Hey @chicagotribune.com Editorial Board: Why did you describe me as a “bomb-throwing influencer”? This is wrong, inflammatory, and racist. Change it. www.chicagotribune.com/2026/07/05/e...

Well.. today, I made 40 meals for @projectsaucenyc.bsky.social using a recipe John and Abagail used for their Independence Day dinners. I also cooked like 50 of a Mac and cheese dish that James Hemings, the chef enslaved by Jefferson used to make.

The Posse Comitatus Act needs to be expanded to National Guard troops.

The U.S. military shot and killed an American on U.S. soil this morning

Le domaine enchanté (IV) / The enchanted domain (IV) - 1953 #artbots #magritte

There is a growing sense among Christian nationalists, says historian Kristin Kobes Du Mez, that Latter-day Saints’ voting muscle is no longer needed. The focus instead is increasingly turning to “who counts as Christian?” And for most evangelicals, “Mormons are not going to be in the fold.”

Damn you Tony, I'm in command.

Beam Trawler, the Seal - 1923 https://botfrens.com/collections/173/contents/3104648

heard some canuck was talking shit about our nation's values? i'll have you know I spent my Independence Day much like some dudes in Philadelphia did 250 years ago: arguing sometimes bitterly about how to improve our country with people i love but also kind of can't stand that's us

Great thread about Thomas Paine, the most correct man of his day, unfairly tarred at times a libertarian caricature

July 4th, 1976 - My mom and siblings preparing to go to see the fireworks in Washington, DC for America's 200th

via @newyorker.com cartoons

The smoke is thick in my neighborhood. Nitrites are at a level which will almost certainly trigger a migraine.

The fourth of July has always belonged to me, to Thomas Paine, to my patrilinial ancestor Jesse Harper, (a Revolutionary War Cavalry soldier), and to those who served in our armed forces. It never belonged to Trump or his worshippers.

"and another thing: i haven't lost the Mandate of Heaven. please don't put in the newspaper that i lost the Mandate of Heaven."

Happy 4th of July!

I can sit on my porch and see $10k in fireworks explode over the neighborhood. What I don't see is the children in the streets with firecrackers or sparklers and while I can smell the gunpowder, I don't smell the charcoal grills.

The bicentennial was a big deal. I was only nine, so maybe it's covered in nostalgia. Yet, at nine I considered myself to be an adult, and the adults who knew me ceded that ground. I was gifted. I read at a college level and followed current events. I was a mutant. I was a patriot. I still am.

Dear God, no.

Relevant 30 years later.

I was only nine at the time, but I was enough of a patriot to enjoy Hustler's Super Bicentennial Edition.

Hustler super bicentennial edition (July 1976)

Oh, give me the beat, boys, and free my soul I wanna get lost in your rock 'n' roll and drift away

No cheating, the last saved celebrity is your therapist

We need a horror movie with these characters.

A Goliath grouper swam by today (w a smaller graysby grouper in tow) to wish a Happy Birthday to the USA where it’s thankfully protected by law on the Florida Reef Tract; the 3rd longest in the world! 🫡🐟🪸🇺🇸🎆 #coralcitycamera

I actually posted about this story on my protoblog, that night.

Fourth of July 1981, I was 14 and seeing a cute blonde girl. I rode my bike to her house and we swam in her pool until just before the city fireworks were scheduled. We then walked to the Indian River and out onto a spit to watch. It was a great view and a really good time.

Sorry about that, but I really needed some July 1976 vibes.

And what's wrong with that? youtu.be/ap87QgZKTNw?...

My 50 year old afghan, my grandmother made this for the bicentennial in 1976

I remember bumming Tareytons from a girlfriend's mom.

Winston Man, 1976 https://botfrens.com/collections/19/contents/1227636

Watermelon, potato salad, hotdogs and hamburgers, ftw!

I'll never forget that NPR tweeted out the Declaration of Independence line by line on the 4th of July, and Trump's supporters flipped out thinking NPR was trashing their King. In 2017.

Your federal government is using your tax money to rescind useful advice it has long advocated for, simply because a political opponent echoed that advice. The result could be a crashed electrical grid with more dead Americans.

Debbie Harry, before she was Blondie (1968).

I'll summarize this: Mamdani asked NYers to keep air conditioning at 78 degrees. A wave criticism hit online. A MSNBC broadcast pointed out the US Department of Energy recommends that 78 degree figure. Immediately after, the US Department of Energy deleted 6,000 web pages related to energy saving.

Marisol, Love, 1962 https://botfrens.com/collections/14377/contents/1136892

Prosperity gospel mega churches are what happens when one ditches Jesus for Mammon.

And most non-denominational megachurches are just Southern Baptists with the serial numbers filed off, and the ones that aren't stealth Southern Baptists are some flavor of Pentecostal that's keeping the weirder parts of Pentecostalism on the downlow until you're in the inner circle.

I'll say this until I'm dead. The whole conservative project has been about the conversion of public spaces to private ones, ones where groups can be excluded all in the name of individual choice. And if you hear the phrase "tragedy of the commons," you know who you're talking to.

They don't know what a crucible is.

Barbarian Sacrifice by Paul Klee, 1932 https://botfrens.com/collections/212/contents/137291

Rewatching Freaks and Geeks for the umpteenth time. As an elder Gen X, it always pulls me in.

R we ded yet?

The fifties were a special time in America, when a man who stank of fish could light a woman's cigarette and immediately bring her to orgasm.

Still eating bogo French bread pizza. Cheap food, but tasty. I'll get at least 2 more meals before I run out of the sauce and pepperoni.

On one hand, it seems astounding that RFK Jr.’s anti-vax organization didn’t vet her before including her in a lawsuit against AAP, in which she claimed that vaccines killed her twins. On the other, it shows the endless capacity of anti-vaxxers to take the word of a random person over facts.