Who knew that Donald Trump, of all people, could possess such a capability for serenity? The man who has spent the past two months losing a war in slow motion and watching the global economy unravel in front of his eyes now claims that he’s in no hurry to end the Iran conflict or reach a deal.
On April 23, Trump took to Truth Social to inform the world, in superlative terms (because of course), that he is “possibly the least pressured person ever to be in this position.” He then added a flourish: “I have all the time in the world, but Iran doesn’t. The clock is ticking!”
That’s just excellent vibes, Mr. President, especially from a man whose “little excursion” is now stomping into its eighth week with no exit ramp and no plan beyond rage-posting on social media.
The trouble is that “all the time in the world” is not a resource available to the average American filling up a Civic before a 9 a.m. shift. A Reuters/Ipsos poll (per U.S. News) released April 24 found 77 percent of registered voters now hold the president responsible for the gas-price surge that arrived after he and Israel kicked off this war.
The truly mortifying figure, the one Karoline Leavitt fears will come up during her next press briefing, sits just below it. 55 percent of Republicans — the president’s own people — are pointing their fingers at him too.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright, who in March pinky-promised gas would be back under $3 “before too long,” returned to CNN this month to admit “that might not happen until next year.” Trump, watching from Mar-a-Lago, told The Hill his own energy chief was “totally wrong.”
Between Joe Kent’s resignation and the firing of Pentagon generals, not to mention the U.S. Navy Secretary John Phelan’s forced resignation, there’s a pattern forming, and not the kind that raises our confidence in the way this administration is handling the war.
Asked what Americans get in exchange for the pain, Trump said the trade-off is “Iran without a nuclear weapon.” Fair enough, except that every intelligence assessment claimed Iran had no intention of pursuing the development of a nuclear weapon. The one person who did say it, though, was Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He has repeatedly said, across the years, that Iran is “two weeks away” from having a nuclear weapon. Since 1992, actually.
And so, the clock Trump claims is ticking against the Middle Eastern country is actually ticking against his own coalition. But hey, who even cares about MAGA at this point? The president is going after them harder than he is going after the Iranians.
Published: Apr 26, 2026 07:51 am