It’s hard to imagine that the most powerful job in the world would ever get dull. But even the constitutionally hyperactive Donald Trump seems to find the war in Iran increasingly tedious. A conflict he first thought would last only a few weeks has now entered its sixth month. Even the thrill of listening to the “bing, bing, bing” of bombs landing in Iran no longer appears to hold the president’s interest. In June, he said that negotiations with Iran had “started to get very boring”. On 28 July, his outburst about Benjamin Netanyahu on Fox News was a sign of his anger at the man who led him into this war. And, in a sense, one can empathise with the president; the war has taken on a Groundhog Day quality. Trump has threatened Iran with complete destruction before backing off a total of seven times. Like Bill Murray finding new ways to entertain himself in his circular eternity, the Pentagon has asked staff to come up with more “creative” ways to punish Iran.
The strategy now appears to be to escalate the war to allow the president to get out of it. But Trump seems less interested in the details of any peace deal than simply getting one as soon as possible. The preliminary peace deal from June, the Memorandum of Understanding, had already given the Iranians room to treat the Strait of Hormuz like a toll road they themselves had built for the world’s convenience. It was only an agreement in the sense that both sides agreed that it meant different things. “I’m under no time constraint – I don’t happen to be running,” is what Trump has nonchalantly said about the negotiations.
It’s not just the war in Iran that Trump has lost interest in. He has no legislative agenda, beyond a plan to mandate ID cards at the polling booth. Threats on his life mean that he is no longer holding vast rallies. The White House seems to spend much of its time devising ways Trump can profit from his time in office, such as the new proposal to charge stockbrokers for early access to his market-moving posts on Truth Social. Even his roasting of the “fake news” media at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in July was half-hearted. “Does anyone understand this stuff?” he asked, losing interest in his own insults, which were once his pride and joy. The 80-year-old took time over the weekend to post about his victory in a golf tournament at his own New Jersey course. “It’s called TALENT, and I have it, and they don’t!” Trump posts about waging war and winning a golf tournament in the same register. And they seem to occupy the same amount of space in his head.
Instead of governing the country for the next two years, Trump’s mind has drifted on to imprinting his name in the national topography before the historians get to work. Maggie Haberman, the leading chronicler of the Trump era at the New York Times, estimates that he spends around 70 per cent of his time thinking about renovations to the White House and around Washington DC. In her and Jonathan Swan’s new book, Regime Change, it is said that Trump often sits in his White House bedroom surrounded by Starburst and Werther’s caramel wrappers with two televisions blaring out praise from Fox News (there is another television in the bathroom). He once called up Emmanuel Macron to ask whether the Arc de Triomphe has a viewing platform as he pondered whether to instal one on the forthcoming Arc de Trump.
This is not to say that America is standing still while Trump makes his money, glues gold ornaments to the Oval Office fireplace and ponders which type of maple tree to order for the White House garden. Look to the review of US forces in Europe or the deregulation of AI to understand the magnitude of the changes the administration is bringing about. Stephen Miller is still pressing government agencies to go harder in their pursuit of illegal migrants. But these actions are often led by his professional and dogged staffers, while the president obsesses over persecuting his opponents and regilding statues down on the National Mall. The aggressive energy that went into rewiring the state in the first year is now being funnelled into enlarging the president’s bank account.
Before the war began, Trump reassured Tucker Carlson that “it’s going to be OK – because it always is”. Perhaps he is now scared that history might not remember him as the great leader that he clearly sees himself to be. He is rushing to ensure he has an architectural legacy at the very least before the Democrats launch their congressional investigations next year, proudly telling Haberman and Swan that the columns of his new White House ballroom will be taller than those on the Supreme Court. He also told them that he is more powerful than leaders such as Hitler, Mao, Stalin and Napoleon. Indeed, he is the “great leader” of our age: an easily bored narcissist reared on television who doesn’t read or have any ideological depth. His fleeting interest in the war did not prevent him from launching it in the first place. He emotes and the world spins.
Collapsing polling, the splits within the Maga movement, the insurgence of socialist democrats – none of it matters in Trumpland, or at least in Trump’s head. Forget that the energy behind Maga has seeped out of Washington. It is time to celebrate the Golden Age. Why can’t the Iranians see that?
[Further reading: Trump has not solved Gaza]
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This article appears in the 05 Aug 2026 issue of the New Statesman, Europe's shame
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Subscribe here to commentThe infatuation of Trump by Farage and Co seems to have diminished, but not their inability to enunciate any policies. How is Farage going to solve the illegal immigration problem? Simple, we employ the Royal Navy to prevent their rubber boats from leaving French waters into British waters. How will Farage deal with the shortage of houses. Again simple. The homeless will be moved into the houses vacated by the illegal Immigrants who are deported. Similarly with unemployment. The British unemployed will rush to take up the Care System vacancies and the NHS employee vacancies when we deport the illegal immigrants. All so simple it is a wonder that Farage and Lowe have not boasted about how easy Trump is finding these policies working in America.