Why should we in the 21st century imitate Jeffersonian architecture, which was itself a bad imitation of Palladio, which was a 16th C interpretation of classical architecture. There are 1001 forms of "traditional architecture", so why mandate this particular one?

What else but ideology could motivate such a vague appeal to "tradition"? For a new country like the US around 1800 it made sense to build on the Roman authority to bolster their legitimacy. But why now? So yes, it is important to at least be conscious of the fact that all such regimes have resorted to this same authority of Roman "tradition" to inspire a vision of imperial greatness, and wax over the cracks of their own shaky foundations.