My personal 4th

If you're looking for jingoistic, feel-good happy talk, go visit someone else's blog today.

I finished Lies My Teacher Told Me by James W. Loewen this morning and immediately started reading Sundown Towns by the same author.

Nine freaking pages into Sundown Towns I came across this:

That evening in Decatur revolutionized my thinking. I now perceived that in the normal course of human events, most and perhaps all towns would not be all-white. Racial exclusion was required. "If they did not have such a policy,"observed an African American resident of Du Quoin, Illinois, about the all-white towns around Du Quoin, "surely blacks would be in them."I came to understand that he was right. "If people of color aren't around,"writes commentator Time Wise, "there's a reason, having something to do with history, and exclusion..." (#16 footnote)

Though mind-boggling to me, this insight proved hardly new. As early as 1858, before the dispersal of African Americans throughout the North prompted by the Civl War, the Wyandotte Herald in Wyandotte, in Southeastern Michigan, stated, "Wyandotte is again without a single colored inhabitant, something remarkable for a city of over 6,000 people." Even then, tThe Herald understood that a city of over 6,000 people as "remarkable"for being all-white. We shall see that a series of riots and threats was required to keep Wyandotte white over the years.

Why would these two paragraphs stand out to me?

Because I wondered about the longer history of Wyandotte, in Southeastern Michigan.


You see, I have Wyandotte blood in me.

On the other hand, being a proud, patriotic (mostly white) American, I can't help but wonder how many Iraq war veterans (that we are sending to make some rich white fucks richer) are going to hit the deck once the fireworks start tonight?

Hmmm, maybe I'll skip the fireworks, they kind of make me jumpy. Maybe I'll go see Michael Moore's Sicko, although I don't really need to, my parents are fighting with their insurance companies all the time.

Happy fucking "Independence Day" folks. At least Scooter Libby has something to celebrate

And here's a nice wrap up for today, even though I missed it a couple of days ago:

San Diego Public Schools Grapple with Muslim Prayer by: Lucas O'Connor
Mon Jul 02, 2007 at 08:44:03 AM PD

Uhhh, Lucas, isn't Hirsi Ali from Somalia?

Let me be clear. Fundamentalist Islam is not something I want invited in to my country, my city, my home. Like any form of fundamentalist religion, I flat out hate the motherfuckers.