Posts on Saturday, July 4, 2026

Louis Armstrong’s Hot Fives and Hot Sevens began turning 100 last year. An epochal centennial in American music! These 70-plus tracks, laid down between 1925 and 1928, are the source of so much of what was to come and remain a delight to the ear to this day. Woody Allen said that Armstrong’s “Potato Head Blues” was one of the reasons life is worth living. “Melancholy Blues” is included on the Voyager Golden Record launched into space in 1977. Armstrong spanned the 20th century with his trumpet playing, his singing, and his warm and welcoming personality. No other jazz musician had more radio hits than Armstrong, hits heard during

Move over Sydney Sweeney: America has a new heroine perfectly fitted to the July 4 semiquincentennial today: She is Sophie Cunningham, Sophie being an adaptation of sophia, the ancient Greek word for wisdom. And sort of like Helen of Troy, our Sophie has launched a thousand memes. So as we celebrate today the sophia of our founding, let Sophie help point the way!

I’m sure you don’t, but I’ll give you one anyway. Michelle Obama has spent years selling herself as America's warm, approachable former first lady. Remember the whole “when they go low, we go high” thing? We knew then it was just an empty slogan, because whenever she had a chance to prove she’s the bigger person, she just proved the opposite. According to a Daily Mail report, Barack Obama’s wife personally torpedoed Cheryl Hines' return to the small screen when Larry David's new HBO series, Life, Larry and the Pursuit of Unhappiness: An Almost History of America, began casting. The show premiered last week. Higher Ground, the production company

Rep. Marianette Miller-Meeks, R-Iowa, is turning Hillary Clinton's most infamous phrase against her, sharply criticizing the former First Lady's suggestion that spy agency workers resist Acting Director of National Intelligence Bill Pulte and keep intelligence from him. “I’m going to use Hillary Clinton's own words: deplorable," Miller/Meeks told the Just the News, No Noise TV show on Thursday. "That is disgusting behavior from a former secretary of state, from a former first lady, from a former senator."

Over the weekend, some of Hollywood's most legendary hip-hop artists will be performing in Washington amidst the backdrop of the nation's 250th birthday, disregarding any former stigmas surrounding President Donald Trump that previously prevented such performances. One of the biggest acts of the 250 concert series on the National Mall was Thursday night, featuring multi-platinum recording artist Flo Rida, whose 2007 breakout single "Low" was number one on U.S. charts for ten weeks and broke the record for digital download sales at the time of its release. He performed to a packed-out crowd in scorching temperatures hovering around 100 degrees,

BlackRock is best known as a financial behemoth managing trillions in assets. But now the world’s largest money manager is making a different kind of bet: one on the future of American workers. The company’s new Future Builders initiative will deploy $100 million over the next five years to help train and place 50,000 skilled trades workers at a time when America is racing to scale the energy infrastructure needed to power the AI boom. “What better way to celebrate America’s 250th than to honor the men and women who actually built the country, and those who are actually going to build the infrastructure on which we all rely?”

Recently, we’ve had a lot of discussion about racial relations, and the consensus from left to right seems constant and uniform that they’re getting much worse. There were two or three iconic events this last week that emphasized that pessimism. One was the Juneteenth celebration in Chicago, which commemorated the official end of slavery in the 1860s and is now our newest national holiday. It ended up with 39 people wounded, seven dead, semiautomatic gunfire. It was almost like a war zone. The mayor of Chicago, Mayor [Brandon] Johnson, did not comment on what was the cause of this or the pathologies that would lead people to slaughter.

President Trump warned Friday that communism poses a “mortal threat” to the country during a speech at Mount Rushmore on the eve of America’s 250th birthday. “As we approach this magnificent anniversary, we see our American identity under a renewed attack,” Trump said in his remarks in South Dakota. “A generation after we fought and won the Cold War against the menace of communism, there is now a resurgence of the communist menace in our land, including from newcomers to our country who embrace ideas totally opposed to our way of life and our great success,” the president continued.

Iran saw Trump's turn-around on permission to have ballistic missiles and... must have thought, "Why not nuclear weapons too?" The goal seems to be to outlast the current US administration and then openly march toward nuclear bombs. One look at Libya and Ukraine, which gave up their nuclear weapons with catastrophic results, and then at North Korea, which did not, tells the regime everything it needs to know. A nuclear deterrent is the ultimate insurance for survival -- and expansion. This critical moment is not helped by wishful thinking. Flawed agreements, or even ones that look firm, will simply wait until the US has turned its attention somewhere else.

In this year that we celebrate 250 years since the Declaration of Independence—and the ensuing U.S. Constitution and unprecedented national prosperity—it is vital that Americans understand the evil roots of the communist movement that is seeking to supplant our nation’s birthright of liberty. The biblical account of Cain and Abel in Genesis 4 provides a profound archetype for the destructive power of envy—the emotional and spiritual engine behind revolutionary ideologies. The biblical warning remains as relevant in 2026 as it was in the beginning: rule over the sin crouching at the door, or it will rule over you.

The Trump administration is set to cut subsidies for new solar and wind power projects on Saturday. Estimates suggest the subsidies have cost taxpayers more than $141 billion over the past 16 years, more than any other energy source. The Working Families Tax Cuts, a signature piece of President Trump's tax legislation signed a year ago, set Saturday as the deadline for federal tax credit subsidies on any new solar or wind projects not currently under construction. U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Chris Wright touted the subsidy deadline and criticized solar and wind energy projects in a video posted to social media Thursday.

President Donald Trump said on Friday that he signed pardons for six people who he claims were sent to prison by the Biden administration for "fixing their car." "It is my Great Honor to have just signed Pardons for six people who were persecuted by the Biden Administration, and were in, or being sent to, prison, for “fixing their car.” While I know this sounds ridiculous, it is nevertheless a fact, and part of the Weaponization and Stupidity that our Country had to endure during four long years of Sleepy Joe Biden," Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

An Air Force major was arrested on the steps of the Capitol on Wednesday after calling for President Trump’s and Vice President Vance’s impeachments. Peaceful demonstrations are permitted on Capitol grounds, but a protester must remain alongside a member of Congress to speak openly from the steps. Originally, Air Force Maj. Jason Watson was accompanied by Rep. Al Green (D-Texas), who later left. Upon the lawmaker’s exit, Watson was directed to come off the steps or face arrest, U.S. Capitol Police told The Hill. Watson was then arrested for crowding, obstructing and incommoding, the authorities noted in a statement. “When the president of the United States orders military