We’re All Here Together: Black, White, Red, Yellow & Brown
There is an old saying that goes back to ancient Greek Mythology, or even earlier than that, where everything a king touches turns to gold. The individual that quote refers to is King Midas, of course.
Hence, the Midas touch. Whomp! Whomp!
Obviously, there’s no King in American politics, but in Washington, DC, everything President Donald Trump lays his fat, grubby hands on turns to ashes and dust.
Maybe Trump’s the cursed UnKing, if there could be such a thing.
Trump’s latest disaster is the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool that is now an unsightly bright algae green, because Trump & Company stupidly decided to redo the pool in American flag blue.
What?
Not only was the decision unwise to begin with, as anyone who knows anything about Washington DC is well-aware of the headache the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has been for decades simply because it’s a too shallow, unnatural body of water, sitting on top of swamp land in one of the most humid cities in the entire country.
If that sounds nasty, it is.
When the conditions are just right, the pool can look like an enticing body of placid, silvery water from a distance, reflecting the tall obelisk of the Washington monument, and the Lincoln Memorial nearby. However, up close, it was never that. The pool was dirty, often foul smelling and not something anyone would unthinkingly stick a bare toe into.
Greater minds than what is now available at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, knew better than to rush job a permanent solution, as to how to fix the nation’s most famous – deservedly or not – pool. Thus, lacking in sound judgement, the vainglorious 47th President of the United States ordered the Reflecting Pool repainted in a dark blue color that would immediately collect summertime heat and turn the shallow water into an ugly, algae maligned mess.
Yes America, these kinds of misadventures happen when those closest to the President are only a bunch of quisling sycophants who believe that their only job is to tell POTUS exactly what he wants to hear instead of what he needs to hear. Which should have been; “Hands off the National Reflecting Pool buddy! We don’t need to do that!”
If only….
The ceremonial core of Washington DC, which includes the Federal Triangle and other important government buildings near the Potomac River is the worse for wear in Trump II, a meager 16 months into his second term. The front of the Kennedy Center is draped in an unsightly opaque white tarp, and is a big, fat middle finger, “up yours” to the federal judge who dared demand the UnKing remove his name from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
The U.S. Institute of Peace, located on nearby Constitution Avenue, has been quietly renamed the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace. This particular renaming has completely escaped national attention. The 47th President of the United States put his name on that building for no other reason, than because he could.
The stately East Wing of the White House was bulldozed to the ground without so much as a single congressional hearing or notice of any kind to anyone beyond Trump’s closest advisors. Structures such as the East Colonnade, and the building which once housed the offices of former First Ladies, were razed, on Trump’s word alone.
So now the nation is left with the prospect of a ridiculous 600-million-dollar gilded ballroom that no one beyond Trump, himself, asked for. Just on a side note, the impressive 1000 seat Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium exists in the same downtown area as the White House. The recently restored auditorium is already a glittering and sumptuous example of Neoclassical excess.
There really isn’t a need for a gilded in gold, 600-million-dollar ballroom.
A large venue already exists, right there, in the Federal Triangle, mere blocks from the White House.
There’s much more Trump treachery to add, such as the destruction of the historic Rose Garden, and the horrible red Christmas trees that Melania Trump herself, or some weird devil whispering in her ear, decided that the American nation needed to be subjected to, albeit during Trump’s first term.
Mercifully, the austere red trees are only seasonal decoration. Their unsightliness cannot be unseen. Do yourself a favor. Don’t research them. Your eyes will thank you for that, not insignificant favor.