What does it mean to be an American in 2026? Two distinctly and significantly different visions showed themselves in recent days.

On the South Side of Chicago, there was the long-awaited opening of the Obama Presidential Center. In the presence of three past presidents and an assembly of dignitaries and music stars, former President Barack Obama saluted “American values we can all share,” and he expressed his faith that Americans “are looking for fairness and common sense and mutual respect, that deep in our gut we want to find a way to turn towards each other again, not further away.”

A few days earlier, on the White House lawn in Washington, a very different celebration took place. Its centerpiece was a less permanent yet still pretty expensive structure, a 600-ton steel and star-spangled “Claw,” which to Gal Beckerman of The Atlantic “looked like it was about to pick up the White House like a stuffed animal in an arcade game.”

This was the setting of UFC Freedom 250, an evening of mixed martial arts matches staged to celebrate President Donald Trump’s 80th birthday and, apparently, our nation’s semiquincentennial.

Among other crowd-pleasers, it included an Air Force flyover, a Marine Corps band with singers, military honor guards and “Octagon Girls” in sequined red-white-and-blue costumes to parade around the big cage between rounds for a spectacle that, perhaps intentionally, reminded many of ancient Roman gladiator matches.

Trump Fight Club, as some wags called it, drew 17 million viewers on Paramount , in addition to a few........

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