“…as thousands protest against Putin”
Is this our future one day?
Nah, that could never happen in the USA.
*Note: Not sure where this thread belongs. Please move if this is the wrong forum. *
For it to happen here, a lot of judges will still need to be replaced. But that’s about all it would take. An authoritarian Administration can always find people to do the arrests of political opponents; if it can count on judges to rubber-stamp the arrests, then arrests will happen. At the moment, the Trump Administration can’t count on all the judges. Yet.
(So you could well argue that Elections is the right place, because elections decide who appoints the federal judges. Or maybe that’s too attenuated a line of reasoning. ^_^)
eta: more to the point (on forum choice), Navalny was arrested in advance of elections in Russia. (March 18.)
Moved from Elections to the Pit.
[/moderating]
A democracy will only remain so if the people want it to.
About 35% of Americans would be completely fine with Trump arresting his opponents. Keep an eye on that number.
No prob. I’m fine with that. 
You mean the kind of people who would shout, “Lock her up! Lock her up!” Hehe. The New York Times reported that, didn’t they? Must be Fake News.
It’s unpleasant to keep an eye on that number as it looks like you just pulled it out of your ass.
nm
How about 38.8%?
And how many of those 38.8% still feel Obama didn’t do enough during the 9/11 attack?
No need to replace them when you can just stuff the bench with additional appointees. The constitution doesn’t prescribe any limit to the size of the Supreme Court, so you can just appoint enough cronies to do your bidding and start arresting your political opponents willy-nilly. Then, when the lower courts release them on Fifth Amendment grounds, you instruct your prosecutors to appeal the cases all the way to the stacked Supreme Court, which will rule in your favour.
On the Russian side, Putin is just a continuation of the very long time tradition of Strong Men rulers. Stalin, Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible, Ivan the Great, etc.
Unfortunately, he is still relatively young at 65, so I would expect a minimum of another 10 years of his rule.
On our American side, well, there will come a point where Americans start resisting, hopefully first with mass protests and blocking traitorous police sent to arrest the [del]King’s[/del] President’s opponents. Then with guns. At that point, I would weep for America, because two things are certain about an oppressive regime and widespread resistance. 1> Lots of people die. 2> The Economy tanks.
That would be the end of the United States of America as a superpower and world leader. Darth Putin would be proud of his Sith apprentice, Darth Bigly.
Just in case I’m not being whooshed…
Ah, I was not aware that the size had been fixed by statute. There goes my bright idea for staging a coup through the judiciary…
That sounds about right. Polling on beliefs in democratic institutions is spotty, but 63% of Republicans and 35% of Americans agree with President Trump that journalists today are an, “Enemy of the American people.”
Along the same lines, 53% of Republicans and 39% of all Americans think flag burners should have their US citizenship revoked, consistent with tweets by Trump.
https://www.cato.org/survey-reports/state-free-speech-tolerance-america
Furthermore, Trump led chants of “Lock her up”, didn’t seem to bother most Republicans.
Just two days ago right wing wacko Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch called for Hillary’s arrest. And last fall there were inumerable right wing pundits calling for Hillary’s arrest. NeverTrumpers are pretty weak, and there is little evidence of serious push-back against these ideas within Republican ranks.
So I’d say your conjecture is not without basis.
Guinastasia, that statute doesn’t really have any teeth. Any court-packing scheme would already need to have approval of Congress, because they’d have to confirm the extra appointees. And if you have the approval of Congress to pack the court, then they can just repeal that statute, too. What we really need is a constitutional amendment. Or, correction, we really needed for the Founders to have done it right the first time, along with establishing an actual procedure for appointing judges to begin with, since it’s only in the last couple of years become apparent that we don’t actually have one of those.
Although institutions are rightfully emphasized, it’s become clear that much of our democracy is reliant upon norms. And support for democratic norms is pretty flimsy among the Republican elite.
James Fallows:
Admittedly, Ta Nehsi Coates notes that the US took a flyer on democratic norms for about 100 years after the civil war, at least as far as African Americans were concerned. Some Thoughts on Democratic Norms - The Atlantic
Someone who didn’t click your link might think you just cited “About 35% of Americans would be completely fine with Trump arresting his opponents” rather than his approval rating. Don’t you think that’s kind of full of shit?
Anyone who supports Trump tends to slavishly approve of anything he does. Otherwise his approval rating would be in low single digits.
Remember his comment about shooting someone? Did he lose support over that?
Navalny is probably fortunate to have been arrested. Putin’s history suggests that this is a warning - perhaps his final warning.