“Actually, in a Representative Democracy, we don’t even have a historical precedent for this being necessary.”
Weimar Germany was just such a representative democracy, and Chancellor Adolf Hitler gained his office by legal means.
You are right. I stand corrected. I actually should have remembered that as I had a great-great uncle who was part of the Weimar resistance against Hitler and was murdered in Dachau.
What’s interesting about this (because you brought it up, and it is relevatnt, I’ll suspend calling Godwin’s law)- was how Hitler came into power. He revolted against the established government, using the fear of governmental conspiracies. He started his rEVOLution with the youth, making them fearful that the government was a conspiracy controlled by secret controllers (Jews) who ran the government and banks.
If we are going to learn from this, we should learn from both sides of that battle. Be careful of people trying to start revolutions based on conspiracies of hidden controllers and fear.