It’s one thing to redecorate the Oval Office with garish gold doodads superglued to the walls and fireplace surround. It’s another to build a ballroom to rival the gaudy excesses of the Palace of Versailles, or to have gold gilt applied over statues that were intended to be bronze. Tasteless and wastefully expensive, for sure, but arguably within the constraints of the president’s aesthetic choices. After all, elect a boy from Queens as president and you get the tackiness that comes with him.

But aircraft carriers? Yes. Even aircraft carriers.

The U.S. Navy is considering a major redesign of its new aircraft carriers to better match President Donald Trump’s preferred aesthetic for the warships, according to seven current and former U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

The service is evaluating the feasibility of moving the multistory tower that acts as the carrier’s command center farther forward, toward the middle of the ship, to resemble older vessels, the officials said. The review, which has not been previously reported, is in response to Trump’s concerns about the “look” of the new Ford-class ships, where the tower is near the rear, these people said.

One might fairly ask why a president, commander-in-chief though he may be, is more concerned with “the look” of warships than their functionality or cost. This question is particularly apt when the crew of the USS Lincoln is struggling to deal with the problems with food, sanitation and mental health from an excessive deployment and Trump denies that these very real problems exist at all.

Instead, what really bothers Trump is that the new Ford-class aircraft carriers don’t look like the old carriers from World War II.

Trump’s preference, current and former officials said, is for the new aircraft carriers to look more like those that were in service during World War II.

This isn’t about the efficacy of the carriers. It’s not about whether they will perform their function better. It’s about one thing only: Trump’s aesthetic preference. It’s essentially no different than if Trump decides that ships should be painted American flag blue with a gold stripe rather than gray because that’s Trump’s favorite color scheme. And this preference comes with a price tag, like everything else Trump prefers.

The Navy also examined the issue during his first term as president, said a former senior U.S. official. A study found that moving the island could cost billions of dollars in redesign costs and significantly delay the program, this person said.

“It came back that the cost and time to do so would just be extraordinary,” the former official said.

But hey, what’s time and money when it comes to the president’s preferred “look”? In the Trump administration, few things matter more than appearances, reality notwithstanding. But when it comes to Trump sticking his nose into the Navy, moving the Island to the middle of the aircraft carrier isn’t the only change Trump demands.

Moving that command center, known as the “island,” would be the second major design change prompted by the president, who on Thursday issued a national security memorandum directing the Navy to develop a plan to revert to older steam-powered catapults on future carriers. The systems help launch jets off the ships’ flight decks.

The story is that during his first term, Trump was told that the old steam system was more reliable than the modern electromagnetic system that offers a host of advantages. Then again, as Trump has made abundantly clear over and over, he doesn’t grasp how magnets work.

The gold doodads on the walls of the Oval Office can be removed, even if the taxpayer dollars squandered on 24-carat gold will be lost. The significance of changes to American naval warships, on the other hand, will remain with us for generations to come, just as the cost will be added to the national debt, now over $39.83 trillion. But hey, Trump has his preferences and don’t we really want our aircraft carriers to look like the ones built more than 80 years ago?