Independence Day

Happy 4th of July to all the wonderful citizens of my country (the United States of America). This day commemorates the day we told the British we didn’t need their help mucking things up and politely asked them to leave, communicating our desires for peaceful coexistence with lots and lots and lots of gunfire. If you’re reading this from another country, you have my permission to have fun although you’ll have to supply your own reason for celebration (like It’s Another Day That Ends with a “Y”). If you’re English, please be aware that our country desperately needs your sense of humor these days. If you’re willing to invade and bring your humor with you, we promise not to kill you too much this time around.

To all my knuckle-dragging, cousin and gun-loving, narrow-minded neighbors who think a bowl is good for both soup and haircuts and who think “harass” is what you grab when she bends over, I remind you that blind patriotism is no patriotism at all. Our country was founded by a grouped of armed guys who didn’t like the oppression and mistreatment of the former government and did something about it. Almost a hundred years later, the country was later shaped by more dissenters with a civil war that rid the world’s first “free” country of that embarrassment called slavery and established a stronger federal government thereby allowing us to grow into a single prosperous country instead of turning out like the U.N., which is basically Star Trek’s Federation except that it’s a useless laughingstock. A complaint is not sedition, it’s usually just a person being minimally observant. When Thomas Jefferson said “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance” he was talking about keeping an eye on the government, not your neighbor. Try to remember that your neighbor is a fellow American be he a darker shade of brown, somebody who’s god is not named jebus, a person who thinks country music sounds like a bag of cats being drowned in corn whiskey, or *gasp* even a woman.

To the latte-slurping, granola-munching, sandal-wearing, left-wing vegan weenies who think they are mentally superior to everyone who doesn’t share their opinion despite the fact that they are willing to stand in line for hours to buy a cup of coffee that costs, on average, about the same as a newlywed’s starter mortgage (but coffee is not an addiction, no sir), I ask you to take a day off. Not from work, but from your endless whining and bitching. I’m sorry your shining knight what’s-his-name lost the last election due to a dirty political trick wherein more than half of the country voted that he is a bigger jerk than the one we already have, but get over it and everything else. This is not a fascist regime and the most oppressive country on the planet. Our people are too unfocused to get a proper regime going, and our leader is not as charismatic or well-liked as Hitler. I support your right to be unhappy, but if you truly believe this to be such an evil and irredeemable place, then why don’t you leave? The last time I checked the exit turnstiles were not padlocked. Besides, a country is not its politicians, legal system, or even economy. A country is its people. Despite the fact that a lot of you are assholes who drive too slow in the fast lane and use the express checkout line when you clearly have more than ten items AND you’re trying to cash an out of town, two-party temporary check with no picture ID, this country’s people are basically decent. We don’t dance in the streets when a major disaster befalls another nation, no matter how much they hate us. We don’t routinely jail people for criticizing our leaders, joining unpopular religions, or reading materials some consider questionable. We don’t torture our sports teams when they lose, although we may wish to reconsider that one. What we are guilty of is taking things like running water, cable TV, and (in some cases) air conditioning for granted, thinking of them not as luxuries but as immutable parts of the physical world like gravity and sunlight. Do the world a big favor: take a step back and a deep breath, look around, and realize that it isn’t such a bad world we live in and, if it is, it’s partially your fault for doing nothing more than moaning about it.

So, show a little patriotism in our forefather’s traditions by grilling pig parts, guzzling beer, and endangering your neighborhood with a drunken display involving colorful explosives. Take a break from your woes and enjoy the day for what it is – hot and miserably humid. I myself will be sitting inside under the a/c watching TV and keeping a fire extinguisher handy like a true American.