Military force? Democrats love it if it’s aimed at Trump

President Donald Trump is frequently ridiculous, as almost everyone knows. The latest evidence is his absurd name-changing, his orders that Lake Ontario become Lake America, and artificial intelligence become superintelligence. As chief executive, he can force these solecisms into official U.S. documents, but everyone else will continue using the proper names, and some future president will reorder federal officialdom back to normality.As odd as Trump is, however, he is clearly outmatched in derangement by his opponents. A poll this week found that 59% of Democrats, who are members of a party that touts its qualifications as the vital defender of democracy, would feel very or somewhat positive if the president were removed from the White House by a military coup.The Center for Strategic Politics asked people how they’d feel if they woke up in the morning and learned that various scenarios had taken place. This framing creates distance between respondents and the action they are asked to assess, making affirmative answers more likely; it is, after all, easier to be pleased by something drastic having already taken place than to advocate such a thing. Nevertheless, even with that caveat, the proportion of Democrats welcoming news that Trump had been removed from office by radical means unprecedented in this nation is startlingly high.If he were ousted under the Constitution’s 25th Amendment by his Cabinet declaring him unfit for office, 84% of Democrats would be happy. Only a tiny minority would object. If he were impeached, found guilty, and removed from his job, 87% of Democrats would welcome the news. If Trump died overnight in his sleep, 55% of Democrats would view this positively (although doubtless their hair would instantly burst into flames over Vice-President JD Vance moving into the Oval Office).Democrats draw a line only at a putative assassination of Trump. If that were to be the morning headline, 32% would have a very negative response, and 11% would feel somewhat negative about it. But on the other side of the ledger, 23% would feel very positive, and 9% would feel somewhat positive. Fully 25% would be neither positive nor negative. In other words, 57% of Democrats, adherents of a party that parades its opposition to “gun violence,” would not feel even slightly dismayed if the president were to be taken down by a fatal bullet.The gulf between who the Democrats think they are and who they really are is wider than the Grand Canyon. They believe they’re against autocracy but would be happy if the army shoved aside the people’s democratically elected president; they think they’re against “gun culture” but if it produced the political outcome they favor, most would not object; they’ve already impeached Trump twice, but they’re itching to do so again. So, as though further evidence were necessary, it is clear that Trump drives the Left crazy.But there is more to the poll findings than that. Such whacked-out sentiments as those revealed by the Center for Strategic Politics are symptoms not simply of dislike for a particular leader but of a society that has lost its bearings. Trump is more a symptom of this than its cause.In a properly ordered society with a stable and self-confident culture, political parties dislike but broadly accept government by opponents who have won power in a legitimate election, as Trump did. Democrat daydreams about their head of state being removed from office by military coup, abuse of the Constitution, lawfare, sudden death, and even murder should be seen as part of a picture of wide public distrust and dissatisfaction. The New York Times ran a news story this week declaring that “Americans have a pervasive sense that they are being lied to.” Characteristically, the paper couched its story and skewed its analysis to taint Trump and Republicans in the run-up to the November midterm congressional elections. But set its bias aside, and the story nevertheless revealed something important. Americans’ trust in their government and institutions is near an all-time low, and has been for the past 15-20 years. Trust peaked at 73% in 1958 but has declined since then and has been bumping along below 20% through the presidencies of Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and Donald Trump.It is clear to anyone with their eyes open that distrust is not confined to opinion about the federal government. And that particular distrust has been dwindling about equally through the Republican- and Democrat-led administrations. One needs to look beyond politics for the cause.It began at a point, frequently cited by conservatives, when counter-cultural movements took off in the 1960s, and every institution — the nation, patriotism, marriage, family, community, merit, diligence, honor, and much else — was subjected to hostile deconstruction. American culture is fragmented. Instead of sharing common understandings and assumptions with our compatriots, the nation was balkanized into increasingly, then thoroughly, divided subgroups.HUGO GURDON: HAKEEM JEFFRIES GETS READY TO GOVERNIn this unlovely dispensation, people are inclined to become alienated from others not in their tribe, and to assume malicious intent where there is merely disagreement. It is harder and harder in this environment to accept that people who do not share one’s own opinions may be just as smart and well-intentioned as oneself.It is then that public opinion polls find that members of one tribe would be glad to hear that the leader of another tribe had been drummed out of office, toppled, died, or even been murdered.