# 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:** 27
**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 23, 2021, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/522 "2021-01-23T16:28:42Z")
[Excuse Our Coups!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMHviQunXBA&ab_channel=Mrs.BettyBowers%2CAmerica%27sBestChristian) A funny video from Mrs. Betty Bowers. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2021, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/523 "2021-01-23T16:44:29Z")
There was another violent white terrorism incident in a place ironically called Grant Parish, Louisiana in 1873, which arguably encouraged more violence such as the kind that later occurred in New Orleans the following year. > **[Colfax massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colfax_massacre)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > > > Courthouse attackers In reality Louisiana, like much of the South, was a hotbed of post-Civil War violence almost as soon as the war ended, which led to Reconstruction. It was thought that a strong federal response and presence in the South would eventually intimidate the South into accepting some of the civil rights reforms proposed by the Union. Didn’t happen. The White League, KKK, Knights of the White Camellia became the paramilitary/militia wing of the radicalized Democratic party. It’s important to understand: the ideology of Southern politics radicalized, and their tactics evolved to respond to a revolution with their own counter-revolution – that is probably what we’re seeing right here and now in 2020. The Obama and post-Obama era is the ultimate realization of the fear that white conservatives have had for a while: their relative loss of power, their relative decline…is someone else’s gain. White America, particularly White males 40 and older, are having to come to grips with the reality that they are losing their clout, hurtling toward plurality status. The Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, QAnon – these are your White League, your KKK, your Knights of the White Camellia today. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/524 "2021-01-24T05:10:45Z")
I would have no problem whatsoever with charging any and all of these lowlifes with treason. ---
**Author:** ![Monocracy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monocracy/32/4493_2.png) [@Monocracy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monocracy)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/525 "2021-01-24T13:20:11Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > 100+ republicans in the house were ALREADY massively violating our norms by refusing to certify a legal election with the hope of getting the losing candidate installed as president. You really think that those 100+ Republicans thought that a majority of both the House and Senate would vote to disqualify the electors from at least three states? People in this thread need to start living in the real world. not a coup ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/526 "2021-01-24T13:37:26Z")
> [@Monocracy](#): > > You really think that those 100+ Republicans thought that a majority of both the House and Senate would vote to disqualify the electors from at least three states? People in this thread need to start living in the real world. > > not a coup I lived in a banana republic, coups also depended on a significant number of politicians supporting the coups so as to allow the coup leaders (it can be the current president in an auto-coup) to get national and international support with the fig leaf that it was a “democratic” action. Some very stupid posters in the past did try to defend the last coup in Honduras with that “logic”. As pointed before, it was a stupid coup now, but the political support that allowed that stupidity to be considered and deployed **is still there** and it needs to be countered. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/527 "2021-01-24T13:44:14Z")
Let me guess, you’re white? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Librarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_librarian/32/402_2.png) [@The\_Librarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Librarian)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/528 "2021-01-24T14:04:18Z")
So they were just pandering to the lowest denominator of the scum outside? And that is somehow better? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/529 "2021-01-24T14:39:16Z")
> [@Monocracy](#): > > not a coup As has been explicitly recognized ever since Riemann’s post #4 in this thread, the point is that it was a coup attempt. Nobody is claiming that any of the parties involved actually managed to execute a successful coup. But what plenty of them were consciously trying for (however stupidly and ineffectively) was an attack on government to illegitimately interfere with a peaceful and legal transition of power for the existing leader’s benefit. That counts as an attempt—admittedly a very stupid and luckily ineffective attempt—at a coup, specifically the type called an “auto-coup”. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2021, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/530 "2021-01-24T14:55:42Z")
> [@Monocracy](#): > > You really think that those 100+ Republicans thought that a majority of both the House and Senate would vote to disqualify the electors from at least three states? That’s not what he wrote. > People in this thread need to start living in the real world. We are; you are clearly not. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/531 "2021-01-25T02:58:19Z")
Gonna post this in a couple of places. At least on congressional snake grudgingly admits he doesn’t believe the election was a fraud. [Rep. Madison Cawthorn, who sought to overturn Biden’s win, admits that the election ‘was not fraudulent’ on CNN (msn.com)](https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/rep-madison-cawthorn-who-sought-to-overturn-bidens-win-admits-that-the-election-was-not-fraudulent-on-cnn/ar-BB1d3vlK?li=BBnb7Kz) ---
**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 25, 2021, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/532 "2021-01-25T12:24:10Z")
Cawthorn, my new representative, is _such_ a turd. He has lied about everything from start to finish. When I was working polls on election day, fellow alumni from his conservative Christian college (which he dropped out of) showed up, to campaign _against_ him, based on things like his multiple sexual assaults on female students, and on things like his declaration during one class that if he’d lived in the antebellum South and one of his slaves had tried to escape he’d have killed them. His district is gerrymandered to include some extreme death-cult right-wing Appalachianers, along with most of Asheville. Unless he gets primaried in 2022, we’re likely stuck with him. Fuck that dude. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/533 "2021-01-25T13:55:21Z")
I’m not even sure I would necessarily call it a stupid coup – the higher level mobilization or faux protesters wasn’t at all stupid. It was a professionally organized political rally, but instead of just being a rally, it was a professionally organized mob. It’s clear that at least one (and probably a handful of people) among the president’s supporters saw an opportunity to use the mob as an agent of chaos, thereby presenting the Executive Branch with the opportunity to use its powers. I am doubtful that absolutely nobody who organized the protests, knowing that known extremist groups would be blending in with the 10,000 strong mob, foresaw the potential for violence - and chaos. It was always a question of what kind of unrest would it provoke and how/to what degree the chaos could be exploited. So I wouldn’t necessarily say that it was a stupid coup, even though clearly some of the individuals in the mob were comically inept and stupid. Rather, I’d argue that it was a poorly organized, half-hearted coup. And in the end, as evidence by Trump’s unwillingness to pardon the rioters, Trump’s heart just wasn’t into being America’s first strongman president. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/534 "2021-01-25T14:31:45Z")
Let’s not forget that Giuliani used the phrase “Trial by Combat” during the rally; that some Republican members of Congress apparently gave recon tours the day before the attack to the attackers and that one GOP member of Congress live tweeted Pelosi’s location during the attack. Had it been successful in seizing important personages, I have no doubt much o he GOP would have tried to use it to seize power. Their approach gives them enough plausible deniability that stupid people declare it wasn’t a coup. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/535 "2021-01-25T15:29:09Z")
Exactly. In one of these threads someone has posted that recent investigations show a hard core of 30-40 self-appointed “commandos” who were actnve as a coherent organized fighting force and fully intended to kill the “traitors” = D congressmen once they caught them. Then there were (probably) a few hundred wannabes who had been having individual wet dreams in their individual basements about doing that. And then 9500 useful idiots came along to provide mass. And (mostly unwittingly) to provide cover for the others who actually matter. Who on the inside was helping the 40 while it was happening and who in (or near) the administration made sure the 40 were there in the first place? Those are the true coup plotters, the ones who should hang in a public square. After we hang the 40. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/536 "2021-01-25T15:39:50Z")
And since the coup failed (this time) other useful idiots come in to trivialize the entire event, not three weeks after it occurred. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/537 "2021-01-25T16:11:06Z")
When people think of ‘coups’, they’re typically thinking of armed forces, such as the military, large illegal militias (often the case in civil wars), and/or national security forces that rebel against their regimes and take over by force, with consent from political forces within or who have close ties to a former government. That’s the image people have in their heads: a cadre of officers who coordinate and use force to overthrow a government in unambiguous fashion. But there are different ways a democratic government can essentially cease to function normally, and that is what the goal was here; not necessarily to use General Milley as a blunt instrument of terror on behalf of the president - that was almost certainly never going to happen. Everyone knows that. What seems to have been the goal is to test the waters to see how much chaos could be sown and to see how different institutions would react to it, and to exploit these institutions to interrupt the normal transfer of power, and to further cast doubt on any possibility that Joe Biden could be president. Remember: the Republicans - even those who eventually came around and condemned the violence on January 6 - stood by and watched as the activist elements in their party at every level tried to use debunked claims to throw out votes and overturn an election. They tried using unethical and illegitimate means to delegitimize Biden’s victory at the polls. All of these efforts failed, but some of these tactics came rather close to succeeding, which, had they been successful, would have been used to add credence to the claims of voter fraud. The Wisconsin Supreme Court just narrowly rejected a suit filed that could have possibly (though not certainly) tossed votes in Wisconsin’s most heavily democratic leaning district. We now find out that there was a plan to fire the acting AG to replace him with a Trump loyalist, who would have the used the DOJ to make a baseless claim that widespread voter fraud had been determined – a move that appears to have been assisted from within the congress, no less. That also failed. The attacks on January 6th were the last, most violent manifestation of a months-long effort to delegitimize the election of November 3rd. This wasn’t a mob that got a little too rowdy; this was a well-organized and well-funded mob, that just also turned out to be (fortunately) a disorganized, half-hearted coup attempt, but a coup attempt nevertheless. What’s more, this is probably not over. There will likely be more assaults on our democracy until a solid majority come to the realization that this type of action is not just unacceptable but counter-productive. People have to believe that American democracy is worth saving and worth protecting from thugs like these, and voters have to sanction the enemies of democracy at the polls by voting them out of office. We’re two, maybe three, election cycles from potentially losing American democracy for a long time, possibly forever. ---
**Author:** ![Akaj](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/akaj/32/145_2.png) [@Akaj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Akaj)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/538 "2021-01-25T16:13:10Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > … one GOP member of Congress live tweeted Pelosi’s location during the attack. Who was it? And why isn’t this person currently in jail on charges of insurrection? > [@LSLGuy](#): > > Who on the inside was helping the 40 while it was happening and who in (or near) the administration made sure the 40 were there in the first place? Those are the true coup plotters, the ones who should hang in a public square. After we hang the 40. Oh, just let it go already. This is a time for unity, amirite? /s ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/539 "2021-01-25T17:02:25Z")
Jesus fucking Christ it’s not my job to keep you abreast of widely reported events. > **[68 officials push for probe of congresswoman who tweeted lawmaker locations...](https://www.yahoo.com/now/68-officials-push-probe-congresswoman-195320268.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAKn6GiEyUWMD-aHNPjcsO3qaFMCwyITF4y6ApQt76-r0-2AROyW88hE5pNJGPBiSBLlecEWPpVKCsZA7oJy_W1mLXbpjhlc4Rxzs6hsRfuAaEwsobja_izvujLwjOghZhBmqoMTVpX-dFJ0Nf_2CaVK1zoZtun4UqZ23hvf5C9CC)** > > 68 elected officials from Colorado have sent a letter to lawmakers requesting a probe into Rep. Lauren Boebert’s actions before and during the day of the deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol, according to multiple reports. The letter was addressed to... > **[A Colorado Republican tweeted about Pelosi’s location during the Capitol...](https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/01/12/nation/colorado-republican-tweeted-about-pelosis-location-during-capitol-siege-shes-now-facing-calls-resign/)** > > Colorado Representative Lauren Boebert went on the offensive Monday night, with the Republican issuing a bellicose statement amid growing calls for her resignation following her actions before and during the riot at the US Capitol. > **[Boebert's Tweet History Scrutinized Amid Questions on Her Capitol Riot Role](https://www.newsweek.com/lauren-boeberts-tweet-history-scrutinized-amid-questions-her-capitol-insurrection-role-1562255)** > > The Republican congresswoman faces criticism for her actions ahead of, and during, the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/540 "2021-01-25T17:11:21Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > What’s more, this is probably not over. There will likely be more assaults on our democracy until a solid majority come to the realization that this type of action is not just unacceptable but counter-productive. People have to believe that American democracy is worth saving and worth protecting from thugs like these, and voters have to sanction the enemies of democracy at the polls by voting them out of office. My attention has been drawn to [this recent article in The American Conservative](https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/waiting-for-our-salazar/), extolling the Portuguese dictator António de Oliveira Salazar: > [@](#): > > Dr. Salazar, as he was always known, was an economist by training. In 1926, a military junta brought an end to the anarchic, anticlerical First Portuguese Republic; the generals asked him to serve as their finance minister. […] > > Soon, by popular acclaim, the military appointed him prime minister. Over the next few years, Salazar dismissed several of his cabinet ministers and took their portfolios for himself. Thus did Salazar establish himself as dictator, almost without anyone noticing. […] > > Looking around our own country, it’s increasingly difficult to refute Patrick Deneen’s thesis that liberalism has already failed. All the hallmarks are there: overdependence on foreign markets; a stagnant and servile economy; an increasingly polarized left and right; widespread political violence; a loss of faith in our democratic institutions. > > Yet Salazar’s example offers a different kind of post-liberal order to those offered by left- and right-wing ideologues. Salazarism, if there is such a thing, is a kind of paternalistic traditionalism. […] > > Summing up the spirit of Salazarism, Gallagher incisively quotes the Israeli conservative thinker Yoram Hazony: “Where a people is incapable of self-discipline, a mild government will only encourage licentiousness and division, hatred and violence, eventually forcing a choice between civil war and tyranny. This means that the best an undisciplined people can hope for is a benevolent autocrat.” > > Events of the last year may prove Hazony right. If we Americans lack the self-discipline necessary for self-government, if liberalism _is_ off the table, the only alternative to a tyrant like Lenin or Hitler may be a man like Salazar: a paternalistic traditionalist, a philosopher-king. The sheer chutzpah of that anti-democracy arrogance is breathtaking. It’s conservative business-elitism that has done most to create our current “stagnant and servile economy”, and conservative ideology and lies that have been eagerly promoting “an increasingly polarized left and right” and “widespread political violence” and “a loss of faith in our democratic institutions”. Yet the author claims to consider them an indictment of liberalism, and in fact of democracy itself. You know, it was barely fifteen years ago that pro-war conservatives were exhorting us about the importance of democracy and the need to encourage the growth of democracy in the Third World, by force if necessary, and warning us about the “soft bigotry of low expectations” if we objected that foreign military invasion and conquest was not the best foundation for a healthy democratic government. And now some of them are coming right out and saying that if they can’t reliably impose a conservative-elitist government (by pretending to follow the rules of democracy while simultaneously undermining them), then we should all just give up on democracy altogether. [David Frum predicted this](https://www.vox.com/2018/1/18/16880524/donald-trump-democracy-republicans-trumpocracy), but I really didn’t expect to see an article in a mainstream elite-conservative publication—the kind that claims to be well-informed and scholarly about economics and history and so forth—embracing this position so openly. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2021, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/541 "2021-01-25T17:11:40Z")
A coup is the illegal seizing of governmental power. If the military, or a faction of it, is involved, then it is a military coup. There are may different types of coups. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407.md?page=26) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407.md?page=28)