Am I Writing for SNL Now?

" Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder." - George Washington

Last week, I talked about the staggering degree of self dealing by the Trump family in the past year. From Middle Eastern oil money to crypto to military drones, right down to overpriced watches and sneakers. The latest, though, may be the most cynical of all. And you all have heard it by now.

Roughly $580 million in oil futures were traded minutes before Trump reversed course on Iran, announcing talks were underway. The trades hit in a single minute around 6:50 a.m., betting on oil dropping and stocks rising. About 15 minutes later, Trump posted about “productive conversations” with Iran and paused planned strikes, triggering the market activity these trades counted on. Economist Paul Krugman says that exploiting advanced knowledge of military decisions for profit isn’t just unethical, it’s “treason.” He also pointed out that trading on that kind of information effectively signals U.S. intentions to anyone watching the markets.

So, was the first family involved? No one yet knows, but if not directly, then someone in the President's inner circle leaked to some interested parties, and a lot of money was made. That is the very definition of insider trading. Frankly, if I were Martha Stewart, I'd be royally pissed.

Of course, Iran denies those talks and has rejected a US ceasefire proposal. And the confusion in the White House should be downright scary. From a blog writer simply named No1...

Friday’s press gaggle. Barely exaggerated: at 12:03 PM, President Trump told reporters he wanted a ceasefire with Iran. At 12:05 he declared victory. At 12:07 he announced he was sending Marines. At 12:08 he said no boots on the ground. At 12:11 he said he did not want a ceasefire. At 12:16 he declared victory again. At 12:17 he asked for a ceasefire. At 12:23 he told NATO they were cowards. At 12:29 he said Iran was begging for a ceasefire. At 12:31 he said everything was perfect. At 12:36 he said $500 oil was a good thing. At 12:37 he demanded Iran open Hormuz. At 12:39 he said Hormuz was never closed. At 12:41 he said the US was not at war with Iran. At 12:42 he declared victory in Iran.

And now, joining the Marine Expeditionary Force, the Army's 82nd Airborne unit is on the way.

But don't worry. Lindsey Graham rose from his fainting couch to declare, "If we took Iwo Jima, we can do this."

Lindsey, buddy. We took 26,000 casualties at Iwo Jima. There has to be a better metaphor out there. Maybe Gettysburg? Or the Stonewall riots? Anything else.

But believe it or not, it gets dumber. The President is rightfully worried about the upcoming midterm elections in just over 200 days. High oil and gasoline prices are not a very good campaign platform, so how to bring the price down? I know, let's get more oil on the market pronto.

So, we have taken sanctions off the sale of oil from our buddies in Russia, who will now be able to afford to kill more Ukrainians. While we're at it, let's remove sanctions from, wait for it...Iran. Yep, the guys who just, for the first time, shot down 2 $90-million F-35 jets and are about to fight with the Army and Marines.

And Russia is supplying intel to Iran, along with drones. We have now officially gone way beyond satire.

Look, even the staunchest critic of this war has to admit two things. Well, of course, other than the crowd in charge makes a Saturday Night Live sketch look like a Ken Burns documentary.

First, the Iranians are genuinely bad guys. And second, the US military is the best in the business. But take the two together, and you might be surprised.

I take you back to 2002, a year after 9/11. A recently declassified “after-action” report from a 2002 war game, “triggered internal warnings that the U.S. military was vulnerable to low-tech warfare,” according to an article in the Washington Post written by National Security Archive fellow Nate Jones.

The simulated U.S. Navy battle group was defeated in ten minutes by an enemy that launched its attacks from commercial ships using other unconventional means. The findings of the newly released postmortem from the $250 million Millennium Challenge 2002 exercise foreshadowed “the very challenges the United States would face in the 2003 invasion of Iraq and other conflicts since then,” according to Jones, who is FOIA director at the Post.

So, the Pentagon changed the rules of engagement, particularly for the "enemy" and re-ran the whole thing. Lo and behold, we won.

Jones requested the document while working at the National Security Archive in 2013 after coming across a 2002 article in the Army Times that quoted Marine Lt. Gen. Paul Van Riper, who led anti-U.S. forces during the simulation. Van Riper was highly critical of the Millennium Challenge, calling the exercise “rigged.”

And, let's throw this into a depressing mix. American manufacturing might was, at least once upon a time, the envy of the world. When WWII ended, this photo was taken of a gigantic armada of surplus B-17 bombers, some of them brand new and never in the fight. Almost all were headed for the scrapyard.

Now, after 3 weeks of fighting a medium-sized country, albeit with a boatload of money, we are nearly running out of high-tech weapons. Israel, too, is facing a critical shortage of missile interceptors for its vaunted "Iron Dome" defensive shield.

The sheer expense of the weapons involved and their limited availability is also pertinent. One expert estimates intercepting a drone costs five times more than producing one, while stockpiles of the most advanced US-made weapons are very limited and can only be replenished slowly. Such munitions are in great demand elsewhere, such as in Ukraine or Taiwan. Yeah, well. Good luck there.

Before long, US pilots will be honing their gunnery skills, knocking down drones like Zeros in WWII. I would have simply said enemy planes, but Trump has already insulted the Japanese Prime Minister, so what the hell.

So, it looks like a war of attrition, if I'm allowed to call it a war. And why did he start it? I think a combination of the midterms, Israeli prodding, outdated intelligence on Iran's nuke program, and, of course, the ghost of Christmas past, Jeffrey Epstein.

He'll need more brave Marines and Naval officers like, oh, John McCain and Robert Mueller. I'm sorry, did I pick the wrong officers?

And did I forget to mention that, according to the US Treasury, we are officially insolvent? My mistake. But the fact is, we are. That’s not hyperbole — it’s the conclusion drawn directly from the Treasury Department’s own consolidated financial statements for fiscal year 2025, released last week. Did you hear any reports on it? Did Fox run its overused "Breaking News" banner? Did Bari Weiss and the merry pranksters at CBS lead with it?

Of course not. The numbers: $6.06 trillion in total assets against $47.78 trillion in total liabilities as of September 30, 2025. Fortune Magazine explained...

Most people cannot relate to trillion-dollar figures on a government ledger. So consider this: divide every number by 100 million — drop eight zeros — and federal finances look like a household budget in freefall.

That household earns $52,446 and spends $73,378 — running a $20,932 annual deficit. Its total liabilities and unfunded promises amount to $1,361,788 against just $60,554 in assets, leaving it $1.3 million in the hole. Uncle Sam, by any accounting standard, is insolvent.

So, Happy Birthday, America! I am reminded of a story about former Texas Congressman Ron Paul. He was in a Budget Committee hearing and one member exclaimed: "We're spending money like a drunken sailor!"

Paul responded, "No, we're not. A drunken sailor spends his own money."