Banners in Washington

 

Remarking on the banners of Trump displays on buildings in Washington, D.C., a thirty something woman said, "Oh, that's such a Hitler thing."

This surprised Mad Dog because for her Hitler, the Third Reich, should not be a thing. She is of a generation for which Hitler is just some grainy black and white image on a youtube video, or possibly she's seen "Inglorious Basterds" or "Sophie's Choice," but she is of a generation which seldom refers to Hitler. She has tattoos. She met her husband on the internet. She read "Project Hail Mary," and saw the movie and loved them but she has never heard the soundtrack to "Hair" or read "Exodus" or seen the movie.

For many of Mad Dog's friends who still live in Washington, D.C., the Trump banners hanging from the stately granite buildings have been particularly demoralizing. For some who have decided to retire and move away from Washington, the topic of the banners arises with some frequency.

What is it about a cloth banner?

In its very impermanence, it contrasts with the stolid stone building from which it is hung, and it proclaims an ascendance of a feeling of what that building means now, in the moment.

Banners may have been used before Hitler and the Third Reich, but nobody ever embraced them to the extent the Nazis did. Rallies with thousands of bright red banners thrilled the masses.

The sight of Trump's face on the Department of Justice or the Department of Agriculture looks to Mad Dog as much a desecration as spray paint graffiti tags on the Lincoln Memorial would be, or Swastikas on a Jewish gravestone.

And for longtime residents of DC, seeing those banners is more than jarring. 

Trump has even hung his banner next to a banner with Lincoln's image, which is interesting. Next to Obama, Lincoln is the President Trump wants most to best. With Obama, who so thoroughly humiliated Trump with his devastating digs at the White House Correspondents' dinner, it's personal. Obama, lean, athletic, who played basketball weekly is simply the cool kid Trump grew up seething against, someone who was simply so superior Trump knew he could never compete. Lincoln, on the other hand is someone Trump never met, and all he knows about Lincoln is everyone says he was our greatest President and that's a title Trump wants.

Of all the photos of Trump banners, the one with Lincoln is Mad Dog's favorite. Trump put it up there to show he belongs in the same company as Lincoln. But, of course, it shows just the opposite. Everyone can see it. Everyone but Trump.

One thing about those buildings--the Agriculture Department, or the Justice Department buildings-- is by their very permanence they were quiet reminders that this, too, shall pass. Administrations come and go, but those buildings remain. They were there before Trump. They were there for Hoover and Roosevelt and Kennedy and Reagan and Obama and they will, hopefully be there for whoever follows Trump, but the banners say, "Trump rules."

Trump, of course, wants to be on Mount Rushmore, but that's in South Dakota, and in the famous Hitchcock movie with Cary Grant, and it's so artificial and something of a joke. It's sort of a gauche American attempt to emulate the Pyramids or the Sphinx.

The Trump banners in Washington are not so much gauche as louche. 

Colleges fly banners, sometimes for occasions like graduation, or, in the case of NYU, to distinguish college buildings from other city buildings in a college which has no discrete buildings of its own.

But banners on the State Department, the Justice Department, the Department of Labor? Those are supposed to be beyond politics. Those are supposed to be the civil service which  just trudges on and does its work no matter who is in the White House, doing the science so we can have accurate weather predictions (Commerce), tending to the missile silos (Dept. Energy), scouring the country to prevent Mad Cow Disease from infecting human populations (Agriculture), monitoring and alerting for the next pandemic (HHS) and rescuing people from storms at sea and hurricanes and tornadoes on land. 

And maybe that's why the banners matter now. The Supreme Court (which, as far as Mad Dog knows does not yet have a Trump banner) is supposed to be doing its thing guided not by Trump but by the law. Same for the Interior Department and Justice and State. The White House establishes policies, but the civil service is supposed to follow the law, which means Congress has a role, but you don't see images of Congress on any of the buildings. 

And, so far at least, there are no Trump banners on the Capitol dome, although it wouldn't be a surprise. Stay tuned.

It's not rational, but maybe that's why banners are so effective. They do not appeal to the rational. Like flags, they are meant to provoke emotion, not thought.

Banners are mute testimony and they speak not to the brain but to the heart.