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No, but the opposition that the left once fronted to the NSA's surveillance has withered in the past ten years or so and (some) republicans have picked up the s

No, but the opposition that the left once fronted to the NSA's surveillance has withered in the past ten years or so and (some) republicans have picked up the slack. Not too long ago the "war on terror" was considered to be the road to authoritarianism, now democrats are openly championing making it a new domestic war on terror. To those who opposed the war on terror from the beginning it's scary how quickly this opposition was abandoned by some once they could be the ones to wield it.

acdw 4y ago
I'm really bothered by the way you casually conflate an actual war in the middle east---the longest war in American history, by the way---with a metaphorical war on domestic violent extremism and neonazism. these are two very different things.
- anshorei 4y ago
  I used quotes to indicate I'm not talking about the war itself but about the surveillance state established in the aftermath of 9/11 (and shenanigans such as the pushing of mentally ill people into acts of terrorism they would never have committed without interference), which is the clear parallel politicians themselves want to draw when they say "war on domestic terror" (unless you believe they want to start another civil war by deploying troops in the states). Same as one would with "war on drugs".
michaelmrose 4y ago
- philippejara 4y ago
  Democracy isn't a king of the hill match, if some loonies managed to take over the capitol they'd just get siege'd out. How do you honestly think this would go? they take the capitol and trump shows up and says "im the president for another term" then everyone goes home and ignores the corpse of Mike Pence?
  - dane-pgp 4y ago
    > How do you honestly think this would go? They destroy the certifications of the electoral votes from the states (as almost happened[0]), causing various states to (disingenuously) disagree about how to replace the lost documents. Enough FUD (and lawsuits, and delays) would be generated during this period of public disorientation that the Republican party could exploit the ambiguity of the Constitutional phrase "a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed"[1] and trigger the contingent election procedure described in the Twelfth Amendment.[2] Since a majority of states at the time had Republican representation, they would have elected Trump and the Democrats would have not been able to stop them, even if Trump did eventually let them back into the Capitol. [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/senate-aides-rescued-electoral-votes-before-congress-evacuated-capitol-2021-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/senate-aides-rescued-elector... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_Count_Act#Majority_of_electors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_Count_Act#Majority_o... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election
    - sidewndr46 4y ago
      If the US is so fragile that a box of paper is somehow key to the stability of an entire empire, we're pretty much doomed. Also your statement that "Since a majority of states at the time had Republican representation, they would have elected Trump" is laughable. It's well known that Trump asked multiple Republican governors to "find some votes" and they obviously did not do this. Even if someone is a demagogue that doesn't make them willing to commit a career ending felony. After all, being a demagogue got them a long way. Not by falsifying election documents.
      - nobody9999 4y ago
        >Also your statement that "Since a majority of states at the time had Republican representation, they would have elected Trump" is laughable. Actually, it's not. The way this works (I really hope you're not an American, because if you are you really should know this) is that if the counting of electoral votes is sufficiently disputed (in this counterfactual case, the vote certificates were destroyed), deciding the outcome of the election rests with the US House of Representatives. If that were (and it has, several times in US history), to happen the members of the House would vote (on a state by state basis, not each representative voting individually) on who was to be the President. Since a majority (26 or 27 out of 50, IIRC) of states have Republican majorities in the number of House members, a House vote would likely have gone Trump's way[0]. This is something of a peccadillo of the US Presidential electoral system that probably should be reformed[1], but it currently is the law of the land. [0] Which is why it was so important (at least for the Trumpists) for the proceedings to be disrupted. It was the final opportunity for them to overturn the clearly expressed will of the people. [1] Because regardless of which party's state cohorts have a majority, that's a supremely undemocratic way to choose the winner and is a relic of the state of the states (as essentially separate nations banding together for defense) in the late 18th century. Edit: Fixed typo.
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  If you think a plot to kill a governor is somehow destabilizing to the United States, you should probably read about Rod Blagojevich. The guy tried to sell a US senate seat. Corruption has a much farther reaching effect than any single assassination.
- soundnote 4y ago
  Coups need weapons, you know. Preferably tons of them, and generally involve fun activities like killing or summarily imprisoning your political opponents. Somehow a huge swarm of a generally armed demographic left their guns at home when attempting a 'coup'. Or maybe they just went to protest what they thought to be a wrongful state of affairs, and the situation devolved into a riot. Who knows. Maybe you can pull off a coup against the United States with selfie sticks instead of F15s.
  - michaelmrose 4y ago
    https://www.dictionary.com/browse/coup-d-etat https://www.dictionary.com/browse/coup-d-etat > a sudden and decisive action in politics, especially one resulting in a change of government illegally or by force. It is an attempted coup to ask election officials,courts, and then lawmakers to toss out legitimate ballots or wholesale discard or modify results in order to change the outcome of an election and then attempt to intimidate lawmakers with a show of force and violence intended to convince them in the presidents own words to "show some strength" by which it is meant illegally discard democracy in favor of fascism. This statement by you reads like an apologist for a rapist disregarding allegations by virtue of re-defining rape to mean a stranger dragging a poor misdirected maid into the bushes. It also reeks of a peculiar strategy that suggests we dismiss the actual by virtue of how little sense the strategy makes in the cold light of day. To this day I refer to this as the Connie defense in honor of an erstwhile house guest who while living in my home stole and then explained when caught that she wouldn't possibly have done that because it would be such an extreme disadvantage to do so for such a small gain. Indeed it was and I don't logically need to explicate her stupidity in order to allow the evidence of my own eyes to trivially convict her and put her out of my house like Fred Flinstone's cat. The same women got a vehicle towed because she was speeding down the highway, while smoking a joint, and driving without a license. I doubt the Connie defense availed her then either. We all saw the attempted coup on TV. Personally I watched it in real time on multiple monitors showing the news cameras view on one side and the insurrectionists on the other side. I saw months of blatant lies followed by a plea directly issued by the president to intimidate lawmakers and an organized if badly organized attempt to intimidate lawmakers. It happened. There was no stolen election and indeed only one side was working double time to steal it for Donald Trump.

acdw 4y ago

I'm really bothered by the way you casually conflate an actual war in the middle east---the longest war in American history, by the way---with a metaphorical war on domestic violent extremism and neonazism. these are two very different things.

anshorei 4y ago
I used quotes to indicate I'm not talking about the war itself but about the surveillance state established in the aftermath of 9/11 (and shenanigans such as the pushing of mentally ill people into acts of terrorism they would never have committed without interference), which is the clear parallel politicians themselves want to draw when they say "war on domestic terror" (unless you believe they want to start another civil war by deploying troops in the states). Same as one would with "war on drugs".

michaelmrose 4y ago

philippejara 4y ago
Democracy isn't a king of the hill match, if some loonies managed to take over the capitol they'd just get siege'd out. How do you honestly think this would go? they take the capitol and trump shows up and says "im the president for another term" then everyone goes home and ignores the corpse of Mike Pence?
- dane-pgp 4y ago
  > How do you honestly think this would go? They destroy the certifications of the electoral votes from the states (as almost happened[0]), causing various states to (disingenuously) disagree about how to replace the lost documents. Enough FUD (and lawsuits, and delays) would be generated during this period of public disorientation that the Republican party could exploit the ambiguity of the Constitutional phrase "a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed"[1] and trigger the contingent election procedure described in the Twelfth Amendment.[2] Since a majority of states at the time had Republican representation, they would have elected Trump and the Democrats would have not been able to stop them, even if Trump did eventually let them back into the Capitol. [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/senate-aides-rescued-electoral-votes-before-congress-evacuated-capitol-2021-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/senate-aides-rescued-elector... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_Count_Act#Majority_of_electors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_Count_Act#Majority_o... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election
  - sidewndr46 4y ago
    If the US is so fragile that a box of paper is somehow key to the stability of an entire empire, we're pretty much doomed. Also your statement that "Since a majority of states at the time had Republican representation, they would have elected Trump" is laughable. It's well known that Trump asked multiple Republican governors to "find some votes" and they obviously did not do this. Even if someone is a demagogue that doesn't make them willing to commit a career ending felony. After all, being a demagogue got them a long way. Not by falsifying election documents.
    - nobody9999 4y ago
      >Also your statement that "Since a majority of states at the time had Republican representation, they would have elected Trump" is laughable. Actually, it's not. The way this works (I really hope you're not an American, because if you are you really should know this) is that if the counting of electoral votes is sufficiently disputed (in this counterfactual case, the vote certificates were destroyed), deciding the outcome of the election rests with the US House of Representatives. If that were (and it has, several times in US history), to happen the members of the House would vote (on a state by state basis, not each representative voting individually) on who was to be the President. Since a majority (26 or 27 out of 50, IIRC) of states have Republican majorities in the number of House members, a House vote would likely have gone Trump's way[0]. This is something of a peccadillo of the US Presidential electoral system that probably should be reformed[1], but it currently is the law of the land. [0] Which is why it was so important (at least for the Trumpists) for the proceedings to be disrupted. It was the final opportunity for them to overturn the clearly expressed will of the people. [1] Because regardless of which party's state cohorts have a majority, that's a supremely undemocratic way to choose the winner and is a relic of the state of the states (as essentially separate nations banding together for defense) in the late 18th century. Edit: Fixed typo.
sidewndr46 4y ago
If you think a plot to kill a governor is somehow destabilizing to the United States, you should probably read about Rod Blagojevich. The guy tried to sell a US senate seat. Corruption has a much farther reaching effect than any single assassination.
soundnote 4y ago
Coups need weapons, you know. Preferably tons of them, and generally involve fun activities like killing or summarily imprisoning your political opponents. Somehow a huge swarm of a generally armed demographic left their guns at home when attempting a 'coup'. Or maybe they just went to protest what they thought to be a wrongful state of affairs, and the situation devolved into a riot. Who knows. Maybe you can pull off a coup against the United States with selfie sticks instead of F15s.
- michaelmrose 4y ago
  https://www.dictionary.com/browse/coup-d-etat https://www.dictionary.com/browse/coup-d-etat > a sudden and decisive action in politics, especially one resulting in a change of government illegally or by force. It is an attempted coup to ask election officials,courts, and then lawmakers to toss out legitimate ballots or wholesale discard or modify results in order to change the outcome of an election and then attempt to intimidate lawmakers with a show of force and violence intended to convince them in the presidents own words to "show some strength" by which it is meant illegally discard democracy in favor of fascism. This statement by you reads like an apologist for a rapist disregarding allegations by virtue of re-defining rape to mean a stranger dragging a poor misdirected maid into the bushes. It also reeks of a peculiar strategy that suggests we dismiss the actual by virtue of how little sense the strategy makes in the cold light of day. To this day I refer to this as the Connie defense in honor of an erstwhile house guest who while living in my home stole and then explained when caught that she wouldn't possibly have done that because it would be such an extreme disadvantage to do so for such a small gain. Indeed it was and I don't logically need to explicate her stupidity in order to allow the evidence of my own eyes to trivially convict her and put her out of my house like Fred Flinstone's cat. The same women got a vehicle towed because she was speeding down the highway, while smoking a joint, and driving without a license. I doubt the Connie defense availed her then either. We all saw the attempted coup on TV. Personally I watched it in real time on multiple monitors showing the news cameras view on one side and the insurrectionists on the other side. I saw months of blatant lies followed by a plea directly issued by the president to intimidate lawmakers and an organized if badly organized attempt to intimidate lawmakers. It happened. There was no stolen election and indeed only one side was working double time to steal it for Donald Trump.