April 20 was Hitler’s holiday. Now it may mark the day Trump declares martial law, suspends the Constitution, and finishes the job he started on January 6…
Absolutely. He will try to foment violence through inside agitators and use that as an 'excuse' for the 4/20 announcement. The question is, how do we do mass protest without any possibility for violence? Mass coordinated Zoom protests????
Most of the violence seems to be coming from the MAGA counter-protesters. If the Insurrection Act of 1807 is invoked, the vast majority of defense personnel would refuse to fire upon peaceful protesters, even if ordered to. Trust that they hate what is happening just as much as you do; possibly more so
I was on campus in Albuquerque a few days before the National Guard bayonetted eleven protesting students on campus a week after Kent State. The students were protesting the Kent State incidents and the Vietnam War.
Forget the backlash Fay, New day, new regime, new rules/ We now have an obsequious media and judicial system, including law firms, and half the people are on the side of Trump.
Ms. Wells, I wish you were correct. But I Doubt it.
In 1967 the Detroit police raided an after hours joint on 12th street and arrested everyone in it. The police were all white and the arrested were all black. Two of them were young returning combat vets from Vietnam. One was a decorated hero. The city erupted almost immediately into demonstrations and violence. The Republican governor George Romney sent in the state police and the state militia. He asked President Johnson for federal troops. But Johnson refused until Romney agreed to claim an insurrection was happening.
Then president Johnson, for whom I had voted, sent in the 82nd Airborn division and the 101st Airborn division.
My wife and I were social workers in Detroit. Standing in my backyard on the East side near the Detroit river I looked up and saw 20 military helicopters fly low over my house. The helicopters were loaded with soldiers holding automatic assault rifles. We looked through the open hatches into each others eyes as they flew over heading toward the area of East Kerchaval Street. Soon I heard hundreds of gunshots from the Kerchaval area. I jumped into my car and headed toward the gunshot sounds intending to bear witness to what was happening. But when I got there the street was blocked off by state police so I could not see up close what was happening.
Later I was in a friend's apartment on the third floor of a building on Grand Blvd. when the floor began to vibrate and we heard strange sounds in the street. So I stuck my head out the window to see what was going on. I saw in the street below an army tank firing tracers at an upward angle toward the roof of the Herman Kiefer hospital on the other side of the John Lodge freeway. A young soldier with a bullhorn popped up out of a hatch on the tank and ordered me to pull my head back into the room or I would be shot.
The city was occupied by the military for about 3 or 4 days. During that time according to the authorities, 7000 were arrested and 43 gunned down. But I find those figures to be doubtful. I believe them to be too low. I had worked in the Harper Hospital central supply department for a year and the morgue was capable of holding several dozen bodies. It was overflowing with corpses and some were on gurneys in the hall way. This does not account for the several other hospitals in Detroit and their morgues. Belle Island, in the Detroit river was used as an open air detention camp. I saw what looked like many more than 7000 mostly Black men held on the island, which was isolated by Detroit police. This does not account for all the lockups in all the Many police precincts in the city. I have many more stories I can tell about this military occupation. But let me end with a final one. After the violence was over I continued visiting the women on my Aid to Dependent Children [ADC] case load. The walls of the apartments and houses of some of those women displayed bullet holes going clear through their dwellings.
So, you see Ms. Wells it has already happened. If you are interested in my home town, you might want to read THE ALGIERS MOTEL INCIDENT by John Hersey and DETROIT I DO MIND DYING by Dan Georgakas. You might also like to look into the events surrounding Coxey's Army in Washington DC in 1894.
IIn '68 the country was burning. Troops in most major cities.
In DC over 13,000 Federal troops, including 1,750 National Guard troops on April 5th. Troops stayed in the city for several days after the riots ended on April 6th to discourage a second round of rioting.In the end, 13 people were killed, around 1000 were injured, and over 6100 individuals were arrested.
Yes Mr. Solomon I too remember that summer of 1968. When The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. came out against the war in Vietnam. He was the only important public figure to do so. He also changed his message from criticism about the terrible treatment of Black citizens to a critique of how our economic system treated all ordinary people badly, creating poverty for BOTH Black and White citizens. This changed message of his was undoubtedly what got Dr. King assassinated with the connivance of J.Edgar Hoover. He was tolerated, barely, as long as he kept his message focussed on the bad treatment of Black citizens. When he began to advocate for ALL American citizens; that was when he became a real danger to the elite power structure in the U.S. and he had to be eliminated.
His Southern Christian Leadership Conference [SCLC] had been planning a Poor People's Campaign for the entire country. The day before he was to bring it to Detroit, he was assassinated in Memphis. The SCLC came to Detroit without him and we had the Poor People's March on Woodward avenue through Detroit. I can relate tales of extreme police violence against citizens at this peaceful demonstration. The one I remember most was when 22 horse-mounted police officers pounded the heads and bodies of many dozens of innocent, peaceful citizens standing in front of the Cobo Hall arena. Children included. I watched from the deck of Cobo Hall. These people had to be hospitalized, some with serious injuries. I saw this and more in my hometown as a young man.
The entire country was growing resistant to the bloodthirsty war against the Vietnamese people. The public tension in the nation was high. The assassination of Dr. King ignited the explosion all over America. I was proud of my fellow citizens in those days. They stood up to the military industrial complex; if only for a short brilliant period.
I am far too old to entertain the idea that there might be heroes in this world. But when I was young The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther king was my hero. There were giants in the earth then: Dr. King, Malcolm X, Huey Newton, Rosa Parks, Mohammad Ali, Shirley Chisholm, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Harry Belafonte.
Gerald, hats off to you for bearing witness. Many thanks for taking the time and energy to relate your personal stories as part of the history of our nation. And as a warning of what could come to be.
What you described was the police and military response to a protest, which was not peaceful. Violence must be avoided, as to not give them any excuse to open fire
Ms. Wells, I am not sure which of my comments you are referring to when you say "to a protest which was violent" the 1968 protest was a peaceful demonstration. The public was NOT violent. The police were violent without any provocation from the public. The public was marching down Woodward avenue, with a formal permit from the city of Detroit.
Please do not misunderstand police. They are a double edged sword in any community. We hope they are there to catch those people who violate the law. That is what we expect of them. That is what our tax dollars pay them to do. In the town where I currently dwell, the police use up 50% of the city's budget each year. The other edge of the sword is that the police will repeatedly overstep their authority and abuse the public with violence. Repeatedly.
Perhaps you have never been physically abused by the police where you live. I hope not. But others in your community have been. For every police officer killed on the job by a citizen; the police kill 10. This is a national average year after year. The law also grants police officers what is called limited immunity from prosecution when they harm the public. This means the law always gives the police the benefit of the doubt if there is any uncertainty of who is to blame for violence between a police officer and a citizen.
This is why the police in Manhattan were exonerated for killing a man on the street who was selling cigarettes without a tax stamp on the package. An officer strangled him while other officers held the citizen-victim down on the concrete sidewalk. This act of police homicide was videoed. There are hundreds of such cases every year in America, not on video. The government does not require police departments to keep records of such incidents. And they do not. Only the ones which are witnessed and widely complained about by the public are the cases we hear about.
The case of officer Derek Chauvin who was successfully prosecuted for the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minn., was so rare that I never saw a similar case in my 36 years of teaching Criminology. The only reason Officer Chauvin was successfully prosecuted was because his act of murder was video recorded and the whole world saw it. And it became just that "one step too far." It was clear the public would not stand for it any longer. If you see the video; you will see other officers watching Chauvin, but refusing to stop him.
The city of Minneapolis had already paid out $9 million to two Black men whom Chauvin had done the same thing to. The city had also previously paid out $600K to a woman Chauvin had done the same thing to. Chuavin had also smacked a 14 year old Black boy on the head and caused him to require stitches to repair the damage. He also kneeled on that 14 year old boy's neck.
Something to think about: Chauvin was not a "bad apple." He was considered a good and effective police officer by his supervisors.
I was replying to your recounting of the 1967 Detroit incident, in which you said, "the city erupted almost immediately into demonstrations and violence". Police brutality isn't generally tolerated here in Australia
I would love to trust them but Trump has prepared the ground by gutting the military and security of principled leaders. We have Hegseth instead of Milley who led the Joint Chiefs. Look at the masked people who seized the students. Doubtless the military would justifiably use their gas masks to perform distasteful dishonorable orders.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) is an advisory body that reports to the President, the Secretary of Defense, and the National Security Council, but they do not have operational command authority, as the chain of command runs from the President to the Secretary of Defense, and then to the combatant commanders.
The chain of command is Trump, Hegseth and Combatant commanders
Sounds as a likely scenario, paid agitators, then the dictator applying Insurrection Act. Maybe we will have safety in numbers 19 April. On Saturday I went to the Hands Off protest at a small college town in western Colorado. Oddly, though turn out was good there were very few young people. Would police actually beat up a bunch of old people? Oh well, this old white guy will show up and dive under a picnic table in the event of violence. Are young people showing up in your area? Or are they nationally, like too busy like or like they just don't care like.
Social media is bought and paid for, dominated by the fascists. They own it because they have money and buy ads,influence or like Musk the program itself.
I don’t think the young people grasp the threat Thom outlined to our democracy in the violations of law Trump is currently undermining. Look. They are a product of the privilege of our democracy and can’t fathom what Trump is doing could lead to the devastating consequences other societies have experienced by dictator rule.
Fay, who set the date of April 19th? That is also the date of Juneteenth, the day when the last slaves in Galveston, TX were set free.
I smell the hand of the regime in this. I shudder that we are playing into their hands.
I had acquaintances with men who were agent provacateurs and had inflitrated movements. I also attended a "rally" ( more of a meeting, of the Communist Party in 1980 when Carol Marx was running for President and there were more FBI at the meeting than commies.
50501 are promoting April 19; could just be that it's 2 weeks after April 5. Every day of the year is someone's birthday or the anniversary of something
This is so frightening. Trump is a dangerous man. Surely he can be stopped. I cannot imagine our military following an order to turn on the American people.
You MUST imagine it. Trump has gotten this far because none of us could imagine he would. If we don't get ahead of him, and understand where he's going, we are done. He has already gutted the military of principled officers, established his own Yes Man in Hegseth, and cultivated his private militia whom he released from jails.
Each time some have said "oh that won't happen because it's too obvious", and then that damn psychopath manages (legal or not) to do it.
That is at the heart of the problem---Trump IS a psychopath. People don't get it. Most don't want to study what that means. Please explain it to everyone you can.
Listen to the song "Sounds of Silence" by Simon and Garfunkel. It couldn't be said better: "And the people bowed and prayed to the neon god they made."
WE THE PEOPLE have to be the conscience of America, because Trump and his Cult do not have one. Thanks for the heads-up on the date,Thom.
They are thought to be at least 1 percent of society and more than 3 million in America. Empathy and conscience maybe on a scale, and we are seeing the damage from those at the low end.
In the end I have to admit to enjoying the thought of what happened to Hitler and Mussolini will happen to dump. However, I want to thank Thom for writing this since I’ve been expecting the orange coward to try out this tactic as the overwhelming number of us gather force.
Small hands is a gutless piece of tar.
I may be considered older in years, but I’m telling you I’m younger day by day in spirit. And, thinking MANY OF US ARE!
Hitler and Mussolini were taken down by external forces, not internal forces.
Consider that who is there externally to take down Trump. Consider that Putin, Orban, Erdogan have not only survived by secured firmly their dictatorships.
In the last act of Hamlet, Fortinbas, King of Sweden saves Denmark. It's usually, however, not portaryed.
Check out Carney's background. Mark Joseph Carney is a Canadian politician and economist serving as the 24th prime minister of Canada and leader of the Liberal Party of Canada since 2025. He previously served as the eighth governor of the Bank of Canada from 2008 to 2013 and the 120th governor of the Bank of England from 2013 to 2020.
Comparitively the Trump administration is no competion. Does Canada have a "fifth column" in DC? Senate passed a Democratic resolution that aimed to overturn Trump’s tariffs on Canada — four Republicans joined with Democrats to vote in favor. It was largely a symbolic vote, but still a rare rebuke from members of his own party.
Canadians should protest to Congressional Republicans especially in border states and in Florida, where 500,000 Canadians pay Florida real estate taxes and Canadian employers pay 54,000 Floridians and where usually more than 3 million Canadian tourists and snowbirds spend $ billions.
Mr. Solomon, and the last thing Hamlet said in his final soliloquy was "to be or not to be, that is the question" What shall we do? As a nation? Shell we be? A
We are in deep deep trouble now BUT we are 350 million patriotic Americans who love our Country more than we will allow 1 orange felon to steal it and our freedoms and our reputation and our democracy and our WAY OF LIFE for his financial gain and POWER. We will rise up... BUT MAKE NO MISTAKE...THAT MEANS ALL OF US !!!!!! ALL OF US.....SHOWING UP ... There is no other way now
Our next day of protest, April 19, we must not give Trump an excuse to declare martial law while still not backing down from our demands.
We need to reimagine HOW we protest.
What about a day when there is NO ONE in the streets - no people, cars, bikes etc - and everyone is on a local Zoom protest? Held by conjoined orgs like Indivisible, Mobilize, etc?
Samani, Business as usual only fortfies Trump, mass protests can be infiltrated and used as a pretext to declare martial law.
Staying home is resistance, passive resistance and there is no justification in that for him to declare martial law. It is an excellent idea, but going to work and going shopping is bolstering Trump and approval.
I also fell and bummed my right knee on March 26th, I am now just healing enough to do some chores.
William Farrar, interesting you certainly are. I understand the logic...Timing! Variety. It reminds me that guerrilla tactics can so very effective. Keep them guessing. I wondered during our rally here 4-05 if there were 'a few not so like minded people wandering around' taking note. Silence can be as effective as noise. Can you imagine rump making a speech to a crowd followed by complete silence? Not one clap. Nothing. May your knee repair asap! Meanwhile I'll enjoy your comments on substack.
Rest assured that whenever there is a demonstration, there will be agents and provacateurs, sometimes they even organize the demonstrations.
Familiar with Mao's little red book? Let a thousand flowers bloom?
Well the flowers are dissidents, give them room to stick their head above the crowd so you can identify and chop them off.
During the Seattle WTO riots, there were men dressed in black, wearing black balaclavas and masks, breaking windows and inciting looting and violence, none were caught, they just disappeared
In Minneapolis during the George Floyd BLM demonstrations there was the umbrella man, all dressed in black, walking along breaking windows for looters, he too disappeared.
During the Portland BLM marches, out of nowhere appeared the men in black, balaclavas and masks, breaking windows, causing violence, but this time one was spotted climbing into an unmarked police van after doing his damage.
The left is pretty naive about infiltrator, the right more wary. I know a person who was interviewed for admission to Aryan Nations in Idaho, he failed, and a good thing, because they had a record of killing suspects.
Absolutely stay active. But stay smart and live to continue fighting. This kind of reaction is what Trump would love. He's goading us into violence and using us to justify the martial law designation he wants.
This is 'urban' warfare. Zoom, then hit the streets when he doesn't expect. Or get Congress to hit the streets with us and with many many non-violence experts sprinkled in each crowd. Or....? Zoom is not a necessity, non-violence is.
No. it would be carrying out our protest in a smarter novel way. Again -
we must reimagine HOW we protest.
It would confound Trump if the streets went silent. We must be as unpredictable as him, even though he will hear about it in advance through organizational emails.
Other thoughts can be sent to Indivisible and Mobilize leaders etc. There are other smarter ways for this next protest - the one after that, maybe return to the streets, maybe something else. Keep DT guessing.
A smart way Freda. Thank you for it, we are now living under an authoritarian regime, old rules no longer apply. We have to think different and smarter how, the only thing we can do is resist and sabotage.
WTF is wrong with people, don't they have a clue. Trump has the most powerful organizations in the country bending a knee, the media and law firms.
WTF is going to take for people to get a clue, the STASI or GESTAPO pulling up to your house in a SWAT van and bus.?
The way I look at it, Trump has lost many of his major supporters for several reasons. I still think national security is his Achilles heel. E.G. https://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/50094
Trump and Musk oppose each other on tariffs. Today, Musk is asking for a tariff free zone that encompasses the EU.
Trump and a few Republicans oppose each other on deportations. I've been asking people to pressure our three amigos, and contact CANF, the Cuban American National Foundation.
Trump and some Congressional Republicans oppose each other re Musk/DOGE.
Last week, 4 Republican senators voted to exempt Canada from tarriffs, and Grasseley sponsored a bill to revoke Trump's authority re tariffs.
With help of some Republican constituents and donors who now realize that all are compromised, we might get shared government.
I predict a prominent Republican will be assassinated by sniper on April 19 by a pardoned Jan 6 rioter. I think it will be Mitch Mconnell. Trump will claim a Venezualan gang member did it and have an innocent Hispanic man with tattoos and a Chicago Bulls hoodie killed as proof.
Trump will then claim we are under attack, declare a national emergency, and use that as his excuse to declare martial law on April 20. I wonder if I will be dragged away by face masked men in an unmarked vehicle for writing this.
That's good imagining and a possible tactic on their part - just as King Henry said 'will no one rid me of this man?' (or something like that) about Thomas. If DT said that about Mitch, a Proud Boy would step up.
I'm reading/audioing by Maria Tessa, "How To Stand Up To a Dictator and was reminded that when the Philippines dictator, Marco, ordered the troops to fire on protesters storming the palace, the troops refused. I'm eagerly reading the rest of the book for information concerning how to resist our dictator.
We should remind everyone in the armed services that “I was just following orders” did not work as a defense at Nuremberg and that any order to fire on civilians is illegal!
Assume nothing. Study the actions already taken. Talk is worthless, words are poison when it comes to nihilistic Nazism. Words are betrayals for actions to come. Trust no one you do not know implicitly via some mechanism you also trust.
The Nazi playbook is the only plan I have ever seen TFG follow. In all his business dealings, he spitballs stochastically, like he has done so far on many fronts. But this is very probably part of the planning. Latest financial data show that 10 percent of population is responsible for 50 percent of the economy, and 90 percent for the other 50. They do not need really poor or old folks, at all, except as target practice.
All of us old folk are now seen as non-contributors unless we are Nazi loyalists with lucre to spend and contribute. This asymmetrical warfare it is using is meant to disorganize us, demoralize us and create fear. Some of you are afraid. Get over this. It is irrelevant and hinders the absolute push back needed. For every asymmetrical move made by these Nazis we must be one step ahead with our own symmetry. This is cat and mouse. TFG and clan are out front, we must be guerilla. We have to have at least three counter measures and alternate moves to their one. If they see us older folk as useless, they will think nothing of taking us down, via Kent State terror, arrests, beatings, water cannon, audio and wave tech assaults.
This a maniac who said, on camera, to a bunch of barely nubile girls standing behind him, when he signed some dopey order forbidding trans athletes in female sports: he was sitting, turned around to them and said - none of you have a weiner under there, do you?
Seriously, do any of you doubt the brazen madness of this entity?
History has shown us what mad dictators will do to stay in power. The words of the Khmer Rouge before executions, "To keep you is no profit; to destroy you is no loss."
Most of the people who died of COVID were on Social Security. We need a flu vaccine that is up to date with the virus's mutations in the fall.
There is conspiracy in the air. Trump dumped stock before the tariffs were defined. Pam Bondi continues to debase herself. She is complicit in Signalgate as a Signal user and too corrupt to recuse herself. Until we have the House, we cannot impeach. We will have job growth because of the CHIPS Act and the Infrastructure bill. But the jobs shipped overseas are not coming home. https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/jobs-wont-come-back?r=3m1bs
Good advice, Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association is the most important subversive right wing organization in America. They will not enforce laws that they decide are unconstitutional, and will provide armed support to a fascist regime.
Yep… most here don’t understand that 420 is shorthand for weed (Mary Jane). It’s actually “4:20 pm, down behind (the gym?)” at a high school in San Rafael, Calif, where a few students would meet to smoke weed and get high.
My Substack today is about the anti-war protests at Michigan State, SDS, and the 1970 Huber 50 page report on Campus Unrest- which I have a copy of. "Then and now: Comparing the radical and dangerous SDS protest plans of 1970 with the HandsOff!" I note that if someone like Hitlerian Trump was president then he would have invoked the Insurrection Act and declared martial law. here's the link: https://halbrown.substack.com/p/then-and-now-comparing-the-radical
Fwiw, I asked a neighbor friend whose son recently made Lt. Col how the officer corps (it's the colonels who really run the service, and make the juntas worldwide) felt & she said that the grunts may be Trumpists, but the officers are loyal to the Constitution -- the real one, not the one reimagined by the SCOTUS hacks. So, no, they won't fire in civilians.
Otoh, that's not the National Guard, and we remember Kent State. But Sat says there are more of us than "them" and the military are people w friends and family too.
And Americans have a 250-year of experience w freedom; we won't take kindly to soldiers in the streets
You know, April 19th is also the anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord. I could just see on that day a serious but non-violent mass protest being used by Trump as the excuse for declaring that a new "insurrection" was beginning. Not exactly a Reichstag Fire, but enough to try and push through an Enabling Act giving all power to him.
Given that the next mass protests are planned for April 19, Trump invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807 the following day is a chilling possibility
Absolutely. He will try to foment violence through inside agitators and use that as an 'excuse' for the 4/20 announcement. The question is, how do we do mass protest without any possibility for violence? Mass coordinated Zoom protests????
Most of the violence seems to be coming from the MAGA counter-protesters. If the Insurrection Act of 1807 is invoked, the vast majority of defense personnel would refuse to fire upon peaceful protesters, even if ordered to. Trust that they hate what is happening just as much as you do; possibly more so
Kent State. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYOz12OG8mI
I was on campus in Albuquerque a few days before the National Guard bayonetted eleven protesting students on campus a week after Kent State. The students were protesting the Kent State incidents and the Vietnam War.
The Insurrection Act of 1807 wasn't in force during that event, plus the resulting backlash reduces the chance of it ever happening again
Forget the backlash Fay, New day, new regime, new rules/ We now have an obsequious media and judicial system, including law firms, and half the people are on the side of Trump.
Ms. Wells, I wish you were correct. But I Doubt it.
In 1967 the Detroit police raided an after hours joint on 12th street and arrested everyone in it. The police were all white and the arrested were all black. Two of them were young returning combat vets from Vietnam. One was a decorated hero. The city erupted almost immediately into demonstrations and violence. The Republican governor George Romney sent in the state police and the state militia. He asked President Johnson for federal troops. But Johnson refused until Romney agreed to claim an insurrection was happening.
Then president Johnson, for whom I had voted, sent in the 82nd Airborn division and the 101st Airborn division.
My wife and I were social workers in Detroit. Standing in my backyard on the East side near the Detroit river I looked up and saw 20 military helicopters fly low over my house. The helicopters were loaded with soldiers holding automatic assault rifles. We looked through the open hatches into each others eyes as they flew over heading toward the area of East Kerchaval Street. Soon I heard hundreds of gunshots from the Kerchaval area. I jumped into my car and headed toward the gunshot sounds intending to bear witness to what was happening. But when I got there the street was blocked off by state police so I could not see up close what was happening.
Later I was in a friend's apartment on the third floor of a building on Grand Blvd. when the floor began to vibrate and we heard strange sounds in the street. So I stuck my head out the window to see what was going on. I saw in the street below an army tank firing tracers at an upward angle toward the roof of the Herman Kiefer hospital on the other side of the John Lodge freeway. A young soldier with a bullhorn popped up out of a hatch on the tank and ordered me to pull my head back into the room or I would be shot.
The city was occupied by the military for about 3 or 4 days. During that time according to the authorities, 7000 were arrested and 43 gunned down. But I find those figures to be doubtful. I believe them to be too low. I had worked in the Harper Hospital central supply department for a year and the morgue was capable of holding several dozen bodies. It was overflowing with corpses and some were on gurneys in the hall way. This does not account for the several other hospitals in Detroit and their morgues. Belle Island, in the Detroit river was used as an open air detention camp. I saw what looked like many more than 7000 mostly Black men held on the island, which was isolated by Detroit police. This does not account for all the lockups in all the Many police precincts in the city. I have many more stories I can tell about this military occupation. But let me end with a final one. After the violence was over I continued visiting the women on my Aid to Dependent Children [ADC] case load. The walls of the apartments and houses of some of those women displayed bullet holes going clear through their dwellings.
So, you see Ms. Wells it has already happened. If you are interested in my home town, you might want to read THE ALGIERS MOTEL INCIDENT by John Hersey and DETROIT I DO MIND DYING by Dan Georgakas. You might also like to look into the events surrounding Coxey's Army in Washington DC in 1894.
IIn '68 the country was burning. Troops in most major cities.
In DC over 13,000 Federal troops, including 1,750 National Guard troops on April 5th. Troops stayed in the city for several days after the riots ended on April 6th to discourage a second round of rioting.In the end, 13 people were killed, around 1000 were injured, and over 6100 individuals were arrested.
Yes Mr. Solomon I too remember that summer of 1968. When The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. came out against the war in Vietnam. He was the only important public figure to do so. He also changed his message from criticism about the terrible treatment of Black citizens to a critique of how our economic system treated all ordinary people badly, creating poverty for BOTH Black and White citizens. This changed message of his was undoubtedly what got Dr. King assassinated with the connivance of J.Edgar Hoover. He was tolerated, barely, as long as he kept his message focussed on the bad treatment of Black citizens. When he began to advocate for ALL American citizens; that was when he became a real danger to the elite power structure in the U.S. and he had to be eliminated.
His Southern Christian Leadership Conference [SCLC] had been planning a Poor People's Campaign for the entire country. The day before he was to bring it to Detroit, he was assassinated in Memphis. The SCLC came to Detroit without him and we had the Poor People's March on Woodward avenue through Detroit. I can relate tales of extreme police violence against citizens at this peaceful demonstration. The one I remember most was when 22 horse-mounted police officers pounded the heads and bodies of many dozens of innocent, peaceful citizens standing in front of the Cobo Hall arena. Children included. I watched from the deck of Cobo Hall. These people had to be hospitalized, some with serious injuries. I saw this and more in my hometown as a young man.
The entire country was growing resistant to the bloodthirsty war against the Vietnamese people. The public tension in the nation was high. The assassination of Dr. King ignited the explosion all over America. I was proud of my fellow citizens in those days. They stood up to the military industrial complex; if only for a short brilliant period.
I am far too old to entertain the idea that there might be heroes in this world. But when I was young The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther king was my hero. There were giants in the earth then: Dr. King, Malcolm X, Huey Newton, Rosa Parks, Mohammad Ali, Shirley Chisholm, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Harry Belafonte.
Gerald, hats off to you for bearing witness. Many thanks for taking the time and energy to relate your personal stories as part of the history of our nation. And as a warning of what could come to be.
Not to mention Watts, Harlem, and the "police riot"at the DNC in Chicago.
What you described was the police and military response to a protest, which was not peaceful. Violence must be avoided, as to not give them any excuse to open fire
Ms. Wells, I am not sure which of my comments you are referring to when you say "to a protest which was violent" the 1968 protest was a peaceful demonstration. The public was NOT violent. The police were violent without any provocation from the public. The public was marching down Woodward avenue, with a formal permit from the city of Detroit.
Please do not misunderstand police. They are a double edged sword in any community. We hope they are there to catch those people who violate the law. That is what we expect of them. That is what our tax dollars pay them to do. In the town where I currently dwell, the police use up 50% of the city's budget each year. The other edge of the sword is that the police will repeatedly overstep their authority and abuse the public with violence. Repeatedly.
Perhaps you have never been physically abused by the police where you live. I hope not. But others in your community have been. For every police officer killed on the job by a citizen; the police kill 10. This is a national average year after year. The law also grants police officers what is called limited immunity from prosecution when they harm the public. This means the law always gives the police the benefit of the doubt if there is any uncertainty of who is to blame for violence between a police officer and a citizen.
This is why the police in Manhattan were exonerated for killing a man on the street who was selling cigarettes without a tax stamp on the package. An officer strangled him while other officers held the citizen-victim down on the concrete sidewalk. This act of police homicide was videoed. There are hundreds of such cases every year in America, not on video. The government does not require police departments to keep records of such incidents. And they do not. Only the ones which are witnessed and widely complained about by the public are the cases we hear about.
The case of officer Derek Chauvin who was successfully prosecuted for the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minn., was so rare that I never saw a similar case in my 36 years of teaching Criminology. The only reason Officer Chauvin was successfully prosecuted was because his act of murder was video recorded and the whole world saw it. And it became just that "one step too far." It was clear the public would not stand for it any longer. If you see the video; you will see other officers watching Chauvin, but refusing to stop him.
The city of Minneapolis had already paid out $9 million to two Black men whom Chauvin had done the same thing to. The city had also previously paid out $600K to a woman Chauvin had done the same thing to. Chuavin had also smacked a 14 year old Black boy on the head and caused him to require stitches to repair the damage. He also kneeled on that 14 year old boy's neck.
Something to think about: Chauvin was not a "bad apple." He was considered a good and effective police officer by his supervisors.
I was replying to your recounting of the 1967 Detroit incident, in which you said, "the city erupted almost immediately into demonstrations and violence". Police brutality isn't generally tolerated here in Australia
I would love to trust them but Trump has prepared the ground by gutting the military and security of principled leaders. We have Hegseth instead of Milley who led the Joint Chiefs. Look at the masked people who seized the students. Doubtless the military would justifiably use their gas masks to perform distasteful dishonorable orders.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) is an advisory body that reports to the President, the Secretary of Defense, and the National Security Council, but they do not have operational command authority, as the chain of command runs from the President to the Secretary of Defense, and then to the combatant commanders.
The chain of command is Trump, Hegseth and Combatant commanders
Military personnel take an oath to uphold the constitution, unlike ICE and DHS
Sounds as a likely scenario, paid agitators, then the dictator applying Insurrection Act. Maybe we will have safety in numbers 19 April. On Saturday I went to the Hands Off protest at a small college town in western Colorado. Oddly, though turn out was good there were very few young people. Would police actually beat up a bunch of old people? Oh well, this old white guy will show up and dive under a picnic table in the event of violence. Are young people showing up in your area? Or are they nationally, like too busy like or like they just don't care like.
G2 -they are not showing up in the north suburbs of Atlanta. They are stupid and don't care.As long as they have their cellphones,they are happy.
Social media is bought and paid for, dominated by the fascists. They own it because they have money and buy ads,influence or like Musk the program itself.
I don’t think the young people grasp the threat Thom outlined to our democracy in the violations of law Trump is currently undermining. Look. They are a product of the privilege of our democracy and can’t fathom what Trump is doing could lead to the devastating consequences other societies have experienced by dictator rule.
Fay, who set the date of April 19th? That is also the date of Juneteenth, the day when the last slaves in Galveston, TX were set free.
I smell the hand of the regime in this. I shudder that we are playing into their hands.
I had acquaintances with men who were agent provacateurs and had inflitrated movements. I also attended a "rally" ( more of a meeting, of the Communist Party in 1980 when Carol Marx was running for President and there were more FBI at the meeting than commies.
Juneteenth is June 19th, not April.
Thanks but it rhymes :)
Smile!
50501 are promoting April 19; could just be that it's 2 weeks after April 5. Every day of the year is someone's birthday or the anniversary of something
What is 50501?
https://www.fiftyfifty.one/
50 protests, 50 states, 1 movement
I saw that last night on Rachel Maddow. Let us hope that the protests continue because a one day affair is blowing off steam and is ignored.
This is so frightening. Trump is a dangerous man. Surely he can be stopped. I cannot imagine our military following an order to turn on the American people.
You MUST imagine it. Trump has gotten this far because none of us could imagine he would. If we don't get ahead of him, and understand where he's going, we are done. He has already gutted the military of principled officers, established his own Yes Man in Hegseth, and cultivated his private militia whom he released from jails.
You are correct!
Kent State-no one who killed 4 students were ever charged.
Each time some have said "oh that won't happen because it's too obvious", and then that damn psychopath manages (legal or not) to do it.
That is at the heart of the problem---Trump IS a psychopath. People don't get it. Most don't want to study what that means. Please explain it to everyone you can.
Listen to the song "Sounds of Silence" by Simon and Garfunkel. It couldn't be said better: "And the people bowed and prayed to the neon god they made."
WE THE PEOPLE have to be the conscience of America, because Trump and his Cult do not have one. Thanks for the heads-up on the date,Thom.
He has also surrounded himself with other psychopaths.
Exactly, Tim.
They are thought to be at least 1 percent of society and more than 3 million in America. Empathy and conscience maybe on a scale, and we are seeing the damage from those at the low end.
In the end I have to admit to enjoying the thought of what happened to Hitler and Mussolini will happen to dump. However, I want to thank Thom for writing this since I’ve been expecting the orange coward to try out this tactic as the overwhelming number of us gather force.
Small hands is a gutless piece of tar.
I may be considered older in years, but I’m telling you I’m younger day by day in spirit. And, thinking MANY OF US ARE!
Hitler and Mussolini were taken down by external forces, not internal forces.
Consider that who is there externally to take down Trump. Consider that Putin, Orban, Erdogan have not only survived by secured firmly their dictatorships.
Riots in Hungary, Turkey.
In the last act of Hamlet, Fortinbas, King of Sweden saves Denmark. It's usually, however, not portaryed.
Check out Carney's background. Mark Joseph Carney is a Canadian politician and economist serving as the 24th prime minister of Canada and leader of the Liberal Party of Canada since 2025. He previously served as the eighth governor of the Bank of Canada from 2008 to 2013 and the 120th governor of the Bank of England from 2013 to 2020.
Comparitively the Trump administration is no competion. Does Canada have a "fifth column" in DC? Senate passed a Democratic resolution that aimed to overturn Trump’s tariffs on Canada — four Republicans joined with Democrats to vote in favor. It was largely a symbolic vote, but still a rare rebuke from members of his own party.
Canadians should protest to Congressional Republicans especially in border states and in Florida, where 500,000 Canadians pay Florida real estate taxes and Canadian employers pay 54,000 Floridians and where usually more than 3 million Canadian tourists and snowbirds spend $ billions.
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/FL.
Is internal dissention Trump's Achilles heel?
Fortinbras?
Mr. Solomon, and the last thing Hamlet said in his final soliloquy was "to be or not to be, that is the question" What shall we do? As a nation? Shell we be? A
free nation?
We are in deep deep trouble now BUT we are 350 million patriotic Americans who love our Country more than we will allow 1 orange felon to steal it and our freedoms and our reputation and our democracy and our WAY OF LIFE for his financial gain and POWER. We will rise up... BUT MAKE NO MISTAKE...THAT MEANS ALL OF US !!!!!! ALL OF US.....SHOWING UP ... There is no other way now
Unfortunately I can imagine all kinds of people doing all kinds of things, given enough pressure. Look at all the social experiments.
It only takes 3 Republican House members to stop this madness.
https://jerryweiss.substack.com/
You are dreaming Mr. Solomon. the Congress has no power. The office of the Executive has all the power.
Read Feathers of Hope. Some of us know how to fight....and sometimes dreams come true.
Mr. Solomon, I shall never stop dreaming and hoping for a better world.
Our next day of protest, April 19, we must not give Trump an excuse to declare martial law while still not backing down from our demands.
We need to reimagine HOW we protest.
What about a day when there is NO ONE in the streets - no people, cars, bikes etc - and everyone is on a local Zoom protest? Held by conjoined orgs like Indivisible, Mobilize, etc?
Thinking Dumf would like us to stay home, close our windows & doors. Frighten us.
Nonono not me! Not the citizens of my town on upper Cape Cod, who are smart, brave. resilient, creative and highly motivated.
I admire your bold thinking of tactics however, Freda.
We all need to do that! I’m trying to stay active in every way possible, to push through any awkwardness that I stumble across daily
Ie just re-injured R knee as I stumbled on two roots while filling bird feeders.
(Idiot that I am:-) I’d still strap on a knee brace to mobilize if necessary. Instead I’ll strengthen it slowly to be ready for the next action.
Post cards? Yes!
Samani, Business as usual only fortfies Trump, mass protests can be infiltrated and used as a pretext to declare martial law.
Staying home is resistance, passive resistance and there is no justification in that for him to declare martial law. It is an excellent idea, but going to work and going shopping is bolstering Trump and approval.
I also fell and bummed my right knee on March 26th, I am now just healing enough to do some chores.
William Farrar, interesting you certainly are. I understand the logic...Timing! Variety. It reminds me that guerrilla tactics can so very effective. Keep them guessing. I wondered during our rally here 4-05 if there were 'a few not so like minded people wandering around' taking note. Silence can be as effective as noise. Can you imagine rump making a speech to a crowd followed by complete silence? Not one clap. Nothing. May your knee repair asap! Meanwhile I'll enjoy your comments on substack.
Rest assured that whenever there is a demonstration, there will be agents and provacateurs, sometimes they even organize the demonstrations.
Familiar with Mao's little red book? Let a thousand flowers bloom?
Well the flowers are dissidents, give them room to stick their head above the crowd so you can identify and chop them off.
During the Seattle WTO riots, there were men dressed in black, wearing black balaclavas and masks, breaking windows and inciting looting and violence, none were caught, they just disappeared
In Minneapolis during the George Floyd BLM demonstrations there was the umbrella man, all dressed in black, walking along breaking windows for looters, he too disappeared.
During the Portland BLM marches, out of nowhere appeared the men in black, balaclavas and masks, breaking windows, causing violence, but this time one was spotted climbing into an unmarked police van after doing his damage.
The left is pretty naive about infiltrator, the right more wary. I know a person who was interviewed for admission to Aryan Nations in Idaho, he failed, and a good thing, because they had a record of killing suspects.
Absolutely stay active. But stay smart and live to continue fighting. This kind of reaction is what Trump would love. He's goading us into violence and using us to justify the martial law designation he wants.
This is 'urban' warfare. Zoom, then hit the streets when he doesn't expect. Or get Congress to hit the streets with us and with many many non-violence experts sprinkled in each crowd. Or....? Zoom is not a necessity, non-violence is.
That would be giving in to Trump's intimidation, which is EXACTLY what he wants
No. it would be carrying out our protest in a smarter novel way. Again -
we must reimagine HOW we protest.
It would confound Trump if the streets went silent. We must be as unpredictable as him, even though he will hear about it in advance through organizational emails.
Other thoughts can be sent to Indivisible and Mobilize leaders etc. There are other smarter ways for this next protest - the one after that, maybe return to the streets, maybe something else. Keep DT guessing.
A smart way Freda. Thank you for it, we are now living under an authoritarian regime, old rules no longer apply. We have to think different and smarter how, the only thing we can do is resist and sabotage.
WTF is wrong with people, don't they have a clue. Trump has the most powerful organizations in the country bending a knee, the media and law firms.
WTF is going to take for people to get a clue, the STASI or GESTAPO pulling up to your house in a SWAT van and bus.?
The way I look at it, Trump has lost many of his major supporters for several reasons. I still think national security is his Achilles heel. E.G. https://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/50094
Trump and Musk oppose each other on tariffs. Today, Musk is asking for a tariff free zone that encompasses the EU.
Trump and a few Republicans oppose each other on deportations. I've been asking people to pressure our three amigos, and contact CANF, the Cuban American National Foundation.
Trump and some Congressional Republicans oppose each other re Musk/DOGE.
Last week, 4 Republican senators voted to exempt Canada from tarriffs, and Grasseley sponsored a bill to revoke Trump's authority re tariffs.
With help of some Republican constituents and donors who now realize that all are compromised, we might get shared government.
I predict a prominent Republican will be assassinated by sniper on April 19 by a pardoned Jan 6 rioter. I think it will be Mitch Mconnell. Trump will claim a Venezualan gang member did it and have an innocent Hispanic man with tattoos and a Chicago Bulls hoodie killed as proof.
Trump will then claim we are under attack, declare a national emergency, and use that as his excuse to declare martial law on April 20. I wonder if I will be dragged away by face masked men in an unmarked vehicle for writing this.
That's good imagining and a possible tactic on their part - just as King Henry said 'will no one rid me of this man?' (or something like that) about Thomas. If DT said that about Mitch, a Proud Boy would step up.
I'm reading/audioing by Maria Tessa, "How To Stand Up To a Dictator and was reminded that when the Philippines dictator, Marco, ordered the troops to fire on protesters storming the palace, the troops refused. I'm eagerly reading the rest of the book for information concerning how to resist our dictator.
We should remind everyone in the armed services that “I was just following orders” did not work as a defense at Nuremberg and that any order to fire on civilians is illegal!
Assume nothing. Study the actions already taken. Talk is worthless, words are poison when it comes to nihilistic Nazism. Words are betrayals for actions to come. Trust no one you do not know implicitly via some mechanism you also trust.
The Nazi playbook is the only plan I have ever seen TFG follow. In all his business dealings, he spitballs stochastically, like he has done so far on many fronts. But this is very probably part of the planning. Latest financial data show that 10 percent of population is responsible for 50 percent of the economy, and 90 percent for the other 50. They do not need really poor or old folks, at all, except as target practice.
All of us old folk are now seen as non-contributors unless we are Nazi loyalists with lucre to spend and contribute. This asymmetrical warfare it is using is meant to disorganize us, demoralize us and create fear. Some of you are afraid. Get over this. It is irrelevant and hinders the absolute push back needed. For every asymmetrical move made by these Nazis we must be one step ahead with our own symmetry. This is cat and mouse. TFG and clan are out front, we must be guerilla. We have to have at least three counter measures and alternate moves to their one. If they see us older folk as useless, they will think nothing of taking us down, via Kent State terror, arrests, beatings, water cannon, audio and wave tech assaults.
This a maniac who said, on camera, to a bunch of barely nubile girls standing behind him, when he signed some dopey order forbidding trans athletes in female sports: he was sitting, turned around to them and said - none of you have a weiner under there, do you?
Seriously, do any of you doubt the brazen madness of this entity?
History has shown us what mad dictators will do to stay in power. The words of the Khmer Rouge before executions, "To keep you is no profit; to destroy you is no loss."
Most of the people who died of COVID were on Social Security. We need a flu vaccine that is up to date with the virus's mutations in the fall.
There is conspiracy in the air. Trump dumped stock before the tariffs were defined. Pam Bondi continues to debase herself. She is complicit in Signalgate as a Signal user and too corrupt to recuse herself. Until we have the House, we cannot impeach. We will have job growth because of the CHIPS Act and the Infrastructure bill. But the jobs shipped overseas are not coming home. https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/jobs-wont-come-back?r=3m1bs
Keep an eye on sheriff's offices.
Good advice, Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association is the most important subversive right wing organization in America. They will not enforce laws that they decide are unconstitutional, and will provide armed support to a fascist regime.
So true, Jon.
For those that don't know why, please read the pledge made by the Oath Keepers that helped head Jan. 6th. Find out if your sheriff signed an oath.
Good Lord, I’d rather they take a few tokes and chill on 420.
Yep… most here don’t understand that 420 is shorthand for weed (Mary Jane). It’s actually “4:20 pm, down behind (the gym?)” at a high school in San Rafael, Calif, where a few students would meet to smoke weed and get high.
Also HH (88's) birthday.
… and Mr Musk famously filmed himself smoking a joint on (I think) Twitter shortly after marijuana was legalized in many states
My Substack today is about the anti-war protests at Michigan State, SDS, and the 1970 Huber 50 page report on Campus Unrest- which I have a copy of. "Then and now: Comparing the radical and dangerous SDS protest plans of 1970 with the HandsOff!" I note that if someone like Hitlerian Trump was president then he would have invoked the Insurrection Act and declared martial law. here's the link: https://halbrown.substack.com/p/then-and-now-comparing-the-radical
I'd be happy to make a paper copy of this report and send it to Thom if he'd like to read it.
I appreciate your historical info and commented on your Substack. Thank you.
You're welcome, Gloria.
Fwiw, I asked a neighbor friend whose son recently made Lt. Col how the officer corps (it's the colonels who really run the service, and make the juntas worldwide) felt & she said that the grunts may be Trumpists, but the officers are loyal to the Constitution -- the real one, not the one reimagined by the SCOTUS hacks. So, no, they won't fire in civilians.
Otoh, that's not the National Guard, and we remember Kent State. But Sat says there are more of us than "them" and the military are people w friends and family too.
And Americans have a 250-year of experience w freedom; we won't take kindly to soldiers in the streets
You know, April 19th is also the anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord. I could just see on that day a serious but non-violent mass protest being used by Trump as the excuse for declaring that a new "insurrection" was beginning. Not exactly a Reichstag Fire, but enough to try and push through an Enabling Act giving all power to him.