Presidential Legacy
Presidents leave multiple legacies. Their working environment is part of that package.
In addition to domestic policy and foreign affairs, a president leaves a working environment at the end of a term. What is the condition of the White House? Are travel arrangements workable and secure?
These are essential issues. Sadly, in a world of Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS), anything Donald Trump does has to be wrong and done for the wrong reason. If he were to comment that the Earth is round, the flat-Earth theory would immediately become fashionable.
The British hosted an impressive state dinner at Windsor Castle with more than 150 guests at a single long table. Trump had long been embarrassed by the lack of a place inside the White House for large dinners. Tents are sent up, lacking style and raising security concerns.
Years before Trump ran for President, he proposed a solution to President Obama’s staff. He would arrange funding and build a dining area. His idea was not taken seriously. But Trump was profoundly serious. The United States is an important country and should be able to do things with style and class.
He may have seen the White House television tour I saw many years ago. First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy talked about the money donated to restock the supply of china and flatware. Those items need to be replaced over time. She saw a need and asked gracious friends to help provide the funds.
Trump is taking the same approach. He saw a need years ago. He is a builder. He knows everything there is to know, especially how to avoid all the delaying tactics that could stop it. For example, there is no government money, so there is no need for competitive bids. He doesn’t have to go through twenty years of committee approvals for the design. He will do it.
Trump and donors are spending $250 million to create a suitable, secure area for state dinners and other events. Then, TDS takes on a new flavor. It starts to become “truly dumb and stupid.” One of the Democrats’ congressional “shining lights” has a brilliant idea. Californian Eric Swalwell proposes that every Democratic presidential candidate must pledge that their first action as president will be to demolish the new room.
That only makes sense if there must be nothing to remind you of the fact that Donald Trump was ever President of the United States. He was!
Another item he started working on in his first term needs to be completed. That’s the Presidential airplane. For the experts, I know the difference. Air Force One is a call sign. Informally, the term is used to speak of a specific airplane, and I am going to use it that way for now.
The current 747, still used as Air Force One, entered service in 1990 and was 25 years old by 2016. It was time for an upgrade. Most passenger planes use only two engines even though they fly long over-the-water segments. For assorted reasons, four engines were still considered necessary for the replacement Presidential plane. This left only one possibility, the latest and last version of the Boeing 747. There was a lot of noise about costs, delays, and related issues.
One issue causing turmoil is President Trump’s proposed change to the plane’s color scheme, or livery. Change is always unsettling, and the present design was partly the work of Mrs. Kennedy. Also, the reports about Trump’s plans were absurd.
His proposed design is similar to the current one in the placement of words, flags, and presidential seals. It has more white space on the top half of the plane. The difference is the colors. The present design uses two shades of medium blue. They are pleasant but have no meaning. Trump’s proposal is simple. The plane for the chief executive of a nation should have the colors of the nation’s flag.
A bigger problem explains why he is building the White House extension with little or no involvement from government agencies. As noted above, the current Air Force One was twenty-five years old when Trump took office in 2017. It has been a decade since then.
Boeing has not performed very well in that time. There have been problems with the 737-Max. Doors have fallen off other Boeing models in mid-flight, and they’ve had other problems. Even so, ten years would seem to be enough time to complete an airplane with any color scheme. If they had delivered it in the Biden years, they could have used the current livery.
There are problems either with Boeing or with constant changes to the government’s specifications. Now, it has been thirty-five years, not twenty-five. Then the plane was old enough to run for Congress. Now it can run for President.
There has been a name change at the Pentagon. The Department of Defense (DOD) is now the Department of War (DOW). I don’t think this is what they had in mind. Changing the acronym from DOD won’t change things. It will still be the Department of Delay.