# 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:** 42
**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:** [December 9, 2021, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/822 "2021-12-09T21:47:06Z")
> Donald J. Trump was winning by a significant margin across all key states Nov 3 evening. Which happens when Republicans claim to their supporters that it’s not safe to mail your ballots in and demand that they go in-person to vote, their ballots get counted earlier. Plus Republicans are less likely to worry about spreading disease by attending packed polls, because Covid is a hoax. > Vote counting stopped in key states where Smartmatic software and either ES&S or Dominion machines were used. Vote counting stopped _everywhere_ when it was really late because even poll volunteers need to sleep. > When reporting resumed a massive spike occurred that favored Joe Biden and exceeded the counting capabilities that were on hand in many cases. See before where Republicans badmouthed mail-in ballots. When it came time to count those, was it a shocker that Democrats gained an advantage? Also, “exceeded the counting capabilities that were on hand” is just word salad. That’s the only part of the PDF which didn’t seem to be pulled straight from the pages of _Weekly World News_, and yet it was still very weak and easily explained with common sense. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2021, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/823 "2021-12-09T21:52:44Z")
Kind of old joke now, but it’s only a coup when it’s from the coup d’etat region of France. Otherwise, it’s sparkling sedition? ---
**Author:** ![Moriarty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moriarty/32/49_2.png) [@Moriarty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moriarty)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2021, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/824 "2021-12-10T00:41:51Z")
> [@Drum\_God](#): > > Wait. I’m confused. Who controls Dominion and ES&S? The powerpoint seems to indicate Venezuela and President Chavez. Later, it says that China and the CCP have done the nefarious deeds. > > Which is it? Slide 14: “ China has leveraged financial, non-governmental and foreign allies including Venezuela to acquire INFLUENCE and CONTROL US Voting Infrastructure in at least 28 States.” … What I find most interesting is the part of the plan that has the National Guard re-counting the (approved) ballots, with photos or video of the ballot being put online so we can count along with them. And this is pretty chilling: “ When you first disqualify all the counterfeit ballots and then count all the remaining legal paper ballots nationwide, you restore confidence in the Election Outcome ▪ Regardless of the cheating and stuffing of the ballot box, by eliminating the counterfeit mail-in and absentee ballots → Trump Almost Certainly Wins ▪ Additionally, US Senators, US House Races, State, and Local races now turn to Republican ▪ This remedies the problem quickly and easily by: ▪ Eliminating counterfeit ballots and subtracting them from current totals to see if races change, or ▪ Recounting remaining, legal ballots by hand to see who wins races. ▪ Either way, we quickly and easily find out who the elected leaders REALLY ARE and restore confidence in the outcome!” ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2021, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/825 "2021-12-10T18:25:15Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > Also, “exceeded the counting capabilities that were on hand” is just word salad. Nah, it’s quite literal. “exceeded the counting capabilities that were on hand” translates to, ‘the Republicans ran out of fingers to count on’ ---
**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:** [December 10, 2021, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/826 "2021-12-10T19:16:54Z")
Nice. 👍 ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2021, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/827 "2021-12-10T22:53:35Z")
Yes this all fits in a nice bit of circular reasoning. Trump tells all of his followers that Covid is a myth and mail in ballots are ripe with Fraud so only commie Pinko Chinese pansies would vote from home. Democrats meanwhile prudently fearing Covid stay away from crowds and vote by mail. Pollsters and pundits across the country see this coming and tell people that they should expect Trump to take an early lead which then diminishes and disappears as the mail in ballots are counted. Evening goes down pretty much exactly as pundits and pollsters said it would with the possible exception that Trump and Republicans slightly exceed expectations. Strong partisan differences between in person and mail in voting is used as proof that Trump was right that mail in voting was full of fraud. The fact that the media knew before hand is proof that rather than being an fluke, the whole thing was planned and that they were in on the conspiracy from the start and so can’t be trusted to report on the outcomes. 🙄 ---
**Author:** ![Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/son_of_a_rich/32/5439_2.png) [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2022, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/828 "2022-01-08T06:40:49Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > …Hitler didn’t get into power because of the Beer Hall Putsch. He got into power because of back room political deals. He got off easy to the world’s detriment. Maybe putting him up against the wall would have given future traitors something to think about. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2022, 7:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/829 "2022-01-08T07:21:01Z")
> [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](#): > > He got off easy to the world’s detriment. [But what’s happened since.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7itFdNE2Qw) ---
**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:** [December 20, 2022, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/830 "2022-12-20T02:14:37Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > I am very Liberal. I am pissed off at what happened, as everyone in the nation should also be, regardless of party. > > But this was not an attempt at a takeover of government. > > It just was not. Given that Trump was referred to the DOJ for Insurrection, have you changed your mind? ---
**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:** [December 20, 2022, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/831 "2022-12-20T02:27:36Z")
LOL yes that did not age well. 😆 Then again, it wasn’t so great to begin with. ---
**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:** [December 20, 2022, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/832 "2022-12-20T02:48:04Z")
This was on my list of “threads that need revisiting when events happen” for a while now, lol. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/833 "2022-12-20T03:00:39Z")
"partisan witch hunt! Lamestream media! Lock her up! (gotta get in in the classics) Buy my trading cards! " ---
**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:** [December 20, 2022, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/834 "2022-12-20T03:01:21Z")
Well, to be fair, that wasn’t the OP’s position _at all_. ---
**Author:** ![Guest-starring\_Id](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guest-starring_id/32/21736_2.png) [@Guest-starring\_Id](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guest-starring_Id)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/835 "2022-12-20T03:26:31Z")
Oh I’m pretty sure **Sitnam** ’s going after the Astronaut one and the Fat Cop one. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/836 "2022-12-20T15:31:14Z")
Let’s be real, MAGA fans are stupid, but this NFT bullshit is just a a way for some shady fucker to pay Trump for some shady shit he did. That it strips away whatever dignity Trump had managed to scrape up out of a gutter lately is just hilarious. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/837 "2022-12-20T15:39:33Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Given that Trump was referred to the DOJ for Insurrection, have you changed your mind? Apparently not. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/838 "2022-12-20T16:17:15Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Given that Trump was referred to the DOJ for Insurrection, have you changed your mind? Coup: there it is. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/839 "2022-12-20T16:34:59Z")
To quote my favourite historian - Heather Cox Richardson: > Fittingly, on December 15, the Coup d’État Project of the Cline Center for Advanced Social Research at the University of Illinois, which maintains the world’s largest registry of coups, attempted coups, and coup conspiracies since World War II, reclassified the events of January 6 as an attempted “auto-coup.” > According to its director, Scott Althaus, an auto-coup occurs when“the incumbent chief executive uses illegal or extra-legal means to assume extraordinary powers, seize the power of other branches of government, or render powerless other components of the government such as the legislature or judiciary.” ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/840 "2022-12-20T16:36:25Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > Let’s be real, MAGA fans are stupid, but this NFT bullshit is just a a way for some shady fucker to pay Trump for some shady shit he did. You are correct about the NFT’s. But what about the referral to the DOJ about the Jan 6 insurrection? > Given that Trump was referred to the DOJ for Insurrection, have you changed your mind? ---
**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:** [December 20, 2022, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407/841 "2022-12-20T16:53:37Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > Fittingly, on December 15, the Coup d’État Project of the Cline Center for Advanced Social Research at the University of Illinois, which maintains the world’s largest registry of coups, attempted coups, and coup conspiracies since World War II, reclassified the events of January 6 as an attempted “auto-coup.” Lol, I love it when the experts take 2 years to state what was obvious to us Dopers on November 9th, 2020: > [@The American Coup: 11.9.2020 -](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-american-coup-11-9-2020/925182): > > thinking Trump fired his Secretary of Defense, replaced Esper with Chris Miller. This is a totally normal thing for an outgoing President to prioritize. Esper then says, in an interview in Military Times, that for the George Floyd protests he (Esper) would not support Trump’s desire to invoke the Insurrection Act against the Floyd protesters: [[Google Photos] ](https://photos.app.goo.gl/9xqbCpACp8jJAxHG6) We know if you’re Donald Trump and you want troops on the streets for a Portland police stat… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407.md?page=41) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-wasn-t-a-coup/930407.md?page=43)