Bowie, Maryland, is the jurisdiction in PG County where Collington (the senior living community where we now live) is located. It comes as close to representing “Middle America” as any Washington metro area community with the exception that the county is racially integrated with a high percentage of middle and upper-middle income African Americans.
On the day of the No Kings protest, some 60+ residents of Collington gathered in front of our community to wave signs at the cars passing on a heavily used road. Embry took the Metro to join members of All Souls Church participating in the mass gathering of several hundred thousand near the Capitol. I went to the Bowie Library with two other Collington residents to join a racially integrated crowd (though still mostly white) of many hundreds spread out along a major highway on both sides of the road, waving their colorful signs and cheering. The atmosphere was festive and up beat, and it did not hurt that the weather was drop-dead gorgeous.
The most amazing thing to me was the constant cacophony of honks of automobiles passing with people rolling down their windows, waving and giving us thumbs up and victory signs in support of the effort. This went on for at least two hours and was still going strong when I and my two friends from Collington returned to the campus to share our experience with others here who had demonstrated at the entrance to the community. There were similar No Kings protests in other parts of the county.
By now you have probably seen the estimates. Between seven and eight million people demonstrating all across the country in close to 3,000 locations and in every state in the Union. This would make it the largest coordinated mass demonstration in US history. There were few incidents or arrests and the mood elsewhere all across the country has been described as mostly upbeat, hopeful, and focused on the dangers Trump has wrought on our nation. Many were waving American flags.
Will this make a difference? Will it change the hearts and minds of the spineless Republicans in Congress who are afraid of standing up to what many of them must know in their heart of hearts that much of what Trump is doing is wrong? Is this the beginning of something greater or just a flash in the pan? That is, of course, yet to be decided. Trump, Vance, Johnson and the Republican leadership continue to describe us No Kings participants as Marxists, Communists, Anitfas, thugs, criminals, and people who hate our country. Really? All of us? My guess is at least some of them must know that something is brewing here that could–and I believe will–get our country headed back on the right track. But the No Kings effort on Saturday must be the beginning not the end. As the old saying goes: never give up, never, never give up. We shall overcome.
Standing by for what happens next….
