Even on the days when I try—genuinely try—to soften my contempt for the vile disregard shown to the American people by an Administration with no shame in its debauchery, the universe reminds me why my temperance fails.
I tell myself: Grace, write lighter today. Dance. Sing. Share a happy distraction. And then there it is. A photograph dripping in gold leaf, casino-bright opulence, the White House staged like a gilded palace. A Trumptian ruler lounging beside his Saudi financier, wrapped in an aesthetic that screams excess, arrogance, and transactional power.
We are not just talking about decor. We are talking about a set piece. Gold walls, gold chairs, gold table settings—a golden theater built to frame a moment where power congratulates itself. And at that table sits a man whose wealth and influence were never truly separate from the brutal silencing of one journalist’s voice.
Then I watch him turn on Mary Bruce, the ABC reporter whose only offense was asking the questions any functioning democracy requires:
Mr. President, how much will your family profit from this allegiance with the Saudi Crown Prince? And how do you sit here hosting the man U.S. intelligence concluded approved the killing of a Washington Post journalist?2
And what does he offer back to the American public? The most cowardly shrug of moral responsibility ever uttered from a modern head of state:
“Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t.”
“Saudi Arabia is a great ally.”
“We’re not going to give up billions of dollars in arms deals.”
