Happy Dependence Day...

de·pend·ence  (diˈpendəns/)
noun

   1. the state of relying on or being controlled by someone or something else.
   2. reliance on someone or something for financial support.



So, Friday was the Fourth of July. To most of the world that's all it was, just another Friday, unless they happen to be following the World Cup games in Brazil, in which case it was an ordinary Friday punctuated by football soccer games.

Here in the good ole' US of A, most people had the day off to celebrate Independence Day, a national holiday set aside to celebrate that day in 1776 when our founding fathers signed the Declaration of Independence and began a war against our English masters to gain our freedom as a nation.

Most of my fellow Americans slept in, woke up late, and headed off to the lake or the beach or to a giant family cookout, swilling beers and inhaling burgers until the sun went down and the fireworks began. In many cases the fireworks began early and in earnest as folks set off their own pyrotechnics in the confines of their yards, scaring the bejeezus out of household pets and causing many a combat veteran to twitch nervously and sweat profusely.

Not me; I worked. I was up at 2:15 am and out the door thirty minutes later on my commute in. I started at four and got off at one in the afternoon. Someone had to work so that everyone dependent upon the government (like the majority of my neighbors) could stay at home celebrating their freedoms, like freedom from work, freedom from responsibility, freedom to enjoy their Obama Phones and EBT cards and Section 8 and Medicaid and heating assistance and cooling assistance and every other known assistance and entitlement program paid for by those of us who weren't at home with the family enjoying the day relaxing and celebrating. When I got home I was pretty wiped out so I took a fitful nap and woke up a couple hours after I laid down. Right about the same time that my neighborhood started sounding like frikkin' Anbar Province...ain't got jobs but they got money for fireworks. 'Murica!

We used to celebrate Independence Day on July 4th. We celebrated the day when our Founding Fathers rose up to throw off the yoke of a tyrannical government that didn't represent them, rulership by an elite class headed by an all-powerful monarch, oppressive taxation enforced at the tip of the sword and barrel of the gun, and fought as free men to achieve their own country with a limited, small central government bound by Constitutional checks and balances so as not to encroach upon the natural rights of the citizens who elected it to serve them..

Now we celebrate Dependence Day in America. We revel in government entitlements and a society that has become dependent upon the government like baby birds with their mouths open awaiting puked up nourishment. Over the past few years, the America I grew up in, the America I served in the Army, the America my family came to from their homelands, has become a broken shell.


Only in America could politicians talk about the greed of the rich at a $35,000.00 per plate campaign fund-raising event.

Only in America could people claim that the government still discriminates against black Americans when they have a black President, a black Attorney General and roughly 20% of the federal workforce is black while only 14% of the population is black. Over 40% of all federal entitlements go to black Americans; 3 times the rate that go to whites, and 5 times the rate that go to Hispanics.

Only in America could we have had two of the people most responsible for our tax code, Timothy Geithner (former head of the Treasury Department) and Charles Rangel (who once ran the House Ways and Means Committee), BOTH turn out to be tax cheats who are in favor of higher taxes. In fact, the entire Administration is riddled with tax cheats and other corruption.

Only in America can we have terrorists kill people in the name of Allah and have the media and liberals react by worrying that Muslims might be harmed by the backlash from said attacks.

Only in America would we make people who want to legally become American citizens wait for years in their home countries and pay tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege, while the Left discusses letting anyone who sneaks into the country illegally just 'magically' become American citizens.

Only in America could the people who believe in balancing the budget and sticking to the country's Constitution be thought of as "extremists." And racists...

Only in America could you need to present a driver's license to cash a check, board an airplane, buy alcohol, or even get the power turned on to your house, but not to vote, and be branded a racist for even suggesting the need.

Only in America could people demand the government investigate whether oil companies are gouging the public because the price of gas went up when the return on equity invested in a major U.S. Oil company (Marathon Oil) averages 12% profit. They take all the risk and the US government takes by force 18.4% to 24.4% in gas tax for taking zero risk and doing absolutely nothing for that revenue other than creating a law to force the oil companies to give it to them. So the government makes 6% to 12% more profit than the oil companies themselves on gas sales for doing absolutely nothing but using force.

Only in America could the government collect more tax dollars from the people than any nation in recorded history, still spend a trillion dollars more than it has per year - for total spending of $7 million PER MINUTE, and the Left complains that it still doesn't have nearly enough money for all their programs.

Only in America could the so called "rich people", who pay 86% of all income taxes, be accused of not paying their "fair share" by people who don't pay any income taxes at all .

Only in America could law-abiding gun owners be characterized as lunatics while the Attorney General sells guns to Mexican drug lords to be used against Americans.

Only in America would Left-controlled schools and other institutions ban people from flying the American flag or wearing a patriotic t-shirt because it might offend people who came to this country to reap its benefits.

Only in America could illegal aliens be offered all the benefits of a citizen like government entitlements, driver's licences, tuition assistance and in-state tuition at universities while working under the table, paying no taxes, and sending most of that money overseas.

Only in America would veterans who fought for the freedoms of America be ostracized as terrorists, live homeless on steam grates, and be denied medical care on secret waiting lists at VA hospitals while lagabouts and illegals get treated as heroes.

Only in America could a Muslim terrorist kill 13 people on a military base while yelling "Allah Akbar" and have it called "workplace violence".

Only in America would the administration leave citizens to die in a terrorist attack and blame it on a YouTube video.

Only in America would the government promote an electric car with a 40-mile range, priced so high that only the wealthy can afford it as a status symbol, and then give the same wealthy people a huge tax break for buying it.

Only in America could politicians think that making more laws will fix the fact that current laws are either ignored or simply not enforced.

Only in America can the government expect people to believe the two years' worth of emails vanished on a broken hard drive to cover up the IRS systematically targeting people it dislikes.

Only in America could people in designer clothes, drinking designer coffee while using designer laptops and smartphones, protest corporations by shitting on cop cars, burning American flags, taking all manner of drugs and raping each other in parks, and causing giant garbage mountains.

Only in America could a filthy rich politician burn holes in the ozone layer with his giant mansion and jet trips all over the world lying about global warming and extorting millions from corporations for allegedly burning holes in the ozone layer.

Only in America could a filthy rich politician dictate to grown adults in a free society how much salt or soda they can ingest.

Only in America would the wife of a politician think she can dictate to a free society what they may eat while all the while eating Wagyu beef on vacation after vacation.

Only in America, speaking of vacations, could the average citizen be unable to afford a vacation while their President spends hundreds of millions on vacations around the globe.

Only in America could we be trillions in debt while still handing out billions to every begging nation with its hands out.

Only in America could the leader of the nation boast that he'll bankrupt entire industries and cause your bills to skyrocket and receive thunderous applause on the way to the golf links.

Only in America could we send money and soldiers to every Third World backwater to solve their problems while we fail to secure our own borders.

Only in America could we demand free dope for the poor while homeless veterans grow in number every day.

We live in a country where illegals pour across the border carrying all manner of infectious diseases that doctors are warned to keep quiet about under fear of arrest while the illegals are hailed as heroes and will be given the royal treatment, but a legally-visiting South African videographer is facing arrest for flying a camera-equipped drone above a fireworks display over water in Florida.





Jos Stiglingh flew his DJI Phantom 2 drone equipped with a GoPro Hero Silver camera into the midst of a West Palm Beach, Florida fireworks display, and the resulting footage is stunning - but also illegal. While authorities are cool with disease-ridden illegals streaming across the border like ants to the picnic, they frown upon tiny unmanned remote-controlled helicopters flying through fireworks. I argue that the exclusion zone rules in effect during fireworks displays are there to keep manned aircraft from accidental harm and to keep manned boats out from underneath falling cinders. Were the drone to be downed by a firework, well no one is on it to be hurt and ostensibly there's no one below it, right? At the worst, the owner is out a few hundred bucks for a drone and camera. Where the penalty for invading the United States by crossing the border illegally is free food, housing, medical care, amnesty, three years of tax-exempt status to start a business and eventual education benefits whether you even bother to learn English or not and having everyone cater to your home culture while taking every measure to not offend you with an American flag, the penalty for violating a safety zone is a $40,000 fine and for willful violations it is a Class D felony, punishable by at least five, but no more than 10 years in prison.



What the hell happened, America?  Detroit was once the world's richest city and is now America's first Third World city. We lose more Americans in Chicago on an average weekend to homicides than we do in Afghanistan. We used to be The Land of the Free and Home of the Brave. Now we're The Land of the Sheep and Home of the Slaves.


But who cares? Just keep the free stuff coming from Washington.

Below is the entire text of the Declaration of Independence. I'm sure you'll find a plethora of parallels to modern times and today's tyrants in Washington to those grievances of yore.



IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. 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.

Big tip of the hat to the crew at Tea Party News for the inspiration.

Oh, it's the Fourth of July?

Well, here we are at the July 4^th holiday.

Sadly, I’m just not feeling it this year.

When I was a kid, the Fourth was a big deal. My mom’s family really embraced it, a family of immigrants from Canada living in the suburbs around the nation’s capital. We got together as a family, we cooked out, we waved flags, and we either climbed on the roof to watch fireworks or went to one of the local displays. We celebrated the freedom of being in America, of the opportunities afforded our family when they moved down from Toronto 9 years before I was born.

Nowadays, though, things are different. 

I’m still a proud American, a veteran of the United States Army, but the Fourth just doesn’t feel the same to me.

This year, I feel the proud nation I grew up in is teetering on the brink of collapse. What happened to the country I grew up in, the country I defended, the country that two of my uncles fought for during the Vietnam era in the Army without being American citizens, the country that sheltered and took in my Polish ancestors on my father’s side in 1913, with my grandfather (the last-born child) being the first of the family born in America and who served her during WW2, the country my stepfather served for 24 years as an officer in the US Navy? Where did it go?

Our country is so far in debt to communist China that our unborn grandkids owe money. Our economy is shredded.

Our so-called President, rather than uphold the Constitution and defend our borders, instead panders to a Latino minority by circumventing the law and granting blanket amnesty to a huge multitude of illegal immigrants. 

The Injustice Department sold guns to Mexican drug cartels and caused untold numbers of deaths, including the death of US Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, and then lied about it. When the US House of Representatives found Attorney General Eric Holder in Contempt of Congress, I was absolutely DISGUSTED that the Congressional Black Caucus played the race card and said they would walk out in protest over whitey daring to say boo to a black man, because if you dare to disagree with the Obama Dictatorship you’re a racist. Holder scurried under his master’s skirts and won’t be prosecuted because the Dear Leader has claimed Executive Privilege.

The Supreme Court of the United States, an august body that I once admired, is populated by progressive liberals who upheld Obamacare as not only constitutional but as a justifiable tax, setting the precedent that yes, Congress can force you to buy whatever it deems you must have, a move that will bankrupt the health insurance industry and small businesses trying to get by.  The bulk of the costs of Obamacare, 75%, falls on those making less than $120,000 a year. 

The court then further dishonored itself by striking down the main crux of The Stolen Valor Act that sought to punish those who falsely wear medals they didn’t earn and claim to have military records far & above what they attained, if they attained any whatsoever at all. According to the Court, it’s okay to lie about your service because it’s Freedom of Speech, protected by the First Amendment, just like burning the US flag or taking a dump on the Constitution.

The government can now force religions to go against their tenets and make them pay for contraceptives they don’t believe in. And, thanks to special loopholes in Obamacare , we now live in a country that taxes citizens differently depending on their religion. How? Mainstream Protestants, Catholics, Jews, and even non-religious Atheists will now be taxed at a higher rate than Muslims, the Amish, Scientologists, or Christian Scientists. This is because the "tax" (i.e.: penalty) for not buying health insurance does not apply to:
*Muslims
*Amish
*Scientologists
*Christian Scientists

No such exemption exists for those of other religions.

I don’t recall in the past being inundated with ads for July 4^th sales the way that I have this year. However, like other patriotic holidays like Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day, the true meaning is lost as desperate companies scrambling to stay afloat beg you to come spend your holiday not with family and not in quiet reflection giving thanks for this great nation and those who serve her, but spend it instead buying a new bed, couch, or a car from Government Motors.

Fireworks? In Depoe Bay, Oregon, the town buckled under FEDERAL pressure to cancel their fireworks because the noise might disturb wildlife. The Feds cancelled the Fourth.

The Injustice Department strikes down the law in states like South Carolina that requires you to have a photo ID to vote, claiming that it disenfranchises minorities, but those same people need an ID to drive, cash a check, buy a beer, or get on a plane…this corrupt government wants every citizen to prove they have health insurance without having to prove they are even a citizen to vote.

We live in a Welfare State that rewards the Leech Class while killing the Free Market, Capitalism, Private Industry, and hard-working Americans like me. A record of 8,733,461 workers took federal disability insurance payments in June 2012, according to the Social Security Administration. That was up from 8,707,185 in May. That, friends, exceeds the entire population of New York City which according to the Census Bureau's latest estimate hit 8,244,910 in July 2011.

Enjoy your food stamps, welfare checks, free cell phones, Medicaid, and Section 8 houses tomorrow on the Fourth, Leech Class…and make sure you have a big cookout on my dime, and with the money you didn’t have to spend on the food, enjoy your iPhone and lottery tickets and make sure you stock up on beers and blunts to fill with weed. Nothing says Happy Birthday, America like Mexican pot and free food.

Meanwhile, both my wife and I will be working yet another holiday. I think we have had one July 4^th together in the past 7 years.


With the Declaration of Independence adopted on July 4^th, 1776, our Founding Fathers faced a rebellion against a corrupt and tyrannical government that was out of touch with Americans. Take some time this July Fourth to contemplate your freedom and this great nation, remember those who have fought and bled and died to preserve it and defended the Constitution against enemies both foreign AND domestic, and commit yourself to rebuilding America, and steel yourself for the upcoming elections.

It’s time for Americans to TAKE BACK AMERICA.

The Annual Post-Fourth Roundup

As I do every year, it’s time for my annual Post Fourth of July Roundup. Why do I do this? Because every year I see a lot of people who have absolutely no business dicking around with fireworks doing so.

I live in a state where fireworks are legal, and sold in stores statewide all year long. In my town of just about 6500 people, I have two or three large, permanent stores damn near the size of a Dollar General that sell pyro to anyone and everyone who can fog a mirror and wave a dollar bill. And for the two weeks prior to the Fourth, roadside stands made from semi-trailer cargo containers pop up like weeds. Nothing says HOLIDAYS like buying explosives from a ramshackle hut staffed by what looks to be retired carnival workers like some Beirut arms bazaar.

Right here in my town....and yeah, they have a website no less.


I grew up in states where the most you could get was maybe a few firecrackers and some sparklers, and even then it was only around the Fourth. Here in SC, it’s common to buy them all year long, but most especially at July 4th and New Year’s. Instead of a few whoops and cheers, or maybe banging a wooden spoon on a saucepan to make noise to ring in the new year, my neighbors fire off a barrage of explosives that make my neighborhood look like Baghdad on opening night of Desert Storm. And then they continue to do so…all night…and for a few nights thereafter, causing my dogs endless grief.


When I was stationed in Kansas, about a week to ten days prior to the Fourth, we’d see the stands spring up like mushrooms after a rain, and we did what bored 21-year old kids with extra money did: we bought assloads of fireworks and whatever we didn’t fire off on the holiday we shot off, usually at each other and oft times down the hallways of the barracks. It was nothing for us to toss a lit brick of firecrackers under a guy’s door at 3AM for shits & giggles. Mature, responsible military policemen indeed.


Anyways, I guess I feel guilty for having been so reckless with stuff that’d blow off fingers with ease, and so every year I bring a little attention to the dangers of the pretty things that go boom.

In Ocracoke, NC, four workers unloading fireworks in preparation for that night’s show were killed when the whole shebang exploded at once. Dock master Robert Raborn noticed the workers unloading the truck from the Anchorage Marina about 200 yards away. He heard the explosion, which he described as one of the loudest things he has ever heard, then turned to see what happened.

"It was like 40 minutes worth of fireworks going off in four seconds," Raborn said.

In Youngstown, Ohio, Mercer County dispatchers reported that emergency workers took one person to the hospital by helicopter from a fireworks accident that occurred a little before 11 p.m. Saturday. The accident also caused the house where the accident took place to catch on fire, a dispatcher said. No other information was available.

In Quakertown, Pennsylvania, a man was killed Saturday after an accident during a fireworks show at the town’s Memorial Park. Police Chief Scott McElree said "some kind of explosion" occurred as the show’s grand finale was starting and authorities immediately halted the show and evacuated part of the park. The 40-year-old man was taken to St. Luke's Hospital with head injuries, officials said. The man was pronounced dead at the hospital shortly after the blast.

In Arthur, Illinois, some people attending a large fireworks display on Saturday night suffered minor burns when a shell misfired, Arthur fireworks commissioner Mark Jones said Monday.

Now, those accidents are bad enough, and they involved professionals who are used to handling pyro daily. The ones that really cause me to shake my head are the ones involving rank amateurs or kids doing dumb shit. Leave the fireworks to professionals…jeez.

In Bennettsville, North Carolina, two kids were burned when their father was lighting off a home-grown display when one of the rockets misfired towards the house, landing in a BUCKET of fireworks on the porch. Kids were on said porch. The six-year old girl has second-degree burns, and her four got a minor burn on his shoulder. Both are recovering at the Augusta Burn Center in Georgia.\
And worse still, right here in South Carolina, fifteen year old Ryan Stancell has lost his hand and most likely have to have both legs amputated after a fireworks accident Thursday night.

He is currently at Greenville Memorial Hospital with severe burns on his chest and will need skin grafts, according to his mother. She said they do think he will survive.

Neighbor Perry Oakley said he felt the shock inside his house when the explosive went off, and ran to help.

“I was completely shocked out, “said Oakley. “There was a nurse at the end of the road and if it wasn’t for her, I don’t know what the kid would have done. She got us to take our belts off and create tourniquets for him. “

Oakley said even more shocking, the explosion was caused by sparklers.
“It was a sparkler. Those are $.25 a box and most people would never think that would cause the damage that it was capable of, “said Oakley.

The Anderson County Sheriff’s Office said there were possibly more than 100 sparklers gathered together, creating what’s called a sparkler bomb. It creates tremendous explosive power, according to the Anderson County Fire Chief.
“Anytime you alter a firework and use it for anything it’s not supposed to be used for, it’s a recipe for disaster. “

The fire chief says the investigation is still open and charges could be filed, because it is against the law to alter an explosive device. He says the boy was with a 21 year old at the time, and reports say that it was the adult, not the fifteen-year old, who actually lit off the device. Stancell realized the danger and was trying to extinguish the blaze when it exploded.

I checked a couple different sources and have read 100 sparklers, 144 sparklers, and up to 500 sparklers were taped together to make this redneck clusterbomb. Regardless, that’s just insane. What sort of imbecile straps a couple hundred sticks together of something whose sole purpose is to BURN, very hot and very fast, like nothing’s gonna happen?

As is usually the case, the innocent party is also the injured party. My heart goes out to those injured this year.

Look….even trained professionals can have disasters happen on their watch. The vast majority of you are not trained professionals. Many of you should not be allowed near fireworks, and some of you shouldn’t even be allowed near a book of matches. What’s worse, the frikkin’ Web is full, and I mean FULL, of instructional videos and pictures of how to make sparkler bombs.

Oh yeah, THAT looks safe. A fool and his fingers are soon parted...

Don’t end up being featured by me next year in my 2010 roundup…

July 4th, 2009

Happy Fourth, ya’ll.

For my readers outside the USA, I know today is just another Saturday, in which case I hope you have a great weekend. Party it up but be safe. For my fellow Americans, Happy Birthday! And for my fellow veterans and current service members, I salute you all, my brothers and sisters, and I salute your sacrifices and those of your families.

I am the son and grandson of immigrants, from Canada, Poland, and Wales, with roots further back in England and Scotland. I am the product of people who came here looking for a better life than what they left behind. I am also one in a long, long line of soldiers and sailors and airmen (I actually don’t have any Marines in my lineage to my knowledge, but my oldest friend in the world is a former Devil Dog so that covers that).

My great great-grandfather, circa 1900

My great grandfather, second from right, in the 1930's

My grandfather, circa 1940

My folks in King's Bay, GA in 1988

Me in Germany, early 1989

I made my decision to enlist in the Army on July 4th, 1987. Four days later, I signed on the dotted line, and left for basic in January 1988.

Having traveled outside my own borders and lived overseas, I am keenly aware that while I feel that I live in a great nation and there’s nowhere else I’d really rather be, there is indeed more to this world than the United States, and the world does not revolve around us. I am, however, proud of how we as Americans band together to help those around the globe who need us.


Be safe. Be happy. Be proud of where you live and who we are.

Be free.

The annual post-Fourth of July roundup

Ah…so Friday was the Fourth of July. I worked a regular shift, up at 2:30 AM and home at about 2:00 in the afternoon. Crystal, my wife, had to work last night, from 11:00 PM to 7:00 AM this morning. Needless to say, we didn’t get to go to the Charleston waterfront for the fireworks display launched off the deck of the USS Yorktown at Patriot’s Point. Our town of Walterboro only bothers with fireworks for the opening night of the annual Colleton County Rice Festival in April.

Have no fear, though, because this is South Carolina, and if there’s one thing you can count on in semi-rural SC, it’s that your neighbors will keep you up half the night setting off their own displays, usually after spending the day partaking of adult libations. Much the same way that mushrooms crop up in your yard after a drenching rain, the first couple weeks after the summer solstice sees the blooming of that most ubiquitous of Carolina growths, the roadside fireworks stand. These seem to crop up on almost every intersection along the major thoroughfares, and in the outer boundaries of most Wal-Mart parking lots, in addition to the permanent year-round stands almost always co-located with an off-ramp to the I-95 to sell to the tourists from states that don’t allow fireworks. Here in Walterboro we have at least three full-year shops, and I saw a good half-dozen roadside stands crop up in the past two weeks.

You see, here in South Carolina, we encourage people to play with explosives in their yards. The Post & Courier, our local newspaper in Charleston, went so far as to print an article that told the readers what the best & worst fireworks to buy are. It’s good to know that in the caveat emptor world of home-grown explosives that the local newsies are on top of suggesting quality goods.

Ironically, despite the abundance (Or maybe because of it) of pyrotechnics available locally we don’t really hear about big fireworks accidents here in the Lowcountry. Conversely, it’s generally in the states where fireworks aren’t legal where we hear of the horrific tragedies, like the ones I reported last year at this same time:

http://mojosteve.blogspot.com/2007/07/post-july-4th-update.html

And, of course, there’s already stories out from Friday night’s debacles…

Police in Riverside, Ohio, said a man lost part of his leg when fireworks went off inside his parked sport-utility vehicle, blowing the windows out.

A 6-year-old girl in Bayville, N.Y., suffered second-degree burns when fireworks landed in her lap, police said. Investigators said it wasn't immediately clear who launched the fireworks but said the child wasn't at a public pyrotechnics display.

A 3-year-old boy in Leominster, Mass., suffered serious burns after his father shot off fireworks that went awry, authorities said. The 37-year-old man will probably be charged with illegal possession of fireworks, police said.

In Port Huron, Michigan a 51-year-old man was critically injured when he was struck in face by a mortar-type firework, the St. Clair County sheriff's department said. Officers said the man was placing the firework in a tube when it ignited.

A Fourth of July fireworks shell misfired in the northern Iowa town of Charles City, sending a fireball skidding down a street into a crowd of spectators and injuring 37 people. Most of the people treated after the Friday night accident in Charles City suffered minor injuries, a spokesman said. It appears there was a misfire involving 13 racks of firework tubes during the finale of the city-sponsored show said Saturday.

Charles City, Iowa, picture by Ryan Kronberg

And at Jones Beach, the popular state park near New York, a bunch of unexploded shells from Friday night’s displays started to wash up on the beach. Roughly 2,000 visitors were told to leave the beach immediately after the seaborne shells began turning up around midday Saturday. The beach was to remain closed until sunrise Sunday as authorities continued searching for any remaining fireworks. The shells apparently stemmed from Friday night's show, launched from an offshore barge, but the company that put on the show said that all of their shells had been accounted for.

And if you still doubt that fireworks will seriously Eff your day up, go do a google image search on firecrackers...there's a couple of rather grotesque pictures there...


Hey look! An x-ray of a fireworks accident!

The Post-July 4th Update

Sure enough, kids, verily I predicted the July 4th tragedies that I read about in the news after the holiday week. I hate to say I told you so, but hey, I did. And I hate to make light of other people’s misfortunes, but this shit is simply inexcusable.

In Lubbock Texas, a 2-year old girl died from burns over 50% of her body after she poured gasoline on herself and was set ablaze by an ember from a sibling’s sparkler. Officials ruled the death an accident, but where the fuck were the ostensibly responsible adults who should have been supervising the kids and keeping toddlers from dousing themselves in gasoline? That’s not an accident; it’s tragic negligence.

In Portland, Oregon another toddler was hospitalized after she was burned by errant fireworks late. The 2-year-old girl's face, abdomen and legs were burned after fireworks struck her and ignited her pajamas. She was playing in her yard in the suburb of Medford at about 9:45 p.m. Wednesday when the fireworks struck her. Fireworks are illegal in Medford, by the way.

And in the Detroit suburb of Melvindale, Michigan, a powerful firework exploded in the face of a woman trying to set it off, killing her as her fiance and 8-year-old son watched. Danialle Barse, 27, was unfamiliar with the commercial-grade aerial firework she was using Monday night, said police.

Barse and another woman were trying to set off a 3-inch mortar bomb in the parking lot of the car wash where Barse worked when it went off as she had her head over it. One round hit her, while the other 25 mortars continued to explode in sequence, keeping rescuers at bay. No one at the car wash had permission for a fireworks display. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was investigating where the commercial-grade fireworks came from.

Three inches is approxmatey 76 millimeters. The grenade launcher I had mounted under my M-16 in the Army was 40 millimeters in caliber. Light mortars carried by Army airborne and Marine Corps infantry units are 60 millimeters. The main gun on most World War Two tanks was 75 millimeters. What in the hell are average Joe Blow citizens doing with a 76 millimeter, 25-round launcher in the suburbs? Getting killed, that’s what.

Saddam was stockpiling sparklers.....

As another July 4th holiday approaches, in the midst of taking our freedom for granted, feeding our obesity at picnics and sending all our money to China via Fourth of July sales at Wal-Mart, thoughts often turn to celebratory fireworks.

I grew up in the Maryland burbs where you couldn’t buy your own fireworks easily, nor did you really need to. You went out in the yard or up on the roof and watched the displays in nearby College Park or as far away as DC itself. I guess I grew up a little spoiled by easy access to massive holiday fireworks displays. And while we didn’t shoot off our own in the yard, we always managed to have a few sparklers around on the Fourth. Like any normal kid, we’d run around to and fro with our hands waving our little torches, and we thought it was just the coolest shit imaginable.

When I was in the Army, one of the few cool things about being stationed out at Fort Riley, Kansas was the fact the fireworks were legal for purchase the week before the Fourth. When you’re that far removed from big towns and cities with displays, you end up making your own, though the base itself put on a pretty nice show and invited all the locals to attend. Being mature, responsible Military Policemen, we’d all pool together a couple hundred bucks and buy a massive stockpile of pyrotechnics like we were Guy Fawkes blowing up Parliament. We’d semi-illegally set off about half our stash on the Fourth and then cache the rest like the Viet Cong, breaking it out to do stupid shit like tossing smoke bombs into the gate shacks, bottle rocket fights in the hallways of the barracks, and tossing lit bricks of 250 firecrackers under your buddy’s door at 3 AM. Bear in mind, these were pre-WW2 wooden tinderboxes we were living in that would ignite at the slightest spark. Mature & responsible indeed; that was us.

Now I live in South Carolina, where fireworks stands and full-blown warehouse stores are running neck and neck with Starbucks for command of every street corner. Some of these stores are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so if you get a sudden craving to light off a display at 1AM to celebrate Sweden’s National Waffle Day on March 25th, you can. Someone will gladly accommodate you, right of any exit on I-95, where any mook from the Jersey burbs can buy a box of Black Cats and later get arrested by Newark’s Finest.

The other sure thing that’s become synonymous with July Fourth is the annual litany of well-meaning but trite news blurbs on local as well as national TV about the dangers of fireworks. I’m 38, and I know that for at least 30 of those years I’ve had to watch some poor mannequin get its fingers blown off by an M-80, and slabs of beef get scorched by Roman candles. Horror stories of disasters and tragedies will be used to frighten and dissuade the masses from enjoying fireworks in their yards. The latest report I caught had some whining ninny railing against kids using sparklers because, according to this pundit, sparklers burn at the same temperature as electric arc-welders. Who’da thunk it? Sparklers are the WMD’s.

I’m not saying that these warnings are useless, though. Each year, drunken fruitcakes across the land, including here in the Deep South, utter those immortal words “Hold my beer while I get the matches”, and end up a side note on the evening news. And a couple days ago a 9-year old kid in Maryland was burned when his pants caught fire after he put a lit sparkler in his pocket. Yes….he put a burning stick in his pocket. Someone pissed in the gene pool, methinks. Most kids figure out before age 9 that flaming objects and pants pockets don’t mix. Keep an eye on this kid; he’ll end up in the White House for sure.