Happy INDEPENDENCE Day (Originally Posted in 2012)

I awoke this morning to find that many of my close friends had texted me "Happy 4th of July everyone!" I replied to each (and undoubtedly will continue to do so all day) with "I assume you meant Happy INDEPENDENCE Day...."

On a July 4th, 236 years ago, our forefathers declared our independence from a tyrannical king. The date is irrelevant in itself as every day in America should be a happy one. It is what happened on this date that all Americans should be keenly aware of. Unfortunately they are not. While I am sure that the crowd I associate with knows American history it is sad to know that a huge chunk (I would say more than 50%) of our neighbors do not. As I come across people, especially younger ones, I bluntly ask them what the "4th of July" means and "who we got our independence from." The answers range from stunned uninformed silence to France.

So today I wish you all a safe and happy INDEPENDENCE Day and give special thanks to all of the men and women that secured and safeguarded our freedom throughout our history.

I leave you with this:





When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.