(AFP) – US President Donald Trump has tried his best to ensure that America’s 250th birthday celebrations revolve around one man — Donald Trump. In a country whose founding fathers declared there should be “no kings in America,” the 47th president has other ideas. Trump has canceled a planned Independence Day event on July 4 in Washington to stage his own “Make America Great Again” rally. He has staged a huge mixed martial arts fight on the White House lawn and is also set to speak at a “Great American State Fair” in the US capital on Wednesday.
For the former property tycoon and reality TV star, taking center stage is in his blood. “I ended up getting the Olympics and getting FIFA — and we got 250 too,” Trump said earlier this month, referring to a series of major events taking place during his second presidency. “I want to take credit for 250 years but that I’m not gonna get away with!” he then joked — though with Trump, many a true word is said in jest. “Trump likes the spotlight, and I think he’s trying to take the spotlight,” Peter Loge, director of George Washington University’s School of Media, told AFP. “I think that’s unfortunate, because the United States is an ideal and an idea that we keep trying living up to. Donald Trump is trying to say ‘I am the embodiment of the idea’ — but by claiming that he is running counter to the idea of the United States.”
For many Americans, Trump’s idea of America as it turns 250 years old is very different from their own. A half dozen recent polls collated by USA Today as the country approaches the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence showed a majority believed the country’s best years were behind it. Most were also dissatisfied with its present state and pessimistic about its future. Trump, 80, has bragged of bringing a new “golden age,” but his America is a deeply divided country that is trying to extricate itself from an unpopular war in Iran. The oldest US president ever to be inaugurated is also deeply unpopular, with mounting voter anxiety about the cost of living fueled by the conflict with Tehran.
But Trump appears increasingly consumed by leaving a legacy with his name splashed all over it. He has promised “the most spectacular TRUMP RALLY of them all” in Washington on July 4, after canceling the bipartisan celebration when several musical artists pulled out citing its politicized nature. Trump will even control the playlist at the event. Add to that the string of renovations that Trump is making to Washington in the country’s 250th anniversary year. The projects include a giant White House ballroom and a triumphal arch — plus the Reflecting Pool by the Lincoln Memorial, which is currently beset by algae and peeling paint after a multi-million-dollar upgrade.
Trump has frequently compared himself to Abraham Lincoln and the other great presidents from the past 250 years going back as far as George Washington. Plans are even afoot to put Trump’s face on a special $250 dollar bill to mark the anniversary, breaking a tradition of having only late presidents on US banknotes.
Commentators have noted how different the occasion feels from America’s bicentennial celebrations in 1976, which appeared to unify the country in patriotism after a difficult few years of Vietnam, Nixon, and the oil crisis. But Tevi Troy, a senior fellow at the Ronald Reagan Institute, said there was still a chance the 250th — or semiquincentennial — celebrations could do the same. “I know that as a nation, we’ve taken some hits to our patriotic spirit for the last few decades, and I don’t know that this semiquincentennial will be able to accomplish that, but that is the hope,” Troy told AFP.
Despite his brash tendencies, Trump was also far from the first president to enjoy a bit of glitz. “Is Trump leaning into it? Sure. Did Gerald Ford lean into it? Yeah,” Troy said. “The question is: is the way Trump leans into it something that will end up being unifying to this nation and bring people together?”
– Danny KEMP
© 2024 AFP
