Independence Day means nothing significant to me. It is the one time of year that we allow children to play with pyrotechnic devices. We turn them loose with matches and low grade explosives. In Darwinian fashion some return with fewer fingers or with scars that will warn future prospective mates that the barer may not be the ideal parent due to a lack of good judgment.

In addition to the rash of maimed children, there will be barbecues, keg parties and fireworks displays. There will be sales at car dealerships, hardware stores and the mall.

I will cringe at every pop and bang until I have totally assumed a frame of mind that will not associate these sounds with the sounds of mortar and rifle fire. I have found that setting off fireworks with the kids is the best way to get into that peaceful state. Even then I will wake from sleep grasping for a pistol every time there is a late night explosion.

All of this is fairly divorced from the intention of the holiday itself. The mythology behind the United States becomes more and more diluted each time it crosses another line. Each dirty little secret that is revealed crushes an ideal that we once held as the gold standard. When we find out that we torture we can no longer claim to be champions of human rights. When it comes to light that we have an extensive domestic spying program we can no longer look down our collective noses at countries that violate the privacy of their citizens. These were things that the Soviets did. They were things that happened in backwards dictatorships, not the United States.

Even the education on the subject that one receives in school is far removed from the reality. Few school children actually read the Declaration of Independence. From the point of view of the State this is a good thing, as children who read it might feel impelled by patriotism to engage in acts of sedition and revolution. Certainly, there are parts that apply to our situation today where the United States is the oppressive imperial power.

Describing the reasons that they decided to take up arms against their own country the Founding Fathers wrote:

“He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.”

Black Water and Armour Group rely heavily on foreign mercenaries to do their work. Iraq is rotten with Afrikaner mercs running around with AKs in Datsun pickups.

They also wrote:

“He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.”

There is a case to be made here as well. An article in the January 30, 2008 edition of the Boston Globe reports that the President declared he is not bound by Congress's laws when they apply to the military. He claims that since he is Commander-in-Chief, laws passed by Congress that limit his authority with regard to foreign affairs and the military are unconstitutional.

The United States that those early malcontents fought and died for is long gone. The new state that overthrew an imperialist oppressor is now seen by the rest of the world as an aggressive enemy of peace. Their radical ideas about personal freedom have been eviscerated by the Patriot Act.

Abbie Hoffman once wrote that “Amerika is just another Latin dictatorship.” Although we protest, hold signs, and occupy the offices of high officials, we cannot escape that fact. When we show pictures of the dead and wounded to our congressional representatives, believing in our heart of hearts that a picture is worth a thousand words, they will nod and look concerned in a manner practiced in front of a mirror. They will echo our lamentations in the most sincere voice that they can muster, but they will do nothing. They know that while a picture is worth a thousand words, they need money to be reelected. War profiteers can provide the money that sponsors campaign commercials, paid interns, and plane tickets. All that activists can offer is a few lousy votes that will be far outweighed by the numbers they will reach with that ad spot during American Idol.

In the end, we only need to compare ourselves to those enemies of the Crown who founded our country to see why we are failing. They were faced with a problem and said “we will do something about it.” We have been faced with a problem and we say, “lets hold signs so people in power might read them and do something about it.” That is the difference between free people and subjects.

Independence Day means nothing to me, because we are only superficially linked to those great criminals who fought to be free. I am certain that if they were alive today, they would disown us on sight.