kickingandscreaming
PREMIER
The Left is in a mental health crisis.
Today in Fascism
- Thread starter Hüsker Dü
- Start date
The Left is in a mental health crisis.
Hüsker Dü
DA
Whistleblower reveals exactly what happened behind closed doors at the Kennedy Center.
Josef Palermo was the Kennedy Center's very first curator of visual arts. Soon after he accepted that position, he spent 10 months watching Donald Trump's team systematically loot, corrupt, and destroy one of America's most iconic cultural institutions. When they fired him and offered severance in exchange for his silence, he bravely said no.
Now he's talking. And what he saw is worse than you even imagined.
Trump appointed Richard— a former ambassador with zero arts expertise who reportedly wanted to be Secretary of State instead — to be his president of the arts institution. Palermo says that Grenell treated the Kennedy Center presidency as a consolation prize and ran the institution like a personal fiefdom and a Trump fundraising operation simultaneously.
Box seats for Les Misérables went for $2 million, with a private presidential reception included. As one of Palermo's colleagues — a Republican campaign veteran — put it: "We are grafting political management principles into a nonpolitical organization."
According to Palermo, the corruption was everywhere. The historic Circles Lounge was renamed the SyberJet Lounge — after an aircraft company whose CEO had been convicted of defrauding investors and received a Trump pardon.
The African Room, filled with priceless artifacts representing African cultural heritage, was renamed "A Tribute to America's Intelligence Community" and handed to a donor the Wall Street Journal described as someone who allegedly lied about being in the CIA. Priceless handmade African textiles, a wooden sculpture donated by Ghana to mourn President Kennedy's assassination, and doors carved from 700-year-old wood depicting Yoruban village scenes were taken down. Palermo was never told where they went.
At an October 7th anniversary commemoration in the Israeli Lounge — an event honoring victims of a pogrom — Grenell used the occasion to shake down the Jewish attendees for donations, warning that the lounge would be "given away" to a new sponsor if they didn't write checks. "It certainly would be a shame if we lost this room," he said. Palermo was mortified.
One of Grenell's lieutenants texted Palermo asking if the Center could "do something" with an artist whose work Grenell personally owned — a move that would have increased the artwork's auction value and directly benefited Grenell. Palermo ignored the request.
Meanwhile, Grenell instituted a return-to-office mandate that applied to everyone except himself. While staffers' meeting requests went unanswered, Grenell was posting Instagram photos from a yacht off the coast of Croatia. The Kennedy Center now denies this happened, despite the existence of the Instagram posts.
Then came the order that stopped Palermo cold. Grenell told him to "get rid of everything" in the permanent collection — including the eight-foot, 3,000-pound brass bust of President Kennedy that has stood in the Grand Foyer since the center opened. If donors wouldn't pay for removal, Grenell said, they could auction the works off or give them away. When Palermo reported this to another senior leader, the man's eyes went wide. He told Palermo to do nothing and said his office would handle it.
The roof was leaking. The willow trees outside were rotting. The fundraising operation couldn't pay its postage invoices. But the high-priority renovation? Gold gilding on the chandelier of the presidential box in the Opera House.
Grenell's grand vision for America's 250th birthday celebration at the nation's premier cultural center? An America's Got Talent-style talent show. We’re not kidding.
Palermo refused the gag order. He is now cooperating with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse's investigation and has been in contact with Representative Joyce Beatty's legal team, which is suing to stop the renaming of the center.
"There must be a firewall put in place by Congress to prevent this kind of hostile political takeover of the Kennedy Center from ever happening again," he wrote.
The Kennedy Center was built as a living memorial to President John F. Kennedy — a gift to the American people and a symbol of this nation's commitment to art, culture, and the best of what humanity can create. Trump renamed it after himself, tried to sell its lounges to Kazakhstan, ordered its permanent collection disposed of, and ran it into the ground in less than a year.
The bust of President Kennedy still stands in the Grand Foyer. For now.
Please like and share this post if you believe America's cultural institutions belong to the American people — not to Trump's donors, Trump's pardoned felons, and Trump's Instagram feed.
Josef Palermo was the Kennedy Center's very first curator of visual arts. Soon after he accepted that position, he spent 10 months watching Donald Trump's team systematically loot, corrupt, and destroy one of America's most iconic cultural institutions. When they fired him and offered severance in exchange for his silence, he bravely said no.
Now he's talking. And what he saw is worse than you even imagined.
Trump appointed Richard— a former ambassador with zero arts expertise who reportedly wanted to be Secretary of State instead — to be his president of the arts institution. Palermo says that Grenell treated the Kennedy Center presidency as a consolation prize and ran the institution like a personal fiefdom and a Trump fundraising operation simultaneously.
Box seats for Les Misérables went for $2 million, with a private presidential reception included. As one of Palermo's colleagues — a Republican campaign veteran — put it: "We are grafting political management principles into a nonpolitical organization."
According to Palermo, the corruption was everywhere. The historic Circles Lounge was renamed the SyberJet Lounge — after an aircraft company whose CEO had been convicted of defrauding investors and received a Trump pardon.
The African Room, filled with priceless artifacts representing African cultural heritage, was renamed "A Tribute to America's Intelligence Community" and handed to a donor the Wall Street Journal described as someone who allegedly lied about being in the CIA. Priceless handmade African textiles, a wooden sculpture donated by Ghana to mourn President Kennedy's assassination, and doors carved from 700-year-old wood depicting Yoruban village scenes were taken down. Palermo was never told where they went.
At an October 7th anniversary commemoration in the Israeli Lounge — an event honoring victims of a pogrom — Grenell used the occasion to shake down the Jewish attendees for donations, warning that the lounge would be "given away" to a new sponsor if they didn't write checks. "It certainly would be a shame if we lost this room," he said. Palermo was mortified.
One of Grenell's lieutenants texted Palermo asking if the Center could "do something" with an artist whose work Grenell personally owned — a move that would have increased the artwork's auction value and directly benefited Grenell. Palermo ignored the request.
Meanwhile, Grenell instituted a return-to-office mandate that applied to everyone except himself. While staffers' meeting requests went unanswered, Grenell was posting Instagram photos from a yacht off the coast of Croatia. The Kennedy Center now denies this happened, despite the existence of the Instagram posts.
Then came the order that stopped Palermo cold. Grenell told him to "get rid of everything" in the permanent collection — including the eight-foot, 3,000-pound brass bust of President Kennedy that has stood in the Grand Foyer since the center opened. If donors wouldn't pay for removal, Grenell said, they could auction the works off or give them away. When Palermo reported this to another senior leader, the man's eyes went wide. He told Palermo to do nothing and said his office would handle it.
The roof was leaking. The willow trees outside were rotting. The fundraising operation couldn't pay its postage invoices. But the high-priority renovation? Gold gilding on the chandelier of the presidential box in the Opera House.
Grenell's grand vision for America's 250th birthday celebration at the nation's premier cultural center? An America's Got Talent-style talent show. We’re not kidding.
Palermo refused the gag order. He is now cooperating with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse's investigation and has been in contact with Representative Joyce Beatty's legal team, which is suing to stop the renaming of the center.
"There must be a firewall put in place by Congress to prevent this kind of hostile political takeover of the Kennedy Center from ever happening again," he wrote.
The Kennedy Center was built as a living memorial to President John F. Kennedy — a gift to the American people and a symbol of this nation's commitment to art, culture, and the best of what humanity can create. Trump renamed it after himself, tried to sell its lounges to Kazakhstan, ordered its permanent collection disposed of, and ran it into the ground in less than a year.
The bust of President Kennedy still stands in the Grand Foyer. For now.
Please like and share this post if you believe America's cultural institutions belong to the American people — not to Trump's donors, Trump's pardoned felons, and Trump's Instagram feed.
kickingandscreaming
PREMIER
Leftists lie - it’s in their nature.
x.com
Adam Urato, MD (@AdamUrato1) on X
Now that the second Pennsylvania death has been revealed, it is clear that Gov. Shapiro's press conference (& the media coverage) was misleading. 1. Gov. Shapiro used the term "unvaccinated" to describe the two. But neither child was eligible for the MMR vaccine. The boy died right after birth, an…
Hüsker Dü
DA
merican Scoundrel: Roy Cohn's Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump is a 2026 biographical work by Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Kai Bird and researcher Susan Goldmark, published by Scribner. [1, 2, 3]
What the Book is About
What the Book is About
- The Ultimate Fixer: The biography explores the life of Roy Cohn, detailing how he sat at the center of American political corruption and power from the 1950s through the 1980s. [1]
- McCarthyism and Red Scare: “At 27, Cohn was on the cover of Time magazine,” after graduating from Columbia Law School at age 20, prosecuting Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and serving as chief legal counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy during the brutal communist witch-hunts [. [1, 2, 3]
- The Mob and Manhattan Elite: After being pushed out following the Army-McCarthy hearings, Cohn reinvented himself in New York as a high-priced divorce attorney, a lawyer for organized crime families, and a political fixer rubbing shoulders with the glitterati. [1, 2]
- The Trump Connection: “[The authors] tell the long, sordid tale of how one 'narcissistic con artist'—as they characterize Cohn—did so much to create another, the man who now occupies the most powerful office in the world.” Cohn mentored a young Donald Trump in the 1970s and 1980s, instilling in him a playbook of aggressive counterattacking, evading rules, and never admitting defeat. [1, 2, 3]
- Legacy: Cohn died of AIDS-related complications in 1986 while vehemently denying his illness and closeted sexuality, leaving a dark legacy that directly bridges mid-century McCarthyism to modern American populism.
Chelsea dad g09
SILVER
Since when has the Kennedy Center been non political?
Chelsea dad g09
SILVER
The pride in some people is utterly insane. Trump is on FIRE and winning!!! Look at Du Du on here this week. A total loser with zero humility. The only avatar that likes any of his shitty takes is espola. espola is full of hate as much as Du Du is full of shit and hate. espola only desire before he dies is to pee on T's grave and he told all of us Charlie Kirk deserved to be assassinated for his actions on campus talk that day.
