By Eric Peters
Eric Peters Autos
August 4, 2026
The President of the United States just released the following statement:
"We have just been asked by Iran, and other Middle Eastern Countries, to hold off any attack in that the perimeters of a deal has been agreed to."
This exceeds even The Chimp's "Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning"?
Doesn't it make you feel a little bit like Mr. Hand, from Fast Times at Ridgemont High ? Mr. Hand was a high school teacher perpetually exasperated by the sloth and indifference to learning anything displayed by his students. In their defense, they were stoned teenagers - in the movie. What is the president's defense?
If you are in your teens or early 20s today, you probably don't get why it's so exasperating - to GenX and older generations - to hear the president speak of "perimeters" and deals that "has" been agreed to. It's more than just grammar policing, too. The statement also says: "The U.S.A. is locked and loaded and ready to go against the Islamic Republic of Iran, at levels of Military Terror, Strength, and Power not seen since World War II." One can easily picture Trump as you-know-who in that scene from Downfall that became the basis for countless parodies.
The Fuhrer - whoops, president - also says (once again) that the "deal" must encompass the "Total OPENING OF THE HORMUZ STRAIT, and an end to Iran's nuclear threat."
How many times has he said the same thing already ? How many times have the Iranians said that they do not agree ? Why does the Fuhrer - er, the president - continue to say the same thing over and over and over ? In between pauses and resumptions and threats of resumptions?
Because it keeps everyone on edge - and distracted. That is the true purpose of this stupid, evil war - which is more evil than stupid. Ordinary people have their heads on a swivel. They get up in the morning and wonder what insanity has propagated while they slept. They keep glued to the "news" - and their screens. The idea is to keep them anxious - and it's working. A technique used to wear down someone is to keep throwing things at them such that they can't catch a breather, much less have the time to calmly deal with one thing before the next thing is thrown in their laps like a hand grenade. This is part of Trump's art of the deal. He learned it from his mentor, Roy Cohn - an evil fixer of the '50s and '60s and '70s, who mentored the young apprentice.
Note that the Epstein Stuff has all-but-gone away. A treasonous honeypot operation involving the intelligence apparatus of a foreign entity is alarming but $4.10 per gallon is distracting. Also the worry that it could get much worse - any day now. People having to deal with existential threats to themselves haven't got time to worry about what the cretins who rule them have been up to. This is why the war goes on... and on. It will probably continue to go on. And then off, sort of - for awhile. Before it goes back on again.
Orwell explained it (through Goldstein and his "book") in 1984. The war is meant to be forever, the antagonists regularly shifting but the essential chaos never ending. The chaos - and the collective cortisol amping up it produces - is the point of it all. Keep the masses occupied and terrified and misdirected.
Cue the Lee Greenwood song. Again.
This article was originally published on Eric Peters Autos.