You’re not helping your argument any.
Where’s that darn “like” button? 
As much as I despise Trump, everything he is, and everything he stands for (or in his case doesn’t stand for), I would never support a coup or insurrection IF he wins.
That is treason.
Here’s the thing. If Trump really were such a widely predicted disaster that a coup is being batted about by the generals, then why wouldn’t Congress be drafting articles of impeachment to go into effect before Trump can even take office?
Oh, Congress is supporting Trump in your scenario? Then how the fuck is the coup supposed to succeed? If the people are backing Trump and Congress is backing Trump then how is it that the military is United in opposition to Trump?
We actually have several constitutional methods for removing the president from office and if Trump gets elected and is as big a disaster as everyone expects, then we can just use one of those methods, and the elected officials who ousted Trump will then face either the wrath or the applause of the electorate.
Oh, Mr. Slacker, some day you’ll look back on this thread with renewed insight. Cherish that moment when it happens and use it as an internet prophylactic.
It was not, but the United Nations took it so seriously for its exploration of contemporary political issues that they invited castmembers and writers of the show to come to the UN and do a panel:
Another sick burn! I’m in awe.
Ding ding ding! Concise and spot on.
Is your argument that a coup will happen if Trump is elected, or is it that a coup should happen? I ask, because it seems like it’s shifted from the first to the second.
Even if a coup deposed Trump as soon as he took office, it wouldn’t be a good idea. The way to debunk/discredit Trumpism is to let a Trump presidency play out for a few months, in its awfulness, and thus let the public wake to its senses and recognize how bad a Trump presidency is. Then Congress or the Cabinet can boot him out.
If you dump him before he even takes office, Trump supporters will forever wax nostalgic about the Trump presidency that never was. “Trump would have eliminated the national debt!” “Trump would have gotten unemployment down to 2%.” “Trump would have done this or that.”
There’s no shift: read the last paragraph of the OP. My argument has always been that it could conceivably happen, and that it wouldn’t necessarily be such a bad thing if it did. All the content-free or content-lite ad hominem preening that has come in the several pages since then has not changed my mind; however, Velocity just made a very good and well reasoned point that does make me reconsider somewhat.
America–the idea, and the state–is not invulnerable or immortal. It will end someday, for better or for worse.
A Trump victory might well be survivable, in itself. But even a Trump loss might be the beginning of the end, if we don’t handle the ramifications well enough. In any case, this story won’t end on November 8, or on January 20.
So, I guess my question is, why do you think it would be a good thing? I mean, i get that you don’t like Trump and don’t want to see him as President. I don’t like Trump and don’t particularly want to see him as President either, but why are you hoping for some sort of extra-consstitutional action to remove him, should it come to pass?
Andrew Sullivan’s New York Magazine piece from this summer contains the answer, starting with its subhead: “Democracies end when they become too democratic.”
Extinction level event. That’s why.
I’m pretty sure Andrew Sullivan would call you a moron for this OP, too.
So Trump is an extinction level event for our democracy, yet a military coup that literally overthrows a democratically elected President wouldn’t be?
It may certainly be the case that if Trump is elected president it means that democracy in America is over. But you couldn’t fix that with a military coup. It’s like trying to cure cancer with a guillotine.
Exactly.
I’m still trying to figure out how somebody can be smart enough to know electing Trump is a bad idea but dumb enough to think overthrowing democracy is a good idea.
As people are fond of saying about this election*, sometimes you have to choose what you think would be the lesser of two evils. YMMV about which is the lesser.
*FTR, I don’t believe Hillary is “evil” at all. I like her and believe she would be a good president. But the previously referenced Andrew Sullivan detests her, yet still believes she is the only thing standing between us and the void.
I understand the view that, faced with an apartment building you believe is in imminent danger of collapse, one might choose to limit the damage done by bringing it down with a controlled explosion. The problem, from this analogy’s standpoint, is that either way the building is fully occupied, and thus the least worst course may be to frantically and constantly shore up the building until it can be properly stabilized, even with the risk that it could still fall over, rather than to blow it up thus guaranteeing that the residents will not come out of it well.
That could be the analogy. But I still keep thinking that if Trump wins, it’s not really Trump himself that’s the problem, but the electorate. If a majority (or near-majority plurality) of American voters make him president, then IMO we don’t deserve democracy: we can’t collectively be trusted with the franchise. “This is why we can’t have nice things!”
ETA: As noted upthread, if we’re going to lose democracy either way (and I’m not sure that’s the case), I’d rather have some smart military officers and career bureaucrats in charge instead of Trump and whatever crazies he appoints.
I’ve read some brain-dead things on the Dope lately, but this one is right up there at the top.
The only objection that I can liberals making about Trump being the top law enforcement guy is that he will remove all obstacles to the investigations into Hillary and she’ll probably wind up in jail. And libs would find that tragic, since they think the sun shines out of her ass.
And the exact same thing will happen when Clinton wins. And the whole mess will be repeated in 4 years.