Trump’s Iran war has entered the phase everyone warned about: The quagmire phase.
Not the “mission accomplished” phase. Not the “we bombed them and they folded” phase. Not even the “we have a diplomatic off-ramp” phase. No. We’re now in the “let’s keep the Strait of Hormuz closed for months, keep US forces parked in the region, watch oil and gasoline prices explode, and hope Iran blinks before we do something even stupider” phase.
That’s not a strategy. That’s Vietnam with oil futures.
The reporting today is pretty straightforward. Trump reportedly doesn’t want to resume bombing Iran, but he also doesn’t want to back down. So now the plan is an extended blockade. The Strait of Hormuz stays closed. The blockade remains. US forces remain in the region. Iran doesn’t capitulate. Trump doesn’t retreat. And both sides sit there waiting for the other guy to blink -- or fire first.
And the problem is, that’s how wars spread.
This is the thing Trump never understands. Or maybe he understands it and just doesn’t care. You can’t shut down one of the most important oil chokepoints in the world and then act shocked when oil prices spike. Gasoline is already climbing. Oil is already surging. And that feeds directly into inflation, which feeds into bond yields, which feeds into mortgage rates, business borrowing, the cost of servicing the national debt, and eventually recession risk.
So when Trump says he’s being tough, what he’s really saying is: You’re going to pay more at the pump, your mortgage is going to get more expensive, businesses are going to get squeezed, and the Fed may have to keep rates higher because Trump needed to prove he was a big strong man.
And politically, the numbers are brutal. Americans think the economy is on the wrong track. Independents say the economy was better under Biden. Trump’s inflation numbers are historically awful. That’s the part he can’t spin away. You can lie about a war. You can lie about a deal. You can lie about Iran being “in collapse.” But people know what they’re paying for gas. They know what groceries cost. They know what their rent and mortgage cost. Reality has a way of punching through the propaganda.
And then there’s the Comey indictment, which is almost too stupid to be real. James Comey gets indicted over seashells arranged to say “86 47,” while Trump’s own allies have used the exact same “86” language about Biden and members of Congress. Trump himself has posted violent imagery about Biden. But somehow Comey’s beach photo is the national emergency.
This is what authoritarian governments do. It’s Soviet, communist Chinese, and Putinesque. They don’t apply the law equally. They define the law as whatever protects Dear Leader and punishes his enemies. If Trump’s enemies say something ambiguous, it’s a federal case. If Trump’s allies say something worse, suddenly everyone becomes a free speech absolutist. (Remember when JD Vance scolded the UK, and Europe overall, for being soft on free speech?)
The rest of the show is the same theme in different forms: corruption, hypocrisy, decay, and consequences. Israel wants Ukraine’s help against Hezbollah drones while still playing footsie with Putin and refusing to help Ukraine. The Supreme Court just made it easier to dismantle minority voting power. The White House calls Trump a king days after Trump says calling him a king puts his life in danger. And Trump manages to embarrass himself in front of actual royalty, because apparently even the British monarchy isn’t safe from his desperate need to be the center of attention.
The through-line is simple: Trump creates chaos, lies about the chaos, blames everyone else for the chaos, and then asks why everything is on fire.
