On the ball.

Another Graham - Graham Greene, saw this sort of thing gaining traction decades ago.

This is a classic case of retrofitting Trump's erratic and directionless actions into a coherent strategy, in order to avoid facing what is, for some, a very uncomfortable and inconvenient reality:

Trump has no idea what he's doing, and is likely just stuck at a pre-reflective moral stage where power feels self-justifying and restraint feels arbitrary - a stage most of us had progressed passed by the time we were adults.

I now call it "the 4D-Chess myth".

The article repeatedly infers doctrine from rhetoric. Trump's rambling press conferences are treated as strategic signals, while contradictions and improvisation are reinterpreted as deliberate design. That's narrative smoothing, not evidence of planning.

The "broken windows" analogy is the clearest flaw. Policing metaphors don't scale to sovereign states. Venezuela is not a squatter camp; it is a complex political system with regional spillovers, alliances, and escalation risks. Treating regime change as tidy law-enforcement trivialises those dynamics.

The legal framing is similarly thin. Calling a military seizure of a foreign head of state "law enforcement" does not resolve the international law problem, it simply dismisses it. US law does not substitute for sovereignty by assertion alone.

Oil is also treated as a universal lever: stabiliser, bribe, deterrent, revenue stream, and electoral tool. This ignores infrastructure collapse, corruption, sanctions, long lead times, and the historical record of resource-driven instability.

Finally, the piece claims Trump rejects exporting democracy while repeatedly relying on democratic legitimacy when convenient. Democracy is dismissed rhetorically but smuggled back in narratively.

As MAGA storytelling, the article is internally consistent. As strategic analysis, it is speculative, metaphor-driven, and overconfident.

Poor old Chat Bot Johnny…he just ain’t got the understanding! (Maybe he’s the wrong colour, or gender).

http://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/01/withdrawing-the-united-states-from-international-organizations-conventions-and-treaties-that-are-contrary-to-the-interests-of-the-united-states/

Trump is in fact, very focused, fail to see how, (unless your a free love and open borders Democrat), you dispute that!

Clearly my post irritated you, Muff Diver Dan.

Splendid.

That link doesn’t address my point at all, sorry. Withdrawing from international institutions shows hostility to multilateral constraints, not evidence of a coherent, pre-planned Venezuela strategy. I never claimed Trump was confused about his dislikes.

The issue is whether Graham is inferring doctrine from rhetoric after the fact, and smoothing over contradictions by treating improvisation as design. Posting an EO doesn’t answer that.

Also, reducing disagreement to “free love and open borders Democrats” is just a way of avoiding the argument. You can oppose international institutions and stil

Why not check out this reference
http://chrishedges.substack.com/p/the-narco-traficcking-elite-set-to

Two books
Black Pill by Elle Reeve
American Reich A New Age of Hate by Eric Lichtblau

I think that Trump thinks in terms of vassal states like AC, except in this case Venezuela is a vassal state.

Trump is far from stupid as he realises how little assistance Russia can offer, especially with the naval blockade. The occupation is limited to the oil producing area, and the US will be in almost complete control over what goes in and out of the country. Trump isn't dealing with psychotic fanatics controlling a brainwashed population, rather a gangster elite with a large excluded population that would be glad to see the back of them, much as you find in any socialist nation.

Seeing the revolting commies kicked out of central America would be prelude to increased stability and economic advance in the region, and a great achievement for Trump.

Such a contrast from the divisive cult leader Albo making a hash of the economy here with his team of ageing political activists.

Hopefully the Iranians can overthrow their theocratic oppressors.

Johnny CB.

#…Trump has no idea what he's doing, and is likely just stuck at a pre-reflective moral stage where power feels self-justifying and restraint feels arbitrary - a stage most of us had progressed passed by the time we were adult
I now call it "the 4D-Chess myth…#

Well, really.
"Society has a right to insure its own survival” . Stage five (a more accurate assessment I would judge), of the six stages of moral development in Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development, which you seem to be alluding to as your guide to pillory Trump.

Anybody that cannot observe a definite planned direction to which Trump moves the two dimensional chess pieces, across a three dimensional world chess board, is ideologically blind and probably very stupid.

That’s enough for the moment, except to offer Daffy Ducks phone number if I had it; you pair would have a lovely night together on the porch under the glow of the red dragon.

Thanks, Muff Diver Dan.

You just handed me a gift with that last response of yours. You see, invoking Kohlberg doesn’t rescue your point, it undermines it.

Stage 5 reasoning is explicitly about social contracts, procedural legitimacy, and constraints on authority. Power is justified because it is constrained, accountable, and rule-bound.

What you’re describing instead is power asserting its own necessity. That mode of justification appears at multiple stages, including much earlier ones. Quoting “society has a right to ensure its survival” doesn’t locate the reasoning at Stage 5; it just supplies a slogan.

More importantly, none of this addresses my actual claim. I’m not arguing Trump lacks motives or reasons. I’m arguing that Graham’s article retrofits coherence by treating rhetoric as doctrine and improvisation as design.

If this is “strategy,” point to the constraints, sequencing, and trade-offs identified before the action. Strategy without constraints isn’t strategy; it’s narrative pattern-matching.

As for the insults, they don’t strengthen your case. They just signal how uncomfortable you are with the argument.

Johnny CB.

What stands out in your original post, is not an objection to the obvious meanings behind the article, but your Trump bitch-out, assembled with fake intelligence, and plied as fact but implicitly wrong, with its only achievement a demonstration of ideological bias, which frankly is childish, unoriginal and boring: I’ve pulled it apart at the first paragraph, and laid it bare for what it is …crap.

You can argue till the cows come home, but tell it to Daffy Duck, he’ll likely believe you, whereas…

Muff Diver,

I'm quite happy to defend what I said about Trump. I see nothing to suggest that Trump has any concept of what he is doing. Nor do I see anything to suggest that he has the ability to engage in any form of long-term planning.

Trump's actions have been a series of uncoordinated impulses driven primarily by emotion and dangerously disorganised thinking. And again, his mode of justification treats power as self-validating and restraint as optional.

These aren't insults, they're observable patterns (or the lack thereof).

If you think I'm wrong, point to a case where Trump accepted binding constraints, respected process over outcome, or refrained from action because legitimacy mattered. Not rhetoric after the fact - actual restraint before action.

Simply asserting "society has a right to ensure its survival" doesn't locate Trump at a higher moral stage. That slogan can justify anything, at any stage, including very early ones.

Until you can show reflective constraint rather than post-hoc narrative, calling this "strategy" is just retrofitting intention onto power.

Thanks for the article GY.

Johnny CB

#…Trump's actions have been a series of uncoordinated impulses driven primarily by emotion and dangerously disorganised thinking. And again, his mode of justification treats power as self-validating and restraint as optional…#

Give some examples.

#…These aren't insults, they're observable patterns (or the lack thereof).…#

You try to escape censure with a preceding apology, but you can’t hide the fact that your Trump bigotry gets in the way of logical analysis; and that is simply true, since you offer no evidence to back up your bigoted analysis of Trump.
I can only argue against your bigotry, which isn’t worth the effort.

It was truly said of Trump by the inestimable Salena Zito that ""When he makes claims like this, his enemies take him literally, but not seriously; his supporters take him seriously, but not literally."

If you see Trump as a fool, then everything he does is seen as foolish. The problem there is you're constantly trying to find ways to rationalise his many successes, but the left is very practiced at rationalising away unwanted facts.