14 April—The crocus have croaked. They popped up only about two weeks ago, rather late this year. Yet today they’re already dead or missing, but for a few survivors. Since crocus are winter hardy, the local fauna must have been feasting on them. No problem there.

Apropos croaking, the whole nation must be relieved that Donald Trump passed his five-hour physical at Walter Reed last Friday and isn’t likely to croak any time soon. If you can believe what the White House announces, that is, given this administration’s notoriously wide credibility gap. And as for the whole nation being relieved . . .

The current White House physician announced yesterday that Trump is in “excellent cognitive and physical health . . . exhibiting robust cardiac, pulmonary, neurological, and general physical function . . . and is fully fit to execute the duties of the Commander-in-Chief and Head of State.”

While Trump’s fitness as head of state is open to question on any number of grounds not considered in the annual physical exam (because they’re not readily measured), he gushed that he “got every answer right” on the cognitive test. Remember how proud you were when you aced tests at school? Anyway, Trump had to volunteer, “Overall, I felt I was in very good shape. A good heart, a good soul, a very good soul.” Unfortunately, the medical exam couldn’t confirm anything about Trump’s soul.

Since it appears that Trump will at least make it to his 79^th birthday on 14 June, word from the District is that he’s planning a big military parade to celebrate the great event. It must be noted that as far as anyone can recall, the only American presidents whose birthdays have been celebrated with parades are dead ones.

It’s not all that unusual, however, for dictators to celebrate their birthdays with military parades. Notably, Adolf Hitler celebrated his 50^th birthday in 1939 with a humongous parade, organized by propaganda boss Joseph Goebbels, including 40,000 to 50,000 marching troops on the ground and 20,000 official guests in the grandstand. Spectators in the hundreds of thousands watched the parade, many because they had no choice.

But that was for Hitler’s Golden Jubilee and it also was intended to impress the world with Germany’s military capability.

The mayor of Washington, D.C., recently said the White House had started discussions with her people about a long military parade this summer—from the Pentagon to the White House—but the White House insists that no parade has been scheduled.

And if a big military parade should be staged, not only is 14 June Trump’s birthday, it’s Flag Day and—and this is a big and—the U.S. Army’s semiquincentennial. That’s the Army’s 250^th birthday. So it’s more than likely there will be a big military parade in two months. And it’ll be a great excuse and cover for Emperor Donald’s glorification . . .