Off to Great Debates.
Nope. If this became necessary, America would be over already.
No. We have established methods of dealing with Trump within our democracy.
The military are not our representatives, so the idea that they should fight individuals within our own government for us unless they actively declaring war on us is ridiculous and hubris on the part of the military.
It would set a horrendous precedent that would ruin our country in the long run. We would be effectively forced to start our country from scratch.
Or rather, as per Chronos it means the country’s really broken and the coup is not going to fix THAT.
No, we’re not some banana republic. We have a system! And it works. A military coup would be the death knell for America. Even if it were only for a week or something (which it wouldn’t ever be).
Watch Seven Days In May. Very topical movie.
Without even checking I can tell you the military overwhelmingly voted for Lord Dampnut and they’re perfectly okay with his stealing the election. They would be far more likely to help him install a dictatorship than stop him.
But in an imaginary world when Dampnut arrested congress and the judiciary and the military wasn’t in his pocket, then yes, take him out.
Wow. Dick move Sarah Silverman. :rolleyes:
No because it’s not necessary. Our president doesn’t have enough power that he can be dangerous enough to warrant a coup. We have both checks in other branches of the government and legal ways to remove him if he gets too out of line.
Basically it would never get far enough to need it. The only way a coup would be necessary would be if somehow the entire federal government went off the rails.
it is not the military’s right or duty to decide to over throw the government.
The right is solely owned by the People, as others said, it is there duty to refuse to carry out orders that they know to be illegal, but that is all.
Only the People have the right and duty to abolish and reform if a government no longer
suits it’s intended purpose.
And you do not decide to have a military coup because you do not like the president.
Firstly, you don’t do anything simply because you don’t “Like”
Secondly, if the president is guilty of gross misuse of office, violation of the peoples trust, and probably 20 paragraphs of other things there is already a legal means in place to take care of such matters, it is called impeachment.
You work with the tools and laws and systems you created until such times as all those things fail to serve their intended purposes anymore, then you regretfully abolish them and start over.
@Atamasama
I will say one thing though.
Do not ever be so complacent as to believe that a person never has enough power to become dangerous.
Indeed. At the risk of following Poe’s Law, the German intellectuals and legislature thought the same thing about Hitler.
Going “off the rails”… is that a term of art? Does it have an actual operative meaning in the context of this discussion? Who decides what “off the rails” is?
When Yeltsin had tanks fire shells into the Russian Parliament…that was off the rails.
I think the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would ask Congress to impeach and move The Donald from office first … otherwise I don’t see the military taking any political action, it’s just not their style …
That would still be a political action on the part of the general. The military leadership already said they would not carry out illegal orders, so don’t sweat that. The civilians in Congress will wake up within two years.
Yeah, I think that this is one of those things that happens in fixed-term presidential democracies, unfortunately. The independent election of the president allows an inexperienced nutter to come in as “the choice of the people” without having to lead a parliamentary caucus. The lack of a “no-confidence” vote to change the government makes it hard to remove a nutter by legal means.
The USA may not like it, but we were officially OK with it happening to Allende in Chile and to Zelaya in Honduras. It’s time.
Now, I voted yes, not so much in general, but in the specific case or (as in reality) on the specific theory that it appeared Trump would, unilaterally, try to launch nukes, or otherwise try to start a war. I could alternatively see it being wise if Trump sabotaged a defense treaty, and didn’t respond to, say, Russian aggression. A mentally unfit head of government can’t be permitted to commit us to national suicide, which a nuclear strike on Iran, say, would be. Nor should he be permitted to commit atrocities in our name for his own peculiar egomaniacal reasons, which (at this point) a nuclear strike on anybody would also be. A president refusing to honor the NATO treaty is less clear a case. I’m not sure if it makes as much sense to “cut off the head” preemptively as to wait until a stupid, destructive order. But taking him out now would probably make things more stable, not less. And that’s the point where it becomes a thinkable thing.
Perhaps it’s the German in me that makes me think any tactic is acceptable if it gets an under-educated, racist, senile, egomaniacal dictator, or incipient all-of-that, out of power. Right now, it looks like the USA is determined to learn this the hard way. Which, if it only killed white Christian conservatives like my extended family, would be OK. (Well, not OK, but “on one’s own petard,” yeah?) The problem is that this is a nuclear superpower and a global hegemon. I can pretend to be blithe about my own country going to hell, in a way I can’t about us taking entire other countries out in a global race war.
Just curious, why do you think that a nuclear strike on Iran would be “national suicide”? It’s certainly not ideal, but I don’t see how it gets anywhere near “national suicide”.
Imagine if Trump decided it was time to dismantle Iran’s nuclear facilities. That’s certainly a decision the President is entitled to make, and not necessarily anything ‘mentally ill’. In working our way down the list, if we find that our much-vaunted bunker-buster bombs aren’t enough to take out the underground facility at Fordow, a not-quite-inconceivable backup plan might be to nuke it. Would that strike be “national suicide” in your mind?
The USA could nuke Iran if and only if Iran launched nukes first. There is no way for the USA to strike Iran first without reprisals from other countries. This is the sort of thing that the old foreign service hands would explain if asked. But Trump dumped them. And just as you don’t realize this, there’s a chance he doesn’t, either.
Whoopee! We’re all gonna die!
Hey, I’m just trying to learn here. Which other countries do you think would offer these reprisals? What would they constitute? Nuclear strikes on America? Sanctions? Something in between? Please be specific.
Almost certainly both Iran and NK would attempt some kind of nuclear option, whether by missile or some other form of nuclear attack. I would expect severe sanctions from the EU, NATO, and the UN. Putin would probably just applaud Trump sending the country into a tailspin, whatever Russia’s previous relationship with Iran was. I have no idea as far as China is concerned. There would likely be a lot of harsh rhetoric and sabre-rattling from them, but as far as final action(s)? No clue.
Big economic implications there too. But it’s difficult to be specific about a highly theoretical scenario.