Donald Trump loves to keep us guessing. This is exactly what we’re all doing as his second term in the White House begins. It’s one way he controls the narrative.
Trump’s off the cuff, unfiltered, controversial statements infuriate opponents and delight his supporters. The rest of us are left trying to figure out the difference between the shenanigans and when he’s actually serious.
At a recent news conference, Trump was in an expansionist mood, telling reporters he wants to take over Greenland, annex Canada, and return the Panama Canal to U.S. control. But is this all a part of a negotiating strategy to get something else?
For extra measure, he also declared “all hell will break out” if a deal to release Israeli hostages held by Hamas was not done before his inauguration on January 20, 2025. Both Israel and Hamas wanted to avoid finding out what his comments mean as both sides reached a ceasefire agreement within days of Trump’s threat. Now he’s getting credit for movement in negotiations that had been stalled for months.
Will the next four years be like his first administration? Yes and no. While Trump himself doesn’t appear to have changed much, apart from getting older (quite a bit older) and more experienced in the ways of Washington, his administration could be far more disciplined than the chaotic first four years.
Susie Wiles, the incoming chief of staff—Trump’s closest advisor—says backbiting and drama won’t be tolerated in this White House. Wiles is a politico pro, seen as a steady and experienced hand who played a key role in Trump’s well-run 2024 campaign. She will control information and access to the Oval Office, set the president’s daily agenda, and manage his White House staff.
Unlike the first time around, Trump’s top picks for his second term were announced very quickly. All but a few nominees are poised to win easy approval in the Republican-run Senate.
From Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at HEW and Tulsi Gabbard as director of National Intelligence to Scott Bessant at Treasury and Marco Rubio at State, the new administration will include a surprisingly broad range of opinions, from brash tech entrepreneurs and traditional corporate conservatives, to conspiracy theorists, and Make America Great Again (MAGA) populists.
Are diverse viewpoints a sign of confident strength or mere confusion and chaos? We are kept guessing and only time will tell.
While the president-to-be and his loudmouth MAGA allies have cowered all but a handful of Republicans in Congress, the Trump coalition is already facing a bitter split over immigration. Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, and the big business wing of the Republican Party think that admitting more skilled immigrants, including brainy scientists and technology wizards, would be good for business innovation and the economy. Trump’s hardcore populist supporters want to shut the door on newcomers. So far, Trump seems to be siding with Musk.
We know that many will be angered by what Trump does, but exactly who he surprises and who he offends is almost impossible to predict. Despite what you may read from ever-confident pundits online or in the columns of your favorite newspaper, we’re all guessing. Perhaps that is all part of Trump's negotiating strategy.
In a best-case scenario, a second Trump administration will boost growth, reduce undocumented immigration in an orderly way, manage China, and broker a ceasefire in Ukraine. But the worst case would include an assault on democratic norms and trust in public institutions, along with more political polarization and violence in the streets. Under Trump, the U.S. may help Putin and America’s adversaries by turning its back on long-time allies, undermining NATO and Ukraine, and getting into a full-on trade war with China, leading to higher inflation and an economic crisis.
The possible outcomes range from exhilarating to deeply alarming.
For almost a decade Donald Trump and his MAGA movement have been banging at the gates of power, challenging the elite, and ridiculing the government. And now there's a chance to prove they can go from complaining about the problem to implementing solutions.
Now he’s in charge. It’s his show. His supporters are the new establishment.
So this question for the next leader of the free world: Will you lift up more than you tear down? We’re still guessing what the outcomes will be.
Richard Davies is a podcast consultant, host, and solutions journalist at daviescontent.com.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.