No Kings, Part II: They're Back... with a Vengeance

Brought to you by the people who wanted you fired, fined, and FEMA-camped for refusing the jab. (*And don't worry about Antifa—they're imaginary now.)

Regular readers may recall my first (and last) running-away-from-home story—the one where my dramatic exit was followed by a sad, silent stretch of nobody frantically trying to find me or even, frankly, caring that I was gone.

That’s kind of how the first No Kings protest went. Big announcement, bigger promises… and then a whole lot of yawning. But apparently, someone on the anti-royalty board decided that indifference was a sign that they needed a sequel—so they’re back this weekend with another highly-organized, well-funded day of protesting the man the overwhelming majority of Americans picked to be president.

I wonder if these people picket the weather when it rains on their picnics or boycott Levi’s when they can’t zip their jeans.

If you missed the first No Kings installment (lucky you), the original event back in June was all about Trump’s “authoritarian ICE raids.” The current panic isn’t over immigration enforcement—it’s the sweeping descent into authoritarianism unfolding under his watch. Which is a bold stance to take from the same side that shut down free speech in the name of “safety” during the pandemic, forced Americans to get medicated just to keep their jobs, and skipped an entire primary to install their preferred presidential candidate like a software update. But sure. Tell me again who the fascists are.

The stated goal this time around is to “remind Trump that power belongs to the people.” I’m pretty sure he’s up to speed on that—seeing as the people literally put him in office. Not all of them, of course; just enough to make it legally binding. Meanwhile, Joe Biden was locked in a basement somewhere for four years, only showing up in public long enough to fall off a bike or stumble up some stairs, and I don’t recall any coordinated, nationwide “Days of Action” against him or his administration. No, we gritted our teeth, sucked it up, and prayed for the time to pass quickly.

Organizers call the rallies “peaceful action.” Then again, so did Antifa. Which is weird, because according to the media, Antifa doesn’t even exist. That’s right, because they don’t have a board of directors or a budget or a corporate headquarters. By that logic, termites don’t exist either—they’re just “loosely affiliated wood enthusiasts.” It’s the same brand of smug, semantic gaslighting we saw with “turbo cancer,” with the media’s same collective eye-roll—“That’s not a medical term!”—that makes it sound like we’re debating Scrabble rules while people are dying. “Turbo cancer” might not be in the dictionary, but neither is “hangry,” and I dare you to tell me that’s not real. The fact that Antifa doesn’t print business cards or file taxes doesn’t make it imaginary. It makes it unaccountable. That’s the point.

Fueled by media hype and mystery money, No Kings has morphed into a polished, professional protest machine—with all the grassroots authenticity of a Pharma ad campaign. And just like with Antifa, it’s amazing how much “spontaneous outrage” millions of dollars can buy. You can practically smell the Soros seed capital wafting through the crowd like incense at a yoga retreat.

And now, as if on cue, congressional swamp rats seem determined to give the movement a little boost. GOP lawmakers say Democrats are deliberately dragging out the government shutdown until after the rallies—letting anti-Trump tension simmer just long enough to hit a full boil. In other words, they’re keeping the lights off to set the mood for their big protest. So that’s cute.

Speaker Mike Johnson called the event a ‘hate America rally,’ and honestly he’s not wrong. No Kings isn’t about monarchies—nobody’s worried Charles is going to try to annex Delaware—it’s shorthand for “No Trump.” Framing every protest as a noble defense of democracy while simultaneously refusing to accept an election that didn’t go their way is a delicious bit of cognitive dissonance. They chant about “resisting authoritarianism” while cheering for more censorship, federal control, and policing of ideas. They wave “Power to the People” flags and then try to silence half the country for voting the wrong way. If that isn’t flat-out hostile to democracy—or, you know, anti-American—I don’t know what is. (But if ‘hate-America rally’ sounds harsh, we could always call it what it is: the ‘We Lost, So Let’s Burn It All Down Global Tantrum’.)

Note to protesters: if Trump were really a king, you would not be able to organize a group meltdown over his reign. You wouldn’t be designing matching “RESIST” shirts on Canva and live-streaming your outrage on an iPhone made by Chinese factory slaves. You’d be whispering your grievances into a pillow and hoping the royal guard didn’t hear you.

But this is America. Which means you can march, chant, cry, scream, glue yourself to a Starbucks counter, and still make it home in time for your nightly dose of Rachel Maddow.

The No Kings mission statement says they’re here to “defend democratic norms.” But the last time I checked, Trump won the election by an actual landslide. So what exactly are they defending democracy from—democracy? In reality, this is the political equivalent of flipping the poker table because someone else got blackjack, brought to you by the same sort of people who’d have formed a We Hate Clubs Club in high school.

Are you ready to rally—or are you planning to peacefully resist by staying home and not setting anything on fire? Tell me how you plan to spend Saturday in the comments. ;)

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