There are a seemingly endless number of memes on the reflecting pool disaster. Readers are welcome to provide links to their favorites in the Comments. I thought this one posted by Sarah Dahlinger on Facebook was nicely done.
I've seen a lot of brilliantly made craft cocktails dedicated to the Reflecting Pool this past weekend, and I thought, something was missing. Something wasn't right.They didn't quite capture the level of class and sophistication that our Reflecting Pool currently has, so here's my version.To start, line your glass with a blue fruit roll up. Then you're going to need:2 oz rum4 oz juice that is kinda yellow (pineapple, mango, orange, lemonade, whatever you like)1 oz blue curacao (you can adjust for color)Garnish with lime zestThe yellow and blue liquids make a lovely shade of algae and the rum eventually melts the blue fruit roll up, which is, IMHO, the best part.
Dummy Drump's fiasco!! I love it!
ReplyDeletebobbie
*latest fiasco
DeleteIt sounds perfectly disgusting.
ReplyDeleteTruly a fitting tribute.
I think it is somewhat disgraceful to use this as a means to belittle President Trump. Does anyone think that his interest was not to beautiful the pool? If he did it to gain some credit, what other politician wouldn't do the same?
ReplyDeleteI would think that we would be obedient to the better angels of our nature to let out some sort of sigh as in "nice try, but I'm sorry it didn't turn out well."
Do we really hate Donald Trump so badly that we celebrate any failure associated with him? I dare say that if President Obama had had similar results in an attempt to beautify the pool, we'd rightly feel a bit badly about the matter.
And, really, what's so deeply wrong with Trump remodeling the White House by building a very useful new wing?
I left the Republican Party because of the hateful way my fellow party members treated Obama. I thought it was disgraceful to revel in every perceived failure. I feel no different about the way Democrats and liberals act about the pool.
You can rightly jeer Trump's political and personal foibles...but, c'mon, an attempt to better things? No. Just no.
Does anyone think that his interest was not to beautiful the pool?
DeleteAbsolutely.
"nice try, but I'm sorry it didn't turn out well.",
But it wasn't a nice try. It was doomed to fail from the beginning and they pressed on anyway, ignoring all common sense, past experience and general pool knowledge.
It is a perfect example of arrogant ignorance where someone fails to understand than when a seemingly obvious solution to a problem hasn't been tried, that is probably because it doesn't work for a reason that everyone that has studied the subject has figured out. But studying things takes effort, so let's ignore that and go for the obvious thing and see what happens!
Do we really hate Donald Trump so badly that we celebrate any failure associated with him?
Well, that depends. According to him there is no failure, so there is nothing to celebrate. According to everyone else there is. And worse, it was predicted by anyone who knows anything about algae in pools.
I dare say that if President Obama had had similar results in an attempt to beautify the pool, we'd rightly feel a bit badly about the matter.
Well, during the Obama administration, a significant effort was made to rebuild the pool that was pretty much falling apart - the bottom was sinking in the underlying swampy soil - please remember that the land west of the Washington Memorial was only reclaimed from the Potomac slightly more than a century ago. Part of the rebuilding effort was to reduce the algae growth by creating an exchange system with water in the nearby tidal pool, complete with some system to kill algae. That didn't do so much. Because shallow pools in hot summers are just ideal algae growth conditions.
The pool itself is in much better shape, considering that the entire presidential motorcade drove through it.
Also, the reason why a reflecting pool is blue is the reflection of the blue sky. Reflecting pools are not blue because they have blue paint in the bottom like swimming pools. Painting it blue was just foolish.
It is just a fact that pools with little moving water grow algae. This is why most larger ponds have a fountain to keep the water moving and reduce algae growth. This is why the water in the WWII memorial with all its fountains tends to be cleaner than the reflecting pool.
Meanwhile, dark coating of the reflecting pool has increased algae growth so that it's not scummier and greener than nearby other pools, such as the Tidal basin (which gets some water movement from the tidal movement of the Potomac River), the adjacent Constitution Pond, and the other reflecting pool in front of the Capital. Ponds, I might add, that have gone entirely untouched. And are as nice as they always have been. [Personally, I am particularly fond of the Constitution Gardens/Pond because it's always quiet there, whatever madness is going on on the National Mall. I spent some quality time there this weekend chasing down a red-winged blackbird for a nice picture.]
(continued)
Deletewhat's so deeply wrong with Trump remodeling the White House by building a very useful new wing?
That he did not go through the normal procedures for remodeling the White House that exist to protect it. And knocked the East Wing down illegally. The White House is National Park. It is common property of all Americans, not of the person that happens to be president.
Furthermore, the White House is specifically designed not to look like European royal palaces with giant ornate ballrooms. It is a residence with an office, not a palace. A giant golden ballroom does not fit in that vision.
I left the Republican Party because of the hateful way my fellow party members treated Obama.
This whole reflecting pool project is part of that.
an attempt to better things
But he's not. Demonstratively not.
The National Mall, part of the National Park Service can always use more money for maintenance, but Republicans in Congress have for decades starved the NPS from funding. Receipt from 2009: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2009/jan/27/eric-cantor/cantor-says-more-stimulus-washinton-grass-small-bu/
Trump decided that he wanted to make DC beautiful and has changed the National Mall into a giant construction zone. It's hideous. The White House is currently enclosed from G St to Constitution Ave (B St) and from 18th to 15th. Large parts of the National Mall are fenced in for the Great State Fair. The Reflecting pool was fenced in yesterday. The horse structures behind the Lincoln Monument are covered. The front of the Kennedy Center is covered in tarps. Dupont Circle was closed for the Juneteenth/Pride weekend. Toxic waste from the East Wing is being dumped in East Potomac Park, which is also fighting reconstruction.
None of these projects have gone through the regular channels, nobody knows where the money is coming from, and few people know what all this construction is really doing. The (admittedly overbearing) regulatory structures to preserve DC's sights and keep construction staggered as to not hinder tourists too much are completely ignored.
Meanwhile, locals are confronted with constant street closures and are seeing their park space - the National Mall is also a giant city park! - reduced with no end in sight. And many tourists that make their once-in-a-lifetime trip to DC do not get to see the monuments that they came to see.
And that's not even mentioning that Trump obviously hates DC. When he's in DC, he barely leaves the White House. He's eaten in one restaurant, two blocks from the White House. He's gone a few times to the Kennedy Center, but mostly to slap his name on it. He publicly trashes the city constantly, and actively works against the City Council as its trying to do its job. He disrespects local democracy constantly.
So no wonder that there are some negative feelings around.
I have no problem with someone wanting to improve something. If he started this process reasonably, saw the problem, and his response was, "Mistakes have been made and we're attempting to correct it.", I would not have been concerned.
DeleteHowever, the order of events has been:
1. A no-bid contract to a friend-of-a-friend that doesn't have experience in this type of work.
2. Warning from professionals telling him, "If you make it darker, you WILL get algae blooms from absorbed heat."
3. Regular bragging about how amazing and strong the lining was going to be. "It's so strong you won't be able to cut it with a knife."
4. The predictable problems he was warned about show up.
5. The attempted fix was to dump hydrogen-peroxide into the water to kill the algae despite it also being a paint striping agent.
6. The paint begins to peel.
7. Chump blames vandals for using a knife to cut the uncuttable lining without any video from one of the most monitored areas in the city, which caught people damaging grass nearby just weeks earlier. Chump's evidence of the vandalism? "You just have to look at it."
8. Someone is arrested for touching the striped paint and touted as the/one of the vandals.
9. Chump continues to blame others for the forewarned problems, and takes credit for the very nature of water in general. In one of his tweets, he refers to it as the, "Reflecting Pool", and immediately follows with a comment it had a mirror-like finish it never had before. Really? The Reflecting Pool never reflected before, but you made it possible? Going back over 100 years, it's more difficult to find a photo of it without a reflection of the Washington Monument.
...and honestly, lying about something so easily disproven, I don't know if he's so stupid he thinks people will believe it, or if he thinks the public is too stupid to realize how absurd it is. He lies worse than a 5-year old.
If it was really an attempt to beautify the pool then it would be unfortunate. Since it's a self-serving gesture, a waste of taxpayer money, that was also used to reward a major campaign donor and has also become an excuse to harass people then it deserves to be mocked.
DeleteThe same for the new wing. Is it really useful? Is it really needed? Why the rush?
The problem with Trump isn't his "foibles". It's his failures.
The snideness of your sarcasm is duly noted! Well done.
DeleteHere are my favorite memes so far:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=36661491640132311&set=a.100779069963696
Seems rather than cocktails you got cock tales.
ReplyDeleteAs an International person grossly effected by the present president of the USA I hereby cast my vote to dethrone him and replace him with a person with a normal emotional state of mind.
International / foreign, you know what I mean.
I am even White and speak English as my first and only language, so your president Chump should most likely like me better than others, going by the way he seems hell bent on removing slightly tanned skin immigrants legal and otherwise from your country primarily made of immigrants.
But no, his distraction efforts in Iran cause sky rocketing fuel costs, fuel costs that hinder me and a whole lot of people here as transport and food charges become untenable (I am sure it is worse in the U.S., but I am whinging about my situation, lol)
Seems to me your twice elected by the American people president Donald Jester Chump has the intention of throwing the world into a great depression, the likes of which have not been seen since 1929, the biggest recession yet, never one bigger, a deep, deep depression ... with the sole aim of owning every house, business, farm, and building as people jump or otherwise quit the debts they will have, making him, in effect if not by legal means, king of the USA.
The country with the highest gun ownership in the world.
But obviously not enough grassy knolls.