Steyn is in rare form.

"So, no, since you ask, I didn't have that Glorious a Fourth. I almost wrote about it yesterday, but was too sad to find the appropriate tone. I'm still very sad, so if you want to cut to the chase and get on with your day, the takeaway is America might as well hang a sign on its door saying, "Final Three Days! Everything Must Go!!! Ultimate Storewide Blowout!!!!!"

As readers may know, the Steyn worldwide corporate headquarters is located in Woodsville, which is part of the township of Haverhill, New Hampshire. Actually, the only reason readers would have any cause to know it at all is that an hilariously inept attack poodle called Bernie Quigley wrote in The Hill that I had no idea what the real, authentic America was like and to demonstrate the point plucked three real, authentic, entirely random American places off the map (well, two off the map and one off his LP collection) and said that Steyn would "would get a rash in real places like Tobaccoville, N.C., Haverhill, N.H. or Luckenbach, Texas".

What are the odds of that? Of all the bazillions of pinpricks on the American map, Quigly takes a blind stab and hits mine.

So, on Saturday morning, I was in Haverhill, NH working on my rash. I'd had to swing by Steyn Global HQ in Woodsville for one reason or another and got there about 9.45, and already the elderly veterans and widows and spinsters were camped out in their lawn chairs holding their miniature flags in readiness for the 11 o'clock parade. Gotta get there early and grab a good spot. But I figured I could get the work wrapped up at the office and still skedaddle back to the main drag and catch the Fourth of July observances. For decades, Woodsville has joined with Wells River across the bridge in Vermont to host one of the biggest Independence Day parades around. Between them they have a population of about 1,500, but folks come from neighboring towns because they seem to like the whole twin-state vibe. So the parade always starts in Woodsville, marches down Central Street, and over the Connecticut River into Vermont where it wraps up on Main Street, Wells River...."

"...After 240 years that's what it's come down to. Happy Independence Day! Pin the flag to your ass and Shelter in Place!..."

http://www.steynonline.com/7040/insuffic...pendent-to-hold

I love it! That's my new motto: Pin the flag to your ass and shelter in place!

One might say Mark is in a fine fettle. My favorite line, in a piece which practically calls for tears, "I quote Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Committee (sic) on Foreign Relations, and the very definition of a sober, respected, judicious paragon of torpidly conventional wisdom."