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[-] midribbon_action 155 points 1 week ago

No bid contract to a friend of Trump's in the hotel pool industry. The idea stemmed from Trump seeing the park service scrape algae off the top because of ongoing filtration issues. That's it. He just wants to hide the algae. It's so dumb, and as far as I understand it, pool paint is nearly impossible to remove.

Hey did you know that darker colors reflect less sunlight? They turn a substantial portion of light into heat; I wonder if that will affect the algae. I also wonder how he ever thought something on the bottom of the pool was supposed to hide the surface. That's not how occlusion works.

[-] iamericandre@lemmy.world 125 points 1 week ago

You’re trying to rationalize the mind of a literal anus. Quit while you’re ahead

[-] midribbon_action 38 points 1 week ago

At least we don't have Harris in office, we dodged a bullet there. /s

[-] normanwall@lemmy.world 42 points 1 week ago

She would have started a war with Iran!

[-] EggInDisguise 37 points 1 week ago

And she might have supported Israel in an ongoing genocide!

And started a trade war!

Sure glad none of this stuff is happening.

[-] midribbon_action 19 points 1 week ago

I'm even more glad that the Democrats are moving quickly to the left and not openly attacking their own progressive party members and mayors. If they didn't do that, it would undermine the only strategic justification we have for not voting. That would mean our inaction did nothing at all except help fascism spread across the entire political spectrum.

Sure glad that's not the case; I'm going to sleep well tonight.

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[-] rustydrd@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 week ago

how he ever thought

I think you got your answer right there

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[-] StillAlive@piefed.world 61 points 1 week ago
[-] mkwt@lemmy.world 72 points 1 week ago

The reflecting pool on the National Mall is shallow pool / fountain that's there to look neat. It's not intended for swimming. It's an iconic landmark that connects the Lincoln Memorial to the Washington Memorial. It's been featured in all kinds of media, films, and TV for decades. Martin Luther King Jr's "I have a dream" speech was there.

Trump decided that the reflecting pool needed to be painted blue like some kinds of swimming pools. He caused the government to hire "a guy he knows" without putting the contract out for normal competitive bidding.

Also, I think they're painting directly on to granite, not concrete.

There's also this shot of the President driving his motorcade of several multi-ton vehicles directly on top of the granite pool.

[-] FrChazzz@lemmus.org 13 points 1 week ago

Because I'm an insufferable pedant sometimes: MLK's speech was on the Lincoln Memorial steps (they have brass replicas of his foot prints on the very spot). The crowd was gathered in front of those steps and the crowd stretched back alongside the edges of the pool.

[-] programmer_belch@lemmy.dbzer0.com 21 points 1 week ago

Lincoln memorial pool is being painted blue for repairs. Some people think it is illegal and/or looks ugly CNN

[-] grue@lemmy.world 62 points 1 week ago

It's not "for repairs." It is, itself, damage.

[-] midribbon_action 22 points 1 week ago

Yeah spot on. 'Granite' is a wide category of rock. The Vietnam memorial is also apparently granite, I just learned that today. It looks nothing like the reflecting pool, it's much darker, almost black. The specific types of granite, maybe even the specific quarries, was chosen by each architect for it's texture and color. Congress paid extra to keep the original granite floor while replacing everything else about it in 2009.

It will never be restored, I don't think it's possible. Our generation will have been the last to be able to see the original intended art piece.

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[-] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 52 points 1 week ago

Are they using felt-tipped pens to paint it? Cause that’s what it looks like in every single picture.

[-] FatVegan@leminal.space 8 points 1 week ago

Looks like they use some sort of sponge technique from art attack

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[-] smuuthbrane@sh.itjust.works 45 points 1 week ago

My favourite? The overspray. Really classes up the national monument. Chef's kiss.

[-] ramble81@lemmy.zip 15 points 1 week ago

I was gonna bring that up. It’s not a small area, so how bad do you have to be doing things to get such a bad amount of visible overspray from an ariel photo?!

[-] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.cafe 10 points 1 week ago

They started with paint rollers, and realized that wasn't going to work, so they switched to sprayers. Seriously.

There are plastic sheets all around no? So they have no reason to be precise while spraying.

[-] Doomsider@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago

Getting paid millions of dollars to paint something and not bothering to do prep work: Priceless

[-] jobbies@lemmy.zip 40 points 1 week ago

Thats awful. Can't beleive you guys are just letting that man trash your country.

[-] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 21 points 1 week ago

Oh no, the country founded on Indian burial grounds, slavery, and not wanting to pay taxes isnt a good place! Who could have guessed?!?!?

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[-] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.cafe 21 points 1 week ago

From what I understand, his Arc de Trump (seriously, that's what it's called), is going to be located between the pool and the Washington Monument, and will be TALLER than the the Washington Monument. He's making sure it gets a nice reflection.

Lovely.

[-] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 12 points 1 week ago

I wonder what will become of all these garish monuments he leaves behind once history correctly sees him as neo-Hitler?

[-] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.cafe 7 points 1 week ago

We should pass a law that it is illegal to name anything after him, or build any monument to him. How many statues of Hitler are there in Germany?

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[-] TryingToBeGood@reddthat.com 9 points 1 week ago

No, it will be on the VA side of the river, and shorter than Washington, but still tall enough to create a hazard to the flight path into national airport. FAA, don’t fail us. 🙏

[-] froh42@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago

Arsch de Trump, as we say in Germany.

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[-] HulkSmashBurgers@reddthat.com 20 points 1 week ago

So we have the Epstein pedo party ballroom, and now we have the Epstein pedo party pool.

[-] Darthcapi@lemmy.ml 20 points 1 week ago

So…we’ll be able to use it as a splash pad?

[-] ThePantser@sh.itjust.works 10 points 1 week ago

If there is one pool that deserves to be pissed in, this is it.

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[-] blargh513@sh.itjust.works 17 points 1 week ago

Using funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the National Park Service reconstructed the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. The pool's water supply system was updated to eliminate stagnant water by circulating water from the Tidal Basin; the pool was formerly filled using potable water from the city.

Seems like algae and other water-borne nasties have been a thing since they started pumping the tidal basin water in.

I get it, don't waste drinking water, but I don't think pumping untreated water into a space without natural flow is going to work. You're basically making stagnant water and a lovely home for algae. Unless there was a steady stream of in/out at a fairly high refresh rate, you're going to get funk. You're trading the consumption of water for consumption of energy to run a pump system 24/7.

Either they need to fully naturalize it by adding plants and other life that balances out things or go full chem. It would still need to be circulated. Just throwing ozone into the water ain't gonna cut it. At that point, you may as well just run a full pool pump system (big one) and filter system with a sanitizer like chlorine or bromine. Potable water has a small amount of chlorine in it already, that's why it wasn't as bad with potable water.

If you start with sanitizer, I would presume that the unfinished concrete wouldn't last long. That may be what is going on. I'm not going to give anyone credit here, but sealing the surface prior to adding sanitizer makes sense. I think there are ways to sanitize with hydrogen peroxide, but I don't know if it would work on a scale like this. Most pools are deeper; this thing is only like 18 inches deep. That means very high evaporation relative to the total volume. Even with chlorine which deteriorates in sunlight, any sanitzing agent will will be quickly consumed. If you're pumping in basin water with lots of organic material and then throwing chlorine into it, the result will be a lot of nitrogen trichloride aka chloramine. It smells like pool, but with this much surface area it will be REALLY smelly.

That would be a fitting result of all of this. A giant pool of chemical soup and a resultant stink so nasty that nobody can go near it.

[-] midribbon_action 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

The floor of the pool is the original granite from the 1920s, but most of the structure is new concrete from 2009.

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Idk... The Walmart blue really gives it some authority.

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[-] Zier@fedia.io 15 points 1 week ago

Painting this pool a darker color than the concrete that is already there is one of the dumbest things ever. President Pedo routinely lives in opposite world. Complete idiot and waste of DNA.

[-] LemmiChanga@programming.dev 15 points 1 week ago

Just be glad he didn’t paint it gold.

[-] Zier@fedia.io 9 points 1 week ago

I would love that because it would look like a big piss trough. Stay classy!!

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[-] WesternInfidels@feddit.online 12 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Not my pictures: "Reflecting Pool Boondoggle" Flickr Album.

This one in particular has a lot of details that reward / punish close zoomed-in examination, I think.

This one shows that some of the banners surrounding the site have been defaced, including at least two sections which appear to have been sliced out with a box cutter or something similar. I'm curious what was on those parts that were removed.

News about the pool project got me to dig into my crummy tourist snapshots from 2024. And the reflecting pool appeared ... blue? What are we after with all this, again?

PNPCmPCtUfA6AAG.jpg

Maybe the real purpose is to keep the president occupied with trivia, distracted from whatever the vile shits behind his throne are up to.

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[-] regedit@lemmy.zip 9 points 1 week ago
[-] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Trump's having the reflecting pool painted blue to make it look "better."

[-] portuga@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago

He has a “pool guy” as far as I unwillingly learned and don’t need more information on

[-] nuko147@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago

The real news is that was a Trump's choice contractor that would do the job for $1.8 million but the cost got to around $13 million..

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[-] Lanske@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago

So much beauty coming out of America these days........

[-] brendansimms@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago
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this post was submitted on 13 May 2026
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