One of the many unusual things about this Fourth celebration was its VIP tents; I watched it from the second of four separate areas reserved for VIPs, a dozen or so rows from the podium but with a view of the president somewhat obscured by a decorative military personnel carrier. Around me were numerous service members and their families; closer to the president, and among the multiple military honor guards, were men and women with bars on their starched sleeves indicating the number of combat tours they had served, most at least two or three, others even seven or eight.[...]
There was mention of Lewis and Clark, but no mention of their native guide Sacajawea. There was mention of God, and Lincoln’s words at Gettysburg, but none on Lincoln’s meditation in his second inaugural on the Lord’s justice, and perhaps his punishment, for the sin of slavery in hundreds of thousands of American dead.
There was even mention of Martin Luther King Jr. speaking in 1963 from the spot that Trump did Thursday evening, but nothing about the racial and economic divides that he worked to repair, or the work yet to be done before America shall overcome. There was mention of a Catholic nun who has long served the needy in Washington, D.C., but none about young migrants, most of them Catholic, and whether their needs were being met. And in Trump’s call to national service, encouraging young Americans to serve in the military, there was no hint of humility or irony that he had not chosen to do so.
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