By John Kass

Sunday July 6, 2026

Some 250 years ago, long before the communists took over the modern Democrat Party-by overpromising so much to the unqualified, undereducated mob of ravenous and self-styled elitists who make up their base vote–there was a common understanding among us in America: that we should avoid those who would try to bribe us with our own money.

Or hold them in thorough contempt before having them tarred and feathered and whipped into the wilderness.

We were a wild people back then, unbiddable and untamable or so our myths told us to believe.  And since this July 4 marks our 250th anniversary as the greatest nation in the history of the world, let’s take a moment to examine an iconic American beast:

The wild pig,

If you had the bad luck to ride up unaware on a big angry wild boar like the one pictured here perhaps in the Texas hill country or near Butler Alabama, home to massive feral hogs experiencing 300+ pounds of filthy lice-infested malevolence–chances are that you would be dead and your horse would be dead.

Even if you were a good shot and were carrying a short-barreled carbine, the pig would be into your mount’s legs before you could react in a squealing spinning rage even before you could figure out the direction of the threat and get off a shot.

The horse would go down, gutted by the long yellow tusks, and then the boar would turn and come for you. Then would come the flies.

It happened to a war comrade of my father, a member of his company in the Greek Army during ther Greco-Italian War (October 1940–April 1941). They searched for him for days before they found his legs in the snow. There were no flies in that cold. After they pushed the Italians off the mountains, then came the Communists. And as you can see from the the news, the communists are still coming.

Wild pigs are no joke. There are some 9 million feral hogs in the United States.

I wrote a version of this one a long time ago, but that’s the odd thing about real common sense. It lasts a long time for it to sink in.

As does the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States and barbecued ribs on Independence Day, and while some have tried to tear these institutions down, many Americans love them still. We’re stubborn like feral hogs and just won’t budge. We love the 4th of July, even though Democrats and  president Joe Biden just let in tens of millions of illegal migrants–some of them violent and predatory–who don’t know what Independence Day means. And many don’t care to learn. Nearly half of all Americans do not know what historical event the Fourth of July commemorates. A national poll conducted by the Cato Institute reveals that only 53% of adults can correctly identify the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, with younger demographics—such as Gen Z—showing significantly lower awareness. And public school teachers don’t want to teach the Constitution or civics.

And  because of that, the communists keep coming.

Now onto my favorite story of American independence.

Every Fourth of July we Americans celebrate our liberty and our independence from an oppressive, overreaching government.

We do this through wonderful, time-honored rituals.

We wave the flag. We shoot off fireworks. We barbecue and eat watermelon in the shade.

We drink beer and the kids gather round and sit on the grass where they light sparklers and chase fireflies. Some even listen to our stories. But few, if any of us, tell children of the most important Independence Day story of all:

How to Catch Wild Pigs.

The Americans who won independence with their blood and sacrifice didn’t have to tell their kids how to catch wild pigs. They knew. Their kids knew.

But these days, especially now, our children need to know. This sort of thing won’t be taught in school. It’s too subversive.

Wild pigs have been on my mind lately, with the federal government growing and growing. Over the last several decades, under Republicans and Democrats in the White House, the federal administrative authority (or Deep State) has grown beyond imagination.

And the debt has grown so large with a certain president eager to buy votes by “excusing” college loan tuition and “free” this and “free” that,  we can’t even pay the interest on the $39 trillion national debt we owe now.

Which brings me back to the story of the wild pigs.

I first read about it on the Internet a few years ago by an unknown author who deserves the thanks of every American. And I used the idea at the tail end of a column about the politics of the baby boomers. Because when they were young, the boomers smoked pot in the streets, listened to Dylan and dreamed of taking great risks. But now they’re old, and with age comes fear and it’s become easier to yearn for the embrace of the federal leviathan.

Young people have no understanding of how things were before the security cameras were everywhere, before the president ran the banks and piled trillions of debt on their backs.

So, this Fourth of July, as I’ve done for years, I tell my own version of how to catch wild pigs.

Wild pigs are crafty creatures. They’re dangerous and can kill you. They live free in the wilderness. They’re cunning, and they’re quick. And they have tusks.

Beware. They’re dangerous the way Americans were dangerous, once. And they are desirous of their freedom.

When my father fought the Nazis in Albania during World War II, the Greek Army starved in those hard winter mountains. Theirs wasn’t the hunger of missing a breakfast or a snack. They missed days and days of breakfasts, lunches and dinners while fighting battles in the cold. They were starving.

They were about to eat their shoes, their belts and their boots, they were that hungry.

One morning, another soldier spotted some boar tracks in the snow. He took a pack mule and a rifle, promising the guys he’d be back by sunset with dinner.

They found the soldier three days later, frozen solid, all but cut in half by the tusks. The giant boar was dead. The mule was dead.

They ate the boar and the mule — starving armies don’t waste good meat — and buried their comrade. But nobody tracked wild pigs after that.

Even so, pork is a scrumptious and traditional Fourth of July food as we celebrate American freedom and liberty, serving barbecue on patriotic red, white and blue paper plates.

The thing is, if you want to catch wild pigs, please don’t try to chase them down. They’ll get angry. You might get hurt.

Don’t track them like some hunter. Use your head, like some crafty politician.

Don’t pursue them. That’s dangerous.

Instead, bribe them with corn and call it “free stuff.”

Like free buses, “free” education, and freedom from police and freedom from judges of the criminal courts.

Speaking of free stuff, the last few weeks have provided an endless cornucopia of “free stuff” being promised by our American communists, who call themselves Democrat Socialists of America.

I’m told that if you just pour a few buckets of corn on the ground, sooner or later, the wild pigs will come trotting through the woods.

First, they’ll sniff the corn and run away. Eventually, though, they’ll find it delicious. The best part is that they’ll tell all their piggy friends. Soon you’ll have a whole herd of them scarfing what they think is free corn. Humans aren’t pigs, but they sure do like free stuff.

Then, put up one side of stout fence. Naturally, the wild pigs will run away. But soon, they’ll drift back to the corn.

A few weeks later, put up the second length of fence and throw more corn. They’ll disappear, but they’ll return, because they’re used to the program. Then the third side. But keep spreading that corn. It’s part of their routine.

Finally, it’s time to put up the fourth side of the fence, the business side, the side with a gate.

Just keep adding corn, and soon they’ll trot through the woods and through the gate. When they’re all in, all you have to do is quietly close the door.

They won’t even notice they’ve been caught. That’s when you begin the process of domestication.

The problem is that a plain fence can be so boring. So, let’s dress it up, say with a little placard over the gate. Perhaps we should inscribe fancy words on it, too.

What comes to mind is an expression often attributed to a wise Frenchman named Alexis de Tocqueville, who wrote about the American experiment with freedom and liberty after it began more than 250 years ago.

No matter who said these words first, they’re perfect for the plaque on our fence. Here goes:

“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.”

But now the angry Jacobins infest the Democrat party with blood lust and all those greasy promises for “free stuff” we can’t afford.

That will bankrupt us.

I suppose that generations of Americans educated to not care about American history won’t mind all that much. There is a new world to conquer.

From New York, to Los Angeles, Washington and else where in the deepest blue cities, a pattern of pitiless conquest is taking place. In New York for example, socialist Daria Avila Chevalier just won her election on a platform of defunding the police, stopping ICE, and opposing placing notorious violent offenders in prison. This qualifies her to become mayor of Chicago . What we are seeing is the same takeover through force that we saw in the “Summer of Love” where the democrat left forced even leftist democrats like Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot to her knees in Chicago. And in California, New York and blue democrat towns, where  establishment Democrats had once been powerful.

Free buses, free college, free everything. Everything from Mamdani’s mouth is a promised deal. And his smile steals souls. And the communists plant their parasites among our young. Happy Independence Day.

Will America exist in 250 years?

I can’t say, but I remember a poem from the third grade we read aloud, when we believed it was impossible that America would never, ever end:

Ozymandias

by Percy Bysshe Shelley

“I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:

And on the pedestal these words appear:

“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

 

-30-

About the author: John Kass spent decades as a political writer and news columnist in Chicago working at a major metropolitan newspaper. He is co-host of The Chicago Way podcast. And he just loves his “No Chumbolone” hat, because johnkassnews.com is a “No Chumbolone” Zone where you can always get a cup of common sense.

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