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3 Things to Read This Independence Day Weekend
Happy Independence Day. Or, from Britain’s perspective, Happy Treason Day, you ungrateful colonials.
One good habit on this anniversary of our Independence is to read the actual Declaration by the Second Continental Congress, agreed to on July 2nd but announced a couple of days later. It’s not a lengthy document but is the “why” behind the “how” of the Constitution, ratified some 13 years later after our war for Independence, which I’m reminded of every time I pass by the Brandywine River a few miles west of our home.
But I suggest reading two more documents by the American patriot, Thomas Paine, who is perhaps the most interesting of our nation’s founders. British born, he came to America in 1774, and a year later, wrote the document — a pamphlet — “Common Sense” that makes the case for American independence. It’s a bit longer than the Constitution, but worth your time.
Two and a half years ago, I shared how my father acquired a cannon for holiday noisemaking and celebration in the story “
Just where does an American-based corporation and their rich, male, former jock, brand representative get off imposing history over the narrative of a woman? I had thought we were past powerful privileged men silencing, dismissing, and trivializing herstory. Yet here we are, with another patriarchal pack mansplaining a woman’s original work. The corporate leadership of Nike, following the lead of Colin Kaepernick, have branded 
