Yet another Hacker News

U.S. in Highest-Risk Category for Civil War, Coup, or Collapse in CIA Model

29 points JumpCrisscross 52 minutes ago 9 comments

huijzer 13 minutes ago | parent

If the CIA could figure out how to stabilize a country that would be nice, but seems they know only how to destabilize countries when looking at their track record [1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_involvement_in_r...

well_ackshually 11 minutes ago | parent

Breaking news: after being the biggest threat to world stability, the US realizes that their behavior is also a threat to their own stability.

FrankWilhoit 10 minutes ago | parent

There are no blue states. There are only blue cities. If they wish to "secede", what that indicates is that they have not thought through how easy it is to block a road.

CuriouslyC 6 minutes ago | parent

By that logic, there are no red states, only red hinterlands.

mcmcmc 3 minutes ago | parent

[delayed]

maelito 9 minutes ago | parent

Yes, that's the impression from abroad, from Europe.

noir_lord 5 minutes ago | parent

The worrying thing for me as a citizen of a European country (though one not now in the EU) is that we appear to be on a similar path though perhaps a little further back on it.

It is not normal for a hard right/far right party to get 72 million quid funding from crypto-billionaires within 3 days while that same party is under police investigation for breaking laws on electoral funding/donations.

That and the more... interesting folks over the pond seem determined to interfere with our politics as well.

The instability/uncertainty in the US is because of their historical (and current) weight on events is spreading everywhere.

It's easy to poke fun at the US while downplaying our issues but in the long run, *unwise*.

HPsquared 7 minutes ago | parent

Always worth studying 1980s USSR.

ModernMech 7 minutes ago | parent

No CIA model needed. A man caused an insurrection meant to overthrow and destabilize the government. Instead of holding him accountable, his actions were ignored despite a clear directive in the Constitution he should never hold any office again; he was nevertheless made president again; he pardoned all the insurrectionists; and now wants to pay them and himself with tax dollars for his inconvenience.

That system is bound for collapse, I don’t care what any model says it just cannot be sustained as a country that ostensibly cares about laws and the Constitution. It’s a joke all the way down.

alephnerd 4 minutes ago | parent

Barbara Walter's model (which is what Armitage is leveraging) is deeply flawed and not the norm in most studies into autocracies and state instability.

And to add on to that, Armitage himself has been a provocateur for "soft secession" (which is basically an attempt at trying to instigate a nullification crisis 2.0).