MENTAL ILLNESS AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE.

James "Long Emergency" Kunstler went to Saturday's so-called "No Kings" gatherings in two upstate New York towns.

Old folks, too, as far as the eye could see, predominately of the female persuasion: the devouring grandmothers. The Democratic Party has marshalled mental illness as its premier campaign strategy, and lately it is winning bigly around the country as mental illness becomes the go-to cope option for the ragged remnants of Boomerdom.

To his east, Common Dreams contributor Phil Wilson saw the same thing in Lesbianville, where he put a braver spin on it.

Indeed, these people, the majority for sure, sport grey hair, wrinkles, wearied gaits and maybe the strange understanding that, in a seeming eyeblink, we all have been transformed from young, zealous radicals who once chanted “two, four, six, eight, organize and smash the state,” to becoming part of a last stand against the fascist nightmare that would have blown our minds in 1968. I see young people too, but not enough. Mostly white people make up the throngs, but Northampton is just a small piece of something vastly larger.

The Fourth Estate captured the same demographic in Oregon, Illinois.

Earleen Hinton photograph retrieved from Shaw Media.

It gets tiresome, the same stuffed animals costumes, the same references to actually existing fascist states where such assemblies would be met with gunfire (I'm looking at you, Iran), and it's amusing how the more information that comes out about the corrupt establishment's fixer, the more Democrat participation comes to light.

Mr Wilson might have said the quiet part out loud. "At some point there will hopefully be mutual clarity, plans, resistance, strikes, boycotts, blocked traffic, but we need sheer numbers, and a pause in ideological oneupmanship."

Good luck with that.  Ground Zero for the freak show was, as one might expect, Minneapolis, and Power Line's John Hinderaker was watching.

The main event apparently was here in the Twin Cities, headlined by Jane Fonda, Joan Baez, Bernie Sanders and Bruce Springsteen–octogenarians trying to relive the glory days of the 1960s (Springsteen, to be fair, is only 76). Like the entertainers, the crowd was old and white. What they thought they were accomplishing, God only knows.

For people who repeatedly tried to have Donald Trump jailed; who succeeded in getting him shot; who took every possible measure to bar him from the ballot in the 2024 election; who used the FBI and the CIA to undermine Trump’s first term by propagating lies–the Russia Collusion Hoax–with the aid of the press; who rely on rogue, partisan district court judges to frustrate the will of tens of millions of voters; who are already threatening to jail conservatives if they win the White House in 2028; and who happily team up with the Communist Party USA, to complain that Donald Trump is a “king” and a “dictator” betrays a stunning lack of self-awareness.

But of course, they don’t actually believe it. If they really thought Trump is a tyrant, they wouldn’t confidently take the stage to call him one, with no fear of reprisal.

Put bluntly, "weirdo boomers," enjoying the privilege of being able to protest their government's actions without being shot down by the revolutionary guards or dangled from construction cranes.  And the editorial board at New York's Post correctly notes that the gatherings might better be understood as "No Republican Kings."  "Democrats cheer authoritarian behavior — as long as they’re in charge."

Which I submit, dear reader, is why Donald Trump, for all his foibles, is again in the White House.

In Chicago, the usual suspects took to the usual places to register their discontent.  One person, during a radio interview on a different outlet, said something about people being shot down in the streets.  I assure you, it was not about another mostly peaceful weekend in Chicago.  "Those non-kings? The ones who love criminals, especially murderers and rapists."

Let me stipulate, before I continue, that it is not a capital offense to be a bad-tempered soy-boy with a punchable face.

On the other hand, if among the substantive grievances you're assembling to redress you include de jure qualified immunity for sworn law enforcement officers, you ought expect push-back from people who perceive de facto qualified immunity for repeat illegal immigrants.

Billons of  dollars were spent on the illegal migrants by American taxpayers whose children were killed by those tax subsidized illegals, some by gunfire, some by a crushing blow with a rock, some by the impact of a vehicle driven by the illegal while drunk. In each case there was silence from Democrats, and silence from the news media lest mention of the dead anger the partisan leftist subscribers.

Bruce Springsteen did not sing Kate Steinle's name.  She should still be here.

Bruce Springsteen did not sing Laken Riley's name.  She should still be here.

Bruce Springsteen did not sing Katie Abraham's name.  She should still be here.

Bruce Springsteen did not sing Sheridan Gorman's name.  She should still be here.

As John Kass notes, "The legacy media knows [c.q.] it is in serious difficulty."  But if you're Brad Reed for Common Dreams, it's for not giving the boomer antiques favorable coverage.  “The NY Times saves its harshest skepticism for progressives.”

Oh, piffle.

Journalist and author Mark Harris called [Jeremy] Peters’ take on the protests “predictable” and said it was framed so that the protests would appear insignificant no matter how many people turned out.

“There’s a long, bad journalistic tradition,” noted Harris. “All conservative grass-roots political movements are fascinating heartland phenomena, all progressive grass-roots political movements are ineffectual bleating. This one is written off as powered by white female college grads—the wine-moms slur, basically.”

I'm searching my memories to identify a "conservative grass-roots political movement" that didn't quickly take incoming from the legacy media let alone the academy or the sort of compassion fascists who write for Common Dreams.