Tag Archives: John Nichols

A Wisconsin Day to Remember, and To Carry “Forward”

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Cathedral Square Park is jammed with an estimated 10,000 “No Kings” protesters Saturday. Photo by Mike DeSisti Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

The clash of resounding, angry coast-to-coast public sentiment against self-satisfied Trumpian tone deafness thundered across real space and time on Saturday, June 14.

Yes, it was the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Military and somebody’s 79th birthday. So the Narcissist-in-Chief got his HUGE military parade – a la Communist China, North Korea and Russia, all groaning, pavement-crushing tanks, roaring overhead jets and marching troops – to pretend it was all in his glorious honor. Many troops reportedly did not want to be there.

“I have never experienced such a joyless, lifeless, and sterile mass event in my life,” commented Esquire‘s longtime political reporter Charles Pierce. Yet Adolf Hitler’s moldy remains probably quivered in envy.

So that was the weird cocoon of Washington, D.C. adorned with its MAGA shell.

What was really happening in America Saturday?

Five million people were amassing across the nation, in “No Kings” protests fully rejecting the way Trump’s agenda is striving to endow him with monarchial, increasingly authoritarian, powers. People are protesting masked ICE agents workplace raids to deport immigrants without due process, and National Guard and Marine actions in Los Angeles, the arresting of a U.S. Senator at a press conference, the ongoing travesty of American governmental support of Israel’s self-defense-turned-genocide of Palestine’s Gaza, among a myriad of other problems with our deeply injured democracy right now.

Désirée Pointer-Mace, of Milwaukee, sings during the No Kings protest at Cathedral Square Park in Milwaukee. Carol Coronado / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

As the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported, Wisconsinites in more than 50 towns and cities took to the streets on Saturday, June 14, as part of what organizers say was the largest nationwide protest yet against President Donald Trump’s second-term agenda, the stuff of tyranny running amok.

In downtown Milwaukee, organizers estimated the crowd reached almost 10,000 people, according to Alan Chavoya, a protester with the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. Protestors chanted and sang in Cathedral Square Park, before marching a mile loop around part of downtown. The rally was energetic, but peaceful.

I was there and can affirm that description.

The protest’s first phase was a series of speakers who had plenty to say, some fiery, some incisive and learned, and speakers ran much longer than the planned one hour time slot. But these times are bristling with burning issues to discuss and protest from the Trump agenda, defying the law, a compliant Congress and the Courts, with immigrant issues at the top of the list.

The crowd remained attentive and patient. There were a number of quote-worthy speeches and notably one speaker who offered the shocking news that Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, were shot and killed, a short time beforehand. Also, Minnesota state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, were shot multiple times in the early morning hours Saturday. The anouncement prompted the crowd to a moment of silence to honor that  tragedy. (Vance Boelter was arrested Sunday night in rural Sibley County, about 50 miles from Minneapolis, as the prime suspect in what has been described as a politically motivate assassination.)

Laurie Peifer, of Milwaukee, dressed in a “Handmaid’s Tale” costume as part of No Kings protest at Cathedral Square Park in Milwaukee, June 14, 2025. he was protesting to support women’s health care. Carol Coronado / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

However, I took no notes Saturday so I’ll let one speech suffice by example. Renowned progressive journalist and author John Nichols delivered a double-whammy of a special sort. He first declared that he actually had a distant ancestor who took part in the American Revolution. But then he quickly clarified the role of dissent in our history of patriotism by noting that only white men could vote when the nation was formed. Suffrage for women and voting rights for people of color came much, much later, a long, achingly profound history we must never forget.

As another speaker said, quoting the great Black abolitionist Federick Douglass, “If there is no struggle, the is no progress.”

Then at one point, Nichols paused and said, “I just had a call from a friend of mine.” It seemed a curious disruption of the momentum of his speech. But in a few moments we understood what this meant. After a click or two, a voice came over the loudspeaker — the unmistakably Brooklyn-tinged accent of Senator Bernie Sanders. No figure but the voice was doubtless. It was a bit of old-fashioned sleight-of-hand stagecraft, updated for the cell-phone era.

Sanders gave us about five minutes of his vintage stem-winding rhetoric about billionaires screwing the countless of the 99 per cent. He also pointed out how the recent Wisconsin election of liberal Supreme Court justice Susan Crawford provided powerful repudiation of Trump and his then-right-hand billionaire Elon Musk who had contributed millions to defeating Crawford (before bowing out of his despicable position). It was just the sort of thing this crowd deserved to hear, I daresay. Nichols actually co-authored a book with Sanders published last year, It’s OK to be Angry About Capitalism, striving to reground the left’s arguments in the new populism.

After years of political prominence Sanders may be right now — along with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — the two most electrifying figures on the left side of democratic politics, by virtue of their recent “Fighting Oligarchy” nationwide tour, which has continually commanded large crowds. The pair is all the more striking for representing political figures widely separated generationally, yet brought together in resounding harmony of defiance.

Nichols, a Wisconsin native and Madison resident, closed his speech by telling us we cannot go backward into the nostalgic fictional past of the white supremacist MAGA movement. “We are Wisconsinites and Wisconsinites go forward!” he shouted, invoking the state’s motto, ever pointed to righteousness.

This was one protester among many who added wit and levity to the proceedings with his Elvis assemblage. Photo by Nancy Lynch Aldrich
Finally the protest morphed into a march gathering along Wells Street behind the speaker stage and snaking slowly east to the lakefront. Then the crowd turned south, past the War Memorial and curved west at the DiSuvero sculpture, The Calling,” in front
“No Kings” protesters march west from the Milwaukee lakefront and the iconic DiSuvero sculpture “The Calling,” and the Milwaukee Art Museum’s brise soleil. Photo by Kevin Lynch
of the Milwaukee Art Museum’s Calatrava addition with its flaring brise soiel sunscreen. No doubt this mass of humanity had a calling this day. It was certainly the first time I’ve ever marched up Wisconsin Ave, Milwaukee’s downtown main street.
The eastbound lane was open to car traffic and many drivers honked their horns in solidarity, a few displaying “No Kings” protest signs through sun roofs.
If anything signified the transformation of Milwaukee into meaningful expression and acton it was this scene, rising from the city’s most iconic setting.
And yet, this was one of so many across the nation.
We the people have spoken. Who will hear us?
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Your blogger, Kevernacular, at the Milwaukee “No Kings” protest with his well-traveled Trump sign, modified with a “king” crown motif. Photo by Nancy Lynch 

How has capitalism worked out for you? Socialism is not a dirty word. Even less so is democratic socialism.

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If a political novice like Donald Trump can become president, why not give a political novice, like New York Senate primary winner Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez –  with the energy, sharp intellect and vision of youth – a chance to apply her ideas about democratic socialism? We are, after all, a democratic society. Medium

Perhaps the most naked and time-worn example of American “anti-intellectualism” is the demonizing of the word “socialism.” Even some educated and seemingly thoughtful people instinctively react as if even the scent of socialism robs them of their precious liberties.

But the freedom capitalism promises – and now delivers so pathetically to “we the people” – is to empower or enrich persons or corporations in isolation, leaving distribution of wealth up to the enriched.

Yet in the United States, a person is almost invariably part of some community, if they admit it or not. Even a hard-working farmer, living perhaps a mile away from a neighbor, is sorely dependent on an economic system that runs fairly to compensate and support his labors. This means that a socio-economic system that balances the needs of individuals, as opposed to greedy wants, with the needs of the community makes sense. Why? Because trickle-down theories of capitalism rarely actually deliver to the people, whereas a social-minded system strives to assure the individual gets back something from the communal system.

I think a more socialist-oriented America can help redirect appropriate percentages of taxes on the rich, help close the terrible income equality gap, and stimulate the economy with greater consumer-spending power. Democratic socialism can co-exist with our capitalist system, in a dialectical tension, a check and balance, if citizens and our leaders do their jobs.

Bret Stevens, a conservative New York Times opinion columnist, reacted recently with condescending, patriarchal tone to the win of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old newcomer to politics who beat out an old Democratic Party insider, Joseph Crowley, in New York’s senatorial primary, and who has captured the imagination of a lot of America. She’s a self-described “social democrat.”

Stevens then trots out examples of how a few socialist governments in Mexico and South Africa have been corrupted. In Europe, democracies have consistently strengthened or formed since World War II, based on socialist principles. But their current struggles with reactionary politics are due to mainly to massive refugee flight from wars elsewhere. The problem isn’t the democratic socialism of, for example, Germany where, despite her challenges, chancellor Angela Merkel is now, in effect, the leader of the free world, now that President Trump his virtually abdicated such a role, with his anti-allies and pro-dictatorial perversities.

His disgraceful post-Summit press conference performance beside Vladimir Putin in Helsinki on Monday is only the latest (and perhaps the worst) example.

It’s true that any political system can be corrupted. That is why democracy can never be a spectator sport, and part of the people’s role is remain vigilant about keeping our politicians honest. And Mr. Stevens, what about the gross corruptions that capitalism has wrought, time after time after time? We live in one of the worst ever –  the reason why American people across much of the political spectrum want meaningful change, not the same old same old. 1

More in America’s societal key, Stevens sings the grindingly tired “left-center-right” song that has not an ounce of intellectual creativity in it:

“If Trump is the new Nixon, the right way to oppose him isn’t to summon the ghost of George McGovern. Try some version of Bill Clinton (minus the grossness) for a change: working-class affect, middle-class politics, upper-class aspirations.” 

First of all, Trump is proving far worse than Nixon, who at least had intelligence for political and policy nuance, and a sense of shame. And Nixon actually accomplished some policies that provided ordinary people social and economic benefit, unlike anything Trump has done. And summoning “the ghost of George McGovern” is lamely poking at a straw man.

As for what we should agree on, we do need finally “working-class affect, middle-class politics,” and even “upper-class aspirations.” Those are all things that a well-run government that functions for general societal benefit can provide, with good faith and creative collaboration. You might notice how Stevens’ historical cherry-picking ignores the historic elephant in the room, the most relevant history in modern America. Of course, that’s Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, which produced the most successful and extended period of across-the-board prosperity in American history.

As John Nichols points out in his history of American socialism, Roosevelt “drew inspiration from the platforms of the Socialist party that (Eugene) Debs handed off to Norman Thomas. But Roosevelt, a lifelong reader of (Thomas) Paine quoted the pamphleteer’s fireside chats (‘So spoke Americans in the year 1776. So speak Americans today!’) borrowed at least as much from the distant revolutionary’s canon.” 2

We know that when social-minded policy is put on the table, conservatives often start bleating about profligate hand-outs to the needy. However, thinking of American farmers, Thomas Paine wrote in his pamphlet “Agrarian Justice”:

“But it is justice, and not charity, that is the principle of the plan. In all great cases it is necessary to have a principle more universally active than charity; and with respect to justice, it ought not to be left the choice of detached individuals whether they will do justice or not… It ought to be the act of the whole growing spontaneously out of the principles of the revolution, and the reputation of it ought to be national and not individual.” 3

I want to draw an arc from Thomas Paine to the New Deal more pointedly, to one of the most explicitly acclaimed examples of socialist success in American history – in Milwaukee – which Nichols details in his book. But it was a column on this very topic this week by Shepherd Express writer Joel McNally which actually inspired this blog.

The longtime journalist has also taught a class on urban history of Milwaukee at UW-Milwaukee. His column notes the swelling energy and activism begat by Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign, and concisely delineates how the three consecutive Socialist mayors of Milwaukee, from 1910 to the 1960s, succeeded.

McNally explains that “there is a reason why young activists don’t consider socialism to be a scary word. They’re well-educated.” McNally then demarcates a history he taught his students, about what he calls “Milwaukee’s Socialist example.” The city’s three socialist mayors over that time were Emile Seidel (1910-1912); Daniel Hoan (1916-1940); and Frank Zeidler (1948-1960). The first, Seidel, helped clean up Mayor David Rose’s corrupt government, and Zeidler lives on as far more than a historical entity to those old enough to have witnessed his successful mayoral terms.

“But it was Hoan – the crusading socialist city attorney left standing after the 1912 purge of socialists who was elected mayor in 1916 and held the office for the next 24 years – who defined lasting contributions of Democratic Socialists to democracy itself,” McNally writes.

Socialist Milwaukee Mayor Daniel Hoan on the cover of TIME magazine in 1936. Courtesy TIME

Daniel Hoan was so successful with a socialist Milwaukee government that he was “recognized nationally for its sound financial management while expanding public employment for those out of work.” The New York Times praised Hoan in December 1931, two years after the stock market crash of 1929, for paying its bills, delivering unemployment relief to hundreds of thousands, “and at the end of the year will have about $ 4 million in the bank.”

And TIME magazine, run by conservative Republican publisher Henry Luce, put Hoan on its cover in April 1936, reporting: “Under him, Milwaukee has become perhaps the best-governed city in the US.”

McNally then describes how, despite The Democratic Party’s successful undermining of The Socialist Party, Democrat Franklin Roosevelt  “used public employment, unemployment benefits and other social safety net programs to pull the nation out of the Great Depression and become the most popular president in history.”
Lyndon Johnson’s Medicare and Medicaid,  Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act similarly are socialist programs, McNally notes.

“It’s as American as apple pie to elect a bright, new generation of Democratic Socialists. They’re fighting to preserve the American ideal of sharing the economic benefits of democracy with everyone, not just the wealthy.” 4

And we’re likely better off with more women public servants, like Ocasio-Cortez, baking America’s apple pie, because they’re often more skilled and experienced in the societal kitchen than men, and know how to slice and distribute the pies, to Make America Socially Equitable Again. How great would that America be?

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1 Bret Stevens,

“Democratic Socialism is Dem Doom,” https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/06/opinion/democratic-socialism-alexandria-ocasio-cortez.html, The New York Times, July 6, 2018

2. John Nichols, The “S” Word: A Short History of an American Tradition… Socialism, Verso, 2011, 46

3. Nichols, quoting Thomas Paine in The “S” Word: A Short History of an American Tradition… Socialism, 50

4. Joel McNally, Democratic Socialists Aren’t Demons; They’re Just Energized Democrats, The Shepherd Express, July 12-18, p. 10, 2018