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 [ VOICES ](https://mail.citywatchla.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&id=375)

#  From “No Kings” to “No Clue”?

Written by Ken Alpern.

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January 05 2026

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ALPERN AT LARGE - This last year we saw many Americans (some with and others without easily-defensible reasons) criticize President Donald Trump, criticize President Vladimir Putin of Russia, and criticize Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as rapacious war criminals who evoked images of Nazism and dictatorship…

…while giving the leaders of Iran, Venezuela, and China a pass.

Israel…Nazis. Hamas and their Gazans…victims.

Trump...a bully.

Buuuuut Iran…well, we gotta work with them.

ICE and Border Patrol and Coast Guards stopping and blowing up boats with no fishing apparel whatsoever (but lots of fast engines and containers with high-high-potency life-destroying poisonous drugs)…evil Nazis.

Buuuuut drug runners and human traffickers, all in cahoots from China to Venezuela to Mexico to Iran…well, they’re just misunderstood and America has a comeuppance to pay.

Jews…the problem in the world, and too many too rich, controlling, and imperialistic who need to be crushed underfoot.

Buuuuut Islamists and those not assimilating into the Western nations while taking their free food, shelter, and clothing (and lots of money!)…well, they’re misunderstood victims of racism that made antisemitism look irrelevant.

Free speech to criticize criminal elements, be they home-grown or foreign-imported…racist and fascist and hate speech warranting cancelling and prison.

Anarchistic troublemakers disrupting traffic on freeways, roads, and other public venues to defend the lawbreakers and criminals…well, they’re just this generation’s freedom-fighters.

And the ISIS-affiliated Boko Haram performing genocide against Christians (not a military conflict as in Gaza, but a true genocide by terrorists against civilians) in Nigeria? Bah…nothing to see here! (“…aaaaaand just where is Nigeria on a map, and just what is Boko Haram?...right?)

And the Persians/Iranians here and in Iran and abroad decrying the Islamic regime? Bah…nothing to see here! They’re probably just kissing up to Trump!

And the Venezuelans here and throughout the world in exile decrying Nicolás Maduro and his narcoterrorist regime who’s stolen two elections and turned Venezuela from a capitalist upcoming Latin America superpower to a socialist and now dictatorship hell? Bah…nothing to see here! They’re probably just kissing up to Trump!

So now it’s a new year, the cost of gas is going down (although you wouldn’t know that in California), crime in major cities went down…buuuuut…Trump and his goons are just a bunch of Nazis who will do anything to enrich themselves.

Iran will NOT get nukes, but Trump is the bad guy…and America, to boot.

The Gazan hostage crisis is mostly over with, but Trump is the bad guy…and America to boot.

Maduro just got taken away without any American military deaths, but Trump is the bad guy…and America is to boot.

Yet forgotten by the “No Kings” protestors are the Iranian, Gazan, and Venezuelan people who REALLY know that the TRUE Kings are easily found in Iran, in Hamas, and in Venezuela.

And, to a lesser degree, the cities and states who game the system to allow only ONE political party are also “Kings”, with victims of crime, illegal immigration, fraud , etc. all told to stand down, shut up, and pay your taxes with as much “taxation without representation” as anything the thirteen U.S. colonies once had under England’s rule.

What we SHOULD all agree upon is that Trump and the military under his command don’t get us bogged down in Venezuela. That regime was NOT voted in, but it’s gotta be the Venezuelan people who do the work, with 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado and other civilian leaders overseeing regime change.

For those unaware that U.S. oil and Venezuelan refineries once had a wonderful win-win relationship, and for those unaware that a loss of Venezuelan cheap oil to Cuba and China and other bad actors (and ditto for Russia and Iran with their oil) will create an economic/political domino effect that will benefit the West…maybe, just maybe…

…you should learn a bit about the worldwide cold war we’re in, and which involves oil, economics, and pitting the U.S. and what remains of the West against a China/Russia/Iran/Cuba/Venezuela axis that wants to supplant the West with a new, more frightening hegemony that would show us all what “imperialism” really means.

President Donald Trump IS a foul-mouthed boor who says things that bother even his most loyal supporters—but the other side (China, Iran, Russia, etc.) are much, much worse.

No one says (or at least reasonably says) that anyone has to like Donald Trump, but asking if you’re in support of America and the West is reasonable, indeed.

We should NEVER get into another Iraq-style quagmire, but at this time we shouldn’t ignore and dismiss the throngs of Iranian, Israeli, Venezuelan, and even growing numbers of European nations who may or may not like Donald Trump…buuuuut…

…they do seem to like what he’s doing, because they’re fighting REAL Kings!

*(Kenneth S. Alpern, M.D, is a dermatologist who has served in clinics in Los Angeles, Orange, and Riverside Counties, and is a proud husband and father. He was active for 20 years on the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC) as a Board Member focused on Planning and Transportation, and helped lead the grassroots efforts of the Expo Line as well as connecting LAX to MetroRail. His latest project is his fictional online book entitled The Unforgotten Tales of Middle-Earth, and can be reached at <Ken.Alpern@MarVista.org>. The views expressed in this article are solely those of Dr. Alpern.)*

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