18 States just declared war on the rest of the country.
Democrats think that the Trumpists are attempting a seditious coup. The Republicans are claiming that Biden stole the election. The evidence points not to Biden stealing the election. That’s clear now. The Trumpists have been absolutely unable to produce evidence in court of any fraud, nevertheless the industrial-scale fraud they claim. The evidence they’ve produced for the public amounts to fictitious accounts from un-credible witnesses that can’t be used under oath, and deceptively edited videos. Their evidence is “we don’t like this.” Their goal is the production of disinformation, not legal relief. They’re using the courts to generate propaganda. And this is just one aspect of the con.
I won’t delve deeply into what’s going on with the pressure being applied to GOP politicians in Georgia and Pennsylvania to replace their electors, or the outright armed intimidation that’s happening in Michigan. There’s enough there alone to merit pages and pages of analysis and opinion. But, all evidence points to the truth that the Trumpists are actually staging a coup. Am I nervous? Am I scared? I don’t care who’s doing it, I’m straight terrified for what comes next if they pull this off. I might be more terrified for the mess we’ll be left with if they don’t.
We have Texas which is, by filing a suit in the Supreme Court, and 17 other states who joined the suit, telling 4 “swing states” that 18 states won’t accept the outcome of their elections. While the nominal claim, which itself strains credulity and is in regard to a matter in which Texas nor any other state has a say, is that the swing states violated their own election laws. The reality is that the Republican Trumpists in Texas simply don’t like who won. Not only that, but the quiet part is that they’re saying that the elections are invalid because of *who* the states let vote. They’ve explicitly declared large swaths of the population as non-citizens unworthy of the franchise.
This is essentially what the GOP as a whole has been trying to accomplish with their extreme gerrymandering, the repeal the Voting Rights Act, and their other various and sundry disenfranchisement efforts. You can’t just act like this didn’t happen if it doesn’t succeed. It makes the antics 2000 look harmlessly cheeky. (Although, those antics embolden the players in 2020.)This isn’t a matter of partisan politics where the Democrats see it one way and the Republicans see it the other. Their is objectively anti-Democratic malice and bad intent on the part of the Republicans, and, again, the evidence supports that while the Republicans have absolutely no evidence to support their claims. It’s a naked attempt to overthrow the government. You don’t just get to walk away from that.
They might just pull this off. Regardless, this is a civil war. It’s no longer teetering on the brink. We crossed the Rubicon when these 17 states and many of their elected representatives declared themselves part of the coup by joining Texas’ lawsuit to overturn the election. Either through the courts, Congress, intimidation, or other means yet to be exposed that may be unspeakable, they’re are hellbent in making sure those 4 swing states electors are Trump electors, or that their votes are not counted when the Electoral College convenes. (Of course, their goal is the continued Imperial Presidency of Donald J. Trump in an effort to cement permanent conservative minoritarian rule, but that goes without saying.)
If you pro-Democracy and you’re not scared, you’re in denial.
(And if you’re backing the attempt to overturn the election, you’re making a Faustian bargain you’ll regret sooner or later.)