Well, when you've got a lot of money in a capitalist country and that money is influential,

like, use it. That's what happened. Unless somebody stops you. Unless there's a law pass.

Hello and welcome to Wise This Happening with me, your host, Chris Hayes.

Recently, we had Jimmy Rask and the Congress member on the podcast. And if you haven't heard that

episode, I really recommend it. And one of the things that's striking about talking to Congress

and Raskin who's serving on the January 6th committee is that he refers to what happened on January 6th

as a fascist coup or a would-be fascist coup sometimes. And you know, that's very powerful,

powerful language. And I think it's powerful language because it's the kind of language we don't

normally think of in an American context. And that's, I think, part of the power of that phrase

and the effect of it. I think it's probably also true about insurrection. All these kind of

linguistic terms we've grappled with to describe what happened to American democracy

tend to have these associations with foreign countries. But there's actually a fascinating

footnote on that about a fascist coup plot in the United States, at least one that was alleged.

And in 1934, one of the most decorated Marines, General Smedley Butler, testified before a

House Congressional inquiry and then subsequently made that public that he had been recruited by

a Wall Street bond salesman and another high ranking military official to essentially

be the figurehead for a fascist coup against FDR. That a combination of right wing business

interests who hated the new president and thought he was a communist and thought he was extinguishing

American liberty and was going to destroy American capitalism along with veterans and active

duty members who were sympathetic to that cause. Would unite and march an army of Butler said

that he was promised 500,000 troops on the Capitol under the false pretense that FDR was sick

and declare Butler and maybe somewhat else as the kind of, you know, reigning dictator of the country.

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