Oh come ON.
“The Trump Kennedy Center?” As one of my Trump Deranged friends posted on Facebook, quite appropriately, “What’s next, The Trump Washington Monument? The Trump Lincoln Memorial? The Trump Jefferson Memorial…?”
I don’t even want to think about what’s next. Ugh. Ack. Yecchh.
You would think that after his Rob Reiner fiasco, the President would be just a teeny-weeny bit wary for a while. Clearly not.
If President Trump had any sense at all, he would thank the board but turn down the wildly inappropriate honor. But he doesn’t have any sense at all, not in these kinds of things.
I am aghast.
Ethics Alarms 
And–not only is it dictatorial, unAmerican, impressively stupid…it’s also most likely illegal. Congress named the damn place (renamed it, actually) after JFK’s assassination. He’s not a goddamn king. He can’t just name shit, or get his ass licking sycophants to name them for him. So…a cash strapped, premier arts organization is going to have to spend hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, defending this illegal move in court. All for one very very very tiny person’s massive ego.
But this is like picking up a snake, and being surprised it bites you.
When he slapped his name on the Peace Institute, it was equally illegal, abnormal, and inappropriate. When he had huge banners of his face on government buildings, it was very Hitler or Hoxha or Kim Il Sung. The only thing that surprises me is that, so far, there’s no actual corruption involved in his takeover of the Kennedy Center. Usually, when Trump does stuff like this, he, his family, his organization, or a wealthy campaign donor benefit. But give him time–I can see the Trump-Kennedy Center Crypto coins! One side JFK, the other DJT! Available now, operators standing by!
I’m old enough to remember when Republicans seriously worried that Obama was too beloved, that he was creating a cult of personality….but the WH has almost never had a more modest and respectful occupant. Think of all the ways in which Obama respected the office–when he gave presidential speeches from the WH, he didn’t excoriate his political enemies. He didn’t post childish attacks on his predecessors, or put slurs under their portraits. He was a gentleman. This guy is a no class dumbass with the ethics of a mobster, and the attention span of a housefly with a bladder infection.
Congratulations.
It’s a minor point and not relevant to the larger one, but can the KC board change the name of the thing? Usually boards have that power, but I haven’t seen the organizing documents and the bylaws. I would argue that the name change is plainly against the interests of the organization, and thus a breach of fiduciary duty. BOY I could run a great website if I had some interns, a staff and a budget. It would also ne nice if I could fly by flapping my arms real hard…
I’ve long said “Trump is his own worst enemy”….and it always comes back to his amazingly asinine ego. All the goodwill he’s earned through the much-needed policy corrections he’s made can be undone in a nano second by putting his name on everything from watches to National Park passes, to cultural venues. NONE of those self-serving moves improve the lives of the people he claims to care about…they just highlight his own insecurities. Where are the sane family members or advisors to firmly shout, ENOUGH!! STOP IT!”
The Trump model has always been to slap his name on something — he is basically a branding guy. So this seems completely “on-brand” so to speak.
The only thing that’s a little different from some of the other Trump ventures is that the Kennedy center is not a second or third rate operation — but those “in charge” are working hard to correct this to align better with the sort of quality we expect of Trump Steaks, Trump University (okay, that was well below third rate), Trump Golden Sneakers (yeah, ditto I guess) etc.
Next initiative: Bring back the $1000 bill, with Trump’s face on it! It could be backed with Trump Crypto coins (gold, of course!).
As someone who has attempted to defend some of Trump’s more moderate positions, i feel personally slapped in the face.
This Kennedy Center crap, and the Reiner comments, for me, comes on top of my company not being able to hire an immigrant because Trump raised the application fee for a work visa to $100,000 per employee.
$100,000 dollars.
It is pretty hard to defend against the claim “Trump is anti-immigration” when he pulls stuff like that. The fee apparently can be waived if “there is no American who can do the job”. If there were an American who could do the job, we’d hire both, because there is a critical shortage of qualified people. Yet this grand standing jerk-in-chief screwed over our our potential employee. How can you trust a ‘waiver’ process for a policy so poorly thought out and deliberately provocative?
You might want to put the blame for the H1-B fees where it belongs, on the companies abusing the the H1-B system to suppress wages and push Americans out of the labor force in favor of indentured foreign labor. You might have a legitimate need for an immigrant due to lack of qualified American candidates, but the overwhelming use of that system was to hire foreign workers for jobs that had plenty of American candidates with the necessary skills. What can’t go on forever won’t, and the bad actors take everyone else down with them.
So the solution is to make the application fee $100,000?
If it were up to me, I’d make it $100k a year. No more hiring foreign programmers at $60k a year with the dangled carrot of a green card to get people to work at $100k below market rate. No more taking up all the junior programming slots with foreign labor preventing Americans from getting a toe in the door.
You’re aghast? Really?
Nothing in the world could be Trumpier than this. This is the ultimate troll of the Democrats and quintessential Tump — narcissistic, petulant, and obnoxious to the point of parody.
Parting shot: How sycophantic is the board? Again, it’s almost parody-worthy.
“Almost”?
I am aghast. 1, because Trump had already attained Code Red asshole status with his Reiner post, and any sane politician would be thinking…”OK, maybe I should be a little careful until this cools off.” 2, because it’s almost pathological. 3, because he has to understand that the less popular he is, the more imperiled his Prseident and its crucial policies are. How can he not?
Heh. Funny you think Trump has the self-awareness (or even the modicum of humility required) to think he should allow things to cool off. Keeping everyone not a sycophant mad at him is the air he breathes, and he’d rather indulge his baser instincts to attack and humiliate his foes than even consider trying to lower the temperature.
Yes, I know it’s bad, but honestly, it’s almost Julie principle or scorpion-frog territory.
Why was it named the Kennedy center when Eisenhower pushed for a national cultural center? Seems to me that naming it the Kennedy Center by that board was basically the same as this one. Granted it occurred after he was assassinated but the board would have been appointed by him. I think this was a stupid thing to do even though he pushed to get more money from Congress for the deferred maintenance. I also believe it was stupid to name Nancy Pelosi Speaker Emeritus when Gingrich is ignored so maybe he is taking his cue from her. It also seems to me that deferring maintenance to that degree is also a breach of fiduciary responsibility as well.
I am not going to get worked up about these issues. When he starts restricting speech, initiating restrictive rules to protect his financial interests or otherwise violates our individual rights to maintain power then I’ll start worrying about such matter.
Why? Because JFK was assassinated just as it was being competed, and everyone was going on a JFK honoring binge. Cape Canaveral was renamed for Kennedy. They took Ben Franklin off the 50 cent coin and put Kennedy on it instead. Idlewild airport in NYC was renamed for Kennedy. And the Kennedy Center. It was way overboard, but JFK can’t be blamed for it, because he was dead.