America’s 250th birthday celebrations are a mess. Here’s how we should mark the day | Dave Schilling

7 hours ago 6

I hate birthdays, especially my own, which is ominously arriving next month. I used to love them, back in those days when I had something tangible to look forward to: getting my first car, graduating high school, my first legal alcoholic drink, a new Star Wars film that’s actually good. That time is long gone. I can do all those things I listed, plus I haven’t seen a good Star Wars movie in more than 20 years. What am I even celebrating at 42? A slightly paunchier waistline? A larger bald spot? If the present you’re getting me isn’t a free Turkish hair transplant, I don’t want it. I don’t relish being 42, but imagine if I were 250?

America (the country, not the band) turns 250 this weekend, and we’re all meant to celebrate that fact on the Fourth of July. Millions of dollars have been poured into marking the occasion, though few of the events hold much appeal for me. I didn’t watch the UFC event; I have no desire to watch a bunch of cars driving around in circles, and the PragerU Freedom Truck hasn’t even come to my town. I couldn’t even get to finally see Vanilla Ice live in concert. Like every birthday, a lot of money has poured into a day where no one has any fun.

Even if I’m a birthday grump, I do think I could have done a better job commemorating 250 years of Budweiser-soaked Americana. It all starts with the most important part of any birthday: the gift. While I can’t offer every American a free hair transplant, I think I could come up with something better than a miniature wooden arch, a poorly attended state fair with a malfunctioning ferris wheel, and a pool full of green slop. A $50 Roblox gift card from Target and a hug would be a better gift than any of those.

Let’s start by eliminating the electoral college. The whole thing has turned into a real pain, not just because the absurd system gave Donald Trump the presidency despite his winning fewer votes than his competition in 2016. Put that aside for a moment: the real problem with the electoral college is I have to do math every four years. Trying to cobble together how many electoral votes each candidate has is only slightly less annoying than figuring out various World Cup group stage tiebreaker scenarios. We might as well pick the president through a marathon session of Dungeons & Dragons. Let John Roberts be the dungeon master and see how it goes. It would certainly be more entertaining than what happened in 2000.

My second gift to the United States would be making Puerto Rico a state. The US controls 14 territories, five of them inhabited by people. Puerto Rico might be a mostly self-governing community with a unique culture that predominantly speaks a different language, but so is Texas. Throw Guam in there while we’re cooking, too. I think we’re due for a new flag anyway. Plenty of room for more stars up there.

Lastly, and most important of all, I’d force HBO to do a season nine of Game of Thrones. So many Americans simply weren’t satisfied with how the show ended. Time to fix this and truly bring the country together. While all the main actors are still around, I think we could shave off some production costs by having AI generate 10 episodes. Sure, most of the renders would look terrible; half the cast would come out of the generation with extra fingers or soulless, dead eyes. The dialogue would be worse, the stories would be cliche fan service, and it would signal the inevitable end of human creativity, but at least we could finally get all the characters to kiss at the end like we really wanted. If we’re trying to be patriotic and give back to our beautiful nation, the best thing we can do is finally make something with the billions of dollars that have been invested into artificial intelligence. We’d put most of the film industry out of work, but omelettes require broken eggs.

Whatever we do this weekend to acknowledge the unceasing passage of time, it should honor the spirit of the country. A fair no one goes to and fencing around a national monument does feel in line with the moribund vibe of the United States, but more can and should be done. With that in mind, I’m going to celebrate both America’s birthday and mine appropriately. I’m getting a 30-pack of beer, locking my door, binging some Theo Von podcasts, and dumping my life savings into a Kalshi bet that Donald Trump dances to YMCA at the end of his speech. With any luck, by the conclusion of my drinking-and-gambling binge, all my problems will magically go away. Hiding, irrational optimism, and terrible financial decisions. That’s America.