When did the GOP Coup begin, in reality?

[Gore1FL]

I was thinking about this. People keep warning the coup is still on going. I believe it is. When did it start, though? Looking back, I see some possibilities. In my mind, as I look back, I feel like this has been smoldering for a good while. I am interested in the thoughts of others.

37 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	1968 Nixon/Vietnam
	2 (5%)
	1972 Nixon/Watergate
	1 (3%)
	1994 Newt Gingrich (in general, but including the later impeachment)
	23 (62%)
	2000 Bush v Gore
	5 (14%)
	2016 Trump/Russian Interference
	0 (0%)
	2021 The January 6th attack on the capitol
	0 (0%)
	Other Time/incident?
	6 (16%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[Swede]

1. Bill Clinton's impeachment was payback for watergate.

nt

[zipplewrath]

2. Mostly Newt

He's the one that said the GOP had become to comfortable being the "loyal minority". Really, the current insanity though finds its true nexus in the realization in the early 2000's that they could control the senate and the House with a minority by gerrymandering much of the country. It was then that the party decided to be the "controlling minority". They control 50% of the Senate with the votes of just 30% of the population. Their representation in the House is even worse. And it affects the EC which is why Hillary lost, and the Orange Menace only by about 85000 votes in the right states, despite losing over all by millions. They have now successfully manipulated the Supreme Court with a significant majority despite representing around 30% of the country. And soon, probably by 2040, 70% of the population will live in only 15 states which means that 30% of the population will control a majority of the senate, and have a disproportionate representation in the House, not to mention the EC.

[OAITW r.2.0]

7. I give him credit, too.

Boundless hypocrisy. Power for Power's sake. His Contract on America was designed to destroy the Institution of Democracy.

[FakeNoose]

3. One of your choices should be Ronald Reagan

Remember ... "trickle down economics"?

[Akacia]

6. yup I was looking for him as a choice.

[Auggie]

16. Reagan: "Government is the problem"

[Silver Swan]

18. Yes!

I remember when values changed under Reagan.

[Auggie]

21. Those four words destroyed the social agenda

[electric_blue68]

25. Oh, yeah... THAT 😬

[JustAnotherGen]

19. The sneaky shit

He pulled with the hostages

[unblock]

5. I went with newt, but arguably, 10/7/1996.

The founding of foxnews.

[radicalleft]

8. Gotta go with Bush v. Gore

They tested the water and realized they could get away with anything...

[betsuni]

9. When the country club party sold out to vulgar movement conservatives and Christian evangelicals.

Seventies. Gingrich putting the party firmly on the path to Trump. Right-wing media bubble accomplished brainwashing voting base. Inevitable.

[Enter stage left]

10. The election of Reagan!

[I_UndergroundPanther]

11. When this country was founded.

Not every founder saw eye to eye on what a more perfect union meant.

[LonePirate]

12. It started after Clinton won in '92 and went into overdrive when Obama won in '08.

They truly thought they had a permanent lock on the Presidency after GHWB won in '88. Clinton's victory upended that and sent them into a tailspin. They thought they had stabilized things after stealing the election from Gore and swiftboating Kerry. Then Obama won with a very young and urbanized/suburbanized coalition that shook them to their core. They have been completely batshit insane ever since.

[electric_blue68]

26. Well said, too.

[William769]

13. The day Bill Clinton became President.

[Stinky The Clown]

14. Newt

Way back in the early days of internet political boards, mystery sig line was Shewt Newt.

[hunter]

15. Ronald "Meat Puppet" Reagan.

Every Republican President since has been a meat puppet.

The devil recognized his mistake with Nixon. Nixon had his own agenda that was not always compatible with the devil's, but not necessarily any less evil.

[JHB]

17. They've been on this precise trajectory since the one-two combo of Limbaugh and Gingrich...

...and that's how I voted because of the "precise trajectory" part, but you can take it back to the 1952 Republican primary, where conservative Taft supporters aching to undo the New Deal were outmaneuvered by Northeastern moderates like Dewey to make Eisenhower the presidential nominee. The founders of modern Movement Conservatism, like then-27-year-old William F. Buckley, were livid at this "betrayal."

Between that and the 1964 "betrayal" of Republican moderates who voted for Johnson over Goldwater, they were set firmly on eliminating opposition, not stopping at compromises "nobody liked but everyone could live with." Their goals were too radical to make headway by that method. Their first target was the "quislings" of 1964, the Rockefeller Republicans. And by the mid-Eighties, they'd succeeded in wiping the RRs out.

Then, by 1992, two things had happened that scared the shit out of them. The first was the fall of the Soviet Union. Sure, they celebrated, but what were they going to do now, without the looming threat of The Evil Empire? The second was the Democrats nominating the Pro-Business, ok-with-the-death-penalty governor of a Southern "right to work" state, one who (with some differences) accepted the basic framework of Reaganomics the way Ike had accepted the framework of the New Deal. Someone who could get squishy weak conservatives who believed all that stuff about "small government" and "getting government off the backs of the people" to declare victory and go home, and not carry on to overthrowing all that stuff that sets "real conservatives" hissing like vampires with a cross thrust in their face: Social Security, Medicare, and other mainstream "big Government" programs.

So they went post-modern and left facts behind. They'd take control through bile, fantasy, and horseshit, where we are today.

[LakeArenal]

20. When they lost the Civil War and have paid the country back in spades.

[CMYK]

23. This

[Iggo]

22. 1980.

[Celerity]

24. Right after their crushing defeat with Goldwater in 1964. That is when they they first started to

game theory out what would become the Southern Strategy of racial re-alignment of the parties. At the same time you had the ur-type RW modern evangelicals start to envision becoming politically active at ALL levels of government (from the local ground levels up) to degrees not seen in decades, and do so using planned systemic control strategies for the first time on a national scale.

White Power became engaged to, then, after a decade or so, married a Fascist-conceived RW Jeebus. Thus was spawned the hybrid rough beast that grew into the party of Reagan and then Trump, suckled on greed, fear, power-lust at all costs, and hate.

[moondust]

27. Reagan

The presidency of Ronald Reagan in the United States was marked by numerous scandals, resulting in the investigation, indictment, or conviction of over 138 administration officials, the largest number for any president in American history.
~
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reagan_administration_scandals

Demonizing "big gubment" (to the benefit of predatory fat cats) worked for Reagan so it became standard GQP practice. Now worse than ever after people learned to hate "big gubment" and embrace a corrupt, lawless pResident.

[Polybius]

28. How could you have left out Reagan 1980?

It would be winning.

[inwiththenew]

29. At least since the 90s

Trump may have emboldened them and gave them a voice but he didn't create them. He just tapped into something that had been building for decades.

[Spider Jerusalem]

30. 1987. when Reagan's FCC abolished the Fairness Doctrine

paved the way for the rise of right-wing talk radio like Rush Limbaugh, which contributed to the GOP's 1994 victory and helped lead to where we are now (including the creation of a separate right-wing media ecosystem, since Rupert Murdoch looked at the numbers Limbaugh was doing and said "I want some of that market", which is how you get Fox News).

[myccrider]

31. Why isn't Reagan a choice?

HE ushered in trickle down economics and the ideology of government being the source of all problems.

[Efilroft Sul]

32. Powell Memo, August 23, 1971

https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/democracy/the-lewis-powell-memo-a-corporate-blueprint-to-dominate-democracy/