[SmithL]

Happy 4th of July!

[Fiddlstix]

BTTT

[freedom44]

[EdHallick]

I can`t wait to play my favorite 4th of July drinking game tomorrow; M-80 shots. You take an M-80 and put it in your mouth and light the fuse and if you chicken out and take it out of your mouth before your friends do, you have to take a shot of whiskey or beer. That game is cool.

[potlatch]

I saw a flag the wind had tattered,
No one to care or think it mattered!
Windtorn and faded stripes were flapping,
Pale stars upon pale blue were napping
I wondered if a bugle blowing,
Would rouse our country to bestowing...
Upon our flag more true devotion,
And stir our hearts with real emotion!
Forgotten there, so bravely flying.
A symbol worn but never dying
A challenge to a nation sleeping,
A loyal sentry, Watch is keeping!

Edna R. Zunino

[solzhenitsyn]

"The birth year of the republic, 1776, McCullough observes, was 'a year of all-too-few victories, of sustained suffering, disease, hunger, desertion, cowardice, disillusionment, defeat, terrible discouragement, and fear .'"

Couldn't Washington see he'd led them into a quagmire?

[HiTech RedNeck]

It appears that the first Independence Day was marked with more grimness than jollity, befitting the task that the revolutionary government had set itself. But they succeeded in taking out the trash and for that we rejoice.

[agere_contra]

Happy Birthday, America!

[hershey]

Hear! Hear!