The GM Financial Parade of Lights will return. This year, Fort Worth, enjoy it online
The light will return in 2021
Star-Telegram reporter James Hartley did a fantastic job illuminating the effort going into this year’s virtual GM Financial Parade of Lights production. (Nov. 16, 1A, “Parade of Lights goes virtual but will provide ‘bit of joy’ in pandemic”)
We want families to have the best possible experience enjoying this Fort Worth tradition, even if it has to be from the safety of their own homes.
From the floats and marshals to the hometown heroes and musical guests, hundreds of people came together to make the virtual parade possible. We’re proud of this holiday gift to the city we all call home.
Tune in from 7 to 9 p.m. on TXA-21 or streaming on Facebook and YouTube and see for yourself that Fort Worth’s holiday spirit is alive and well in 2020. And we’ll see you back in downtown next year.
- Andy Taft, President, Downtown Fort Worth Initiatives, Inc., Fort Worth
Know what we can count on in D.C.
Thankfully, and regardless of outcome, the elections are over. Congress can finally get back to the business of accomplishing nothing.
- David Ross, Bedford
Trump is the anti-woke man
Some arrogant Democrats are saying Trump supporters are bad people. Wrong. People supported President Donald Trump because they wanted better for themselves and their children, same as Democrats.
But they are so sick of politically correct, “woke” identity politics that they’d rather roll with an anti-Washington outsider (even if he is vulgar) than another condescending politician telling them their values are wrong.
Americans are sick of the bullying left and the cancel culture. It’s frustrating for me as a progressive that nearly half of Americans are alienated, as when Hillary Clinton called Trump supporters “deplorables.” Way to win hearts and minds.
Democrats are too smug and detached to understand how badly working Americans are hurting and to offer any real solutions.
- Michael Evangelista-Ysasaga, Fort Worth
Time for us to come together
The politicization of our COVID-19 policies has eroded public confidence in anything that is said unless it supports our already formulated conclusion. This is not helpful to any of us.
It is time we all take a step back, clear our hearts and minds, and listen again. Try to understand a sensible way forward that will allow us to safely continue to live our lives until this virus is no longer a threat. The measures we follow should change only when a consensus of doctors and infectious disease experts suggests so.
Let us all work together and show each other a little more patience than might be deserved and a little more grace as we approach the holiday season. We can do this.
- Jeremy Raines, Fort Worth
We’re not showing greatness
Texas culture, as with American culture in general, values the good of the individual over the good of the community. Nowhere do we see the failures of that culture more acutely than with COVID-19. Texas state and local leaders, along with American leaders as a group, have failed the nation, bringing about the worst infection rates and deaths in the world.
The dangerous and silly controversies around mask-wearing, social distancing and temporary movement restriction have turned into a divisive political statement about American liberty.
The generation of Americans that sacrificed daily during World War II is long gone. In its place is a shallow, uncaring, selfish and lazy population incapable of the slightest grand gesture of sacrifice for patriotic purposes or the common good.
- James McAlister, Fort Worth
How to weed out bad cops
So many members of law enforcement help provide the protection our communities need. But the cops who abuse their power or enforce the law without care have poisoned the well for me and many others.
One way to restore trust in our law enforcement would be to reform qualified immunity. Allow people who are victims of police brutality and excessive force to sue the bad cops that brutalized them. It is a simple way to protect officers who do right by our communities every day and would weed out the bad officers who perpetrate violence.
I want to trust law enforcement again. I want to hold bad cops accountable and keep good ones safe.
- Dorothy Lynn Brooks, Arlington
This story was originally published November 22, 2020 at 5:00 AM with the headline "The GM Financial Parade of Lights will return. This year, Fort Worth, enjoy it online."