# It wasn’t a coup **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 13, 2021, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407 "2021-01-13T05:29:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 17
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/321 "2021-01-16T14:34:24Z")
> [@lobotomyboy63](#): > > WRT the KKK etc. sorry if I missed these upthread but I’m hearing a couple others I’ve heard: > > Y’all-qaeda > The Taliban-jo I’ve heard these, but both of them draw an equivalence between Southern culture and this New-Yorker-led shitstorm, and other than the cleverness of the puns, it’s super inaccurate and kinda gross. The traitors hail from across the country and are as likely to say “youse guys” as “y’all.” Don’t make this a Southern thing. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/322 "2021-01-16T14:37:35Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > I’ve heard these, but both of them draw an equivalence between Southern culture and this New-Yorker-led shitstorm, and other than the cleverness of the puns, it’s super inaccurate and kinda gross. The traitors hail from across the country and are as likely to say “youse guys” as “y’all.” Don’t make this a Southern thing. We’re in the pit. It’s a joke. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/323 "2021-01-16T14:54:00Z")
> [@lobotomyboy63](#): > > We’re in the pit. It’s a joke. I appreciate the reminder. Fuck off with your shitty misleading joke. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/324 "2021-01-16T14:55:02Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > I appreciate the reminder. Fuck off with your shitty misleading joke. Fuck you as well. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/325 "2021-01-16T15:02:51Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > How much more of this is necessary before the “it wasn’t a coup” people abandon the postage-stamp-sized ground of rationalization on which they currently teeter? The coup planning began, with Trump, in October… but Fox News completely fucked his plan: [![Imgur](https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50841506272_34c35f99af_b.jpg "2021-01-16\_09-00-04") ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/68782016@N08/50841506272/) [![Imgur](https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50841425711_9314060c86_b.jpg "2021-01-16\_09-04-51") ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/68782016@N08/50841425711/) [https://www.axios.com/trump-election-premeditated-lie-ebaf4a1f-46bf-4c37-ba0d-3ed5536ef537.html](https://www.axios.com/trump-election-premeditated-lie-ebaf4a1f-46bf-4c37-ba0d-3ed5536ef537.html) ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/326 "2021-01-16T17:39:33Z")
> [@lobotomyboy63](#): > > We’re in the pit. It’s a joke. It’s a dangerous joke. It’s like DARE teaching kids that “drug dealers” are shadowy figures in trench coats. These people were professionals. Lawyers and realtors and law makers. This isn’t just hillbillies playing dress up, so ridiculous you don’t have to take it seriously. And the more we push the comforting narrative that that’s who it is, the more we miss the real threat. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/327 "2021-01-16T17:43:43Z")
Are you guys opposed to the term “southern strategy” since it appealed to racists in other places too? ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/328 "2021-01-16T17:46:13Z")
I like “cognitive dissidents” (from another thread). ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/329 "2021-01-16T17:47:22Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Are you guys opposed to the term “southern strategy” since it appealed to racists in other places too? Seriously? The Southern Strategy was a strategy designed to win electoral votes in a specific region of the country. That’s not even remotely what this is. This was people across the nation trying to launch a coup to steal the votes from Georgia, Arizona, Pennsylvania, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/330 "2021-01-16T17:50:53Z")
Yeah, _if only_ the MAGA cult was just southern rednecks. Just like COVID, this virus is everywhere. Y’all Qaeda is very funny, but that’s why there’s all the more risk in it taking hold as a misleading meme. ---
**Author:** ![Zakalwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zakalwe/32/270_2.png) [@Zakalwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zakalwe)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/331 "2021-01-16T18:12:48Z")
Thanks for the Axios link! That’s a fascinating story and I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the series. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/332 "2021-01-16T18:13:37Z")
Yes, thanks, **JohnT**. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/333 "2021-01-16T18:40:17Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Yeah, _if only_ the MAGA cult was just southern rednecks. Just like COVID, this virus is everywhere. > > Y’all Qaeda is very funny, but that’s why there’s all the more risk in it taking hold as a misleading meme. I prefer Alt-Qaeda myself. ---
**Author:** ![Saintly\_Loser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saintly_loser/32/4045_2.png) [@Saintly\_Loser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saintly_Loser)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/334 "2021-01-16T18:52:55Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The traitors hail from across the country and are as likely to say “youse guys” as “y’all.” Yep. I’m amazed that _any_ union would have endorsed Trump in 2020, but especially amazed that any New York City unions would have endorsed him. And yet the union that represents the vast majority of New York City police officers endorsed him. As did a number of other police unions. ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2021, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/335 "2021-01-16T18:54:02Z")
Lookeee here, possible attempt to use the 1806 Insurrection Act - someone now tell me the following 1. It wasn’t a coup 2. It had absolutely no chance of success - especially with a dead VP, House Speaker, most of the rest of congress - tell me how this would not have then needed military call out, or at least ell me how it would not be justified. > **[MyPillow CEO photographed with notes after Trump meeting](https://thehill.com/homenews/news/534564-mypillow-ceo-photographed-holding-notes-after-trump-meeting/)** > > Photographs of MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, a Trump supporter, went viral Friday after social media users were able to catch glimpses of notes he was holding as he walked outside the White House foll… The bullet might have missed, but it could easily have caught a ricochet ---
**Author:** ![cincinnatus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cincinnatus/32/7990_2.png) [@cincinnatus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cincinnatus)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2021, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/336 "2021-01-17T00:20:06Z")
We all pretty much know what did and didn’t happen on both sides of the capitol doors from all the coverage. And to my mind, this was clearly an inside job. Security pretty well stood down. Even the off-duty capitol police were kept away, from what I read. I believe if they dig deep enough they will find a somewhat orchestrated plan to make it easy to breach the capitol. I have a suspicion who planned it, but since I obviously don’t have proof I won’t say. Somebody needs to swing at the end of a rope for the grievous crime. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2021, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/337 "2021-01-17T00:41:58Z")
> [@cincinnatus](#): > > I believe if they dig deep enough they will find a somewhat orchestrated plan to make it easy to breach the capitol. I have a suspicion who planned it, but since I obviously don’t have proof I won’t say. If this were an orchestrated plan, the conspirators would almost certainly have succeeded. This seems much more like a handful of sympathetic or complicit Capitol Police combined with general incompetence and unwillingness to contemplate the worst. As a nation, we (and in particular, federal law enforcement) has been so focused on the threat of foreign terrorism for so long that the idea that a throng of ‘ordinary’ citizens would just force their way past inadequate barricades and into the Capitol Building threatening to hogtie, kidnap, or lynch legislators just seemed too ridiculous, and in fact if you went to some publisher with that as a plot of your political potboiler they’d turn you away for being absurd, and yet…it happened. Nearly half the voting population of the country has fallen over itself to re-elect an inept reality television star to the presidency despite that he has fucked the dog at every turn, which tells you everything you need to know about how complicit the population at large is for the current state of affairs. It is easy to blame Trump, or social media, or the GOP for allowing things to have gotten this bad, but a democracy is ultimately only as strong as its electorate, and this nation as a whole has veered substantially toward autocracy and self-victimhood for its problems led by very people screaming about the virtues of individualism and personal responsibility. Instead of looking for sophisticated conspiracies, just look at your neighbors and count how many would eagerly trample on the rights of others just to satisfy themselves that they are something exceptional just for existing. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2021, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/338 "2021-01-17T01:57:39Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Instead of looking for sophisticated conspiracies, just look at your neighbors and count how many would eagerly trample on the rights of others just to satisfy themselves that they are something exceptional just for existing. On another board I participate in, made up primarily of current or former naval officers and skewing quite a bit more conservative, that’s the turn the thread on this subject has taken. A good chunk of them (about half, maybe a little more) are seriously arguing that the primary take away for us as a nation following this event should be to make it harder to vote. Perhaps by requiring some sort of citizenship exam for all would-be voters, perhaps by requiring in-person voting with paper ballots and mandatory ID requirements. As if the big take away for us as a nation ought to be that the people alleging fraud have just lost faith in the electoral process and we ought to all jump through hoops to make them feel more confident. Lots of talk, too, about how sacrifice (hardship!) is so important to being a “good citizen” that we might as well go ahead and bake some more of that into the voting process, to make sure only people who “really care” will be the ones to vote. And, you know, if that means fewer minorities vote, well… “How dare you call me a racist!” Not that anyone actually _called_ them a racist, but, you know know it is. Not surprisingly, a good number of these same board members also think Heinlein was on to something with _Starship Troopers_ (military service as a prerequisite for citizenship), and they can’t see how such a system could ever turn out wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2021, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/339 "2021-01-17T02:04:48Z")
> [@rboyce](#): > > I did not say “all” of them were innocent. > There were some who were duped by da dump because Trump was/is the President of the USA If you are duped into assaulting the government, you are still guilty of assaulting the government. You aren’t innocent. ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2021, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/340 "2021-01-17T02:29:21Z")
> [@ASL\_v2.0](#): > > Perhaps by requiring some sort of citizenship exam for all would-be voters, perhaps by requiring in-person voting with paper ballots and mandatory ID requirements. I assume that they would be okay then with making all candidates pass a test showing an understanding of the constitution they will be sworn to defend… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407.md?page=16) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407.md?page=18)