It’s been 48 hours since organizers unveiled the lineup for the “Freedom 250” concert on the National Mall, and nearly every featured musical act has dropped out. Morris Day & The Time say they were never confirmed for the kickoff to The Great American State Fair, while the other acts all posted some version of the same statement. Martina McBride said she “was assured this was a nonpartisan event,” while Bret Michaels said the event was described to him “as a celebration of our country through music and a chance to honor … hardworking Americans from all walks of life.” “Unfortunately, what was presented to us as a celebration of our country has evolved into something much more divisive,” Michaels added. Rapper Young MC offered a similar excuse, saying he was “never told about any political involvement with the event” and expressed his desire to “perform in D.C. in the near future at an event that is not so politically charged.” What a load of bullshit. I don’t expect famous musicians to embody courage and patriotism, but even by celebrity standards, this is an egregious display of both ignorance and cowardice. These artists didn’t pull out because the concert was politicized — they politicized it by pulling out. The bigger issue is that the event would have been politicized no matter what the artists did. Had McBride and Michaels and the lot stayed on the bill, it would have sent a message to Americans about the importance of separating patriotism from politics. Instead, their actions worsened the problem they pretended to lament. It’s unfortunate, and it’s embarrassing. Let’s break it down. Partisanship Is Neither Bad Nor Un-American I want to start here, because this is the subtext of the entire debacle. The artists were happy to sing on the Mall until the media and Democrats started deeming it “Trump’s concert,” at which point they promptly ran for the hills. The real issue, of course, is that they don’t want to be associated with Trump (more on that later). But because they want to seem like they’re above the political fray, they simply say that they want to remain “nonpartisan.” People love to say this, and it always makes them sound stupid. You can’t touch politics and remain nonpartisan. Bipartisan, sure — it’s possible for people with different party affiliations and ideologies to work together, and good when they do. But nonpartisan? To quote the 21st century’s sleepiest president: Come on, man. This isn’t even a commentary on our divisive political age, though it’s certainly gotten harder to play at nonpartisanship over the past decade. Partisanship is literally built into the foundation of this country. The Constitution? A document born out of a brutal political struggle. Washington, D.C.? Declared our nation’s capital after a backroom trade between warring factions. Even George Washington’s Farewell Address — where Washington famously cautioned Americans to avoid “the enterprises of faction” — is a partisan document. Alexander Hamilton wrote the speech with an eye towards Thomas Jefferson and James Madison’s nascent Republican Party. Washington wasn’t warning Americans to avoid political parties as a rule; he was telling them they should all be Federalists. So, even if a celebration is associated with a particular party or politician, that doesn’t make it bad. But as luck would have it for our roster of stars, that’s not even a thing they needed to worry about. There’s Nothing “Partisan” About The National Mall Concert Donald Trump is a divisive and partisan figure. The former is a matter of perception: if Democrats could get over themselves, he would be seen as the opposition rather than the enemy. But the latter is an indisputable fact: Trump is an elected official and the head of the Republican Party. In that role, he is inherently partisan, no two ways about it. But Trump isn’t just the leader of the Republican Party. He’s the President of the United States. As ultraliberal President Jed Bartlet says in “The West Wing,” “I’m the President of the United States, not the president of the people who agree with me.” So it is with Trump. Partisanship is just one part of a presidency. The other, more important part — leading the nation and all that — was perfectly reflected in this concert. Trump is right to mark the 250th anniversary of American independence with, as John Adams once wrote, “pomp and parade, shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations.” Now, Trump will almost certainly make some kind of political speech at the concert. Of course he will. Would it be better if he stuck to patriotic platitudes and avoided potshots at political foes? Of course. But that’s not who he is, and that’s not what our politics is like these days. But even a presidential display of partisanship is not enough to drown out the broader message of the concert. That’s the entire point of this country – the republic looms larger than, and outlasts, our petty squabbling. It’s also, to a certain extent, the point of live music. Conservatives take it for granted that their favorite artists hate them, and they go to their concerts anyway. You can sit through a rambling Springsteen monologue about tyranny if it means getting a roaring “Tenth Avenue Freeze Out.” Liberals, having enjoyed cultural hegemony for so long, can’t conceive of this. And so these artists — none of whom are really famous enough to pass up a national stage — chose to stay home rather than play nice with the president for an afternoon. That’s unpatriotic and stupid, but it’s also just really, really lame. Everyone Needs To Be Cool About Cool Stuff Just because partisanship isn’t inherently bad doesn’t mean it’s all inherently good. And one of the worst expressions of partisanship is when people let their political priors blind them to objectively good things. We see this all the time when politics and entertainment intersect. Before acts started pulling out of the concert, people were talking about the upcoming UFC fight on the White House lawn. Construction began on the Octagon this week, and liberals naturally took to social media to say that this was an affront to democracy. If I thought that these critics were arguing in good faith, I would say that a bare-knuckle brawl on the White House lawn is the perfect distillation of American democracy. But of course, these critics aren’t arguing in good faith. It’s not about keeping the White House free of spectacle, or else they would have been furious when Joe Biden turned the lawn over to a bunch of half-naked transvestites. It’s about opposing anything that’s even a little bit affiliated with Trump. Republicans have this problem, too. It was dumb to pretend it wasn’t awesome when Obama played basketball with Kevin Durant. That was awesome! It was an incredible American moment, just like Dubya telling the White House press corps to “watch this drive.” A UFC fight on the South Lawn, a concert on the National Mall: these are incredible spectacles, and it’s objectively cool that the president is involved. It would be cool if the president was a Democrat; it would be cool if the president was a different Republican. Some things are too enjoyable to let politics get in the way. It’s why there are conservative Grateful Dead fans and liberals who love “Yellowstone.” It’s why Martina McBride didn’t object when Americans turned her song “Independence Day” — written from the perspective of a woman fleeing domestic violence — into a patriotic anthem in the wake of September 11. The song’s writer, Gretchen Peters, has complained about the song’s new life, making it known that she donated her royalties from Sean Hannity’s show (which famously used “Independence Day” as its theme song) to Planned Parenthood. Not so McBride, who famously performed the song while flanked by two giant American flags at Farm Aid in 2001, shortly after attacks on the World Trade Center. The singer would subsequently say that she had “mixed feelings about” that performance, because she doesn’t “want to take away from what the song is really about.” But she was very clear about the reason she leaned into a patriotic interpretation of the song when she did. “We were all so raw … and trying to have solidarity and pulling together as a country,” she said. “When I realized that the words to that chorus, ‘let freedom ring,’ kind of mirror what we were all feeling at the time, I made that decision to do that.” Some things are bigger than politics. Americans understand this. The president understands this. There was even a time when Martina McBride understood this. It’s a shame that she and her fellow performers lost sight of this truth.  But hey, there’s still time: maybe Trump can get Morgan Wallen or Ella Langley.