Trump floats sending military after US citizens on election day

MicroWave@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 882 points –
Trump floats sending military after US citizens on election day
independent.co.uk

‘I think the bigger problem are the people from within, we have some very bad people, sick people, radical left lunatics,’ Republican candidate tells Fox’s Maria Bartiromo

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"And it should be easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military," he said.

"I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within. Not even the people who have come in, who are destroying our country."

It isn't clear under what circumstances Trump would view it justifiable to call in US troops against his own countrymen.

But his comments mark a baseless attack and a particularly hollow one coming from someone whose supporters violently attacked the US Capitol in an attempt to stop him from being thrown out of office three years ago.


🗳️ Register to vote: https://vote.gov/

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This is a reminder to American service members:

Your oath of allegiance is to the United States, not to Donald Trump, Joe Biden, or Kamala Harris. You have a duty to obey lawful orders issued under the authority of the commander in chief. But it is your duty to disobey unlawful orders.

The oath is actually to the Constitution of the United States. So it's not even the country or the government but the idea, the founding document.

Is it the current one, or the originalist one, or the supreme court interpretation one, or the cherry picked and misunderstood one, or?

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Heritage Foundation: Hold my beer, SCOTUS ASSEMBLE! You know what to do.

SCOTUS: it's legal now.

The military has never had any hesitancy at all in murdering American citizens when told to. They will not stand up.

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It isn’t clear under what circumstances Trump would view it justifiable to call in US troops against his own countrymen.

Isn't it though? He would view it justifiable to call them in for literally any reason.

The media, as usual, talks as if they're trying to discern his secret, rational plan. Even when he spouts fascist threats of mass oppression and murder, they discuss him as if he's just another politician with policy proposals. It's unclear under what circumstances he'd call in troops against Americans because he's psychologically chaotic, fragile and highly volatile. Anything could trigger him to do so. The only thing that's consistent is he threatens retribution against immigrants, trans people, Black people, women, and anyone who doesn't worship him enough.

"They brought me a turkeyberder instead of a HAMberder?! Call SEAL Team 6!!"

"I don’t think [immigrants] are the problem in terms of election day,” Trump told Bartiromo. “I think the bigger problem are the people from within, we have some very bad people, sick people, radical left lunatics.”

At that point, he suggested a seemingly sinister solution.

“And it should be easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military,” he said.

“I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within. Not even the people who have come in, who are destroying our country.”

He's called Biden a "radical leftist", it's anyone who won't vote for him...

If anyone actually believes Biden is a radical leftist it has to be a combination of a failure of the education system and systemic brainwashing.

The fact that anyone in America politics is being called a radical leftist is funny.

"I don’t think [immigrants] are the problem in terms of election day,” Trump told Bartiromo. “I think the bigger problem are the people from within, we have some very bad people, sick people, radical left lunatics.”

And yet there are SO many “radical left lunatics” right here on lemmy that seem to think both sides are equally as bad.

Trump being a lunatic doesn't automatically make the Democratic party the good guys. We don't live in a Marvel movie.

Do you live in such a nuance-less world that you automatically assume that if someone is saying that Trump is exponentially worse than Harris- what they really mean is that Harris is the epitome of all things good and can do no wrong?

You should maybe look into fixing that.

And marvel movies are hot garbage. So, I’d never compare anything even capable of being somewhat mediocre with them.

No, but I look at people espousing right-wing beliefs such as yourself and think of how far the Democratic party has fallen and why they struggle to compete against someone like Trump. It's like you're in a race with MAGA supporters to see who can destroy the country first.

No, but I look at people espousing right-wing beliefs such as yourself

Maybe I don't know how to read... Where did this person espouse right-wing beliefs? I consider myself pretty far to the left, and everything they said is correct and reasonable.

ROFL…. I’m espousing right wing belief now?

Is everyone that disagrees with you right wing?

Supporting genocide, calling those who don't support genocide "the radical left", calling for the US to back out of places like Ukraine for a few examples. All right wing rhetoric and beliefs.

I also noticed you and this other guy prole always seem to follow each other around on lemmy and reply to each other's comments with similar rhetoric. Kinda funny how that works...

And I noticed that you like to make false accusations of people you know nothing about. Is it accurate to assume that every far left outraged idealist is you? Because you seem to show up a lot where they’re being called out. And your single example is surely enough to base an accusation on.

it’s funny how you jumped on the one thing you believed you could build a strawman out of- I never said anything about Ukraine. In case you’re not aware, America recently sent troops to Israel to help with defense against Iran. I was talking about that-

Most people would have extrapolated this.

Well in is obviously the better choice.

I don't see that often.

What I see a lot of is accounts that say Kamala has to be "conservative" on some issues to get votes, but can't give a valid reason why Kamala sticks with unpopular policy like pro-genocide or pro-fracking.

But she doesn't take the threat of trump seriously enough to make her want to aide with the platform of her own goddamn party. She like genocide and fracking too much apparently, and it would be cynical to imply it was the donations and not her genuine feelings on the issues

Not a single person is saying she needs to be conservative. You know this. Everyone knows this. So, nice bad faith straw man there.

What people are saying is that she needs to play the centrist game to garner support. It’s a known thing that any candidate that dabbles in “leftists” territory is unelectable. Maybe it’s the stink of delusion and ignorance, or maybe it’s their lack of any semblance of organization.

My guess if asked, is that no one takes their embarrassing “pRo GeNoCiDe” accusations seriously.

You don’t get to threaten candidates with your sad little withheld votes and demand them to kiss your asses while they jump through your single-issue hoop.

That’s not how politics work. It’s not how politics ever worked, and it’s not how politics ever will work.

She’s trying to save democracy. With, or without your help.

Not a single person is saying she needs to be conservative

So why is she for:

  1. Fracking

  2. A border wall

  3. Coninuing support for genocide

People defend her move to the right on those three and more fucking daily...

Like, you think no one is pressuring her into that and she is willing to risk trump by being more conservative than the Dem voter base because she believes in those three things that much?

If you want to "save democracy" you'd be doing anything you can to get her more votes, that means dragging her back left towards the party base.

She keeps going right, and her numbers keep dropping. It ain't a coinky dink bud

Be against fracking and lose Pennsylvania.

Genius move there sport. It's a wonder you aren't a political consultant.

Dude. If you are against a modern economy with electricity, don’t be a hypocrite.

Turn off your phone and go outside and sit there by yourself.

You're right. It's better that we keep pandering to the lowest common denominator time and time again and lose Pennsylvania to something else like a massive hurricane because at least then we can say we won some contests along the way.

So… since you’re incapable of having a discussion without resorting to accusing people of supporting genocide- I’m going to end this here and flag you as a bad actor.

accusing people of supporting genocide

They say just as it's announced that the US is sending troops to Israel.

Also, I find you trying to minimize genocide down to something akin to legalizing weed and mocking the OP as a "single issue voter" to be quite abhorrent. If Harris loses the election, it's going to be in part to disgusting viewpoints such as yours.

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Touch grass. If a Democratic presidential candidate were to come out strongly against Israel prior to Election Day, they will lose.

You need to get a better understanding of the political situation in your own country.

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And polls continue to call the race a tie.

At some point we have to acknowledge that roughly 30% of our population are just evil, fascist monsters. Having lived in those states, this isn't a surprise.

Some of them are just country bumpkins who vote for whoever their pastor says

Still counts

Still counts more in fact. Our system is broken.

The system in question:

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-10-02-0065

There was one difficulty however of a serious nature attending an immediate choice by the people. The right of suffrage was much more diffusive in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of the Negroes. The substitution of electors obviated this difficulty and seemed on the whole to be liable to fewest objections.

The south has a massive advantage in the electoral college because they demanded to be able to launder slave votes.

The bigger problem is that the number of seats in the House has been frozen for about a hundred years. Our population exploded, but our number of representatives stayed static, so places with the most people actually get less representation in congress.

On top of this, the number of electors a state has its equal to the number of representatives that state has in the Senate and the House combined. So more populated states also get underrepresented in the presidential election.

The Three-Fifths Compromise was absolutely fucked, but it's not what is deadlocking the House now and its not what is letting a people lose the popular vote and still go on to be president in 21st century elections.

If we took away the at large electoral seats, and the senate, that would get us halfway to fixing the representation problem.

The house would be next, but that's a more moderate problem compared to the other half.

Been in their churches, you hear the chorus loud and clear when he talks about 'taking the country back from the powers of satan and other elitists'. He doesn't mean Olympic athletes.

We need to find those churches then and report them to the IRS no?

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I'd say 20% are just absolute morons that watched ancient aliens and garbage like that back in the day then fell for every dumbass psyop conspiracy theory on the Internet. Now they are willfully ignorant of facts and truth.

Ughh you described my dad, except he's still watching shit like that and skinwalker ranch... And yes he's a full blown Magoo. :(

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The guy's a nutjob and the fact that his candidacy is still being framed as having any air of legitimacy by the media is fucking disgusting.

Edit: any reason I got downvoted into the dirt for asking for a source on real polling numbers because I didn't have time to do my own digging right at that moment?

Not that downvotes generally bother me but JeeZe. Wasn't even expressing an opinion just looking for clarification. And thanks to those who provided it.

ORIGINAL

All the polls I can find show them damn near dead even now.

That was a 20 second search though do you have a source?

Are the polls landline calls? If so you are going to get mostly boomers that still have a landline

Almost all reputable polling groups have an all-the-above strategy. They also attempt to adjust for errors in polling due to things like the aforementioned “only old people have landlines” issue. Turnout is what ACTUALLY wins elections, and there are a LOT of people who will turn out for the orange turd, so we all need to make sure that we are turning out everyone we can too.

I've long felt that regardless of the levels of "we factored that into our results" that pollsters can accomplish, at the end of the day, these polls can only survey that demographic of "people who agreed to be polled".

That being said, I feel that Trump gets a slight advantage in any advanced polling thanks to his cult of personality: between Trump and any opponent thus far, a greater percentage of Trump's followers are more likely to be "loud and proud" enough to want to have their voice heard by a pollster.

I feel this effect is even more pronounced now, with a significant portion of the voting public falling into the camp of "conservative, but put off by Jan. 6th". People who voted for Trump twice but who won't this year. These people are also less likely to want to participate in polls.

Where I feel this effect may have tricky implications is whether they stick to their beliefs in the polling booth or just cave in the final moment and still vote Trump...or if they simply don't vote at the top of the ticket (or vote 3rd party)...but still vote for Republicans down-ticket.

While I'm no pollster, I would not be surprised to find that Trump underperforms vs projections, even as the GOP overperforms in House and Senate elections.

I pray you’re right, and fear that you might be wrong. The “red wave” that was supposed to happen and was wrong last time gives me a small amount of hope.

The sad part is that half the population doesn't bother voting

"There's a reason you separate military and the police. One fights the enemies of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people."

“I think the bigger problem are the people from within, we have some very bad people, sick people, radical left lunatics."

Yeah Don, we know. They even wear a red hat to help identify themselves.

"dictator day one"

"prosecute my opposition"

"prosecute my critics"

It seems insane to think people are shooting at him because they're listening to democrats (something the MSM largely does not do) and not because people are just listening to the things he's saying he'll do.

It seems insane to think people are shooting at him because they're listening to democrats

I'm confused by this sentence. What do Democrats have to do with any of this?

Trump has had multiple assassination attempts on him this year, and each time it happens Trump blames Democratic rhetoric as the motivating force.

Of course, anybody who took even a cursory look into the motives of each would-be assassin (and let's be frank, it's a big stretch to call some of these guys assassins - getting caught with a loaded weapon near where Trump is located is apparently enough to be considered an assassination attempt, even if Trump was never in any danger) they are often Republicans who absolutely hate the Democrats, so they wouldn't be listening to their political rhetoric anyway which has been nothing short of "Political violence is not the solution, let's win at the ballot box in November."

Meanwhile, Trump is promising to be a dictator on day one, promoting eugenics, deploying the armed forces to deport legal residents, threatening to prosecute and jail his political opponents and revoke the 1st amendment rights of his critics, but refuses to answer calls to "turn the temperature down".

the media line was that democrats were being to mean to trump.

I don't know, some republicans think Democrats have something to do with this?

For the millionth time all leftists should be armed. Cannot stress enough how important that is.

What would be grounds for lethal action? Self defense against the national guard? An ar-15 won't be able to do much against that. The only option for your own survival is not to play

If survival was your goal, I'd agree being armed probably wouldn't help much.

When you're fighting against fascism survival isn't the most important thing.

That's fair. Personally, I am no soldier, I intend to flee if the US become a battleground, and I would encourage, even go out of my way to help, my friends and family flee as well. I would really oppose anyone I know dying for a political cause.

lol, leftists here are doing everything they can to take away the right of the people to keep and bear arms.

That type of comment may have gone over well back on reddit but, sir, we are not idiots here. UTTER BULLSHIT, LEFTISTS DO NOT WANT TO TAKE AWAY YOUR RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS. We want that right too. We just don't want mentally ill people having access to assault weapons with which they can kill many, many people with significantly reduced effort. Someone going on a rampage with a pistol or a shotgun is far less deadly than someone with a long rifle of any type, especially automatic rifles. BULL-FUCKING-SHIT LEFTIST DO NOT WANT TO TAKE THAT RIGHT AWAY.

I want to take away everyone's arms. This country would be safer without guns.

You rant loudly but wrongly about "assault weapons". The fact is that pistols are used to kill far more people in the USA (and elsewhere) than "assault weapons" and any other kind of rifle. 3% or less of all homicides involve any kind of rifle.

Go on, name the leftists doing that. That's liberal shit.

Furthermore how many mass shootings are committed with hand guns? Mass shootings are the target of 'assault weapon' rhetoric, not gun violence. And any one with a more than surface level knowledge understands how silly the framing and blaming on AR style guns has been.

But to call that 'coming from the left' is insanity. The media if staunchy neoliberal, the politicians are too. The dems pushing that gun control are just as right wing as the 'moderate conservatives', they are reactionary liberals all the same bud. Reactionary liberals are the types who call for such extreme bans (books, guns, abortion, contraception).

Every leftist I've ever met is completely for the right to bear arms. Other than the ones who realise that against the advanced military might of nations in 2024 owning your own gun of any capacity is meaningless (against state tyranny).

The state has a monopoly on violence bud, owning a high capacity rifle will not protect you from state tyranny, neither will a hand gun. But a hand gun is a far more effective self defense tool for home defense than an AR15. So if it's not for state tyranny, and its not for self defense, it's either pure gun fetishism or you have a purpose to unload the high capacity ammunition rapidly (that could be 40 wild hogs or you know 40 wild schoolchildren).

That being said, I still think you should be able to get them. Its called 'gun control' you know, background checks, ensuring safety. Not 'ban all guns'.

Responsible owners are no problem in my book, nor does banning a gun platform make sense. Curtailing the constant terrorism against our children and minoritys should be a high priority for anyone though. Left or right, its not simply 'a fact of life'.

Anyway brain dump but main point is y'all mfers need to stop conflating centre libbies with the left. Its fucking mind numbing.

The old saying is; if you go far enough left, you get your guns back.

Military weapons? Yeah. They should be.

Pistols? Shotguns? Not really. And yes, you can point to more extreme cases of 'liberals' who do want to amend the constitution, which is about the same thing as calling anyone even slightly conservative on one issue a fascist.

OMG! The former president is threatening mass violence and possible oppression by using the US Military on the citizens! Oh btw you shouldn’t have a weapon that looks like the one the military uses or shoots faster than those made 100 years ago.

The AR-15 is not a military weapon, purely civilian. In any case you should be able to own military firearms, the government is not to be trusted.

An AK is a better fit, lol.

But (just going with this for a second) I dont see a scenario where even having like an M240 is going to make much of a difference going up against the US military. What do you picture happening, a good honest firefight? At that point homemade bombs and such are your only resort where a pistol wouldn't work.

Iraq and Afghanistan and Vietnam have left the chat. Why is this talking point always used to counter gun rights? It’s objectively not true ans has been proven time and time again. It’s guerilla / asymmetrical warfare, thr gov has to come to you.

The AKs available to the US consumer are also not weapons of war, they are strictly semi automatic.

An M240 would be a major upgrade in such a scenario. It would be more effective than a pistol, ideally you would have people with M240s and people making IEDs.

Yes. Gravy Team 6 has spent generations fighting an asymmetrical war against Russia then the US and I'm sure they train every day at Taliban compounds or are remnants of the Republican Guard

Be real: they sit in their garage drinking shitty beer and jerking off their unsatisfying-to-anyone cocks to guns, trucks, and Trump

I mean, they did a great job Jan 6, when Babbitt did not comply, of fighting back and showing big ol tyrannical gov! /s

Jk, they ran like little girls as soon as the reality set in

Lemme see any of these fucks hump full battle rattle 15 miles before we talk about them staging an insurgent war against the US

Christ, I bet all but a handful can't do a single pull-up

Yes, there are people in that culture that are capable of small-arms engagement, using fire and maneuver to close with engage and destroy the enemy, but the VAST majority of them are fatbody chodes who fantasize about living in right-wing Divergence or some other young adult fantasy novel series

In a most likely scenario, this ends up being a quick decapitation strike at those attempting to hold the Republic together, or ends up being a low engagement years long drawn out war. The military would be reluctant on both sides, leading to mostly an arms race of local and state police battling disgruntled / rioting citizens with some groups of more organized cells. The Troubles and not GWOT.

a semi-auto AK and an AR are functionally identical for most practical purposes.

As for the scenario proposed: any direct long engangement would be suicide, but other tactics would be viable. The most likely scenario in the US would look something like The Troubles in Ireland.

But it's possible a significant portion the military could defect, which could make things look a little more like the Spanish Civil War.

Also, I would point to the existence of Rojava, which for years has been able to hold out against Turkey despite Turkey having access to significantly more sophisticated hardware.

The US military failed to fight insurgents in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. What makes you think they'd be any better against an insurgency in the US, especially when it'd involve a good portion of people in their own ranks?

You guys are living a fantasy if you think a large chunk of the US population will turn into the Taliban, Viet Cong, Mujahideen or whatever over which party is in the govt and whatever antics you think Trump or Harris get up to.

We live in a rich, militarized surveillance state. A rifle is not how you fight that.

For now. But if you can't imagine any scenario where an M240 would be useful, you're very shortsighted. If (and this is a big if) we devolve into civil war, then an armed insurgency is very much on the table. All the tech stuff relies on infrastructure, and stable infrastructure is one of the first things to go.

Well liberals certainly are, I don't know if I'd say leftists are.

Oh hey, treason man is yet again announcing publicly that he's a treasonous piece of shit and that he plans to continue committing treason? Wow, what shocking news. /s

Why wouldn't he continue? It's not like there's ever any consequences for him.

So that's how he plans to make the economy better, to force his opposition to leave the country and appropriate their wealth and property. Who did Nazi that coming?

What is a Nazi dictator to do but follow his heart.

This is EXACTLY what the Founders Intended! George Washington LITERALLY said that the US Military should be used on US Citizens and that Children should be Gunned Down in School!

This guy in my discord I got into an argument with recently was going on about how he's voting for Trump because he cares about the constitution. You can't win with these clowns

This rhetoric is meant for voter intimidation because they know Republicans always lose when Democrats turn out to vote.

The polls are meaningless because they could be manipulated or manufactured, we don’t know who’s being polled. People just need to cast their vote and not let this be a close election.

I will never express my opinions in places where I can be easily identified unless I am among people I know and trust. I will vote and keep my leftist ideology to myself amongst strangers irl. I rather like living without being bothered.

There’s no such thing as living without being bothered in an autocratic regime, doesn’t matter who you are. You could be the most ardent supporter and you’d still be shit out of luck for any reason. Stalin used to have his own cabinet members routinely disposed of

I meant being bothered as in strangers harassing me for my beliefs lol. I live in a grossly red part of my state and I keep a low profile out of what I feel is necessity

I do too but idgaf and start shit with anyone stupid enough to try with me. I made the religious sign holders leave Pride fest by simply talking absolute fucking nonsense with adamant of a mood. They left shortly thereafter. I was a volunteer for the event wearing the shirt and all.

I had a sign in my yard that said "support trans kids" someone peeled into my driveway, leaving huge ruts in the gravel/mud, and stole the sign one day when I wasn't home. That's when I decided to not voice my opinion openly like that anymore.

Oh I would post it only when I was ready to fish for evidence and...well...yeah. Once we caught them, fry them for dinner

Didn't he try to use the military the last time and he was told no? What a psycho.

He's crying.

He's falling apart and going more batshit as his last-ditch attempt to grab power before crashing permanently.

Maybe, but he could still easily win if enough voters don't vote.

So like, when was the last time someone said they needed to handle the "enemy within"?

Oh wait

A famous image of Joseph Goebbels, nazi propaganda minister

I remember this from history class!

Them "stop calling everyone you disagree with a nazi!"

Reasonable people: "then stop suggesting nazi shit?"

I took World History Honors in Florida 2 years ago, pretty much learned nothing about the coming up of the Nazis. It was mostly memorizing the causes/effects of stuff like the industrial revolution or King Henry the 8th. However the teacher DID wear a Roman dress with a helmet and shield for the test day of the Roman empire so that was cool.

Also completely unrelated but we only had to memorize the places of iirc 13 European countries and the big ones like Russia/China/India and that's it.

This is the collective stupidity of America

It isn't about Turnip making dumb comments like this or suggesting making fascist government

No

It's about how America just sits around and listens to all this stupidity and accepts it all as a regular normal part of the political conversation.

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Looks like the U.S. is going to vote in an oppressive dictatorship to own the libs.

One word: Kristallnacht

It's actually uncommon to refer to the November pogrom as Kristallnacht in German because it's the positive spin the Nazis put to that. It's not outright taboo but it can be a dog whistle

Interesting. It's definitely not viewed positively anywhere I've ever heard the term.

For background, Kristall is obviously cristal in German, which is associated with cleanliness and purity and high value. The name plays into the idea of "cleaning" Germany from the "dirty" parts of society

That's not correct. The expression refers to the shards of broken glass after the Nazis destroyed the windows of Jewish stores and homes; among many other atrocities, like killing over a hundred Jewish people.

Which is why we don't use the expression any more and refer to these events as the November pogroms instead, because that better conveys the scope.

Right. In English, it's usually translated "the night of broken glass".

Soldiers are not obligated to follow unlawful orders....the brass will say "no".

Just cause the big guy called Trump a fascist doesnt mean there arent plenty of supporters down the chain of command.

If the soldiers down the chain don't get the order because the big guy ignored the fascist, then their feelings don't matter.

How much support is there for Trump in the military though?

I'm worried about the possibility that this kind of rhetoric could lead to an attempted coup or civil war.

Really depends. In general officers tend to be mixed bag while enlisted soldiers tend to lean Trump.

But it also depends the branch. In my experience most Marines tend to support Trump while the Navy and Airforce is more mixed.

I’m sure you can get some statistics if you look it up. But it’s pretty certain the military leans more conservative than the general population on average.

They lean conservative but not Trump. They voted blue in 2020 because the conservatives didn't really come out to vote for him. They also have very complicated feelings about the Constitution and targeting Americans. So they probably would refrain from getting involved in anything but the most egregious conduct, like the Jan 6th insurrection, until we're so far down the hole they can't maintain unit integrity between left and right. At that point you'd probably see about a 60/40 split.

Our two party system has been in a civil war over control of us slaves for decades. .

Spoken like a person who had no idea what slavery is .

It may not be slavery by the purest interpretation of the meaning of the word, but what we have is still essentially "do shitty work you hate or starve and die in the street".

Unfortunately people as a whole tend to follow orders regardless of their political party or legality. It's been studied and observed all throughout history

The officers already told Trump no. And when the National Guard was deployed for BLM protests they actually stuck to their ROE and didn't deploy force recklessly like the police. Even when the police tried to get the NG in trouble with the people by dressing like them and then telling the NG they might as well.

If the NG was ordered to show up at the polls they would most likely sit in a position a couple hundred meters away where most people won't see them but they'd be able to respond rapidly. They'd force the governor to be more and more explicit in their orders until they got to an actually illegal one. For example if the NG has been called for law and order they would be under the same restrictions as the police in regards to polling places. (In many states police aren't allowed to hang out there, they have to vote and leave unless someone specifically calls them and faking a call to get them there could count as election interference.)

I know it's hard to understand the military mindset from the outside looking in, but I guarantee you it's not the robotic machine that Hollywood portrays. They are very conscious of their responsibility to the people.

You don't think Trump will find people to do the job for him? Do you remember them black bagging and abducting people off the street in Portland during BLM? While the NG's performance was commendable during that turbulent time, I wouldn't rely on that fact staying true. Also I'm a vet and at least when I was in when we were given orders we weren't told why we were doing them or given any context for them so in the heat of the moment that's all you're going to have to go off of.

This is at a level far above where we dwelled. It's the guys with stars on their shoulders shielding the troops. And you're correct, Trump did find willing lackeys, but he found them in Federal Law Enforcement. Most of them came from the Bureau of Prisons. He can't openly recruit among the military the way he can among federal agents. So I'm pretty sure what will really happen, if he's elected, is he'll stand up that group of agents again, equip them heavily and just call them soldiers.

Which is actually straight out of the dictator's handbook.

Its not as simple as that though, e.g. that electro shock experiment was rather shaky and subsiquent attempts to replicate it have all but falsified its results.

What you have to do is cherry pick the small group of people that are willing to do awful things, you then get them to do those things in presence of the saner people who then feel guilty by association. After that you can use their lack of action to stop this awful thing as blackmail/guilttrip to get them to do some small awful thing of their own, and then repeat that process to get them to do increasingly awful things until everyone is just as bad as what was originally just a very small subset of that group. Importantly even though they're doing awful things they still feel bad about it but they're in too deep, this makes them even more effective than your original psychopaths because they know how they're likely to be punished should your side loose which makes them fanatical in order to avoid punishment.

Its a tried and tested process but not quite as simple as people just following orders.

We have innocent men being lawfully executed by the state in the current year. How many people in total were involved in those processes without a single one standing up for justice? Our current "liberal" presidential administration hasn't uttered a single word in opposition to their murders

That’s because that’s what liberals are and that’s what they do. MLK knew this, and spoke on it, and yet for some reason people like to pretend they didn’t hear it.

And this is exactly why I registered as an independent once Trump hit the scene and I still don't feel safe with just that. I'm not some big brain smarty-pants, but I could see this piece of shit going full Nazi from a mile away, not to mention the frothing rage Fox news has kept The Base in with regard to anyone on "the left."

It's kinda sad to know that there really were only 2 people in our entire country who really would have tried to kill Hitler and one was a damn kid.

Man someone should give him the end of his political carrier that Mussolini got. The person who does has my respect for life.

He's going to get consumed by his own MAGA faction. It's closer every day.

He rambled on about immigrants at a rally and said election day will be our Liberation Day. Sounds like mass deportation and mass killing of liberals to me.

I should have been doing it regardless, but this past weekend I started hitting the shooting range again.

Mainstream media: Trump unveils strong agenda on homeland security to battle rising crime

There's no enemy Donny. You're talking about your own countrymen.

I actually laughed out loud when I read that headline.

It's profoundly horrifying but so absurd.

Ok, then, so if they try another January 6 we're authorized to go all Tienanmen of MAGAs asses?

No

I mean, it's just fair. An eye for an eye.

I wouldn't want to make martyrs out of them, which is what that would do.

Instead, have a significant law enforcement presence on standby, and if things go that way, call them in, and round up every single one of them, in the moment, and put them all in jail, pending prosecution.

Speedy trial, sure, but another event like that will easily take months for investigators to sort out all the details and build the state's case against them. Meanwhile, they're all sitting in cells, losing their jobs, falling behind on rent and payments, having things repossessed, bringing shame and embarrassment to their families, and just so the state can't be accused of any sneaky legal maneuvers, their names and faces are to be plastered all over the media.

And bring reasonable charges, no plea deals or consideration of good behavior or lack of prior issues. When these people come out the other end of their sentences (years from now) make sure they have a nice felony conviction dogging any attempts to get their lives back on track for the next decade or three.

Make their actions and the consequences truly hurt. For them and their families. Make the spouses and children feel the pain, create resentment toward their flawed ideology that will last for a generation. And again, make it public. If these idiots want to overthrow our government, they don't get to slink back into the shadows of whatever armpit they crawled out of for the next 4 years. Let the media hound them, cameras in the street in front of the house, investigative reporters digging up embarrassing details of how they lost their jobs, the whole nine yards. Make their lives suck bad enough that the neighbor's wife starts telling her husband, "You can be pro-Trump all you like, but so help me, if you bring that shit storm to our family, I will divorce you and take the kids somewhere safe so fast your head will spin!"

In short, don't make martyrs out of them, make examples out of them.

Theres no way Trump would float at all, especially after all that weight he lost.

Fat floats pretty well and Trump is not the chiseled Adonis Ben Garrison would have you believe he is.

idiot has to know he cant do that. the ones that can had better not if they want to keep their stations

Trump will be able to do essentially whatever he wants. One of the bullet points of both Project 2025 and Agenda 47 is to greatly extend the power of the executive branch by making essentially all decision making roles in government agencies a political position. In doing so he'll fire anyone who doesn't step in line and replace them with a loyalist.

Combine that with the rulings from SCOTUS and people should be fucking terrified of him, or any Republican, being in power. Because it's not just him. He's just a useful idiot.

useful? hardly. more of an impediment to progress than any president since taft

Not useful to you, silly.

Had you not heard the term "useful idiot" before?

useful idiot, noun: 1. Soviet sympathizer in Western countries, from the perspective of the political right; 2. One who is seen to unwittingly support a malignant cause through their 'naive' attempts to be a force for good

Is it at all possible that the "radical leftist" he is referring to are ones that would potentially react violently to him becoming president? Such as the 2 that have already acted violently by him running as president?

None were leftist, and only one got as far as violence.

Yeah that's fair then, 99.99999+% of leftist don't support assassination. Trump is blowing it out of proportion.

But there are violent radicals inside the homeland, that are Americans. So he has a point somewhat.

Of the left and the right 99 out of 100 terrorist attacks in the last 2 decades were by far right extremists.

Yeah that's a fair point. I looked into it a bit more, right-wing extremists have sharply increased since Jan 6th, so there is a concern there. It isn't 99/100 though. Still high, like 90/100 Maggoty got some data, real number for violent terrorist attacks by political ideology is 85% far right to 8% far left. Or rather, 58% far right, 8% far left, 27% Islamist

For anyone interested in the stats, this is taken from the Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States (PIRUS) dataset at start.umd.edu

That includes literally any ideologically motivated crime. Protesting in the street is an ideologically motivated crime. It includes people who are just associated with extremist groups. So if your brother joins a group, congratulations, this graph represents you.

This is not what anyone is talking about when they say "terrorist attacks". And neither is releasing the cows, or egging an elected official, or handcuffing yourself to a building. This is as disingenuous as it gets.

Kicking around their Keshif tool quickly reveals that the Far right makes up 57% of all violent ideological crimes since ~1950. The far left makes up 10%.

Using filters for mass casualty crimes, intended and successful, since 2000, reveals 58% Far Right, 8% Far left, and 27% Islamist. Islamists are also Far right, we just separate them in America for obvious reasons. So you get 85% and 8% in straight up far fight vs far left since 2000.

So yeah not quite 99/100 but definitely a majority, especially recently. And I agree its very concerning that domestic terrorists are usually far-right. It is something I'll bring up in the future to Trumpists, I honestly don't know what their reaction to this info would be, but I hope it causes some kind of change.

Grouping Islamists with domestic right-wing is a bit odd, but I get your point. I doubt they would vote for Trump. Trump would also absolutely deploy the national guard and army against Islamic extremists, even if they were "right-wing" technically.

I could potentially see an argument that Islamists would be leftist in an American context, since their main opponent was the Bush and Republican administration, but that is also a stretch.

58% Far Right, 8% Far left, and 27% Islamist

Seems the most descriptive. Thanks for the info and stats

No problem, most of these groups use the most inclusive dataset they can get away with because it helps with funding. But they usually also maintain a data tool that lets you find what you need fairly quickly. And I agree that Trump far right would fight Islamic far right, but they are both still far right ideologies. We separate them in data because of base assumptions from the 20 years of wars in the middle east.