250 Years of Freedom & Independence!

Two hundred fifty years ago today, fifty-six men then assembled in Philadelphia and representing the Thirteen Colonies unanimously approved the Declaration of Independence by which we separated ourselves from the Old World and its ways. American Independence and everything upon which it is predicated and all that it entails is one of the most radical events in human history. It is such a miraculous development that perhaps only the intervention of Divine Providence can explain it. Fifty years ago, the Old World sent its tall ships to America. Now it sends its soccer players and fans, and we welcome them. Perhaps this will give them a view of what is possible once a people and a nation break through the iron-hard bounds of the past, throw off their tyrannical governments, and embrace the rights and freedoms and dignity inherent in every individual person who has ever lived and ever will live. Today we celebrate Independence Day.

Independence Day the movie was released thirty years ago, on June 25, 1996, or the day after Flying Saucer Day. I don't know whether that release date was intended to match an anniversary. Now we have Disclosure Day, which was released in the United States on June 12, 2026, or twelve days before Flying Saucer Day. The initial showing was in Paris. Five out of the six leads are British or Irish. So we have an American movie about an American phenomenon, and yet it was first shown overseas and its actors and actresses are from lands we left behind. Curious.

Disclosure Day involves psychic powers and mind control. In other words, it is not a science fiction movie, for there isn't any science in these things. Psychic powers and mind control are, in scientific terms, nonsense. Physicists talk about all kinds of forces and brands of matter and energy supposedly at work among the stars. Some of these are propositions only. They are not known to exist. And yet they have been set forth and are discussed and considered as scientific possibilities. In contrast, no one has ever proposed a scientifically plausible means of communicating psychically, viewing remotely, moving things with the mind, or any other psychic exercise. Again, in scientific terms, these things are nonsense. In the real world, the idea of psychic powers draws charlatans, or maybe more charitably we can call them performers.

Psychic powers have been a staple in science fiction since at least the Golden Age of the 1930s through the 1950s. But they are not science, and they don't belong in proper science fiction. Call them something else if you'd like, but they're not science fiction. Write about them in some other genre, but don't call it science fiction. Use them in your movie, but don't try to pass it off as a work of science fiction. Beyond any of that, to use psychic powers in a supposed science fiction film at this late date is the equivalent of having a character wake up completely unharmed after being knocked over the head with the butt of a pistol, or, alternatively, developing amnesia from a blow to the head, or having an evil twin, or any other of the very hoary clichés and conventions from decades ago and all of the cheap melodramas of the past. These are not serious ideas. They are instead shortcuts and easy ways out for the unimaginative screenwriter. If you have every possible story to tell about aliens on Earth, why are you writing about psychic powers?

My understanding is that Disclosure Day is also about the contactee and abductee phenomena, which are among the shabbiest (re.: contactees) and saddest (re.: abductees) aspects of the flying saucer story. (In the 1950s, there was a split between those who wanted to study UFOs as a hard, physical, aerial phenomenon and others who wanted to talk about "occupants.") In one advertisement I have seen for Disclosure Day, there is an image of a crop circle. Crop circles are British. They are not part the flying saucer story in America. They really don't belong in an American movie. (That was one of the flaws in the movie Signs, from 2002.) Finally, there are conspiracy theories in Disclosure Day, theories that, in the real world, are or tend to be shabby as well.

So: two movies about two days, a positive and triumphant Independence Day and a paranoid, conspiracy-minded Disclosure Day. How things have changed in the past thirty years. But those of us who remember things from thirty years ago already knew this.

For full disclosure, I have not seen Disclosure Day. But when I heard a review on the radio and it mentioned psychic powers and mind control, I immediately turned against it in my own mind. If I could have sent a psychic message to the moviemakers, I would have. Anyway, if I get a chance, I'll watch it. Maybe it won't be so bad after all.

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Now some facts about America versus the United Kingdom, Europe, and the rest of the Old World:

A quote from: "As Summer Begins, Let’s Give Thanks For A Life-Saving American Invention: Air Conditioning" by the Issues & Insights Editorial Board, June 10, 2026, at the following URL:

https://issuesinsights.com/2026/06/10/as-summer-begins-lets-give-thanks-for-a-life-saving-american-invention-air-conditioning/

Compare the U.S. total [of heat-related deaths] to the EU [European Union], where there are regularly far more deaths from heat than in the U.S. Last year, for example, from June through September, the EU had 62,755 heat-related deaths, or 26 times more than the U.S. in 2024. Here’s another shocking statistic: The EU heat-death total is more than total U.S. deaths annually from gun violence (44,447 for all of 2024).

In other words, Europe sacrifices its people in order to propitiate the gods of global warming. Meanwhile, we in America fend off so many heat-related deaths by comporting ourselves with reality. In Europe, people die for the sake of what European elites call progress. In America, people live and thrive by real progress.

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A quote from: "America at 250: The Greatest Compounding Machine In History" by Meb Faber, dated June 10, 2026, on the website Real Clear Markets at the following URL:

https://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2026/06/10/america_at_250_the_greatest_compounding_machine_in_history_1187441.html

Since 1800, $1 invested in U.S. equities would have grown to more than $200 million today. Over that same period, the rest of the world combined turned $1 into roughly $2 million. The gap isn't incremental; it's exponential. As Charles Ellis observed, time is Archimedes' lever in investing--and no nation has pulled that lever longer or harder than America. [Boldface added.]

Other nations have squandered their resources on war, attempts at empire-building, schemes of social engineering, the creation and maintenance, such as it is, of welfare states, and various isms, including statism, globalism, internationalism, multiculturalism, and experiments in various brands of socialism and other harmful and destructive ideologies. Under socialism, the deaths and suffering of countless millions, if not billions, are considered historical necessities. They are considered necessary for our march into glorious futures. Now European governments seem determined to destroy their own nations and their own peoples by, among other things, letting in hostile invaders and welfare colonists from other lands. All of these things are also called progress. Meanwhile, Americans have built, maintained, and continuously improved upon a successful, powerful, and enduring means of generating wealth for everyone interested and of raising countless millions, if not billions, out of poverty. You're welcome, Europe and the World.

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According to various sources: the per capita gross domestic product (GDP) of Alabama is greater than that of Canada.

According to various other sources: the per capita GDP of Mississippi is greater than that of the United Kingdom. In other words, if the United Kingdom were a state, it would rank 51st in per capita GDP.

According to the World Bank and the United Nations: the per capita GDP of West Virginia is greater than that of Germany.

In other words, three of our southern states (if West Virginia is a southern state), which our elites tell us are full of backward and ignorant people, are outperforming three of the world's supposedly great economies on a per capita basis. I think we can lay the blame once again at the feet of socialists and other progressives, but there are plenty of others to blame, too, including global warmists and, in the Venn diagram of progressivism, the overlapping globalists who prefer foreign invaders and colonists from afar--especially members of the religion of pieces--to their own people. They try to shed blame, of course. To them, these things are also known as progress.

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Finally, according to various sources: the fifth leading cause of death in Canada is assisted suicide, or state-sponsored euthanasia, in other words, murder.

The United States has invaded Canada twice in hopes of bringing that British-oid nation into the fold of American freedom. Both times they sent us packing. But we don't want them now if they're going to remain in the business of murdering their own people, who can no longer be considered citizens but instead have been reduced to serfs, or something even lower than that in the great chain of being. Call them instead livestock. One explanation for this kind of thing is that a suicidal nation will encourage suicide in its people.

I said we don't want them, but I guess we'll take Alberta if that comes about.

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Thank God and thank the Founding Fathers and all of the Patriots of the Revolutionary Era that we separated ourselves from the madness, murder, tyranny, and oppression of Great Britain, Europe, and their now worldwide ideological satellites. Once again, America, the Empire of Liberty, stands alone. And still we will stand, I hope for hundreds of more years to come, for as long as we remain the indispensable nation and dedicated to the propositions stated so profoundly and eloquently in our Declaration of Independence.

Astounding Science-Fiction, July 1942, with cover art by Charles de Feo (1891-1978).

Happy Independence Day, America!

Original text copyright 2026 Terence E. Hanley