No Dems, What is Occurring is NOT a Coup

It's the Electoral Consequences of the System We Have

I’m seeing more and more Democrats and liberals scream about how what is occurring is a coup. It seems to be something circulating through Dem messaging too as I see more reputable talking heads casually throw out the term, which is troublesome. Don’t believe me? Here’s left wing rag Pravda The Daily Worker “The Nation” talking about Elon Musk’s Coup.¹

Please stop. You sound utterly stupid calling what is going on a coup, because you demonstrate you genuinely have no sense what a coup is, other than that it is bad.

This kind of over-the-top, hyperbolic rhetoric is what continues to harm and damage the Democratic brand. The most zealous and alienating activists hear this and run with it. They let their minds and tongues go wild concocting all sorts of unnecessary and off-putting scenarios. This is the kind of thing that led to Trump winning election in the first place. But let’s start by stating the obvious first:

No, this is not a coup.

It’s the actual consequences of an election.

As if to make this even more clear to you, this is a coup:

This is NOT a coup:

One of the reasons I hate it when activists talk this way is because it makes it that much harder to believe when this kind of shit ACTUALLY DOES happen. There’s a huge “boy who called wolf” syndrome within Democratic messaging and it starts with mislabeling and misappropriating terms and definitions like this. Words have meaning. It’s important to stick with them lest they just become empty phrases and rhetoric.

Some Vocabulary Lessons

Although the concept of a “coup d’etat” (stroke of state) has been around since ancient times², the actual term did not really arise until around the French Revolution. As more populist uprisings in the American Colonies and the civil unrest of France grew, the idea that you could overthrow and usurp the powers of established monarchial government came along with it. As the French put King Louis and Marie Antoinette to the guillotine, and freed the political prisoners at the Bastille, the term found solid footing.

A coup d’etat is essentially, an illegitimate overthrow of existing government structure. The terms of the government and succession being previsously and expressly (or implicitly but very obviously) described, certain conditions arise that gives the masses an outright rejection of them. Through a mass fit of sorts, the people kick the old regime out in favor of something new. It needs to be stressed also that it is an illegal overthrow outside of the law; a prescribed transition, such as what happened after apartheid South Africa fell, or when the US pulled out of Afghanistan giving it to the Taliban, is not a coup. Coups start with the mass uprising of the people, lead to a level of anarchy as government rule collapses and results in a sudden and abrupt end, either with success and a new government, or a strongarm putdown usually resulting in mass executions. Quite often it turns bloody; prolonged coups are the equivalent of revolutions or even civil wars if they grind to a stalemate. According to Wikipedia, there were 457 coup attempts between 1950 and 2010, half of which were successful, mostly centering on underdeveloped nations. We haven’t seen a successful coup in a major nation since the Arab Spring³ or the Maidan protests in Ukraine.

Now, what happened on January 6th, 2021 could be described as a failed coup. Trump had lost the election and literally incited a riot in a vain attempt to try and overturn the results illegitimately. In fact, I for one had been in favor of calling it just that. But Democrats and the media preferred the term “insurrection” to describe the event. To be sure, it’s a less controversial term and softens the edges of what a coup is. Insurrections are by nature more like toddlers being beligerent, which describes Trump and those that took part in 1/6 pretty well. Coups are typically groundswells and much larger, broader. They are the results of outright treason against the established government. There are almost always severe consequences for the losers of a coup as well.

However, we live in a Constitutional form of government. It outlines how elections and successions and transitions are to occur. Last November, we had an election for the President (and House and Senate) and Trump won the Presidency, Republicans won the House and Senate. He won an outright majority of the vote as well, so there can be no question about a mandate. Everything he is doing right now, he SAID he was going to do, and the American voters voted for him anyway.⁴ People may not like it (I don’t— I find what he is doing repulsive and repugnant), but they are the natural consequences of what occurs following an election; the winner does what he said he would do.

Now some of you out there may be like “But what Trump is doing turning the reins over to Elon is a coup! We didn’t elect Elon to run the country!” To that I say, Elon actually has zero power in the American government, but for whatever power Trump chooses to delegate to him within the Executive Branch (all of Elon’s actions still have to be supported by Trump to be legitimate). He is currently doing everything with the expressed authority GRANTED to him by Trump. Elon is essentially acting in the same way as a policy czar typically does. It’s horrible, wrecking our executive branch and utterly self serving on Musk’s part, but Trump could kick him out at any time. He won’t because he’s as utterly corrupt as Elon is, but this is why you don’t elect crony capitalists to positions of power.

Some others of you out there would be like “But what if Trump decides we’re not going to have elections anymore? Would THAT be a coup?” In that case, I would say “It depends.” You see we do have this thing called a Constitution and a rule of law (as much as Trump has kind of shredded that last term, trust me, it still exists). Trump could propose an amendment outlawing elections, Congress and the states could approve it and there you go— a legitimated autocracy. In practical terms though, Congress and the states would never go for that (at least they shouldn’t). If he announced it, there would be a huge mass uprising of political opposition to it all across the country. Say what you will about Republicans, but ALL americans take pride in elections and their ability to change the course of political life if they get upset. If Trump actually tried to follow through on it, most Senators and Reps would impeach him out of fear of their own constituents. The only way this results in a coup is if Senators and Reps, outside of the legitimate authority granted to them by their constituents, supported Trump’s takeover of the government and rubber stamped it, or outright abolished Congress. That ain’t happening.

So before the more liberal readers of this substack go all hyperbolic in using the “c” word here, think again. It makes you sound crazy. It makes you sound outrageous and unhinged. This is the whole reason Trump won in the first place. Pick and choose your words (and your battles) more carefully.

Complain all you want about what they are doing. Make a point to demonstrate how it is seriously damaging standing in the US and the World. Describe in detail the consequences and damage it is causing to the American voter, economy and way of life. My congressman referred to Musk’s Treasury raid as “…abusing Americans most confidential and personal financial information…a breach of our privacy rights.” which I completely agree with.

Just don’t call it a coup.

PurpleAmerica’s Cultural Corner

This brings me to the second little beef I have with out of depth liberal activists right now. They are quickly, reflexively and immediately, comparing Trump to Hitler.⁵ This comparison doesn’t help. People hear that and immediately tune out everything that is said after it.

One of the muddled non-truths of recent years was that Hitler was elected. No he wasn’t. He just didn’t come to power in a coup; he was legitimately promoted and appointed. Voters actually REJECTED Hitler in national elections for President, twice. They instead elected the aged and growing feebler by the day, Paul Von Hindenburg⁶. And to demonstrate how much they didn’t vote for Hitler, Bavaria, the area Hitler claimed as his home, was the source of the greatest vote AGAINST Hitler and the Nazis.

The Nazi party grew in the elections of early 1932 winning more seats. What Hitler WAS good at was commanding his party to grind the government to a halt, stopping all legislation and dissolving that government to instead force new elections later that year. When another round of elections happened, Hitler lost AGAIN, by a BIGGER margin, and this time the Nazis lost seats showing people tiring of the crybaby loser.

What happened next was that to placate Hitler, Hindenburg and his political allies thought they could control him (or make him look bad) if they appointed him Chancellor (similar to Speaker of the House). After all, it’s easy to run against a villain, and Hitler would take all the blame for everything Parliament couldn’t get done. They had their reasons to believe this but a chain of events occured that greased the wheels to Hitler’s authoritarianism.

First off, Hitler tried getting an “enabling act” passed by the Reichstag. This is an act that means as it’s head, the Chancellor can dictate a law without a vote, and subsequent votes by the Reichstag are essentially to negate the Chancellor’s decree. This was shot down repeatedly by the Reichstag until the famous fire that Hitler used to get holdout parties (such as the Bavarian People’s Party) on board. The next day after that vote, he abolished those parties and subsumed them into the Nazi Party. The other event, was the death of Hindenburg. Hitler used that to merge the offices of the Presidency and Chancellor—through a decree made legal through the enabling act—and a dictatorship was born.

Nothing Hitler did in this was illegitimate, though they were shameless power grabs. It was all by legal means. It was the dumb actions taken by others to placate and not oppose him, that abdication of morality and responsibility, that ceding of their own obligations, that gave him his megalomaniacal and unquestioned rise to power. And the results of that are too horrific to count. One could make the argument that Republicans being doormats for Trump/MAGA is pretty close to what the Nazis did in Hitler’s rise to power, and to that I can see some resemblance. But I’m not there yet to call all Republicans outright Nazis, and I don’t think people saying it out loud does them any favors either. If you want Republicans and Republican leaners to see the error of their ways, equating them with one of the worst mass murdering regimes in history does not exactly win them over to your point of view.⁷

For more about these events, I highly recommend the recent book “Takeover” by Timothy Ryback. It really is a great insight into how a government can fall so far, so fast.

PurpleAmerica’s Obscure Fact of the Day

What is purported to be the bloodiest coup in history is the Khmer Rouge takeover in Cambodia during the 1970s. Led by Pol Pot, this radical communist regime aimed to create an agrarian utopia by forcibly emptying cities and subjecting the population to forced labor and executions. Over the course of their rule, it is estimated that nearly two million Cambodians lost their lives due to execution, forced labor, and famine.

PurpleAmerica’s Final Word on the Subject

Since Trump’s re-election is jokingly referred to as due to “the price of eggs” I suppose one could say that his re-election amounted to a “coop d’etat.”

See what I did there?

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Footnotes and Fun Stuff

1. Elon Musk is acting on the delegated authority of the President under Executive Order, something completely in his capacity to do. That Trump would give him this much authority is akin to incompetence demonstrated, but it is not a usurpation of power by any means.

2. Brutus and everyone stabbing Julius Caesar could outright be described as a coup.

3. I guess this depends on whether you consider Egypt a “major nation” but the massive support initially kicked off in Tunisia, which caused a coup in a span of 2 weeks, and that sparked coup attempts all across the Arab world, resulting in new governments in Eqypt and Libya, attempted coups that caused reforms in Jordan and some other states, and kicked off a bloody civil war in Syria that JUST recently ended.

4. I got into a squabble with someone on Reddit about this, when they responded “Not all Americans voted for Trump or this to happen!” *Sigh*, no, you’re right. But a MAJORITY did, and that’s how elections work. As grown ups, we don’t always get everything we want in life. Cry somewhere else anonymous redditor.

5. I’m intentionally leaving Musk off this part; he genuinely seems to be trolling in Nazi tropes.

6. When I think of Joe Biden running for re-election in 2024, I think of Hindenburg.

7. I want to differentiate here actual neo-Nazis who have swarmed to the GOP like moths to a flame, and general Republican voters who think they are supporting less government and lower taxes. During the 80s and 90s, Republican leaders made it a specific point to shame neo-Nazis and work their best to kick them out of the party. Since Trump, however, he has made common cause and considers them allies to an extent. In that regard, the Republican Party is much more Nazi adjacent than it has been in the past, but to the 10-15% of voters who determine elections, they don’t see the GOP that way. Grouping them in with the worst of the worst is the wrong way to approach electoral politics.