So let’s look at some numbers as we all witness the devastating chaos of Trump’s war-on-my-whim against Iran. Gasoline prices have gone up daily, with AAA reporting prices increasing from an average of $2.98 to $3.41 a gallon in the last week. The price of crude oil has surpassed $90 a barrel. (every $10 increase raises the inflation rate by .2 to .4 percentage points) Qatar has fully shut down its gas liquefaction facilities. Insurers are refusing to insure ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz (Al Jazeera reports that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps [IRGC] is in complete control of the waterway), Trump is offering insurance coverage (our tax dollars at work!) but shipping companies are reluctant to take the risk. On the munitions side Barron’s Jack Hough notes that it costs $45,000 an hour (more than what some of us earn in a year) to operate a carrier based F-35 fighter jet. RTX PAC-3 missiles (used to intercept Iranian drones) cost $4 MILLION a pop. Lockheed-Martin’s Thaad system costs $14 MILLION per launch. And six of our military personnel are dead, a cost beyond price. But let us eat cake! NYC billionaire and Trump ally John Castimatidis, owner of United Refining Company, wants us to suck it up. The fuel price hikes are “temporary fluctuations” and we should “suffer for a month” so the US can “take out the terrorists.” And of course our not-so-intrepid lawmakers, Fitzpatrick and Fetterman voted along with a complicit and cowardly Republican majority defeating a War Powers Resolution intended to rein in Trump’s actions, with Fitzpatrick pusillanimously claiming the resolution was “poorly worded.” This is a war of choice, with little public support, and no end in sight. Trump’s latest shrill call for “unconditional surrender” signals more weakness than strength as the chickens: a conflict that is shaping up to be not so temporary, soon with American boots on the ground, lack of public support (56% against), disintegrating support from gulf-state and European nations, spiraling energy costs, higher inflation, ballooning government debt - come home to roost. No amount of ever-evolving, throw it against the wall, see if it sticks spin will justify the toll that Trump’s war is and will bring upon us as a nation. His self-aggrandizing, warmongering machinations must be stopped at all costs.