California is closing its beaches for the Independence Day weekend. Miami has declared a pandemic curfew. Texas’ governor has gone from preventing cities from issuing mask mandates to requiring them statewide. As the U.S. breaks records practically every day for the number of new coronavirus cases, the rest of the world has come to fear America, with Britain putting U.S. travelers on its “red list” for quarantines, and Mexican officials concerned about contagious Americans crossing the border. It all comes to a head today, with holiday celebrations, discouraged by health officials, but egged on by President Donald Trump.

Decrying a “left-wing cultural revolution,” President Trump held a rally Friday at Mount Rushmore, saying, “these heroes will never be defaced.” Two presidential faces on the iconic mountainside, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, owned slaves, and civil rights protesters have targeted figures associated with slavery and racism. With no social distancing or mask requirement, critics said the event would spread the coronavirus, and campaign fundraiser Kimberly Guilfoyle, girlfriend of Donald Trump Jr., recently tested positive. Today the president hosts an Independence Day “Salute to America” at the White House.

Read this OZY op-ed on the racist threat to national security.

The 21st century beckons. The Washington, D.C., based National Football League team has long been criticized for its name, a racial epithet against Native Americans. Amid a reinvigorated civil rights movement, it’s likely to rebrand itself, ESPN reports. Officially, it’s a “thorough review” that formalizes long-running discussions with the NFL. Meanwhile, similar pressures have put Cleveland’s objectifying “Indians” baseball moniker under review by the team, which said it would “embrace our responsibility to advance social justice and equality.” U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington State urged the NFL to act, and “be on the right side of history.”

Populist leaders like Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro, the United Kingdom’s Boris Johnson and U.S. President Trump are presiding over the world’s highest COVID-19 death tolls, thanks to denial of the public health threat or unwillingness to implement painful solutions. And their popularity is fading fast. Bolsonaro and Trump have plunged in the polls, a condition that has spread to Europe’s far-right. The prognosis? A Democratic world shifting back toward liberalism, posits journalist James Traub. But without addressing the preexisting conditions — weakened institutions and a lack of social cohesion — a relapse is likely.
OZY takes a look at the local leaders filling the void.

Police are investigating Friday’s fatal shooting of an 8-year-old boy at an Alabama shopping mall. Iran is refusing to say what caused a Thursday fire at its Natanz nuclear plant. And 14 nursing home residents are feared dead after floods from heavy rains in Japan forced massive evacuations.

In the week ahead: Croatia and the Dominican Republic hold elections on Sunday. Beatles drummer Ringo Starr marks his 80th birthday Tuesday with an all-star online benefit concert. And on Thursday, Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Mark Milley are scheduled to testify before the House Armed Services Committee on using troops to quell domestic protests.

OZY co-founder and CEO Carlos Watson is now on Instagram. Follow him @ozycarlos for all his latest updates, along with some behind-the-scenes pics from a secret new project we’ve been working on over the last few weeks! Check it out.

Oklahoma hasn’t been feeling the love for President Donald Trump. After a poor showing at a recent Tulsa rally, Sooners have voted to expand Medicare. The Trump White House could be falling further out of step with how 2020 voters view health care, even more so amid mass layoffs and a deadly pandemic. The decision could also torpedo a federal plan to overhaul how funding is provided to the states. Next month Missouri votes on a similar measure, possibly setting the tone for a health care-dominated election come November.
Read OZY’s examination of corporate health care alternatives.

Can you take Facebook at face value? For technology journalists who’ve been burned by the information conduit for 2.5 billion people, the answer is clear: Don’t trust Mark Zuckerberg. But it’s a daily nightmare skulking around the platform’s ever-expanding margins. For years, most media milked the social network for geeky product news, but the U.S. presidential election of 2016 and more recent battles over political hate speech have dramatically changed that dynamic, writes author Jacob Silverman. Now that Facebook is an all-powerful entity with global responsibility, do its watchdogs have the clout to hold it accountable?

OZY discovers a social network for poets.

Nigeria and India, home to two of the biggest film industries in the world — Nollywood and Bollywood — are collaborating in unprecedented ways. That’s thanks to Nigerian millennials desperate for movies from a place experiencing similar growth pains, with a conservative society clashing with open-minded youth, OZY reports. It started decades ago, when Lebanese and Syrian merchants imported videotapes of Hindi films. A few years ago, the two movie industries unveiled their first co-production, while Nigerian actors have succeeded in Bollywood films. And as long as Western films remain prohibitively expensive, these cinematic ties can only strengthen.

“Smoke ’em.” That was Clint Lorance’s 2012 order to his 1st Platoon before two Afghan men were gunned down in cold blood — earning the Army first lieutenant a 19-year prison sentence for second-degree murder. President Donald Trump has pardoned Lorance, leaving the soldiers who testified against him haunted by an incident that damaged their psyches — some have attempted or committed suicide — and careers. The Washington Post documented their tragic stories and unheralded bravery, rescuing their comrades and breaking the warriors’ code of silence, only to see an unrepentant Lorance, lionized on Fox News, say, “I don’t know any of these guys.”

This OZY op-ed argues for a smaller military.

There are some things money can’t buy, says newly signed New England Patriots quarterback Cam Newton. That’s one answer to peers who think he got robbed with a base salary of barely $1 million. Newton hopes to earn respect after a foot injury kept him on the Carolina Panthers’ bench for much of last season. At the same time, Pats coach Bill Belichick is proving that money can buy a credible replacement for the legendary Tom Brady: a 2015 MVP who never lost against New England. Getting him on the cheap without raising competitors’ suspicions? Priceless.