Inflation Is Back and Nobody in Washington Is Surprised But You

By Buck Buckhorn · August 12, 2026

Opinion

Funny how the same government that prints the inflation report is the one causing the inflation. The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced this week that consumer prices ticked up again in July, annual inflation sitting at 3.4%, and Washington reacted like this was weather they didn’t see coming. They saw it coming. They engineered it.

Operation Epic Fury, American and Israeli forces bombed Iran's petrochemical plants and military installations for 40 days.

Gas is still over four dollars a gallon. Groceries keep climbing. And the man who promised to lower costs on Day One is now running a war in the Persian Gulf that sent oil markets into a panic, slapping tariffs on 99% of imported goods on top of that. Ask yourself who benefits from that combination. Not the guy filling his tank at Sheetz. Not the woman pricing out eggs at Walmart. The people who benefit are the ones who own the supply chains, the defense contracts, the energy futures. The same people who always benefit.

Trump got asked in May how much Americans’ financial situations were on his mind while he negotiated an end to the Iran War. He said “not even a little bit.” Then he went back to talking about nuclear weapons. That’s not a gaffe. That’s the whole system talking through him. They don’t think about your financial situation. They think about the map.

Gas prices remain over four dollars a gallon.

Operation Epic Fury launched February 28. American and Israeli forces bombed Iran’s petrochemical plants and military installations for 40 days. The Foundation for Defense of Democracies estimates $144 billion in damage to Iran’s economy. Iran’s own regime says $270 billion. Either way, that’s not free. You paid for every one of those bombs, and you’re paying again every time you fill your tank. The war cooled off briefly in June, prices dipped, and the administration tried to take a victory lap. Now hostilities are ramping back up, the Strait of Hormuz is a powder keg again, and the numbers did exactly what numbers do when you start bombing oil infrastructure.

Chuck Schumer stood up and said Trump is spending $900 million on a gilded ballroom at the White House and zero dollars to lower your costs. He’s right about the numbers. He’s wrong about the outrage. Schumer has been in the Senate for 27 years. He’s been in the swamp longer than some of these tariffs have existed. You think he just noticed? The Democrats are holding up the inflation report like a mirror and saying “look what he did,” and they’re correct, but ask yourself what they plan to do about it besides fundraise off it. Katherine Clark already has her November talking points ready. “Donald Trump’s economy is a disaster.” True. And the Democratic plan is to take back the House and then what? Pass a resolution? Hold a hearing?

Chuck Schumer, a U.S. Senator, stated Trump is spending $900 million on a gilded ballroom at the White House.

Alex Jacquez, former Obama guy, now at Groundwork Collaborative, said Trump is “not serious about bringing relief to working families.” No kidding. But neither was the last administration, or the one before that, or the one before that. The tariff taxes, the war spending, the inflation, the gas prices. This isn’t mismanagement. Mismanagement is when you try and fail. This is management. They’re managing you. The inflation report is just the receipt.

Every few months they hand you a number and tell you to be grateful it isn’t worse. And it will keep getting worse, because the people who profit from worse are the ones writing the policy. Funny how that works.

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