by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
The thing about what’s going on right now is it’s difficult, if not impossible, to figure out how serious Trump is about staging A Very American Coup and how much is him simply hedging his bets. Trump may simply want a wide-array of options to choose from.
And, remember, Trump must know by this point that Russian hackers are going to (attempt) to directly change the results of the 2020 election by hacking directly into our election computer systems. As such, that MIGHT be the real explanation behind the odd decision on the part of the Trump Campaign to go dark with their advertising in key battleground states right before the election. Trump is lulzing it because he knows nothing matters at this point — the fix is in.
Anyway, let’s imagine he decides to go ahead with his Very American Coup. What happens?
The Coup
The key thing you have to remember is Interior Minister Bill Bar is going to fuck with the election in a very “Who, me?” kind of way. He did it with the Mueller Investigation and he’s going to do it with the election. In fact, I would go so far as to say his success in blunting the blow of Mueller Investigation has given him a very good understanding of what to do.
As long as House Trump controls the post-election narrative, they win. As things grow more and more unhinged, the pressure will be on Biden to accept “defeat” for the “sake of the country.” So, it’s easy to see a situation whereby somehow even though a coup takes place, The New York Times and others play right into Barr’s hands by not even recognizing that a coup has taken place.
And, really, Barr has every reason to believe he will win. So, it’s very possible that even if MAGA state legislatures simply seat Trump Electors out of spite, a wide swath of the mainstream press will go full Vichy on us. I could see this being the setup to not a civil war, but a fucking revolution.
In other words, House Trump and Barr pretty brazenly steal the election post-Election night by fucking with the selection of Electors. The New York Times‘ Maggie Haberman in a ever-so-droll way, signs away the Republic. She poo-poos the notion that anyone has the right to object to this theft and goes back to telling randos like me that I don’t know anything about (access) journalism.
So, this would be a moment of truth. I honestly can’t tell you which way the public would go. There might be some protestings here and there, but Barr controls the media narrative so completely that The New York Times focuses only on the violences associated with these otherwise peaceful protests and that’s it. We turn into an autocracy without even putting up a fight. Remember, the Women’s March has some pretty huge peaceful protests every year and the national press lulzes them because it’s just a bunch of angry broads, amiright?
The Counter-Coup
This is very iffy because of what I describe above. But let’s say Trump, despite “winning” so absolutely brazen in his theft of the election that he enrages enough of the population that Nancy Pelosi finally, finally, finally, finally, FINALLY really begins to play white knuckled power politics with Trump. She begins a game of chicken with him.
Now, the thing to remember is, there are a lot of different things that would have to go wrong for Trump for this to happen. A lot. He’s going to bank on a hard 5-4 vote in his favor at SCOTUS if it comes to that. And he’ll be right. But it’s at least possible that out of sheer desperation, Pelosi drops an H-bomb on Trump’s plans to steal the election.
She announces soon after the last 5-4 SCOTUS vote a two pronged attack against Trump’s coup. First, the House will immediately impeach Trump the moment it comes into session in January. But it won’t be a “skinny” impeachment, it will be a 10 article political MOAB. Everything Trump — and Pence have done over the last four years, from Stormy Daniels to general abuse of power will be thrown into the expansive articles of impeachment. Now, if the Senate hasn’t flipped, then lulz, this is all smoke and mirrors.
existential angst https://t.co/eIVkoMeAif
— Shelt Garner (@sheltgarner) September 24, 2020
MoscowMich does exactly what he did with the first Trump impeachment. But, let’s suppose the Senate does flip. If the country is obviously beginning to fall apart at this point — which would be the only way Pelosi would actually have the guts to do any of this — then there might be a real shot that both Trump AND Pence would be convicted.
This is where things get tricky.
In an effort to placate some very angry Biden voters, Pelosi says she’s going to step aside and have the Democratic House name Biden as speaker of the House, thus putting him in line of succession. The argument that Pelosi could make is that desperate times call for desperate measures and one coup deserves another.
Remember, this would NOT happen in a vacuum. The entire country would likely be on the cusp of implosion at this point. And Trump could very well send in the D.C. national guard (or whatever) to Capitol Hill and try to disperse any impeachment proceedings. But let’s suppose that doesn’t work for some reason, maybe a massive human shield of voters or something.
So both Trump and Pence are convicted — in no large part because Senate Republicans realize the country is probably going to descend into civil war / revolution anyway — and Biden becomes POTUS in a very roundabout manner. He proceeds to name Harris as his veep, and the Senate approves her at a record speed.
If things have gotten THIS BAD, then obviously Trump — who is probably barely hanging on to his sanity — will hold up in the White House. But it’s reasonable to believe that rather than play Hitler-in-the-Berlin-Bunker, he steals Marine One and races to, say, the very CSA-friendly Mobile, Alabama.
And that’s how the country implodes.
