The Christmas Eve West Wing Fire of 1929

Tsunami Stops Concert

This morning, according to presidential historian Jon Meacham, speaking on Morning Joe:

On xMass eve in 1929 president Hoover was heading up a White House Dinner of elites.

During that celebration fire alarms went off as the Oval Office in the West Wing caught fire.

The President, smoking a cigar, watched the firefight as it burned.

The First Lady wanted the band to continue playing xMass music.

(Paraphrased, see also this). It reminded me of the movie "Titanic" where the ship of that state was going down but the band kept playing.

Like the days daze just prior to the "Great Depression" when a popular economist Irving Fisher gave an "everything is ok, don't worry, be happy, the stock market and economy are the best ever" type of speech:

"The stock market crash of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression cost Fisher much of his personal wealth and academic reputation. He famously predicted, nine days before the crash, that stock prices had 'reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.' "

(Irving Fisher). When the government sleeps not every eye is closed, but some eyes are closed (U.S. Geological Survey Unable To Provide Indonesia Tsunami Data Due To Government Shutdown).

Is there a metaphor which is instructive in these premises?

---

---