Yes, I am one of Empires dwellers. I see the 4th of July not as a celebration, but a commemoration. This bill of particulars presented is sadly factual. Those particulars are what I commemorate. If I find it tough to read, and my cynicism of the concept of American Exceptionalism has steadily grown over five (yes, 5) decades, then as stated in the essay opening, "None of this is personal." Take all the time you need to read, absorb, and start thinking of what needs to happen in our land.
One suggestion: American elections are always portrayed as pocketbook elections. The siphoning of our hard earned tribute into the maws of billionaire revenue streams does create an image that resonates in our minds. But forget the pocket book part!
We are in a large, very, very large class. Our class is being pummeled. We need to start administrating beatings on that small, small, small billionaire class.
We must insist and in fact show that our votes for public officials are conditioned upon legislation that clips billionaires wings. Example: throwing out the DMCA. Another: 75% or any number up to 100, percent tax on private equity. Also, severely limit the types of services that private equity can infest.
And we simply must eliminate the predation of our poor. We need them to join our fight. Right now they cannot.
In the interest of brevity, I wish you a commemorative Fourth.
eins auswischen?? wie soll das gehen? "Wir müssen...die Macht von Milliardären einschränken...wir müssen die Ausbeutung unserer Armen unbedingt beenden."
besser, Sie würden das träumen beenden und erkennen wie ohnmächtig Sie in wirklichkeit sind. spenden Sie weiter für commen dreams wenn Sie das beruhigt.
kein wesen auf der welt gibt freiwillig eine macht ab, von der es profitiert und die die garantie für diesen profit ist.
Massacre is an acquired taste. The United States is arguably the only country on the planet whose national personality and self-image is rooted in centuries of unremitting expansion through race wars punctuated by massacre. There have always been “free-fire zones” all along the coveted, ever moving peripheries of white American power, from the “Indian country” surrounding the settler beachheads of Plymouth Rock and Jamestown to the “Sunni Triangle” of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan. Whole peoples – millions – have been erased in the glorious march of American Manifest Destiny.
It is true that the globe-ravaging European colonial powers certainly killed more human beings in the course of their imperial careers than their settler sons in North America. However, the national characters of Britain, Spain, France, Holland and Belgium were already formed when the Great European Breakout and Worldwide Pillage commenced. Although their wealth was later built on the blood and bones of faraway “natives” and slaves, European civil societies were already shaped by long histories of conflict among themselves, between classes and nations on their small sub-continent. Britain and France stretched forth their naval and army tentacles to ensure that wealth arrived in Liverpool and Marseilles, but the colonized peoples did not effectively intrude on the evolution of European society.
Nobody had to invent the historical personalities of the Frenchman in France, the Englishman in England. Their civil societies were deeply impacted – and some sectors greatly enriched – by the existence of the colonies, but not (until very recently) by the foreign peoples who died for European prosperity.
The English settler colonies in North America were different – unique. Masses of armed migrants came to steal, and stay, and keep stealing. Theirs was an enterprise of aggrandizement at the native’s expense, and unlimited expansion. Less than a century and a half after the massacre and near-erasure of the Pequots – in celebration of which the Governor of Massachusetts proclaimed the first day of Pilgrim Thanksgiving – the white colonists decided that they were a distinct people, no longer Europeans.
They were right. American colonial society was shaped by constant depredations against non-whites, close up and brutal. By 1776, one out of five non-Indian residents of the colonies were Black slaves, the control and dehumanization of which had become a daily collective duty of much of the white population. Across the Alleghenies lay unconquered Indian lands that, once cleansed, could usher into being a white empire that would dwarf Europe. The English King and his treaties with the Indians stood in the way; he had to go.
The “American” mission was clear, manifest: to endlessly expand through the elimination of impediments posed by the External Other (“savage” Indians), while keeping white society safe and separate from the “debauchery” of the valuable, Internal Other (Black slaves). This is the foundation on which the American iconography and celebration is based. Lacking any other, it is the template of white American identity and purported “civilization.”
👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 every word is on point. Tho I might add that Americans have a part to hold in this. The American empire isn’t some omnipresent thing. It doesn’t breathe on its own. Its ribcage and mechanics of its expanding lungs aren’t made up of abstract parts, it’s made up of people. The demand of capitalism is upheld by people. The genocide in Gaza exposed that Americans rather keep their illusioned comforts and let the world burn just as long as we don’t have to lose a single inch of our conveniences. Everything we have here is tainted in blood. And at this point we all know. And no one cares more about the blood than they care about their comforts.
"The US has been the most violent and murderous state-building experiment in history."
The US government is currently the world center of Zio Imperialism. This fact is the result of a complex historical process. Without reviewing the revolutionary or civil war, both of which I am proud, I will just say this Zio Imperialist outcome was not inevitable. The future of Zio Imperialism in the US is not inevitable either. It's also very important to remember that the US government and the two official Zio Imperialist parties do not reflect the interests or the desires of the majority of the wage slaves that inhabit the US. There are two Americas. Anyone who has interacted with wage slaves from the US will recognize this fact. Anyone acquainted with class reality in their own country will recognize this fact. The US government ended up like this through the continuous violent repression of the militant working class. Since the 60s the class struggle has been further repressed by a false racial, gender sexuality struggle promoted by many a former "leftist" turned Zio Imperialist. That said, I love my fellow American wage slaves. They are the only revolutionary element in the US. I'm proud of their predecessors' fight to throw off the old Imperialist power in Britain and to end the chattel slavers of the old South. I heartily agree with many of the sentiments of Thomas Jefferson, as well. I hate only the usurping Zio Imperialist ruling class of America and the government it has purchased to carry out it's every wish. Only from this class perspective, can wage slaves internationally make a correct appraisal of the US. Only from this class perspective, can wage slaves internationally comprehend how critical the American working class is to overthrowing the Zio Imperialist US ruling class/government.
Nate, your voice is a balm to my world-weary soul. You articulate the fact-based truth of what the USA actually is, like none other. In order to become free of the propaganda of "America the home of the free" we must first be able to clearly SEE the atrocities perpetually demanded (yes - demanded) by the cult and cartel that is and always has been America.
I would add U.S. women and children to your list of true victims for we are born into a culture that expects us to serve the ravenous and endless hunger of the patriarchy and sacrifice our very lives and the nurturing all human beings need to their unholy and ultimately deadly bottomline.
American Imperialism saw that the Spanish Empire was quickly loosing control over some of its Latin American colonies and swooped in to take them over (Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Philippines, Guam, and later Hawaii, American Samoa, Panama canal and the Virgin Islands).
My first time on your page but I must say - when all you see is the worst, the cynical aspect of yourself shines. So in all of mankind’s faults, (or is this just limited to the United States?), what, if any possible remedies are offered? I must have missed that non-cynical aspect of the piece.
I can offer you this: Ability to map out unthinkable atrocities with eloquence without an objective answer to achieve a better world serves only one purpose: to lower vibrations and frequency of the reader. (Whaadayou? a Loosh seeker?) Unthinkable atrocities describing human behavior behaving like devil worshipers straight from Hell acting against other Human Beings is nothing that just started with the United States. And we could agree to name them would appear almost endless when considering throughout all of human history.
Your article is nothing more than YOU taking your frustrations out on those of us that appreciate the only Nation on Earth that recognize ‘ Certain Unalienable Rights” given by their Creator that resulted in the most experienced freedoms on Earth.
We live in Biblical Times and Energies coming to Earth as I write are changing the collective consciousness of many now upon this planet. As a miniscule grain of sand of an offer to prove to you that things are getting better, I will ask you to watch the video and tell me when you have ever seen such a thing happen on Planet Earth – let alone within the United States? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYpxcbKnqEs
Are you truly concerned about making the planet a better place or just pissed off that people feel strongly about their Nation’s ability to establish the largest middle class population ever seen and experience more freedom than anywhere else on this planet? Your premise appears to be that no one is allowed to feel good so long as one act of disharmony of any kind takes place. I would say POUND SAND and I’ll choose to use my free will and feel as good as I wish to. And in so doing I would hope it rubs off and the collective consciousness develops an upward swing that would do more to eliminate the horrendous behaviors described than 1000 more of your cynical articles. I say we all need to get on the same page of Raising Vibrations.
'If the two American revolutions marked the ascent of the democratic principles proclaimed in 1776, the 250th anniversary is being marked under conditions of their staggering crisis and decay. The present government, and the social order over which it presides, are in every sense a repudiation of the American Revolution and of the principles that found their most profound expression in the Declaration of Independence.’ https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2026/07/04/thco-j04.html?pk_campaign=wsws-newsletter&pk_kwd=wsws-daily-newsletter
Throughout their colonial history Europeans (esp. Brits and French) used the same "Divide and Conquer" strategy to have other nations fight each other for the benefit of the Imperialist Oligarchy.
And the best way to analyze how the U.S. operates is to remember how it was created in the first place.
As the European powers were realizing that direct conflict with each other was becoming counterproductive, they conspired to create a pirate colony of which they would all benefit. There were some bitter fights over the arrangement, but it is still part of the European style of Empire.
That's why the U.S. is more like a Corporation than a Country.. That's why the orange clown presents himself as a CEO, bragging about "good deals".
Yes, I am one of Empires dwellers. I see the 4th of July not as a celebration, but a commemoration. This bill of particulars presented is sadly factual. Those particulars are what I commemorate. If I find it tough to read, and my cynicism of the concept of American Exceptionalism has steadily grown over five (yes, 5) decades, then as stated in the essay opening, "None of this is personal." Take all the time you need to read, absorb, and start thinking of what needs to happen in our land.
One suggestion: American elections are always portrayed as pocketbook elections. The siphoning of our hard earned tribute into the maws of billionaire revenue streams does create an image that resonates in our minds. But forget the pocket book part!
We are in a large, very, very large class. Our class is being pummeled. We need to start administrating beatings on that small, small, small billionaire class.
We must insist and in fact show that our votes for public officials are conditioned upon legislation that clips billionaires wings. Example: throwing out the DMCA. Another: 75% or any number up to 100, percent tax on private equity. Also, severely limit the types of services that private equity can infest.
And we simply must eliminate the predation of our poor. We need them to join our fight. Right now they cannot.
In the interest of brevity, I wish you a commemorative Fourth.
eins auswischen?? wie soll das gehen? "Wir müssen...die Macht von Milliardären einschränken...wir müssen die Ausbeutung unserer Armen unbedingt beenden."
besser, Sie würden das träumen beenden und erkennen wie ohnmächtig Sie in wirklichkeit sind. spenden Sie weiter für commen dreams wenn Sie das beruhigt.
kein wesen auf der welt gibt freiwillig eine macht ab, von der es profitiert und die die garantie für diesen profit ist.
Massacre is an acquired taste. The United States is arguably the only country on the planet whose national personality and self-image is rooted in centuries of unremitting expansion through race wars punctuated by massacre. There have always been “free-fire zones” all along the coveted, ever moving peripheries of white American power, from the “Indian country” surrounding the settler beachheads of Plymouth Rock and Jamestown to the “Sunni Triangle” of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan. Whole peoples – millions – have been erased in the glorious march of American Manifest Destiny.
It is true that the globe-ravaging European colonial powers certainly killed more human beings in the course of their imperial careers than their settler sons in North America. However, the national characters of Britain, Spain, France, Holland and Belgium were already formed when the Great European Breakout and Worldwide Pillage commenced. Although their wealth was later built on the blood and bones of faraway “natives” and slaves, European civil societies were already shaped by long histories of conflict among themselves, between classes and nations on their small sub-continent. Britain and France stretched forth their naval and army tentacles to ensure that wealth arrived in Liverpool and Marseilles, but the colonized peoples did not effectively intrude on the evolution of European society.
Nobody had to invent the historical personalities of the Frenchman in France, the Englishman in England. Their civil societies were deeply impacted – and some sectors greatly enriched – by the existence of the colonies, but not (until very recently) by the foreign peoples who died for European prosperity.
The English settler colonies in North America were different – unique. Masses of armed migrants came to steal, and stay, and keep stealing. Theirs was an enterprise of aggrandizement at the native’s expense, and unlimited expansion. Less than a century and a half after the massacre and near-erasure of the Pequots – in celebration of which the Governor of Massachusetts proclaimed the first day of Pilgrim Thanksgiving – the white colonists decided that they were a distinct people, no longer Europeans.
They were right. American colonial society was shaped by constant depredations against non-whites, close up and brutal. By 1776, one out of five non-Indian residents of the colonies were Black slaves, the control and dehumanization of which had become a daily collective duty of much of the white population. Across the Alleghenies lay unconquered Indian lands that, once cleansed, could usher into being a white empire that would dwarf Europe. The English King and his treaties with the Indians stood in the way; he had to go.
The “American” mission was clear, manifest: to endlessly expand through the elimination of impediments posed by the External Other (“savage” Indians), while keeping white society safe and separate from the “debauchery” of the valuable, Internal Other (Black slaves). This is the foundation on which the American iconography and celebration is based. Lacking any other, it is the template of white American identity and purported “civilization.”
👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 every word is on point. Tho I might add that Americans have a part to hold in this. The American empire isn’t some omnipresent thing. It doesn’t breathe on its own. Its ribcage and mechanics of its expanding lungs aren’t made up of abstract parts, it’s made up of people. The demand of capitalism is upheld by people. The genocide in Gaza exposed that Americans rather keep their illusioned comforts and let the world burn just as long as we don’t have to lose a single inch of our conveniences. Everything we have here is tainted in blood. And at this point we all know. And no one cares more about the blood than they care about their comforts.
"The US has been the most violent and murderous state-building experiment in history."
The US government is currently the world center of Zio Imperialism. This fact is the result of a complex historical process. Without reviewing the revolutionary or civil war, both of which I am proud, I will just say this Zio Imperialist outcome was not inevitable. The future of Zio Imperialism in the US is not inevitable either. It's also very important to remember that the US government and the two official Zio Imperialist parties do not reflect the interests or the desires of the majority of the wage slaves that inhabit the US. There are two Americas. Anyone who has interacted with wage slaves from the US will recognize this fact. Anyone acquainted with class reality in their own country will recognize this fact. The US government ended up like this through the continuous violent repression of the militant working class. Since the 60s the class struggle has been further repressed by a false racial, gender sexuality struggle promoted by many a former "leftist" turned Zio Imperialist. That said, I love my fellow American wage slaves. They are the only revolutionary element in the US. I'm proud of their predecessors' fight to throw off the old Imperialist power in Britain and to end the chattel slavers of the old South. I heartily agree with many of the sentiments of Thomas Jefferson, as well. I hate only the usurping Zio Imperialist ruling class of America and the government it has purchased to carry out it's every wish. Only from this class perspective, can wage slaves internationally make a correct appraisal of the US. Only from this class perspective, can wage slaves internationally comprehend how critical the American working class is to overthrowing the Zio Imperialist US ruling class/government.
Thank you for this piece, translated in French here : https://zanzibar.substack.com/p/nee-un-4-juillet-pour-le-pire-il
Nate, your voice is a balm to my world-weary soul. You articulate the fact-based truth of what the USA actually is, like none other. In order to become free of the propaganda of "America the home of the free" we must first be able to clearly SEE the atrocities perpetually demanded (yes - demanded) by the cult and cartel that is and always has been America.
I would add U.S. women and children to your list of true victims for we are born into a culture that expects us to serve the ravenous and endless hunger of the patriarchy and sacrifice our very lives and the nurturing all human beings need to their unholy and ultimately deadly bottomline.
Mahalo nui loa for your courage.
Thank you CarolAnn
I wrote the following on July 4, 2015 while attending a Fellowship of Reconciliation retreat in Seabold, Washington.
The Eagles are Screaming!
4th of July USA
Ancient evergreens
Blazing summer sun
The sea gently dancing
along the shore
Perfect summer day
But as evening falls
ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE!
The report from the fireworks
maims my marrow
Sounds likes a goddamn war zone
"Bombs bursting in air", as our anthem states
Along with the deafening noise
Too bright colors fill the sky
Followed by "Oooohs" & "Ahhhs"
- but not by me
As my soft body recoils from the assault,
My left brain tries to soothe me with,
"Don't worry -
we are just celebrating our Independence.
This is just for FUN!
No one will be harmed
Just relax and enjoy it."
My tender underbelly is not appeased
and wants to run and hide
But knows that there
IS NO REFUGE,
no safe place at all in my homeland -
Truly one of the most violent cultures
this world has ever known
I am standing in the dark
Beneath a giant fir tree
Trying my best not to cry
And above the din I hear
A sound that pierces my very soul ~
THE EAGLES ARE CRYING AND SCREAMING!
I join them,
"NO! NO! NO! NO!
STOP! STOP! STOP! STOP!"
But no one is listening.
Because,
"Boys will be boys"
and
"It's Traditional"
drown out our pleas for Peace.
Well, enslaving people of color
Used to be "Traditional"
Here in the good ol' USA
As well as raping one's wife
And beating the children
But that didn't make it
Right
And a few good people
Spoke up
While sadly
people of color
women
children
and the disabled
are at times still grossly mistreated,
At least now we have some laws
That claim that violence is WRONG
and offer some protection from
Our misguided Traditions.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That all men (sic) are created equal,
That they are endowed by their Creator
With certain unalienable rights;
That among them there are
Life
Liberty
And the pursuit of happiness."
It is high time that we
STOP Terrifying ourselves and our fellow creatures
And that once and for all
We declare our
Independence
from celebrating the violence of our culture
By blowing things up
It is time now that we form new traditions
Honoring our interconnectivity
With all of life
And do no harm ~
American Imperialism saw that the Spanish Empire was quickly loosing control over some of its Latin American colonies and swooped in to take them over (Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Philippines, Guam, and later Hawaii, American Samoa, Panama canal and the Virgin Islands).
youtu.be/F_pxZ-Rl6DM?t=1056
***
In 1899, 60 000 US troops invaded the Philippines - a massacre and genocide of women and children, the new “Open Door Policy”.
substack.com/home/post/p-201348278
***
The Jamesberg Agreement: DuPont acquired all US territories, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Colombia and Venezuela.
Dupont is the longest-serving military contractor for the United States of America. Since U.S.-British War of 1812
***
"United States" to Imperial America:
youtube.com/watch?v=Df4R-xdKvpM
youtu.be/NpjDyhGyjNk?t=817
Mr. Bear:
My first time on your page but I must say - when all you see is the worst, the cynical aspect of yourself shines. So in all of mankind’s faults, (or is this just limited to the United States?), what, if any possible remedies are offered? I must have missed that non-cynical aspect of the piece.
I can offer you this: Ability to map out unthinkable atrocities with eloquence without an objective answer to achieve a better world serves only one purpose: to lower vibrations and frequency of the reader. (Whaadayou? a Loosh seeker?) Unthinkable atrocities describing human behavior behaving like devil worshipers straight from Hell acting against other Human Beings is nothing that just started with the United States. And we could agree to name them would appear almost endless when considering throughout all of human history.
Your article is nothing more than YOU taking your frustrations out on those of us that appreciate the only Nation on Earth that recognize ‘ Certain Unalienable Rights” given by their Creator that resulted in the most experienced freedoms on Earth.
We live in Biblical Times and Energies coming to Earth as I write are changing the collective consciousness of many now upon this planet. As a miniscule grain of sand of an offer to prove to you that things are getting better, I will ask you to watch the video and tell me when you have ever seen such a thing happen on Planet Earth – let alone within the United States? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYpxcbKnqEs
Are you truly concerned about making the planet a better place or just pissed off that people feel strongly about their Nation’s ability to establish the largest middle class population ever seen and experience more freedom than anywhere else on this planet? Your premise appears to be that no one is allowed to feel good so long as one act of disharmony of any kind takes place. I would say POUND SAND and I’ll choose to use my free will and feel as good as I wish to. And in so doing I would hope it rubs off and the collective consciousness develops an upward swing that would do more to eliminate the horrendous behaviors described than 1000 more of your cynical articles. I say we all need to get on the same page of Raising Vibrations.
True ThaT !
🙏🌍☮️.
'If the two American revolutions marked the ascent of the democratic principles proclaimed in 1776, the 250th anniversary is being marked under conditions of their staggering crisis and decay. The present government, and the social order over which it presides, are in every sense a repudiation of the American Revolution and of the principles that found their most profound expression in the Declaration of Independence.’ https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2026/07/04/thco-j04.html?pk_campaign=wsws-newsletter&pk_kwd=wsws-daily-newsletter
In 250 years of USA history it has been at war for 233 of them:
youtube.com/watch?v=ooMCvGlbbc4
Despite the US have never been invaded by a foreign military
***
US launched 253 military interventions since 1991, and 471 since 1798:
geopoliticaleconomy.com/2022/09/13/us-251-military-interventions-1991/
***
The US Wars killed up to 4 700 000 Humans since 2001:
https://costsofwar.watson.brown.edu/costs/human
https://www.thesouthasiatimes.com/story/US-WAR-2001
***
Lancet study - The U.S. unilateral sanctions alone killed 38 million people from 1971 to 2021:
substack.com/@kairostimenow/note/c-251327395
I agree, it's nothing to celebrate. It was nothing to celebrate 20 years ago & it's nothing to celebrate now.
(btw, the people are "Afghans."
"afghanis" is the currency)
Throughout their colonial history Europeans (esp. Brits and French) used the same "Divide and Conquer" strategy to have other nations fight each other for the benefit of the Imperialist Oligarchy.
youtube.com/watch?v=rbsfynApnVg
***
And the best way to analyze how the U.S. operates is to remember how it was created in the first place.
As the European powers were realizing that direct conflict with each other was becoming counterproductive, they conspired to create a pirate colony of which they would all benefit. There were some bitter fights over the arrangement, but it is still part of the European style of Empire.
That's why the U.S. is more like a Corporation than a Country.. That's why the orange clown presents himself as a CEO, bragging about "good deals".
USrael Inc.
***
youtube.com/shorts/0yziG3eSCSo