Imagine walking through NATO and White House meetings with your feet being chewed up by ill-fitting Oxfords. Why would you do that?
Because it pleases Trump.
What Trump considers a loyalty test is actually a tell to be exploited. If I say, “You have great taste, I love these shoes,” my proximity to his power increases. One reading is that Trump is a “strongman” demanding people wear his clothes. My view? Trump is the one being exploited. His penchant for flattery is so obvious that people like Rubio, Graham, and Lutnick are happy to play along if it buys them influence.
These idiosyncrasies make him easy prey for motivated actors. Lindsey Graham has been psychopathically campaigning for war with Iran for two decades. Two decades. Lindsey Graham wears the shoes.
Trump is an empty vessel of a president, just as easily manipulated as Biden was. The "swamp" he promised to drain simply learned his tell. You see this now as Trump realizes the war in Iran has not gone as expected. In a rare moment of contrition, he has begun blaming his advisors like a schoolboy explaining poor homework. He is trying to reclaim lost power by shifting the blame, but it isn’t an excuse. He is the one making the judgments. If his shortcomings allow him to be exploited, that is on him.
In the early days of this conflict, Trump clung to the idea that he could stop it “any time he wanted.” He likely believed it, but that belief was built on “advice” designed to stroke his ego and his desire for ratings. It is trivial to sell a war to a man led by those principles.
Trump’s tell has been used to drag America into a war that could last for years. The tragedy of promising to "expel the warmongers, those horrible warmongers from our government — those stupid, stupid people." only to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them and accept their stupid gifts. The very "warmongers" he vowed to exile simply worked out his tell, put on his shoes, and played his ego until they got the one thing they’ve wanted for two decades.
It doesn't matter what Trump believes now. The war has started, and he doesn't have the power to stop it. He’s in it, and there is no obvious way out — which is precisely what the warmongers who infiltrated his presidency wanted.
Incredibly, within minutes of me posting this, the director of the National Counter Terrorism Centre has just resigned with these scathing words:
President Trump,
After much reflection, I have decided to resign from my position as Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, effective today.
I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.
I support the values and the foreign policies that you campaigned on in 2016, 2020, 2024, which you enacted in your first term. Until June of 2025, you understood that the wars in the Middle East were a trap that robbed America of the precious lives of our patriots and depleted the wealth and prosperity of our nation.
In your first administration, you understood better than any modern President how to decisively apply military power without getting us drawn into never-ending wars. You demonstrated this by killing Qasam Solamani and by defeating ISIS.
Early in this administration, high-ranking Israeli officials and influential members of the American media deployed a misinformation campaign that wholly undermined your America First platform and sowed pro-war sentiments to encourage a war with Iran. This echo chamber was used to deceive you into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States, and that should you strike now, there was a clear path to a swift victory. This was a lie and is the same tactic the Israelis used to draw us into the disastrous Iraq war that cost our nation the lives of thousands of our best men and women. We cannot make this mistake again.
As a veteran who deployed to combat 11 times and as a Gold Star husband who lost my beloved wife Shannon in a war manufactured by Israel, I cannot support sending the next generation off to fight and die in a war that serves no benefit to the American people nor justifies the cost of American lives.
I pray that you will reflect upon what we are doing in Iran, and who we are doing it for. The time for bold action is now. You can reverse course and chart a new path for our nation, or you can allow us to slip further toward decline and chaos. You hold the cards.
It was an honor to serve in your administration and to serve our great nation.
Joseph Kent
Director, National Counterterrorism Center
Note, I used Claude Code to make an app that lets me post comments to Substack (and many things you can't do on Substack). I'm using that now.
I liked you comments on Trump's shoe fetish. I had not heard that one before, but really, how many presidents have been flattered on a routine basis? It must be every single one of them! And if Rubio's shoes don't fit, I'm sure he could order the correct size and return the ones that didn't fit. As an aside, I have an AI generated photo that shows me walking with Trump out on the White House portico. I like the picture because the AI made me look really thin and well - it helped motivate me to get thin once again. But I couldn't help but notice the shoes "I" was wearing in the picture. They looked very nice but unlike any I ever wear. I wonder now if those are Trump shoes!
Anyway, Israel clearly wants regime change in Iran, and the U.S. needs it less so. So of course Israel will attempt to get the U.S. to work with them for regime change - even if it's not in the U.S. interest (or the worlds). What else do you expect them to do?
And of course, every single administration has voices pushing for various things. That's how White Houses work. Who gets heard is who - perhaps flatters some - but really makes the convincing argument to the president. But this is why presidents often say, "The buck stops here". Regardless of the strong voices on all sides, it's the president who has to decide what to do and it's the president (or his party) who will be held accountable by the voters. That's the way it should be.
What do I think of Trump? I think he really wants peace. Really wants it. And this war could help bring a level of peace that few thought was possible in the Middle East. Or it could go really bad. But that's why you have a president to make tough decisions like that.
I also think Trump is new to how wars work, so he's learning too. That's why I pray God gives him wisdom. He needs it.