This week’s OpED article was a mess of a choice. Trump, the Master Blaster (remember Tina Turner’s “Thunderdome” project?), pushing his massive weight around onto and into spaces that were not designed for such personality projects, was intended to be the focal point. However, there was so much material I found myself looking at a book manuscript instead of a mere opinion piece.
I reduced the choices to two major scenes. One is Trump’s continued frenzy over putting his name and face on every national monument he can find (as many observers said he was wont to do in New York before he ran for the POTUS position). He didn’t build much quality stuff in the Big Apple during his career there, but he repeatedly put his name on as many buildings as he could–the “I was here” incentive that kids and teens regularly have to stick their names on places.
In New York, Trump is still demanding to insert his name as a replacement for valued landmarks like the Kennedy Center (he lost that battle). Currently, he is pushing to have the landmark New York Penn Train Station Central hub renamed the Donald J. Trump-Penn Center and the Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia renamed the Donald J. Trump International Airport.
There is currently outstanding opposition to both of those naming projects, as well as continuing and growing opposition to Trump’s continued push to remake the scenario of Washington, D.C. The main symbol for the latter is Trump’s design for the Triumph D’Arc (also called The Triumphal Arch), a 250-foot giant monstrosity that, according to a recent National Park Service evaluation, would severely interfere with the public’s access to at least 40 other landmarks in the D.C. area, including the Lincoln Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery and the Washington Monument. As expected, Trump has ordered the project forward, full steam ahead, despite that analysis. But military war vets have recently filed a major lawsuit against the project– calling Trump a draft dodger with no right to overshadow war vets– that has a great chance of dooming Trump’s whole effort in that area to memorialize himself at the expense of so many others more deserving.
Outside the U.S., however, Trump seems to be having more success with his constant self-aggrandizing effort. Morocco, a recently rejoined member of the African Union, a few days ago announced that it was renaming its new Tiznit-Dakhla Highway that stretches approximately 1,055 kilometers through the country and that ends in Western Sahara (the only non-state member of the African Union).
Western Sahara is a disputed territory–in constant warfare– that is also the center of one of Africa’s longest-running conflicts, and calling it the Donald J. Trump International Highway retains Trump’s name well into the future of an area of the world that Trump has continued to insult and disparage. As the world turns, I guess.
