The other night, I was at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, and, as rapper D Smoke ripped through a song, I thought to myself, “Thank you, Dwight Eisenhower.”

The concert celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy Center, and throughout the evening host Audra McDonald, the Broadway star, repeatedly referred to the venue’s history. Contrary to what many may believe, JFK did not create this showplace for music, theater, and dance. In the 1930s, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt pushed to build a national arts center in the capital, but Eisenhower kickstarted the project in 1958 when he signed into law the bipartisan National Cultural Center Act. A few months before he was assassinated, Kennedy placed his John Hancock on a measure extending this law, and following his death, the center was named in his honor.

Eisenhower gets the credit for birthing what he would later call an “artistic mecca” for the performing arts. And this evening, it was indeed a mecca. To mark its half-century of performances, the center delivered an eclectic and diverse range of acts. The National Symphony Orchestra played the overture from Leonard Bernstein’s Candide. (Bernstein’s Mass opened the center in 1971.) The spunky violinist Ray Chen tore through a Mendelssohn piece. The Emmy-winning actor-musician Darren Criss performed “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Misérables. Renee Fleming sang opera and “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” The Punch Brothers and Rachel Price (of Lake Street Dive) did “Little Birdie,” a traditional folk song. Keb’ Mo’ gave us a Leadbelly tune. There was jazz, swing, Sondheim, Latino music, a composition by pioneering Black composer William Grant Still, and a number from David Henry Hwang’s play Soft Power. Joshua Henry, an alumnus of Hamilton, belted out Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come.” Soul singer-songwriter Bettye LaVette interpreted the Beatles’ “Blackbird.” (Listen to her stunning version here.) Marc Bamuthi Joseph performed a spoken-word piece entitled “Dignity as Currency.” Toward the end, Common dropped sharp rhymes assailing racial and social injustice.

Often these variety-show-like affairs can have a square-ish and obligatory quality to them. But the producers managed to emphasize the common denominator (sorry, no pun intended) of American music with joy and verve. The masked-and-vaxxed crowd relished the wide assortment of offerings. Not many audiences applaud wildly for both opera and hip hop. The show was, to sound hokey, an effective tribute to the nation’s shared cultural heritage. (It opened with a Native American ceremonial song). It was a refreshing throwback to those days when one could converse about the arts as a force that overcomes differences within America. Of course, that was one of many aspects of national life that Donald Trump diminished. As president, he skipped the Kennedy Center Honors, which celebrates prominent performing artists, out of fear of being targeted by the honorees or heckled from the crowd. His absence was no great loss. More important, Trump did little in office to advance the arts. Each year, he proposed killing the National Endowment for the Arts—and failed to win congressional support for that. Bolstering what common ground may still exist within the United States didn’t interest him.

Which brings me back to Ike. We were all there in part because this Republican general-turned-university-president-turned-president and the Democratic Congress of 1958 shared a vision. That was a time when Republicans (at least some of them) believed that government could actively expand the wellbeing of the nation with initiatives like an arts center. Eisenhower enlarged Social Security and bolstered federal housing programs. He created the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and developed the interstate highway system. He took steps toward ending segregation. Of course, he committed significant mistakes, among them overthrowing governments in Iraq and Guatemala, initiating the Bay of Pigs operation, launching the US military intervention in Vietnam, lying about a U-2 surveillance plane shot down in Russia, and failing to publicly confront Sen. Joe McCarthy and his virulent red-baiting. (Eisenhower plotted against McCarthy behind the scenes.) But there is a reason why you don’t hear modern-day Republicans saying much about Ike. He accepted the basic premise of the New Deal and viewed government as a potential force for good (though in a more limited way than the Democrats). Soon after he left office, the GOP lurched to the right, as Barry Goldwater and anti-government extremists seized control.

In the decades since, Americans have wrangled over what holds the nation together and what they should jointly pursue as a community. In recent years, that battle has become increasingly embittered. The core of Trump’s narcissistic political pitch has been that he’s leading “real Americans” in a life-or-death crusade against anti-America Americans. And the Republican Party has turned into a cult-like collection of trolls slavishly serving Trump. What would Ike say?

At a 1963 event to celebrate and raise money for this new cultural center, Eisenhower, then out of office, noted that the institution would provide “a better appreciation of America.” The 50th anniversary did precisely that.

PBS will broadcast the show on October 1.

Got any comments or suggestions about this newsletter—or tips and leads? Email me at thisland@motherjones.com.

Dumbass Comment of the Week

It’s been a long time since I’ve bothered to pay attention to Ann Coulter. But I did notice that in her recent column, the pundit-provocateur made this all-caps claim: “COVID IS NOW OVER.”

Here’s STAT’s chart of deaths from COVID-19:

It sure doesn’t look over. About 2000 deaths per day this week. I cannot fathom the callousness of those on the right who continue to downplay or dismiss the pandemic. Imagine a terrorist group murdering thousands of Americans on a daily basis. Coulter—and everyone—would be in a justifiable panic and screaming for action. Yet when it comes to a virus slaughtering hundreds of thousands, she and her comrades on the right would rather own the libs, demonize Dr. Anthony Fauci, and stick it to Big Government than save lives. What dark souls they have.

Coulter is irate that Fauci and other public health experts are saying that even with the availability of the vaccines it is still necessary to wear masks. “Do the vaccines work or don’t they?” she huffs. “If they work, we’ll thank you to stop bossing us around now.” It’s hard to tell if she is being purposefully stupid. The reason for mask-wearing among the vaccinated is to thwart or slow transmission of the virus because the vaccinated can still become infected (especially with the Delta variant) and pass on the virus. Slowing the spread achieves two main goals: It protects the unvaccinated, and it lowers the odds that the coronavirus will mutate into a strain more virulent than the Delta variant that could defeat the vaccines. Given that COVID, per the New York Times map below, is battering rural America, a.k.a Trump country, and jeopardizing local health care systems, it’s a wonder conservatives and Republicans don’t give a damn. It seems they’d rather be Right than right.

The Mailbag

Reader Michael Murphy writes:

Investigate McConnell's fortune! He needs to be exposed. Rich politicians have wrecked America.

To be fair, some not-so-rich politicians are also working mighty hard to undermine the United States. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), for instance, is not wealthy. But I take your point. And journalists have long looked at Sen. Mitch McConnell’s personal finances. The New York Times had an interesting piece two years ago that linked his substantial wealth to the business ties in China of his wife’s family. It began:

The family of Elaine Chao, the transportation secretary and wife of Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, has high-level political connections not only in the United States but also in China. That gives the family unusual status in the world’s two largest economies.

Through interviews, industry filings and government documents from both countries, The New York Times found that the Chaos, and by extension Mr. McConnell, prospered as the family’s shipping company developed deeper business ties in China. Along the way, one of the company’s boosters was Ms. Chao, who now oversees efforts to promote America’s own maritime industry, which is in steep decline as China’s shipping sector rises in global dominance. Here are five takeaways.

You can read the rest here. By the way, a few months ago I did have a scoop about Chao apparently violating federal ethics laws. The Transportation Department’s inspector general had referred a report on her to Trump’s Justice Department for possible criminal prosecution. The department declined to open an investigation.

Got any questions I can help you with? Email me at thisland@motherjones.com.

MoxieCam™

Moxie knows she’s not supposed to be in the flowers.

Read Previous Issues of This Land

September 21, 2021: The Trump-Russia scandal denialists are taking another desperate stab at gaslighting you; Netflix’s The Chair nails the assignment; and more.

September 18, 2021: Hey Marco Rubio and Glenn Greenwald, this is the real problem with Milley, Trump, and nuclear weapons; Dumbass Comment of the Week (did Barack Obama really kill rock ’n’ roll with racial politics?); the Mailbag; MoxieCam™ (a new toy!); and more.

September 14, 2021: Will the new Bill-and-Monica television series spur a reappraisal of the Clinton scandal?; a stunning new Holocaust movie you can’t see—yet; one of the best articles ever about a family and its dog; and more.

September 11, 2021: How Trump’s conspiracy theories are killing people in West Virginia and elsewhere; more 9/11 reflections; Dumbass Comment of the Week (Special Confederacy Edition); a look at HBO’s very odd White Lotus; MoxieCam™; and more.

September 8, 2021: 9/11 plus 20: a remembrance and a thank-you; the chilling climate crisis warning in HBO’s Reminiscence; and more.

September 3, 2021: Texas shows how Trumpism has become fascistic vigilantism; Dumbass Comment of the Week; Rock ’n’ Roll Flashback (how I was popped by Iggy Pop); MoxieCam™; and more.

August 31, 2021: How a 1954 analysis perfectly explains today’s Republican Party; on his new album, James McMurtry captures the spirit of Warren Zevon; and more.

August 20, 2021: Yes, there are laws Trump may have broken while trying to overturn the election; Dumbass Comment of the Week (special Afghanistan edition); the Mailbag (should we report on Trump’s inane remarks?); MoxieCam™; and more.

August 16, 2021: The Afghanistan debacle: How Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden bamboozled the American public; the “Banana King” of Wellfleet, Massachusetts; and more.

August 13, 2021: Hey lefties, stop telling me not to report on Trump’s dangerous comments; Dumbass Comment of the Week; rock ’n’ roll flashback: Sting abuse at a Police show; MoxieCam™; and more.

Got suggestions, comments, complaints, tips related to any of the above, or anything else? Email me at thisland@motherjones.com.