3 ms·

This is a very easy exercise: instead of cowering while letting other people take risks in his name, President Trump walks over to the Capitol. With him at the

This is a very easy exercise: instead of cowering while letting other people take risks in his name, President Trump walks over to the Capitol. With him at the head of the column, many more people storm the building (the Capitol police likely don't put up a fight because nobody told them to fight the President), they occupy the building and take representatives hostage. At this point in time there is no longer a democracy in the US. What happens after that is anybody's guess; by my lights, probably the military leaders don't the President, their troops mostly follow their orders, they retake the Capitol, restore power to Congress, and install Pence as President, followed by democracy being restored not long after by a quick 25th amendment or impeachment and removal. But it would be plausible that some number of the military's leaders choose to back the President instead, or that an insufficient number of the troops follow their orders, resulting in either a successful coup or a protracted civil war. The only thing that saved us from this was Trump's cowardice.

jacquesm 6y ago
I'd hate to see that put to the test but what you describe could well have happened.
mistermann 6y ago
This is a legitimately good description of an arguably plausible (but still plausible!) scenario. But I must note that democracy is not lost in this scenario...unless you'd like to explain: > At this point in time there is no longer a democracy in the US. If we were to attach a debugger and step through the code, what state (variables and their values) would represent a valid scenario of democracy no longer existing in the United States? Or I suppose we could just look at the implementation of IsDemocracy(), assuming the designer of this shitty simulation is reasonably organized. > The only thing that saved us from this was Trump's cowardice. Well, that and other things that you haven't considered. I don't say these things because I think these morons are righteous, or Trump is a good president, or because I think this event is insignificant, but the opposite: I think this scenario is extremely significant - so significant that I suggest we discuss it with the same rigorous precision that is usually reserved only for discussing topics like computer programming. I think a decent argument could be made that the welfare of the country inside of which we write computer code should command at least as much respect during conversations (even if begrudged) as we enthusiastically heap upon coding arguments. But of course, this is just my opinion. And to be fair, if shit really does ever hit the fan, most everyone in this forum is well off enough to get the hell out of dodge to some other country that hasn't gone down the drain, where we can start the process all over again.
- dang 6y ago
  It looks like you've been using this site primarily for political battle. That's not what HN is for, and it destroys what it is for, so we ban accounts that do it (regardless of their politics). Please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stop doing this.
  - mistermann 6y ago
    From your comment (on a different story): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25843947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25843947 > All: I know this is a little late, but those of you posting ideological flamewar comments to this thread are breaking the site guidelines. We're trying to avoid hellfire here, and we're banning accounts that feed it. Please don't feed it. > HN is not for all types of discussion. It is specifically for curious conversation. Here's a test you can apply: curiosity is equally open to what's true, false, or interesting about anything. If your position is that your side is right about everything while the opposing side is wrong about everything, you have left the spectrum of curiosity gratification and are functioning in the spectrum of political battle. Those do not overlap. My ongoing issue, the "axe I grind", the "dead horse I beat" (refer to my history), is this very thing: the constant and obvious degradation of the quality of discourse on HN when it comes to Culture War topics. Most specifically: the homogeneous culture of refusal to even consider what is actually true. Not only is there little interest in what is true, but the very notion seems to be considered highly inappropriate for discussion, and anyone who dares mention it is considered an immoral heretic. This trait has been sweeping through Western culture for years, if not decades - like a virus of the mind. HN was an outlier for quite some time, but as you know the infection has spread to here, and is flourishing. From my perspective, there are at least two noteworthy issues in play: 1. The orderliness of HN forums. 2. The orderliness of the USA, and in turn the entire planet. I imagine you may be less concerned about #2 than I am, but I happen to subscribe to the theory that "with great power, comes great responsibility". What if there was an approach that could plausibly "solve" (to a worthwhile degree) #1, and possibly also contribute to the solving of #2? And if no one does anything different, where is the world going to be 5, 10, 20 years from now? Where would the world be today if it wasn't for the actions of a few key individuals at key points in history?

jacquesm 6y ago

I'd hate to see that put to the test but what you describe could well have happened.

mistermann 6y ago

This is a legitimately good description of an arguably plausible (but still plausible!) scenario. But I must note that democracy is not lost in this scenario...unless you'd like to explain: > At this point in time there is no longer a democracy in the US. If we were to attach a debugger and step through the code, what state (variables and their values) would represent a valid scenario of democracy no longer existing in the United States? Or I suppose we could just look at the implementation of IsDemocracy(), assuming the designer of this shitty simulation is reasonably organized. > The only thing that saved us from this was Trump's cowardice. Well, that and other things that you haven't considered. I don't say these things because I think these morons are righteous, or Trump is a good president, or because I think this event is insignificant, but the opposite: I think this scenario is extremely significant - so significant that I suggest we discuss it with the same rigorous precision that is usually reserved only for discussing topics like computer programming. I think a decent argument could be made that the welfare of the country inside of which we write computer code should command at least as much respect during conversations (even if begrudged) as we enthusiastically heap upon coding arguments. But of course, this is just my opinion. And to be fair, if shit really does ever hit the fan, most everyone in this forum is well off enough to get the hell out of dodge to some other country that hasn't gone down the drain, where we can start the process all over again.

dang 6y ago
It looks like you've been using this site primarily for political battle. That's not what HN is for, and it destroys what it is for, so we ban accounts that do it (regardless of their politics). Please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stop doing this.
- mistermann 6y ago
  From your comment (on a different story): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25843947 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25843947 > All: I know this is a little late, but those of you posting ideological flamewar comments to this thread are breaking the site guidelines. We're trying to avoid hellfire here, and we're banning accounts that feed it. Please don't feed it. > HN is not for all types of discussion. It is specifically for curious conversation. Here's a test you can apply: curiosity is equally open to what's true, false, or interesting about anything. If your position is that your side is right about everything while the opposing side is wrong about everything, you have left the spectrum of curiosity gratification and are functioning in the spectrum of political battle. Those do not overlap. My ongoing issue, the "axe I grind", the "dead horse I beat" (refer to my history), is this very thing: the constant and obvious degradation of the quality of discourse on HN when it comes to Culture War topics. Most specifically: the homogeneous culture of refusal to even consider what is actually true. Not only is there little interest in what is true, but the very notion seems to be considered highly inappropriate for discussion, and anyone who dares mention it is considered an immoral heretic. This trait has been sweeping through Western culture for years, if not decades - like a virus of the mind. HN was an outlier for quite some time, but as you know the infection has spread to here, and is flourishing. From my perspective, there are at least two noteworthy issues in play: 1. The orderliness of HN forums. 2. The orderliness of the USA, and in turn the entire planet. I imagine you may be less concerned about #2 than I am, but I happen to subscribe to the theory that "with great power, comes great responsibility". What if there was an approach that could plausibly "solve" (to a worthwhile degree) #1, and possibly also contribute to the solving of #2? And if no one does anything different, where is the world going to be 5, 10, 20 years from now? Where would the world be today if it wasn't for the actions of a few key individuals at key points in history?