This Is How To Stop The Next Republican Coup

[Celerity]

We now know how far Republicans will go to win elections, so now is the time for Democrats to prevent them from attempting another violent coup.

https://thebanter.substack.com/p/this-is-how-to-stop-the-next-republican



In the far distant past of post-9/11 2001, the Republican Party was so patriotic that not being a Republican probably meant you hated America. We know this because Republicans told us so on a daily, if not hourly, basis. But that was then, this is now. These days, to be a Republican means actively and openly rooting for America to lose. Zack Beauchamp of Vox explains:



America, The Beautiful. America, The Enemy

Let’s skip the thought exercise where we imagine how the right would react if the left did this. We already know Republican hypocrisy has no limits and Republicans have no shame. Instead, pay attention to the fact that Republicans are not just rooting for Democrats to fail, but America itself. Republicans, once the most vocal defenders of all things America, are now Team “Anyone but America”. They swoon over the dictators of other countries that oppose the United States. Mind you, these are the same people who demanded the execution of those who did not think we should invade Iraq. Why? Because they were not sufficiently loyal to America. Fast forward twenty years and Republicans think bloodthirsty maniacs like Viktor Orban are heroes while spitting on their own government:

Link to tweet

Tucker Carlson sure has a funny way of upholding the GOP slogan of “America First”. But he’s far from alone. The core ideology of the right wing is no longer “America, the beautiful” but rather “America, the enemy”:

Link to tweet

Republicans openly talk about their support for authoritarian regimes and how enamoured they are of coups that topple democracies. Disgraced former Trump national security adviser and current treasonous pig Michael Flynn called for one right here in America to screams of delight from a Republican audience:

Link to tweet

Where’s The Love?

These are not people who love America. These are people who hate everything about the country they are living in and are plotting to destroy right in front of us. They hate our laws (except when they can be used to oppress people they hate), our system of government (except when it can be used to oppress people they hate), and they hate the culture (except, ah, you get the idea). They want to rewind America to a past where instead of being imaginary victims, they can be the racist monsters they dream of being but with none of the consequences. You can take a deep dive into the numerous pathologies at the heart of the Republican hatred for the United States but it all boils down to one simple fact: Even in an electoral system heavily tilted in favour of the Republican Party, they are slowly but steadily losing. Of the last eight presidential elections, Republicans lost the popular vote seven times. Even with extreme gerrymandering and even more extreme voter suppression, they lost control of the House and the Senate under Trump. Republicans are openly bragging about using even more extreme versions of both to take back Congress but it’s clear that, sooner or later, the GOP will start losing every election. Faced with this reality, Republicans had a choice to either modify their politics to appeal to a wider base or embrace fascism. Once the GOP decided to centre its entire message around White grievance and racism with the Southern Strategy in the 1960s, there was no going back. To truly shift the party away from racism would have been (and remains) electoral suicide.

The Politics Of Hate.................

snip

[NBachers]

1. OK, I read the whole page, but I didn't see anything about how to stop the next Republican Coup.

Can anyone give a condensed review of where they explain how to stop the next Republican coup?

[pecosbob]

2. No clue...paywall

[Celerity]

6. here

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100215728511#post5

[Celerity]

5. here

Donald Trump, a reality TV clown with zero political skill, stole the entire Republican party using the politics of hate. Under Trump, all you had to do was hate liberals and America would be great again. Republicans are now willing to commit suicide and spread Covid as aggressively as possible just to show how much they hate liberals. They literally cannot wait to send them to school without masks and rejoice at the anguish liberals will feel as tens of thousands of kids are hospitalized and thousands more die. If they’re that eager to sacrifice children, there’s no question that they’re going to keep trying to destroy America. The GOP’s current solution to their electoral dilemma is to declare every election they lose fraudulent and abuse the law to grant themselves victory no matter how transparent the lie. But if they can’t pull that off, Plan B is simply to whip their base into a mindless frenzy and then try to seize control through violence again and again until they succeed.

The Only Way To Short Circuit This Coup Loop Is The New Voting Rights Act

Sometime in the next few weeks, the fake Arizona “audit” will wrap up and a tidal wave of bullshit will come flooding out of MAGAland. Literally none of it will withstand ten seconds of scrutiny. When the inevitable lawsuits come, Cyber Ninjas, the clown show in charge of the circus, will stand in front of a judge and walk back every single claim they’re about to make. Remember, perjury is a crime. If you claim in court that you “discovered” evidence, you have to produce said evidence or you are going to have a very bad day. But that will not matter since the entire point of the charade is to justify every lie Republicans are telling about elections. The “audit” will discover massive fraud and therefore Republicans will have to pass as many laws as possible to keep Black people from voting. They will also have to pass as many laws as possible to give themselves the ability to reverse the results of elections they lose. Sure, none of that will actually protect elections from fraud and will, in fact, enable it, but so what? Democracy is for the weak, libtard! The “For The People Act” and the “John Lewis Voting Rights Act” would short circuit the feedback loop between this ongoing assault on election results, voter suppression efforts, and coup attempts. Both bills would block the majority of the GOP’s voter suppression bills. They would also end partisan gerrymandering, something Republicans absolutely require to carry out their “soft” coup in 2024.

The John Lewis bill, specifically, would restore the 1965 Voting Rights Act preclearance provision the Republican wing of the Supreme Court gutted. With preclearance back in place, that ends the little game the GOP plays where they pass extremely unconstitutional laws and then the Republicans on the Supreme Court pretend it’s too close to an election to change anything. Both bills remove the Court and their crass political shenanigans from the equation. Republicans will rage against this but their ability to rig elections (legally, at least) will be gone as will their ability to (legally) tamper with the results. The only thing they’ll have left is violent coups and those will be harder to justify without the first two steps, rigging and tampering. Here’s the deal: You have to be able to justify your coup as “righteous”. There has to be a pretence of some sort. An election has to be “fraudulent” or a political party has to be blood-drinking paedophiles. The status quo must be illegitimate or the coup invites an immediate backlash from the people. This is the point of the Big Lie that the 2020 election was “stolen”. Just as QAnon exists for the explicit purpose of bringing the ancient “Blood Libel” into the modern era and applying it to all Democrats instead of just Jews, so, too, does the Big Lie justify political violence.

Strip away the Republican Party’s ability to rig and tamper with elections in order to cast doubt and the Big Lie loses power (not all of its power, but a lot). They need the public to be unsure of what’s happening to make their hoped-for coup legitimate. They cannot just overthrow the American government in the name of white nationalism and fascism. That didn’t work in 1865 when America was a country with millions of enslaved Black people. Later, we fought a World War to crush fascism in Europe. There is zero chance we’ll put up with that now. Unless we don’t realize what is happening until it’s too late. This is a make or break moment for America. Republicans and their base are done with democracy. We know this because they tell us so every single opportunity they get. They will either cheat their way into power and then abuse that power to end free and fair elections forever or they will try to use violence to murder democracy in broad daylight. Unless we want to fight back bloody coup attempts after every election or risk the complete collapse of the rule of law under the next illegitimate Republican president, we must pass both the For The People and John Lewis Voting Rights acts. Even that will not guarantee there will not be blood in the streets as the GOP’s base rages at the dying of the White, but it will make it much harder to carry out their plans to replace the United States with a dystopian nightmare.

[Silent3]

3. I'm much more worried about voter suppression and outright Republican refusal...

...to certify votes in favor of Democrats than a direct physical insurrection at this point.

[Cosmocat]

4. They kind of go hand in hand

but, end of the day, yeah, the institutional elements will be the kill shot.

Though, the violence will most assuredly come after that - with localized factions of law enforcement and governors going rogue with national guard the next step in turning this country into a full on tin pot, chriso-fascist authoritarian Idiocracy.