There’s always been a forlorn tale about history slipping away in the Miller House, a farmhouse where George Washington slept and plotted strategy during the Battle of White Plains in 1776.

It has been hanging on by a thread for many years, almost forgotten in an industrial area opposite a cement plant: roof near collapse, ceiling beginning to crack, porch sagging, barely (if at all) open to the public.

So maybe it was just more of the same last week when the Westchester County executive, Rob Astorino, kicked off the Fourth of July weekend by vetoing a $1.2 million bond issue passed by the county Legislature to save and restore the house.

Or maybe in this summer of oil, war, recession and gridlock, this was the perfect Fourth of July snapshot for the pinched era of Tea Party 2.0, the summer of “No we can’t.”...