In July 2016 President Obama established America250, as a nonpartisan, non profit 250th anniversary commission. Congress gave it 150 million to organize it in communities in all 50 states. Trump gutted America250 in favor of his newly created and for profit entity, Freedom 250, then diverted $125 million of America250’s funding, probably all that was left by then, into it. This is essentially why the entire thing’s become a shitshow.

Something to pay attention to is this isn’t just about the way he trashed the celebration in Washington DC, but also how he’s trashed all the state and local celebrations because he stole the money to pay for their organizing.

This is what Donald Trump does. This is what he has always done. But he didn’t do it all by himself either.

There’s the American right wing white supremacist evangelicals, like Franklin Graham, who went all in for Donald Trump because he was cut from the same cloth as them.

There’s the ersatz conservatives who went all in for Donald Trump because he was cut from the same cloth as them.

There’s the tech bros who went all in for Donald Trump because he was cut from the same cloth as them.

And of course the American fascists who went all in for Donald Trump because he was cut from the same cloth as them.

And the pure as the driven snow Left that won’t vote strategically to keep the fascists, the white supremacists, and other hate mongers out of government, because that would mean casting a vote for someone who isn’t as pure as they are.

None of these are hard categories. There’s a lot of bleed between them. They amount to maybe a third of the American voting population, total. But there’s another third who have even less excuse morally. Those I have just described are at least honest, somewhat, in their hatreds, their arrogance, and proud of their moral squalor. They may hide behind a religion, they may excuse themselves on the grounds of some half-baked Randian, technocrat, or leftist political morality and/or philosophy. But they stand openly on their ground. They are proudly what they are. The other third I mention are the totally clueless, the Can’t Be Bothered, who routinely walk away from the task of citizen participation in their own democratic government, and allow themselves to be manipulated by anyone and anything that catches their attention before election day. The ones who think politics is boring. The ones who excuse themselves on the grounds that their vote wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Both these groups brought us to this bleak place. But the clueless are the worse offenders because they never cared one way or the other so long as their own lives remained untouched. They are the ones Dante spoke of as the neutrals Heaven does not want, and Hell will not have. And I would hope if this really is the end of the American Experiment, it is their names on the roll call of the damned, ahead of all the others. The first would have never thought to stop this because they wanted it, while the last could have but couldn’t be bothered. And they’ll be the ones complaining the loudest when it all comes crashing down, and pointing their fingers everywhere but at themselves.

Full story of how the 250th anniversary turned into a shitshow follows, from Facebook user “Top Disney”…

How the current President ruined July 4th and an historic anniversary in just over a year due to narcissism and delusions of grandeur.

Disney’s 2026 Semiquincentennial celebrations of the United States aren’t going to have the same pop as they did for the Bicentennial in 1976, and here’s one of the main reasons why.

On July 4, 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed a joint bipartisan resolution from Congress establishing the non profit American Revolution Bicentennial Commission to organize national events for 1976, a full decade away.

His successors in office, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, left the commission alone to do their work, and the result was a year long 200th birthday celebration that people still talk about.

President Barack Obama, following the example of LBJ, signed a resolution establishing America250, in July, 2016.

America 250 was also a nonpartisan, non profit commission, and they got right to work.

Their initial project was reaching out to Americans in all 50 states to record or write their own American life stories, which would be collected, preserved and shared during the Semiquincentennial celebrations in 2026.

Many of these family and individual stories would be from those whose ethnicities, faiths, cultures and groups were traditionally marginalized throughout American history.

The plans also called for kicking things into high gear in 2025, with party planners across the country coordinating with America250 on the best way to have celebrations large and small that included everyone.

That’s the way it was done in 1975, getting communities and their local representatives and media excited a year before, creating a groundswell of red, white and blue leading up to July 4, 1976 with little to no cost to organizers.

Congress allocated $150 million to America250 for that purpose.

And then….

In January, 2025, America250 was essentially gutted, in favor of a newly created for profit entity called Freedom 250.

$125 million of America250’s funding was immediately diverted into Freedom 250, which was also known as “The White House Task Force on Celebrating America’s 250th Birthday.”

Also added in to the new for profit commission were the instructions that the name of the President of the United States and his picture be added to all public materials connected with Freedom 250’s celebrations.

No other President requested that before for any public July 4th celebrations, as the aim was to keep them nonpartisan and more about the nation as a whole rather than one person or party.

Freedom 250 also did something else that America250 did not.

They set up licensing and branding deals and merchandise for profit with groups like the UFC, where the funds would go to undisclosed accounts and not the U.S. treasury.

Some of the President’s family and cabinet members were also given sweetheart deals for their companies, like crypto currency brokerages, that will bring them enormous profits.

The America250 idea of collecting and sharing individual stories and connecting with local communities to generate interest and excitement was scrapped in favor of Freedom 250’s events like a UFC match, a Grand Prix, a military parade and a “National State Fair” all to be held in Washington D.C.

While some events are still happening in cities big and small around the country, they are muted, as is enthusiasm for our 250th.

It’s hard to recreate such a massive success as the 1976 Bicentennial, but when you tinker with funding and programming at the last minute, it makes it even more of an uphill climb.