1. The boy in the story stop saluting the flag maybe to please his father. He is constantly trying to make his father notice him, read his stories, be proud of him. So when his father talks to him about politics, when the boy finds something his father care for, and suggest him a book and a story that he finds interesting or important, the boy listens and learns to try to connect with his father through something he seems passionate about.
2. Miss Colon equates being free with saluting the flag because the American flag, as many other of the nation's symbols, represents the fight the American embarked on to free themselves from the British ruling.
3. Apparently, the father fought against the American invasion of Puerto Rico (not necessarily invasion, but the American interference in Puerto Rican politics). He's an anti-imperialist, and he is so because he is aware of the constant American interference in Latin American politics, like what happened with Salvador Allende, the Chilean president overthrown by a military coup backed and funded by the CIA.
4. The narrator is afraid of his father's reaction because he can never impress him, not with his grades,not with his writings. He wants to believe that he did something brave and noble, but he can never predict his father reaction. In the end, his father reacts like a coward, feeling ashamed of his kid behaviour.
I think his reaction is justified, he acts like the oppressed man he is, we all are. And is very difficult to match your actions with your beliefs, especially when you have a family to support and a child to make sure has a decent future, and those beliefs could endangered that.
5.
