If and when Donald Trump ever gets around to building a library, you can bet that it will have a casino, rollercoasters, and a midway – you don’t get to be the tackiest person to ever live and suddenly change stripes to Presidential Library-type class. Trump cannot even resist keeping the White House safe from promotional events (e.g., Elon Musk’s car show on the lawn). So you already knew there would be trouble upcoming when this particular president will be in office in a very particular 250th Anniversary year – 2026. Among what is sure to be a stunning number of humiliating events is a UFC fight (Ultimate Fighting Challenge) on the White House lawn. He is like a kid in a candy store, and he passed the eclairs to get to the bubble gum-flavored cotton candy. It is surely safe to say that the White House, the same sacred space that has hosted weddings, heads of state, treaty-signings, and priceless works of art, will never be the same again. He already pulled the Rose Garden for a Mar-a-Lago-like patio.
We have a report from CBS News:
Get ready to see some punches on the White House grounds. President Trump says he will host a UFC mixed martial arts fight at the White House as part of next year’s festivities celebrating 250 years of American independence.
The idea came up during a Thursday night speech at the Iowa State Fairgrounds The federal government is planning to mark the occasion with a year’s worth of events — including a UFC fight, according to Mr. Trump.
“We’re going to have some incredible events,” the president said. “Some professional events, some amateur events. But the UFC fight is going to be a big deal, too.” The president is “dead serious” about the idea, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told a pool reporter on Thursday. A UFC spokesperson also confirmed the plans to CBS News.
If we are going to descend to UFC fights, then an attempt should be made to go full circle and get so far around “spectacle” so as to come back around to cool. Some of us would say that at this point, just install a pole for strippers – fewer would get hurt, there is no gambling, and Melania might feel nostalgic.
BREAKING: Trump announces a UFC fight with 25,000 people attending on the grounds of the White House for America's 250th birthday next year.Note: The CEO of UFC, Dana White donated $1 million to “America First Action,” a pro-Trump Super PAC.
— Krassensteins (@krassenstein.bsky.social) 2025-07-04T01:29:56.184Z
It is not that there is anything really wrong with UFC fights. If one is okay with entertaining oneself by watching two people commit what would otherwise be aggravated felonies, possibly attempted murder, in any setting other than the octagon, then there is nothing wrong with a UFC fight in Madison Square Garden or your local arena. But have one on the White House lawn, and now you’re talking about lasting damage going beyond just certain people’s temporal lobes and facial structure. Indeed, for the people who have worked a lifetime making the White House into one of the planet’s most austere and respected complexes, it will feel like a blow to the head.
Additionally, there is no rule that the White House will recapture its luster upon the arrival of a new president (Buttigieg, for example). No, once such a thing takes such a hit to its reputation, revival can be laborious and slow. Perhaps we should be even more guarded. After all, he hasn’t released the full schedule of events. Who knows what he meant when he said “professional” entertainment?
Brace yourselves because strippers don’t work for free, and the house always wins.
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Sadly, it’s not just the venerable once-respected White House (aka The Dump according to Trump) which will be diminished by boy-king Donald. The whole USA will feel a new wave of shame and embarrassment as each ever-tackier event unfolds and as the entire world looks on in horror. Horror and laughter, that is; there will be fuel for comedy enough to last decades. And no, the nation will never recover its respect. Once lost, ne’er regained. Much like love.
The truly sad thing is, the only way the US could regain any level of its pre-Drumpf prestige is to engage in a lot of behavior that would only deepen the shame. Rounding up all the *real* traitors (the insurrectionists back behind bars, the Republican Party being shut down with all its “leaders” rounded up and tried for treason, etc) and since SCOTUS said anything a President does in his “official capacity as President,” it’s all good. Oh, and on the matter of SCOTUS, arrest Thomas and Alito and all three of the Drumpf appointees (might keep Roberts around so he can “revel” in all he’s wrought) and remove all the judges who gave any favorable rulings for Drumpf at the lower levels and then replace the whole lot with attorneys who understand the judiciary’s role in the government.
Basically, we have our own little dictatorship, but run more along the lines of the ancient Roman dictators–men who led the country through a crisis and then stepped aside once the crisis had passed. And let the MAGAts who willingly welcomed this fascist wannabe strongman to take over reap a liberal whirlwind.
I know it’ll never happen. Men and women of honor, trust and respect who truly care about the institution of government would never allow themselves to go down that road, for even a day. But it can’t hurt to fantasize.
You had me worried until the last paragraph when you rescued it. And then spoiled it again! Inmy mind the fantasy would be the seed to the deed. A better fantasy is that Dem behaviors to repair the damage done demonstrate adult responses on behalf of all America so that its wayward children learn by example. Cumbaya. Now that’s a real fantasy given the ingrained cesspit of racial and cultural hatred that T has let loose such that any affort to rollback/move forward will be readily seen as a denial of ‘Murican values and “our” Constitution.
Sounds about right.