Here Be Pirates!

 

July 13, 2026: Here Be Pirates!

No, I am not talking about the Pittsburgh Pirate baseball team. Once upon a time I was a huge fan, when I spent a great deal of time with John and Robert Pira, who were rabid Pirate fanatics. It was easy to like the Pirates because of Willie Stargell, arguably the nicest guy in baseball at the time, and the immortal Roberto Clemente, whom I thought was the most exciting player in the game, beyond even Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays.

No, I am not talking about the Pirates of the Caribbean, who were my all-time favorite real-life characters when I was growing up. I collected every one of the 66 cards in the Fleer Pirate Bold set and read their tiny biographies, the size of an old tweet, every day. I am still fascinated. My favorite trio is Calico Jack Rackham, Anne Bonny and Mary Read. The original Skull and Crossbones motif on a pirate flag is said to have emerged from Calico Jack’s even better design, a skull, representing him, and crossed swords, representing his two female companions and soldiers-in-arms.

I am talking about real pirates on the High Seas today. Specifically, I am talking about the Strait of Hormuz and the United States Navy. More specifically, I am talking about the Navy’s Commander-in-Chief, Donald John Trump. Today Trump announced that our navy will be keeping the Strait open and that he expects passing ships to pay America a 20% surcharge to offset the cost of doing so. This means Trump plans to charge our allies to control, not fix, a problem he created when he declared war on Iran. It sounds like piracy to me. It sounds like extortion.

Maybe I am being unfair. To pirates. What Trump wants to do sounds like a protection racket. Old school: let me smash up your business, and if you don’t want it to happen again, pay me 20% of everything you make so I can protect you against myself. He’s not a pirate, he’s a gangster. He’s not Blackbeard, he’s Al Capone.