Happy 4th of July

Having spent our 50th anniversary in London, a few Independence Day thoughts are in order.

First, while watching the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, with all the pomp and rigidity of the occasion, I found it amazing that democracy originated out of this. But it did and the world owes them.

Second, the security surrounding the royals is intense and thorough. Guys with submachine guns with fixed bayonets etc. etc. I haven’t seen things like that since NY State penitentiary denizens were brought to my office for neurologic evaluations. I wouldn’t want to live like that.

Third, I can begin to see why 50+ years ago in grad school at Harvard, the US was regarded as somewhat crude, slow and inelegant. It was the era of the ugly American etc. etc. This, despite Don Voet’s observation that the Universal Scientific Language was broken English.

Going through London’s excellent museums one can see why people who’d been to Europe back then might have thought this way. But the museums are all about the past (except for an incredible exhibit at the natural history museum on epigenetics complete with research professor and two graduate students). What did the next 50 years bring? They’re all carrying cell phones over there, and iPads, and using Google and of course the internet, all originating in the USA. Compare the Science the USA has produced during that time to that of Europe: equal at the worst.

Never mind that we did it with European castoffs (4 of the 7 Nobels in the Harvard Chemistry department during this time, were Jewish refugees or their children). That’s the great strength of America, they’re as American as anyone else, just like Sergey Brin the cofounder of Google, a Russian Jew by birth. Or Andrew Grove, etc. etc.

Even back in the 60s, I never thought Europe was so wonderful. Two world wars, the concentration camps, Stalin and the Gulags to atone for. So I never regarded them as particularly civilized, something only strengthened in the 90s, with their atrocious handling of genocide in Kosovo.

Lest you think this is all in the past, my cousin the month we were in London was on some sort of river cruise down the Danube, and their tour of Vienna had to be rerouted because of a NeoNazi rally. They appear to have learned nothing from their awful history.

So happy 4th of July. Glad to be back in the good ol’ USA.