Trump built Taj Mahal sans love, now trying Great America sans greatness
In the late twentieth century, Donald Trump also built a Taj Mahal but not for his beautiful wife Melania Trump. The braggart man named it after his own name --Trump Taj Mahal
Mughal emperor Shah Jahan built Taj Mahal in memory of his favourite wife, Mumtaj Mahal, after her death in the seventeenth century. The Taj Mahal stands on the banks of the River Jamuna in India's Agra as a symbol of eternal love.
The relief work in white marble and inlay with precious and semi-precious stones make Taj Mahal a monument apart. The architectural beauty of the mausoleum makes it to the list of the seven wonders in the world.
In the late twentieth century, Donald Trump also built a Taj Mahal but not for his beautiful wife Melania Trump. The braggart man named it after his own name --Trump Taj Mahal.
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He also hung the portrait of the late Mughal emperor-- Shah Jahan in his Taj Mahal. The giant building was constructed spending $1.2 billion as the world's largest casino.
The 120,000 square-feet casino had 3,008 slot machines and 167 gaming tables with a dazzling decoration with gold-made taps, sink and lifts.
During its inauguration on April 2 in 1990, Trump proudly called it "the eighth wonder of the world."
But he could not hold his Taj Mahal. It went bankrupt in 2016 for losing money for years.
Hard Rock International which bought it for $50 million and renamed the casino as Hard Rock Hotel and Casino scrubbing the Mughal styled sculptures and the ubiquitous presence of Trump's names.
However, this veteran businessman did not have to bear the pain of losing the Taj Mahal for long. That same year, Trump won White House-- the residence of the president of the United States. He won the 2016 US presidential election using the slogan --- Make America Great Again.
The Americans enjoyed a Golden Age in the third quarter of 20th century following the end of the Second World War.
During that period between 1948 and 1973, the United States' real GDP rose 169 percent, employment increased by 75 percent and manufacturing jobs by 30 percent, while per capita personal income almost doubled, according to a MarketWatch article.
The postwar economic boom was inevitable, read the article titled "The US economy will never have another Golden Age."
It said Europe and Japan were in ruins thanks to the war, while the American mainland was unscathed by World War II.
Besides, the Arsenal of Democracy that built the tanks and planes used to win the war had US factories in high gear.
"The Arsenal of Democracy," a term coined by US president Franklin D Roosevelt during one of his Fireside Chat radio broadcasts on December 29, 1940. In that speech, Roosevelt called on the nation to unite with swift cooperation in producing vast shipments of weaponry to aid Europe.
The US economy is now grappling to secure a standard economic growth amid a war against the coronavirus pandemic.
The world's largest economy under the leadership of Donald Trump witnessed a negative GDP growth rate of -9.5 percent in June 2020 while Xi Jinping's China, the world's second largest economy which was first hit by the pandemic, secured a positive growth of 3.2 percent during the same period.
The US also lagged behind Germany in terms of leadership, according to a Gallup poll conducted in 2019.
Germany had a 44 percent global approval rating while the US had 33 percent, just one percentage point ahead of China.
Washington's rating could suffer even further regarding its mismanagement of the pandemic. The US turned into the worst hotspots for the disease with the highest number of infection and death cases.
During the reign of Barack Obama, the US was the most admired country in the world for every year except one (when it came a close second to Germany in 2011).
But the country's popularity plummeted 18 percentage points after Trump took office in 2016, recovering marginally after that at just over 30 percent.
Only time will tell whether Trump will be able to turn America back into a great power or whether he will have to witness another unpleasant outcome like the Taj Mahal, in the backdrop of Xi Jinping rising popularity and China's unbound prosperity.
