Last weekend, I had the privilege of attending WelcomeFest, the “largest public gathering of centrist Democrats.” While the world outside was bleak, inside the Hamilton Hotel, Abundance co-author Derek Thompson, Slow Boring Substack’s Matt Yglesias, Reps. Richie Torres, Jared Golden, et al. had complaints about #resistance liberals, progressives, and zoning laws. Enough commenters have “dunked” on the event already that I do not feel like I need to rush out my report—I am more interested in contrasting its content to the start of the Los Angeles protests and riots and National Guard deployment, as well as Mr. Trump’s North Korea-style birthday military parade.
I expected that on June 14, I would attend a No Kings protest to show my disdain for Mr. Trump’s authoritarian theatre. Showing dissent as the world comes down was how I imagined myself as a teenager, and what portended a collapsing nation worse than tanks in the streets?
I wish that were a rhetorical question—the answer is “the mobilization of the military against Los Angeles.” This has put me in a darker mind. If we are watching America fall, and I have deputized myself as a recorder of this time, then—and I hate this—I will have to watch the awful parade ruin the streets of the nation’s capital myself.
How unlucky we are to be alive right now.
If I attended a No Kings event in Baltimore, Annapolis, or some other location that resonated with me, I could at least feel a hopeful connection with my peers and bring that sense to my readers: that we are not alone in our defiance and that millions of us are fighting. But just as I worry about the corrosive indolence that despair inspires in the electorate, I fear that patience and hope may themselves be lazy.
“Woke” Bill Kristol and Jonathan V. Last at the Bulwark have called this the most dangerous week in America; it still feels strange to say the Project for the New American Century author is one of the most clear-eyed anti-authoritarians now—I would not be shocked to see him in a denim vest with Anti-Flag blasting from his headphones soon enough.
“Powder keg,” “powder keg,” “powder keg,” all the podcasters say to the point or triggering misophonia. The line between relative peace and total violence is so small that, like Jason and his sown men, it can be breached by one rock aimed at the wrong place.
This is my meandering way of saying: The WelcomeFest event report is in progress, but it cannot be completed except in a pair with this weekend’s ugliness. My apologies for turning what was meant to be a bit of housekeeping into a grim rumination.
- Hex
Postscript: And if they catch me rolling my eyes and talking shit tomorrow, and I end up squished by a tank, Dear Reader, please be certain to remember me with a Trump Is a Bitch t-shirt.