Sometimes, the small things get to you in a way the big things don't.
It isn't that tearing off the East Wing of the White House to install a grotesquely huge ballroom that 44 presidents managed to live without is worse than, oh, a crusade against immigrants sending masked thugs into cities to kidnap workers off the street, or squashing the free press, or murdering people at sea, or demonizing LBGTQ Americans, or corrupting the justice department, or extorting money from the government, or accepting bribes from foreign governments, or undermining of women's rights, voting rights, science, health care, higher education and the general destruction of the federal government as a tool for helping people.
To name a few.
That latter part is worse. Far worse. And yet. Seeing the rendition of the huge honking Versailles of a ballroom he is erecting hurt in a new way. The surprise, the suddenness of it — an airy plan one day bruited by a chronic liar who sometimes follows through, usually doesn't. Then backhoes ripping out the walls. It's so symbolic of what is happening all around us. A hundred novelists couldn't dream it up. Ripping apart the White House. It would be too obvious, too crude. Too wrong. It would look trite in fiction.
But it's not fiction. It's real. Another impossible to image development that, in retrospect, we should have seen coming. What made us think he would limit himself to figurative destruction of the edifices of democracy. Of course this lurch into the literal.
Outrage was both on point and pointless.
"It's not his house," Hillary Clinton said on X, summing the situation up perfectly. "It's your house. And he's destroying it."
Got that right. Maybe the creeping terror is because the White House is still exactly that. A house. A residence where people live. Like all homes, it's supposed to be secure. Safe from vandalism and the whim of tyrants who temporarily — or not so temporarily — dwell there.
"It's not his house," Hillary Clinton said on X, summing the situation up perfectly. "It's your house. And he's destroying it."
Got that right. Maybe the creeping terror is because the White House is still exactly that. A house. A residence where people live. Like all homes, it's supposed to be secure. Safe from vandalism and the whim of tyrants who temporarily — or not so temporarily — dwell there.
But it isn't safe. None of us are. Not anymore. We're supposed to be secure. The Fourth Amendment guarantees the right to be secure in our houses. If the People's House is not secure — if Trump can destroy it at will, right before our eyes — then whose home can't he destroy?
Unfort. on social media, there'll be ultra conservatives taking Hillary's quote and making a joke of it saying she should worry about what her husband did in the WH. False equivalent. He didn't tear down any walls just for his ego. And wouldn't Dump's admin. be over with by the time that addition is done? Or will it?
ReplyDeleteAnd if Trump did what Bill Clinton did, it would have been with a 12 year old.
DeletePretty sure the East Wing was built in 1902, under Teddy Roosevelt. And then enlarged by FDR during WWII. It's where the White House tours started. I did one as a teen-ager, back in '62. Still have the souvenir guidebook.
ReplyDeleteRevenge on Obama and Biden isn't enough for Orange Julius. This is revenge on the ROOSEVELTS, for chrissakes. On TR, FDR, Eleanor. He probably thinks they were all Jews.
Both wings were done in away as not to spoil the look of the overall building. The White House is pretty small. The ballroom will dwarf it and look stupid.
DeleteThe East Wing was enlarged by FDR to cover up the bomb proof bunker they installed during WWII!
DeleteA picture is worth a thousand words.
ReplyDeleteFunnily( not so funny ) it happened the week Virginia Guiffre's book was released. So one more distraction. I hope it is called the Epstein Ballroom into perpetuity.
ReplyDeleteI REALLY like that idea of getting everyone to call it the "Epstein Ballroom." I'm going to do what I can in my circles to get that to be a thing and to stick.
DeleteYes, Epstein Ballroom is on-point, given the assorted attempts to distract from those files. But I'll be calling it the Faux King Ballroom.
DeleteA great summation. I, too, was surprised at the gut-punch I felt about this. Then not surprised that the feeling followed with the same conclusion you draw, that it is symbolic of all that is happening. And then the despair set in.
ReplyDeleteOver in the MAGAverse, they're praising the demolition to the skies and repeating endlessly, "The East Wing is NOT HISTORIC!!!! It's NOT part of the original White House!!! So there!!!!" and/or that every President has complained about not having a big enough ballroom, but couldn't afford it. Meanwhile, the Roosevelts (Teddy and FDR) could have built a 90,000 sq foot ballroom if they wanted (they definitely had the money) but didn't.
ReplyDeleteI'm not really much of a Rick Wilson fan, but he has a post about the East Wing that is pretty good. It's long, though!
Delete"It wasn’t grand in the old European sense; it was American grand, which is to say an old beauty, balanced and proper, perhaps a little improvised, a touch austere in places, and deeply intentional."
...
"The White House was never meant to be a palace, nor the Oval Office a throne room.
The East Wing ... was the workbench of the republic’s rituals, the place that once transformed policy into hospitality, power into presence, memory into history."
https://therickwilson.substack.com/p/the-east-wing-obscenity
What's now the gilded Oval Orifice was never meant to be a throne room.
DeleteIt was an office for the boss, the office of America's CEO.
Until that came to stand for Criminal, Excessive, Orange.
SMH. JFC. GFY, DJT...
The erosion of the protections in the 4th amendment began through actions of lawyers ,judges, politicians and lobbies long before the current court and administration.
ReplyDeleteWhile it sometimes seems like we are being attacked by our government like during no other time that isn't accurate.
After all you aren't the only one able to write what you think Every God damn Day.
Millions of people matched through the streets just a couple of days ago undeterred. free and fair elections will occur next month and next year.the courts continue to strike down many actions of this administration
During the civil rights era the FBI had a notable presence at rallies.
The police set dogs on protesters and murdered people while they slept... thousands were jailed . Including journalists.
We've waged covert wars
The war on drugs.
The surveillance state.
Extinguished the Puerto Rican nationalist movement. They are American citizens.
Property seizure.
Discriminatory sentencing and erroneous convictions of innocent people.
Innocent people executed.
Let's vote the bumbs out in the midterm! Get t work people!
True, it's good to understand our history. There's always been something, and some really big, awful somethings! But never at this level with everything all at once and never to literally overturn democracy and destroy governing as we know it - even with all its warts. But that is the intent and determination of the Trump administration and the many, many people he has working behind the scenes to make it happen. All outlined in Project 2025 - and in consultation with Bukele and Orban and friends. And while most of us currently can march and speak freely and perhaps vote freely in November in various places, I really am not so sure the 2026 elections will be free and fair as we try to vote the bums out.
Delete(Oh, and how many US citizens were just arrested and detained in Chicago yesterday ... This is only the beginning.)
Yes it is important to understand our history but to say it's never been this bad?.
DeleteOur country was torn in half and millions died in a civil war that was our country. Only 150 years ago.
Our current situation could turn out worse but it's not worse now.
When someone gets elected in this country that is democracy at work.
We saved democracy is important but not if our guy loses.
. Then the other side cheated
If the Supreme Court will not meaningfully stand in his way, there's no guarantee about future elections. John Roberts was fine with crippling the Voting Rights Act years ago and appears determined to go further.
DeleteOf course, the orange felon loves to gripe about the 2020 election being stolen (still!), despite voluminous evidence to the contrary, but long-time and continuing Republican efforts to chip away at the rights of non-Republicans is the real scandal.
Only 620,000 died in the Civil War, not millions!
DeleteThere have been quite a few elected officials who have come forward in the last few days to say that authoritarianism is here.
ReplyDeleteAre they too late in their claims?
What happens to the white house?
What happens to us...
Thank you, Neil, for today's posting.
ReplyDeleteIt's been quite a week for DT, what with the posting of the AI generated image of his response to the No Kings Day protests; the announcement (a lie, naturally) of the mininimal modifications to be done to the East Wing (when in fact it's now going to be torn down completely); and then the demand that he be compensated for $230 million of the People's money for the "wrongful" investigations into his various acts of malfeasance. And, on top of this, he kneecaps his base of rural supporters by once again using the People's money to prop of the Argentinian government, which relies on soybean sales to China thereby denying our US farmers and suggests buying their beef to bring down meat prices.
This morning, I became aware of various Government sites containing Partisan banners on their Home pages. For example, the Department of Treasury contains the following banner:
"The radical left has chosen to shut down the United States government in the name of reckless spending and obstructionism. As a result, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s websites will only be sporadically updated until this shutdown concludes. Please refer to Treasury’s contingency plans for more information."
https://home.treasury.gov/
And this, from the USDA site:
"Due to the Radical Left Democrat shutdown, this government website will not be updated during the funding lapse. President Trump has made it clear he wants to keep the government open and support those who feed, fuel, and clothe the American people."
https://www.fns.usda.gov/
I didn't check every site, but the banner of the Dept of Commerce does not yet sport a Partisan banner. Perhaps only his most devoted apostates have chosen this route.
I'm not a lawyer or legal scholar, but is this not a violation of the Hatch Act?
The destruction of the White House, The People's House, is nothing more than symbolic of the destruction that has been and continues to be wreaked upon our Democracy, the Constitution, our laws, rules, and regulations, and the Institutions by both him and his apostates.
Just when I think he's finally jumped the shark, he goes further. It's unreal.
it's now $40 billion to Argentina, the extra $20 billion will be kicked back to the demented, deranged, moronic, fascist traitor in a Grand Caymans bank account!
DeleteI fully expect the next Democrat to be president to demolish it, providing there's actually another election, something the demented would be king doesn't want to happen!
ReplyDeleteMillions of us saw this coming and voted for sanity. Millions more, aided by big money, are still blind to the horrors.
ReplyDeleteAs this lunatic delves deeper and deeper into the destruction of our tripartite democratic society, and now literally destroys our physical icons of democracy and rigs the system for the taxpayer to pay him off for having been prosecuted for his crimes, I marvel at how any newspaper, media outlet, or pundit talks about anything else. As one of the greatest democracies in human history is turned into a third world autocracy shouldn't every voice in America be shouting in anger and disgust all day every day? The GOP congress and the Trump Supreme Court that enables this monster must be made to pay for their mendacity some day.
ReplyDeleteIf Trump can tear down the East Wing, then it follows that a future president will be able to tear down the Trump ediface. I hope I live long enough to see the rubble being carted away in dump trucks, Trump's broken throne perched on top for the photo-op.
ReplyDeleteI just read on another blog post the interesting point that nowhere in the Constitution does it say that the President has to or gets to live in the White House. It's a tradition - but obviously, tradition can be changed. Basically, Trump's just crashing there for 4 years, and it's incumbent on us to kick his ass out.
ReplyDeleteBelief always trumps reality. And, HE BELIEVES he is the country and can do whatever he likes. Unfortunately, HE'S not the only one who seems to BELIEVE that. And it's the rest of the believers we really have to wonder (worry) about...
ReplyDeleteThe destruction of the East Wing is an abomination, not just for what it does to the historical integrity of the White House. It is the most blatant evidence yet that Drumpf has no intention of leaving .. now, in three years, EVER. He is not erecting a grand ballroom on the order of Mar-a-Lago. What he's building is a throne room reminiscent of Versailles. Watch .. there will be a raised dais complete with a magnificent, gilded chair, presumably with a pee-proof seat. Everything he touches is sullied and destroyed. Our democracy is only the latest in a long line of shattered traditions and "norms". And the worst aspect is that we .. some of us, enough of us .. elected him.
ReplyDelete