Defending Donald Trump … Again?
Why playing devil’s advocate with the Republican front-runner’s rhetoric eventually leads back to the source of the problem — Washington.
On this week’s episode of The E.R., FP’s David Rothkopf, Kori Schake, Rosa Brooks, and Yochi Dreazen dig into what it really means to “defend” Donald Trump’s more cogent political thinking among his erratic and offensive comments and ludicrously vague would-be policies. And why suggesting that Trump may have gotten a few things right doesn’t mean he isn’t wrong about so many other things — like nuclear weapons, NATO, China, Mexico, how to battle the Islamic State, and how to handle the quagmire that is the Middle East.
On this week’s episode of The E.R., FP’s David Rothkopf, Kori Schake, Rosa Brooks, and Yochi Dreazen dig into what it really means to “defend” Donald Trump’s more cogent political thinking among his erratic and offensive comments and ludicrously vague would-be policies. And why suggesting that Trump may have gotten a few things right doesn’t mean he isn’t wrong about so many other things — like nuclear weapons, NATO, China, Mexico, how to battle the Islamic State, and how to handle the quagmire that is the Middle East.
Discussing Trump’s problematic campaign success for a second week, the panel looks at why — and how — he managed to earn the support and allegiance of so many Americans. The bigger question unpacked then is not whether defending Donald Trump is right about foreign policy or domestic problems, but whether it’s time to call out the Washington consensus for not being more concerned with engaging the American public. And if those in Washington don’t want Trump in the White House, they have to do more than mock him and call his policies “ridiculous.” Could the 2016 presidential campaign finally shake Washington into addressing the public’s fears and concerns and compel lawmakers to follow through with their own policies?
Rosa Brooks is a senior fellow at the New America Foundation and teaches international law, national security, and constitutional law at Georgetown University. Follow her on Twitter at: @brooks_rosa.
Yochi Dreazen is the managing editor for news at FP and author of The Invisible Front. Follow him on Twitter at: @yochidreazen.
Kori Schake is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, where she focuses on military history, and is a former foreign-policy advisor to Sen. John McCain. Follow her on Twitter at: @KoriSchake.
David Rothkopf is the CEO and editor of the FP Group. Follow him on Twitter at: @djrothkopf.
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