President Trump has been here before…President Trump laid out his approach to Iran at the White House Diplomatic Reception Room on Oct. 13, 2017

https://time.com/4989040/trump-sidelines-iraq-rolls-over-kurds/

Any connection?

Parallel?

Mirror?

Spidey senses tingling?

Anything interdasting?

Holding Iraq together without the common enemy of ISIS looming over it was always going to be tough. President Donald Trump is not going to make the task any easier.

The rise of the Islamic State in 2014 forced many factions in Iraqi society to paper over their differences against a common enemy. In the contested areas of Iraqi Kurdistan, Kurdish authorities took control of oil-rich Kirkuk after the Iraqi army fled as ISIS advanced. On Oct. 16, Iraqi forces returned to take back Kirkuk and its surrounding areas by force, in response to Iraqi Kurds’ overwhelmingly voting for independence in an unsanctioned referendum on Sept. 25.

The Iraqi Kurds might feel hard done by. For the past three years their peshmerga fighters, trained and armed by the U.S., have played a pivotal role in beating back ISIS. Their expectation was that in time, they would be rewarded with a homeland of their own, despite the strenuous objections from neighboring Turkey, Syria and Iran, all of whom have sizable Kurdish populations of their own.

The Kurds’ insistence on carrying out a referendum, while understandable, put the U.S. in a bind. Washington opposed the vote for fear it would weaken pro-U.S. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ahead of elections next year. The U.S. has spent over a decade trying to stabilize the country it invaded in 2003, propping up the central government while also providing aid to Kurdish forces. Hence Trump’s announcement on Oct. 16 that “we’re not taking sides.”

While the rhetoric makes sense, Trump’s decision to decertify Iran’s compliance with the nuclear deal, coupled with his inconstant support for Iraq’s Kurds, have pushed things closer toward an endgame. In recapturing Kirkuk, Iraqi security forces were joined by Shi’ite militias backed by Iran. The Iranians, emboldened by Trump’s nuclear-deal gambit, have every incentive to push the U.S. into these kinds of existential geopolitical dilemmas.

To be fair to Trump, this is not the first time a U.S. President has had to give way to realities on the ground. Obama did virtually the same with the Ukrainians when Vladimir Putin invaded in 2014, leaving Kiev in the lurch. The difference here is that it was Trump’s unilateral decision to provoke Iran that ended up forcing moves in Iraq, much like it was Trump’s unilateral backing of Saudi Arabia that touched off this year’s spat between Qatar and other Gulf monarchies. With allies like these, Iraq’s Kurds might be asking if they really need enemies.

This appears in the October 30, 2017 issue of TIME.

>>12389993

>what is the portait of behind him on both sides…clearly that G Washington behind him

Jacquelin Kennedy had the mural wallpaper installed…

https://www.whitehousehistory.org/the-diplomatic-reception-rooms-historic-wallpaper

After the destruction of the White House by the British in 1814, the Executive Mansion was reconstructed with a servants’ hall directly below the Elliptical Saloon (today’s). In 1837, President Marten Van Buren repurposed the servants’ hall as a furnace room in order to provide heat for the building, a significant milestone in White House technology. By the time of Theodore Roosevelt’s , the Ground Floor room had become a labyrinth of pipes, ducts, and splintered plaster, hovering over a clammy, concrete floor. Charles F. McKim, the primary architect of the renovation, envisioned a new purpose for this room: a third formal White House oval room to complement the Yellow Oval Room on the Second Floor and the famous Blue Room of the State Floor.

McKim and his team utilized his Parisian École de Beaux-Arts education to combine modern architectural technology and historic design, a concept demonstrated in the new Diplomatic Reception Room.

The White House could not have been a more suitable enterprise, and the Diplomatic Reception room no better illustration of McKim’s vision.

>>12390029

>>12389993

moar on White House mural wallpaper…

McKim’s oval room hosts esteemed dignitaries, diplomats, and luminaries from around the globe. In the uncertain times of the Great Depression and World War II, President Franklin D. Roosevelt used the room to calm the nation with his famous “”. In addition to the many historic events that have taken place in this space, the room is adorned with many items from the White House collection of decorative arts and furnishings. One piece in particular was installed during the Kennedy refurbishing in 1961, an element of the White House visitors do not walk or sit on: scenic French wallpaper.

Inspired by French artists’ engravings of American sites from the 1820s, French artist Jean-Julien Deltil designed the wallpaper, which was created in 1834 by a French firm, Jean Zuber and Co.

Officially titled, Vues de l’Amerique du Nord (“Views of North America”), the wallpaper depicts panoramic scenes of New York, West Point, the Natural Bridge of Virginia, and Boston Harbor around the 36 x 26-foot oval facade.

Onlookers may assume these illustrations are wholly inspired by American landscapes; but this is inaccurate. Wallpaper historian Catherine Lynn noted that, in the “General View of Boston” specifically, “the foreground bears a close resemblance to waterside views of European ports.”

Although the State House signified Boston’s cityscape, the engravings that Deltil and Zuber referenced for the landscape’s finer details were somewhat misleading.

Even though this wallpaper was imported to the United States from France in the early 19th century, it was not solely intended for upper class individuals and city residents. In fact, manufacturers reproduced the wallpaper frequently throughout the 19th and 20th centuries,Inspired by French artists’ engravings of American sites from the 1820s, French artist Jean-Julien Deltil designed the wallpaper, which was created in 1834 by a French firm, Jean Zuber and Co.

Officially titled, Vues de l’Amerique du Nord (“Views of North America”), the wallpaper depicts panoramic scenes of New York, West Point, the Natural Bridge of Virginia, and Boston Harbor around the 36 x 26-foot oval facade.

Onlookers may assume these illustrations are wholly inspired by American landscapes; but this is inaccurate. Wallpaper historian Catherine Lynn noted that, in the “General View of Boston” specifically, “the foreground bears a close resemblance to waterside views of European ports.”

Although the State House signified Boston’s cityscape, the engravings that Deltil and Zuber referenced for the landscape’s finer details were somewhat misleading.

Even though this wallpaper was imported to the United States from France in the early 19th century, it was not solely intended for upper class individuals and city residents. In fact, manufacturers reproduced the wallpaper frequently throughout the 19th and 20th centuries,