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FernieBee Star Player
Joined: 17 Nov 2003 Posts: 8033 Location: 921SD
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Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2021 10:16 am Post subject: Happy 4th of July |
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I am grilling today and tomorrow, so my holiday celebration is starting a day early.
Here's hoping all of you, no matter our similarities or differences, have a nice holiday weekend.
_________________ Garvey, Lopes, Cey, Russell |
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jodeke Retired Number
Joined: 17 Nov 2007 Posts: 67998 Location: In a world where admitting to not knowing something is considered a great way to learn.
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Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2021 12:56 pm Post subject: |
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Happy 4th to the country. My independence day was/is Juneteenth. _________________ Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.
America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves. |
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angrypuppy Retired Number
Joined: 13 Apr 2001 Posts: 32768
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Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 12:22 pm Post subject: |
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It's kind of a big deal out here in New England, as this is the birthplace of the rebellion that brought independence from England. Those required US History courses in both high school and college never put the War of Independence into perspective. A few factoids:
1. The war itself was really a continuation of the Seven Years War. In our history books we give you a blurb on the French and Indian Wars, but that's just our provincial perspective. Following the Seven Years War (and our French and Indian Wars) there was an ongoing cold war between England and France. Even before France recognized the colonies as a nation, they were supplying (not so) covert military aid.
2. A fair number of Hessians didn't want to serve. Desertions led our first German settlers. Ditto with some regulars in the British army. It makes me wonder if some were just using the war as a free ticket to a new land.
3. It started as skirmishes that were unnecessary, but England decided to flex it's military muscle which exacerbated tensions. Don't blame the English, our foreign policy has been over-reactive as well in recent years.
4. The Brits did a good job of leveraging Native Americans and former slaves as both fighting and support forces. In fact the Brits were compassionate in that they fled their last stronghold in Manhattan with freed slaves. They honored their commitments.
5. There were 14 colonies, not 13. The northernmost colony did not enter into the struggle (Oh Canada!).
6. That justification you read in revisionist history about the Brit taxes being reasonable to defend the colonies is a line of crap. Defend from whom? At the first sign of trouble, the colonies appealed to France.
7. Despite the setback, the Brits made out like thieves. The war continued without American participation (I dare you to find that in our history books). Eventually the British fleet got revenge for the Battle of Chesapeake Bay by defeating the French fleet in the Caribbean. This left them with monopoly power over one leg of the triangular trade (slaves, sugar, rum).
8. The French were financially ruined bankrolling the Americans. They went heavily into debt by financing the war, and lost a major source of revenue in the Caribbean. Disregarding any notion of guns vs. butter, the nobility taxed the hell out of their commoners for the massive deficit. The commoners in turn organized their own violent revolution, which derived ideological inspiration from the the American revolution. |
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angrypuppy Retired Number
Joined: 13 Apr 2001 Posts: 32768
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Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 5:53 pm Post subject: |
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Anyway, so much for trivia. America is a noble experiment that will forever fall short of her ideals. But that's what makes us great, we pioneered a form of egalitarianism that transcended a racial phenotype. Despite the divisions, what unites us is the desire for liberty, equality and democracy. It's in our Constitution, we just have to embrace it. Happy birthday America! |
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