Hoo boy, it's a toughie. On the one hand, Trump would still be around. He also wouldn't be in as much legal peril as he is now (it's likely there wouldn't have been an appetite to prosecute him over the Stormy Daniels hush money payments, and the classified documents case would have never happened to begin with since he wouldn't have had access). But he almost definitely WOULD have tried to pull off another insurrection similar to Jan 6th--he was foreshadowing that he wouldn't accept the results if he lost even back in 2016, using the same language as he did in 2020 before he launched his coup attempt.
The world where Trump doesn't attempt a coup isn't very interesting, at least for this thought experiment--he slinks off, continues shitposting about Hillary on Twitter, but likely doesn't try to run again (or loses in the primary because he's a sore loser). Everyone ignores his hush money payments in the interest of "statesmanship," and at best he becomes a minor kingmaker in the party apparatus. MAGA withers on the vine, and we largely continue with the late Obama administration status quo.
The world where he attempts a coup is much more interesting. The real question is, what would have changed after the failed insurrection attempt? It's highly unlikely it would have succeeded or even gotten anywhere as close as it did, since a lot of the original plan relied on access to the levers of power (I.e. being able to withhold security to let the rioters overrun the Capitol). But how would everyone react to it long-term? In this timeline, Republicans genuinely distanced themselves from Trump and Jan 6th at first, likely out of shock over the realization that they were actually in danger and the very real fear that they could end up hurt or killed. But as the shock wore off, Republicans started shuffling back to MAGA as the propaganda machine did its work to downplay and normalize the failed coup, and they realized that their base saw Jan 6th as a good thing.
In a theoretical timeline where Trump tries a coup in 2016, it depends on how far Trump gets before he fails. If he's thwarted to the point where he doesn't (or can't) hold the rally that stormed the Capitol, then nothing really comes of it at all--it becomes a footnote in history that is only cared about by political historians, pub trivia enthusiasts, and people who like to talk about politics on the internet. If he gets to the point where he holds a rally, but the rally is prevented from interfering with the certification process (complete with provocative images of cops in riot gear swinging at MAGA rioters), it's likely that this downplaying and normalization would have been ironically amplified by virtue of the coup attempt being less successful. Without the visceral fear of hiding from rioters, Republicans would have no reason to distance themselves from the attempt, and they would almost immediately start using it as fodder to attack the new Clinton administration. In short, the hypothetical coup attempt would become another Benghazi scandal for Clinton--something that she had little real involvement in and largely wasn't her fault, but that she gets blamed for anyway. Trump, meanwhile, would remain largely in the same position as in 2015--the dominant force in the party.
Aside from that, the court wouldn't be as openly corrupt as it is now. It'd be filled by a moderate Clinton appointee if democrats have the 51 votes to abolish the filibuster for supreme court appointees (or held open by McConnell otherwise), and when RBG dies her replacement is decided by whoever wins the 2020 election. Roe v. Wade would still exist, the chevron deference would still be the law of the land, and we wouldn't have the terrifying prospect of legally sanctioned presidential death squads.
Overall, I think we would be largely in line with the status quo of 2014-2015. Not great, with a worrying trend towards fascism and an establishment largely too busy huffing their own farts to address the vast majority of problems facing us, but a LOT better than where we are right now.
Would the hush money have ever been a thing (I don't know the timeline of when it happened, but if after the 2016 election then it likely never would've happened.)
I doubt there would've been a coup attempt in 2016, while people were interested, he was still very much an unknown to most. He didn't have the fanatical following he's known for now. While boring, I expect when would've faded into the background.
The hush money payments were before the election so they were still felonies. It's possible Trump wouldn't have bothered hiding them like he did if he lost, but in any case there wouldn't have been the appetite to prosecute him.
As for the coup, he absolutely would have tried it, definitely through filing lawsuits, and probably up to the same fake electors scheme and the riot, but it's debatable how far he would've gotten. Definitely not as far as he did in reality, though.
Yeah, there are so many moments I wish I had a time machine so I could go back and yell at various people while shaking their shoulders.
For the love of God, Barack, don't make fun of Trump at the White House correspondent's dinner, he'll run for president to dismantle all you've built up in revenge and HE WILL WIN.
Please, Ruth, I beg you to step down now while there's still an opportunity for you to be replaced with another liberal justice. If you don't, your legacy will be undone I'm under four years and it will herald the end of American democracy.
Please, Barack, don't let them steal a supreme court seat like this, you have to force the issue while there's still time or else you will watch the heritage foundation gloat about the second American revolution against the left while a corrupt court anoints the president as above the law of the land.
For the love of God, Biden, please run in 2016, I know you're still grieving over the death of your son, but if you don't you'll be grieving over the death of your entire country.
For the love of God, Hillary, please step aside and let Sanders be the candidate, I know you agreed with Obama that he would give you SoS in return for you running after him but the Republican propaganda machine has made you toxic.
Barack, you can't sweep this Russian interference under the rug, it's too important to ignore, please!
I beg you, Hillary, don't ignore the rust belt, your numbers are weaker than they should be there and they are too important to lose, the literal future of democracy is at stake.
For fuck's sake, Comey, don't reopen this stupid email investigation two weeks before the election, we both know there's nothing on that fucking laptop. You need to shut down the trumpy faction before they leak its existence because they are trying to interfere with the election, and if Trump wins he will reward you with a pink slip while gleefully dragging the country to a dictatorship.
This timeline could've been so easily avoided, if only one variable out of dozens was different. But here we are, with me wondering where I can even flee to in order to escape the coming dictatorship.
No way in hell would Clinton have been even remotely as corrupt as Trump. You're just projecting the fact that you are using any excuse to excuse his corruption.
Shed be finishing up her second term and there is no evidence that she is in some poor health. It seems you keep mistaking Trump's shortcomings for Clinton's.
Are you suggesting that she won't make it till Jan? Because that just ridiculous if you have to point to something that happened seven years ago to prove it.
As surprised as people using a, "cold" for Biden's senile dementia on the debate stage. Everyone but Biden's fans knew this old man was in decline and now Dems are acting surprised or lol... making excuses. You're not the type to be surprised by Biden's decline, you're the type to use excuses foolishly.
fkin dead. Thanks man, I definitely enjoyed that taco.
You even know the video was misleading, which is why you posted it without context. You're desperate to avoid admitting you were wrong, and maybe even in this case easily duped by propaganda...so it has to be me that is foolish and making up excuses.
You think you see yourself in me, which is why this has you so frustrated. But I assure you, it's your shortcoming alone here.
Damn you're pretty good.. long ago I would self proclaim to be libertarian.. but the libertarian party is full on fkin derpy, stopped caring about the Libertarian party a couple years after Ron Paul was on the debate stage owning the status quo. And not so much a Russian stooge.. I just don't have beef with Russia or Russians. Cold war is over.
No, the sheer lack of understanding and critical thinking to grasp why your comment is wrong is what makes you delusional. Criticizing both sides is what people are supposed to do.
Wat. My sheer lack of understanding and critical thinking... Hillary is fkin corrupt. Just about every person that opposed Hillary and put her on blast ended up unalived, but your excuse will be, "it's a coincidence". Not to mention, Hillary's a racist ass bitch. She put ethnic minorities under the umbrella term, "Super predators". The Dems did some massive damage to ethnic minorities, destroyed innocent lives and families. At the aftermath of the crime bill, that should have been the moment they should have turned their backs on the Dems.
But I concede.. I lack understanding and critical thinking haha.
Without Trump fucking shit up on a government level (the Supreme Court in particular), there would probably be less scary shit happening on that end. Would have slowed things down.
But the radicalisation of the Americans began before 2016. Trump is a symptom, not a cause. The disease started spreading as early as 2008. The recession, the damp squib that was the Occupy Wall Street event was the inception of many political movements, both far left AND far right.
That's the thing people don't realise. Even if Donald J. Trump didn't exist, the underlying social tensions mean that inevitably someone would show up to galvanise far right sentiments, and the political estabilishment would have boosted them, whoever they were, because when the common folk are getting angry about their lot, then to the people actually in charge, a fascist dictatorship is preferrable to the alternative.
I think that electing someone as deranged as Trump — who basically would try anything and everything that a sane person wouldn’t risk out of self-preservation, we basically saw a speedrun of finding out all the weaknesses and exploits of our government, combined with proving that impeachment and removal is basically impossible as long as one party is in collusion with the president.
We might have gotten here anyway, but it might have been a decade or two rather than four short years.
And the Supreme Court wouldn’t look like it does and be doing what’s it’s doing, which is also now a speedrun of horror.
Yeah. Pushing for nearly immunity of the president might turn out to be very costly when someone actually reckless comes to presidency. And I presume Trump will be a version of that someone, as he is getting old and there won't be another term for him. Nothing to lose, all to gain. He will make th US a shit show.
No, it started with Nixon, and his Southern Strategy. Reagan and the Silent Majority--which was fundamentally about racism and the desire to segregate schools, even though abortion was their cause célèbre--made it worse. And Newt Gingritch and the "Contract With America" really threw gasoline on the fire.
I mean if you wanna dive that deep, it started when some religious extremists got kicked out of England for being too extremist (for the british empire!) and moved to the new world, killing the people who previously lived there.
... But up until 2008 shit more or less held together? Not pretending 'murica was ever good, but it was the 2008 recession that caused its structure, however fucky it had been from first principles, to really break down.
The modern far-right really got it's first big taste of legitimacy with the Tea Party. Which, yes, would be 2009-ish, and a blood-relative to the election of Obama. (E.g., without Obama as president, the racist fears of the Tea Party would have fizzled out in the harsh light of reality.) But I look at all of this on a continuum; the only two conservatives I see in recent memory that have made an apparently sincere attempt to stop the crazy train have been John McCain (...although he took Palin as a running mate...) and Mitt Romney, and they both got crushed by Dems. Well, maybe Liz Cheney too. Maybe. But she was okay with everything except Trump, so I dunno. Anyway, point is - Nixon, Reagan, and Gingritch were all laying the foundations and drawing up the architectural plans that Trump has used, and is using now, to build his version of a fascist state.
The modern far-right really got it’s first big taste of legitimacy with the Tea Party
Thanks a bunch Koch brother (still quite happy at least one of them is dead.)
That is entirely an astroturfed "caucus" along with the freedumb caucus... Bought and paid for by the ownership class. Ever wonder why those assholes never go away no matter how horrible they are? They're the Koch's henchmen...
I'd say it'd depend on the specifics of the result.
Taking the wind out of MAGA's sails would take a blowout victory and Hillary wasn't gonna get that without doing some serious full court pressing for the entire general campaign, like well beyond even the "she should have campaigned more in the rust belt!" ideas people have about where she fell short.
Nope. The racist bastards would still be hiding under their rocks and you wouldn't have an army wearing red dunce caps drooling while driving their ram pickups with flags in the back.
trump is just a symptom of underlying problem in society that manifests itself all over the world.
populist politicians trying to appeal to nostalgy for "good old times", ability to weaponize social media and craft customized lies to every minor group, russian bot networks spewing out propaganda... it is something that creates problems everywhere and it will not get better.
recent eu parliament elections are shining example.
Yes. Just because trump lost doesn't mean conservative propaganda hasn't been spewing hate and lies for decades. Even before obama, I knew people that hated Democrats but could never tell me why. Their propaganda has labeled Democrats enemies for quite a long time now. They started this shit back in the 50s-70s. Republicans have been brainwashed and somehow they're proud of that fact.
From my limited view, I think not much would be different... The US was already down this path. I think we have to look back further to the Bush/Gore election. That election initially sowed distrust in the election process with hanging chads and SCOTUS involvement in politics. This laid a blueprint for the success Trump and the Republicans have had.
You can bet that there would have been 8 years of propaganda against her. And we would have lost even more house/senate seats because people on the left historically decide to not bother to vote in midterms unless there is an active threat on CNN.
And... I am pretty sure we would have lost in 2020 because of COVID. Which would basically put us back to where we were in 2020 in terms of having a deranged fascist who nobody realized was too dumb to accomplish anything (not a problem this time. See Project 2025).
The main difference would be the Supreme Court. Yes, republicans did everythiing they could to protevent Obama from appointing anyone and I would not put it past them to have stretched that out for a full four years. But Scalia (Rest in Piss) would still be dead and so would Ginsburg (fuck her for putting us in this mess). Which would have made the math a lot tighter. 7 justices but the math would have been tight enough that Hilary likely would have gotten to appoint at least one moderate.
I think Hilary would have bought us the better part of a decade because, like her or not, she is an incredibly effective politician... when nobody thinks she is running for POTUS. She is/was even more generally liked by both sides of the aisle than Biden and would never have had to make concessions to sanders and The Squad for the 2020 ticket (Biden is an asshole but his platform is shockingly Left leaning by US standards...)..
And I think trump would have faded into nothing. But there are plenty of other people who were just looking for an excuse to become a magat on the republican side. And people like cruz and romney and even liz cheney would not be complete laughing stocks without trump. So, at best, we were looking at a ticking clock to the next "reagan republican" as it were.
Like, there are a lot of people who consider the day Ginsburg died to be the day the US collapsed. And we are seeing exactly the repercussions of that with shit like today.