“The Makings of a Coup”

December 12, 2020

A “coup” is defined as “a sudden, violent, and illegal seizure of power from a government” (Dictionary)

         The US Supreme Court battled down a legal challenge to the Democrat’s win in the state of Arizona with a terse, one sentence “application denied” order.    (by Anthony Zurcher, North America reporter BBC News) Trump’s election case:  A week in Trump and Biden’s split-screen America)

This left Trump placing all his judicial hopes on a lawsuit filed by the attorney general of Texas that sought to discard the presidential election results in four states Biden won – Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia.  Texas asked the court to allow state legislatures – which happen to be controlled by Republicans – to determine who should get their electoral votes.

                Election law experts largely scoffed at the prospects for the suit – “utter garbage,” writesUC-Irvine Professor Rick Hasen – but 17 other states with Republican attorneys general, as well as Trump himself, joined the effort.

On Friday night, the Supreme Court slammed that door closed as well.

This ruling was slightly longer that the one-sentence response in a Pennsylvania case.  Two justices, Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas wouldn’t have dismissed the lawsuit outright.  But even they would not express a view on whether Texas’s attempt to throw out millions of votes and effectively hand the presidency to Trump had merit.

This decision paves the way for the members of the Electoral College to meet in state capitals across the US on Monday.  At that point, Trump’s legal challenges to the election will be finished.

  (Anthony Zurcher, BBC News)

“For individual and organizations that champion the rule of law and claim the mantle of the founding principles of our nation to call for overturning an election reeks of hypocrisy” conservative commentator Linda Chavez  (quoted BBC news)

Let us give thanks for the Supreme Court who has effectively thrown cold water on the destructive fire of a coup orchestrated by the Republican Party and President Trump, along with many supporters.  These persons have been trying to kindle this fire of a “coup d’etat” across this nation and burn down the house of our democracy!

Having lived almost 67 years in the United States of America and personally witnessing the office of the Presidency of the United States from President Eisenhower to the present day, I have been appalled, alarmed and sickened by the actions of the current President and his cronies in Congress who are willing to sacrifice our democracy and rule of law of the United States of America in an apparent coup d’etat to satisfy the whims of one power hungry man who has poisoned the wells of our democracy, thrown out common sense and reason in his desire to become a dictator.  He and others have attempted to overturn the will of the electorate, of the citizens of the United States of America, simply because he (Trump) does not like the results of the 2020 election.

If this is not a coup d’etat, then what is?  The only thing lacking is for the military to come and take over Washington, D.C.!  For the five Congressman from South Carolina (all Republican) to join this effort ranks of sedition against our nation and should, in my opinion, all be appropriately punished for this crime.  Are these the type of representatives we need in Washington, D.C?  These men collectively, to a person, are willing to sacrifice our democracy in order to keep their positions of power.  They fall lock step in line like the cowards they are, pretending to uphold the rule of law, when in fact they are attacking the very foundations of our democracy they swore on the Bible to uphold!  This type of behavior makes me spit on the ground whenever I utter their names.

The average citizen of the United States of America, apparently believing that we are immune to power hungry white men taking over the reins of our democracy, being illiterate in even the simplest concepts of democracy and the rule of law taught in 9^th grade Civics class, are more concerned about Christmas shopping than the health of our nation.  As I have previously said, “if the laws of our nation do not apply to every man, woman and child they apply to no one!”  Persons who pretend to uphold the rule of law and subvert it at the same moment are liars to the truth, not only to their own selves, but to all citizens of this great nation.  We will all together live by the laws of our nation or we will die by them, but at least we all have the same laws.

President Trump from the beginning has been a lawbreaker.  Because of his constitutional position as President he has not only pardoned felons who helped him gain power, but he has even considered pardoning himself and by some reports, members of his immediate family as well.  This does not keep him, however, from railing against Hunter Biden’s tax filings even while he pays no taxes of his own.   Unlike all Presidents before him, he won’t even release his own taxes so it can be judged if he is doing anything illegal or not! The man who does whatever he pleases regardless of law, is now pushing ahead to execute as many federal prisoners as he can before Joe Biden becomes president, as Biden has promised to end executions for most federal crimes.

I speak out as a Christian minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior in the hopes of somehow saving some of my brothers and sisters in the faith of Christ who have themselves been carried away by the hypocrisy of this moment.  I call out to them:  NO MORE!  NO MORE!  WAKE UP FROM YOUR STUPOR AND SLEEP!  NO LONGER REST IN THE GRAVE OF SPIRITUAL DEATH BY HYPOCRISY!  AS CHRISTIAN MEN AND WOMEN WHO LOVE JESUS OUR LORD, RISE FROM THE DEADNESS OF THIS GRAVE AND EMBRACE THE LIVING JESUS IN YOUR HEARTS!   BE BORN AGAIN INTO THE WAY OF ETERNAL LIFE IN JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD!  AMEN.

We are approaching Christmas, when we celebrate the gift of a Savior in the baby Jesus, God Incarnate, Savior of our world.  I am hopeful, yea, even encouraged, that the God in Christ who came to live among us so that we could know him and believe in Him, and so find in Christ the good news and the way of eternal life WILL SAVE US ALL!  Loving God in Christ depends on grace and truth.  We cannot live in Christ without both grace and truth.  Let us not as Christians in this most confusing and difficult time in our nation forsake truth.  Just like grace, truth is our life blood.  We cannot live in Christ without abiding in Christ, in the power of Christ’s eternal life.  He is the vine; we are the branches.  Without Christ we can do nothing!

If we wed ourselves to anyone other than Christ, we have married a bastard husband.  The is no person who deserves our allegiance other than Christ!  This is the truth of the gospel!  The good news is that God in Christ, by his grace, can restore even the most lost soul to integrity and truth.  I pray for God to awaken us all from the dead, so we might live in him, without hypocrisy, without blame, without shame in the truth and grace of eternal life.  This is the good news we share together, “one beggar showing another beggar where to find bread!”

And so in closing my little word for today, we are reminded at Christmas to remember the Christ who came to us in order to save us from our sins and to give to us freely the gift of eternal life, though the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord!  This is Jesus, in whom we believe and whom we serve! To Him, Jesus Christ our Lord, we give all praise, glory, honor and power, both now and in the world which is to come!  Amen and Amen!  “We praise you, and you alone, Lord Jesus Christ!”

Bill Wilson, servant of God, by God’s grace and mercies!  Amen!