Post-Mortem of Predictable Nothingness
They marched against kings while ignoring the empire.
The Wrong Target
October 18, 2025. United States military assets positioning across four continents. Warships off Venezuelan waters conducting lethal strikes on alleged drug boats since September, killing dozens. Military fortifications expanding in the Philippines. Trade war with China escalating toward threatened 100% tariffs set for November 1st. Ukraine aid continuing while Trump and Putin prepare for a Hungary summit scheduled for next weekend that might be the last diplomatic offramp before something irreversible happens.
And the “No Kings” protest? What about this time? Rumor has it, some privileged orange man who hates black and brown people, hates women, is corrupt, and is Hitler reincarnated.
Not anti-war. Anti-this-king.
What They Didn’t March Against
No signs about Venezuela. No speeches questioning why American weapons keep funding a failed strategy against Iran. No demands to repeal the Authorization for Use of Military Force that’s been stretched across two decades and counting.
The protest had energy. Real anger. Genuine conviction that concentrated power threatens democracy. But the power they opposed was domestic and partisan. The power they ignored was bipartisan and lethal.
Both parties agree on empire. Both parties fund endless military expansion. Both parties grant presidents unchecked war-making authority. That consensus never makes it onto protest signs because criticizing it means criticizing your own team when they hold power.
The Performance of Opposition
“No Kings” is brilliant branding for a movement that opposes this particular crown on this particular head. It sounds revolutionary. It feels righteous. And it costs nothing because it threatens nothing fundamental.
Real anti-monarchist sentiment would question why any president can order strikes in seven countries without congressional approval. Why surveillance powers expand regardless of who wins elections.
Instead, we get scheduled demonstrations against the aesthetic of authoritarianism while accepting its substance.
The Bipartisan War Machine
Here’s what doesn’t shut down during government dysfunction: weapons shipments. War contractor payments. Intelligence operations. Drone programs. Base construction projects. Arms deals with allied governments.
The Department of War (Trump renamed it back from Defense in September, at least calling it what it is) already has its money. While passport offices close and park rangers get furloughed, while Congress fights over food stamps and park funding, military operations continue uninterrupted. War spending passes early, quietly, with overwhelming bipartisan support. The empire gets fed first. Citizens get whatever’s left over.
The Real Threat
The entire premise of bombing Iran is delusional. Iran’s nuclear program cannot be eliminated because Iran views it as existential: for deterrence and sovereignty. Bomb the facilities, they rebuild. Kill the scientists, they train more. Even if Iran fabricates a weapon, that’s their security calculation, not anyone else’s. The June strikes proved this: twelve days of bombing, and Iran remains.
Billions spent not to eliminate a nuclear program that can’t be eliminated. To maintain pressure on a strategic pivot point. Iran: most populous Middle East country, massive energy reserves, aligned with Russia and China without formal treaties. This is the real threat: not potential weapons, but actual geopolitical orientation. A major resource-rich nation outside Western control, partnered with America’s great power rivals. The strikes serve containment. Keep Iran isolated. Keep it threatened. Keep it from becoming the regional power its size and resources suggest it could be. The nuclear program is pretext. The target is sovereignty itself.
The Alliance That Didn’t Show Up (But Still Matters)
When Israel struck Iran in June, Russia and China stayed on the sidelines. Condemned the attacks. Called for ceasefires. Did not intervene militarily.
Iranian officials felt betrayed. Neither Moscow nor Beijing has a mutual defense treaty with Tehran. No binding obligations. No automatic triggers. Just convenience masquerading as alliance.
But here’s what they do provide: China supplies missile technology and targeting data. Russia shares military hardware. Both offer economic lifelines through oil purchases and sanctions evasion. They conduct joint naval exercises annually. They coordinate diplomatically against US interests.
Attacking Iran doesn’t trigger World War III through formal alliances. It triggers World War III by pushing authoritarian states into tighter cooperation, destabilizing multiple regions simultaneously, potentially closing the Strait of Hormuz, spiking global oil prices, and forcing Russia and China to choose sides in ways that make the current situation look quaint.
The Venezuela Play
Regime change rhetoric escalating. The playbook is familiar. Panama, 1989. Dictator. Drugs. Democracy. And conveniently, oil reserves.
But Venezuela isn’t Panama. Russia and China have interests there. Oil contracts. Infrastructure deals. Geopolitical positioning. Push Venezuela, and it’s one more front against Moscow and Beijing while already confronting them over Iran, Ukraine, Taiwan, and trade. This time intervention doesn’t stay regional. This time we’re already stretched too thin.
The Philippines Calculation
US military upgrading Philippine bases near the South China Sea. Joint exercises simulating Taiwan scenarios. Missile systems deployed. China watching every move.
Economic warfare plus military encirclement is the prelude. Every historical parallel ends badly.
The Budapest Variable
Trump and Putin meeting in Hungary next weekend for a second attempt at ending the Ukraine war. The key issue: whether Trump provides long-range Tomahawk missiles that could strike deep into Russia. Putin has warned this would escalate. Trump’s decision could determine whether Eastern Europe becomes frozen conflict or active conflagration.
One summit. Five fronts. All happening simultaneously.
The Comfortable Resistance
Protesting Trump is safe. Media will cover it sympathetically. Your employer won’t fire you. Your friends will approve. You’re opposing power everyone on your side already opposes.
Protesting American military expansion is dangerous. It means criticizing Obama’s drone program and Trump’s strikes and Biden’s weapons sales. It means acknowledging that your preferred politicians also serve the military-industrial complex. It means losing the comfort of tribal belonging.
So we march against personality while ignoring policy. We call ourselves anti-establishment while carefully staying inside the boundaries establishment allows.
What October 18 Revealed
The protest happened. Crowds gathered. Speeches condemned concentrated power. Everyone went home feeling righteous. And Monday morning, nothing fundamental challenged the systems that actually concentrate power: the military-industrial complex, the surveillance state, the executive war-making apparatus that operates beyond democratic accountability.
It’s resistance as performance art. Loud enough to feel meaningful. Safe enough to change nothing.
The Convergence Point
We’re not facing one war. We’re facing a convergence where five separate conflicts could merge into something no one controls. Venezuela operations. Iran tensions. US-Russia negotiations over Ukraine. Philippines militarization. China trade war.
Each one manageable alone. All together? This is how world wars start. Not through grand declarations but through simultaneous pressure points that cascade into catastrophe.
And the protest movement spent October 18th debating domestic partisan grievances.
What Resistance Would Actually Look Like
Not scheduled marches with permits and police escorts. Not social media campaigns that generate engagement metrics for platforms owned by billionaires. Not protests that reliably occur every few months like product launches.
Real resistance would mean organizing across partisan lines against the permanent warfare state. Building coalitions that prioritize ending empire over winning elections. Demanding accountability for war crimes regardless of which administration committed them.
It would mean getting uncomfortable. Losing friends. Being called naive or dangerous or unserious. It would mean giving up the dopamine hit of tribal belonging for the hard work of principle.
Few want that. So we get “No Kings Day” instead.
October 21
The protest is over. The headlines have moved on. The shutdown continues into week three. And American military operations continue across multiple theaters without meaningful opposition from either party or any significant protest movement.
Here’s what makes this more than just another failed protest: Trump is already president. That fight is over. ICE already has its orders. Those battles are finished, at least until the next election. But war with Iran? Still avoidable. Venezuela intervention? Still stoppable. The convergence of five fronts into something that spirals beyond control? Still preventable.
For maybe another few weeks.
We opposed a king while funding an empire. We marched against authoritarianism while ignoring its most lethal expression. We felt righteous about resisting power while carefully avoiding the powers that actually kill people.