Day 274: A Picture Worth a Thouand Words

 

It’s a cliché, yes, but one that endures because it’s true: a picture is worth a thousand words. And this one? Behold the literal, physical destruction being wrought upon the White House, not by foreign invaders as in the War of 1812, but by the man who swore to protect it, President Donald Trump:

There’s another cliché that asks, “How do you know when a politician is lying?” The punchline: “His mouth is moving.” With Donald Trump, it’s less a joke than a governing principle.  Do you recall that when Trump announced the plans for his ballroom abomination, he pledged not to harm the existing structure of the White House?

“It won’t interfere with the current building. It’ll be near it but not touching it.  And pays total respect to the existing building, which I’m the biggest fan of.”

 That was back in July. Now, after the damage has been wrought, he declares, with a monarch's contemptuous sneer, that:

“In order to do it properly, we had to take down the existing structure,” Mr. Trump said. He also said — somewhat cryptically — that “certain areas are being left.” But the two senior administration officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the plans, confirmed that the entire East Wing was being demolished.

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I wish I could feel some sort of shock at the desecration of America's most hallowed historic site, but I cannot. I feel a weary resignation.  Such blasphemy was entirely predictable. This is, after all, an administration run by and staffed with not just incompetents, but malicious incompetents. The Trump administration is the most un-American I have seen in my lifetime, an ironic outcome for a man who pledged to be "America first." But such is ever the way of demagogues. 

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) was an English writer, moralist, and lexicographer best known for compiling one of the first comprehensive dictionaries of the English language. He was also a towering figure of Enlightenment thought. Revered for his wit, skepticism of political cant, and sharp critiques of false patriotism, specifically warnings that demagogues cloak self-interest in national virtue, his wisdom was never more timely than it is now.

As written in his famed essay, The Patriot:

"But the greater, far the greater number of those [putative patriots] who rave and rail, and inquire and accuse, neither suspect nor fear, nor care for the publick; but hope to force their way to riches, by virulence and invective, and are vehement and clamorous, only that they may be sooner hired to be silent."

In other words, it is all about them and never you. Patriotism, for scoundrels, is merely a means to further enrich themselves at the public's expense.  

Trump and his cabal of grifters fit Johnson's formulation perfectly.

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It is for this reason that I believe that the demolition of the East Wing of the White House might well prove to be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back. I am well aware that policy wonks like me are not the average voter. Joe (or Jane) Citizen has far too much on their mind during these increasingly difficult economic times to obsess over every policy outrage to emerge from the Trump administration. The average voter, especially the low-information voter who has proven so crucial to the MAGA, isn't reading "white papers" nor scrutinizing the New York Times. However, a picture of a portion of the White House in ruins is something that requires little effort to understand.  In a time when the majority of polling shows increasing dissatisfaction with the present regime, such a picture has the ability to connect cause and effect in a way that countless editorials cannot. 

Again, the "picture being worth a thousand words" effect. 

And this picture, I believe, will resonate in a way that may well shake the remaining portions of the MAGA-infested White House to its foundations. There is a wrongness to it that even the lowest of low-information voters can intuit.  

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Take a look at this:

Donald Trump has managed to drive his approval ratings underwater in a mere nine months in office. As the country's condition continues to deteriorate due to his preternatural ability to combine incompetence with corruption, those numbers are only going to get worse as the big midterm elections near next year.  With pictures of the White House in ruins, with ICE raids terrorizing both citizens and non-citizens alike, with Pete Hegseth's "Department of War's" extrajudicial killings becoming the norm off the coast of Venezuela, and with skyrocketing prices at the supermarket combined with economic slowdown, we have hope that the 49.5% of the American electorate that sold their patriotism for the price of a dozen eggs are overruled by men and women of higher intellect and nobler intent. As Samuel Johnson wrote:

That the next House of Commons may act upon the principles of the last, with more constancy and higher spirit, must be the wish of all who wish well to the publick; and, it is surely not too much to expect, that the nation will recover from its delusion, and unite in a general abhorrence of those, who, by deceiving the credulous with fictitious mischiefs, overbearing the weak by audacity of falsehood, by appealing to the judgment of ignorance, and flattering the vanity of meanness, by slandering honesty, and insulting dignity, have gathered round them whatever the kingdom can supply of base, and gross, and profligate; and 'raised by merit to this bad eminence,' arrogate to themselves the name of patriots.

Let us hope that, in 2026, the nation, "with more constancy and higher spirit," unites in a general abhorrence of Donald Trump and his White House wrecking crew.

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