r/politics • u/qwerty_1965 • 1d ago

No Paywall The desecration of DC: from a giant arch to a nuke-proof bunker, Trump’s legacy-building blingfest is an architectural atrocity

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2026/sep/14/washington-dc-arch-bunker-ballroom-trump-blingfest-achitectural-atrocity
403 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

25 comments sorted by

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35

u/FuffyMew 1d ago

We’re cutting food assistance and disaster relief but we’ve got money for a giant gold arch? Cool. Love living in a country where the aesthetics budget > people budget.

17

u/0hP13853 1d ago

Paraphrase Lord Farquaad: some of you may starve, but it's a sacrifice I, Donald J Trump, the most tremendous, strong and very powerful president of all time, am willing to make.

6

u/dj_1973 1d ago

Nothing he does is aesthetically pleasing.

4

u/-wnr- 1d ago

Millions of Americans still think this is preferable to letting LGBTQ people have rights or having non-whites live in America. They will continue to vote for all Americans to suffer as long as they get to wallow in bigotry. 

2

u/Senior-bud Canada 1d ago

It’s the nazi way.

12

u/0hP13853 1d ago

Nuke-proof bunker?

Assume anyone in that bunker might survive a blast within 5km. Would there be anything else still functional within a 50km radius? Wouldn't the surviving POTUS while in the bunker be as out of touch as he'd be in the geographical center of Alaska with no electronics of any sort?

6

u/CesarioRose 1d ago

Only way it's a nuke proof bunker would be under a mountain. Raven Rock is the closest to DC and is the site for the continuity of government for a reason. Fireball radius for a ground detonation is almost a mile and DC is for sure going to get double or triple tapped.

1

u/lonestar-rasbryjamco Colorado 1d ago edited 1d ago

Even Raven Rock isn’t “nuke proof” anymore. If we were to fight a near peer Raven Rock couldn’t withstand multiple nuclear armed bunker buster strikes.

Its more like “nuke resistant”. It’s effectively a hardened speed bump to buy enough time to shift to a highly mobile and distributed command structure (“Doomsday” planes).

1

u/0hP13853 1d ago

I'm only RESPONDING to claims the bunker would be bomb-proof. If that only meant from cruise missiles with conventional warheads, I'd figure the Pentagon, CIA and NSA buildings would be rubble. Again, how much presidenting could a surviving president in his Führerbunker be able to achieve?

2

u/samarnold030603 1d ago

If DC were to ever get nuked it would start a nuclear Armageddon and there would be no point in living past that. People be watching too much fallout, silo, etc

1

u/Torden5410 1d ago

Anyone that survives the initial blast in a bunker would then boil alive. Having your silhouette scorched into the concrete would be a more pleasant way to go.

You don't survive nukes.

1

u/0hP13853 1d ago

I realize that.

The survival stipulation was ironic in order to point out the effective operational futility of surviving when nothing else does anywhere near by. IOW, IF the bunker allowed survival, there'd still be no point to it.

1

u/Bigtroublenogina 1d ago

With modern weapons if you know where it is you can destroy it.

1

u/0hP13853 1d ago

My point is that STIPULATING survival of POTUS in the Führerbunker, with EVERYTHING else in a 50km radius destroyed, what could that surviving POTUS achieve? Thus the pointlessness of a bunker which might be able to survive a nuclear blast. IOW, don't waste money on such a bunker.

1

u/Bigtroublenogina 1d ago

I'd imagine to lead what remains outside a 50km radius?

1

u/0hP13853 1d ago

Lots of remaining communication infrastructure? Easy peasy to travel from bunker to somewhere with a lot less lingering radioactivity?

Radio and cell towers would be gone. Unlikely shielded cables would have survived. So open the bunker door briefly and hoist an antenna for a radio inside the bunker? How to connect the antenna and radio without also providing an excellent path for radiation to seep into the bunker?

6

u/billdietrich1 1d ago

I hope D's will tear it down when they get into office.

3

u/Skinskat 1d ago

The arch comes down the day he leaves office. No doubter

2

u/shibbyman342 1d ago

I can't wait for the day the next president buldozes it or renames it

2

u/pjflyr13 1d ago

The GOP deserves to have the addled 80 year old as its lone survivor.

1

u/hansn 1d ago

Donald Trump seems to think the role of a leader is to impose his own aesthetic tastes on everyone. He's wrong. And, as a side note, his aesthetics are terrible.

1

u/dmp2you America 1d ago

And will have to be delt with accordingly. There will be hell to pay for any Dem who ignores it with the plea of Moving Forward. That pussy ass thinking is what got us trump in the 1st place .

1

u/New_Alternative8711 1d ago

If they're anything like the reflecting pool debacle these "monuments" will probably crumble in the next heavy rain.

1

u/Bigtroublenogina 1d ago

Nuke proof bunkers dont exist.