I know everybody’s scared to jinx it, but you have to admit it’s getting downright vibe-shifty in here. I suppose it’s possible the pollsters are under-sampling likely voters who hate affordable gas, but until they figure out how to tariff hopium, I intend to indulge.

And don’t forget, all the approvals and generic congressionals and head-to-heads you’re seeing this week are before the record diesel spike trickles down to every American grocery store. In hindsight, perhaps outsourcing oil pricing to the Death to America crowd was a strategic error.

Whoever dreamed up that wacky “affordability” word sure knew what they were doing. Probably the funnest thing about having a mad king is paying more for stuff. Sometimes it’s because he’s dumb and starts trade wars, and sometimes it’s because he’s dumb and starts regular wars, but you can count on the dumbness and the paying more.

Plenty of room to get even dumber and more expensive, too. Maybe he’ll cut off all trade with Europe. Maybe he’ll ban fishing. Maybe he’ll order the army to go house to house confiscating all the shoes so we have to buy new ones because that way he could tell everybody he saved the shoe industry.

We’ll miss him when he’s gone, though. The hurricanes will come back, for starters. Then it’s locusts. Caravans. Transgender for everyone. Fast food packaging that differs from that of my childhood. Plus, if this AI stuff turns Terminator after all, we’ll need a high-IQ president, and I can’t think of anybody who’s taken more cognitive exams.

But hey, maybe the plot twist is that Natalie saves us all by printing out so much ballroom/Kennedy Center content that he falls asleep before he can get to Stephen Miller’s no doubt detailed memos urging ICE deployment to “urban” polling stations.

For all his shortcomings, when he wants to see his name on a better man’s memorial, he can be really quite persistent. Either Temu Ahab gets his white whale or it’s surprise demolition time again, huh? Well, it wouldn’t be the worst thing if all this ended with a Disney villain plummet off that scaffolding because he snuck out in the middle of the night to scrawl DONULD in crayon.

We could handle JD for a couple years. Whimpering for another chance is probably about as good as it gets for MAGA’s rotting remnants.

Because even Mike Johnson can no longer keep the floor of the House open without impeaching Pete Hegseth. Isn’t that refreshingly rational? The only people who actually want Hegseth in that job are autocrats opposed to American democracy; it’s unfortunate that one happens to be president.

Almost everything I know about global shipping routes I’ve learned by watching them fall to Middle Eastern extremists on Petey Push-ups’ watch. They’re having a ball over there because they know he doesn’t have enough ammunition left to do anything about it, but don’t worry, the important thing is that the “no fatties” rule will be enforced at his big speech.

Somehow, it’s just easier to lie about casualties to thin people, y’know? Anyway, if a man’s socks are fun enough, who really cares how many bases he loses? Court-martial the warfighters who leaked those photos, by the way. They can bunk with those sailors who got so mouthy about their so-called “food shortages.”

Also, is there room in the stocks for an AI chatbot? Because apparently we’ve got one that damn near led us into a shooting war with China. Jeepers creepers, if we don’t impeach this dweeb, we’re gonna wind up sacked by Visigoths.   

Two fun things Russia has been doing at the same time are A) helping Iran target our bases and B) paying for Don Jr.’s wedding. Yeah, drop seventy grand on fireworks, and the president lets you blow up American troops. That probably seems low to you, but you don’t understand how much Junior likes his sparklies.

We have “pardon brokers” now, in our exceptionally healthy democracy. Didn’t see that one comin’, didja, Madison? I bet pardon brokers can afford gas. I bet they get to shop at fancy stores where the popsicles have hardly any glass at all.

They’re recalling soap now. SOAP. Hand soap has been recalled in fifteen states “over bacterial contamination fears,” which is something that can happen to soap, apparently. I never imagined. You know you’re in a golden age when you can get sick from washing your hands.

Conventional wisdom says a midterm election is a referendum on the party in power, and I can see how that idea might not appeal to people who made blueberries and soap unsafe, but they can always campaign at these measles funerals.

Or you could…y’know…break with Trump. Quietly delete his name from your campaign site. Shit, Maria Elvira Salazar cut a whole-ass ad, and she hasn’t been visited by a single nail gun- or even hammer-wielding psychopath.

Why, the Dotard has finally grown unpopular enough for Erick Erickson to notice some of the naughtiness within his coalition! Racist naughtiness! FASCIST naughtiness, even! How Erick failed to notice this naughtiness at any point during the decade before the Senate map expanded so dramatically is a question best left to those who study the science of noticing things.

Because yes, would-be Texas Railroad Commissioner Bo French is an odious little bigot, but don’t act like he’s an outlier. You’re running one of the Charlottesville dorks for the state House in Florida. Greg Bovino’s been on a tour of European ultranationalist hazing rituals since losing his job to slightly quieter racists. And while I don’t want to impugn anyone unfairly, I suspect that Stephen Miller fellow may have a blind spot or two.

On the bright side, the demon Baal will not be permitted to enter this world through a golden bull statue in Serbia, thanks to the watchful eye of Deputy Secretary of State Chris Landau. We’re so lucky to have our diplomacy conducted by people who know so much more about Baal than, say, the Iranian regime’s ability to control the Strait of Hormuz.

Anyway, the Offal in the Oval banned CNN, MSNow, and Politico from the White House, which, okay, feels sorta tyrannical, but to be honest, I don’t like people watching me while I sleep, either.

Took a few decades, but Mitch McConnell finally found his best self. I like him quite a bit better without agency. Harder to steal a Supreme Court seat this way, y’know?

If you’re ever worried you’re too proud of being American, picture your government conducting a raid to smuggle an accused pedophile out of the British embassy in order to avoid charges. I wonder if they gave him puppies on the flight home. Ghislaine Maxwell got puppies.

Even as we continue to demand further transparency regarding the Epstein files, I think it’s equally important that we forever bury every detail of whatever the fuck prompted Kash Patel to waive the automatic bestiality disqualifier at the FBI.

You want it to be funny, but it won’t be. It’ll be the saddest fucking thing in the fucking world. Like Bongino keeping a “comfort cassowary” locked up in the basement to deal with the stress of having a real job, until Kash walks in on them. “I’ll expect your resignation on my desk in the morning. Of course the bird will have to be euthanized.”

“Of course.”

…but not till after a wild, taxpayer-funded weekend at the Boondoggle Ranch!

Okay, maybe it’s a little funny.

The wee ideological warning signs they’re putting up around the Smithsonian are funny, too. Cory Mills’ grenade factory blowing up is pretty funny. Not as funny as the old man’s meltdown when the Supreme Court stopped his little post office scheme…but funny.

Oh, and glorious victory has been achieved on the Greenlandic front! I’m told America gained as many as 10,000 free hours of AOL in this historic settlement!

I only hope there’s enough beer in the world to celebrate this triumph. I’ll buy as much as I can, assuming grateful readers donate to my beer fund, which you may have heard accepts Venmo, Cash App, AND PayPal.

ON THE OTHER HAND…

Yeah, it’s that time again. It’s COMIC BOOK TIME.

Y’all made the first issue of GENERAL WASHINGTON AND THE LIBERTY TREE such a smashing success that I just had to make a second. Teasers and trailers are on the way, but for now, why not sign up on our KICKSTARTER PRE-LAUNCH PAGE?

Okay, stay safe out there! Follow @john_luzar! Join the email list! MORE COMIC STUFF SOON!