DAD, WHAT's UNABHÄNGIGKEITSTAG?

"Is that when the thirteen colonies broke away from England?" My ten year inquired out of nowhere at 6 AM German time this morning. "Yeah, why do you want to know, eat your breakfast," I mumbled, too sleepy to be very curious. "Because I am afraid my teacher will ask me, since I am wearing this T-shirt and I'm the only American in the class." With an effort, I adjusted my gaze upward to his white T-shirt. It was brand new. Prominent on his breast was an image of the flag and below that:

Waking up now, I reflected that if the Old Navy company could so shamelessly trade on the image of the flag, it ought in decency at least amend the line below to:

But then I thought, what could be more traditional in America than commercializing the flag?

"Waddayamean, you're the only American in class, what's that got to do with the Fourth of July?" My paternal antannae were also coming to life. I remembered that the kids had sometimes returned from Gymnasium, German high school, and recited seemingly off-hand remarks from professors disparaging America and especially George Bush. Some of the hearsay reports had been pretty rough, describing America as killing Iraqis or causing global warming and the like.

"I think he will call on me to explain the Declaration of Indepencence to the whole class," masking his apprehension. "So, what will you tell them?"

"That is how we got free of England," he replied, in German. "That's right, as far as it goes. Never mind breakfast, lets get to the computer, it time to search FreeRepublic." A few minutes later we had a copy of the declaration printed out, with the font changed to italics for psuedo verisimiltude to the venerable document.

"There is actually a couple of ideas in here that are more important than announcing our break with England," I said, highlighting with a yellow marker this passage:

that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights

Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

"This means that who you are, what rights you have, come directly from God and not from the government. In fact, the government is there to serve you, as a child of God, not the other way around, and when the government takes away your rights, the government is not legitimate, and you can change it."

"What's legitimate?" Ah, " berechtigt," I answered. I must have gotten it right for he seemed satisfied with the translation and his Deutsch is better than mine. Handing him the printout, I said, "take this with you, read it on the bus, and when you get to class you tell them these ideas are America's gift to the world. A lot of people in Europe think your rights come from the government, not the other way around. No one had ever done this 'for real' before. Look what it says here just before where they signed it, it means they knew they were risking their lives:"

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor

An hour later, his mother asked me, "Did you give him a printout of the Declaration of Independence?" "Yup," I proudly responded.

Every year my wife asks me, "are you going to host your vanity about the Declaration of Independence again this year?" Her question is really rhetorical, she knows I intend to post it because it has become a tradition in the family much like whether you open your Christmas presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. A tradition like what your family has for Christmas dinner, turkey or ham? Do you display the flag on Memorial Day? For us, living as we do here in Germany, it is our way of holding fast to our America. So every year we keep the tradition and we look forward to the reactions of FReepers which have been consistently gratifying and even heartwarming.

This year, however, I do not look forward with my perennial enthusiasm to the sharing of this vanity. This unease has been inchoate for quite some time but it has now been precipitated by a short reply of wastoute posted to me yesterday. It's just one short sentence. It came in the context of our mutual pessimism about the likelihood of passage of Cap and Trade and of Obama's healthcare. These engorgements of our government are singled out as tokens of the inexorable rush towards socialization of our economy which can only be accomplished with the constriction of our liberties. It is our liberties as expressed in The Declaration of Independence which is the whole point of this holiday and for all the traditions which have surrounded it since I was a boy and long before. Wastoute encapsulated all with this sentence:

This will be the saddest 4th of July in my lifetime.

Unfortunately for the reader I am not nearly as succinct as wastoute

It took me a lot more words in a vanity addressing the question, " Is Barak Obama a Manchurian Marxist or merely a narcissist on the make?

This goes beyond considering whether our economic liberties are going forfeit-that is assumed as a given-but whether our personal liberties are also in grave jeopardy. These are lugubrious matters, I know, but somehow fit for the times and certainly fit for this day:

I think the real question is how committed a Marxist is Barak Obama? Is he so rabid an acolyte of the Saul Alinsky School that he will actively contrive a crisis to seize ultimate power? Or will he merely govern on the left and seize an opportunity only if circumstances serendipitously offer?

In other words, so long as we continue as we are I think our representative democracy will survive Obama. My fear is that we will have a profound financial crash with huge unemployment numbers; or we will experience a wave of the Weimar Republic like inflation which destroys virtually every institution; or we sustain a severe, or a series of severe terrorist strikes; or there is an atomic attack somewhere in the world; or the Iranians or some other crazies, possibly possessed of the bomb, possibly in league with Russia and/or Venezuela, manage to shut off the world supply of oil; or there are assassinations in America.

An event like one of these could be the occasion for Obama to seize ultimate power. I believe he is psychologically prepared to do so but I cannot be sure. If he were to do so, the grab would be rationalized as a move to save the country and an opportunity to finally put the country right. I believe he is psychologically ready to do so because he is a leftist and a God player and an acolyte of Saul Alinsky. This is what the Frankfurt School and the Alinsky School have been striving for without respite for decades.

It is hard to believe that if Obama is offered the ultimate prize that he would walk away like Cincinnatus or Washington.

Now, with that off my chest, our family here in Germany wishes all of you at home a joyful Fourth of July.

Right back at ya’ on the 4th of July wishes, nb.

You are indeed fortunate to have a 10-yr old to talk with and influence. When our kids were that age, we were thanking God for the departure of Jimmy Carter and the arrival of President Reagan. Obama wasn't even a small cloud on the horizon.

We had celebrated America's Bicentennial some years earlier with hope and optimism. The fact that Americans had seen right through President Carter and fired him at the first opportunity was vindication that that optimism was well founded.

And now, as I am fully ensconced in curmudgeonhood, my optimism is severely tested. I wish it were 2012 today, so as to see if America has truly lost its mind, or simply that Obama is an advertising campaign that has worn thin.

God tests us all the time, but right now, I'm tired. Thank you, nathanbedford, for enlightening our youth and passing the torch.

BTW, didn't we used to be New England neighbors?? I really must get out more.

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