Sedition

This is how it starts.

The attorney general of Texas sued four other states in the Supreme Court, demanding their 2020 election results be overturned, which in addition to sowing chaos within those states and in Congress (because, let us not forget, those ballots were for more offices than one), would deny Joe Biden enough electoral votes to be inaugurated.  What seemed at first a public relations gambit and a nuisance suit by a politician looking for a preemptive pardon while being seriously investigated for federal crimes when all of his deputies accused him of corruption, quickly became a Trump loyalty test and a litmus test for a statistical majority of AlwaysTrumpers.  Seventeen other Republican attorneys-general signed on, supported by 126 US House Republicans.  (Trump requested the congressional signatures, and he made it clear he was checking the list to see who was naughty and who was nice.) 

This inspired the first use of the S word when the four states being attacked issued their withering responses, with the attorney general of Pennsylvania calling the suit a "seditious abuse of the judicial process."  

 Eventually 20 states, mostly but not all with Democratic governors and administrations, joined to oppose the case.  They and many commentators expressed shock that so many Republicans would join in denying the basis for elected representative government, otherwise known as democracy.  But sedition? 

Following the unanimous decision of the Supreme Court denying the suit brought by the attorney general of Texas that demanded essentially that the 2020 election be overturned. the chairman of the Texas Republican Party issued a statement suggesting that in response: "Perhaps law abiding states should bond together and form a Union of states that will abide by the Constitution."

Okay.  Now that's sedition.  

Even before this, Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.) requested that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi refuse to seat any members of the newly elected Congress in January who signed on to this suit.  He specifically cited Section 3 of the 14th Amendment "written after the Civil War to bar from government any traitors who would seek to destroy the Union." 

 He said this applies to 126 Republicans who signed as supporters of the Texas suit.  They included the Member who would likely become the Speaker if Republicans regain the majority.   "Stated simply, the men and women who would act to tear the United States government apart cannot serve as Members of Congress."  He called them " Members trying to overturn the election and make Donald Trump an unelected dictator."  

So this is what I meant about the Civil War.  Sedition is a loaded word and dodgy legal concept in a democracy, but when it involves issues that hark back to the War Between the States, it's clear, and it's a fighting word.

 Do Republican party leaders seriously want to start a civil war?  Probably not, at least not directly.  They support Trump's dictatorship perpetuation effort because 1) it's a spectacular money-raiser, 2) they all want the fealty of the AlwaysTrumpers once Trump is off center stage, and 3) solidifying the idea that Joe Biden is not a legitimate President will make it much easier for Mitch McConnell etc. to undermine and paralyze the incoming administration, setting Republican up for congressional victories in 2022 which could easily win them both Houses.

 But it's a dangerous game.  History tells us that Hitler was first elected because of a lot of factions out for themselves, trying to knock each other off.  They didn't started out enthralled with the Furher.  But that's where they soon found themselves.

If they don't necessarily want two sets of states at war with each other, they are fine with two utterly different realities at war with each other, creating an ungovernable country is a time of obvious crisis, apart from the underlying meta-crisis which threatens civilization and life as we know it on the planet.

This particular circus could have been much worse. Resisting it took heroic election officials in the states, the state and federal courts on every level that have turned back some 60 cynical suits so far, the media that won't swallow this.  Notably no Senators actually signed on, and several Republican Senators spoke against the suit (including one from Texas.)  

But it's still pretty bad.  Three-quarters of the Republicans in the US House, who were fine with the elections that elected them, joined the chief law enforcement officers of 18 states in demanding that the results of lawful elections be overturned, with no evidence behind their assertions, in a document that would get a high school sophomore flunked in Civics (if they still taught that),  Composition, arithmetic (a mad assertion that Biden's victory was mathematically impossible) and even spelling.  There must be law professors up on ledges all over academia.

 There will likely be more cynical court cases filed and thrown out, and there may be a play to try to get Congress to challenge electors in early January.  It takes only one Rep. and one Senator to start the process, which involves each house debating the challenges for two hours and then voting.  It takes both Houses to support the challenge, and the Trumpeteers are unlikely to get even the Senate. (I count at least 4 Republican votes against.)  

But that word is out there, and the idea is bigger than it's been, maybe since the Civil War.  (The S word being Sedition or Secession, depending on which side are you on.)  There may yet be violence around this.  But even if this particular typhoon blows itself out, the damage is probably deeper and longer.