Is Washington Becoming the New Versailles or Peterhof?

Picking the brain of Trump.

Oooo… do we want to go there.

•    The ballroom
•    The Arch
•    The Kennedy Center
•    The golf course
•    The banners of Trump all over DC

 What does it remind you of? Versailles and Louis XIV, or Peterhof and Peter the Great?

Is Trump trying to make a legacy like Versailles or Peterhof?

Trump has this dream of going down in history as a great president who designs Washington, D.C., in the image of St. Petersburg or Versailles.

Hyperallergic writes,

$200M Trump Ballroom Proposal Looks a Lot Like Versailles

Social media users couldn’t help but notice similarities between the lavish project, led by architect James McCrery, and the palace of a certain ill-fated French monarch.

Maya Pontone

August 3, 2025

President Trump has proposed a $200 million state ballroom off the White House’s East Wing, the newest addition to his growing list of inane design priorities for the presidential headquarters, which includes ornate gilded décor in the Oval Office, a propagandist painting of his assassination attempt, and a Mar-a-Lago-inspired pave-over of the historic Rose Garden.

[…]

The NCAS is a conservative Washington, DC-based nonprofit that advocates “to end the hegemony of Modernism in federal architecture by advancing the classical and humanistic tradition.” The organization is responsible for partially writing Trump’s 2020 executive order recommending that federal buildings be constructed in the so-called “classical” (referring to Neoclassical, Georgian, Federal, Greek Revival, Beaux-Arts, and Art Deco) and traditional styles. The order was echoed in a memorandum issued by Trump earlier this year that drew widespread criticism.

Evocative of the NCAS’s architectural renderings for the renovation of New York City’s Penn Station, the project envisions a ballroom of lavish grandeur and scale, consisting of high-arched windows, massive chandeliers, fluted columns, and ceilings with symmetrical crown moldings.

In Trump's mind gold = power! And Versailles and Peterhof drip of power and wealth!

Many social media users responded to the White House’s announcement by drawing comparisons between Trump and the last French monarchs, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, whose reign is infamous for lavish personal expenditures and royal extravagance at Versailles amid food scarcity, fueling the masses to revolt. (Trump’s own Mar-a-Lago beach club and New York City apartment bear several architectural similarities to the grandiose Parisian palace.) Some also criticized the project by pointing out the administration’s recent gutting of expanded healthcare coverage and soaring grocery costs being escalated by Trump’s trade war, which he finalized this week.

Let them eat cake!

The British across the pond they write in the Guardian writes...

When you have a developer as US president, you might expect some zhooshing up of the capital. A few buildings renovated, maybe some parks replanted. But when you have a megalomaniac builder in charge, things can get out of hand. A decade ago, when Donald Trump was first elected, I asked what it might mean for the US to be led by a real estate tycoon whose career had left a trail of broken promises, angry buyers and endless lawsuits, with rules flouted, heritage trampled and the world pockmarked by a fleet of aspirational towers clad with a flimsy veneer of luxury. The answer is worse than I could have imagined.

With the air of a nightmarish Hollywood sequel, Trump 2 has seen the president’s true architectural ambitions unleashed: The Blingpire Strikes Back. As America’s self-styled decorator-in-chief, Trump has not only overseen the gilded mutilation of the White House, but embarked on the Mar-a-Lagofication of Washington DC itself, applying his gold paintbrush to statuary, daubing ponds with flaking pool liner, and brewing plans for a colossal triumphal arch – all procured in a blizzard of no-bid contracts. And, in true dodgy salesman style, this programme of bauble-building is turning out to be a high-profile decoy for deeper damage being wrought elsewhere.

[...]

Trump boasted that his ballroom will be “more beautiful” than Versailles, but it looks like something thrown together from the classical off-cuts bin, without any regard to how the pieces fit. “It has all the kneejerk gestures of classicism,” a former Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) official told me, “but they are not integrated in a way that makes any sense.”

A sweeping ceremonial staircase leads to nowhere. A grand pedimented entrance is shunted to one end of the east facade. The portico columns run four rows deep (“The supreme court is three deep,” Trump noted. “No other building has it, and I did it because it’s incredible.”) The ballroom’s proportions are so out of whack, it will make the White House look like a lopsided fiddler crab, the swollen appendage vastly dwarfing the original building.

His construction it is completely over-the-top!

The inflated scale was too much to bear for its architect, the bowtie-wearing James McCrery II, who protested at the increasingly Frankenstein nature of the classical details being applied. Enter Shalom Baranes, whose DC firm has handled multibillion dollar federal contracts, including the renovation of the Pentagon after the 9/11 attacks.

But Trump controlled every aspect of the construction overturning the architects! So much so it has been questioned if the building now meets building codes!

Then we have his golf course!

Park Service quietly awards contracts to work on Trump’s takeover of East Potomac golf course

AP News

By  MATTHEW DALY

September 16, 2026

The Trump administration has awarded contracts to begin work on President Donald Trump’s planned takeover of the East Potomac Golf Links in Washington, Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee said Wednesday.

Rep. Jared Huffman of California, the panel’s top Democrat, revealed during a committee hearing that the National Park Service hired a civil engineering firm to begin work on the historic public golf course, without any public announcement or heads-up to Congress. A lawsuit challenging Trump’s plan to revamp the golf course argues that the administration’s redevelopment would violate the congressional act that created the park more than a century ago.

“Now, this is not just any old golf course. This is a beloved public space with huge historic significance,” Huffman said.

Trump is “systematically moving to take this historic, publicly accessible resource and turn it into another gilded private golf club for the mega-rich,” Huffman said, calling the project “a methodical, deliberate effort to take a public park away from the people,” with American taxpayers footing the bill.

Trump is the "Me" president everything is about him!

However, not everyone likes what they are seeing!

Trump's vision for D.C. draws design backlash and court challenges

PBS News Hour

By Jeffrey Brown, Anne Azzi Davenport, & Azhar Mercha

Mar 24, 2026

Leading cultural and architectural preservation organizations asked a federal court to stop the Trump administration from proceeding with its Kennedy Center reconstruction project. It's the latest development in a fight over the look and architecture of the nation's capital, and the power of the presidency. Jeffrey Brown reports for our series, Art in Action, as part of our CANVAS coverage.

[...]

Yesterday, a coalition of leading cultural and architectural preservation organizations asked the Washington, D.C., federal court to stop the Trump administration from carrying through with its quarter-billion-dollar Kennedy Center reconstruction project.

It's the latest development in an ongoing fight over the very look and architecture of the nation's capital and a referendum on the power of the Trump presidency.

Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown reports for our Art in Action series, exploring the intersection of art and democracy as part of our Canvas coverage.

He wants to remake Washington, D.C.; he wants it to be his legacy! He wants it to become the new St. Petersburg or Versailles. What could surpass the greatest thing for a narcissist to do, but to leave a city made in his golden image?

Racial Profiling -- OK

At least one Supreme Court justice thinks it is okay to arrest U.S. citizens because they look foreign!

ICE Cites Brett Kavanaugh’s SCOTUS Opinion To Defend Targeting US Citizen

Newsweekl

By Dan Gooding and Joshua Rhett Miller

Sep 23, 2026

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Wednesday cited a U.S. Supreme Court opinion, written last year by conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh, to defend immigration agents who stopped and questioned an American citizen in Illinois because he looked like their target.

In its reasoning, the department said it had been "vindicated" for its practices through the Supreme Court opinion, which said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents could stop an individual based on reasonable suspicion. Critics have argued that this allows agents to racially profile individuals as potential undocumented immigrants, leading to conflicts between federal agents and U.S. citizens.

[...]

"To be clear, apparent ethnicity alone cannot furnish reasonable suspicion; under this Court's case law regarding immigration stops, however, it can be a 'relevant factor' when considered along with other salient factors," Kavanaugh wrote.

Welcome to Trump's world... a mixture of The Handmaid's Tale, 1984, and Brave New World! We are moving toward a society where citizens are eyed with automatic suspicion and forced to justify their presence evokes the exact kind of dystopian surveillance and erosion of rights as in those novels. "Your papers please!"

Code Breaker

No, not that kind of code breaker, but rather building code. It seems like there is a big question: Does the new ballroom meet code, and has it been inspected by the National Park Service for electrical, plumbing, and structure?

‘I am the code’: Trump clashed with ballroom architect over safety issues

James McCrery II resigned in October after warning that the president was insisting on designs that violated fire and safety codes.

The Washington Post

By Sarah Blaskey and Jonathan O'Connell

Sept 23, 2026

James McCrery II resigned in October after warning that the president was insisting on designs that violated fire and safety codes.

In the weeks leading up to his resignation last year, the first architect on the White House ballroom clashed with President Donald Trump over design features that the architect believed violated building safety codes, according to two people with knowledge of the discussions and corroborating documents reviewed by The Washington Post.

Trump brushed off McCrery’s concerns, they said, and the president countered that no building codes apply to White House construction. “I am the code,” Trump said. That episode, as described by the people familiar with the matter, offers new insight into Trump’s priorities for the ballroom at a time when he is flexing executive power to fast-track construction projects across the nation’s capital.

The interviews and documents obtained by The Post — including early ballroom designs and images Trump appeared to have marked up with his trademark black-ink Sharpie — also show how deeply involved the president has been in the details of the project.

According to ChatGPT there are questions about:

According to the Post’s documents and interviews:

• Main emergency egress: The early design did not allow the majority of occupants to exit quickly enough through the principal entrance, which the architect said conflicted with fire-safety requirements.
• Secondary exits: The alternative emergency escape routes were considered inadequate.
• Kitchen/fire separation: The design provided insufficient protection against a fire in the kitchen spreading rapidly to the ballroom above.
• Restrooms/plumbing: The proposed number of toilets was inadequate for the building's maximum occupancy. One early plan had only seven women's stalls. The Post says there was little room to add additional facilities because the ballroom consumed most of the footprint. (The Washington Post)
• Overall “life safety”: White House meeting notes from September 2025 specifically recorded “Life safety — big concern.” A November note said, “Life safety — needs POTUS buy in.” The Post reports that discussions about code and life-safety issues continued for months after the original architect left. (Nvdium)

Is this another of Trump's follies?

Nydium goes on to report that:

White House renovations and construction are typically handled by federal agencies required by law to comply with nationally recognized building safety standards to the “maximum extent feasible,” unless doing so would present a national security risk.

But Trump’s White House construction projects are being routed through the Executive Residence, a tiny office that is not a federal agency and is therefore exempt from rules governing agencies. The District of Columbia government has no jurisdiction to enforce local building codes on federal property.

The contractors hired to design and build the ballroom are responsible for adhering to safety standards as they work nearly round-the-clock to meet Trump’s ambitious deadlines, according to experts. Discussions about the life-safety deficiencies in the ballroom’s design continued for months after McCrery resigned, according to White House records.

It is not clear from the records reviewed by The Post whether the safety issues he identified have been resolved in more recent designs by Shalom Baranes Associates, the architecture firm that replaced McCrery’s firm late last year. Shalom Baranes Associates declined to comment. When Post reporters visited McCrery’s office this month, he asked them to leave and not contact him again.

Does this give you a warm, fuzzy feeling? How about this?

Trump’s growing vision for the ballroom triggered a cascade of design issues, including conflicts with building standards McCrery was trained to follow, according to the people familiar with their discussions.

McCrery informed the White House that Trump’s ballroom design did not meet fire safety codes, which require the majority of guests to be able to quickly exit through the main entrance during an emergency, according to the people and documents.

The architect also pointed out that alternative emergency exit routes out of the building were insufficient, and that there was little in the design to prevent a kitchen fire from rapidly spreading into the event space on the floor above.

This is all just a vanity project for Trump... he has a Walter Mitty dream of going down in history like Versailles and Peterhof.

Renderings show an ornate and gilded interior that departs from the simplicity of the original White House and echoes the look of the ballroom at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, a look he has said was inspired by the Palace of Versailles in France. A March budget for the new White House ballroom included nearly $6 million in gold leaf.

Well Now We Know

Earlier I wrote about candidate promises of pie-in-the-sky tax cuts. Now Fazio has said where he will cut... Medicaid!

Ryan Fazio pledges unprecedented CT income tax cut

Plan to save families $2,000-plus hinges on fiscal good fortune, healthcare cuts

CT Mirror

by Keith M. Phaneuf

September 22, 2026

Republican gubernatorial candidate Ryan Fazio swung big Tuesday, unveiling an plan to cut income taxes that he insists would return $2,000 to $2,500 annually to middle-class families by 2031.

But Fazio’s plan is based partly on outdated spending and revenue trends, leaving it unprepared to maintain hundreds of millions of dollars in new investments in municipal aid, affordable childcare and social services.

The relief plan, which he pitched during a midday stop in downtown Stratford, also would end state-sponsored healthcare for undocumented adults and children, impose a controversial “managed care” system to cap Medicaid assistance, and levy fees on private universities with major endowments. It also hinges on Connecticut winning a tax battle in court with neighboring states.

I don't know about you, but I don't like cutting healthcare for the undocumented. So where are they going to get their healthcare? The Emergency Room, the most expensive treatment. And how are they going to pay? They're not, so that will drive up the price for all of us.

“All of this is just based on a house of cards,” Afriyie said, adding the childcare investment is “something that’s going to pay big dividends in the future and shouldn’t be imperiled.”

So he wants to shift the burden onto lower-income people and off of the rich... a typical Republican... "Me" first. No thanks.

Remember When...

The Trump administrations was so upset over software from China being suspect of trojan bugs, well get a load of this... the Trump adminstration but software from a company that supplies software to Russian intelligence!

DoJ: Uncle Sam bought forensics software from same Russian operation supplying FSB

Russian devs alleged to have built tools for US agencies as software from same op was sold to Moscow's security services

The Register

Carly Page

24 Sept 2026

US defense and homeland security agencies bought digital forensics software developed by the same Russian operation that also sold its wares to the FSB, according to US prosecutors.

The Department of Justice says Oxygen Forensics CEO Lee Reiber and Russian national Oleg Sergeyevich Davydov have been arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud over an alleged scheme to hide the company's Russian ownership and where its software was actually being built.

Oxygen Forensics, based in Virginia, sold digital forensics tools to the US Department of War and several Department of Homeland Security components, including Homeland Security Investigations, the DHS Office of Inspector General, and the Secret Service's National Computer Forensics Institute (NCFI).

Prosecutors allege Oxygen presented itself to Uncle Sam as an independent US company, when it was actually owned and controlled by five Russian nationals through a Cyprus-based holding company.

Maybe if Trump and Company didn't fire all those people in the intelligence agencies they might have found that out! 

The Extended Family

[Essay]

Growing up, my mother’s mother lived with us. When we traveled, she traveled with us. She was part of the family.

She was always there, and the thing I remember most is her cooking: her potato pancakes, her beer crullers, and gołąbki.

After she passed away, my maiden aunt moved in, and she was the last of the three sisters.

So growing up, we were always an extended family. It wasn’t because they couldn’t afford to live on their own, but rather because that was family.

Now, once again, extended families are becoming the norm. Why? It is not to have the family under one roof, but rather because that is the only way they can live. Housing, food, and heat are all out of sight! 

And they are only going to get worse.

When my grandmother lived with us, she babysat us and helped around the house. My aunt also tried to help out, but… well, she wasn’t a cook. After my father passed away, she couldn’t stay on her own because she had short-term memory lapses; once she melted an aluminum pan and charred an eye.

So what am I leading to… extended families.

For many in the LGBTQ+ community, we have chosen families because we were disowned by our natural families, so we create our own families to look out for one another and be there in times of need, to celebrate the holidays.

And now it will get even worse this winter, with $5 and $6 home heating oil. More people will have to reach out to others and share apartments and condos.

What I am trying to say is: be aware this winter of those in need. If people are struggling to heat their homes this winter, reach out to them. Invite them over to your warm home for an afternoon, and maybe have them for lunch. We are family, and our family values are to help others.

At a time of skyrocketing housing, food, and heat costs, the Republicans cut housing assistance, cut food assistance, and cut heating assistance. We will need our chosen families more now than ever before.

It is going to be a cold winter with heating oil at $6/gal!

[/Essay]

Warrior Ethos

Author’s Note: The following article contains facts, public records, and journalistic inquiries regarding Secretary Pete Hegseth’s policies. When I attempted to research this topic, ChatGPT completely blocked the line of inquiry, stating the content couldn't be shown for safety reasons. This is the blog post the AI didn't want you to see.

This content can’t be shown for safety reasons. Learn more about our intended model behavior in our Model Spec.

---

Beginning around 2013, the Army researched and developed the Occupational Physical Assessment Test (OPAT). Those standards were based on years of research into the physical demands of combat occupations. The Army is now using new standards, including the Army Fitness Test (AFT) and Combat Field Test (CFT), but questions remain about how their development and validation compare with the extensive research behind OPAT.

Last year, the Secretary called all of his high-ranking military leaders to a meeting. This is what AP News had to say about it.

Pete Hegseth had a lot to say when he summoned military leaders. Here are some facts and context

By  JULIE WATSON, LAURIE KELLMAN and DEEPTI HAJELA

September 30, 2025

 Armed with a 10-point plan and pacing a stage in Quantico, Virginia, on Tuesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth enumerated for hundreds of assembled military leaders just how much of the force’s policy, philosophy and culture will change for more than 2 million Americans in uniform under President Donald Trump’s command.

“For too long, we’ve promoted too many uniformed leaders for the wrong reasons based on their race, based on gender quotas, based on historic so-called firsts,” Hegseth said. The approach, he said, made the Pentagon “less capable and less lethal.” Hegseth talked up his and Trump’s focus on “the warrior ethos” and “peace through strength.”

“No more identity months, DEI offices, dudes in dresses. No more climate change worship, no more division, distraction or gender delusions. No more debris,” he declared.

Secretary Hegseth is bringing more and more of his version of the perfect warrior into fruition. (Hint: It does not include women, gay people, and minorities.)

‘The highest male standard’

WHAT HE SAID: “Any place where tried and true physical standards were altered, especially since 2015, when combat arms standards were changed to ensure females could qualify, must be returned to their original standard.”

THE BACKSTORY: It’s not clear what Hegseth meant by returning physical expectations to their “original standard.” But military culture and the role of women have changed dramatically in recent decades, and Hegseth aims to change them back.

He has some image a Greek mythos of riding a white stallion carrying the banner in to battle... you know like a Walter Mitty fantasy. But it goes deeper then that.

Hegseth belongs to the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches (CREC), an extreme conservative networkthat has it roots in Christian nationalism. Hegseth has several tattoos tied to the Crusades—including the Jerusalem Cross and the phrase "Deus Vult" ("God Wills It") but it is also tied in the Christian nationalism. The church hold that men and women have strict, separate biblical roles, and that women should not occupy positions of physical authority or combat leadership.}

Many Christian nationalists believe a woman's place is in the home, bearing babies. They see LGBTQ+ people as abominations and Black people as inferior. The Christian Science Monitor reports;

In a grassy square dotted with Adirondack chairs that lies at the heart of the Pentagon, evangelist Franklin Graham delivered a special sermon in December at the request of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

“We know that God loves,” Mr. Graham said. Then, he took a turn. “Did you know that God also hates?” he asked the dressed-up children and troops attending. “Do you know that God is also a god of war?”

Mr. Graham then told a story about God taking revenge on ancient Israel’s enemies. “Kill them, both man, woman, infant, nursing child, ox, sheep, camel, and donkey,” Mr. Graham said, quoting the Bible. For those who don’t believe in a vengeful God, “Well,” he warned, “you’d better believe in him.”

Secretary Hegseth thanked Mr. Graham for his “bold” message. And in the following weeks, as the United States launched major military attacks against Venezuela and Iran, he echoed it.

He seems to believe that he is on a crusade to bring god back to a country that has lost its way. The article goes on to write:

It is not just about prayer. Mr. Hegseth has railed against America’s “internal enemies” in religious terms. And, last week, he compared U.S. journalists with the Pharisees – “the so-called and self-appointed elites of their time,” he said – who opposed Jesus.

Hegseth wrote a book, The War on Warriors and various public speeches, Hegseth openly embraces a "theology of Christian warfighting" and a "warrior ethos" inspired by medieval campaigns like the Crusades, which he views as a model for defending Western civilization against Islamism. 

Hmm... sound familiar?

High-ranking nominations for women dropped to a 25-year low under his tenure. Internal Pentagon whistleblowers reported that Hegseth stalled or actively blocked promotion tracks for senior female officers. The Daily Beast reports that;

Pete Hegseth’s block on promotions for senior female and Black officers is just the tip of the iceberg of Pentagon discrimination, sources have told the Daily Beast.

The secretary of defense has embarked on a demotion rampage targeting women and Black men while touting his “warrior ethos” makeover of the military.

The demotions result from the purge of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion from the DOD, in compliance with an executive order signed by President Donald Trump in March last year.

The British Guardian also reported...

The US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, stripped nine navy officers including women and Black service members from a promotion list last month, according to a person familiar with the matter, resulting in an all-male, overwhelmingly white slate of 22 advancing as nominees to become one-star admirals.

But remember, there is a war on! Don't we want the best leaders? These people had years and years at their job... and they get axed! And replaced with "Yes men"

Former top general calls military's removal of trans troops a costly mistake

NPR

Lauren Hodges

February 21, 2026

As 71-year-old retired four star Gen. Stanley McChrystal approaches the podium, the room applauds.

"I can't believe he's here," someone whispers.

Almost as if he heard them, McChrystal says this into the microphone.

"First off, we shouldn't be here."

"Here" is a retirement ceremony for five transgender service members who have been forcibly separated from the military under the Trump administration's second ban. The ceremony, which normally would be given by the Pentagon, has been hosted by the Human Rights Campaign in Washington, D.C.

[...]

"We gather today to recognize Col. Bree Fram, United States Air Force; Cmdr. Blake Dremann, United States Navy; Lt. Col. Erin Krizek, United States Air Force; Chief Petty Officer Jaida McGuire, United States Coast Guard; and Sgt. 1st Class Cathrine Schmid, United States Army."

Between them, they had decades of experience... and now there is a war,

In a memo filed February 2025, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave the following rationale for the reversal:

"The department must ensure it is building 'one force' without subgroups defined by anything other than ability or mission adherence. Efforts to split our troops along lines of identity weaken our force and make us vulnerable. Such efforts must not be tolerated or accommodated."

"It's systematic oppression," says Corcoran. "You're creating unnecessary paperwork for commanders and service members to navigate when it should be the same standard of care in the same process as anybody you would have with a shoulder surgery or a knee surgery."

Politico:

Early in the interview, Hegseth reads aloud the dramatic tagline on the back cover of his new book, The War on Warriors: “I joined the Army to fight extremists in 2001. Twenty years later, that same Army labeled me one.” Later, Hegseth flashes his right pectoral muscle, and the tattoo that, he says, led to the label: a large, inky Jerusalem cross associated with the Christian right.

The question that needs to be asked is: What are these purges doing to the military? These people are experts in their fields but are being let go because of their sex, the color of their skin, because they're gay, or because they're trans—not because of their job performance.

In another PBS News article they write...

Pete Hegseth's Christian rhetoric reignites scrutiny after the U.S. goes to war with Iran

By Tiffany Stanley

Mar 20, 2026

 Since becoming defense secretary, Pete Hegseth has found no shortage of ways to bring his strand of conservative evangelicalism into the Pentagon.

[...]

Now the defense secretary's Christian rhetoric has taken on new meaning after the U.S. and Israel went to war with Iran, an Islamic theocracy.

"The mullahs are desperate and scrambling," he said at a recent Pentagon press briefing, referring to Iran's Shiite Muslim clerics. He later recited Psalm 144, a passage of Scripture that Jews and Christians share: "Blessed be the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands for war and my fingers for battle."

Hegseth has a history of defending the Crusades, the brutal medieval wars that pitted Christians against Muslims. In his 2020 book "American Crusade," he wrote that those who enjoy Western civilization should "thank a crusader." Two of his tattoos draw from crusader imagery: the Jerusalem Cross and the phrase "Deus Vult," or "God wills it," which Hegseth has called "the rallying cry of Christian knights as they marched to Jerusalem."

Now we are in the sixth month of an eight-week war... "Trump's War!" From the opening salvoes, it has been a disaster! And now we have a two-front war with the Strait of Bab al-Mandab , with the possibility of the straits being blocked...

Matthew D. Taylor, a visiting scholar at Georgetown who studies religious extremism and has been a frequent Hegseth critic, said, "The U.S. voluntarily going to war against a Muslim country with the military under the leadership of Pete Hegseth is exactly the kind of scenario that people like me were warning about before the election and throughout his appointment process."

Taylor said Hegseth's rhetoric and leadership "can only inflame and reinforce the fears and deep animosity that the regime in Iran has towards the U.S."

Has Hegseth's policies prolonged the war because he fired the best and the brightest? Is it that he hired "yes men" to replace them?

Oh, What A Tangled Web We Weave, When First We Practice To Deceive!

This administration has tried every which way to deny media access. Only media that toes the party line is allowed access to the administration. Let us list the times they went after the press:

Here’s a list of the major media-access restrictions and clashes in this administration (from Duck.ai):

•     AP barred from Oval Office, Air Force One, and some events over the “Gulf of America” naming dispute.
•    CNN, MS NOW, and Politico banned from White House coverage/grounds, with badges disabled or confiscated.
•    Pentagon access rules that led to reporters being denied badges or pushed out unless they accepted new restrictions.
•   Twice they threated or attempted bans aimed at individual reporters/outlets earlier in the term that were later reversed or ended up in court. 

Then we had the Defense Department starting a witch hunt for whoever leaked the story on the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, along with Secretary Hegseth firing editors and some staff at Stars and Stripes, which he had no authority to do since Congress passed a law against it. But alas, the Trump administration decided not to investigate itself, and Congress just shakes in fear of Trump, bowing to every wish.

This morning I wrote that the administration is fudging the war casualties. Couple that with the attacks on the First Amendment, and you have to wonder what they want to keep from voters.

Where do you see government attacking the press? Russia, China, North Korea, Turkmenistan, Belarus, and Myanmar. What do they have in common? They are all authoritarian governments.

There was a reason the First Amendment was made first. The founders felt it was the most important.

24/7 Political Ad For Trump... TRUMP - TV

Breaking News!!!!!!

Trump starts White House TV news show... Trump-TV

White House launches Trump TV following press bans

The Hill

by Ryan Mancini - 09/21/26

The White House on Monday launched Trump TV, a 24/7 stream on YouTube, days after President Trump banned reporters from CNN, Politico and MS NOW over their coverage of him and his administration.

The inaugural video was a stream of Trump speaking at Mount Rushmore on July 3 as part of a livestream titled “Trump TV: The Essentials Station.” The stream started at 7 p.m.

“Watch the Trump Administration’s biggest moments all in one place,” read the stream’s description on YouTube. “Top videos, major remarks, and must-see highlights streaming 24/7 and updated in real time. Stay informed and stay up to date!”

What a narcissist dream!

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) slammed Trump TV’s rollout in the wake of his ban on White House reporters from CNN, Politico and MS NOW.

“First, Trump banned independent news from the White House,” Newsom wrote on X. “Now, he’s launching what is quite literally state-run TV to try drowning out the fact that he and his corrupt administration are failing the American people. This is truly autocratic behavior from a failed President.”

Trump banned reporters from the three outlets on Friday as a result of what he claimed was “their constant ‘reporting’ FAKE NEWS!” He told reporters in the Oval Office that there was no particular reason for the timing of the ban, rather that it was “really just cumulative stories over the last two years.”

“You get sick of it,” he added.

24/7 propaganda!

How many of you read "1984"?

Do you remember the constant presence and voice of Big Brother—while simultaneously watching and listening to everything the citizens do? This is also where the famous two-minute hate sessions take place. Everywhere you looked there was the image of Trump... oops, I meant "Big Brother."

The Hill article ends with...

“An America cannot have state TV,” Jiang said. “That’s what makes America America … because you need independent actors to be able to be the observers. And if the government is only showing you what it wants, then you have to question: What are we missing?”