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Pete F's new normal to save our Democracy
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Since last Wednesday, people have been arguing what to call what happened at the U.S. Capitol — was it a riot? An uprising? An insurrection? I’ve been public in calling it a coup, but others disagree. Some have said it’s not a coup because the U.S. military and other armed groups weren’t involved, and some because Donald Trump didn’t invoke his presidential powers in support of the mob that broke into the Capitol. Others point out that no one has claimed or proved there was a secret plan directed by the president, and that Trump’s efforts to overturn the outcome of the 2020 presidential election could never have succeeded in the first place.
These observations are based on the idea that a coup is a sudden, violent seizure of power involving clandestine plots and military takeovers. By contrast, Trump’s goal was to keep himself in power, and his actions were taken over a period of months and in slow motion. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a coup attempt. Trump disguised what he was doing by operating in plain sight, talking openly about his intent. He normalized his actions so people would accept them. I’ve been studying authoritarian regimes for three decades, and I know the signs of a coup when I see them. Technically, what Trump attempted is what’s known as a “self-coup” and Trump isn’t the first leader to try it. Charles Louis Napoleon Bonaparte (nephew of the first Napoleon) pulled one off in France in December 1851 to stay in power beyond his term. Then he declared himself Emperor, Napoleon III. More recently, Nicolas Maduro perpetrated a self-coup in Venezuela after losing the 2017 elections. The storming of the Capitol building on January 6 was the culmination of a series of actions and events taken or instigated by Trump so he could retain the presidency that together amount to an attempt at a self-coup. This was not a one-off or brief episode. Trump declared “election fraud” immediately on November 4 even while the votes were still being counted. He sought to recount and rerun the election so that he, not Joe Biden, was the winner. In Turkey, in 2015, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan successfully did the same thing; he had called elections to strengthen his presidency, but his party lost its majority in the Parliament. He challenged the results in the courts, marginalized the opposition and forced what he blatantly called a “re-run election.” He tried again in the Istanbul mayoral election in 2019 but was thwarted. There’s a standard coup “checklist” analysts use to evaluate coups. We can evaluate Trump’s moves to prevent the peaceful transfer of executive power against it. To successfully usurp or hold power, you need to control the military and paramilitary units, communications, the judiciary, government institutions, and the legislature; and mobilize popular support. https://www.politico.com/news/magazi...na-hill-457549 Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device |
So, what thwarted Trump’s slow motion, in-plain-sight attempt at a self-coup? Fortunately, there was pushback from all the key institutions you need for a coup. First, the military and other parts of the government resisted Trump’s efforts to personalize their power. Second, major media outlets reported the facts truthfully. Social media outlets flagged the president’s lies about the election—albeit belatedly—and Twitter and Facebook ultimately cut off his accounts. Third, the judiciary and courts held firm. “Trump judges,” all the way up to the Supreme Court, respected their oath of office and rejected the president’s appeals to overturn legitimate election results. Fourth, state and local government officials refused to be swayed. They repeatedly called out the lie that Trump had won the election. Finally, in the legislature, the vice president performed his constitutional role, as did the Republican Senate majority leader and most of the Senate. The only two elements that rallied behind the president’s coup attempt were the handful of senators and the majority of House Republicans and his popular support, in the form of an insurgency—the mob that stormed the Capitol.
The good news for the United States is that Trump’s self-coup failed. The bad news is that his supporters still believe the false narrative, the Big Lie that he won the election. Trump has not repudiated it, nor have the House and Senate Republicans who voted against the Electoral College results. Millions of people still think the election was stolen. They still support Trump the person, not the Republican Party, and many are prepared to take further action on his behalf. As in the case of other coup attempts, the president’s actions have put us on the brink of civil war. Trump did not overturn the election results, but, just as he intended, he disrupted the peaceful democratic transition of executive power. Unless the Big Lie is thoroughly refuted, we can expect more attempts to subvert the constitutional order from Trump’s supporters—and we still have to get through the January 20 inauguration. The president’s actions and his falsehoods have shattered America’s democratic norms, exacerbated its political divisions and put people’s lives at risk. Five people died during events surrounding the storming of the Capitol, including a member of the U.S. Capitol Police force. Many of the members of Congress who backed Trump’s efforts were themselves at risk of injury or death. If we are to restore democratic norms and make sure this does not happen again, these congressional Republicans will have to take personal responsibility for their actions in support of Trump’s coup attempt. They must tell the truth to their constituents about the election and what the president tried to do in January 2021. They owe it to the people they represent as well as the country they serve. Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device |
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:btu: maybe these people can help restore democratic norms
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I don't think the trumplican army is going very far without the dude with the horns to lead them...maybe a rich celebrity will bail him out so he can return to the front.... |
"I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."On 1/6/2021, some politicians & their followers acted otherwise. Some took down OUR flag & put up THEIRs
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Probably get a medal like Nunes and Jordan, I heard it made Gym feel five feet tall😎 Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device |
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Pete, how about the liberals who used violence to set up autonomous zones this summer, and who were allowed to do so? was that not an act of cession or insurrection?
I’d actually truly like to see RIRockhounds response to that, all the other democrats will dodge. where was the liberal outrage? 19 people killed, over a billion dollars in property damage. Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device |
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This was a concerted and coordinated operation by the President of the United States and his enablers to keep himself in power, and his actions were taken over a period of months and in slow motion. We were one Molotov cocktail or automatic weapon away from losing our government. A true coup Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device |
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you are a true nut... |
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Perhaps that's what we need to do with the people who collaborated in this attempted coup. We could have Donald Trump Day for hundreds of years https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ba0UR7gITrU |
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In the "Communications" paragraph it made the false equivalence of "In the old days, coup plotters would seize the Central Telegraph or Post Office, and later, radio and TV towers" being equivalent to "he discredited the 'mainstream media' that was critical of his actions as the 'enemy of the people'”. Actually, Trump specifically and many times said that "fake news" is the enemy of the people. Which I would agree with. Perhaps you don't. Perhaps for you any fakery that Trump does is tantamount to the destruction of our democracy, but made up phony news is quite all right--at least if it makes Trump look bad. And, as in the entire article, the Politico columnist used manipulative language here as in Trump "recruited or pressured Fox News, Newsmax, OAN and social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook into participants in his efforts to sway public opinion in his favor." Really? He recruited them? His criticisms and comments "pressured" them but not NBC, CBS, CNN, ABC, et al? No other Presidents have criticized press coverage? And Trump had somehow seized Twitter as "coup plotters" in "the old days" would "seize the Central Telegraph or Post Office, and later, radio and TV towers"? And he wraps that paragraph up with "He used social media and cable news to propagate false self-serving narratives, reinforce messages to provide justification for his actions, and mobilize his supporters." So he didn't use Twitter to get out his messages, opinions, accomplishments, which left-biased media either refused to cover or falsely twisted into malevolent intentions and deeds? No, according to Politico, news outlets which, I suppose, did not paint Trump as orange man bad were "recruited" or "pressured" not to do so. There was no possible way that they expressed what they considered true. Especially if Politico just knew it wasn't, but was "false self-serving narratives." In the "Judiciary" paragraph he says: Trump stacked federal courts with what he kept calling “his judges.” More pointed, painted, slanted language. He didn't nominate judges to replace those that had retired or died, he "stacked" the courts--just as, I suppose, we could say every other President has done. And selecting a phrase, "his judges" without any context or examination of what Trump actually meant by it adds intriguing innuendo leaving us to suspect nefarious doings. And, oh yeah BTW, he chose justices on the basis that they would side with him on some election dispute. No, it wasn't from a list given to him by a "conservative" society from which he chose. He chose those he somehow culled up from his deep personal knowledge of which judges existed out there who would side with him in an election dispute. Then he wraps that paragraph up with another false equivalence: Erdogan did the same in Turkey, purging the judiciary and installing loyalists who facilitated his rerun of the 2015 election and sentenced political opponents to long prison terms. Trump frequently called for investigations into his opponents and for courts and law enforcement to “lock them all up!" So Selecting judges from a list given to Trump is the same as Erdogan "purging the judiciary," and, of course, only Trump was calling for investigations (let's not notice what his opponents in Congress and the media were calling for--including locking him up). In the "Government institutions" paragraph again we must compare Trump to "As in Turkey" he "purged" cabinet members. Apparently, when other Presidents replaced cabinet members they didn't "purge" them. And, of course, we are to believe that other Presidents didn't choose cabinet members on any basis of loyalty. Of course, of course, the other Presidents only chose the "most Qualified" folks. Right. Was Trump more loyalty demanding than other Presidents. Maybe--I don't know. Has a study been made? Oh, oh, that's right . . . we're supposed to be looking at all this stuff as Trump preparing for a future coup. In "The legislature" paragraph we find that "Trump usurped the Republican Party." Wow. "Usurp--take (a position of power or importance) illegally or by force." OK . . . by this point, we might assume that Politico has gone a bit overboard on its choice of words. Well, on the other hand, some (Pete F, cough, cough) might think we could be quite a bit more extreme. The article tries to frame everything Trump did as preparation for a coup. But, as with most critiques of Trump's motives, the relevant supposed "facts" are mostly circumstantial. And in the worst way. You can build a circumstantial case, but only if the circumstances strongly, predominantly, and consistently point in the direction you're trying to prove. If, instead, they can easily point in other ways, easily be explained in other ways as well, then you really don't have a case. You have a preferred conjecture. That was the biggest problem with the 10 points of possible obstruction listed in the Mueller report. Each point could easily have been seen as something other than obstruction. And very strongly and admittedly so. Pete's contention that this was a true coup not only rests on the very slimmest of evidence, if we can even call it evidence, it is ridiculous to say "We were one Molotov cocktail or automatic weapon away from losing our government." That is extreme rhetoric made to incite our perspective into the frenzy of Pete's desire to cancel Trump or anyone favorably associated with him. It borders on insane, if not already there. |
My guess is Pete has relatives that are worried about him.
This is why Mrs F would prefer the rest area to home |
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Of the two of you, I would not choose your view and I doubt if any person concerned about national security would either. There are more facts in that article than I have seen to support Trump's claims of fraud in the election, where there are none. |
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As I said, it was a slick job of compiling a bunch of things said and done by Trump into a narrative of circumstantial evidence that could possibly (in her opinion--certainly) claim that what happened was a coup. And, as I said, building a case around circumstantial evidence requires more rigor than was applied in her article. I gave sufficient examples of how her equivalencies to a coup were not solid, even deceitful, and if not that then stupid or ignorant. Everything she claims that Trump did was coup-like can well be considered otherwise--especially in his motivation. It is a very flawed essay composed of weak circumstantial evidence which can easily be interpreted in other ways. And the notion that he was planning this coup almost from the beginning of his term is too fanciful, far-fetched, and too elaborately constructed to accept without far more solid and actual proof/evidence that it was definitely a coup rather than merely presenting a patchwork of disparate facts, put together in a way that, not very convincingly if properly examined, somehow resemble what a coup would look like in the "old days". I stand by what I wrote. If you want to pick it apart, have a go. But don't try to impress me with her credentials as if that were enough to verify her opinion. All people with "credentials" don't fall into lockstep agreement. No doubt people with just as impressive, or more so, credentials disagree with her. I don't get cowed by credentials. I have "credentials" on how to determine if an argument is valid and strongly presented. I examine and critique what is said. That's what I did. Argue with that, don't throw her credentials at me as if that nullifies what I wrote. |
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There are more facts in that article than I have seen to support Trump's claims of fraud in the election, where there are none. |
Former White House and Trump campaign officials say President Trump would have been informed of online chatter about plans to storm the Capitol through his social media team's close monitoring of pro-Trump online communities such as TheDonald & 8kun.
It will all come out..... |
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You did not discuss, debunk, or pick apart what I said about the article. And no matter how many facts you think there are in that article, there is no fact of Trump planning a coup. Can you point out such a "fact" in that article. |
He’s toast
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At this point it doesn't appear to matter. Republicans are running scared and jumping ship. They seem to embrace the notion that getting on the side of totally eradicating and punishing Trump will save themselves. Which may result in the opposite result. They may not be aware that the rising tide of cancellation includes most of them. Were they lying then. Or are they lying now. Not an attractive picture. Not an assurance of being a bulwark against the destruction of the Constitution. Back to Republican=Democrat Light. Very weak and unworthy of midterm success. They don't deserve participation in the American Experiment. But neither do the Dems. Neither do most of us. It will be interesting. Good luck. On the bright side, enough people may get so thoroughly fed up with being blocked by big tech from saying what they want and hearing something other than the ruling class line, that they will within a year or two establish a base that allows them access to what they want to say and what they want to learn and know other than the boring, restrictive monotone of acceptable speech. And there should be enough people like that to make stiff competition with the current oligarchs. That process has begun. Hope our fascistic symbiosis between big government and big business doesn't crush it. |
Orange toast
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Been my goal since the con man came down the escalator
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