We're probably thinking of different things. I'm not discussing a violent coup. I'm referring to the Republicans fixing elections and controlling who wins them, and in so doing, control the government. America is, in my opinion, very close to that now. This silent coup has been in progress for decades now, since the Reagan years, when class warfare was silently and successfully waged. America is already well on its way to becoming a plutocracy and kleptocracy. I would expect that to continue accelerating under Republican rule as it did under Reagan, Bush, and Trump, which I assume will be indefinite if they control the elections. Do you like your Social Security and Medicare? Who will protect you from the Republicans if they gain the power to control the elections? Go ahead and complain, seniors. Nobody's listening. Go ahead and show your discontent at the polls. Oh, what a shame. Your candidate lost. Maybe next time. Go ahead and start a petition and a referendum, and see if that helps. That's what the death of democracy looks like in silent coups. Dog and pony show elections.
Some might argue that we've already been living under a plutocracy for many decades now. I've heard some refer to a coup which allegedly occurred on November 22, 1963. But things like that typically get dismissed as conspiracy theories.
Americans have known about and mistrusted political machines since the 19th century. It wasn't really until the 1960s that the country just barely started to address issues with voting and democracy, and even then, a lot of people may not be convinced.
Personally, I find the most corrupt processes exist when it comes to the internal politics of parties and how candidates are nominated. That seems to be the main issue. It's part of the problem within the Republican Party, as Trump-favored candidates are going against moderate Republicans in the primaries. But Democratic primaries can also be problematic. That's the real pity of it all, since it should really be a slam dunk for the Dems, but the problem is the candidates they nominate are just sooooo bad.
In fact, ever since Walter Mondale, I've had nothing but eternal frustration with the candidates the Democrats pick. Then there was that infamous footage of Michael Dukakis on a tank, which was actually quite symbolic of just how pathetic they had gotten.
To me, the Republicans have always been the party of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Plutocracy and kleptocracy? Of course. Wars for profit? Yep. But the thing is, the Democrats have been there all along. And there have been some Democrats who have also been caught feathering their own nests and other mischief, so they're not immune to corruption and malfeasance.
As with any election, the best people can hope for is the lesser of two evils. That's what America has been stuck with, in terms of "democracy." Other countries seem to be more democratic, at least in the sense that they have more than two parties represented in their parliament or legislature. Theoretically, Americans can vote for any party they wish, but the political culture is inundated with this overriding two-party mindset that makes it next to impossible for any third or fourth party to make any kind of inroads. I've always considered that mindset to be a bane to a democratic system. As with the problems you're pointing out here, it's also a profound weakness which Americans might consider seriously addressing.
This is part of the problem with a system which allows big money and big business free rein to utilize their resources to buy media time and employ whatever tactics are necessary to win. It's not always necessary to spend the most to win, but they still need a substantial amount.
The whole pity of it all is that, even if people can see the causes of our problems and the weaknesses within the system and the fragility you mentioned, even despite all that, no one really wants to do much to change the system and shore up these weaknesses.
No, not of nukes or martial law or FEMA camps. But I think America is very close to being lost to becoming a place where almost nobody is happy. Isn't it pretty much there already? Imagine the last two years under Republican rule. Bye-bye Medicare drug prices coming down. Bye-bye effective vaccine roll-out. Bye-bye infrastructure investment. Bye-bye climate mitigation measures. Bye-bye holding elected officials accountable for their crimes. That's the danger I see.
Well, we've certainly been in a slow decline since the 70s. I've seen it all during my own lifetime. A lot of the damage was self-inflicted, thanks to a lot of myopic, reckless policies. A lot of people seemed to know that things were going downhill, at least in one way or another. "The country is going down the tubes" has become a common trope in popular culture, as it has been for decades.
If people have instinctively known that the country has been going down the tubes for all this time, then sooner or later, we'll probably get there.
