Saturday, October 18th ,2025 was a good day for Los Angeles.

It was a good day for common sense contemporary American people, who like victims of an assault who manage not to succumb to their injuries, will find rays of hope in communing with others who refuse to turn the cheek while stubbornly rising from their ashes to take on the offending entity.

Today at LA City Hall Grand Park the offending entity to be addressed was The Trump Administration.

No Kings is a national movement that has firm roots in the finest democratic assertions that this country has ever served up. The Quakers of the Constitutional Convention, The Civil Rights movement, the Abolitionist tide of the 19th century, the Women's Suffrage organizations, the Gay Rights movement,the New Deal, Johnson's Great Society, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Affordable Care Act are all grand examples of the grit and determination we as Americans repeatedly show in the face of those that would have us have less than our natural and constitutional rights.

The No Kings Protests have been organized by the same folks who brought the Women's Marches and the Hands Off Protests into fruition.

Some of the groups involved are…..Indivisible, 50501, ACLU, Public Citizen, The Open Society Foundations, Move On, Service Employees International Union,American Federation of Teachers.

Saturday was a good day in LA for this moment in this struggle.

The sun was up, the air was clear and100,000 Southern Californians met in Downtown Los Angeles to preach the gospel of constitutional decency, opportunity and civil rights traditions that most of us hold dear.

There were all kinds of folks with all kinds of signs and complaints, clever to crude just like America.

Lots of families were in attendance,freaked out about Trump's attack on immigrant families.

There were young folks rising up with their signage and their bodies to inhabit the same thought space that Frederic Douglass, Tom Paine, Ta-Nehisi Coates or Heather Cox Richardson all inhabited to maintain the torch of the Constitution and our democratic practice.

Subjects covered were : Medicare cuts,Elon Musk, the illegal firing and decimation of federal agencies, the removal of institutional DEI aspects in the government and culture,the militarization of American cities, the smashing of families through ICE, the marginalization of trans people and the insanity of the tariffs amongst a mile long list of Trump crimes were all targets of the activist's wrath.

People were angry but very self controlled.

Recently, After the National Guard had left Los Angeles, Mayor Karen Bass and Governor Newsom had warned that violence would only play into the hands of the Trump Regime and to not repeat the actions of the Los Angeles Hands Off protest where 5 Waymos were ceremoniously turned to ashes.

It appears as though the bait was not taken by more than Seven Million people.

The last “No Kings” protest drew Five Million protesters.

This alone should give plenty of hope for the political neutering of Donald Trump.

Check out this wonderful theory on the chances for political change.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3.5%25_rule



The police presence was very, very small this time around.

LA Sheriff's Deputies blocked off the entrances to the 101 freeway which had been closed off by anti Ice protesters on two previous anti Trump protest outings.

The LAPD ( in normal street uniforms)stood guard over street access to the Federal Detention Center ( as opposed to the National Guard.).

Families mixed with eccentric democracy lovers who protested with teachers, professors, nurses,sanitation workers, actors, federal workers, students, flower salespeople, disabled folks, inflatable dinosaurs, fervent Christians,Union members, Intellectuals from 15 to 90,years of age,grandparents, newborns, accountants and car mechanics to give Donald Trump his notice that they are united, mad as hell and will not put up with the destruction of this still great democracy.

Despite the grim reasons for being there, the day was one long and joyous camp meeting.

Smiles and conversations were everywhere.The signage was almost all homemade stuff stuffed with wit and gravitas.

This day was a respite from the lonely anxiety bubble that we live in while we watch our country deterioration screens inside our comfortable and seemingly safe home spaces.

But if you watched the participants carefully you could see the expressions that you might see if they were safe at home watching the destruction of the republic on YouTube.

There were very, very few arrests made in Los Angeles or nationwide for that matter. There were no reported acts violence in the LA action at the time of this report.

Seven million plus souls showed up to show the Trump Administration that their days in power are numbered,that their attempts at destroying 250 years of solid incremental progress for our democratic republic will be thwarted.

They were there to say that Trump's reign will live in infamy . . . . .

. . . . if they have anything to do with it.