Related to that assassination post going around: I think it's important to remember that assassinations don't generally like,...
Related to that assassination post going around: I think it’s important to remember that assassinations don’t generally like, work? I mean, I imagine they work sometimes, but I can’t think of any political assassinations in a democracy that achieved their goal. It’s certainly not better than chance. It’s no more stalins no more Hitlers all over again! Locating political power in politicians, or even the rich, is missing the bigger picture. This isn’t to say those people have no power, they have lots of power, but their power pales in comparison to the sea of political forces that drive them. It’s like trying to stop a tsunami by sinking the boats it’s carrying along! Sure, maybe you stop that one boat from hitting something but there’s another one popping up to replace it, because the boats are not the main thing!
i mean, that still leaves the question of why supreme court justices aren’t murdered more often
sure, you kill a president or a congressperson and you still gotta deal with all the people who elected them. supreme court justices are powerful (lots of important votes are 5-4!) and appointed by whoever is in office at the time, not vast impersonal forces. you can actually have substantial influence on the US by controlling the timing of when supreme court justices get appointed, cf. the people who insisted that ruth bader ginsburg should have retired during Obama’s presidency
(presumably if they did get murdered very often you’d switch to a new system for appointing them that incentivises it less, i imagine, so it’s not a long-term strategy)
(to be clear this post does not endorse political assassinations of any kind, including but not limited to members of the supreme court, or for that matter non-political assassinations and non-assassination murders. don’t kill people, kids, it’s bad)
don’t kill people, kids, it’s bad
Do you pull the lever?
I mean, I imagine they work sometimes, but I can’t think of any political assassinations in a democracy that achieved their goal
While assassinating heads of state sure isn’t a reliable strategy I would, like, endorse to achieve fundamental political reform (RIP Narodnaya Volya), Andrew Johnson becoming president at the very least moved things in the direction Boothe and co would have hoped for. And McKinley getting shot basically rang n the whole Progressive Era, since TR was slowly rotting in the VP’s chair as that wing of the party’s consolation prize. Which isn’t exactly an anarchist revolution, but it something.
Major assassinations create at least a minor shock, a government reshuffle (to fill the hole) and raising the tension level.
Which means a newly scrambled government has to handle, as their first action, a shock, under raised tensions where new forces may enter the fray or exercise newly unlocked powers (yes, this is an internalization of Hearts of Iron, and I haven’t even read the blog essay of it yet)
Which at least sets up rapid change according to the internal forces of a regime-system, where the previous situation was held in place by external forces (to the state, to the particular cleavage at issue, etc.)