On Trump’s birthday, tell him: ‘No Kings’
Major peaceful protests are planned across the country on Saturday, June 14.
I hope you have plans for this coming Saturday, June 14.
And I hope your plan isn’t just to sit in front of your TV and watch as Donald Trump plays king and gazes at a military parade on his birthday.
I hope you’ll show up at one of the many “No Kings” protests planned that same day to declare our support for a government of the American people, not just the lobbyists, the tech bros, the crypto investors, the Heritage Foundation, the Murdochs, and the Qatari royal family.
Find a “No Kings” event near you, or start your own. As Trump uses the military and law enforcement agencies to try to provoke conflict and intimidate the public, it’s more important than ever to make powerful, peaceful statements in defense of our freedom.
That’s why this Saturday matters. June 14 is a lot of things, some significant, some trivial. It’s Flag Day. It’s the 85th anniversary of the German Army marching into Paris. It’s the 224th anniversary of the death of traitor Benedict Arnold. And it’s Trump’s 79th birthday.
It was destined to be a big day in Washington even before Trump got elected because it’s the 250th anniversary of the founding of the Continental Army, the start of the U.S. armed forces. But Trump made the event bigger – and millions of dollars costlier – by ordering a military parade, with 6,500 troops, 50 aircraft, and 150 vehicles, including 25 M1 Abrams tanks, which are expected to damage the capital’s streets.
Trump has long wanted a parade like this. After he visited Paris during his first term and saw French forces marching down the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, he ordered the Pentagon to look into the idea. He eventually settled for a scaled-down display of military hardware in Washington at a July 4 celebration in 2019. You may recall that event as the occasion where Trump apparently misread his Teleprompter and declared that the Continental Army “took over the airports” during the Revolutionary War.
Let’s make June 14 our day, not Trump’s. Let’s make it so well-attended and widespread that the news media can’t ignore it.
Mainstream media generally underplayed the huge “Hands Off” protests two months ago, and we need to increase the pressure on them to cover the resistance properly.
The New York Times decided the April 5 protests were not worth a story on its front page – just a photo at the bottom of the page. National Public Radio’s public editor, Kelly McBride, likewise was unimpressed. She defended NPR’s lackluster coverage: “Statistically, most news consumers are not protesting: Of the 300+ million people in the U.S., approximately 3 million protested last Saturday at 1,400 locations.”
Media people like McBride, who disparage political participation by THREE MILLION AMERICANS, are among the reasons our democracy is in deep trouble.
We’ll just have to put up bigger numbers on June 14.
Of course, media coverage isn’t the only thing that matters.
Intimidating the fascists matters. Big protests can make the cowardly members of Congress think twice about green-lighting Trump’s authoritarianism.
And growing a resistance movement matters. Protests like this counter the defeatism that the fascists are promoting. They want us to knuckle under, but we won’t.
The atmosphere at these protests is inspirational. It’s a real upper – clever signs, smiling people, democracy in action.
It’s also a rehearsal for bigger protests ahead. If Trump stays on this course, you’ll hear the phrase “general strike” more often.
They have the White House, Congress, and the Supreme Court. Democracy’s defenders have some judges in lower courts, defiant institutions such as Harvard University, and people power.
Be a part of that people power. At this link, you’ll find June 14 protests all over the country. If you can attend one of the bigger ones, please do so to make an especially impressive picture for the press. But in any case, get to a protest by land, sea, or air. But avoid those “Revolutionary War airports.”
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We're experiencing an attempted authoritarian take over and the real possibility of the fall of a 250 year old democracy. Reporters and journalists have the unprecedented opportunity to cover the most groundbreaking and momentous events of our lifetime, maybe anyone's lifetime. And corp media lackeys obediently whiff. Whatever these people chose to believe or to call themselves, they are not journalists.
I've figured out how to get to Seattle's protest by bus.. It's a bit arduous, but after this weekend, I'll do arduous. I have the schedules and my ORCA card set to go.