Stop trivializing the term “coup”. It’s a real thing the US government really inflicts on other countries in a way that actually does topple governments and cause immense destruction. You cannot take over the US government with a small squadron of wingnuts. That’s not a thing.
A coup attempt doesn’t have to be successful for that term to be legitimate, but it does have to have some possibility of success. Trump has no more likelihood of being in office after January 20th than I do; he’s got nothing resembling the kind of support from the military, political establishment, oligarchs and other backing he’d need to accomplish such a thing.
I hereby declare the US election invalid and I, Caitlin Johnstone, am the new President of the United States.
Have I just instituted a “coup”? Or does my complete inability to put such a claim into effect make the use of that term silly?
And now Trump has conceded. My what a funny looking coup.
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It’s very telling how fast the plutocratic media have been to use the word “coup” to describe some idiots interrupting congress for a few hours, since they bend over backwards to avoid using it when their government enacts blatant coups of infinitely greater destructiveness.
Here are some of the headlines from when the US-backed coup in Bolivia was taking place:
“Bolivian President Evo Morales steps down following accusations of election fraud” proclaims CNN.
“Bolivia’s Morales resigns amid scathing election report, rising protests” reportsThe Washington Post.
“Bolivian Leader Evo Morales Steps Down” says The New York Times.
“Bolivian President Evo Morales resigns amid fraud poll protests” declares the BBC.
“President of Bolivia steps down amid allegations of election rigging” we are informed by Telegraph.
“Bolivia’s President Morales resigns after backlash to disputed election” says the Sydney Morning Herald.
In reality Morales was forced from office by the military after winning a legitimate election, which is exactly the thing that a coup is. This has never been anywhere remotely close to a possible outcome for Trump, but since it doesn’t interfere with imperialist agendas they’re allowed to use it.
America routinely CAUSES what we're seeing today. https://t.co/nFHwr0ZBem
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) January 6, 2021
Narrative managers have been falling all over themselves to tell us that conspiracy theories on the internet are going to get everyone killed. They want conspiracy theories censored, especially the ones about how the government murders people around the world and lies about it. FYI your government is many orders of magnitude more dangerous, deceitful and deadly than even the craziest conspiracy theories.
Also, nobody who spent years saying the highest levels of the US government had been taken over by Russia has any business bitching about conspiracy theories.
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Modern liberalism is just QAnon for people with diplomas on their walls.
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The left is always the real target of pushes for more censorship and surveillance. They’re not worried about rightists, who support most of what the establishment wants and who can be manipulated into compliance with a simple 8chan psyop. They’re worried about the faction that wants to dismantle the oligarchic empire.
Rightist wingnuts are always used to justify policies that are designed to neuter the left. That’s why any leftist who’s cheered internet censorship for the wingnuts has been applying their own muzzle on behalf of the authoritarians. Many still don’t realize this.
Look at them, staring around like slack-jawed tourists while staying between the ropes. They have no idea they're being used to institute new FBI ops and pass a bunch of authoritarian laws. https://t.co/EFQff0gxPH
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) January 6, 2021
Sometimes things happen that make people frightened and angry, and there’s a major push (always spearheaded by the plutocratic media) for more authoritarian government control to shut down the bad guys. You can choose to get swept up in that frenzy. Or you can choose not to.
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Just so we’re clear, the policing lesson of the Capitol Hill riots was not that cops should have been more brutal with the Trumpers, it was that they should have been much more restrained during the BLM protests but chose not to be. Don’t let them troll you into cheering for police brutality.
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None of Trump’s post-election shenanigans rank anywhere near the top ten worst things he’s done while president. Mass media coverage hasn’t reflected this fact because they regard imperialist warmongering as normal presidential stuff and don’t regard its victims as human.
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It will never stop being hilarious when Americans rend their garments about the death of a “democracy” that does not exist.
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Americans finally discover they can storm the Capitol to demand what they want, and they do it to defend a corrupt plutocrat.
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Americans think only about America while their rulers think only about conquering the rest of the world.
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What’s it going to take to get American progressives to understand that the Democratic Party is explicitly and deliberately rigged against progress? It’s simply not the tool for advancing progressive agendas. It’s like watching a kid try to open a can of beans using a sneaker.
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FYI you don’t actually need to keep begging for the permission of condescending gatekeepers to push progressive agendas; you can just do it. They’re not the left’s supervisors, they’re just people who speak in a forceful and assertive tone. You are the left.
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You’re trained to see one mainstream political faction with all its politicians, pundits and rank-and-file members versus the other faction with all its politicians, pundits and rank-and-file members. Really it’s the politicians and pundits of both factions versus everyone else.
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While the poor have been inundated with religions glorifying poverty, meekness and obedience, the rich have been circulating their own private doctrines among themselves about why it’s fine for them to have so much while everyone else has so little. They have their own religions.
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Feel free to reject anything at all about your society, your culture, or any traditional relic at all. Our species is now staring down the barrel as a result of everything we’ve done up to this point. The old ways have failed. They are demonstrably bad. Try something new.
Unless we make drastic changes, and make them approximately now, we will likely go extinct due to climate chaos or nuclear war. Everything that brought us to this point has failed as spectacularly as anything can fail. Don’t cling to the old ways. Bring in the unprecedented.
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Trust is a very simple thing: you can trust people to act out the behavior patterns they normally act out. Behavior patterns are generally pretty trustworthy. You can trust nurturing people to do nurturing things, and you can trust destructive people to do destructive things. As long as you’re trusting someone to do what they normally do instead of what they don’t normally do, your trust will probably be well-placed.
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We’re so far from justice that even the table scraps of “You’re too crazy to extradite” are welcomed. You want justice? Free Assange, shower him with awards and compensation, and lock up everyone who helped persecute him. That would be justice. Then you’d be getting somewhere.
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We fight on.
Sometimes it knocks the wind out of us.
Sometimes it knocks us down.
And we lie there and blink a minute.
Just lie there.
And then, after a bit, the air begins sucking back into our lungs.
And the strength returns to our limbs.
And we get up.
And we fight on.
_____________________
Thanks for reading! The best way to get around the internet censors and make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for at my website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking me on Facebook, following my antics on Twitter, throwing some money into my tip jar on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of my sweet merchandise, buying my new book Poems For Rebels or my old book Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I’m trying to do with this platform, click here. Everyone, racist platforms excluded, has my permission to republish, use or translate any part of this work (or anything else I’ve written) in any way they like free of charge.
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90 responses to “Stop Trivializing The Term ‘Coup’: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix”
Dear Caitlynnme: (I allwasy spellyour name wronge. 😉 Keep it coming. Your facts and info is trustable and so helpfull even when I disagree sometimes with your extremist compassionate ranting interpretation of the facts. RE: “STOP TRIVILAZING THE TERM ‘COUP’” Would you like me to show you a video of how I can open a can of beans with a sneaker, just to prove you wrong just once? Just ask. Caitlin Johnstone for president. I second the motion. (spelt your name right ) i had to stop patreoning small $ due to problems with untrustable Patreon and Visa. I’d rather snail-mail you contributions to a post =box. Keep on rocking us babe.
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Dear Caitlin,
Alas, you’re “broad-brushing” it again. If “Americans only think about America,” Aussies, too, only think about America in their complicity to extradite their own countryman to America. WHERE is the collective outcry?! If I were Assange I would disown the country that utterly forsook me in my time of need.
Sincerely,
horror/thriller author S.A. Hogan
These MAGAs are our fellow citizens. They are not the bogeymen under the bed who have come to put us in camps or ovens, for pity’s sake. Their grievances are real, and they are by and large the same as ours, and they are not all as politically naïve as some seem to think. You can’t say you didn’t enjoy the spectacle of them making our sell-out pols scurrying for safety like scared rats. Are you enjoying the nonstop puke from the CIA assets embedded in the media, banging on endlessly about the profaning of the sacred temple of freedom?
There is not going to be a leftist uprising. The momentum and the power were never on that side, not in a country so materialistic, with so little sense of community and collective responsibility. This is all we have to work with and we need to make the most of it. The stakes are the survival of humanity and of the ecosystem itself, which will always be in peril while the empire stands in its present configuration. No one can stop what’s coming and no one can control its outcome. Humans don’t generally do anything the reasonable, nonviolent way. This is human nature. Those of us leftovers from the Sixties learned long ago you cannot change it, and you cannot refuse to play the game the way it’s laid out because the rules offend your oh-so-delicate sensibilities.
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The murder of President Kennedy was a real coup. Bob Dylan has it right in his song”Murder Most Foul”. No President since has tried to curb the oligarchs’ power. They know better. It’s time for change.
The dude with the war paint, horns p, and tattoos is actor Jake Angeli …
Let’s all pay attention and see if he gets into any legal troubles as a result of his performance the other day.
Jake Angeli (stage name) has been arrested and charged according to numerous sources.
This is worth paying attention to … I think.
Coups inside of coups. The global globalists won. The Reset, which has been sporadically trickling in, will now come as a stream and then a flood. From techno tyranny to transhumanism. And death, of course. Lots of death.
Why bother writing comments? Sounds like you’ve given up. Or trying to convince people to give up.
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I. HAVE. NOT.
“You’re trained to see one mainstream political faction with all its politicians, pundits and rank-and-file members versus the other faction with all its politicians, pundits and rank-and-file members. Really it’s the politicians and pundits of both factions versus everyone else.”
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It is what the MSM does best; isolate every story/crime/issue, so it stands alone, unrelated to all the other deep state criminality, and break it down to specific facets so they can create arguments based on party affiliation, race, gender etc. Keeping people divided and isolated in their news bubbles.
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Interesting article at Waking Times today. Apparently some MAGA supporters and BLM supporters came together to protest a proposed NY bill forcing people to get the Covid vaccine.
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I realize there are many people who think this, virtually untested, vaccine is fine. They are absolutely free to get it. Just don’t make me take it. It takes years for vaccines to go through phase II and phase III trials. This one did not go through those trials before being approved.
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In any case here’s a ray of hope that people, who have been conditioned by the media, for years, to hate each other, can put aside their differences aside and work towards solving a common problem.
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https://www.wakingtimes.com/blm-and-maga-come-together-to-oppose-forced-vaccination-bill-in-new-york/
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“New York — Last month, Assemblymember Linda Rosenthal — who is not a doctor, nor a scientist and holds only a bachelor’s degree in history — proposed a massively controversial bill that would mandate the COVID-19 vaccination for New Yorkers. Naturally, she is being met with resistance.”
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“Black Lives Matter and MAGA supporters reportedly threw their differences to the wayside to come together in protest of Bill No. A1179. The event organizer, Cara Castronuova, documented the protest on her Facebook page.”
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“Showing that two groups who are told to hate each other can overcome their differences for a common cause, there was no tension at all and the group successfully made their point.
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“The day went beautifully. The energy was spectacular. Only love and respect. Two different groups that have been painted as enemies coming together for a common cause. I am hoping this sparks something that keeps growing in a positive direction. I am hopeful about 2021.”
“Showing that two groups who are told to hate each other can overcome their differences for a common cause, there was no tension at all and the group successfully made their point.”
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Just wanted to emphasize that sentence.
Not sure how I feel about the hurried Covid vaccine(s), especially in light of RFK Jr.’s work in the area of vaccines in general, but thank you, Shocker, for this little ray of light. May it indeed spread its hope and promise into the New Year.
I am familiar with JFK Jr.’s work, but I would never consider myself an “anti-vaxer.” Although, apparently, if you question anything you get smeared with a label. His work on vaccine safety is probably what made start start asking questions about vaccines. That, and a complete lack of meaningful, regulation and oversight over the pharmaceutical industry and the FDA that they control.
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The unthinkable idea that BLM and Maga could somehow find some common ground did make me happy, though.
Those people that you’re talking about who do that, act just like narcissistists, maybe they are and maybe they aren’t, but if that’s what they are they’ll never be phased by anything we say, but to use our own words against us later on. These aren’t real people, some sort of disease is in complete control of them. They act like pathogens because some pathogen is in control of them.
Caitlin, you are a blessing.
I read your writing critically expecting to find you getting sloppy with your points for the sake of many a good article and all I find is reason and ideas worth consideration. What’s your angle?
Link when I was reading Greewald’s latest piece and he is saying that even though Trumps behavior is completely indefensible …
From the beginning Trump was and outsider. He was saying thats that werent supposed to be said and in ways that they werent supposed to be said. And the demos and much of the rebups decided they were going to ham-string this kook. But in their efforts to undermine him (soft coup) they revealed themselves as corrupt and reveal thier complete contemp for the will of the people. There is tyranny and facism but it’s not coming from Trump. And he helped to reveal that fact. He has some money, but I think he managed to make it through without using his term to enrich himself and his family. We are owned by the wealthy but Trump would be a minor player in that game – I think it is not fair to qualify him as a plutocrat.
Trump felt that the election was questionable and there seem to be good reason to claim this and is something that should be discussed. He felt that his supporters (and the public in general) should make a fuss about the election results to make it difficult for the powers that be to simply over-look the issues. It did not work out and in some ways it went a little too far – though that would be the idea. I was just watching a some years old video by Chris Hedges (talking at New School) where he is discussing the changes that Bush made to election laws that make it impossible to assure the integrity of the vote. They would like people to be channel into there two allowed channels – red/blue – rather than to consider that they are being screwed by both sides.
People need to stop following the latest gossip and look at the big picture – where are we going?
Religions were not tried and found lacking, they were found less immediately gratifying and left untried. I think the proletariat mostly want to be like the ruling class; the hypocrisy and materialism trickle down.
An actual coup attempt has been ongoing since the day of the election last November. Technically, it is called an auto-coup, and it consists of Trump’s refusal to accept the legitimacy of the election result. He has rallied tens of millions of supporters-including over one hundred members of Congress-who fervently believe that he should remain in office, elections be damned. Many of them are heavily armed and itching for a fight. Of course, this auto-coup will fail, but the mere fact that a sitting President would attempt it and have the fanatical backing of so many millions of people is cause for worry regarding the health of what’s left of America’s democracy. We are in a staring contest with fascism.
“I hereby declare the US election invalid and I, Caitlin Johnstone, am the new President of the United States. Have I just instituted a ‘coup’?”
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No, you haven’t instituted a coup. But what you do have is more legitimacy to be the President of the United States than the confused fossilized career grifter that will soon be warming that chair until Her Woke Highness slithers herself into that seat. I’d bet a good sum that you would do a far better job in The Big Chair than those sellouts.
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“It will never stop being hilarious when Americans rend their garments about the death of a ‘democracy’ that does not exist.”
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But we all must PRETEND that it does exist. In fact, just about everything we are told to do and believe these days requires us to PRETEND that these things are true because in fact most of these are empty lies and falsehoods. But if we all PRETEND that these things are true, that MAKES them true!… according to those who peddled the lies in the first place. And for us to say that lies are lies? They’ll respond… that a LIE!
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“While the poor have been inundated with religions glorifying poverty, meekness and obedience, the rich have been circulating their own private doctrines among themselves about why it’s fine for them to have so much.. They have their own religions.”
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The Rich also have their own master-planned community. It’s very, very hot down there. Also, very, very cold as well in certain designated places according to Dante. The Rich sell off their integrity and ethics to buy a ticket to this Really Hot Place that they will spend Eternity in. Hope They feel they got Their money’s worth when the temperature begins to rise.
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OK, maybe not all rich people. Just ALMOST all of them. Corrected just for the “Fact? Checkers?”.
On the topic of freedom of thought, this article will assist if you are having issues with understanding what the hell is going on. It’s long but every word is gold.
https://consortiumnews.com/2021/01/07/the-consequences-of-moving-from-industrial-to-financial-capitalism/?unapproved=411544&moderation-hash=f65363a0b9e1d6e10cea1f01ec1f7065#comment-411544
Link to the videos that indicate agents provacateurs were behind the capitol intrusion:
https://www.thecommunityforum.life/post/cold-blooded-murder-graphic-warning-with-crisis-actors-agents-provocateurs-11352932?pid=1322188886
WWG1WGA
To the White House next?
Sorry, Caitlin, but this time I disagree with you. Glenn Greenwald has come out with the same denial and I am disappointed in him for doing so. The Democrats are anxious to play the events of 6 January down as much as they can, but it was real. The right-wing wackos had been planning on the Internet for weeks but the police did nothing. The right-wing forces in the police and military deliberately stood down until Mike Pence called in the National Guard. They were incited not just by Trumps speech on 6 January, but by his incitement to violence beginning in his presidential campaign and continuing throughout his entire term in office. One could say that Trump “groomed” them, just the way perverts “groom” their intended underage prey. Five people died. It could have been much worse.
Hitler’s “Beer Hall Putsch” didn’t amount to much, but a few years later Hindenberg appointed Hitler chancellor and the failed Bavarian artist had his followers already primed and ready.
Sorry Carolyn, I disagree with you. Your rationales make no sense.
So many Democrats are not playing this down — they are saying what a fantastically terrible thing it is (anyone who says it was a coup or an insurrection is being bombastic). How do you know only the right-wing police and military forces stood down? I’ve never heard the idea that police or military have right-wing and left-wing factions. That sounds nutty — do they have separate commanders? If Trump is a fascist, why didn’t he take control in 2020 with the pandemic or BLM protests? A fascist dictator would seize those opportunities, especially at the end of his term.
If it makes you feel better, David Frum and Bill Kristol agree with you. They also called out Greenwald for “playing it down” and they did the same after 911 to anyone that tried to keep a cool head and not support full totalitarianism overnight. There’s already a new crime bill ready to go, using this as a pretext, that even expands the death penalty among other already abusive powers.
So today some of my neighbors feel pity for Mr. Donald Trump. One of them said he hopes Mr. Trump is wise enough to leave this country because after January 20, 2021 the sharks will be everywhere hunting for his blood. The election is over; but I fear that the ” blood will be flowing in the streets of the USA ” for many, many years after.
Trump may or may not have hidden reserves of wisdom, but Scotland at least seems to have enough not to want him. COVID, naturally:
Rumored Trump Trip to Scottish Golf Course Ruled Out of Bounds
Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, has shot down a supposed plan for the president to pass the Biden inauguration at his Turnberry links.
LONDON — President Trump has not said where he plans to go after leaving the White House on Jan. 20. But the leader of Scotland made clear on Tuesday that Mr. Trump is not welcome in her country.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/05/world/europe/trump-scotland-golf-course.html
Gruesome thought. There certainly are historical precedents. In my lifetime. They tracked Nicaragua’s exiled Somoza down – – in gruesome fashion. They described it as “tyrannicide”
Thanks, Caitlin. Why bother to use words accurately (“coup”, “treason”, “traitor”, “fascist”, “socialist”, ad nauseam, when you can just make up your own meanings? Humpty Dumpty would be so pleased.
I’d like to see anyone use those words – loosely, accurately, or idiolectally – without being challenged. Caitlin at least attempts to spell out how she is using them.
You should check this out: https://www.aclu.org/cases/mediajustice-et-al-v-federal-bureau-investigation-et-al
i’ll paste some highlights:
“Intelligence Assessment that asserts, without evidence, that a group of so-called “Black Identity Extremists” poses a threat of domestic terrorism…. based on anti-Black stereotypes and First Amendment protected activities.”
FBI’s targeting of Black people for surveillance, investigation, and prosecution based on unsupported allegations about a fictitious group of so-called “Black Identity Extremists.”
“The Intelligence Assessment asserts, without evidence and based on flawed logic, that six isolated incidents of violence against police officers by Black people purportedly demonstrate the existence of a shared ideology motivating violence against law enforcement. It wrongly groups together Black people who, in the FBI’s own words, “perceive[ ] racism and injustice in American society” and have beliefs about “Black identity.”
FBI’s creation of a “Black Identity Extremist” threat label is the latest example in a sordid history of efforts to harass, discredit, and disrupt Black activists who advocate against white supremacy and racial injustice.
FBI’s focus on First Amendment protected beliefs, activity, and associations in determining who is a so-called “Black Identity Extremist,” including through social media surveillance.
Thanks Michael, Why talk respectfully, and attempt to explain or point out what you mean so we can all figure this out together when you can just make broad insinuations and leave a smear on good intentions. Is this some form of Israeli superiority complex?
Everything is staged or digitally changed. Its all turning into one big psyop. Stop watching the news. Stop acting concerned. Turn your back on the whole thing and do your bestt o get on with your life the best you can. You will have less stress and be far happier. Besides, you wont make any difference by your anxiety over it.
Is your comment staged, or digitally changed?
Both.
It appears to me that too many people are unable to do basic arithmetic: 74 million votes for Trump plus 81 million votes for Biden gives us 155 million votes total. But there were only 153 million registered voters just two years ago, so that’s 101% voter turn-out. And then 160 million are said to have voted, so that’s 104.5% turn-out! Compare that to 55.7% turn-out in the 2016 election.
I believe that the MSM are precisely what Caitlin says they are. BUT, before I believe your own numbers you will have to deconstruct this:
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/04/2020-election-sees-record-high-turnout-with-at-least-159point8-million-votes-projected.html
There is no way to make the numbers make any sense. Since 2016 the US population grew by just under 8 million. Optimistically assuming half of them became eligible to vote; that would add 4 million to the rolls. Optimistically assuming all of them actually registered to vote, that would only make 157 million. Accept the reported stunning voter turn-out number for 2020 of 66.7%. That’s just under 105 million votes total—nowhere near then 160 million number that has been reported. If Trump got 74 million votes, as reported, then just 31 million votes would be the theoretical maximum for Biden—less then half as many as for Trump.
According to Pew research, “Overall, 245.5 million Americans were ages 18 and older in November 2016, about 157.6 million of whom reported being registered to vote.’ So if more of those eligible registered to vote and voted, as many reported to be the case, might that account for this supposed discrepancy?
Semantics. Nothing new. New or old power factions taking the reins of power. Son killing the old king, killing of caesar, toppling of kings, now removal of presidents or other national leaders. You act like what the US does is something new or especially evil. It is not. Just plain old power politics.
Of course there was no coup attempt. The clowns who got into the Capital building were not a militia nor anything like. But those clowns have inflicted a perhaps mortal wound on Trump. Democrats and Liberals will push this as hard and as far as they can and bleed it for every little bit of harm and damage they can do to Trump.
The election was definitely stolen. The entire US and Western Neoliberal Establishment is behind it and the evidence will never be presented to a court. They want Trump out and Biden/Harris and the Globalist Reset in. It’s as simple as that. Trump is a casualty of the Globalist war against populism. So are we all.
I am curious what the MSM will talk about after Trump is gone. Aftercall he was a ratings bonanza.
Conspiracy theorists, no-vaxxers, Assad apologists, useful Putin idiots, Chinese apologists, Iranian hackers, challenges to LGBTQ* movements, resistance to the Great Reset, resistance to the Green New Deal … the glories of the Kabala Harris administration, you get the idea, K.
Best take on what happened the other night and the current state of American society: “Americans finally discover they can storm the Capitol to demand what they want, and they do it to defend a corrupt plutocrat.”
Best take (and advice) on the bigger problem confronting not only America but the world: “Unless we make drastic changes, and make them approximately now, we will likely go extinct due to climate chaos or nuclear war. Everything that brought us to this point has failed as spectacularly as anything can fail. Don’t cling to the old ways. Bring in the unprecedented.”
This in turn takes us to our two pressing dilemmas: (1) what “the unprecedented” should look like, and (2) how to bring it in ASAP. Talk about anything else is wasted breath, and yet we talk endlessly about anything BUT them. Have we nothing even remotely specific to say about a better, more beautiful world? Have we nothing even theoretically possible to suggest about how to get there?
People have plenty to say about a better world and how to get there. The problem is that nobody’s listening.
Who, Anarcissie, has spelled out in any definite detail, any comprehensive scope, how something like an an eco-socialist system would actually operate–how it would produce and distribute goods and services, how it would provide for personal incentive and social cohesion, how work would be coordinated with other work so that a common worthy goals are pursued, how and when and by whom political and social decisions would be made, etc. And if there are such visionary theorists among us that I’ve missed, who among them have have laid out even a sketchy series of concrete, doable steps to now take us in that direction–other than the possible formation of a third party comprised of the tiny minority on the far left side of things, people like you and me? I’m not talking about M4All or a higher minimum wage or forgiveness of student loans or a Green New Deal or other incremental reforms. I’ve talking about the laying out of a compelling vision of a radically egalitarian social order for our 21st Century, similar in breadth and depth and impact to what Edward Bellamy painstakingly laid out in the late 19th. Clue me in on these substantive, bold, and creative thinkers who have so far escaped my search, and I’ll be forever grateful and dive into their work without a moment’s hesitation.
I share your desire, and your despair, for want of a better word for this wondering how to get where few even seem interested in going, when we ourselves aren’t sure where it is.
The following magazine offers a chuck-full of suggestions:https://zcomm.org/author/malbert/
See especially the writings of Michael Albert.
Thanks, ZN, I’ll check out the links. But I’m looking for a hell of lot more than leftist commentary about how fucked up everything is or how this or that proposal is good or bad or too little, too late. I’m looking for genuine constructive, creative, systematic thinking about concrete alternatives to neoliberalism. Hope you’ve pointed me in a good direction.
It’s not a leftist commentary but concrete proposals on how to implement alternative economic forms o organization.
Given the fact the USA has created similar actions in many other counties why not in its own? Having been to peace marches in the early 70’s in Washington, where police were not only in the street but on roofs with guns, it is mighty odd that storming the capitol complete with photo opps with raiders sitting in office chairs went forward so easily. I say it was an inside job just like the one we created in Venezuela and Syria to provide a reason to expand their totalitarian agenda.
A friend says to look at the “protesters” at the Police (weren’t expecting violence), it was a psyop but I can’t find anything said like this except by Patricia Fahy
The primary tools of tyrants are fear and division. As long as we continue participating in them we will suffer tyrants. Democrat/Republican, black/white, right/left, socialist/capitalist, wear a mask/don’t wear a mask, take the vaccine/don’t take the vaccine, ad infinitum, all contribute to the power of tyrants. Either/or offers no solutions since either/or are the same things with different nomenclature. The 0.1% will continue the rape of the 99.9% as long as we continue to play the game the 01% offers. Political division is a delusion.
Politician: One who is most adept getting the most people to believe the most preposterous lies the most often.
Curious how “conspiracy theory” has become derogatory, as if their was no such thing as a conspiracy, and a theory of conspiracy is not needed to expose them. The CIA invented the derogatory term “conspiracy theory” in an attempt to suppress evidence of their conspiracy to murder of JFK. It worked so well they continued the practice. Applying it to a multitude of other real conspiracies.
The Bolivian coup was done for Elon Musk, who, since a few days is now “officially” the richest person on the planet…. Lithium… When confronted about it on twitter his reaction was “we coup who ever we want, deal with it”…..
Well said. Dont understand why people are aghast. Virtue signaling of another color.
I am making a good salary online from home.I’ve made 97,999 dollar.s so for last 5 months working online and I’m a full time student. I’m using an online business opportunity I’m just so happy that I found out about it……..Read More
Thanks, Minnie! How do you feel about recent developments in the USA?
Looking forward to your contribution …
I like your rant today. Anyway, nothing too serious from me personally today. I leave that to Prof (Uni CT) Peter Turchin, who provides us with some insights which might help us better understand the Seppos:
The Strange Disappearance of Cooperation in America – June 21, 2013
http://peterturchin.com/cliodynamica/strange-disappearance/
WSWS, who profess to be ‘Marxist and therefore should have a smidgeon of historical and political knowledge, have gone batshit crazy about this so-called coup. This outfit is going more bonkers with each passing day. Joe Lauria at Consortium News is one voice of sanity, amongst a bunch of ‘left’ pearl-clutchers suddenly calling for ‘law and order’.
In aggregate, the politics of the ‘insurgents’ might be characterised as similar to the nationalistic anti-China Honk Kong rioters who also occupied and vandalised Chinese government buildings, and who were praised to the skies by the imperialist bourgeoisie and by…WSWS
As a supporter of the WSWS, I naturally disagree with you and take offence at you calling Marxists “batshit crazy”. It is because we have more than a “smidgeon” of historical and political knowledge that we respond to these events the way we have.
I refer you to the “Beer Hall Putsch” by Hitler’s brownshirts. It was a failure, but Hitler bided his time, grooming his fanatic followers for another day. And that day came when Hindenberg appointed Hitler Chancellor of Germany. On that day, all of the followers of Hitler were there, ready and willing, to take over the country and create the Third Reich. For you and others not to see the threat in what happened on January 6, is a very naive and irresponsible attitude. The events of January 6 were just steam escaping from a boiling pot of festering resentments. The fire is not out. That pot is going to boil over.
I would never call Marxists batshit crazy, but I certainly would call any self-professed ‘Marxists’ batshit crazy who advocated the WSWS line on this. No genuine Marxist could ever bring themselves to labelling that slapstick farce as a ‘fascist coup’. Rather, those that do (like the Democrats and WSWS) are nothing but pearl clutchers.
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Well before 1923, before he was imprisoned for leading the Beer Hall Putsch (ie, he actually took part in it), and dictating Mein Kampf to his lieutenants, Hitler was a perfectly conscious fascist ideologue with a well-established and, above all, a disciplined following in a party. A party. He’d been planning the Munich march since at least October 1922, and it comprised a detachment of 2,000 SA (“Storm Detachment”) brownshirts, the paramilitary wing of his Nazi Party. Sorry, Trump is no fascist ideologue despite his fascistic instincts and impulses, and he certainly doesn’t lead any fascist party, although some white supremacists and KKKers may well have pictures of him hanging on their walls as a ‘martyr’ to their ’cause’.
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The ragtag bunch that raided Washington’s ‘sacred’ ‘seat of democracy’ were of course nothing of the sort. Rather, they were a claque of ill-disciplined white supremacists with delusions of grandeur (one was dressed in animal furs with a buffalo-horned helmet for heavens sake) leading a mob of Trumper ingenues seeking answers to their plight. These latter are a part of Trump’s motley cult following, from the lumpenproletariat to pauperised small businessmen facing bankruptcy,
all in despair, whom fascists and white supremacists have always exploited as a fertile recruiting ground for their shock troops. Given the level of US ruling class abuse directed against everyone but themselves, their plight is mostly genuine but they’ve yet to realise that Trump won’t be giving them any answers.
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Like tourists let loose without their guide, they enjoyed themselves taking selfies, manhandling ‘precious’ furniture, engaging in some petty vandalism and otherwise committing acts of ‘sacrilege’ that surely would have violated some obscure rites that haunt those ‘hallowed’ halls of power. From the experience, some may even go on to join a fascist outfit, but a large proportion were ordinary moms and pops. And where was the proclamation of them assuming ‘power’? You can be assured that no-one there would have even thought of that. And look in vain for key support from a prominent high-ranking pillar of the state apparatus. Where was their Ludendorf? Some ‘coup’.
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Worthy of ‘taking offense’ at, however, is this labelling the genuine grief felt by the vast majority of US working people, some of whom in utter despair supported a creature like Trump, as ‘a pot of festering resentments’. The US working class is seething with a rage and fury that is supremely righteous which sorely needs to be directed toward taking power rather than denounced this way just like any frightened petty bourgeois would.
Yes, actually young Caitlin it was a coup attempt. Embedded in the crowd were mercenaries with a clear agenda. Mr. paramilitary man carrying his plastic hand restraints through the senate chamber is one of those embedded mercs. The idea was to capture hostages, ideally for them would have been Pence, Pelosi, McConnell and Grassely. Live stream their executions and give tRump what he needed to initiate the insurrection act. The coup was aided by the recent appointment of tRump cronies at the Pentagon after Esper left. Those cronies ran interference by refusing to deploy National Guard Troops. They also played a part by limiting police presence at the capitol that day.
So, you are incorrect. It absolutely was a coup attempt. Luckily it was attempted by an incompetent boob.
America may not be so lucky next time.
Hi Smedley,
How do you know about this plan?
Good question, Steve. It’s certainly scary as hell and just plausible enough IMHO to pass the smell test…at first whiff. Let’s see if more supporting details are supplied the “general.”
It would make a good action movie, but a serious coup attempt would require military and police backing and would have been far better organized. Having a painted clown marching around the Capitol was ludicrous.
Ludicrous, but symbolic. I’ll remember Q Shaman long after Trump, Biden, Harris, Obama, Bush and all the others have melded into one bland image of US power.
Anarcissie,
Our site is almost up.
I will email you a link.
Roger
If you know where to look.
https://twitter.com/ChrisMurphyCT/status/1347749265435734016?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1347749265435734016%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.democraticunderground.com%2F100214867218
If they were embedded mercenaries, who embedded them and who paid them? I think it more likely they were just nut cases. Only five weapons were confiscated (per Joe Lauria of CN), and the only person killed was an unarmed Trump loving vet shot by a cop. BTW, Glenn Greenwald and Joe Lauria have the best takes I’ve found yet on Wednesday’s protest.
When will the mass exodus begin?
US citizens with enough money and the right connections deserting the sinking ship.
We know a few oligarchs have bought properties in ‘safe’ havens, but when will the smug middle class start emigrating?
A couple of American “patriots,” acting at the behest of Nobel Peace Prize winning President Barack Obama, named Nuland and McCain effected a highly successful coup in Ukraine which brought hard core fascism to an entire country. Your tax dollars have entrenched the resulting dictatorship during the past seven years and have revived the cold war with Russia to an increasing boil.
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Killery Clinton and her flunkies in the state department couped all over Libya ending with a bayonet up the gazoo for Momar Gaddafi and the once most advanced country in Africa now back to buying and selling human beings as slaves. Never mind the collateral damage of losing an ambassador and his posse of spooks gunrunning Gaddafi’s now available armory: just the cost of doing this sort of business. Resident Libyans might bellyache about their once modern country now looking like Bedrock with no prospects for urban renewal anytime soon, but, hey, Killery allegedly had an election stolen by Caligula Trump. Show some sympathy… for the devil with the blue pants suit on.
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That rascally peacenik Obomber had a hand in yet another long drawn out coup in Syria to try to bring down the freely elected Assad administration which allegedly insisted upon gassing its own people with sarin whenever victory appeared imminent–apparently their Russian partners in war crimes had run out of novichok hunting down expats and dissidents. This fiasco, killing hundreds of thousands and displacing millions, was all excused as part of the “Arab Spring.” Ah, reminds me of a show tune: “Springtime for Hitler and Germany. Winter for Poland and France. Springtime for Hitler and Germany. And the Germans go into their tanz.” And the beauty part is that Germany actually got caught in the Mittel of all this… in the form of at least a million displaced Middle Easterners putting down new roots in Deutschland, most with a chip on their shoulders for some unexplained reason. Go tell it to the Swedes, Angela, you enabled Amerika every step of the way. And you still do.
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Let us make the distinction here that Iraq and Afghanistan were NOT coups: they were bald faced invasions. You know like what we did in Canada during the War of 1812 and in Mexico during the eponymous “Mexican War” of 1846. I dunno what we should call our bellicose activities in Lebanon, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan or Pakistan where we frequently drone people, including non-belligerents and unindicted, let alone unconvicted, American citizens and their family members, and otherwise facilitate their slaughter by offering sophisticated military aid to their local antagonists, including darlings like Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Israel. Even the Devil is well connected in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.
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Now our covert shenanigans in Georgia, Venezuela, Belarus, Iran and even Russia were all meant to be small pilot projects that would later blossom into vast, magnificent, even grandiose coups and regime changes putting brown-nosing puppets like Saakashvili, Guaido, Tikhanovskaya, Navalny and, I dunno, the Shah’s great grandson into the seats of power to do America’s bidding in all these countries. Thankfully, these poison-producing saplings have yet to bear fruit. Somebody please, administer the glyphosate before our would be agronomists in American intel start having any more successes.
Rumour is Victoria Nuland is to be under secretary of state for political affairs.
The political analysis is spot on. BUT, the economics (“tax dollars”) are erroneous and self-defeating for the left. The left either embraces MMT, which is no longer theoretical but being implemented by governments worldwide by the trillions (to quell Covid and shore up plutocracy), or the left will fade into the oblivion toward which it is already headed. Let’s stop being oblivious to fiat money so that we can get some of it spent on addressing human and environmental needs.
For those who for whatever reason have developed an antipathy toward MMT, here’s a pretty solid political analysis, looking through the MMT lens, which avoids the letters and the words they stand for. I recall how Edward Bellamy, during the first Gilded Age, refused to call his radical egalitarian society “socialist” because he understood that such a label would likely kill his vision in the crib.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/01/08/austerity-democrats-and-the-state/
Great rant Realist, and spot on. It is befitting that the brand name for glyphosate is “RoundUp”. Just what is needed for “Capitalism’s Invisible Army”, and our other “Intelligence” Agencies.
Brendon O’Connell as usual is spot on.
What happened, what is happening and what will happen is all told in the Book of Revelations. Brendon just fills in the details.
I love this guy. The most brilliant mind I have encountered in my 76 years on this planet.
Thank you, Sandra.
Brendon O’Connell continues to nail it.
The election was a massive fraud – the Rothschilds own the media AND they own the money !
Now the Presidency of the US has gone to a demented lying dog faced pony soldier – who likes to sniff ‘pre pubescent’ girls hair !!
Take it away !
You have a point. Biden seems to be almost as creepy and corrupt as Trump.
I hereby declare the US election invalid and I, Caitlin Johnstone, am the new President of the United States. These are your new prime directives:
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Ah, Ms Johnstone if only the heavens brought this about. Please write a book about just how you would runs things; humanity needs a guide to do the right things all of the time.
Caitlin prefers to write this column and books of poetry, Ron, in which ample advice can be found between the lines. As for a direct guidebook, are you familiar with E.F. Schumacher’s “A Guide for the Perplexed?” One hundred forty pages of solid, practical wisdom.
Does anyone believe that those who would call it a, ‘coup’, to be real people?
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The BBC’s Stephen Sackur called it a completely pathetic and failed coup d’état, which might not be so wide of the mark.
Coup = Cheap imitation marvel comic characters casting, about Qanon documentary methamphetamine fairytales …
That one day will be coming to a neighbourhood near you .
Yes Simpsonville
Preciously brilliant, Ms. J.
Thank you Caitlin for once again being an honest voice. I don’t agree with you on everything, though I am often grateful for your voice. I hope you will consider what I have to say apart from your past, your ideas. Time is running short. We do need that change now. See this as the power of the people for the people.
I hooked up to the internet in 1999. I have read articles and read comments by concerned and insightful people who put much of their energies into ‘activism’ for more than two decades, things have only gotten worse. We can rage and we have rightly so. It all though blows away with the wind. Another day another vertical, unorganized, unloved list of honest concerns and insights fading into oblivion. Is there a solution other than this? Is there a lasting solution in the 21st century to overcome our hurdles?
So people tell me what is the greatest power on Earth? I say it is the Human intellect. What do you say. Humor me here please.
I will answer my own question. We have nuclear weapons and quantum computers, these only exist because the human intellect developed them though. Next question, how does the Human mind work?
I say the human mind works logically. By that I mean it connects dots or pieces of information which it uses over time to develop perspectives or form conclusions, which is what I am doing now. I am taking assumptions, information that I believe I Know and working them in order. Next question, What are the pitfalls of Human intelligence?
The pitfalls of Human intelligence are 1 It is housed in a ‘black box’ where you cannot see the workings, People can ‘put on a show’ and lie all day long or as long as it takes. The logical process is not recorded nor seen and is simply electrons firing. 2 It is housed in the ‘self’ and is thus biased by design and circumstance. The ‘process’ may break down according to the wants and needs of the self. 3 It is a limited perspective in time and space, which may affect the conclusions formed. 4 It is fragile. it’s performance may depend on energy levels or emotional reactions that affect the conclusions formed. Question; How do we collectively and individually address these issues (the failings of Human Intelligence) at present?
We address these issues by choosing ‘Leaders’. We collectively and Individually turn to aggression towards others as we are competing intellects forming perspectives and conclusions which vary. Question, what is the result of this ?
The result is conflict born of cultures and beliefs which can become radically different due to the perspectives of those within the culture and the ‘errors’ that manifest and where allowed to flourish and the leaders who possess power and must retain it by appeasing these beliefs. Now the important stuff. How do cultures address the obvious (to some) ‘errors’ manifest and flourishing within their culture?
They address the obvious errors by 1 ‘holding the line’ as they say, they do what comes natural, they stick together. Societal pressures are developed and these act as an opposing force to independent thought. 2 They dress up the ‘errors’ in pomp and tradition with great fanfare. Question; why does all this matter?
It matters because you have to know your enemy or your failing in order to take action. The people adding to our despair are just individuals showing the failings of Humanity and how we concede the power of the Human Intellect to those failings. These individuals contribute to the societal pressures to accept obvious flaws and support the pomp they dress them up in. Would T.V. anchors or Sixty Minutes seem so acceptable if there was no brand, background music, concerned voice tones and set? So what do we do?
In the age of computers and internet connectivity we must develop a forum that enables us to form conclusions and perspectives with fewer errors that stands quarantined from the clinging needs and wants of the ‘self’ and the need for power to support self-interest.
We can continue to come here and vent, which is good in many ways. I just don’t know that is will really get us what we want. There is war. War is what has always been used as the reset for two opposing perspectives The problem there is that the core issues (error allowed to flourish) is never resolved so the peace never last. Is there another solution though now that we have computers and the Internet. That is the Trillion dollar question.
https://medium.com/@whmilk/the-value-of-anonymity-in-a-collective-intelligence-c0a003f481b6
https://medium.com/@whmilk/save-the-world-collective-vs-individual-intelligence-69e1353ea9b5
https://medium.com/@whmilk/decentralized-thought-9bf368914391
https://medium.com/@whmilk/here-is-a-book-i-have-placed-on-amazon-and-smashwords-e864cc0e2c60
As usual you are exactly right. And now we have a very special plutocrat, an old war criminal who will continue the Empire and make sure the peasants stay in their places. The people are happy because they believe the least of the two evils made it to power. Well, it is my position that the least of two evils is evil and that the strategy of voting for the least of two evils keeps evil in power. At least this new war criminal is senile, so he won’t even know about the crimes committed in his name. Maybe he is less evil because can’t even pretend to think.