Basically agree with your take. The thing is, if Trump suddenly did something extreme, such as order the troops to occupy a rebellious California, I think the chance of resistance by military commanders is high.
To put it another way, it should not be assumed that the military will go along with what Trump commands simply because he is president.
It was only “violent” because the government attacked the protesters, right?
Your logic is specious. I’m sure some people acting under the direction of MLK defended themselves against attacks at some point, but by your logic MLK and his movement were violent.
That makes it sounds like the Ukrainians’ fault. Putin made his own decisions.
I see no way to get one right now without seriously risking getting one that’s much worse.
Shouldn’t he be screaming from the rooftops about this in public?
Sneaking out those of one’s friends who can afford it strikes me as far less than any public figure ought to be doing.
Revolutions very often wind up someplace their originators had no intention of going. The USA got very lucky in the 1700’s; and a lot of people did die in that one.
Sometimes you’ve really got to have one anyway. But it’s not likely to be easy, it’s not likely to be bloodless, and it’s probably not going to wind up where you thought you were going.
The by-state representation in the Electoral Collage and the Senate isn’t necessarily undemocratic except in the most trivial sense of pure majorities don’t always win. I don’t see that fascism requires or is favored by it unless you claim that the over-represented states are somehow inclined to be fascist. Populist fascists who rode a wave of support into office sometimes did so by absolute majorities, or more often a core base and the support/acquiescence of middles voting a “better than the alternative” coalition. I don’t see “pure” democracy as preventing that.
As far as amending the Constitution: being the Federal government’s charter document, originally it was naïvely thought that the Federal government would have no power not explicitly granted it (snort!); and so it was deliberately made hard to amend to make it hard to formally grant the federal government more power. Since that’s now the deadest of dead horses we might as well start by passing an amendment making further amendments easier.
“Corrupt” is a pretty strong word and properly does not include practicing judicial philosophies that you bitterly disagree with and which undermined the progressive agendas enacted under previous expansionist doctrines. I would reserve the term strictly for quid pro quo bribery or prejudice as to outcome.
To have a handle here, I’d need to know what Trump ordered the bureaucrats to do.
Autocrat wannabes tend to focus on the media. So, Trump might easily order arrest of New York Times reporters and editors. Will Justice Department civil servants, and federal judges, go along with arresting people without the normal process that it making Trump’s prosecutions take impossibly long? I think no. Could Trump have his toady AG fire federal prosecutors? I guess. Judges? Harder. We may see it, but I would be cautiously optimistic there.
Another drama will concern Trump ordering the arrest of Biden and family. I think that, even if Trump is generally unsuccessful at consolidating power, that’s an area where he might have some success. But I don’t think unfairly locking up a few opposition politicians would put us much farther on the road to dictatorship.
When the stimulus is there for change, then yes, there are problems so it is hard to change while working through those problems. But if the stimulus for change is not there, then nothing will happen.
I.e., we have a government structure that has a lot of problems right now, but trying to change right now would indeed be risky.
That’s true enough, but they can certainly question the order and state any objections they have in writing. That’s small comfort to someone who has just been killed, of course.
Kinda well, actually. Trump had “adults in the room” around him who prevented him from doing more dumb shit than he did, and Democrats certainly pressed back against him.
And Trump was not really trying to be dictator or anything until January 6.
First, there are state charges for which he cannot pardon himself.
Second, there is no agreement as to whether the president can pardon himself. That would end up going to the Supreme Court. His best bet is to resign and have his VP become president and pardon him (this is more shit for which we need a constitutional amendment…).
There’s nothing wrong with having a speculative thread. But 2nd term Trump would be the ultimate loose cannon leader. During DJT’s waking hours, the foreseeable future would be about 30 minutes.
We could luck out. Judges may stand up to him, and he then starts feeling old and frail, letting some semi-normal veep or Secretary of State step up and act within fairly normal parameters.
It’s not a trivial thing, though. Two of our worst presidents in US history, GWB and Trump would never have won without the electoral college. Gore won the popular vote by over 500,000 votes (cite), and Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 by millions of votes. Further, I have heard no one claim that Trump can win the popular vote this year, yet we fear that he could win in the EC. That’s undemocratic and a load of shit to boot.
They are! The vast majority of overrepresented states are red.
Mussolini marched on Rome. Hitler became chancellor (and immediately dictator) without a majority in the Reichstag (Paul Hindenburg agreed to appoint Hitler as head of a coalition government of Nazis and conservative party members). It’s true that some bad dudes have been popularly elected (Orban, perhaps?), I suppose, but at least in such cases they have the active backing of the people.
Which the red states will of course oppose.
I’m sure you’ve heard of Thomas and his many, many, and BIG gifts from rich people:
That’s what happens to be the case currently. But suppose a popular minority but an electoral majority was opposed to Trump. How would you feel about the arrangement then?
Yes; now tell me, which Supreme Court ruling was swung by Thomas that favored any of the parties he accepted perks from?
As @thorny_locust notes, the US Revolution would have been bloodless if only the British hadn’t fought back. Again, 121 people died directly in the Maidan Revolution, thousands more in the 2014 Donbas War, and hundreds of thousands so far in the War in Ukraine. You are factually incorrect in calling it peaceful and nonviolent.
It only ‘sounds’ that way if you’re pitching a frankly offensive strawman at me.
The Revolution of Dignity (Ukrainian: Революція гідності, romanized: Revoliutsiia hidnosti), also known as the Maidan Revolution or the Ukrainian Revolution ,[2] took place in Ukraine in February 2014[2][1] at the end of the Euromaidan protests,[1] when deadly clashes between protesters and state forces in the capital Kyiv culminated in the ousting of elected PresidentViktor Yanukovych, the return to the 2004 Constitution of Ukraine, and the outbreak of the 2014 Russo-Ukrainian War.
Or is Wikipedia making it sound like it was the Ukrainians’ fault?
That’s an irrelevant point, since the American Revolution was an armed revolution.
You are making a valid point only if you can demonstrate, which you have not, that the Maidan Revolution was intended to be violent or at some point became violet on the part of the revolutionaries beyond a superficial level. Just showing that people died does not prove that the Maidan Revolution was itself violent.
Defend your own points! Are you saying that the Maidan Revolution participants themselves did something wrong that set off the Donbas conflict? If so, please show that.
You haven’t provided enough context or any kind of narrative, actually.
Accepting “perks” is enough for me to think he is corrupt.
And yes, he and anyone who accepts “perks” at that level is bribed. They are more inclined thereby to support the interests of the monied class over those of the people.
And the national referendum of 1955 was intended to peacefully reunify Vietnam. Oddly, people in power with people with guns at their disposal have a habit of making revolutions violent regardless of the “intentions” of the revolutionaries. Which is the entire point of the fact that the US Revolution would have been nonviolent and peaceful if the British hadn’t attempted to stop it. Showing that people died in the Madia Revolution is the very definition of proving that it was violent.
And I’m done with your offensive strawmen. Talk to me in the pit if you wish to continue this line of discussion.