Burritos and Bombs
Life During Trumptime - 8/3/26 - 8/9/26
This week conservatives fought a hard battle over the cost of a burrito. Though the burrito battle spiraled out into podcasts and think pieces, the most heated debates occured on X.com and, if you’re normal, there’s a good chance you have no idea what I’m talking about.
Allow me to poison your brain just a little.
On August 3, in a post on X, Daily Wire host Matt Walsh said “grocery prices are insane” and that politicians needed to focus on bringing down costs for people. Turning Point USA spokesman Andrew Kolvet then retweeted Walsh and shared a line he’d heard from a TPUSA college student: “A burrito shouldn’t cost $20,”
The assertion that a burrito shouldn’t cost $20 and that prices were too high in general drove some conservatives mad. Outgoing Texas Congressman Dan Crenshaw spent several days posting memes and complaining about the complainers.
Ben Shapiro — whose star is fading fast — told the kids that their grandparents would kill to have their grocery bill. He delivered his missive with an air of condescension that was beloved 10 years ago when he aimed it at campus liberals but isn’t playing too well in 2026 now that he’s attacking people on his side of the aisle.
Bill Maher ran a segment during his HBO show where he broke down the numbers and explained that no burrito actually costs $20. Tucker Carlson ran several segments about the burrito where he sympathized with those paying too much for food.
Watching pundits tear each other apart about the cost of a hypothetical burrito, I was reminded of one of the reasons establishment Democrats lost the most recent election. Faced with complaints about the cost of food, gas, and rent from the public, many on the left pointed to charts and graphs and said that prices and wages, actually, were pretty good. But that wasn’t how people felt and no amount of spreadsheets will make people feel better about the high cost of groceries. Listening to the bloodless quants in your party does not help win elections.
Now some in conservative media are making the same mistake, often those with diminishing positions like Crenshaw and Shapiro. Carlson, perhaps understanding the shifting politics of the country better than anyone else, defended the burrito-bereft.
8/3/26
America’s bombing campaign against Iran isn’t going well and US Central Command reached out to military analysts asking for ideas. “We are looking for new creative and unconventional ways to pressure and punish Iran,” CENTCOM’s intelligence officers sent in a wideband email, according to CNN.
Meanwhile, Iran and Oman said they were close to a deal that would see the opening of the Strait of Hormuz. Under the terms of the deal, Iran and Oman would control the Strait, escort ships that traverse it, and charge services fees on both ends. Esmail Baghaei, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, said the deal would “uphold sovereign rights while also addressing the national security considerations of both Iran and Oman.”
In a post on Truth Social, Trump accused Tehran of being “unbelievably duplicitous.”
8/4/26
Three insider sources told Reuters that the US had used up most of its stockpile of long-range missiles.
Responding to a request for comment, chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said: “America’s military is the most powerful in the world and has everything it needs to execute at the time and place of the President’s choosing. We have executed multiple successful operations across combatant commands while ensuring the U.S. military possesses a deep arsenal of capabilities to protect our people and our interests.”
The supply figures have circulated inside the federal government over the last week during tense conversations inside the Trump administration about how much longer the U.S. can continue striking Iran without drawing down the stockpile to levels that would limit the military’s ability to respond to crises elsewhere.
8/5/26
Tucker Carlson (perhaps buoyed by the ongoing burrito battle) outlined a manifesto during a livestream on Wednesday night. The announcement came a month after Carlson told the Columbia Journalism Review that he would “help build a third party” and a few days after former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene posted a photo on X of her hanging out with Calrson and Rep. Thomas Massie and former US intelligence official Joe Kent.
Carlson’s manifesto said that America should be 10 things above all else:
Fair
Sovereign
Productive
Beautiful
Healthy
Honest
Optimistic
Wise
Decent
United
Carlson was once an influential figure in the world of MAGA. During Trump’s first term he had the number one news show on cable and the president’s phone number on speed dial. Now he’s streaming interviews with Hunter Biden and Nick Fuentes on X.com. But Carlson does draw millions of viewers to those streams and has long been a savvy political operator.
Undersecretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby teased a new US nuclear posture during a keynote speech at STRATCOM’s Deterrence Symposium. “There’s, you know, a review or sort of relook at the employment guidance, which is more about the commander of STRATCOM and his responsibilities and secretary’s authorities, etcetera,” he said.
According to Breaking Defense, Colby said he feared the use of nuclear weapons in a regional war. After the speech, STRATCOM commander Adm. Richard Correll told reporters that the Pentagon was looking to expand the president’s options when it comes to nuclear war.
“I think about it much more broadly than our nuclear capability, is from our exquisite non-kinetic capability to our conventional capability, to if you would envision, some kind of limited nuclear exchange to high-end escalation,” Correll said.
8/6/26
The Washington Post reported that Trump yelled at Secretary of War Pete Hegseth about America’s depleted munitions stock during a meeting at Camp David. Hegseth pointed the finger at someone else.
Back at Camp David, as he was confronted by Trump over the bare weapons stockpile, Hegseth defended himself and blamed his deputy, Stephen Feinberg, for the shortages and for not ensuring Trump was fully apprised of the issue, both people familiar said.
The exchange underscored Trump’s increasing frustration with his defense secretary, who was one of the biggest early advocates for taking military action against Iran, convincing Trump it would be a quick and relatively easy win, according to multiple officials.
“This is 100% fake news. Literally never happened. And President Trump has the utmost confidence in Secretary Hegseth,” said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt in response to questions from The Post.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump swore that America had all the weapons it would ever need and called for the hunting down the leakers of “treasonous statements” to the contrary.
8/7/26
The Pentagon released a fifth tranche of UFO related files and documents. No one seemed to care.
A Senate committee voted to hold Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress for repeatedly pleading the fifth while testifying before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs last week.
Progressive Abdul El-Sayed won the Democratic primary in Michigan and will proceed to the general election. He previously ran for elected office in 2018 when he lost to Gretchen Whitmer during the Democratic primary for governor.
8/8/26
The US Senate confirmed Todd Blanche as US Attorney General in a vote of 50 to 49. Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska were the only Republican senators to vote against Blanche’s confirmation.
In a statement on her website, Collins outlined the reasons for her opposition.
Mr. Blanche approved an order to shield the President, his sons, and the family business from IRS audits, protections unavailable to other American taxpayers.
He approved the creation of a $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund.
He promised an anti-abortion organization that he would seek to prohibit the mailing of abortion medication to women nationwide.
Under his leadership, the Department attempted to indict Senators Mark Kelly and Elissa Slotkin over their ill-advised, but constitutionally protected, videos encouraging resistance to unlawful orders.
More than 1,200 former Department of Justice employees have opposed his nomination, arguing that he has undermined the institution.
8/9/26
Iran and Oman, once again, signalled that they were close to a deal to open the Strait of Hormuz. Tehran made it clear that the deal was contingent on the US agreeing to several provisions, including war reparations, the end of the US blockade and sanctions, and the termination of hostilities against Iran and its allies in the region.
“We are low-keying it,” Trump told Axios in a phone call. “We are only semi-negotiating with them. We are just watching Iran with its huge inflation and the fact they have no money.”