  Besides the mechanism responsible for high critical temperature
superconductivity, the grand unresolved issue of the cuprates is the occurrence
of a strange metallic state above the so-called pseudogap temperature $T^*$.
Even though such state has been successfully described within a
phenomenological scheme, the so-called Marginal Fermi-Liquid theory, a
microscopic explanation is still missing. However, recent resonant X-ray
scattering experiments identified a new class of charge density fluctuations
characterized by low characteristic energies and short correlation lengths,
which are related to the well-known charge density waves. These fluctuations
are present over a wide region of the temperature-vs-doping phase diagram and
extend well above $T^*$. Here we investigate the consequences of charge density
fluctuations on the electron and transport properties and find that they can
explain the strange metal phenomenology. Therefore, charge density fluctuations
are likely the long-sought microscopic mechanism underlying the peculiarities
of the metallic state of cuprates.
