The military parade was a benign surprise. It was not nearly as much about Trump as it might have been. And I liked it that a lot of the soldiers had big smiles as if they were enjoying themselves.

Even so, there did not appear to be much point to it. Our major national holiday is the Fourth of July. We all have absorbed some of the history about Independence Day, and it is a natural time for patriotism. Military parades at the conclusion of wars make some sense, as they tend to bring out our appreciation as we realize that too many soldiers are missing, and many whom we do see marching have been through harrowing times. On the other hand, I doubt few of us could have stated when the U.S. Army came into existence and why we were commemorating a date that has gone unremarked for 250 years. Quick. When was our navy created? The marines? The air force?

Perhaps wondering about the point to the parade makes me an outlier. The commentators on Fox News were convinced that it gave all of us a huge boost in patriotism. Seeing files of tanks made them more excited than Al Roker spotting the Snoopy balloon approaching Macy’s.

Wondering about the cost of parade, on the other hand, does not make me an outlier. With a projected price tag of $45 million (not including clean-up and extra police presence), the money spent on the parade could have funded 14 million school lunches, Medicaid coverage for 6,000 people for a year, housing assistance for 4,500 families, annual disability coverage for 7,200 venterans, etc. etc. (See https://www.splcenter.org/resources/hopewatch/5-things-washington-military-parade/). I wonder how many jobs cut by DOGE could have been saved.

Well, back to the parade. Time and again I heard the Fox commentators report that freedom is not free. I think it is fair to say soldiers have helped give us freedom both here and abroad, but I wish we would routinely acknowledge that others who have helped establish our freedoms include non-military patriots who fought for first amendment and due process rights for themselves and others.

A difficult truth is that the sacrifices of many soldiers have not always furthered freedom, for not all our military actions have expanded freedom, neither ours nor others’. Sometimes they have made us (or others) more unsafe or just furthered the interests of a small part of our country.  We have never mastered a way of honoring the warrior while questioning the war.

I will have to admit that the parade concluded with one terrific fireworks display — impressive even on TV. (I wonder how much it cost?) The explosions were well synced with the music. I heard the “1812 Overture,” which I often also hear on Independence Day. Why is a piece that commemorates a Russian victory over the French part of our patriotic days?

Of course, there was also “God Bless America.” Whenever it is played, it should be stressed that it was written by an immigrant from a group that was largely banned from entering the country a few years after the classic song was composed.

It seemed however that no one knew how to end the evening. It went on and on skipping past what seemed to be several natural ending points. It became like gold bathrooms at Mar-a-Lago—simply too, too much.

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Last week several governors were brought before a Congressional hearing apparently so members of Congress could demean gubernatorial patriotism. The governors’ states have sanctuary policies. A sanctuary jurisdiction does not mean that an undocumented person is safe from deportation. It just means that while state officials will continue to enforce state laws (as they were appointed or elected to do), they will not aid federal officers in enforcing federal immigration law. Federal officials imply that local officials are required to assist them. They must report to them whenever they know of an undocumented person. In other words, they must be an informer. That, however, is not the law. There have been societies where informing has been mandatory. They have included Nazi Germany, communist Russia, East Germany, and North Korea.

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Trump says he knows how to handle Putin, but Putin ignores him and creates more brutal chaos in Ukraine. Trump responds by tut-tutting. The U.S. had been negotiating with Iran to get us back to an agreement that Trump abrogated seven years ago. While Trump asked him not to, Netanyahu blew up the negotiations by blowing up Iranian facilities. It would seem that Putin and Netanyahu see Trump as just someone to play. It must be hard for the other players to keep smiles off their faces when Trump comes to the poker table.

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Almost every time I turn on Fox News, they are reporting about the mental decline of Biden during his presidency, a legitimate story. But I am surprised by how much they dwell on it. They also often try to say the electorate gave Trump a “huge mandate” in the last election, even though his margin of victory was the smallest in a generation and was much smaller than the mandate given Biden and Obama (and Clinton if we count only the popular vote). What Fox doesn’t seem to realize is that the more they stress Biden’s decline, the more they imply that voters were not so much selecting Trump as rejecting Biden.

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Sean Hannity, after bashing California and its governor, told his audience that if they wanted a safe life they should live in a red state. Hannity said that is why he lives in Florida. I pulled up homicide rates as a handy marker of safety. They varied slightly from year to year and by some methodological differences, but this result was typical: The five highest homicide rates were in Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, New Mexico, and Missouri. These, of course, are not what you would call solidly blue states. The lowest rates were New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Utah, Massachusetts, and Maine. Florida was in the middle of the pack, higher than the rate for New York State (decidedly blue) and — get this — higher than the rate for New York City.

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The press secretary wears a large cross. When I see it, I remember the passage from the Gospel of Matthew that says, “Whoever prostrates and plastic ties the least of these in the field of lettuce and deports them shall find the Kingdom of Heaven.” But when I look for this teaching in my Bible, I only find something quite different about the least of these.