SNEAK A KISS DAY UPDATES

Know Who to Sneak a Kiss To (if you can)? YOUR DAD! It's Father's Day! Save Him the Big Piece of Chicken, Too!

-This update was begun on Saturday night at the end of day that was sort of billed as one with dueling mega-events: the national No Kings rallies, protesting ... (gestures wildly) ... vs. the DC-based Military Show of Strength and Macho for America's First and Strongest of All the Strong Men, Donald Trump. Entering the day, there was trepidation and not a little bit of depression on the anti-Trump side. Usurping the National Guard in Los Angeles after a wave of ever-increasing raids was generating anger and not a little sense of futility about how or whether they could be stopped. The spectre of tanks rolling through the nation's capital for the veneration of a man who avoided military service in a most cowardly way roared of injustice and bullying.

-The day started with horrific breaking morning news: four Minnesota Democratic legislators and their spouses were shot by a man disguised as a police officer, killing two and placing the other two in critical condition as of Sunday morning. As the day progressed, the suspect was revealed to be, surprise surprise, a Christian nationalist Trump supporter (despite MAGA social media taking the man's appointment to two statewide commissions prior to COVID by Democratic Governors and trying to turn him into a Democrat - utterly untrue) who had a list of virtually every prominent Minnesota Democrat and a car full of hand-made NO KINGS flyers in a car near one of the shooting scenes. It all prompted MN Governor Tim Walz to "cancel" the No Kings protests throughout the state. Brutal.

-On a personal level, I am teaching a summer course via Zoom on Saturday mornings and knew I would not likely make it to Chicago's main rally in the Loop, nor could I make the event just north of me in the suburb of Evanston. But good work was done by my class, so I was able to wrap up and walk to a locally-sanctioned protest, one scheduled near three senior centers that would allow residents unable to make the train or carshare trip downtown an opportunity to voice their opposition to Trump, ICE, deportations, and any number of the litany of problems one can trace to Trump. So, off I went ...

-... and there, my energy and faith that we who oppose Trump can make this fight and win was restored magnificently. When I got to the protest, the crowds were three-deep on one side of the street and four- or five-deep in the other, and stretched two or three Chicago city blocks. The signage was creative, numerous, and witty as heck. The chants were standard but lively. There were indeed older folks with walkers and motorized wheelchairs with signage (OLD MEN AGAINST TRUMP read one, at least three others I saw wearing American Legion and Army hats) but also dogs and parents with young kids and younger students from nearby Loyola University (DON'T DEPORT MY FRIENDS, another poignant sign read).

-I stayed for about 90 minutes and the crowd grew, the energy built with it, and by the time I went home the street itself became part of the protest, with cars and buses and delivery trucks honking and thrusting fists in the air and even writing their own signs in support of everyone on the streets. My rough estimate was about 1,500 or so were there, although I'm not super-good on that sort of thing.

-As I was at that rally, I was in touch with a friend who was in the Loop for the main Chicago rally - one where the crowd was so huge it was difficult to figure out where "the front" of the rally was, and therefore where to start marching. The density of the crowd made it tough at times to send messages or make phone calls, similar to the 2019 Women's March (which was huge despite frigid temperatures), and overall it was clear this crowd exceeded this past April's Hands Off! march - a good sign for those of us who put faith in the finding/theory that if 3.5% of a population is nonviolently protesting a despot - 11.5 million for the U.S. - it is the so-called "tipping point" that would both topple the despot and pave the way for a true small-d democratic rebuilding of institutions, which is already something we know will need to do even though Trump and company have not even been in office for six months this time around.

-I got home and started to track social media, and indeed, in big city after big city, attendance for the No Kings rallies were off the charts. Philadelphia set the tone with an estimated six-figure turnout, then Los Angeles again turned out en masse, then New York City's protests stretched several blocks down Manhattan, then the aerial shots of Chicago showed up, culminating with Boston, who decided to fuse their protest with their Pride Parade (nicknamed NO KINGS - YAAAS QUEENS!) and by their estimates had one million in the streets by themselves. They even marched in Minnesota despite the early-morning assassinations and suspect being at.

-But it was not the big cities that carried the burden by a long shot. Indivisible said nearly 2,170 sanctioned protests went off across the country, from smaller cities like Cleveland and San Diego to red state centers like Boise, ID and Nashville, TN, from smaller towns like the northern Chicago town of Gurnee (known for Six Flags amusement park and an outlet mall) to the aforementioned metropolises.

-Your protest is only as good as your signage, and between what I saw in person and what I saw online, my Top No Kings Signs have been final, and they are as follows ...

-YOU KNOW IT'S BAD WHEN A STRAIGHT WHITE GUY MAKES A SIGN
-YOU CAN OLIGARGLE DEEZ NUTZ
-YOU SUCKED IN HOME ALONE 2
-RESIST BIGLY
-AT LEAST JONATHAN GROFF IS TALENTED. (That one refers to the Tony Award-winning actor who played King George III in the original Broadway cast of HAMILTON.)

-If you saw any others, mention them to me to give them the adulation and respect they deserve! -Also, a partial spotting of marching celebrities included Jon Cryer, Lea Thomspon, Morgan Fairchild, Mark Ruffalo, and CM Punk.

-The marches were massive, they were celebratory, they were non-violent save for some tear gas around a federal building in Los Angeles that was surrounded by federal troops who otherwise had nothing to do - and they got positive coverage everywhere. And because they were literally everywhere and well-attended everywhere, one clear after-effect of No Kings should be a realization to anyone sane in the White House that if they thought the country would roll over to Dear Leader as troops were sent to cities whether they wanted to be there or not, they were and are sadly mistaken. The opposition to Trump is now established, as is the warning that Trump does not have the manpower to stop such protests everywhere, or even in wherever they think is an epicenter of opposition (because there are no epicenters).

-Indeed, on Sunday morning the group 50501 made the official announcement: 12.1 MILLION were on the streets yesterday. That blows past the 11.5 million/3.5% threshold and should signal to the powers that be to back the fk off or face the consequences of a nonviolent majority demanding immediate changes - and we'll get back to this in a few ...

-Back to yesterday. Most of the No Kings protests were done by 5 pm EDT, and that apparently was the plan as designed by Team Trump. They seemed to have made the decision that the No Kings rallies and their patchouli-laced peacenik chanting would be over and the country would then flock to their teevees, where they could partake of old-fashioned American penis placebos that shoot bullets and fire military power and a President unafraid to use it surrounded by hordes of his most rabid and loyal supporters! USA! USA! USA! USA! MAGA! MAGA! MAGA! MAGA!

-WELL, I flipped to my social media networks (because Hell NO I wasn't about to give Fox or anyone else a ratings digit to watch this thing live), and what do they show an hour before the big parade but pictures of ... an absolute smattering of people scattered around the Washington Monument doing nothing and apparently not all that interested in seeing a parade.

-We are talking EMPTY, people. EMP-TY. DC-based reporters noted on Friday that the city was unusually spacious for a near-summers weekend with a holiday attached to it, and with flood warnings throughout Friday and a gray drabness in every photo, it made one wonder whether the MAGA hordes were disguised as humidity ready to appear once the tanks and the bands and the majesty of the Trump Military Extravaganza began ...

-... uh ... nope! The "Trump Military Parade" to show off the force now under the command of the man who was also celebrating his 79th birthday was, by every single metric you can imagine, an absolute, total, unequivocal dud. A crowd that was hoped to hit 200,000 was VERY generously revised to 40,000 - probably half that was the real tally.

-It was so small that at one point, as tanks rolled past the garishly massive video board where Trump and someone who reportedly was Melania Trump (although if you look at the eyes, either Melania got more work done or that was one of the fabled fake Melanias - that's my story and I'm sticking to it!) watched, you could clearly hear the rattle of the tank treads on the asphalt and the tank itself chugging and squeaking along. And they weren't the fabled Abrams tanks of World War II, they looked like tanks that were compacted slightly, which doesn't mean they aren't capable on the battlefield, but for a military parade they looked less than alpha.

-Indeed, the whole precision-military and mighty-might thing just wasn't happening. While a weak attempt was made to discuss the history of the Army (since this was also supposed to be a "celebration" of its 250th anniversary), it was done so with the kind of cheesy narration you hear on a Disney parade holiday special. And just like Disney, each announcement was sponsored by a corporate suck-up to Trump - among them Amazon, Coinbase, Jimmy John's, and most vomitously, Palantir, the Peter Thiel-owned data company believed to have received most of the data mined by Ketamine addict Elon Musk's snot-nosed programming geeks. Army troops were also seen handing out sponsored energy drinks made by Anheuser-Busch and branded by UFC's Dana White. Yum?

-Perhaps that is why when it came time for the Army to give Trump the Kim Jong Un show he had been hungering for literally for years, what he got instead were groups of soldiers just kind of walking, nearly shambling, not on the same foot and not even trying - all to an Army band playing half-hearted cover versions of AC/DC, Metallica, Van Halen, Heart's "Barracuda" (which was immediately denounced by Ann and Nancy Wilson), and most incongruously, the Creedence Clearwater Revival anti-war anti-military anthem "Fortunate Son."

-It all added up to quite the site on the review stand, where the only person smiling consistently was Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth (which makes concerns about his alcohol intake stay sustained), Secretary of State Marco Rubio could not stifle a massive yawn, the lack of any other Congressional MAGAt on the stage (earlier reports said only six Senators were even going to be in town), and Trump was plainly trying to contain ... not rage, and not just staying awake, but pouting with his entire face, unable to contain the gut-level disappointment of seeing his dream ruined because, as it turned out, the Trump Penis Parade was exactly what it should have been: flaccid, soft, tiny, and deservedly humiliating. (And I, for one, wonder how many divots are now in the White House Master Bedroom behind the cakes of dried ketchup and shards of glass spiked in the wall.)

-So, wha'happened?!

-The lack of a show that Trump wanted was a bit of a shock, and at first there were concerns about how the lack of the show was all about Trump's desires turning into humiliation for the Army, and there may be some truth to that. But numerous military observers pointed to stories that on Friday, the same garrisons were marching with discipline and energy and timing, making them believe that a not-so-subtle message was being delivered by the Army to Trump: we are not your props and we resent it. Given the well-known disgust most officers have with the insanely undisciplined Hegseth and the use of the National Guard without resources or basic staples of bedding and food and pay in Los Angeles, this will be useful to monitor in the weeks and months to come.

-The lack of a crowd was also sort of a surprise. (STANDS ON SOAPBOX)

-As someone who has produced theatre shows, trust me, you always want to give people a sense of being part of a crowd, and you do everything you can to get as many people to a show as you can, then get them to sit as close together as they can so the performers feel they are giving their all to a collection of appreciated people.

-At best, whoever managed the crowd and was responsible for getting enough people to DC to at least simulate a crowd should never get a job in production anywhere ever again. At worst, it is a sign that, mere months into the second term, Republicans and MAGAts simply do not have enough people excited or interested enough to come out to support the person who is the apex of everything that they do.

-And there was one person that saw all of that in all its delicious naked brutality: Donald John Trump. The man has clearly been sequestered from reality in all kinds of ways - but not Saturday. His people did not deliver because they aren't good enough to deliver and they can't deliver what isn't there, and in whatever mentally decrepit drug-addled physically decaying state he is in, he saw it all and could not deny it. And you can see it in his face.

-Happy Birthday, Mr. President.

-(STEPS OFF SOAPBOX)

-Let's get to today's trivia, play some music, and celebrate Father's Day however you do it. We will assess how No Kings hitting the 3.5% number will mix with the military parade flop and how it manifests itself with what will be a hurt and vengeful Trump - but for now, fire up the grill and savor the weekend. We earned it and we deserve it!

-NEWS ON THIS DATE: In 1215, the Magna Carta came into force. In 1775, George Washington became commander of the Colonial Army. In 1776, Delaware became the first state to declare its independence from Great Britain. In 1864, a national cemetery was established in 200 acres of farmland formerly owned by Confederate loser Robert E. Lee. In 1940, Axis troops occupied Paris. In 1965, Bob Dylan recorded "Like a Rolling Stone." In 2007, Bob Barker retired as host of THE PRICE IS RIGHT. In 2016, Jay-Z became the first rapper inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

-DEBUTS ON THIS DATE: A national flag (Denmark, 1219 - and it's still in use!), vulcanized rubber (1844), the United States/Canada border (1846), moving pictures (1878), THE APARTMENT (1960), ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN (1974), DURAN DURAN (1981), Nirvana on record (BLEACH, 1989), THE LION KING (1994), THE WHITE STRIPES (1999), ARCADE FIRE (2003), ICKY THUMP (2007), a man walking across Niagara Falls on a tightrope (2012).

-HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Marshall Field IV, Mario Cuomo, Harry Nilsson, Muff Winwood, Xaviera Hollander, Dusty Baker, Jim Varney, Simon Callow, James Belushi, July Hagerty, Wade Boggs, Helen Hunt, Courtney Cox, Adam Rapp, Ice Cube, Tony Clark, Neil Patrick Harris, Mohammad Salah, and Cooper Kupp.

-REST IN PEACE/REST IN POWER: James K. Polk, Wes Montgomery, Jimmy Dykes, Art Pepper, Meredith Wilson, Happy Chandler, John Connally Jr., Dick Murdoch, Ella Fitzgerald, Sherri Martel, Stan Winston, Casey Kasem, Matt "Guitar" Murphy, Franco Zefferelli, and Glenda Jackson.

-FEED THE WORMS: Sam Giancana, Yuri Andropov and Xi Jinping entered Earth on this date. Watergate break-in leader James McCord bought it on this date.

-TODAY IN THE CULTURE: The Number One Album in the United States on this date ... in 2025, I'M THE PROBLEM by Morgan Wallen ... in 2015, AT. LONG. LAST. ASAP by ASAP Rocky ... in 2005, THE EMANCIPATION OF MIMI by Mariah Carey ... in 1995, CRACKED REAR VIEW by Hootie & the Blowfish ... in 1985, AROUND THE WORLD IN A DAY by Prince and the Revolution ... and in 1975, CAPTAIN FANTASTIC AND THE BROWN DIRT COWBOY by Elton John.

-TODAY'S MUSIC INTERLUDE: Happy Birthday, Waylon Jennings! Celebrate with Waylon and Willie and the boys - The Highwaymen ...