Coup or Grace?

Monday of Thanksgiving week.

In the US, one of the Trump lawyers has been fired, after pushing a conspiracy theory that the maker of the software provider for the vote counting was somehow in cahoots with Chavez of Venezuela, who died over a decade ago. This seems to have been too much even for Giuliani, who is trying to push ‘reputable’ conspiracy theories such as a massive plot to commit voter fraud, stuff ballot boxes, and ignore votes for Trump, or that individuals errors in counties should be adequate justification for throwing out all the votes in those counties.

They are melting down, and it is ugly to watch.

We also have seen almost nothing of Pence, Barr or Pompeo, or any of the other enablers of Trump. 

It makes me think that either they are hiding to avoid being smeared (too late) or there is something brewing. I have a hard time thinking what it is, though civil unrest on a massive scale remains possible. That would then require the intervention of Federal law enforcement (as in Portland earlier in the year) but with the goal of intimidating states to select Electors that will vote for Trump. I have no idea what it will take. There may even be a simple attempt to stop some states from ending Electors at all, and in doing so, put the election into the House of Representatives.

Too much quiet from the White House is scary at a time like this. I don’t actually think that Trump and his minions are simply watching TV and playing golf. That is not plausible. Hiding from what’s coming is possible, but unlikely.

So what the hell is going on?

A Thanksgiving-Day Coup?

…

If Trump calls on the Pentagon to send troops to a city, any city, will the generals refuse? If he (or his installed and presumably loyal new [acting] Secretary of Defence) issues a completely legal order, then a borderline order, and then an outright illegal order, at what stage will the generals say “no”?

Will there be an attack on Amerika, say a terrorist attack or other false flag attacks that gives Trump his opportunity to do what Giuliani tried to do after 9/11; delay completion of the election process?

Will he start a war on the way out? But how can he use that to seize power? It will need to be a war in which he can, quickly, smear key members of the Biden camp as traitors and lock them up. Who would let him get away with it?

Will he use the Supreme Court to support the rejection of some ballots in Pennsylvania, and use that as an excuse to exclude all ballots in Atlanta or in a state such as Wisconsin? 

I don’t know, but I cannot believe that he is simply sitting there doing nothing.

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Equally, is it possible that he has just “given up”? That he is simply sitting in the White House waiting for the final call that all options have been exhausted. Sitting in the bunker, so to speak. 

He lost the popular vote twice in a row. The first time the distribution of Electors as defined by the Constitution favoured him. This time that same distribution worked against him. He also lost the popular vote by a greater margin this time. He won more votes in total than he did in 2016, but far more people voted, and the votes were against him. 

So is he simply waiting, playing golf, and preparing to go into internal or external exile, picking the safest place to go to avoid extradition, if it comes to that? And preparing himself for a continuation of the Trump Survival Program from before 2016 – stall in the courts, sue anyone who says anything against him, and keep appealing, all the while looking for a deal that will keep him out of jail and keep most of his assets intact. 

Is he right now negotiating deferrals and changes to the loans that he owes? Is he looking at how to kick-start a media empire to crush Fox?

As a president, he has been a complete failure, with his only wins being the provision of tax cuts for the wealthy and destruction of the social and environmental protections that have taken so many years to implement. 

But will he go quietly?

The Washington Post reports: “Sarah Matthews, a White House spokeswoman, said the president is “hard at work fulfilling the promises he made to the American people and building on his unprecedented accomplishments as he works to rebuild our economy, lower drug costs, end the endless foreign wars by bringing our troops home, and deliver on his ambitious goal to have a safe and effective covid-19 vaccine before the end of the year.””

Not only is all of that bullshit, but everyone seems to know that it is bullshit. Each and every one of the claims in that paragraph is false, and he has accomplished none of them, nor will he. Nor could he even if re-elected.

Yet still, his minions continue to lie for him, afraid of the end of their own careers and hopes if they cross him. They are linked to him, and their only hope is for a successor Trumpist to be identified, and for that successor to recognise their ability to be loyal no matter what.

Meanwhile, he is silent, and that still scares me.