Was the American Revolution Inevitable?

  http://cavett.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/03/skys-the-limit/?pagemode=print

What is it about fireworks?  Eyes wide, mouth wider as we gaze in awe at the beautiful spectacle.  Are we people who just love that flash and bang?  Not too many of us really relate it to the "rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air" and yet, there is just something so awe-inspiring about this celebration.  And when we DO relate it to the birth of our nation, how humbling.
 
Shortly after the horror of 9/11, my husband and I went to a local restaurant.  It was, and perhaps some of you will remember, the day that people wanted to show their support of  and love for their country and at 7:00 pm, eastern time, we were to go outside and light a candle.  The manager of this neighborhood restaurant came around to all the tables, told us they were going to go outside at 7:00 with candles, offered us each a candle and invited us to go.  We did.  There were maybe 50 of us outside on the sidewalk and in the parking lot of this restaurant, at first silently praying for our country, holding a lit candle.  Spontaneously, we started singing "God Bless America" with tears running down our cheeks. 
 
This was just a working class neighborhood, ordinary, but to me it represented what our country is and who it is.  Quite a sight seeing these big guys holding a candle and weeping for the love of their country.  Even now, it raises the hair on my arms, sends a chill down my spine and a tear (or more) to my eyes. 
 
So "Happy Birthday America" and may God continue to bless.

First (way off topic), thanks to DreadPirateRoberts, who said, "Oh Doc, how I have missed you!" yesterday. Olivia, who drug me here awhile back, also 'made my day' when she said she's reading Vonnegut's 'Galapagos' (I am SUCH a fan of 'Cat's Cradle'!). Miss Olivia knows how competitive I am, and she must know I'll be reading 'Galapagos' this weekend simply because she's always one step ahead of me and I enjoy the task of running after her (a metaphor, folks, a metaphor!) 

Now, on to today's topic!   (I love the idea of quoting the British Broadcasting Corporation about the loss of 'The Colonies'!) An excellent article... touching on a central government getting involved in expensive wars and getting desperate to finance them.  It describes folks wanting more and more services, and resenting paying the taxes to provide them.  It goes into the inability of the government to quite 'get it' but eventually climbing down in the face of pressure by bands of fanatical ideologues.  It has to do with a failure to "win the hearts and minds" of the public.  And it mentions a 'bad economy' as a complicating factor.... GEE....sounds so 'contemporary'! 

As the U.S. attempts its level best to emulate Argentina's last 150 years (oh, where are you, Eva Peron?) I wonder when we will start numbering American revolutions just as we number World Wars?  (My friends insist I'm a pessimist... can't understand why, heh, heh).  Am I the only one who remembers the American 'militia movement', Ruby Ridge (1992), Waco (1993), and so on..... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militia_(United_States)#Modern_private_militia_organizations  .Maybe because I live in Texas I'm a bit disconnected from East Coast reality (ya'll are Loyalists!)  and am (somewhat) used to living in a world which harks back to independence (Texas Republic!), the idea that the nation should be 'Christian' (nope, you Catholics are not included!), and the concept that Big Government (except DOD, the FBI, the CIA, and NSA) is Evil. It is fun to listen to folks whine about Washington -- up to a point.  And then I wonder, 'When the xxx hits the fan, are these folks going to start pulling down their assault rifles and REALLY going to try to stage Revolution Two?   ----  As my television tells me, "After a few short messages, we'll return with the rest of this story!" Ahem!  Messages?????

 4th of july
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLILrC7Y5L4&feature=related
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSWuA-RttGU&feature=channel
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&hl=en-GB&v=RssIN3ustUw
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzXxWTpC1CM&feature=channel
 
4 all that enjoy the point of the celebration!

(In case anyone wonders, most folks down here are just folks.... and they don't 'get involved in politics'.)  But then revolutions are not staged by the average Joe... He just gets sucked up in all the excitement (especially if he's a red-blooded male) and is led about by the real 'patriots'.  Such it has been through all of history.  While the average woman just sits back and says, 'Fred, give it a rest!' a few 'patriot babes' run after their men, concerned that 'The Federal Government' is trying to destroy their religion, their babies, their family, and 'America'.  Once the women start supporting the men, then things go into overdrive..... And it will be fascinating to watch the dynamic over what promises to be a very 'interesting' century.... I may decide to emulate the Loyalists, and move on.... ah, those poor forgotten Loyalists.... no one talks about their sad fate every Fourth of July.... much as Vietnamese Americans or Cuban Americans are orphans, so too the Loyalists of 1776 - 1783. :-/   

The  American  Revolution  was  far  from  inevitable.....1/3  of colonists supported  revolution,  1/3  were  loyalists,  and  the  remaining  1/3  didn't  give  a  rat's  arse.   Thomas  Jefferson's  brilliant  document  declaring  independence,  in  conjunction  with  a  former  corset  maker's  document,  Common  Sense,  galvanized   support.   And  Washington's  gutsy  Christmas  crossing  of  the  Delaware  to  {literally}  catch  Howe's  Hessian  mercinaries  with  their  pants  down  sparked  renewed  life  into  the  cause  that  a  few  days  before  seemed  to  be  a  mere  wisp  in  the  wind.  The  finger  of  god  was  operational  in  this  fledgling  nation's  creation,  perhaps  that  spark  can  be  rekindled,  perhaps  not.  Only  time  will  tell.  July  4th  has  always  been  a  bittersweet  holiday  for  me.  Are  we  as  a  nation  still  cohesive  enough  to  grasp the  same  vision?  Has  sacrifice  become  "old-fashioned"  in  an  age  of  narcissism?  Oh  well,  I  am  still  ambulatory,  and  still  pig-headed  enough  to  stand  tall  next  to  anyone  who  is  the  victim  of  the  bully,  the   tyrant.  Get  rid  of  these  moth  balls,  darling  daughter, Find  me  my  old  clothes.....daddy  needs  to  help  the  REAL  heroes,  the  last  of  the  WWII  generation,  march  one  more  time  down  Main  Street.  Damn,  the  morning  sun  is  so  beautiful,  as  it  slowly  comes  over  the  tree  line  in  the  East.....

not only in the continental boundries of the u.s.a., but for all those countries that some named in yesterday's post.........that they are free to live anywhere freely.  i did notice not one listed iran, iraq, north korea, or afghanistan as places they'd rather live than here.  thank god for the revolution, that set in motion, the celebration of 1776, for the majority of the whole planet enjoys the freedoms that stems from those with a little fourth sight.

J-Dog, you asked: Are we as a nation still cohesive enough to grasp the same vision? Has sacrifice become "old-fashioned" in an age of narcissism?

The colonies were never even close to cohesive... the central government was pitifully weak and ineffective for 20-30 years after the close of the war. The Constitution, which we now revere, was only ratified by all 13 colonies after a long, drawn out political battle. We Americans have never been of one mind, even DURING the Revolution.

And in my mind this is what has given the country strength. We are tempered by the arguments. Radical voices (on either side of any question) spur the national conversation, but a more moderate, workable solution to a problem emerges from the general populace. What is critical is maintaining the conversation. What is dangerous is when we stop hearing the other side and demonize them.

I have friends on both fringes of the political scene. Neither wants to destroy this country, both sides want to improve the lives of her citizens. They have different philosophies and means to that end, but they are both seeking the same end. We need to begin to see our fellow countrymen as allies and not adversaries once again.

the silent majority is the body (foundation) of the cake we enjoy, the icing and loud declarations the extremes of the totality of a balanced presentation, for all to enjoy in a celebration of birth.  many cakes, with multiple colors, in all shapes and sizes create unique celebrations, yet all called birthdays.  freedom of choice to, eat of it, or not.  just don't try to take my peace.

In response to yesterday's question of 'do we allow just anyone to run for President?', I at first agreed that maybe there ought to be an IQ test or something, but then DPR changed my mind by saying 'yes, a thousand time yes!'  I have to agree that AMerica is all about letting just any damned fool run for president.  It may be my turn next...you betcha!
 
As for the inevitability of the Revolution, I think yes, because it happened!  Think of Howard Beale in Network:  we're mad as hell and we're not going to take it anymore. 
 
Here's a friend's reinterpretation that we use a work a lot:  I'm as mad as heck and I'm going to take it a little bit longer.
 
I wish all Eyesters a wonderful holiday!

  A little gun shy, for some reason, about another monster post and unable to find the perfect clean link, I will settle for suggesting that everyone read Camille Paglia's  take on Sarah Palin.

Paglia, a social critic, professor, brilliant writer and at least as smart as everyone else, has an informed but unusual view that is worth knowing.   

When politics threaten to ruin the Fourth, BBQ, beer, and beans remind us that 'hangin out' with friends is what life is all about!  I'm off in an hour to party with a guy at work who has his 'tribe' and a boatload of orphans (like me) over to raise a bit of h*ll around his swimming pool.  Who cares if the temp hits 100 again!  :-) 

To Stoney: As a feminist, I have read Camille Paglia's take on Sarah Palin and my response is,"Oh Paleeeeze." Clearly, after seeing her 18 minute rambling babble like speech yesterday, even Camille may have changed her mind today.

Listening to people whine about their guns and big gov't makes me feel remorse for the lack of education in this country.  Still, I feel fortunate to choose to live here and I welcome the other immigrants who come here as my ancestors did, not very long ago.  We need to grow up, spend money on education, clean up the air and the water, and perhaps leave something to future generations that makes protecting simple human rights worthwhile..Peace

thank you stoney, i don't know everything already, so i'm still open to knowing more.

Eye yam     going to Tom's burned out....and hoist a bloody to the American Patriot that made it possible. The unnamed soldier. God rest them all.

Olivia & Doc,

Now I surely (and don't call me Shirley) must read it again. Galapagos was my very first exposure to Vonnegut and I loved it. It has been at least 20+ years ago that I read it this gem, shortly after it came out in paperback, and I still remember one of my favorite paragraphs that involved the "newly" devolved furry creatures rolling around on a beach laughing uncontrollably. The topic was breaking wind. The lesson; "some things never change"...... I won't say more in case Olivia hasn't read that far. Indeed, I accept the fact that my treasuring this particular paragraph doesn't speak very highly of my devolved intellect but as long as it still makes me laugh......that's alright by me. I also remember lending it to a friend and coworker who managed to keep it in his attaché case wherever he traveled, fully intent on reading it, over a span of about 20 years. As we often traveled to the same meetings I would see the book safely tucked away in the exact same place he initially placed it. I'll have to call him and see if a) he ever opened it, and b) could I borrow it back.

Peace out

Meanwhile and far away.... back at the topic.... as others have said; the revolution was far from a sure bet. If there was a Lost Vegas back then, the bookmakers would probably be pulling their hair out and consulting with a desert Shaman or cave hermit to decide on the odds.

With that said, if there hadn't been "our" revolution, I'm sure there would have been many more territorial wars to take it's place at the onset, especially during the expansion from coast-to-coast, and on, and on........

Besides all the conflicts, some additional downsides would be the need for passports for any long-distance drive, different driving rules of the road, currency issues, and probably even more duplication of effort and bureaucracy than we have now.

The upside would be that we would all probably be multi-lingual.

Anyroads, I'm glad we did, happy to be part of it, and grateful to all those who risked everything to make it happen and to those who have sacrificed so much to keep the promise, their hopes, and their vision, alive.

Happy 4th EyEsters.

or as PeterLake would say...... "as long as we never through out the baby with the bath water; everythings gonna be primo in the land of groove" ....... ok, he really didn't say anything like that .....

Kristina:  Good  point  about  how  divided  were   the  original  13  states.   It  took  until  1791  to  come  up  with  the  Bill  of  Rights.   Diversity  of  ideas  is  a  good  thing.  In  science  it  leads  to  invention.    In  genetics  it  leads  to  hybrid  species  with  the  stronger  components  of  each  parent.  I  guess  the  thing  that  scares  me  is  apathy,  coupled  with  the  entitlement  mentality.   Everything  is  important,  nothing  good  happens  without  debate  and  hard  work.   And  freedom  isn't  free.....

Great posts, everyone. Kristina, was it you who was saying you're a bit intimidated with the level of writing here? Honey, you fit right in! Your post was AWESOME, and lifted me up. Thank you so much for being with us, and please write more.
Doc-I so wish I was with you orphans! I have a new bikini I'm dying to get wet, but no pool to play in :(
Oh well, I'm having a quiet 4th, thinking about this amazing, frustrating country, such an aggregation of extremes, from the highest to the lowest in so many ways. We are founded on reasoned debate and differences of opinion. As Miss K so eloquently points out, this is a big part of our strength-the ability to disagree and debate and compromise and support each other even if we do NOT support the other's ideas. I am constantly amazed at the smallminded people who have no clue where we came from, our history and the development of our great nation, and feel that we must all be the same or we're going to hell in a handbasket. History, our collective national and cultural memory, is so important in finding our path to a better future, and it is so frequently ignored. People vote against their own best interests because they can't or won't recall the lies and bat-and-switch tactics of their elected representatives. Everyone thinks Congress is a pack of political whores and congenital liars, and they're right, but then they'll say 'but not MY congersman', which is illustrative of the endemic problem in elective representation. Term limits can help a little, but there is some weight to the argument that we're throwing out the baby with the bathwater, and losing the good ones too.
Education would go a long way towards ameliorating this problem, and politicians (there ARE no statesmen any longer, I feel, and politician is almost an insult any more, about on the level of quack) say lofty things about it, but they do very little, because they know that an undereducated public is easy to mislead, gullible, and herdable. If we don't recall their lies from last year, they can say anything, and routinely do, directly contradicting themselves to lead from the rear.
I'll bet the ancient Greeks had the same problem...
The biggest problem I see with our society is that everything has to make a profit for the oligarchs, or it won't be done. Our medical system is based on gouging the old, the ill, the most vulnerable among us. A quality education is very expensive. None of this can be free, but it can be socialized, and socialization isa not a bad thing if applied appropriately. We certainly have applied it to Wall Street and the Department of Offense. But now our spineless and pathetic Congress is wringing their hands over the cols of extending basic health care to as many of us as possible, pretending that trillions spent on American citizens just can't be done, while routinely throwing far more than that at the military and the financial sector. It's ok to go horribly in debt to kill people far away or subsidize their masters profligacy, but to extend to all Americans the benefits they reserve to themselves is just too much to ask. Poor little Ireland can do it-but then, they don't lavishly support a bloated and inefficient military. They have a little home defense force, and everyone is totally covered for basic health care, doctors and nurses make house calls, and their health statistics are far better than ours.
I think it's a priority thing. With an overwhelming majority of American citizens in favour of single-payer health care and improved public education, our elected representatives just blatantly REFUSE to represent us-taxation without representation-deja vu all over again. I often wonder if they're just trying to ascertain how much they screw us over before we rise up. Like Rome, we have bread (McDonald's) and circuses (TV and the cult of celebrity) to keep us pacified, but also like Rome, there are limits. A seat is Congress is a cushy ride with little expected beyond skillful dissembling, but the truth will out, and we could help ourselves by expecting more of them, and especially more of our corporate-controlled and heavily censored media. They both enjoy the benefits of a lack of accountability-for now. 
I just hope that things don't get TOO interesting, in the Chinese sense, before we force our elected lapdogs to slip their leads and do something for their constituency for a change.
I like to think that things happen for the best, and difficult times lead to opportunities that make life better. I know that the only time I got fired it led to a better job, and a happier situation. Every divorce freed me from horrors, though they were terribly difficult. Every period of poverty taught me a lot about bettering myself, personal responsibility, efficient living, and how to be happy on less. I want all my friends, and everybody, to have a good life. We have so much here, but it's so unfairly distributed, it can get you down sometimes. I have a faint hope that the latest huge SNAFUs will teach us to be a better people, our country as a whole, but then I remember the S&L debacle, and on back to Teapot Dome and so many others. We don't remember, and it happens again. The same lies, the same corrosive government undermining of our freedoms, the constant wasting of resources.
We will learn, or we will fall-probably not a catastrophic collapse, but a slow deterioration.
 
I just think that we, and our children, deserve better.   

Much to clean before arrival of teenage guests, but appreciating all todays posts.  Olivia it is an amazing frustrating country, and we all seem to love it.
 
Sun is out for first time since leaving hospital.  Stoney, we wii explore the wonders of power cups another day and I will find your article.  Gotta run... Happy 4th to all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvYIjFtPQEk&NR=1
 
 

Sorry about the typos, and the length! Omg, very sorry! I just got to rambling and ranting...
 
Bait and switch
wringing their hands over the cost
masters' profligacy
socialization is not
how much they can screw us over
 
I hate typos! 

Olivia,   Well said indeed.   Unfortunately there are no short answers or all our problems would have been solved a long time ago.  As Barney Fife would say...... we should have "nip it , nip it.... nip it in the bud".  Which is a longish way of saying that the length of your comment are totally appropriate

Methinks that at this point in time, to recapture the essence of our country's dream will require a painful evolution. Revolutions were, I fear, meant for simpler times and their effects short lived at best.

As for typos....... my Lost Vegas has your beat by a mile..... although I might be able to get away with saying that it was meant as a metaphor...... nahh

Be well

Peace out

Just a random "where did that thought bubble come floating from thought?"......

As a friend of mine once said......... "I wonder how long it'll take before somebody shoots off some fireworks out of their butts today...... you just know it'll happen"

It's a dreary rainy day here...... just perfect for watching the original Twilight Zone marathon on the SciFi channel with my eyes half open. Rod Serling is waking up my long, slumbering hankerin' for a cigarette. I don't think I ever saw him without one in his hand....

Lost Vegas? I thought it was Lost Wages!
John, there IS a short answer, and it is 42...
Just the word 'fart' is good for a laff in the good ol US of A. In the UK and Ireland, it's 'knickers'.
Of course, a lusty poot speaks for itself!
And I love the Robert Mitchum quote-his pickup line for his future wife? "Stick with me and you'll be farting through silk."
What woman wouldn't swoon at that?
Peace UP! And guys, remember-don't peace into the wind...

I remember a lot of people talking about "when the revolution comes" in the 1970s. Ido not personally remember the 1770s...   http://www.thestate.com/statewire/story/851232.html

becoming more maxine like
yes, it, the inevitability of the inevitably inevitable happened.
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ph49YlxCqi8
 

  It's seventy-four, calm and partly cloudy. A perfect night for fireworks and we will be watching from the most privileged spot in the city, a fifth floor wrap around luxury apartment made available to us by the management of the place my wife's mother lives. Tall cotton indeed.

Gia,

I suppose that one of two circumstances may pertain: Either...

A) You are actually wiser and better informed than Ms. Paglia, or...

B) It might be that Sarah Palin reminds you of real people you actually know and people that the people you know know, if you know what I mean?

As a little boy I met General Eisenhower and as a big boy, shook hands with Harry S. Truman over his wrought-iron fence in Independence, Mo. Since then, the Harvard/Yale types seem not to have served us particularly well.

Either we despised them for lying to us or despised them for failing to lie to us and while I would not be especially tickled to see Sarah as a candidate for anything, it could be just about time for someone cast from an entirely different mold who knows what the meaning of is, is. 

Sarah? A lovely woman. But, as was once the edict for the new government hires: the best and the brightest only need apply...                As we all were shown, Mrs. Palin's major was sports/news casting...her first jobs were in TV,weather,sports...Her best options (IMHO)TV...Fox would come to mind....

Absolutely! Sarah Palin was born to be a Fox weathergirl...

She's ever so perky.  Unless she's insulted, which is often.  Then she's perkily indignant.  Gawd.  Make her stay in Alaska.  It's a nice state.  She's used to it, and I can easily get used to her staying there.