Abraham Lincoln never slept in the Lincoln bedroom because, when he was President, the room wasn’t a bedroom. He used the space as an office and cabinet meeting room. He signed the Emancipation Proclamation in that room. Here is a painting of that event by Francis Bicknell Carpenter. I can’t swear this is an accurate depiction of the room, but by all accounts the room had green wallpaper.

I don’t know which presidents used the space as an office after Lincoln, but at some point it was taken over by senior staff while the presidents set up offices elsewhere. The space was turned into a guest bedroom and dubbed the “Lincoln bedroom” during the Truman Administration.

You’ve probably heard that Trump is mightily proud of his remodeling of the bathroom adjacent to the Lincoln Bedroom.

We can be reasonably certain Trump didn’t use the Lincoln-era marble, since the bathroom didn’t exist until the Truman Administration. This is probably why the thing looked like a standard 1950s-era bathroom. People keep calling it “art deco,” but I’m not seeing the art deco. I’m seeing postwar bleh. I’m not sure what era Trump’s remodel resembles — late Roman Empire, maybe? — but it looks nothing like any 1860s interior I’ve ever seen. Lincoln was POTUS right smack in the middle of the Victorian age, which was all about dark furniture and fussy details. Here’s a Victorian-age bathroom:

UNITED KINGDOM – NOVEMBER 16: Victorian bathroom, c 1880s. Victorian bathroom showing water closet and sink. (Photo by SSPL/Getty Images)

Yes, wealthy Victorian age people did have indoor plumbing and flush toilets. Indoor plumbing and flush toilets were installed in the White House in the 1850s.  Lincoln’s house in Illinois had a well and an outhouse, however, like the homes of most folks at the time.

More on what Trump did with the bathroom:

Lots of gold, notice. Just like Lincoln would have wanted, right? Do see Margaret Hartmann in New York magazine, Trump Adds Gold and Marble to Lincoln Bathroom, As Abe Would Have Wanted. She notes that “Marble walls and floors with polished gold fixtures certainly weren’t common for bathrooms of the time.”

Hartmann also recalls a big source of friction in the Lincoln household. When Mary Lincoln moved into the White House she was shocked at how run down the place was. So she went on a redecorating spree, She bought new rugs and wallpaper and drapes and paintings and chandeliers and furniture. She went over a congressional appropriation for redecorating by 30 percent. When Lincoln learned of this from the White House Commissioner of Public Buildings, a fellow named Benjamin Brown French, Lincoln was furious.

“It would stink in the nostrils of the American people to have it said that the president of the United States had approved a bill over-running an appropriation of $20,000 for flub dubs for this damned old house, when the soldiers cannot have blankets,” he shouted at French.

We cannot know what Lincoln would have thought of the Trump bathroom. He might have thought it more worthy of Napoleon III, who was Emperor of the French in Lincoln’s day. than of an American president. But if you then told him that Trump was spending money on statuary marble and gold bathroom fixtures while denying food to 16 million children, I suspect he would have interesting things to say about that. Never mind the $300 million ballroom.

Which is why Lincoln was a great president, and Trump isn’t. But it also underscores, once again, that Trump knows absolutely nothing about U.S. history and doesn’t seem interested in learning. And if he thinks Lincoln would have approved of the bathroom project he knows nothing about Abraham Lincoln, obviously, especially what sort of man he was.

Last night Chris Hayes tied several things together. He noted that regime change in Venezuela has long been an obsession of Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Meanwhile, Stephen Miller appears to be running the anti-immigrant secret police, and Russell Vought  is seizing control of all government spending. All while Trump is throwing parties and remodeling the White House.

I can’t say I’m too worried about Trump getting a third term, because even if his health holds out that long (fat chance) his political capital will be long spent. Even Republicans will finally want him gone, I suspect. But he’s not really doing the job now. His senior staff are all just running their own projects while he happily travels and plays golf and redecorates.