Below 
is my column in The Hill on our 250th Anniversary. Most of us will be celebrating with fireworks and cookouts today. Yet, some will celebrate not with fanfare but fury today. Rep. Al Green was asked whether he was proud to be an American on this holiday on the steps of the Capitol. He responded, “I am very proud to tell you that impeachment is an option to remove a reckless, ruthless, lawless president. I’m proud that it exists.” Well, at least he is celebrating something. For the rest of us, we celebrate a unique Republic that has brought prosperity and freedom to generations of Americans. Happy Fourth of July to all of the patriots across our political spectrum. E pluribus unum.
Here is the column:
Across the country today, Americans are celebrating a common article of faith: the belief that a free people can govern themselves under rights given to them not by the government but by their creator.
Two hundred fifty years ago, the Republic was founded as the first major Enlightenment Revolution. The Enlightenment had started roughly 100 years earlier. Many in Europe had long argued for a society based on the writings of figures like John Locke. But it would happen thousands of miles away, among a collection of colonies where a people came together and put those principles to the test. They believed that they were entitled to rights of free speech, free exercise, and property as human beings, not as subjects.
We became the fascination of Europe among writers and intellectuals who could not understand how the world’s first Enlightenment Revolution could be brought about by a people with little connection to each other or the land; with no calcified class structure or fixed institutions.
It led one Frenchman, who wrote under the name John Hector St. John, to ask, “What then is the American, this new man?”
In my book, Rage and the Republic, I ask whether we can answer that question today. Who were we then, and who are we now?
In 1776, two revolutions were developing in America and in France. One would become the world’s oldest and most successful republic The other, in France, would become “the Terror,” in which tens of thousands would die on guillotines and in the streets.
The true miracle of Philadelphia was the creation of a system that could harness the self-destructive powers of a democracy. The framers, and particularly James Madison, would create a constitutional system that forced moderation and compromise through checks and balances.
Many wanted a less restrained democratic system, but the Framers understood that such systems stretching back to ancient Athens had become little more than what Benjamin Rush called a “mobocracy.”
In France, such voices prevailed. They unleashed a blood-letting that would ultimately even devour the Jacobins themselves. They first turned on the wealth and aristocrats, then on the priests and then each other. It would lead French journalist Jacques Mallet du Pan to write that “like Saturn, the Revolution devours its children.”
Those voices are with us today. Many, including Democratic and socialist leaders, are denouncing the Declaration and the Constitution as tools of repression.
This week, various Democrats went public to call for radical revolutionary changes or criticize our founding. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani used an occasion with newly admitted citizens to trash the country, oligarchs, ICE, and our “arena of supremacy.”
Socialist Mamdani described a virtual hellscape of a country run by “oligarchs who buy elections” as “children go to sleep hungry.” He added, “We see monopolies that dominate every industry, and oligarchs who buy elections. We see masked agents terrorizing our streets, eating food cooked by our undocumented neighbors before spiriting them away in unmarked vans.”
Mamdani mocked the narrative of the republic, telling the new citizens that “the irony is that the story of America has so often been written by those who were told by others with power and influence and wealth that they were anything but exceptional.”
Others joined the celebrations with their own condemnations. Pennsylvania socialist Chris Rabb, the Democratic nominee for Pennsylvania’s 3rd Congressional District, has joined the chorus of critics.
Speaking at “America at 250 — Trump Fascism, Historical Erasure, and the Battle Over Truth” in Philadelphia, the unopposed Rabb lashed out at a country built on “stolen land and stolen labor.” He also mocked the “lofty” “screeds” that “were notoriously catering to a performative aspect of collective genius that purposely erased indigenous and black peoples.” He denounced this country as based on harmful “myths” supporting white supremacy and fascism: “Fascism is not new. These systems of harm are built into the very fabric of this nation.”
Others, such as former MSNBC host Joy Reid, declared that black Americans don’t celebrate the Fourth.
Reid dismissed celebrating what she called “MAGA America” which she described as “sad, pathetic, boring.”
Others, like Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), used the anniversary to praise Cuba as the true model of success (something Mamdani had also done in his inaugural address).
Blue states — Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Pennsylvania—declined to participate in the 250th anniversary celebrations on the Mall.
In Massachusetts, a historic church ended its long-standing celebration of the Fourth of July to focus on the “on-going process within the congregation to better understand our own whiteness.”
This is the home of John Adams and other patriots. Adams wrote his wife Abigail that this day would be “celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the Day of Deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from end of this continent to the other from this time forward forever more.”
We are seeing not a constitutional crisis but a crisis of faith. Polls show that fewer than half of Democrats are now proud to be Americans.
For many of us, this day remains, as Adams described it, that day of deliverance. These are revolutionary times, but we remain a revolutionary people who believe that free speech and other rights belong to us as human beings. Our belief in individual rights and the free market built the greatest engine of prosperity and freedom in the history of the world.
Many of these critics cite our flaws, including slavery, in a country based on inalienable rights. But what the framers gave us was a system that allows an imperfect people to form a “more perfect union.”
It was here that citizens could pursue their own manifest destiny. It is here that a black minister could speak on our National Mall about his unrealized dream and galvanize a nation to fight for the civil rights of every American.
It is here that an African American, and the child of a Kenyan, could become president.
It is here that the son of Vietnamese immigrants could rise this year to be Navy Secretary.
It is here that a black child growing up in a home with a dirt floor and no plumbing could become one of the longest-serving justices of the Supreme Court.
It is here that a people could survive economic meltdowns, global wars, and natural disasters, based on the simple belief that we share a common article of faith: “E pluribus unum” — “out of many, one.”
“What, then, is this American?” Look around you.
Turley Writes:
“Mamdani described a virtual hellscape of a country run by “oligarchs who buy elections”
* * * * * * * *
Top Individual Political Contributors: 2023-2024
1 Elon Musk
SpaceX
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2 Timothy Mellon
Retired
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3 Miriam O. Adelson
Las Vegas Sands
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4 Richard & Liz Uihlein
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5 Kenneth C. Griffin
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6 Jeffrey S. & Janine Yass
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7 Paul E. Singer
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8 Michael R. Bloomberg
Bloomberg
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9 Dustin Moskovitz
Asana Inc
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10 Marc Andreessen
Andreessen Horowitz
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https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2025/03/elon-musk-tops-list-of-2024-political-donors-but-six-others-gave-more-than-100-million
…………………………………..
According to this list, Mamdani has a legitimate point: ‘Oligarchs are buying elections’.
If anyone is going to be doing any tyrannizing in America, it’s going to be private property owners, not the government. God bless America!
I am light years ahead of you.
Marx was the Jesus of economics.
Marx was the epitome of parasitism, oh, and a colossal fraud.
Dinosaur did not appear in the Constitution, but there was a dinosaur.
You are stupid if you think that asking questions is stupid.
You already know your questions are STUPID!! ANON feels the need to post 100 times per day. TDS infected brain!!
Penis breath.
Where is the “moderator”? We don’t need vulgarity.
The only vulgarity here is the name of Trump.
As Graydon Carter and Kurt Andersen famously described him, he is nothing more than a “short-fingered vulgarian”
EGREGIOUS VIOLATION OF THE CIVILITY RULE BY IMPERTINENT IMPUDENCE.
BAN FOR LIFE!
Anonymous, you’re a sophomoric moron.
Turley is a lot more tolerant of your trolling than I am, you wouldn’t last a day commenting on my blog.
Why do you say that?
“What Then Is This American?” you ask.
Answer: The American Founders at the top of this blog, their Constitution and Bill of Rights, “Ourselves and our posterity,” and those of the Naturalization Act of 1802.
America, the once-great pristine nation of supreme exceptionalism, is now MexAfricAsiArabia, the parasitic steaming remnants of invading, conquering, destitute, and crisis-ridden regions.
___________
“Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
– Dorothy, The Wizard of Oz, 1939
DOGE Sunsets Today
Trump’s January 2025 executive order creating DOGE also established a July 4, 2026, sunset. “A smaller Government, with more efficiency and less bureaucracy, will be the perfect gift” to America on its semiquincentennial birthday, the president said when he announced the commission.
DOGE claims it saved $215 billion, or $1,335.40 per taxpayer, with its cuts, which included slashing duplicative software licenses, canceling diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, grants as well as ending leases for underused office space. That’s a pittance to the federal budget, which is now about $7 trillion each year. The effort faded relatively early too as tech mogul Elon Musk clashed with government officials and left DOGE in May last year.
The White House didn’t address questions about whether DOGE will officially fold, as foretold in Trump’s order, or if it has already.
And no final DOGE review is incoming, according to Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought — known as the man who wished to put federal employees “in trauma.”
“We have no plans to do kind of a closing DOGE report,” Vought said at a hearing Tuesday. “We’re always happy to give you our assessment of that work. I think it made some really important strides.”
https://www.politico.com/news/2026/07/04/doge-july-4-white-house-end-00983651
Trump must accomplish the full, complete, and comprehensive mission after he wins the midterms.
WordPress Censored:
Trump must accomplish the full, complete, and comprehensive mission after he wins the midterms.
WordPress is third world, s—hole country stuff. WTF, over?
Capitalists dissing socialists is like slave owners dissing abolitionists.
It is not “capitalism”; it is freedom, free enterprise, free industries, free investment, free self-regulating markets, and the absolute right to private property.
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AI Overview
The word “capitalism” does not appear in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, or the Bill of Rights. The term itself was not coined until long after the founding era. Instead, the foundational documents promote economic freedom implicitly by protecting private property and the right to free enterprise.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“[Private property is] that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.”
– James Madison
Here is a timely and on-topic essay by Judge Andrew P. Napolitano:
Would The Founders Still Recognize Their Republic?
https://ronpaulinstitute.org/july-4-2026/
“In a democracy, a faithless majority will take whatever it wants from the minority — including its liberty and property. That’s where we are today on the 250th anniversary of the start of this Jeffersonian and Madisonian experiment — a country the Founders wouldn’t recognize as their creation.”
Hedgefunds didn’t exist
Looking Forward After Independence Day, Setting Sights on ‘A More Perfect Union’
Against long odds, a collection of former colonies built a constitutional republic that has endured for nearly two and a half centuries. The country survived civil war, economic depression, world wars and countless political crises. Americans have inherited institutions that have provided remarkable stability and freedom.
July 4th is an appropriate day to celebrate that achievement. But on July 5th, we need to start looking forward.
By: Raymond Barranco | Opinion – Mississippi Free Press ~ July 2, 2026
https://www.mississippifreepress.org/opinion-looking-forward-after-independence-day-setting-sights-on-a-more-perfect-union/
—
The Jews Who Kept the Declaration Alive
How Jewish entrepreneurs, producers, and philanthropists turned the founding document into a mass cultural icon
By: Michael Auslin ~ July 01, 2026
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/jews-kept-declaration-independence-alive
🌭 Nathan’s Famous Hotdog Eating Contest 2026 🌭
Joey Chestnut wins Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest 2026, Miki Sudo is women’s champion
By: Alexa Herrera – CBS New York ~ July 4, 2026
https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/nathans-hot-dog-eating-contest-2026-joey-chestnut-coney-island/
—
Nearly half of Americans, two-thirds of Gen Z, don’t know what America’s 250th commemorates
To the best of your knowledge, which of the following best describes what America’s 250th anniversary commemorates?
https://infogram.com/america-250-celebration-4th-of-july-26-1hmr6g83kex3o2n
“They believed that they were entitled to rights of free speech, free exercise, and property as human beings”
and to own human beings as property. That right was the most important right, a right that less than a century later those who believed in a right to slavery fought to keep it and the rest of the nation fought only to keep the nation united.
“It is here that a people could survive economic meltdowns, global wars, and natural disasters, based on the simple belief that we share a common article of faith: “E pluribus unum” — “out of many, one.””
Not everyone survived those disasters and, following those disasters, few were helped by the many as part of the one.
The true American motto should be “It sucks to be you.”
The exemplar is the guy in Congress who took off 4 months for mental health issues and returned to his job, a guy who voted against even the slightest allowance for anyone else to have that same consideration.
It was democracy that made slavery legal by duly enacted legislation that would only pass today in areas such as Africa, Iran, or environs. Yours is a vacuous cheap trick. You are a Monday morning quarterback who criticizes by taking the subject completely out of context. Congratulations.
You err grievously when you ascribe to the democrats actual support for socialism. They don’t support socialism. They, like all authoritarians, support gaining power by whatever words neccesary to garner the votes of a critical mass of people at least once. This is why they say the things they do about “reforming” the supreme court, eliminating the electoral college adding states etc. They want to get power and then ensure they can never lose it short of revolution. Vote them in but have to shoot them out! They care as much about “the consent of the governed” as they do fairness and justice which is exactly no concern at all. The truly funny thing is that the biggest supporters of that laughing hyena Mamdani et al will be the first to be guillotined which might be worth the price of admission if not for the need of the destruction of the republic neccesary to save us all.
People do many things collectively. Water, garbage, sewage, fire, roads, transportation, etc.
“Who were we then, and who are we now?”
The answer, in both cases, is a mixture. Then, it was a mixture of those who were excited at the prospects for individual freedom, along with a chance to earn prosperity by dint of their own efforts, without an oppressive government snatching away their earnings, or curtailing their liberty, on any capricious whim it cared to assert, with those who were at least grudgingly willing to allow the experiment to produce results of which they were skeptical. Now, it is a mixture of those who recognize that the experiment was a great success, possibly with flaws (most of which can arguably be blamed on the adulterations to the original concepts of individual liberty and limited government that have been introduced over time) on the one hand, and those who seek unearned and unlimited power by asserting an authoritarian government that would have much in common with the one we repudiated on July 4, 1776, along with the mindless masses that they have enfranchised, bribed, and deluded, on the other.
If you support Trump’s war in Iran, then why don’t you go there and fight yourself?
In America, they haven’t used English for years.
“…crooning like a bilious pigeon.”
If prosperity is a measure of a country’s greatness, then consider that China is the most prosperous country in the world.
Per capita?
Why should that matter?
ANON IS STUPID!!
AI Overview
The United States currently holds the world’s largest economy by nominal GDP, at approximately $30.8 trillion compared to China’s $19.6 trillion.
“It’s the [quantum computing that is critical], stupid!”
– James Carville