MONDAY, JULY 6, 2026
Jeffrey Rosen's concern: Yesterday, we tried to click our way through the sitting president's speech.
(You can start by clicking here.)
We refer to his rain-delayed public address of July 4th of this year. Due to the lightning the gods sent down, he wasn't able to start until 11:16 p.m. local Washington D.C. time. When he finally started to speak, the sometimes-invaluable Rev lets us see that he started by saying this:
PRESIDENT TRUMP (7/4/26): Good evening, America! You think that was easy? It wasn't.
AUDIENCE: Applause
The president was referring to the chaos of the rain delay. Then, as he proceeded, he tossed out a number--a number he may have made up:
PRESIDENT TRUMP (continuing directly): And I want to thank everybody because they did the right thing...
And they estimated they had 375,000 people before everybody had to leave. And they now have 150,000 people. It's the craziest thing anyone's ever seen. At least!
When the president describes some alleged accomplishment or some event, the accomplishment is routinely said to be something "no one has ever seen before." An invented number will often be present, perhaps to be embellished at some later date.
The initial number may be replaced by an even larger number! And so it went on this occasion, as Mediaite reports:
‘422,000 People!’ Trump Makes Wild Claim About Crowd Size at His July 4 Event
On Sunday, President Donald Trump revised his initial claim that 375,000 people gathered for the America 250 celebration on the National Mall before the crowd was forced to evacuate due to weather.
“We’re here, we’re here, we’re here. There’s no way we can be deterred. They estimated they had 375,000 people before everybody had to leave and they now have 150,000 people. It’s the craziest thing anyone’s ever seen,” Trump said during his speech that began after 11 p.m. Saturday.
Trump revised that [first] number upward on Truth Social Sunday afternoon.
“The Crowd at 7:05 in the evening was 422,000 people! All were forced to leave because of the weather, the event was cancelled, and everyone was gone because of lightning,” Trump wrote.
By now, the initial crowd was said to be substantially larger. To peruse the Truth Social post, you can just click here.
Back in real time, back in the actual speech on Saturday night, astounding flattery of us the people quickly began after that. He was flattering us the American people. Here's how the fluffing began:
PRESIDENT TRUMP (continuing directly from above): And I want to just thank you, and I feel so badly about some people they left, and they couldn't get back.
But you're very special people, and we have a very special country. Thank you very much.
Those who stayed were "very special people." That's how the fawning began.
That might have seemed like a sensible word of thanks directed at loyal followers. But as the president's speech continued, the delusional flattery grew.
By the time it was 11:18, the president was saying this:
PRESIDENT TRUMP: For two and a half centuries, our American Republic has stood as the crowning achievement of human history...And we're doing better now than we've ever done before.
No people have done more good, shown more courage, made more progress, righted more injustice or achieved more greatness than you, the American people. For 250 years, the United States of America has been the hope, the promise, the light, and the glory among all of the nations of the world.
All over the world, they try and be like us. Nobody can be like us. And with God's help, we will always be this, or even better.
Nobody can be [as good as] us, the president had now said. Later, on several occasions, he traveled that road again:
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Americans must never forget that we are a historic and heroic people with a heroic spirit and a heroic purpose on this beautiful earth of ours.
We are made of the courage and the fire and the flesh and the blood of the best and the bravest people this world has ever produced. We are the bravest and the best.
Tonight we pledge allegiance to the flag they gave us, and we say, "God bless the immortal patriots of 1776 and long live the cause of independence." May it reign forever and ever and ever. We will always be on top. We will never let our country fall. We will always be the best.
"We will always be the best," the president said. As he continued, he turned to this:
PRESIDENT TRUMP (continuing directly): Our founders not only won our liberty, they secured it with the most righteous political document ever conceived. It's called the Constitution of the United States. Very special.
And it's because of their genius that we remain the finest people on the planet after 250 years.
We're the finest people on the planet! So this severely challenged, disordered person now said.
The people who stayed to watch the speech heard themselves praised in such ways. Much later, the president added the strangest claim he's ever made--the strangest in a fifteen-year public career of extremely strange public assertions:
PRESIDENT TRUMP: After two and a half centuries, this American republic still stands tall and strong and we love each other.
Say what? Do we the people love each other? American citizens, please!
As you can see by clicking this link, we love each other so much that this very same sitting president did this the very next day:
Trump also posted a doctored picture of ex-President Barack Obama and ex-First Lady Michelle Obama boarding Air Force One; the pic showed “BLM” and Obama’s slogan “Yes We Can” spray painted onto the plane, as well as some Arabic writing.
Another doctored photo--and how strange! In the rendering posted by the apostle of love, Arabic writing had been spray-painted onto the side of President Obama's Air Force One!
You can see that post if you click that link. (If you do, you will also read about the latest insults the sitting president has directed at Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister.)
As we've noted, we tried to click our way through the entire July 4 address. Eventually, what we took to be a succession of (tasteless) acts of "stolen valor" persuaded us to stop.
We thought we were watching extremely tasteless behavior. Presumably, many of our fellow citizens didn't see it that way at all.
Way back when, President Lincoln almost seemed to wonder if a nation constructed like ours could hope to "long endure." His famous speech started like this:
PRESIDENT LINCOLN (11/19/1863): Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure...
That nation has endured, right up to the present day. The population has actually grown, from something like 33 million back then to something like 345 million today.
Lincoln's nation has endured, in the most obvious sense. But in a recent essay for The Atlantic, Jeffrey Rosen suggests the possibility that the nation President Lincoln described may not endure much longer.
Who the heck is Jeffrey Rosen? And why is he saying such things?
We think his thesis is very strong. We also think it will be ignored, except right here at this site.
Tomorrow: Who is Jeffrey Rosen?
