By Douglas V. Gibbs
Happy Independence Day. It drives me nuts that some folks will say, “Happy 4th.” July 4 is simply a date on a calendar. It’s an important date with a significant history, but the day we are celebrating is not because it lands on the Fourth of July, but because it is the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. America’s Birthday, some might say. But, I will be honest. This year’s Independence Day feels different.
I remember the Bicentennial in 1976. My family visited an uncle and aunt of mine in Irvine, California for fireworks, and then we went to a fireworks show later that evening. The celebration was incredible. America had just been able to put Vietnam behind us, it was an election year, and America was 200 years old. Patriotism filled every nook and cranny of the country. The fireworks seemed brighter, the parades more festive and filled with spectators, and the pride in America was off the charts.
This year the country celebrates 249 years, and we have a new President who is making historical moves and within the first six months of his presidency has turned the economy around and essentially stopped illegal entry into our country by foreign aliens who refuse to go through the immigration process in place to protect us against invaders and criminal aliens. But, the other side, the opponents of American Liberty and the presidency of Donald J. Trump, are operating in a manner we have not seen in American History. Don’t get me wrong; they are not making the fireworks any less bright, or the parades less patriotic for red-blooded Americans like you and me. But they are attempting to tarnish the day a bit because while we are out there celebrating liberty, self-government, and the greatest experiment in human freedom ever undertaken, an element on the Left – the radical, unhinged, truth-denying Left – are actively sneering at it all and mourning that America is not a socialist utopia ruled by communist leaders and filled with equality (equal misery for all).
This past week, while millions of Americans honored the sacrifices of our Founders and appreciated the passing of the Big Beautiful Bill that will place President Trump’s successes on a mighty rocket and fire our economy and country into a new Golden Age, Political Commentator Elie Mystal told “The Joy Reid Show” on Wednesday that we are the bad guys on the world stage. According to him, America is a menace to the world and should be sanctioned as if we were Iran, or North Korea. As if the beacon of liberty that saved Europe from fascism, brought down the Berlin Wall and stood up to communism until the Soviet Union collapsed as a result, and the country that sent men to the moon should now be punished for existing.
Let me tell you – that’s not just ignorance. That’s poison.
Thanks to Cultural Marxism and the institutionalization of leftism in key institutions in the United States, we have a serious problem and it’s bigger than Biden’s bungling or Kamala’s word salads. It’s a spiritual sickness in the heart of the American Left – a rot that despises the Constitution, abhors the Founding Fathers, and sees America not as the last best hope of man on Earth, but as the villain in some twisted ideological horror story.
Think about how bad it is on the side of the aisle that the Democratic Party resides. In New York City their nomination is Zohran Mamdani, a Muslim “communist at the highest level” whose aim is to seize the means of production. He opposes free market capitalism, envisions government run stores and housing, wants to eliminate the NYPD and replace the police officers with social workers, and promised “to make Halal eight bucks again.” While he calls himself a Democratic-Socialist, his vision of a “greater distribution of wealth” and his philosophical views regarding the economy and private ownership reveals that he’s about as communist as they get. Yet, he won the nomination for the Democratic Party in the New York Mayoral Primary.
What does that say about the Democratic Party?
Meanwhile, progressive protests against America have been planned, and are emerging on Independence Day itself, where the Stars and Stripes are burned and chants of “no borders, no nations,” “down with America,” and “no kings” are screamed like some deranged cult that is unable to see the liberty through the trees.
The Democrats, however, not only have not made a single peep of opposition to the anti-American crowd out there, but they have given words of support. The Democrats have no vision, no backbone, and no plan unless you count their “Stop Trump” madness as a strategy – which, for them, passes as governance these days.
You see, they don’t want to fix America. They want to replace it. They want to tear it down as Cloward and Piven suggested, rip up the Constitution, and build a new system in its place – something globalist, borderless, government-run and authoritarian, and free of that pesky thing we like to call “Liberty.”
What is happening has gone way beyond political disagreement, my friends. This is about existential opposition to what America is, and what the Founding Fathers intended it to be.
This all means that Independence Day matters now more than ever. The Founding Fathers didn’t sign the Declaration of Independence on a whim. They pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to a cause bigger than themselves. Liberty was not guaranteed. Victory was not assured. But they possessed a rare, almost extinct quality we used to call moxie. Guts. Grit. Courage in the face of oppressive tyranny.
Do we, as Americans, still possess that kind of boldness, tenacity, backbone, resolve and courage? Because, if we don’t, if we continue to allow the Left to keep chipping away at America’s foundation, mocking her ideals, rewriting her history, and demonizing her values, then the fireworks and parades are nothing more than distractions from our slow-motion surrender.
But I don’t believe that. Not for a second.
I believe there are millions of Americans – maybe you’re one of them – who still carry the spirit of 1776 in their bones. Who know that the Constitution is not the problem, but the solution. We are proud Americans who refuse to bow before the altar of woke dogma and the communist infestation, or apologize for loving their country.
We are not perfect – no people are – but America is still the greatest force for good the world has ever known. And that’s not just worth defending – that’s worth celebrating. Loudly, with honor, and unapologetically.
So, light the fireworks. Fly the flag. Teach your children the truth: America is great because America is good, and its goodness lies in her godly foundation and liberty.
And let those who despise her keep shouting from their leftist media greenrooms and academic cubicles because when the dust settles, and the battle for America’s soul is decided, it won’t be their cynicism that endures – it’ll be your courage.
Stay loud, patriotic, and free.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
