It’s been 250 years. 250 years of blood and stone and steel, of the frontier, from California to the moon, of farmland and towers and Hollywood. Of trains and planes and baseball. Of gold. Of silicon. Of the Ivy League. It’s been 250 years of war for freedom and for peace, and of fireworks on the Fourth of July. We built the greatest nation in history: an optimistic, idealistic empire of liberty, and abundance. But our Founders always said it was an experiment, and lately — we all feel it — the vibes are off. The United States as originally framed, instantiated in concepts of freedom, which came with a duty to, you know, improve things, is largely vanished, as half the country pushes for socialism and the other half sleepwalks through the Trump years thinking we solved all our problems with country music and giant American flags. Meanwhile, a third of the country just got here, tens of millions of whom show no interest in actually becoming American. State capacity is paralyzed in almost every national metro, and the industry holding our entire economy on its back is under threat from an increasingly bipartisan war on innovation. We have a lot to celebrate, but also a lot of work ahead of us. Franklin said we had a Republic, if we could keep it. So enjoy the weekend, and rest up. But be aware of where we are, centuries later, exactly where we started. We fight for this, or we lose everything.
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Last Tuesday, all three democratic socialist candidates backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani won their primaries in congressional races, including two upset victories over incumbent Democrats. [And another won this Tuesday in Colorado.] Their stances include abolishing ICE, supporting “gender-affirming” surgeries with taxes, and freeing Palestine, obviously. Speculators were quick to say that the establishment Democratic Party is basically over, with NYC, Seattle, D.C., and possibly LA all “falling” to libs who are either DSA-passing or explicitly actual socialists. And uh, we tend to agree with speculators. It would’ve been cool if Dems went the “abundance” route and worked hand-in-hand with tech companies to leverage tax revenue from data centers toward parks, libraries, and jobs for the poor — instead, they are going the route of the “rabid Seattle baristas,” who are even more interested in bombing the data centers than freeing Palestine, which is saying a lot. Buckle up, people. There’s about 250 reasons this country is about to get even weirder and more dramatic.
Last week, large swaths of eastern Los Angeles were blanketed in toxic smoke thanks to a fire at a warehouse in Boyle Heights, with the city government continuing to demonstrate a level of fire preparedness that would rival rubbing alcohol. Unlike the Palisades disaster, however, at least Mayor Karen Bass was in town this time ready to spring to action and JUST KIDDING! As flames began engulfing her city (again), Bass was in Chicago paying a pilgrimage to Obama’s brutalist presidential library. But hey, at least she isn’t making excuses this time and JUST KIDDING! Bass claimed the real issue here is that too many warehouses are “concentrated in black and brown communities” (??). Oh well. If only Los Angeles had a mayoral candidate this year who wanted to improve the city’s fire response… (Dear DSA: hope ballot harvesting the homeless was worth it when all of LA has the air quality of Manhattan circa September 2001).
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