Tomorrow could be the biggest day of mass protest America has ever experienced. The "No Kings" rallies planned for Saturday could, collectively, add up to more than the five million who turned out earlier this year for the same reason: to protest that America was founded on the idea that we do not want to be ruled by a king who holds himself above the law, but instead by laws that all people -- even the country's highest leaders -- have to follow. That's a pretty basic premise, really. And the organizers of the rallies have reportedly gotten a much larger signup than occurred at their earlier rally, so the signs are pointing to tomorrow breaking records as well. There will be over 2,500 locations of these rallies across all 50 states, so go to their site and check out where the closest one to you is!

The funniest commentary about this protest movement we have yet seen came in the form of a political cartoon. It shows the bottom of the Declaration of Independence, with John Hancock and all the rest of the signatures, and it has a small caption at the bottom which reads: "NO KINGS PROTEST (original version)" -- which sums it all up very nicely. America was founded on the concept of "no kings."

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Donald Trump ran on the slogan "America First," but more and more it is looking like he's morphing his foreign policy into the second coming of the Monroe Doctrine. The United States meddling in the politics of Central and South America has a long and mostly ugly history, and Trump seems to want to write a few new chapters of that history. This is already causing some blowback among his MAGA supporters, since it runs so counter to what he promised them on the campaign trail.

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On the National Mall, with the United States Capitol as a backdrop, democracy is dying. Or... well... melting, to be more pedantic and less poetic. A brilliant art installation funded by Ben Cohen (of "Ben and Jerry's" fame) was erected this morning and unveiled at noon, consisting of an ice sculpture spelling out "DEMOCRACY" in capital letters five feet high. They lucked out on the day chosen, since it is reportedly a sunny 70 degrees in Washington today, which means the sculpture is not going to last very much longer (there's a live feed of it available, which at roughly 5:00 P.M. Washington time had been reduced to the "D", the first "C", and the "Y", with a portion of the second "C" and nubs of a few other letters still hanging on). The message is as simple as it is brilliant: Democracy is melting away before our very eyes. Or, to rework the now-laughable banner slogan of the once-vaunted Washington Post: "DEMOCRACY" dies in broad daylight.

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So far, the people who own the biggest news media outlets in the country have not been doing a notable job of standing up to Donald Trump. The television and cable networks have largely knuckled under, with several of them paying what can only be called multimillion-dollar medieval tributes to the king. Print journalism has had its exceptions -- organizations which are still standing firm and suing Trump in court (and being countersued) -- but some have also adopted "go along to get along" policies (most notably the Washington Post, which has seen an enormous exodus of longstanding journalistic talent leave, after the paper decided their editorial board had to be more friendly to Trump). But today, virtually all of them stood together and said "No!" to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

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Donald Trump is doing a victory lap in Israel and the Middle East, as all the hostages held by Hamas are released in exchange for thousands of Palestinian prisoners. The ceasefire has taken hold, and although this is just a first step it is indeed a big one. There's no guarantee the war is over -- the ceasefire could end and Israel could continue their attacks, if no agreement can be reached over the ultimate status of Hamas, but at least if the war does eventually continue it will do so without hostages being at the heart of it. Which is definite progress.

But there is another war still raging, and there are developments with regard to Ukraine and Russia that are worth discussing, so while everyone else is reporting on the Middle East I thought it'd be a good time to take a look at where things stand.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has bogged down. It has become just as much as an intractable standoff as World War I, in fact, with the same trenchlines and miniscule progress on the battlefield. It is a meat-grinder for both sides, but neither side has made huge territorial gains and probably won't. This war has changed warfare forever, since the drone technology in use (on both sides) has made things like tanks almost obsolete. The technological advancements in weaponry in Ukraine will soon be copied by all nations (all nations that don't want to get easily beat in their next war, at the very least).

The biggest "front" of the war, however, is the relentless air attacks from both sides. And on that front, Ukraine is having some successes that might actually be instrumental in forcing Vladimir Putin to the bargaining table. To build on these successes, Trump is now considering providing Tomahawk misses to Ukraine to use on targets deep within Russia, which would be an escalation -- but not a huge one, since Ukraine already has drones and missiles capable of hitting targets hundreds of miles into Russian territory.

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Donald Trump actually achieved something worthwhile this week. A ceasefire deal that will result in all the hostages being released was hammered out between Israel and Hamas, and the guns have gone silent in Gaza. Whether this results in a long-lasting peace deal remain to be seen (there are a lot of details that are still "to be determined" in the deal), but progress has definitely been made. However, Trump did not achieve what he really wanted in all this, as the Nobel Peace Prize was announced today -- for someone else. Maybe he'll be considered next year, but so far the petulance and anger from the MAGA crowd has already begun.

It was impossible not to read between the lines of the Nobel citation, which stated in part:

Democracy is a precondition for lasting peace. However, we live in a world where democracy is in retreat, where more and more authoritarian regimes are challenging norms and resorting to violence. The Venezuelan regime's rigid hold on power and its repression of the population are not unique in the world. We see the same trends globally: rule of law abused by those in control, free media silenced, critics imprisoned, and societies pushed towards authoritarian rule and militarization. In 2024, more elections were held than ever before, but fewer and fewer are free and fair.

So at least the Nobel Committee did mention Trump, in a way, since that list seems awfully familiar, these days.

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Jay Jones, the Democratic nominee for the office of Virginia's attorney general, should immediately withdraw his nomination.

That's a tough thing for me to say, less than a month from Election Day and with early voting having already begun. But I feel it is necessary at this point, even if it means the Republican candidate would win.

Some old text messages from Jones surfaced late last week, and they are absolutely disqualifying for anyone seeking the office of the highest law enforcement officer in the state. Because they explicitly talk of Jones wishing for violence and death to not only a Republican politician, but also for the children of Republican politicians. As I said, to me this is nothing short of disqualifying.

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Over two weeks ago, on September 23rd, Adelita Grijalva won a special election for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, in Arizona's seventh congressional district. She won handily -- by a whopping 39 percent margin -- so the results aren't being contested or undergoing recounts or anything of that nature. She won, plain and simple. It was an emotional victory for her because she will be taking the seat vacated by the death of her father Raúl earlier this year. But she still hasn't been sworn in. She is still just "Representative-Elect Grijalva."

The House speaker has refused to swear Grijalva in. And while their are political reasons for him doing so, this should not be allowed to stand. Her district has been without a representative for too long already, and adding additional weeks to that period is not just frustrating for the people who live there, but it is a dangerous and un-American precedent that is being set. Grijalva is now considering whether to bring legal action to force Mike Johnson to swear her in.

Johnson's position is simply not believable. He is saying that newly-elected representatives in special elections have to wait until the full House meets again -- something he is actively delaying (they were scheduled to get back into session this week, but Johnson decided to extend their vacation). But this is simply not true and there is no history of it ever being true.

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The mayor of Portland and the governor of Oregon are (so far) doing a pretty good job of pushing back against Donald Trump's attempted invasion of the city by soldiers. The state has sued Trump in court and has already won two injunctions preventing the deployment of troops. The first barred Trump from using the Oregon National Guard in the city, and the second was necessary because Trump decided to attempt an end-around play by deploying the California National Guard instead. The judge -- a Trump appointee, by the way -- was not amused, and her second injunction barred Trump from using any National Guard troops from any state in Portland. The judge's rulings were pretty scathing, pointing out that Trump's insistence that there is some sort of insurrection happening in Portland is completely divorced from the reality on the ground.

Trump is reportedly not happy with these rulings, and is now contemplating using the Insurrection Act to deploy troops instead. But it doesn't change the facts that the judge pointed out -- that there simply is no insurrection at all. There are some very small-scale protests in front of a federal building (with an ICE facility), but these are happening in a specific area -- there is no wide-spread protest at all.

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As the government shutdown enters its second week, Democrats appear to have the upper hand. It's not an overwhelming advantage, but it does seem like the Republicans are losing the battle for public opinion. This strengthens the Democrats' position -- for the time being. Public opinion is a fickle thing and could easily shift as the impacts of the shutdown become more widely felt, but for now Democrats seem to be the ones winning the battle for hearts and minds.

The best evidence of this is how Republicans are now shifting their tone. They based their initial argument on a flat-out lie -- that Democrats were fighting for "illegal aliens to get free healthcare," to the tune of a trillion dollars no less -- but Republicans now seem to be bowing to the reality that people absolutely do not want the Republican agenda on healthcare.

Here is a quote from a press conference Speaker of the House Mike Johnson just gave (you can be excused for mistaking this as an attempt at comedy -- I certainly laughed out loud when I read it):

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