Hell in a Handbasket

If you want to understand the United States of today, you have to understand the people who forged this country.

I wrote a post about them for The Chicago Boyz last year. The point is that most people think of the Founders as a bunch of wig wearing dandies, fops that dabbled in revolution while counting all the money their enormous estates generated. This is dead wrong.

"It was on this day 231 years ago that those same dandies told the greatest military power on the planet to go get bent. Any reasonable and accurate assessment of their chances to prevail would have been right down there at zero. Everyone who signed the Declaration of Independence, if they were being honest with themselves, could only expect to end their lives at the end of a noose. Most of their friends would swing with them. Their property and fortunes would certainly have been confiscated, bringing ruin and poverty to their families. But they did it anyway."

"Those guys were real men. Balls as big as church bells. Anyone who wants to understand the United States has to start at that basic historical fact."

As Americans, we reap the benefits of their decision every single second we draw breath. We stand on the backs of giants who came before us. The earth shook, the heavens were split asunder, and something new came to be that has yet to be matched, let alone surpassed.

If you are like most of the people who live in the United States, you will celebrate with family and friends. You'll knock back a cold one, eat something grilled in the back yard, and take the kids to a fireworks display in your home town. But all through this day, never forget that we got here because a bunch of guys living in the backwater of the British Empire took a look at the greatest military that the world had ever seen and said "Ah, those guys ain't so tough."

Boo-yah!