Back in November, a few weeks after the election when it was clear that Joe Biden had won and that President Trump seemed like he was trying to reverse the results.

I got a text from a friend.

It read in all caps,

we are in a coup.

Being a habitual skeptic, honestly, I just laughed.

I thought, yes, things are really wild. It's weird that the Republican Party is unable to process their electoral laws.

But a coup d'état? Come on.

I was born in Iran, a country with a terrible history of political upheaval. It's shaped my entire life.

This isn't that.

Yet, despite my skepticism, things got more serious.

The terrible signs that something bad was coming started stacking up. More and more people questioned the election.

Some were calling for an overthrow of the government. People seemed to get angrier by the day.

The idea that we might not see a peaceful transfer of power got more and more commonplace.

And some historians and journalists were sounding the alarm. They saw the signs.

They cited the history of other countries who had democratic systems that collapsed. When so many of us asked,

can that really happen here? They answered, yes, it can.

And finally, on January 6th, those ominous predictions came true.

Amal, incited by fiery political speeches and months of accusations that the presidential elections were rigged,

stormed the Capitol with the aim of reversing the election by force. Five people died.

It was a shock to so many Americans across the political spectrum.

That question about whether it could happen here had an answer. Yes, it could.

But maybe the question was the problem. Maybe the stubborn exceptionalism of living in a country that constantly bombards itself with positive tales of past greatness forced us to ask that question.

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