It’s hard to think of any actual, successful military coups or anything
similar except in Africa anytime recently. Certainly not in any country
remotely as “advanced” and complex as the US. However, The Republican party has
certainly been high methodical and quite successful in setting the
stage—abetted by outmoded provision of the Constitution—to extend minority
power unfitting for a true democracy. In addition, the Democratic Party, as is
well-known, has been much too cozy with corporate interests at the expense of
most people. Much of this will continue post-Trump.
What I think is somewhat hopeful now is that the anti-democratic elements are
more visible and being more actively opposed. While it’s certainly possible
that Biden would have won without the pandemic, his increase in votes—close to
80 million total— despite the pandemic and all the efforts at voter
suppression, is quite extraordinary. The Republicans were more adroit in
getting votes of new voters by vast disinformation and careful manipulation of
internet data. But the Democrats could clearly catch up with that, and
left-wing Democrats may be in the lead.
Further, anti-racism is showing real , new strength, as is environmentalism and
greater recognition and opposition to economic inequality….
All reasons not to succumb to too much pessimism.
Best,
Michael
> On Nov 15, 2020, at 7:02 PM, tbyfield <tbyfi...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> "Words have meanings" is one of those sayings that needs to go away. It
> sounds so sure, so blunt, but it obscures so very much. Yes, words have
> meanings: they have lots of meanings, many of them ambiguous or contrary, and
> those meanings change to keep pace with historical circumstances.
>
> This thread is trying to describe the murky area between things working
> normally and things breaking hopelessly. More specifically, we're at a moment
> when the president of the US is spewing torrents of claims that are
> upside-down and backwards. And he's supported in large part by widespread
> silence across his party and rabid supporters who've completely lost their
> grip. What we're seeing is a profound breakdown in the language we use to
> describe our world.
>
> The definitions of a word like "coup" in a US or UK dictionary evolved in a
> world where it was assumed (as they say) it can't happen here — so *of
> course* those definition will all but insist that the leaders wear aviator
> shades, ridiculous regalia, and all the rest.
>
> The US is breaking down, so it's not at all surprising that some of its
> language for describing the world would as well.
>
> If you think that consulting dictionaries and insisting on definitions is the
> best way to make sense of this, go for it. Myself, I think that kind of
> prescriptive tendency is part of the problem. Think about all the inane,
> endless debates we've seen about whether Trump is "really" a fascist: what
> exactly did they accomplish, except discouraging people from seeing what was
> in front of their face?
>
> As for the "nuclear codes," that's a standard lefty fetish. The US nuclear
> command-and-control decision tree includes entire branches for scenarios in
> which civilian authority is uncertain: nonexistent, unreachable, contested,
> unverifiable, and/or incompetent. Little or nothing is publicly known about
> the criteria and procedures involved in switching to one of those branches. I
> think there's a good chance that a president firing the Secretary of Defense,
> purging the DOD, raving about imagined conspiracies, contesting the election,
> and threatening to never leave would meet those criteria. If it didn't, it
> will within four years.
>
> Cheers,
> Ted
>
> On 15 Nov 2020, at 16:51, Kurtz, Steven wrote:
>
>> Interesting perspective Ted, but I can’t call the examples you cite a coup.
>> The use of political power to reorganize institutions to better solidify a
>> person’s or party’s advantage or even to gain a political monopoly is most
>> of what politics is. Machine politics or the attempt to build a machine is
>> not a coup. And Trump attempting to reorganize institutions to his advantage
>> in an obvious and half-baked way doesn’t make a coup. If that is what a coup
>> is then a coup is ongoing everywhere, all the time from the local to the
>> international. Words have meanings. This word refers to an illegal,
>> unconstitutional, removal of a party or individual from power through the
>> use of force. That is not what has happened or is presently happening no
>> matter how much Trump might wish it so.
>>
>> The only event I can think of that could potentially resemble a (bloodless)
>> coup will be when the military gives Biden the nuclear codes on January
>> 20th, without a care for what legislatures or courts might think about it.
>> It will even better resemble a coup if they give them to Trump (which is
>> very unlikely). If the shenanigans get too wild the military could decide
>> who is president, and the mark of that decision and its enforcement will be
>> who gets the codes.
>>
>> I do agree that Emmet Sullivan is a court room hero.
>>
>> ________________________________________
>> From: tbyfield <tbyfi...@panix.com>
>> Sent: Sunday, November 15, 2020 12:47 PM
>> To: nettime-l
>> Cc: Kurtz, Steven
>> Subject: Re: <nettime> why is it so quiet (in the US)
>>
>> If there will be no coup, Steven, that's because there already was one.
>> But let me explain.
>>
>> Debates about a "coup" in the US are useless, because they're bogged
>> down in endless anticipatory "post hoc ergo propter hoc" arguments
>> ("after this therefore because of this," just before *this* happens) and
>> coupsplaining ("it's not *really* a coup* because" yadda yadda).
>>
>> If our litmus test for a coup is tanks in the streets, you're right,
>> there wasn't and won't be one. But that's mostly Hollywood stuff anyway:
>> in times and places where coups have undeniably taken place, there
>> weren't enough tanks or troops to occupy all those countless streets.
>> The vast majority of those streets were empty, not an obvious sign of
>> force anywhere, and yet coups happened. How? Because a coup is less the
>> show of force than the doubt, helplessness, capitulation, and
>> adaptation. In the US, we've spent the last 3–4 years doing that. If
>> tanks magically appeared tomorrow, few would be surprised, lots of
>> people would mutter about "2020" and "the new normal," and everyone
>> would know how to walk / ride / drive past with their jaws clenched
>> tight and their eyes averted. That part is done.
>>
>> But I'm not arguing that a coup is just a state of mind or some other
>> irrefutable bullshit, though. I'm saying bluntly that, objectively,
>> there already has been a coup.
>>
>> No serious person doubts that Trump would stage a coup if he could, or
>> that the GOP would go along with it if they could. No serious person
>> doubts that he's taken concrete steps on a dozen fronts to pull it off,
>> or that he continues to try. And no serious person doubts that it was
>> unclear how federal court would resolve election-related cases. Yet a
>> huge number of the very same people would also argue that what's
>> happened isn't a coup because it was badly conceived, poorly executed,
>> and failing. But if that's our standard for acknowledging the reality of
>> something, then Trump wasn't president and didn't have policies. What
>> he's done very definitely was a coup: a stupid, flawed, failed coup, but
>> a coup nonetheless.
>>
>> But, ultimately, denials that what's happened isn't a coup become
>> clearest in one area in particular. Trump's attacks on the USPS came
>> very close to winning him the election. If it weren't for sustained
>> public and political pressure, huge numbers of mail-in ballots wouldn't
>> have been delivered on time and wouldn't have been counted — and
>> there's a few key states would have ended up in Trump's column. And, in
>> a softer but equally decisive way, I think, the post–Election Day
>> narrative would have been *very* different: it wasn't just the final
>> tabulation, it was the erosion, dat after day, of Trump's supposed leads
>> that killed his claims. We owe an immense debt to all the people and
>> forces who mounted those challenges, and Emmet G. Sullivan, the DC
>> Circuit Court judge who issues the decisive ruling and imposed deadlines
>> down to the *hour* on the USPS leadership, is a legit national hero.
>>
>> So: there was a couple *and also* the victory of more or less normal,
>> continuous operations of government over Trump's attempt means there
>> wasn't one. Resolving that by saying, "well, there was one but it
>> failed" isn't very satisfying to my ear. The solution is to set aside
>> silly cinematic assumptions that a coup is necessarily a clearly defined
>> thing, that it does or doesn't exist, that did or didn't happen.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Ted
>>
>> On 13 Nov 2020, at 16:52, Kurtz, Steven wrote:
>>
>>> From my perspective there is very little to worry about regarding the
>>> election. There will be no coup, and the electoral college vote will
>>> not be stolen. All the generals who can speak out (because they are
>>> retired) have done so, and do not support Trump, nor do they see him
>>> as the election winner. Trump has not replaced anyone yet with
>>> operational command.
>>>
>>> The electorate sent to congress has to reflect the popular vote. Each
>>> state has a law that enforces this. Police, judges (at all levels),
>>> electorate members, a majority of congress, and state legislators
>>> would all have to agree to break these laws to make this theft
>>> possible. Perhaps either of these theft strategies are possible, but
>>> they are adjacent to impossible.
>>>
>>> When understanding Trump, the best way is to go directly to the lowest
>>> common denominator. Trump is not a complex, reflective man. What does
>>> he like to do?
>>>
>>> 1. Loot and grift. If he were to concede the tap of funds flowing into
>>> legally challenge the election would stop. He has no intention of
>>> cutting this revenue source, since half goes to lawyers and half to
>>> his campaign.
>>> 2. Display his power. His favorite way of doing this is to make other
>>> powerful people say things in public that they know are not true. An
>>> Orwellian autocratic favorite to be sure. He also likes to remind his
>>> party that his base will follow every order. This is how he plans to
>>> stay a power player in the Republican party. I think a line will drawn
>>> at coup time. Thus far no post-election acts of violence from either
>>> side have been reported.
>>> 3. Take revenge. That is part of the reason for the recent firings. He
>>> will put the knife to as many people as he can before leaving. He will
>>> also give pardons to people that he believes will make his enemies
>>> upset. (On the small up side, this may include a pardon for Snowden to
>>> get back at his “deep state” enemies. Trump has said this out
>>> loud.) He will also collect as much dirt as he can to release against
>>> his enemies (another reason for the recent firings).
>>> 4. Undermine democratic institutions. His favorite is elections. He
>>> cried voter fraud even when he won in 2016 and has pursued this lie
>>> ever since, so its no surprise he is doing it when he has lost. He
>>> also does it by putting unqualified hacks into office and removing the
>>> competent. The former is another nother reason for the recent firings.
>>> This tendency is in part residue of Bannon’s accelerationist agenda.
>>>
>>> Will we see Trump run again in 2024? Yes, if he is not in jail. He has
>>> to escape prosecutors in NY state and in Manhattan first. Then, for
>>> four years he will have to resist selling state secrets. A series of
>>> actions that could make him the richest man in the world. I don’t
>>> know if he can resist that, and I am sure he is not smart enough to
>>> get away with it.
>> <...>
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