Dem
47
GOP
53
Readers will remember that, back during Trump v1.0, there was much talk of staging a massive military parade for the benefit of the President. The notion was planted in Trump's head after he witnessed a Bastille Day celebration in France, and decided the U.S. could do even better. Eventually, the event was canceled for a number of reasons: (1) the $92 million price tag; (2) the potential damage that things like tanks might do to the streets of Washington D.C., which were not designed for such vehicles; (3) widespread criticism, both by Republicans and Democrats; and (4) the Pentagon dragging its feet, and somehow not finding time to plan the parade.
As everyone knows by now, sometimes ideas get into Trump's head and they just roll around in there, over and over, for years or even decades. It can be hard to predict which ideas will become obsessions, although those that involve glory for Trump, and that come with the very real possibility that he might achieve an erection without benefit of pills, have a much better chance of surviving in there than many of the other notions. And so, it turns out that he's still dreaming of a military parade, all these years later.
And this time around, it looks like it might actually happen. First of all, Trump is much more open about embracing his inner fascist these days. Second, he has successfully surrounded himself with a group of lackeys that are many orders of magnitude more fawning than the last time around. In 2018, the Secretary of Defense was Jim Mattis. In 2025, the Secretary of Defense is Pete Hegseth.
And third, and perhaps most importantly, someone in the White House has noticed something... useful. The United States Army came into existence on June 14, 1775. Donald Trump came into existence on June 14, 1946. That means that the 250th "birthday" of the Army just so happens to coincide with Trump's 79th birthday. So, he can have his parade, and his all-natural arousal, and claim that what's going on is that the U.S. Army is actually the honoree. Plans are already being developed; the current expectation is that the parade will cover roughly 4 miles, from the Pentagon to the White House, and would come with a price tag of $125 million.
Maybe it won't happen, in the end. It's about 10 weeks to June 14, and that's a pretty short time to pull something like this off, especially since the DoD might have known about it, but local officials in Washington, DC, only heard about it for the first time this week. Also, Hegseth might be all-in on the plans, but others in the DoD bureaucracy might be less enthusiastic, and might find a way to replicate the foot-dragging performance. Also, that $125 million has to come from somewhere, and if a small handful of budget hawks in the House say "Uh, no," then maybe the funding won't be found.
If it does come to pass, well, something like 90% of demonstrations like this are staged for the benefit of fascists, dictators, and fascist dictators. And virtually all of the remainder, like the U.K.'s Trooping of the Colour or France's Bastille Day event, are the modern incarnations of traditions that stretch back centuries, and that were commenced when those nations were empires led by... well, people with dictatorial powers. The point here is that Trump seems to be running every single item in the Kim Jong-Un or Benito Mussolini playbook, which is certainly going to give the Democrats and the media a lot to talk about once the various upcoming election cycles get underway. (Z)