America's Birthday
250 years of progress. How did it come to this?
Saturday in the park
I think it was the Fourth of July
Songwriters: Robert William Lamm.
I’m sure you all know that evocative tune of America at relaxation…
People talking, people laughing
A man selling ice cream
Singing Italian songs…
Except that these days he’d probably be told by some MAGA Karen to speak English or go home, or, if he were more swarthy, he’d get pepper-sprayed in the face by I.C.E. before being dragged off, protesting that he’s a fifth-generation American, to some deportation hell hole in one of the southern states.
Such is the United States of Trump on this Fourth of July, celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
Many Americans may be reluctant to celebrate with Trump in charge, given the reversal of hard-won values and freedoms.
Where the US was a beacon to those who would be free or seek opportunity, the plaque on the Statue of Liberty reads:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
There is now a “No Vacancy” sign at arrivals, and a one-way trip to somewhere you really don’t want to go, with long-time residents who are no longer welcome either.
Laurie King, an anthropology professor in Washington, DC, told the Guardian, “I’m very anxious. The country is at a … tipping point. The worst characteristics and historical contradictions of the US are in ascendance; economically, socially and psychologically, the wheels are coming off, and civil war is not off the table.”
Well, Happy Birthday, America, and pass the ammunition…
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Storianne, a 55-year-old children’s librarian in Connecticut, was even less in a celebratory mood, saying, “We are living in a dystopian hellscape of unfettered capitalism that is ruining the planet, pillaging our savings, our safety net and our freedoms. As a transgender American, I have seen our right to use a bathroom, the end of equal protection under the law and the rise of a toxic form of performative masculinity that makes everyone less safe. Add in the most corrupt administration in United States history, and one has to ask what we have to be proud of these days?”
Which is quite a downer, really, when you’ve got someone who encourages children to read talking about a dystopian hellscape. Sweet dreams, kiddies.
