Second presidency of Donald Trump

So, what is the current state of US-Russia diplomacy? Has Russia actually made any diplomatic concessions since 2022? And where does Europe fit into this equation? I'm Oz Katterjee, and this is not a drill.

Joining us on this episode of This Is Not A Drill to explore the contours of Trump 2.0's flagship diplomatic project is Russia expert Michael Kimmich, director of the Kennan Institute and author of The Abandonment of the West, The History of an Idea in American Foreign Policy.

Michael, thank you so much for joining us on the show.

Thank

discuss, and we can kind of get into some of the details.

Looking just at the latest real clear polling average, we've got President Trump's job approval is at 60.3% disapprove.

We have a number of these very close Senate races that are and the House races that are not entirely encouraging on either polymarket or on the polls.

Obviously, James Tallarico and Ken Paxton in Texas.

So I could go on and I'm sure if you guys have particular races that you'd like to talk about, we can get into the weeds of them.

Obviously, the overall, I think, political environment remains roughly what it was last time we discussed this.

We were saying, I think, that Trump's sort of – as Trump approaches the second half of his second term – There have been a number of projects that don't seem to be going very well.

There's maybe some air going out of the sails.

And, you know, that might be a really good lesson for Trump, who not is he's not on the ballot.

But at the same time, there is a a feel that the midterms might be a little bit of a referendum on trump 2.0 and the second term and the national memo actually cited one of your interviews um saying that uh you've you have interviewed countless trump voters to get kind of a gauge on where republicans chances are in november but standing in the way of salvation for republicans this is this article from the national memo they say is the fact that the 2024 version of Trump stinks.

And they quote you as saying, if we're having an honest discussion, you could be a supporter of the president and you can still be honest.

But I just don't see what sycophants see, how that helps anybody.

To me, it's just so off putting when you have so much more about policy and about actually what voters are focused on, you know, their own lives and what you're doing to actually make America great again.

instead of focusing on some of these other things that frankly have been disappointing.

And it's not just that it's Trump 2.0. A lot of this is also the fault of Congress.

And if Trump could kind of get that messaging and say, listen, stick with us, and I need to have as strong of a Congress as I can to legislate some of these policy issues, you know, going into the next two years, that would be such a more effective message, I think, than you know, kind of just these casual rally jokes that, you know, he loves to do.

How will the rest of this term play out and what fresh hell could possibly follow? There's no way to know, but I don't have a great feeling about it.

So that's it for Lee Zeldin, yet another shit stain fueling the nightmare that is Trump 2.0.

I will continue to comment on the activities of this administration as it pertains to science to the best of my limited ability.

And trust me, there are many more figures to cover.

And they literally started taking the fight to Saudi Arabia.

You know, in the beginning of Trump 2.0, Raising Cain and Pete Hegseth, Big, big, bad dudes.

Remember Pete? He was the guy who did Signal, Chad, and basically let a journalist in on the war plans, how they were going to defeat the Houthis.

They bombed the bejesus out of them for two months.