TOI correspondent in Washington: American fast food chain Cheesecake Factory has spent decades perfecting the art of serving customers an expansive menu in portions that suggest they may never eat again.
It has achieved something even more remarkable now: become a central character in the long running Trump-Obama feud that has devolved into a culinary spat wrapped in a culture war.The MAGA boss on Monday went after Obama, calling him a “lousy president,” after his predecessor mocked Trump’s obsession with a White House makeover, likening its gilded accents and gold platings to a Cheesecake Factory that Saddam Hussain may have opened.
Peeved at the perceived slight to upgrades he thinks are required to restore the White House to pristine glory, but which critics think are gaudy and garish, a clearly annoyed Trump, in a lengthy rebuttal, said Obama was “not a smart guy” because he did not recognise the importance of showcasing class and quality.Also Read: Obama unloads on Trump while stumping for Democrats ahead of midtermsIt was a remarkable amount of presidential indignation to expend over a joke invoking comparisons to restaurant chain famous for serving enough food to require a congressional inquiry into portion control.
It was also cue for Trump’s MAGA minions to order the outrage platter, with extra umbrage on the side, by seizing on Cheesecake Factory’s iconic status as one of the top family restaurants in middle America, a place that makes a glutton’s pulse quicken and arteries thicken.Conservative commentator Scott Jennings jibed that a man like Obama, who “makes speeches for 500k a pop, hasn’t eaten dinner that costs less than $250 in a year, has never been in a Cheesecake Factory,” was being condescending towards Americans who are not part of the elite class.
Radio host Clay Travis recalled that eating there had been a special occasion for his family, as it remains for millions of others.And just to drive home the point, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, a billionaire former hedge-fund manager, duly dined at a Washington-area Cheesecake Factory, emerging to tell a conveniently waiting cameraman the “Martha’s Vineyard set” (Obama and his ilk) should give the restaurant a try.
Criticism of the place that occupied a storied place in Middle America’s heart had come from a man whose presidential library resembled “Darth Vader’s tomb,” Bessent jibed.
The White House itself joined the food fight, posting a list of Trump’s accomplishments in a format that resembled Cheesecake Factory’s menu.Obama’s defenders, trying to forestall the “deplorables” debacle that convulsed America (after Hillary Clinton characterised Trump supporters in those terms in 2016) insist the point was not that Cheesecake Factory patrons are deplorable or declasse or that the food is beneath liberals.
He was making fun of Trump’s fixation on turning the People’s House into a monument to his own tacky aesthetic preferences - and the time and energy the president seems to devote to discussing the makeover while voters worry about prices, housing and healthcare.While conceding that Trump has a legitimate point when he says the White House should be clean, well maintained and beautiful, they argued the question is one of proportion.
If Obama had compared the White House to French Laundry, a rarefied Michelin-star California restaurant, the snobbery charge might have had more seasoning; Cheesecake Factory, they acknowledge, is practically a national dialect.But when a President devotes excessive attention to gold trim, ballroom plans and reflecting pool, as Trump is doing to the point of making it a fetish amid ongoing war and economic crisis, they say the optics become cheesy. The MAGA supremo may regard the work as a labour of love; but right now critics see a commander-in-chief who seems preoccupied with cushions and drapes and upholstery - while the house is on fire.