The Best of Journalism

The Best of Journalism

Recommended Reading

Sunday, July 5, 2026

Conor Friedersdorf
Jul 05, 2026
∙ Paid
A postcard from the 1904 World’s Fair.

This Week’s Selections

What Darwin Saw in the Galapagos (link)

Bob Dylan’s Second Act (link)

How a Nation of Immigrants Traces Its Roots (link)

Picturing Pyrotechnics (link)

A Theory of American Democracy –– and a warning (link)

Will Changes in War Change the Social Contract? (link)

A.I. and the Crisis of Classical Liberalism (link)

Illegible benefits –– The costs of transformative innovations are immediately clear: it’s the longterm gains that are hardest to understand (link)

The World Cup, Consumed in Highlights (link)

FLASHBACKS:

Letter from John Adams to Abigail Adams, 3 July 1776 (link)

Equality and Liberty –– A review of Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality, by Danielle Allen. (link)

What to a Slave Is the Fourth of July? (link)

Calvin Coolidge on America’s 150 anniversary (link)

Other Items of Note

  • America, 1926: What a Forgotten 100-Year-Old Report Says About Who We Are (link)

  • Tyler Austin Harper: The Surefire Way to Elicit Squeals of Delight From a Grown Man (link)

  • Noah Millman: Pointe du Hoc Four Score and Two Years On (link)

  • Flowers of Fire: Illustrations from Japanese Fireworks Catalogues circa1880 (link)

  • The philosopher of the firework (link)

  • Men who eat too many hot dogs (link)

  • The best rendition of The Star Spangled Banner (link)

  • Nick Gillespie: “As the United States celebrates its semiquincentennial, all age groups are less likely to love America than in the past.” (link)

  • How Amsterdam invented the fire department

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