Tales From the MoJo Road –
By Glynn Wilson –
COULTERVILLE, Calif. – California has the highest average gas prices in the nation, at $6.15 a gallon, where prices tend to be higher due to a combination of state taxes and fees, environmental regulations and special fuel blends. Of all the U.S. states, it was California that first began recognizing the true cost of burning fossil fuels, and to enact measures to really begin to fight climate change due to global warming.
In conservative rural California, Republicans blame Governor Gavin Newsom for this. It’s true that gas prices were already higher here.
But it’s Trump’s trade war and war in the mideast that is costing Americans more for not only gas, but eggs and other groceries as well, even as the courts have ordered federal government refunds to some large corporations for their illegal trade taxes paid until the Supreme Court ruled the tariffs unconstitutional. Sorry mom and pop America. You don’t qualify for refunds.
Not one of the members of his sycophant cabinet knew enough about the world or economics in advance to understand what attacking Iran and blocking the Strait of Hormuz would do not just to the U.S. economy. It is disrupting the entire world economy, and at a terrible time when the economies of countries are already suffering from the trade war and other international factors.
Attempts by Trump and his toady followers in Congress to abandon the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare, and gut Medicare and Medicaid, is hurting Americans everywhere in rising health care costs, especially in red states where majorities voted for Trump. Many there still do not get what’s really going on, because the media they consume will not tell them the accurate story.
His public opinion numbers are finally tumbling down closer to where they should be in public approval, however, as people are coming around and noticing the effects of his policies in their pocketbooks. Only 37 percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing, while more than 60 percent disapprove.
But it’s too late now, and the dictator-king-in-chief doesn’t even seem to care. As long as he and his family and cronies profit, too bad for the rest of us.
As America gets ready to celebrate (or not) its 250th anniversary as a democratic republic, the United States is looking more and more like a Banana Republic, run by a tin pot dictator, who some experts are finally calling not only the worst president ever, but the most corrupt by far. We’ve had presidents before who profited from the office, and presidents who were power hungry.
Richard Nixon comes to mind.
Trump is both, on steroids.
His blatant profiteering off his office and the White House is staggering.
According to figures compiled by the Congressional Oversight Committee, as Americans struggle to buy groceries and pay rent, Donald Trump is making his family richer through digital grift schemes, “collecting profits through digital wallets and granting pardons to the highest bidders.”
Trump and his family are using the White House to make billions, they report. As of January 2026, the committee’s analysis shows that these schemes have contributed to an estimated $2.25 billion in realized profits for Trump from foreign payments, corrupt oligarchs and others. This total rises to as much as $9.7 billion when the value of Trump’s digital assets is factored in, with as much as $600 million coming from foreign interests.
“President Trump should be serving the American people, not his own pockets,” the committee says, like weak and starving wolves howling in a desert wilderness.
But in fact, he should have been serving in prison for his previous corruption and never been allowed to get anywhere near being elected president again, as even Republican Liz Cheney pointed out in a Congressional report on his crimes in his first term and in January, 2021, when he incited an insurrection to overthrow the new government before it could be sworn in.
If only President Joe Biden and his Attorney General Merrick Garland had done their jobs and brought him to a speedy trial long before the presidential campaign for president in 2024 kicked off, we would not be facing the mess we are in.
Democrats also botched the campaign for president, and I place much of the blame on Biden’s own staff for the way they prepared him at Camp David for that melt down presidential debate. I wrote about it at the time.
Some Democrats are as responsible for this as the MAGA Republicans, and more Americans than ever are not happy with either party.
At least some Democrats try to do an honest job of governing. But in this country at this time, this is downright impossible.
It looks like the End Times for American Democracy even out here in sunny California, where people are almost as locked in their homes as they were during the Covid pandemic. Who can afford to drive anywhere with these prices?
School is about to let out for summer, as Alice Cooper sang so long ago, and much of the economy here will depend on the summer tourist season. Some travel experts are already saying they may avoid coming here to Yosemite National Park and other California parks, and opt for parks in cheaper states. Canadians and Europeans are already boycotting travel in America because of Trump’s words and policies, and Asians are skeptical too, especially with the new, higher fees for visiting national parks.
This is a disaster of epic proportions, and it looks kind of like Hell on Earth for many people, Armageddon or not.
The only hope is for Democrats to take over both houses of Congress in November, investigate Trump and impeach him again, this time convicting him in the Senate and removing his dumb ass from the White House. It will be tumultuous, sure.
But if that does not happen, say your prayers and head for the hills in some other country. This place is going up in smoke.
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This syndicated editorial opinion column was written for and first published in The Progressive Populist newspaper out of Austin, Texas and Iowa.
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