There is a peculiar, masochistic ritual that defines the American experience. Every four years, the electorate—a collective entity possessing the memory span of a goldfish and the critical thinking skills of a damp sponge—lines up to purchase a ticket for a rollercoaster that they have been explicitly told is under construction, on fire, and operated by a man who thinks safety regulations are a communist plot. Donald Trump promised an economic boom. He promised a transformation so profound, so earth-shattering, that the very laws of finance would bend the knee to his sheer force of will. And now, as we survey the landscape of this promised utopia, we are greeted not by the singing of angels or the clinking of newly minted gold coins in the pockets of the proletariat, but by the dull, rhythmic thud of reality hitting the pavement.

The headline states, with the polite understatement characteristic of journalists terrified of losing access, that the boom is “not quite what has happened.” This is akin to saying the Titanic had a “minor moisture issue.” It is a masterpiece of euphemism. The “sweeping changes” Trump enacted—a chaotic blend of 19th-century tariff mercantilism and deregulation seemingly drafted on the back of a fast-food napkin—have indeed transformed the economy. They have transformed it from a functioning, albeit limping, machine into a erratic casino where the house always wins, and the house is currently owned by people who view the working class as organic fuel for the furnace.

Let us dissect the anatomy of this disappointment, shall we? The premise was simple, tailor-made for the short attention spans of the MAGA faithful and the desperate optimism of the suburban squeezed middle: Elect the businessman, and the business of America will boom. It is a charming fairy tale, one that requires ignoring the fact that running a country is distinct from slapping one's name on a steak or bankrupting a casino. The “boom” was supposed to be a rising tide lifting all boats. Instead, it has been a tsunami that lifted the mega-yachts to the stratosphere while swamping the dinghies of the common man. The promised manufacturing renaissance remains a rust-covered fever dream, fueled by tariffs that function less as a protective shield and more as a tax on the very people wearing the red hats.

But to blame Trump entirely is to give him too much credit and the American public too little scorn. The electorate loves the lie. They crave it like a diabetic craves high-fructose corn syrup. They do not want nuanced discussions about supply chains, labor participation rates, or the delicate interplay of global markets. They want a loud man in a long tie to scream that everything will be perfect, beautiful, and the best anyone has ever seen. Trump delivered the performance; reality simply failed to learn its lines. The economic indicators are a mixed bag of volatility, stagnant real wages for the bottom tier, and a stock market that has detached itself from reality to float in a bubble of speculative delirium. This is not a boom; it is a hallucination.

What is truly exhausting, however, is the feigned shock of the pundit class. They clutch their pearls and point to the data, exclaiming, “Look! He didn’t fix it!” as if a man whose primary business strategy involves litigation and bombast was ever going to meticulously engineer a soft landing for a complex global economy. The “sweeping changes” were never about structure; they were about aesthetics. It was economic policy by vibes. If the graph goes up, it’s a Trump Triumph. If the graph goes down, it’s the fault of the Deep State, the Federal Reserve, or perhaps wind turbines. The accountability is non-existent because the objective was never prosperity; the objective was the maintenance of the ego.

So here we stand, amidst the debris of yet another cycle of overpromising and underdelivering. The Left will scream that this is the result of capitalist greed, ignoring their own complicity in a system that has long abandoned the worker. The Right will scream that the boom is actually happening, you just can't see it because the media is lying, engaging in a collective gaslighting campaign that would be impressive if it weren't so transparently pathetic. The truth, as usual, is boring and depressing: The economy is a beast that cannot be tamed by rhetoric, no matter how loud. The boom didn't happen because magic isn't real. The sweeping changes swept nothing but dust under the rug. And the American public, bless their empty heads, will undoubtedly learn absolutely nothing from this, eagerly awaiting the next charlatan who promises them a free lunch in a restaurant that has been closed for decades.