Meanwhile Biden is calling up Republicans for his fantasy cabinet.
Trump and co.: We are gonna do a coup
chapo.chat: I just don't know how they'll manage to do a coup.
Trump and co.: Coup starting....now.
chapo.chat: I'll guess we see how it pans out
They can try but capital doesn't want to rock the boat like that, it's not profitable for them. If they try they're going to eat big loads of horseshit.
The thing here I've been saying is that capital also doesn't want to rock the boat by preventing it. The division in the country is such that if the trump base sees you stop him from doing this you're setting up an inevitable civil war in years to come whereas if they just roll over and accept it then that's not inevitable.
The only way they prevent this is with a military coup. I see more likelihood in them rolling over and accepting Trump than using force.
EDIT: On the other hand if you were ever looking for what Lenin called a "revolutionary moment" in which a state is weakened by splitting and a population is electrified... You should be paying really close attention to this.
you overestimate the mayo eating Americans effort. they cant roll over fo grab the remote let alone coup a country
I like the optimism of your edit but just don't see that matching the material reality of America. And if it is a revolutionary moment, then the result might be more likely that you will see many accounts on this site never post again.
What happens in the event that both Biden's administration and Trump's administration try to operate in parallel? Assuming they won't attempt a military approach first then the obvious path would be to simply start running their administration from a different location to the White House.
They would speak to states and administrations, seeking that they recognise and deal with them instead of the White House. This will likely work with blue states and cities, they would recognise Biden's administration. What happens when federal police are sent in by Trump to ensure federal buildings operate the way he wants?
There is the real potential for two competing administrations to attempt to run the country for a period of time. That is the very definition of an incredibly weakened state in my book. They will be much too busy competing with one another to take notice of revolutionary organising and the organising that does occur will get far less attention than it deserves based on the threat it represents.
And what happens as the population becomes more and more and more agitated by this dual competing administration situation? A slow slide towards physical conflict. The people become more and more electrified.
What could socialists do in those kinds of circumstances? Why accept either administration? Local agitation could lead to the formation of local worker councils to self administrate. Many areas will be willing to reject either Trump or Biden's admin in favour of local political power. There will be fascists that take advantage of this and socialists should too.
Assuming that is what's coming of course... My assumption would be that they wouldn't IMMEDIATELY roll over and accept it. They'd make some sort of go at getting capitulation to occur.
I think there is real potential and a real moment coming here. I don't think the left is strong enough to take the entire country but I do think the left could take advantage of the situation to catapult its organising efforts in that kind of scenario.
While in general yes, all past successful attempts at revolution have exploited a situation like this (arguably a socialist revolution is even impossible without parts of the ruling class warring against each other) such an optimistic scenario hinges entirely on there actually existing a deep split within the American bourgeoise. Ultimately we have no way of truly knowing if this is the case (unless we have some high ranking insiders here).
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying this is about to be a revolution itself, but that it is a passing revolutionary moment that could be exploited for the goal of revolution if the forces that wanted it were strong and organised enough. I don't actually think either the left or right are strong enough to exploit it, not for the goal of taking the entire US, but I do think that if the above plays out then it is the greatest opportunity for gains that has been seen within the US within the entire period since ww2.
Absolutely, the American left should be prepared anyway, if not explicitly for this specific opportunity then at least generally for the ones coming next.
Did the last civil war hurt the economy? Might be dumb to compare, but others might do it anyways.
An interesting question I don't know the answer to but my gut feeling is that it would be very difficult to compare because the American civil war was fought for slavery which was an essential part of the existing economy, if it hurt the economy you could quite easily attribute that damage to the complete upheaval of the existing organisation of labour.
They can try but capital doesn’t want to rock the boat like that
someone made a thread these days making a point about how the american bourgeoisie is split in the haute bourgeoisie ("globalist", tied to finance and big tech, represented by dems and neocons, currently more powerful) and the national/industrial bourgeoisie (more reactionary, nationalist), and i'm not sure the latter would have such a big issue with destabilization if they think they can get actually depose their superiors or whatever as a consequence of it
not that i'm hopeful either way, just saying it's not an impossibility
I still think they're just playing it up for their base. I don't think the capitalist class would actually support this. Too destabilizing. Bad for investments.
Hope I'm wrong, though, and the AmeriKKKan empire is torn apart by civil war, freeing the rest of the world for a few years to liberate itself from us.
That's true, but it will also devastate most other industries, which would be a net loss for most capitalists, and you can't have literally every capitalist invested in just the MIC and, like, construction. It would be a huge net loss of profitability, which would be fine in another country, but not in the US because it would negatively impact most US capitalists to some degree, many to the point of losing all or most of the value of their investments.
They would only risk something like this in the event of a real crisis, like the looming threat of communist revolution in late Wiemar Germany and pre-fascist Italy.
The Democrats really don't know how to deal with these guys, unfortunately
"Pompeo must resign *immediately. That is absolute Kremlin gaslighting."
me, sobbing while being dragged to a labor camp by US Supreme Empire soldiers "That is not what gaslighting means"
Like, gaslighting is a very serious thing where you push a person to think they are being delirious, it's a horrible psychological torture, and these dipshits use it for politicians manufacturing consent and/or lying
That is absolute Kremlin gaslighting.”
russia
DAE russia??
kremlin!!
russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia russia
:putin-wink: putin :putin-wink: russia :putin-wink: putin :putin-wink: russia :putin-wink: putin :putin-wink: russia
At least they didn't call it "whataboutism," I mutter as jackbooted thugs force me into a train car at gunpoint.
I would say this wouldn't work but their adversaries are Democrats, so...
I think there is a real-world, non-zero chance that if Trump's whole battle wagon of losers all just stayed where they are and pretended nothing happened, the democrats are such spineless piece of shit losers they wouldn't do anything but litigate in republican courts for the next four years while Trump ate McDoubles and pressed the the fake big red nuke button they put on his desk over and over.
"Oh no, Trump never signed the transfer paperwork to let Biden become president! Oh well, better just give up"
Camera zooms in to reveal it's actually a bunch of plungers with feathers hot glued on
Camera continues to zoom in and the plungers are covered in shit, the bow in the background is made of toilet paper rolls stapled together.
You know that hall monitor that one kid realized they could just ignore, and then every kid from then on never took that hall monitor seriously ever again?
That could happen real fast, it feels like.
If I were Xi I would arrange with Putin to acknowledge different US presidents.
Exactly what I figured. Great minds think alike.
Also if they could get the EU to acknowledge Howie that'd be A+ but I'm not holding out hope.
Bolivia, Venezuela and Cuba recognize Bernard as the rightful president of the United States
As revenge for the millions of americans saying "youre welcome for saving your ass in dubya dubya 2"
and people say the US isnt a fascist state, and that its democracy isnt an illusion
Can you imagine how despondent you would have been if Bernie had got the nom., won the election, and then Trump just didn't leave? You could absolutely forget about democrats doing remotely anything to help - to have come so close to meager societal improvement and then have it scuppered before you
Tbh that scenario would have been 100 times more likely than Republicans trying to coup the Democratic Party establishment (who usually even share the same donors as them).
"This is the so-called President Elect's fault for being so radical and unwilling to comrpomise. Show some sympathy for Mr. President Trump, he is just as upset as we are." - Alternate Timeline Pelosi
They're right that the elections arent fair obviously, they should be suspicious of a system that elects only millionaires and not working people and only ever produces austerity no matter the crisis, but of course what theyre actually concerned with is they dont win all the time.
Odd how the GOP's ideal version of America is a one-party state.
At least, from the perspective of a party that wants to actually do things, that makes rational sense.
The Democrats explicitly wanting to be the bottom of a two-party system forever is much odder. If they had all the political power in the world, they'd immediately give (at least) half of it back to the Republicans. They're like a content vassal state of the GOP.
If all politics is sexual pathology, then does this mean that the Dems are just helpless subs?
The Democrats explicitly wanting to be the bottom of a two-party system forever is much odder
They said the quiet part out loud. Dems are controlled opposition and only exist to curb and stifle dissent. They use the fact that they are the only major opposition to the republicans to be the most neolib shitheads they can possibly be.
And the Sec. of Defense, and the person overseeing the nuclear Arsenal.
Maybe I’m paranoid AF, but this seems like power consolidating to me. His militia followers are itching to go out and “kill commies”.
Yep it was the guy that refused to order the military to engage BLM protesters.
I'm calmed by the fact that Esper wanted to quit anyway and Trump is a petty bitch.
Also the troops seem to like Biden and also I'd guess most of them don't want to murder their fellow Americans.
I want to think you're right but I also think that loads of innocent people have thought 'the army won't gun down their own people!' The night before some godawful massacre.
I don't mean that the army won't do a massacre, I just think that any large scale action would lead to a lot of defections and fragging.
The main factions that want Trump to remain in power:
- Evangelicals that want the overthrow the Iranian government immediately.
- The part of the intelligence community that recognize containment & isolation will not work against China, instead want immediate war.
These groups have coalesced into a single bloc in the Trump administration. They are the only factions in the ruling class that will lose ground in a Biden administration.
Bill Barr & Mike Pompeo are probably the most powerful people in this bloc. Curious to see what they can pull off.
Why would the second group necessarily lose ground with Biden, didn't he go especially hard on China during his campaign?
Not hard enough for them. Biden would try to economically contain and control China, but apocalyptically warmongering nuts in Trump's admin probably think we can win a full-on war with another nuclear superpower. Hell even Neoliberals understand there's no "winning" a shootin war with China, but I don't think Neocons do.
In that case they would be right though: China only started rolling out their new high tech ICBMs last year and is still very vulnerable to a first strike, so for these ghouls now would be the best time.
Exactly. I imagine republican politicians will continue to say the election was suspect for years to come but other than that do nothing
You can hear the cope in Pompeo's voice. It's high and borderline stammering. LOW ENERGY
What's the over under here on Trump pulling this shit off? Betting markets have Trump at like 5-10% as "Next President" and climbing, which seems about right. Trump is a fool and I can't imagine capital fighting for him, but also the Dems are also completely incompetent/don't care.
I think the Dems and general ruling class establishment would deeply care if the election was outright stolen. This would be a world destabilizing event. If the Trump administration used their own party flunkies in multiple different states as well as their court appointees to actually throw votes that have already been counted into the trash it would be such a blindingly obvious coup that not only would a large segment of America sincerely and accurately feel like they were living under a dictatorship, but all of America's key allies would see this and understand it as well. Biden has openly signalled many times that it is a priority of his to return the global liberal order back to what it was just 4 years ago, with America as the responsible leader and Europe, the anglosphere and America's other key tinpot allies treated like respected stakeholders. But Trump has been mucking up that entire game, considering it "unfair" to America because of America's burden of being the golden scaled dragon on top of a pile of bones.
If Trump blatantly steals the election it will ensure that America's domestic political situation will be totally unpredictable for the forseeable future, seeing as one of the two major political parties is willing to torch the bourgeois truce of the Constitutional Republic in order to anoint a senile game show host, and as a consequence America's aforementioned key allies will take moves to distance themselves from America's power in order to not be at the whims of a capricious loony house. The globe will be plunged into the great power politics that has been foretold as inevitable by many anxious observers for years, and all the great powers will have their nukes pointed at every other great power.
Francis Fukuyama's book was the dream of the bourgeoisie, it was their wishful thinking. They want an eternity of vacationing in Greece, golfing, gifting their children villas in New Zealand and having everybody they know eagerly suck their dick. They don't want to deal with the complexity of politics, they want politics to be made up bullshit on TV that doesn't do anything substantial but give them some more tax breaks sometimes. The US's rules of play just falling apart into a clown show is so obviously undesirable for them that their power to stop it would either have to be in shambles, or they'd have to be incredibly stupid. If it happens, I think the only way to understand it would be that the political state actually overpowered the bourgeois interests. All of the Republican flunkies that have been praising Trump would have to actually have decided to take the state machinery they were temporarily granted by all the bourgeois interests that really underwrite state power and bludgeoned them over the head with it because they think Trump will knight them and induct them into the new American aristocracy backed by the military that has decided Trump is the guy they'll die for. If it happens I'm gonna go live in Mexico, at least you know what is going on in that country.
A solid analysis. I don't think it contradicts anything I said. Trump might be dumb enough to nuke it all, and his followers dumb enough to follow him, and the Dems/Capital incompetent enough to fail to stop him without the nuke going off (they already failed in 2016, and only barely managed to stop him in 2020).
