This is catching the MOAM's attention today….. One of the most famous writers in America, a Mainer with a library's worth of bestsellers, went to the gas pump this morning and came back with a diagnosis for the President of the United States. Not an argument. A body-part referral.
What was said
On Sunday morning, October 4, 2026 (about 10:01 AM ET), novelist Stephen King posted this on X:
“I just paid $5.32/gallon for hi-test this morning...and I can afford it. Lots of folks can't.
Donald Trump, you can take your war and stuff it up your fat and leaky a**.”
(The asterisks are ours. King spelled it out.)
UNILAD wrote up the post the same day: “Stephen King takes brutal swipe at Donald Trump as trade war spat escalates” (Oct 4, 2026).
Source: Stephen King (@StephenKing) on X, Oct 4, 2026
Context (not spin)
Gas prices are a fair fight. Folks on the North Shore feel it at every fill-up on Route 1A, and nobody in Marblehead is cheering for $5 premium. If you want to blame the White House for prices at the pump, go ahead. Presidents of both parties have been taking that heat since the Carter years.
The MOAM's first problem is the delivery. King didn't make a case about oil supply, refinery margins, or foreign policy. He went for the President's waistline and backside and called it a day. That's not a gas-price argument. That's a bathroom-wall argument with a bestseller list behind it.
Then there are his own receipts. Three weeks ago, on September 11, 2026, King posted on Bluesky:
“I paid $5.50/gal for 93 octane. $50 to fill the tank. It's all that idiot Trump's fault.”
Both times it was premium, by his own description: $5.50 then, $5.32 now. That's 18 cents a gallon cheaper. So the price went down between the two posts, and the insults went up. If Trump gets the blame for $5.50, by the same logic he gets a little credit for $5.32. Nobody's expecting a thank-you card from Bangor, though.
And yes, King gets credit for saying he can afford it. He's right that lots of folks can't. But the man who just reminded everyone he's doing fine at the pump is buying hi-test, not the regular most working people put in the truck.
MOAM's diagnosis
Severity: ACUTE.
This is commentary, so here's the MOAM's opinion. A writer who has scared the daylights out of three generations of readers, and who knows exactly how to pick a word, went with “fat and leaky” on a Sunday morning. That isn't a critique of energy policy. That's the condition where every receipt, every fill-up and every lousy morning gets traced back to one man in Washington. On September 11 it was “that idiot Trump.” On October 4, with the number on the pump lower, it got cruder. When the price drops and the temperature still rises, it was never about the gas.
Mr. King, you're a New England treasure, and the MOAM means that. Down here in Marblehead we'd say save the horror for the books and bring the numbers to the gas-price argument. The 18 cents is in your own posts.
MOAM Out.
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