Comment by dataflow

Most of the people who make the argument I described probably believe the UN is the only legitimate body that could make this decision, based on some combination of practicality, historical precedent, and international agreement. And the UN absolutely has a mechanism for doing it (the security council). But one alternatively might argue the UN is broken/dysfunctional/corrupt enough that it can't be relied on despite having the "proper paperwork", just as national democracies can be for national affairs.

Unfortunately the non-democratic nations outnumber the democratic nations at the UN: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index

It's why the UN has an obsession with a tiny democracy in the middle east and ignores the multitude of brutal dictatorships which oppress and kill far more people around it and across the globe.

Who decides when a leader is illegitimate or not?

Well, as always, who decides the leader is illegitimate? Are the Saudis illegitimate, according the the rubric we put on Maduro?

The UN deliberately has no mechanism for this because it's a talking shop intended to help avoid war by providing a talking venue. That's the whole idea, they're not the world police, there is no such thing. They're a forum.

I'm absolutely not defending any given dictator but history shows that every attempt to remove a dictator "for the greater good" is usually 1) selfishly motivated and 2) backfires horribly.

Right but "Don't kidnap/assassinate the enemy leaders" is often a good policy even when nobody will enforce that rule on you by force.

For example if your country is subject to a terror bombing campaign, it's very tempting to assassinate the one leader who had the power/respect/authority to order the attacks to start but often they're also the only leader who can order the attacks to stop

In the 1970s/1980s presumably the UK could have had IRA leaders Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness assassinated. But it sure turned out to be useful, in the late 1990s peace process, that the IRA had identifiable, living leaders who could engage in negotiation, sign an agreement, and get the bomb makers to stop making bombs.

Russia is a regional power, though.

Public opinion?

The UN security council is one reasonable and popular choice, although it has lots of problems.

But enforcement is not even my point. I'm referring to a moral principle.

I can see how all of this is about leftists on HN, well done.

That's easily written if you're in the country that benefits most from that situation, not so easily in other countries.

The entire post-WWII system with the UN and international law was an attempt to change this.

The Colorado Supreme Court ruled Trump engaged in insurrection as a matter of fact. That is, they deemed it so obvious from the evidence presented (much of which was publicly available) that it didn't require a trial for determination.

This was appealed to the US Supreme Court, who didn't rule that this wasn't true, they ruled that the 14th amendment needs to be applied by Congress for reasons of consistency across states... which sidestepped the entire issue and was a dereliction of duty in my opinion, in the sense that they are the highest court and could have ruled on the issue of insurrection, or at least required some kind of jury proceeding at that time. They basically didn't do their one job.

Then Jack Smith later amassed a case about it, with grand jury approval. He ran out of time to try and convict Trump before he was elected, basically published a summary report of his case. Recently he testified before a congressional committee about it and asserted he was extremely confident Trump would have been convicted. He testified that he never consulted with Biden about the case, and asked that the rest of his materials from his investigation be publicly released.

Legally speaking there is a strong argument that Trump engaged in insurrection; he's just been shielded from the consequences by political maneuvers and poor timing.

Put differently, one state supreme court decided he so obviously engaged in it that it didn't require a trial. Another federal attorney presented his evidence to a grand jury and they decided he was likely to succeed if it went to trial.

My personal belief is historians will look at the evidence presented and conclude that US Congress made catastrophic mistakes by not impeaching Trump the first time (for obstruction of justice first, and insurrection second), and that SCOTUS made an equally catastrophic mistake (or corrupt decision) by not ruling on insurrection as the highest federal court, either on its own or with a grand jury trial.

Bookmark this comment because it’s going to be very relevant in a few years.

Ok, now who can do the toppling? What if China had done this?

Zelensky has suspended elections since Russia invaded. He hasn't had a chance to be voted out, and probably will never get one.

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Those are some good quotes.

Just speculating, but I wonder if there is another purpose as well: To hand the military a story it can tell itself to assure they are still the "good guys" - i.e. ensuring "troop morale".

If you have thousands and thousands of servicemembers, not all of them might submit to drill or be motivated by money or career advancements or other personal goals - some people might ask questions about the bigger picture, about why they are doing an operation, etc. I imagine for situations like this, it's useful for an officer to have some ready-made answers available that they can use to counter those questions, even if the answers really don't make a lot of sense.

For all the personnel who executed the Maduro operation, the "we're just helping law enforcement to arrest a criminal" story was probably the practical reality for the last months, no matter how ridiculous it is in the larger context.

I'm so bored.

Trump is a sex offender. He's also a convicted criminal. He is also completely devoid of ethics or morality.

But because of the car crash that is American politics, you have to address all of this through the theatre of the set of documents associated with the world's most infamous paedophile (who also appears to be his best mate).

It's exhausting.