Posted on 07/20/2016 9:11:44 AM PDT by Kaslin
Turkey’s failed coup, combined with the disastrous disunity and polarization in the United States thanks to Barack Obama, have gotten people talking about whether it could happen here. For example, part-time law professor and full-time Instapundit Glenn Reynold has recently taken some serious looks at the issue of coups within the context of the American system of checks and balances. So what if next January Obama and his barely post-puberty band of juice box screw-ups in the West Wing decide they don’t want to leave? And the issue is even more pressing with Donald Trump sneaking up in the polls – Nate Silver gives him a 34% chance of winning, which is up from the approximately 0% chance a whole bunch of people gave him a year ago, your author included. If a couple more disgruntled cop haters with totally obvious unknown motives and a few more [OMITTED] radicals go on kill sprees, Trump might well be our next president.
So, could Barack Obama pull off a coup to keep himself in power rather than turn over the keys to the Oval Office?
Of course not. At the outset, what makes you think he would suddenly become competent enough to pull off that kind of sophisticated scheme, especially with him leading from behind the wheel of the Ivy League clown car that is his administration? These twits can’t even beat a bunch of Bedouin banditos sitting out in the open in the middle of a desert. But it never pays to rely solely on the incompetence of your opponents, so let’s run through a scenario and see how it plays out.
Donald Trump gets elected, snatching Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan from Hillary when the people liberals have spent the last half-century dumping on get mad and vote. Gracious as always, Trump’s victory speech promises that Attorney General Chris Christie’s first job will be to investigate and prosecute Pantsuit von Pervenabler and President Faily McWorsethanCarter.
That gets Obama’s attention faster than a delicious doggie at dinner time. His post-presidency plans involve sucking up the residual adulation of the idiots who love him; they don’t involve dodging subpoenas and maybe even indictments. Hillary, after she sobers up, calls him and shrieks that he has to do something. Obama quickly says, “Valerie, it’s for you” and hands over the phone, but it’s quite clear – this whole peaceful transition of power thing just can’t happen. Plus, he tells himself, the rule of law is racist anyway. And so the coup plotting begins.
Now, a coup is generally a small group of people quickly seizing power, often bloodlessly. This is in contrast to a civil war, which is usually neither quick nor bloodless. In the American system, it would likely mean one part of the government (here, the executive) moving to essentially unmoor itself from the checks and balances of the other branches. In other words, it would be Obama doing what he has tried to do for the last eight years, except with guns.
So, how does one pull off a coup in the United States? It’s actually harder than it appears. A coup by definition is covert – you have to try and keep the active force as small as possible to maintain secrecy yet still have enough assets to do the job. The problem for Obama is that a significant portion of the most important element, the military, has nothing but contempt for him.
That does not include the military’s senior leadership. The sorry spectacle of senior officers slavishly going along with troop-imperiling idiocy like transsexual integration instead of throwing their stars on the table and walking out is a disgrace. So a significant number of generals would be intimidated into doing whatever Obama asks – if they can’t tell him that “No, America’s greatest strategic challenge is not slightly warmer weather,” then they haven’t the intestinal fortitude to tell him “No, I’m not putting a mech battalion on Capitol Hill.”
The next challenge is to get the troops to actually do it. “Wait, colonel” says Captain Smith of Rapid City, South Dakota. “You want me to take my infantry company into Washington? And maybe shoot American citizens? Sir, did you start at the O club a little early today?”
Assume the good captain passes that manifestly unlawful order to his troops (My own captains would have assumed that I had stuck my head and politely dragged me away to get an MRI). So, then Sergeant First Class Jones and most of the rest of the company NCOs would report that some unexplained maintenance problem had rendered most of the unit’s vehicles deadlined. “Oh well, sir,” he’d say, shrugging. The military runs on NCO power; when they stop playing, you don’t have an army anymore. You have a bunch of government employees sitting around dressed like shrubs.
But assume the military does act. What’s it do? How about seize the prime media outlets? Well, there would be no need to seize many of them– the New York Times and the alphabet networks would cheerlead a coup. But the others? Which of the thousands of radio and TV stations would they grab? And how about the internet – where do the soldiers go to take over the internet? Mark Zuckerberg’s hacienda?
And there’s another problem – Texas, plus a bunch of other states with administrations that still have an affinity for that wacky old Constitution of ours. How do you imagine Governor Abbot reacting to Obama informing the nation that he thinks he’ll just stick around for a while, only without those meddling kids in Congress? Probably not so well. Governor Abbot has most of an infantry division that works for him. All the other loyal governors have forces too. And, it being their home, those local boys and girls will fight.
Speaking of fighting, that brings us to one more little obstacle in the road to Coupville. That’s us – the American people. It’s been Obama’s greatest disappointment that he has been unable to crush and humiliate the decent patriots of this country who keep and bear arms for the defense of themselves, their families, their community and – oh yeah – the Constitution. Disarming us isn’t just fun; it’s a strategic necessity for a coup to work.
But American patriots buy 60,000 firearms every single day. That’s four infantry divisions worth. The U.S. military has (very) roughly the equivalent of 25 active and reserve infantry and armored divisions. Their troops’ dubious loyalty to some usurper president aside, that means every week loyal Americans arm themselves in numbers in excess of the basic ground combat forces of the U.S. military.
This is not the place to dispel the tiresome assertions of some Twitter keyboard commandos who argue that small arms in the hands of the populace can’t effectively oppose a modern army. They would not be the guys who had to run resupply missions across a state like Pennsylvania that was filled with several million ticked off deer hunters packing 30-06s. But let me just share a few words with you on that subject: Vietnam. Iraq. Afghanistan.
So, in the end, Obama will leave in January, and good riddance. Wargaming the possibility of the elite trying to retain its grip on power is an amusing exercise, but in the end, it’s those damn bitter clingers who would once again mess up the liberals’ scheme. Of course, we know those bitter clingers as something else – patriots.
If Trump is elected then Hillary will not be yelling about a coupe. She and many others will be yelling for blanket pardons. May be the first time an out going president has to pardon his entire administration.
Clowns like Obama just murder everyone in sight.
I am with you on this. barry has proven that he will do anything so long as his party and his media has his back.
I guess there is nothing they won’t tolerate. All in the name of tolerance dontchaknow.
I don’t think anyone could pull off a coup in the US so long as there are 300 million guns in private hands. Literally millions of armed Americans would step forward to stop it.
Stephen Coonts latest book “Liberty’s Last Stand” is all about this. President Barry Soetoro takes a black swan terrorist event to declare marshal law and dismisses both congress and the courts until resolved.
The book takes place Aug 2016 and, while entertaining, is a long stretch. TX does declare independence though so that’s a good thing.
If things had progressed as far as they did in the book society would collapse - no electricity when barry shuts the grids down would cause immediate anarchy and doubtful things could recover from there.
Any way, it is possible if not plausible.
This is good too: Obama would be “leading from behind the wheel of the Ivy League clown car that is his administration? These twits can’t even beat a bunch of Bedouin banditos sitting out in the open in the middle of a desert.?”
Pardons won’t save them. The Trump justice department will compel their cooperation and investigate everyone else. The slightest noncooperation or misstatement will find them in the slammer.
Or you declare martial law and ‘suspend’ everything.
In effect you just tell everyone to keep doing what they did yesterday, but with a gun to shoot anybody who objects.
If Trump wins the election, the most dangerous time for this country, in its history, will be between the 2nd Tuesday in November and Jan. 20th. That will be the time Imam Obama unleashes everything on the U.S. If the she -devil wins, he won’t have to because she will finish his job herself. And he will also give the green light for the 57 Islamic states to attack Israel.
Yes but most people don't have more that a few thousand rounds of ammo if that, and we have no source of resupply. The lines at bulk ammo section of last week's gun show were short. People need to Buy Loads Of Ammo Today.
I agree it might be the stuff of Tom Clancy novels, but Obama could stage a putsch. First it would take a major crisis like a large terrorist attack in the US. Second Obama declares martial law and suspends the elections until the crisis ends. He has the power to shutdown the Internet and could cut off other communications. Obama could count on the media for total support and the RINOs in Congress would just whimper and be ignored. Given the mood of the country and the military who swear their allegiance to the Constitution I doubt the putsch would last long. I would expect to see tanks on front of the White House and the perpetrators being brought out in handcuffs. Another reason such a plot would fail is that the population is well armed
Love this rollicking funny piece! Just love it. Especially the part about, except for some generals, the military has utter contempt for the man.
Another thing that would get Obama’s attention is if Trump started talking about Roberts’ arrest for human trafficking of his illegally adopted “South American” children.
What a mess DC is in.
This destruction has been going on for decades. Witness how Whittaker Chambers was treated. When did Saul Alinski write his book? 1960s? The Gramercies (sp?) were Italian Socialist when? Late 19th or early 20th century. The press has been pushing a socialist agenda for over a half a century. The three biggest enemies to the United States are the Democrats, the mainstream media, and the RINOs.
He wouldnt get the same result as Erdogan. That only works if some people like you.
Obama would love to pull an Erdogan if he thought he could get away with it, including taking this country the same way - full Muslim/Sharia.
Yes!
The only sentence can be hanging. He is too much of a threat to let live. Can you imagine what he would do if he were elected to lead the U.N.? Satan on steroids.
The military can’t protect their own families from the American people; they have plenty to fear from them. People don’t even need guns; what is a military wife with small children going to do against one guy with a baseball bat?
Lying Paul Ryan would fund anything Obama attempts.
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