Everytime you think that an American national holiday might have passed in peace, you find out that America's most famous faux-historian Howard Zinn showed up just in time to — paraphrasing Hunter Thompson — piss down everybody's throats.
On this July 4, we would do well to renounce nationalism and all its symbols: its flags, its pledges of allegiance, its anthems, its insistence in song that God must single out America to be blessed.
Is not nationalism — that devotion to a flag, an anthem, a boundary so fierce it engenders mass murder — one of the great evils of our time, along with racism, along with religious hatred?
Well, no. The great evil of the 20th century was atheistic totalitarian collectivism, of which Zinn has been a lifelong supporter. I believe the body count is now upwards of 100 million and likely to climb if the likes of Hugo Chavez get their way. The great evil of the 21st century, on the other hand, seems to be shaping up to be totalitarian theocratic collectivism.