There’s a saying on the conservative internet that “the left can’t meme.” While conservatives have proven adept at churning out punchy, ironic, and relevant memes, both visual and verbal, leftists respond with ponderous diatribes that consist of walls of words and muddy, confusing images. In a world of 3-second attention spans, their messaging fails dismally.

It turns out that our White House can meme very well, too. Nothing more perfectly exemplifies this than the official White House website response to the Democrat hysteria regarding the upgrade that President Trump is doing to the East Wing of the White House.

James Hoban’s original design for the White House. Public domain.

As we are all aware, the East Wing was constructed during World War II to accommodate the surge of office workers flooding the government during the war. Additionally, it may have been added to obscure the fact that the White House was upgrading its underground military headquarters and adding a bomb shelter.

The old building’s history isn’t very interesting, and it wasn’t an architectural gem. Instead, it was a warren of rooms, including the First Lady’s office (since Rosalynn Carter’s era), as well as lesser facilities, such as the calligraphy office and a small movie theater.

Meanwhile, White House entertaining has been taking place in small, 19th-century rooms that hold fewer than 200 guests for a reception. For the most important, and one of the most populous, nations in the world, that’s ridiculous. Large receptions have been held in tents, with guests trudging over to portable toilets. It’s third-world political theater for a first-world country.

So, the Trump administration acted. With private donations, Trump developed a plan for a large space that can accommodate up to 1,000 guests and features numerous bathrooms. It also features spacious and modern office facilities. And if rumors are true about secured facilities underground, I’m sure they’re getting an upgrade, too.

Naturally, as the Democrat-created government shutdown proved first to be a non-issue and then an anchor around their necks, the Democrats decided to get hysterical about the sacred East Wing. How dare that Neanderthal Trump, with his tacky tastes, despoil this hallowed ground? Who does he think he is to do something without Congressional permission and taxpayer funds? How will this holy site ever survive the insult he’s committed against it?

Faced with this frenzied response, the White House, in a section of its official website dedicated to the building itself, offers a comprehensive timeline of major events in the building’s history. It’s actually interesting.

It opens by explaining how Washington selected the building’s site in 1791. By 1792, James Hoban was the designated architect, and the cornerstone was laid. In 1800, although the building wasn’t yet completed, John and Abigail Adams were the first official occupants.

The building had to be rebuilt after the British torched it in 1814. Once again, James Hoban led the reconstruction, bringing it back to its original classical design. In 1824, Hoban’s design for the iconic South Portico was added to the building.

And so the timeline goes. We learn that Andrew Jackson added the North Portico in 1829. The building had some internal remodels during the 19th century, which the timeline doesn’t discuss. It picks up, instead, in 1902, when Theodore Roosevelt tore down greenhouses on the west side of the White House to add the West Wing, a colonial garden, and the East Terrace. In 1909, Taft remodeled and expanded the West Wing, adding the Oval Office. (Few people probably know what a late addition that was.)

The Rose Garden (which Democrats loved when Jackie Kennedy updated and had emotional collapses when the Trumps upgraded it) didn’t come along until 1913, during Wilson’s term.

In the 1930s, Franklin Roosevelt expanded the West Wing, including a swimming pool, relocated the Oval Office, and, as noted, constructed the East Wing.

After WWII, as the central building was showing signs of collapse, the Truman administration conducted a total reconstruction inside the White House. Almost all the original old building’s interior was rebuilt.

In 1970, Nixon got rid of Franklin Roosevelt’s swimming pool, converting it into a briefing room. He also added a bowling alley.

So far, this is a standard timeline. And then, you get these two entries:

Oh, maybe the building isn’t quite so sacred and holy, after all.

Following that magnificent trolling interjection, the timeline resumes its staid course. In 2020, we learn, the Trump administration added a privately funded tennis pavilion.

Things got jiggy again, though, during the Biden years:

The last items in the timeline are what Trump did in 2015. He personally paid to install two gigantic flagpoles. Then, using private funding, he renovated the Rose Garden to get rid of the soggy lawn that sucked down women’s heels. He also obtained private funding for the Oval Office, including restoring myriad old paintings that weren’t sufficiently politically correct for the room’s Democrat occupants. And, lastly, there’s the planned new East Wing:

The White House may be historic, but it’s not a museum. We’re not Europe, which is a fossil of its once important self.  (I always say that one of Europe’s problems is that because all it had to offer after WWII was being a museum for tourists, it got frozen in amber and stopped developing.)

We are a dynamic and important nation, and the White House needs to adapt to the times. It can move in a sordid direction (affairs, Islamic radicals, cocaine, and transgender debauchery) or it can keep up with the demands of a powerful nation that’s on the move. Thankfully, Trump has chosen that second option.