I thought since we are taking a holiday this weekend that instead of just looking for a local fireworks display, that I would take the time to read the document that is the center for the celebrations this weekend. Here it is for you, taken National Archives:
In Congress, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The document is more profound for me today as I can align it with local politicking of our government. We have moved so far away from what our Founders are intended that we don’t even know it. That every grievance they filed against the King is done so and at our beck and call. Government is now Daddy and we do not take action or responsibility for ourselves under such laws. How can we blame the youth when many boomers even subscribed to this concept.
Please read this again and again. Read it till it inspires you to create a similar list of the tyrannical laws being forced on us, yes Sara just like the flock cameras watching our every move.
Have a fabulous celebration, but remember our Founders, these great strong resilient Men who had Women behind them to offer them support. But these Men took action to create a wonderous government and opportunity for generations to benefit from the world of tyranny they lived under. Let us honor them by taking the mantle and carrying it forward for the next 250 years.
God Bless these United States of America.
StephsNY retweeted
Letitia James has sent more than $54 million in taxpayer money to organizations that advocate for defunding the NYPD and a future without jails. That money should be going to help victims of crime.
As your next Attorney General, I will set it right.
StephsNY retweeted
🔥Bronx woman has a message for AG Letitia James:
“Being that you told ICE agents to get the F out of the Bronx, well, a lot of us Bronx residents feel the same way about you. We can’t wait until you get the F out of the Bronx.”
StephsNY retweeted
Yes. Kathy Hochul and Tish James were fighting for the power to throw New Yorkers into Quarantine camps! Thank God for Attorney Bobbie Anne Cox @Attorney_Cox who challenged them in court and won on behalf of all New Yorkers.
Yet another reason to head to the polls this November. We support Bruce Blakeman for Governor. @NassauExec
StephsNY retweeted
NY AG hopeful Komatireddy pulls within just 6 points of Dem incumbent Tish James after debate: bombshell poll trib.al/4oedY2W
StephsNY retweeted
⚡ 11 DAYS TO GO! ELECTION INTEGRITY IS EVERYONE'S BUSINESS.
Election integrity should never be reduced to a partisan argument.
Regardless of political affiliation, every voter has an interest in transparent procedures, accurate results, meaningful safeguards, and an electoral system worthy of public confidence.
That is the focus of our October 29 community forum.
ELECTION INTEGRITY: A Discussion with Nonpartisan Election Experts
🎤 Lulu Friesdat, Co-Founder & Executive Director of SMART Elections, joins us to share her perspective on election systems, transparency, and verification.
Come hear the discussion. Bring your questions. Learn more about the procedures behind our elections.
Important conversations deserve more than comments on social media. They deserve people in the room.
📅 Thursday, October 29, 2026
🕡 6:30 PM – 8:30 PM
📍 John Hughes Club
1305 86th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11228
🅿️ Free Parking
🎟️ REGISTER HERE:
eventbrite.com/e/election-in…
📞 718-541-5721
🌐 djtnyc.com
Fair elections. Clear procedures. Informed citizens.
StephsNY retweeted
We SO deserve her.
New York, get your head back . Go vote this woman in.
StephsNY retweeted
Excerpt from Ilhan Omar article.
Her father should never have been admitted, let alone her as a tag along.
Other countries must belly laugh at America constantly.
StephsNY retweeted
The election fraud we see today is the election fraud of the past.
As soon as it is spotted, it mutates into something else. In the old days, there was ballot stuffing. More recently, inflalated voter rolls, then tabulator fraud, then algorithmically-controlled tabulation and vote reassignment to phantom accounts.
Most recently, the capacity poll pads have for creating totally invisible alterations to elections was revealed.
The age of AI will be next to impossible to keep up with, if not completely impossible.
The problem is less that these methods exist, than that there are people who create and want to use them.
Election fraud has this in common with gun violence, the people who use guns to commit crimes are the real issue, not the guns themselves.
In America today, too many officials turn a blind eye to fraud, very likely because they are themselves compromised by it. Those people must have their authorities stripped. They should be replaced by honest stewards. That is how the problem of election fraud is solved.
StephsNY retweeted
The insanity of our elected officials, on full display.
On October 15, Mayor @ZohranKMamdani, @SenSchumer, @SenGillibrand,
Leader @RepJeffries, nine New York members of Congress including @AOC and Jerry Nadler, and NYC Comptroller @MarkLevineNYC signed a letter urging private garage owners to deny space to federal law enforcement agents.
Why? Because on October 8, federal agents tried to arrest Oscar Belgal in Marble Hill: a man with a grand larceny conviction, a pending felony drug-sale charge, and, according to DHS, ties to the Trinitarios gang.
This year, federal prosecutors charged the gang's "Bad Boys 7" crew in a carjacking murder on the Cross County Parkway and a Bronx killing.
DHS says Belgal was a target of the investigation into last year's shooting of a CBP officer, and @SecMullinDHS says he has "either indirect or direct knowledge" of it.
DHS also says he rammed agents' vehicles trying to flee.
This wasn't the cook at your local restaurant.
How does shielding him make New York safer? Instead of asking why a man with a federal immigration detainer was back on our streets, these officials went after Target because agents parked in a lot it co-owns.
This is intimidation, and it puts every business owner in this city in an impossible position.
Someone should remind these elected officials that knowingly concealing or shielding someone from federal authorities is a federal crime, punishable by up to five years in prison.
How do these people keep getting elected?
StephsNY retweeted
In 2017, @andrewcuomo spent $106 million of your money on a vanity light show for seven MTA bridges, while the subway was falling apart.
The project collapsed, and $37 million in brand-new lighting fixtures got shoved into a warehouse.
Then @KathyHochul took over, and she did nothing. For four years those fixtures sat in boxes.
For four years you paid $300,000 a year to store them, more than $2.1 million in total. They went out of warranty and became obsolete.
The only reason they were ever sold is that a POLITICO reporter started asking questions.
Final sale price: $383,000!
That's a third of a penny on the dollar!
And @TomDiNapoli, the man whose job is to catch this? State law requires him to audit the Power Authority. He audited it in 2023 and again in 2025, and he never said a word about $100 million rotting in a warehouse.
Watchdog groups were demanding an investigation as far back as 2017.
Nothing happened.
Cuomo wasted it.
Hochul buried it.
DiNapoli slept through it.
It took a reporter to do the job the Comptroller gets paid to do.
In the private sector, wasting $100 million gets you fired and sued. As Comptroller, I'll audit every idle asset and every dead project, and I'll name names.
No more waste approved by Albany, ignored by Albany, and paid by you.
StephsNY retweeted
Years after the height of the pandemic, New York’s COVID-era controversies continue to raise questions about how public officials, lobbyists, contractors and government resources were handled during an unprecedented emergency.
The column revisits former Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s $5 million pandemic book deal and allegations that state resources were used in connection with the project. New York’s Attorney General’s Office confirmed in 2021 that investigators were examining allegations involving state resources and the book deal.
For New Yorkers, the concerns remain:
Ethics waivers and emergency procurement decisions deserve clear public documentation
Taxpayers need confidence that government employees and public resources are not being used for private financial interests
It illustrates why emergency government authority needs effective oversight even when officials are operating under extraordinary pressure. Post-pandemic accountability is ultimately about more than revisiting individual controversies, it is about determining whether New York’s procurement and ethics systems provided sufficient transparency when billions of public dollars were at stake.
Not shocking. Every down ballot Canddiate will separate from Kathy’s sinking ship.
Today’s cover: Long Island Dem Tom Suozzi blows off Hochul campaign event as party snubs mount trib.al/el7FYir
StephsNY retweeted
Kathy Hochul and Leticia James NYC yall.
A complete disaster.
This is why all New Yorkers need to vote Bruce Blakeman @NassauExec and Saritha @sarithaforny to fix this madness .
BREAKING: A man is dead after a shooting at the Seventh Avenue-53rd Street subway station in Midtown Manhattan, police said.
The shooting happened shortly before 12:30 p.m. Saturday on a northbound E train platform. Sources told ABC7 the man and the suspect were arguing on the platform, and the dispute spilled onto the train and back out onto the platform. Police are still investigating whether the shots were fired on the platform or on the train.
The victim, said to be in his 30s, was taken to Bellevue Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. His name has not been released.
No arrests have been announced, and police are searching for the suspect.
Uptown E trains are running on the F line between West Fourth Street and Jackson Heights-Roosevelt Avenue, and uptown C and D trains are bypassing Seventh Avenue, according to the MTA.
Video by @L2FTV | Licensing @FreedomNTV [email protected]
They. Are. Scared. Get out and VOTE !!!
A group of Democratic U.S. senators are the latest to demand that Attorney General Todd Blanche publicly pledge the Department of Justice (DOJ) won’t seize ballots or election materials during the midterms. democracydocket.com/news-ale…
StephsNY retweeted
And as this is happening NYC’s elected want to disband the NYPD’s Riot police and take away the tools and tactics required to contain this.
It’s not a matter of if this will start happening in major US cities, it’s only a matter of when.
StephsNY retweeted
🇺🇸 Your vote helps decide who makes the decisions that affect everyday life: what the government spends, how laws are enforced and which priorities receive attention. Don’t leave those choices to everyone else.
🗽 Make your plan for November 3. Review your ballot, know your candidates and support Republican leadership focused on public safety, economic opportunity and accountable government. Vote Republican down the ballot, in every race.
StephsNY retweeted
Just fight crime.
Make New York a place where every woman can feel safe walking our streets, riding the subway, and living her life.
Period.
StephsNY retweeted
Brooklyn Attorney Cheers on Military Convoy running through NY hopefully setting up for the elections. #votenyc #nycelections #electionintegrity #brooklyn



























