Aloha and Namaste, everyone, and welcome to Impolitic with John Hyalman, a puck and

Odyssey Joint, featuring lively, in-depth conversations with the people who cruise the quarters

of power in America, sculpting and shaping the ebb and flow of our politics and culture.

Just about a week ago, Donald Trump's 2016 campaign Spangali,

first-term White House chief strategist and former resident of the federal correctional institution

in Danbury, Connecticut, Steve Bannon went on a podcast from The Economist and repeated

for like the triple umpteenth time this

year that the second Trump term wouldn't be the last Trump term that the man that Bannon calls

a quote vehicle of divine providence would remain in the White House past 2028, basically for however long it

might take for the MAGA movement to, quote, finish what we started, though by what means

methods or machinations, Bannon refused to say. A few days later on Air Force One, as President Trump was flying to Japan,

reporters seized on Bannon's comments as an excuse to ask Trump about the topic of him seeking a

third term. And in the course of a typically rambling and self-pleasureing response,

Trump said something almost as unsurprising as what Bannon had coughed up to the economist.

Quote, I would love to do it.

Now, the fact that this answer wasn't surprising does not mean it wasn't news, because while

Trump has teased the idea of him running again in 28, despite the fact that it's clearly

and abundantly at odds with the 22nd Amendment of the U.S.

Constitution, he is usually a bit more subtle about it. Like, you know, he sends Trump 2028 hats to Gavin Newsom, for instance. Or he takes those same hats and puts them on the

resolute desk so that they be photographed during an Oval Office meeting with Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries.

Ha, ha, ha.

Now, those kinds of gestures have made it easy for elected Republicans to deflect questions about

...