Trump, Netanyahu, and the Absence of Process: Laura Rozen on Power, Personality, and a World Out of Balance

In this wide-ranging and unsparing conversation, Marc Schulman is joined once again by veteran Washington correspondent Laura Rozen, whose reporting on U.S. foreign policy and the Middle East spans two decades. What begins as a discussion about Trump’s latest diplomatic theatrics quickly becomes a deeper examination of how global decision-making now works—or no longer works—when power is concentrated in the hands of a few leaders and stripped of institutional process.Rozen and Schulman dissect the emerging “Gaza Board of Peace,” the strange language surrounding it, and what it reveals about Donald Trump’s worldview: diplomacy as spectacle, permanence, and personal control rather than policy. They explore why Israel benefits from Trump’s leverage—particularly in securing a hostage deal—while being unnerved by his unpredictability and transactional diplomacy. Netanyahu’s position, weakened domestically yet dependent on Trump, runs as a constant undercurrent throughout the discussion.The conversation then widens to Iran, Ukraine, Venezuela, and Europe, probing the absence of coherent U.S. national-security decision-making, the hollowing out of expertise, and the replacement of structured policy with social-media pronouncements. Rozen offers rare insight into how decisions on Iran are being made, who is actually in the room, and why even major military or diplomatic moves appear to lack a “day after” plan.At the same time, the episode does not shy away from Israel’s own crisis of governance: the erosion of foreign-policy institutions, the paralysis of Netanyahu’s government, the slow grind of the judicial process, and the broader sense that both Israel and the United States are being led by aging, embattled leaders governing through grievance rather than strategy.The episode closes on a more reflective note—touching on Israeli television, the role of fiction in making sense of chaos, and the personal toll of covering a world in constant crisis—before Schulman encourages listeners to follow Rozen’s Substack, Diplomatic, for her ongoing reporting.This is an essential episode for listeners trying to understand not just today’s headlines, but the deeper structural breakdown shaping global politics right now. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit marcschulman.substack.com/subscribe