July 4th - "Today we celebrate our independence day!"

Last night my wife and I partook in our July 4 guilty pleasure: we watched the 1996 movie Independence Day (ID4) while the neighborhood's illegal fireworks provided the incessant background explosions. The movie starred Bill Pullman as President Thomas J. Whitmore, Will Smith as Marine Captain Steven Hiller, and Jeff Goldblum as MIT-educated computer hacker David Levinson.

Afterward, after searching my own blog, I realized that it has been four years since I last posted President Whitmore's speech and video -- four years: I can't believe it's been four years already!

So, to indulge my/our guilty pleasure, here it is yet again, from ID4:

Good morning. Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world, and you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind.

Mankind, that word should have new meaning for all of us today.

We can't be consumed by our petty differences any more.

We will be united in our common interest.

Perhaps it's fate that today is the 4th of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom. Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution, but from annihilation. We're fighting for our right to live, to exist. And should we win the day, the 4th of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day when the world declared in one voice:

"We will not go quietly into the night!
We will not vanish without a fight!
We're going to live on, we're going to survive."

Today we celebrate our independence day!

—President Thomas J. Whitmore
    July 4th, 1996