The Solution Is Americans

Saturday, July 4, 2026

Yesterday I noted that America is fundamentally the same as it was 50 years ago, yet the national anniversary celebrations are quite different, this celebration being quite muted compared to the last.  I noted that the biggest historical difference was covid and that it taught one, perhaps two, generations to wait for permission to step out and to rely on the nation to do things that were essentially their responsibility.  But if individual Americans are the problem, so are they the solution.

Pennsylvania was, governmentally, one of the holdouts to the celebrations on the National Mall.  Yet small business and individuals in that state picked up the slack.  America works best when it acts, not when it waits on government to do something.

During covid the white collar class hid at home, but throughout the nation, even in the highly restricted blue regions, the working class went to work.  They built things those sheltering in their homes needed.  They delivered the food the others ate while sheltered.  They drove trucks across the continent as goods imported needed to reach their destination.  While some quit working, many worked even harder.

While the number of people donating to charity in this nation is on the decrease, the dollars donated are ever increasing.  This is a deeply generous nation, not a penurious one.  Everyday new businesses open as people take risks and rely on themselves to provide for their family – they do not wait for a job to present itself.

During covid, my wife and I commuted often between very blue, extremely restricted California and our then future home in East Tennessee.  The contrast was remarkable – as marked as the contrast between the 200th celebration and this 250th.  In East Tennessee, and in many other places around the nation, people did not hide from covid, they carried forward with life.  Here is East Tennessee, the celebrations this evening are expected to rival those of 1976.  In fact they may greatly exceed them as the facilities downtown have been greatly improved.  The crowds are predicted to be far larger than I, in my senior years, am wiling to cope with.

While the newsmakers and news reporters see a muted 250th, America is not muted.  America will not be muted.  We are in a struggle between those that expect the nation to care for them like children and those that simply get up each day and carry one.  The struggle may be prolonged and it is difficult.  But in the end the later group will prevail by virtue of simply getting up each day and getting busy.

Let the whiners, complainers and ingrates wallow in their self-pity and depression.  Let us declare our independence from them.  America remains the greatest nation ever conceived.  Its future is bright – as bright as it was when the Founders declared their independence from England and its king.