My neighbor Swamp Rabbit thinks MAGA zealots will stand by their man. They didn’t lose faith when Donald Trump imposed counterproductive tariffs, undercut freedom of the press, sabotaged renewable energy projects, and deported immigrants who are U.S. citizens. According to the polls, even the jump in food and gasoline prices caused by Dear Leader’s “little excursion” in Iran didn’t drive away his hardcore cultists.
Hold on, I told my bibulous buddy. A recent Washington Post article has shed light on a new, dirtier problem — six-dollars-a-gallon diesel fuel — which is threatening to make agnostics of Trump’s true believers in districts he used to take for granted:
The political fallout [from rising diesel prices] is landing in deep-red voting districts the hardest. Federal data shows these tend to be the places where diesel powers the fuel-thirsty tractors and other machinery that the agriculture industry relies on.
Which means that farmers, who make up one of MAGA’s core constituencies, might not be able to turn a decent profit unless they pass on the rising cost of diesel to food shoppers.
“That’s us,” I said. “You might have to resort to shoplifting hot dogs at the SuperFridge again. I’ll have to live on lentils and ramen noodles.”
“You’re crazy,” Swamp Rabbit replied. “I predict them farmers will tell Trump they ain’t gonna vote for his lackies in the midterms unless he makes a deal with Iran that brings down fossil fuel prices.”
“Too late for that,” I said. “The midterms are only five weeks away.”
Desperate Trump boosters are saying the crisis will end if we stop exporting diesel produced in the U.S., but economists think that move would result in a glut that would make the problem worse. Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress and farming industry leaders still don’t have the guts to speak out against the idiot responsible for the crisis. The head of the Iowa Corn Growers Association blames “all our elected officials in D.C.”
Maybe farmers and other hardcore Trumpers will wise up after the midterms, but who knows? Zealots rarely defy their god, even when their livelihoods are at stake.
