No Kings, No Royal Flush
What Comes Next?
I had mixed feelings about No Kings Day before it happened and mixed feelings now that it is over. The worst—violence—was avoided. It was a remarkable and heartening day of peaceful protest. The right-wing militia goons stayed away. There weren’t enough American flags, but I saw only a few Palestinian banners in the crowds…and while the CNN reporters kept yammering about the many colorful costumes, I didn’t see many of those, either, thank God. Sobriety not japery was called for. There were a lot of people out there, which was good. But it was an NPR crowd. Those who participated—including my friend Bill Kristol—may feel warm and cuddly and righteous, but the nation’s political needle was moved not one iota. (Even Trump’s AI video, with King Trump as fighter pilot dumping shit on the marchers, seemed kind of lame.)
Troops remain in the streets, unnecessarily. The government remains shut down. The Democratic Party remains unreformed, as even the New York Times noted in its editorial today:
Yet many Americans see the Democratic Party as too liberal, too judgmental and too focused on cultural issues to be credible, and voters are moving away from it.
This, in the midst of a shocking discovery by the Times: moderate candidates do better than left-wingers do. This was obvious as far back as 1989, when Elaine Kamarck and William Galston wrote a paper called The Politics of Evasion for the Progressive Policy Institute. It remains true to this day, as Kamarck and Galston showed when they updated their paper this year.
The prevailing fantasy of the left—and the right—is that moderation does not involves best practices, but merely pragmatism. That does pragmatism a disservice: left-wing policies are, with rare exceptions, not expressions of the highest political truths, sadly watered down by wimpy moderate cowards. They are wrong in their conception. They are social engineering attempts to impose mediocrity on a wildly creative populace. They have their moments, in emergencies like the New Deal and the Great Recession of 2008. But the most important progressive ideas, like Social Security and Medicare (and Obamacare) have already been implemented. And yet, the left persists. Magic potions and silver bullets are conjured. The Times specializes in retailing them, as they did with this chuckle-headed effusion by Chris Hayes over the weekend:
In other words, even though [Kamala Harris] lost, her core problem was not her message, however imperfect it might have been. It was an inability to get enough people to hear it, in spite of record-breaking advertising spending. If Mr. Trump had not run a single paid advertisement in the race, he almost surely would have dominated the single most important resource of our age: attention. Democrats need to win the attention contest in 2026 and beyond if they want to win back the country.
In our current environment, national candidates must be comfortable talking off-script in a wide variety of venues with lots of different kinds of interlocutors. Mr. Trump and particularly JD Vance were far more willing to give interviews, take questions and talk to all kinds of outlets (often friendly but not always) than Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz were.
There is some truth here, but a lot of twaddle. Harris should have gotten out more. But as long as she was peddling pablum, she was going to lose. And it is true that TV advertising isn’t the powerhouse it once was, especially in high-profile races like a presidential campaign—except when it isn’t, as was the case in Trump’s wildly effective "Kamala is for they/them” ad, which may have moved enough independent voters toward Trump to win the election.
In fact, Harris lost because the Democrats are fundamentally at odds with the American public on too many cultural issues. Indeed, libs like Chris Hayes are looking through the wrong end of the telescope. He writes:
Taboos in society are important, and we are watching many of them, particularly around racism and antisemitism, degrade before our eyes.
Indeed, taboos about racism are disappearing but in the exact opposite way from the left’s imaginings: We have just experienced 60 years of the greatest advances in the elimination of white bigotry, and black progress, in American history. There is a large-and growing—black middle class that simply didn’t exist before. There are interracial neighborhoods dotting middle class suburbs across the country—I was just in one in Charlotte, NC—that simply didn’t exist before. (It might be nice if Dems acknowledged this every so often, but they can’t: they need to feed the delusions of the grievance groups). And as for the “taboos” against anti-semitism eroding, Chris, that’s mostly coming from the pro-Palestinian left.
No, the Times hints at what’s needed: A full-throated rejection of identity politics by the Democratic Party. An acknowledgment that crime, while lower, is still too high. And that trans-sexual experimentation was a tragic fad (it is declining rapidly according to recent polls). And that fresh young Democratic candidates like Seth Moulton, running against the sclerotic Senator Ed Markey in Massachusetts, should not be punished for saying that he doesn’t want his daughters playing on the same teams as boys. And that MeToo was a necessary corrective for male degeneracy, but men can not be assumed guilty till proven innocent. And that ivy-clotted locutions like “birthing person” and “they/them” and “intersectionality” and “Latinx” are arrogant impositions on normal speech. And that two parents are better than one, even though there are large number of heroic and loving single-parent families. And that Charter Schools have been proven to work better for poor children. And that patriotism is a good thing. It’s a grand old flag, and it is being desecrated by those who adorn it with Trumpist symbols.
There is an awful lot of rhetorical crap that needs to be cleared away by the Democratic Party if No Kings is to move beyond sunny-day crowds to effective action. The baggage can’t be hidden or ignored, as too many libs are now trying to do. It must be acknowledged before the great moderate American middle can be asked to trust Democrats again.
Once that happens, the issues, arguably, are running against Trump. In 2026, Democrats can campaign on more police, fewer ICE raids and no unnecessary troops in the streets; on stopping the Trump tariff inflation, rather than crushing American farmers (and the rural economy); on building a 21st century energy grid—and creating lots of jobs—using all available energy sources, rather than rapidly rising electricity prices. (Trump’s aversion to solar, wind and geothermal power is as mysterious as Joe Biden’s refusal to close the Southern Border.) Democrats can run on order, as opposed to Trumpian chaos; on the promise of prosperity, as opposed to Trumpian uncertainty; on patriots’ pride, rather than gilt-flecked phoniness.
All of this is possible. But Democrats have to get right on cultural issues first.
Excellent observations, but it is hard not to notice Spanberger, Sherrill and Mamdani are all running, albeit it ever so quietly, on mass amnesty for the 9 million migrants lacking valid asylum claims, and the right of school children to choose their own school bathrooms, locker rooms and athletic teams. They all supported Biden's trillion dollars in Climate spending and uniformly oppose school choice.
They will all likely win, although there is a small chance Sherrill's miraculous $7 million dollar stock gains, might offend enough NJ voters the state swings Red. In a way, an upset or two might be the best thing for Dems in the long run.
Despite the the author and a handful of other Dem pundits ringing the alarm bell and a 24% approval ratting, as a Party, Dems show no signs of retooling any policy that cost them the last election, to the most decisive Rep candidate in US history.
Purposefully, successfully dissolving not just the Southern Border, but decades of immigration law, all without a peep from Congress, has convinced Dems they no longer need to compromise or propose any legislation. They can just ignore any law or policy they find offensive. The optics of Trump's deportations will allow that, until it does not.
Europe is showing, all across the Continent, voters in a democracy will allow wildly unpopular policies to be shoved down their throats, for only so long. The Populist Parties in France , Germany and England are all surging. They may all be in power, by the end of the decade, if not before. The March had a great turn out, but no policy revisions. In the long run, especially after Trump is gone, it will take more than geriatrics with signs, for Dems to win elections.
I am a lifelong Democrat, my first presidential vote was for Dukakis, my most recent was for Harris. I am on social media a lot, and I know sm is not real life, but from what I read on there, so many Democratic voters are in deep denial of the current state of their party and of what happened in 2024. So many people will not tolerate a word of criticism of Biden, and some still insist that he would have won. Many will not tolerate a word of criticism of Harris or the campaign she ran, and some hope she runs in 2028. Too many insist that the 2024 election was stolen. I made the mistake of responding to a post on X that insisted the election was stolen by pointing out the Biden administration’s deep unpopularity, inflation, and Harris’ lackluster campaign as reasons she lost. I was viciously attacked for my post, and called a Trump supporter and a fascist. Too many Democrats are living in a fantasy land and have not learned a thing from 2024, which makes me discouraged about 2026 and 2028.