I love our nation’s capital city, and one of my favorite tourist spots there is the White House. So the recent photos of the White House’s East Wing being demolished gave me pause. Initially, I was alarmed to see razed this historic architecture, which my family enjoyed touring over the years, including the White House movie theater.
But come to think of it, there’s something very American about continually updating, changing and expanding the residence of our commander in chief. We’re a restless nation, always striving for better. (Albeit, sometimes missing the mark, which may be the case with this current demo; the soon-to-be ballroom looks as though it might dwarf the rest of the White House compound.)
This isn’t Europe after all, which clings to its ancient ruins. “Old” here means circa 1970. And aren’t we all better off demolishing any traces of avocado-colored kitchens?
The way that the new construction is being funded by corporate donors does give me pause, but that seems quintessentially American too. I for one am keeping an open mind and dance card to waltz in the new (insert your company name here) ballroom during my next trip to D.C.
— Stacy Seiden, Northbrook
Is the public welcome?
I was just wondering how I can get an invite or buy a ticket to the grand opening of the ballroom addition to the White House when it’s finished. I am close to being 70 years old and have paid my taxes every year since I started working at an early age during high school in Chicago. Is there a waiting list? There must be a table or two that haven’t been promised to people who have contributed to this historical undertaking. From what I’ve heard, it’s being paid for by donations and private funding.
Does that mean the general public will never see the inside of it?
— Cecelia Kubik, Willowbrook
Boycotting donors
Upset? Livid? Outraged? That the East Wing of our White House has been not altered but demolished to make way for a grand 1,000-person ballroom? I am, and I’m looking at the list of donors for this privately funded project to boycott them. Yes, even Amazon, Apple, Google and Comcast.
It’s time to take a stand and take back our country.
— Barbara Chrisman, Glen Ellyn
A true professional
As an addendum to the many letters about the destruction of the East Wing of the White House, I thought I would add mine. It seems it takes a true professional to destroy a large part of the “People’s House” that a contingent of that professional’s goons could only attempt to do to the United States Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
See how it’s done, guys?
— Harvey Orlov, Glenview
White House changes
President Donald Trump should be thanked for updating the White House East Wing instead of being blasted by his liberal critics who hate all things Trump. When President Andrew Jackson added the north portico, he was criticized. So was President Teddy Roosevelt when he added the West Wing. There were people who didn’t like Jacqueline Kennedy’s Rose Garden or President Richard Nixon for building a press briefing room by converting a swimming pool. Or how about President Barack Obama’s basketball court construction?
It is embarrassing to think that our leaders have to rent a tent to hold state dinners on the lawn. Trump has already upgraded the Rose Garden and done a fine job of it. He has decades of experience constructing buildings, and I think when this project is finished, it will be magnificent — although the liberals will never admit it.
Most importantly, it’s not going to cost the taxpayers a dime since it is being paid for by donations. How can anyone complain about that fact?
— Mike Kirchberg, Chicago
It’s about destruction
The article in the Oct. 27 Tribune about the demolition of the East Wing of the White House described very clearly the differences between what President Harry Truman did and what President Donald Trump is undertaking. The headline “Tale of 2 White House renovations” is very misleading because it suggests an equivalency between the two projects. Nothing could be further from the truth.
As the article clearly points out, Truman’s project was about restoration and renovation. Trump’s project is about destruction.
— Joseph Dalpiaz, Lockport
Advice for Democrats
I’m a regular reader of the Tribune, and the first things I read every day are the editorials and letters to the editor. The letters tend to reveal a steady flow of anti-Donald Trump rhetoric ranging from comments on tariffs and immigration to now the demolition of the East Wing of the White House.
People are aghast and incredulous at his every move and don’t seem to comprehend how we as a country have gotten to this point. May I make a suggestion?
Instead of focusing on Trump, try focusing on what Democrats have done wrong. What is it about the Democratic product that people are rejecting? What is it that the people don’t want to buy?
If you focus on improving the Democratic message and revamping the far left policy positions the party has drifted toward, perhaps voters will find Democrats more appealing.
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If not, then voters will have no choice but to vote against them.
— Tony LaMantia, Chicago
We must snap out of it
So President Donald Trump has demolished a historic structure, the East Wing of The White House. The nickname the “People’s House” seems like a sad joke now. He did this without consulting anybody (big surprise) and after promising to not do it (ditto) to poach space for a party room.
So, what else is new?
Two things are obvious to me. The first is that Trump is motivated by the outrage that his actions provoke in those who do not support him. The second is that Americans are not responding with nearly the amount of outrage that his actions deserve and, certainly, not enough to make him think twice before doing something outrageous again.
To a great extent, the serial outrages caused by Trump have numbed Americans and normalized them. We need to snap out of it and be outraged before what remains of our freedom evaporates.
The Republicans should be heading into an electoral buzz saw next year, as the party that holds the White House (or, in this case, what remains of it) normally loses seats in off-year elections. The many unpopular, arrogant and corrupt actions taken by them this year should bring a double-digit House seat loss into play.
Republicans know this and are going for broke; they know that losing power could mean being out of power for a long time. They are doing everything that they can, re-gerrymandering being a prominent example, to make the “wrong” votes not count.
I believe that if the Republicans retain control of Congress next year, it will show that their project to do this will be so far along that, with two more years to tamper with the system, the 2028 elections will be Hungarian-style shams whose main consequence will be installing Trump as president for life.
Anybody who disagrees should tell us all where the cavalry will come from that will rescue the republic. I see no threat to Trump’s “Whaddya gonna do about it?” regime other than voters in November 2026. If Trump can get past them, there will be no more guardrails to restrain him.
— Curt Frederickson, Mokena, Illinois
‘Just trust us’? No.
We are now over nine months into a period of unprecedented changes in federal policies. The list of those changes is long, and, in many cases, the purpose is not easy to understand. When confusion driven by the scale of these changes seems overwhelming, we can simplify.
Stop to ask: Is my life better today than it was before these changes? Are the lives of my family, friends and neighbors better today? If not today, am I confident the changes will eventually make our lives better individually, as a community or as a country? Are necessary changes implemented in a way that respects human dignity and reflects who we want to be as a country?
If we cannot answer “yes,” then we must require all of our elected officials to help us better understand these policy changes, including how they are being implemented. If elected officials cannot or will not clearly share that information in a way we can both understand and evaluate, we need to question whether those elected officials are doing the job they were elected to do for us and hold them accountable.
“Just trust us that we know what is best” has never been a sufficient answer from our government, and we should not settle for that now.
— Michael Bruton, Woodridge
The letter of the law
I’ve been reading about how the crackdown on immigrants is acceptable to many people because they are technically breaking the law — and should be held accountable for their actions. I would love to see the public outcry if everyone going more than 65 mph on the area’s freeways were pulled over by armed, masked state troopers and given citations. They are technically breaking the law.
Folks will say that is not a fair comparison, but my point is that when you start interpreting laws on the letter rather than the spirit, you can eventually arrest anybody.
— Ed White, Grayslake
Mike Johnson’s job
We taxpayers pay U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson an annual salary of $223,500. His job is to lead the House in its function of presenting and passing legislation, both monetary and otherwise, to move to the Senate, where it may eventually become the law of the land. By his decree, the House has not been in session since Sept. 19. Johnson has not been doing his job, possibly because he does not want to negotiate with his Republican and Democratic members to end the government shutdown and possibly because he does not want to swear in a new member, Adelita Grijalva, a Democrat who won a special election for an Arizona district on Sept. 23. She could possibly be the deciding vote in favor of a discharge position releasing the Jeffrey Epstein files, which Johnson seemingly does not want to do.
Based on U.S. census data, the district that Grijalva won has a population of 813,289 people who currently have no representation in the House of Representatives until she is sworn in. “Taxation without representation is tyranny.”
It is past time for Johnson to do his job and call the House into session.
— Denise Perkins, Naperville
Madman in the house
Grifting, demolishing, kidnapping, banishing journalists, punishing our country’s allies, ignoring court orders, trampling the Constitution, mocking law and order, spoiling land, ruining economies, denying aid, bombing boats, scoffing past convictions, ridiculing, humiliating and sneering.
Wearing a crown (in a computer-generated video) to drop dung on his own constituents.
There’s a madman in the White House. Republican members of Congress: We’re all looking at you.
— The Rev. Phyllis Beattie, Winnetka
Helpers with whistles
In a Chicago, which is currently being invaded by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol, whistles are being distributed, an efficient way to alert others about impending danger. There are many reports that the whistles work. Folks are hearing the warning, running to safe hiding places and avoiding being “disappeared” from our public spaces. It is surreal to be typing those last words. There is an urgency to this moment.
I propose that all of us who exist outside the endangered circle of those being labeled “illegal” wear a whistle. For three important reasons. The first comes from Fred Rogers’ mother who consoled her son as a boy that when you see scary things in the news, look for the helpers. She said, “You will always find people who are helping.” We can be those helpers with our whistles; let’s swell the ranks of citizen watchdogs. Second, our whistles can serve as a visible badge of resistance, our next move after the wonderful success of the No Kings rallies. Like the legend of the king and people of Denmark wearing Jewish stars in protest of the Nazis, we can signal a united front, all with a simple whistle. We are all of us Mexicans, Venezuelans, people who come from a foreign land.
And make no mistake: That endangered circle continues to widen, reason No. 3.
I’m going to pass out whistles to parents feeling vulnerable just picking their kids up from a school nearby.
Mayor Brandon Johnson and Gov. JB Pritzker, can you scale this initiative up? Chicago could be known as the City of Big Shoulders and the loud whistle!
Anyone and everyone can whistle. And we will.
— Anita Goldberg, Highland Park
Counteract Trumpism
There are only two meaningful ways to counteract Trumpism, and we haven’t heard or seen the weak Democratic Party push hard for either of them — impeachment, requiring a slight congressional change, or filling an empty hole with a really strong leader, strong in personality and politics.
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Until they do that, and there’s no obvious choice right now, President Donald Trump will continue to get away with almost anything because the guardrails on unlimited presidential power were torn down by his people in the U.S. Supreme Court.
— Ed Stone, Northbrook
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