The coup is forming now. It’s a takeover not by force of arms and certainly not by our thoroughly emasculated military leadership. Instead, the seeds of devolution are being sown on a feather bed masquerading as an American rescue, plumped up by the sensible masters of polite society, those very few who can proclaim they hate Washington and politics on the one hand and pretend on the other that they have had no part in any or every failed adventure of the past two decades.

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is everywhere these days, making speeches, appearing on TV, being quoted in the news media, groping the minds of America’s Boy Scouts. He is the kingpin of these American Yodas, urging Congress to pass fast-track power to complete the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) on trade, concerned that Hillary Clinton’s use of personal email for government business was “risky,” opining about ISIS, commenting on the final episode of Mad Men (okay, maybe not).

Sunday Gates was on Face the Nation, not exactly a must see for the Gawkersphere, but the epicenter of geriatric astuteness and bloviation. There our Mister Jane Pittman opined that not one of the candidates currently in the Presidential field for 2016 has any national security experience. “I haven’t been particularly impressed, frankly, by anybody at this point. On either side of the aisle,” HE said. He then followed up by saying that Hillary was knowledgeable and tough, even though they had their differences (she was too tough!). Don’t worry though, he followed, they will learn. From him and his like. And then they will beg him to serve. That made me think for the umpteenth time, what does this guy actually want?

This weak on national security thing – it’s the same slam that the right communicated about Clinton and Obama, and then even weirder the left used it against Bush junior with his National Guard service. In the Gates lexicon, national security experience is synonymous with surrender, which is to say that the candidates, whomever they are, had better attach themselves to the likes of Gates and get on board with the agenda if they want to serve. That’s how we got Cheney and Rumsfeld, and, frankly, that’s how we got Gates, chosen by Bush in 2006 to be the anti-Rumsfeld and then kept on by Obama to shore up his own defenses.

It’s uniquely in the field of national security that the Gates’ of the world – Republican and Democratic – can be either hawk or dove, left and right, because in the field of national security, there is only one acceptable policy stance, and that’s the one that roots for war. In the Clinton years, humanitarian intervention became the war cry. For whatever you think about Bush junior and Iraq, he just inherited the tough regime-change policies of the two previous administrations and that also meant war with Iraq. Obama has just droned on, whatever is labeled terror obligates us to a lifetime of perpetual war. Gates can go on Face the Nation , as he did Sunday, and say that the alternative to negotiations with Iran isn’t war, that is, until it is. Always relevant, never trapped.

You might think I’m overstating the coup, and I am, except for the mental coup that homogenizes every alternative possibility and sets every agenda. That’s how Gates actually became President the last time there was a coup, and it is an interesting story.

It was Inauguration Day 2009 and Robert Gates, defense secretary holdover from the Bush administration, was designated the man who would be king.

“In order to ensure continuity of government, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been designated by the outgoing Administration, with the concurrence of the incoming Administration, to serve as the designated successor during Inauguration Day, Tuesday, January 20th,” the White House announced.

Two administrations seemingly miles apart in ideology and vision designated? According to the Constitution and the Presidential Succession Act of 1947, the Vice President succeeds the President, followed by the Speaker of the House and then the President pro tempore of the Senate (traditionally the senior member of the majority party), and then the Secretaries of State and the Treasury, and then the Secretary of Defense.

Since the beginning of the nuclear era, there always been a successor tucked away just in case, and over the years, because of assassinations and screw ups, the Constitution has been amended and laws and policies have been added to make things clearer. But never has an administration-to-administration suspension of the Constitution designated a sixth-stringer to be the successor. The news media and the American public cowered. It was the first change of hands while America was at war, terrorists could attack, blah, blah, blah, they repeated. But thank God it was Gates, the man who knew everything, the man who would remain calm and carry on. Never mind that after eight years of war, not one of these national security grand pooh bahs could offer assurances that all of that warring had or could prevent an Apocalypse on that day, nor would they want to. And so the Constitution and laws were ignored – Gates was appointed President just in case – and everyone seemed to think it was a sound and sensible decision. In other words, for the good of America, or at least good America, they would just decide what was right.

When Gates was Secretary of Defense, he famously went before the Army at West Point and the Air Force at the Air War College and lambasted an enduring and insular uniformed military institution that he said he found timid and passive-aggressive in its insubordination and unwillingness to change. Gates then railed in favor of that very institution, lamenting that they were being asked to solve too many of the problems of the world, urging the non-military agencies to do more. Gates cut off and canceled weapons that weren’t helping the troops. And then he spent billions on what he thought was needed (more intelligence), even bragging in his autobiography how he evaded Congressional control (I tell the story in Unmanned). Gates rejected the counter-attack against counterinsurgency by those who argued that America needed to be ready for big war. But he did nothing to reduce the nuclear burden and, well, as the world’s number one Soviet expert (it says so on his coffee cup), he did absolutely nothing to find common ground with Russia.

That’s Gates. He opines and prods and as a national security scold, he deftly evades that many of the things he seems to be frustrated with he was also once in charge of. So here we are years later and what has really changed? Nothing. Gates is still scolding.

On Face the Nation and in every public appearance – and there are many; he’s at Amherst, he’s at Denison, he’s at William & Mary with Condi – Gates assures that the candidates will learn, that after any unsanctioned misstatements “their views are probably largely unformed,” which is also to say that he and the rest of the Yodas will make sure that full indoctrination is achieved before any pliable and sanctioned candidate emerges. Gates is all over any pretender to the throne: blowing in their ear the wisdom of the chameleon.

[Art by Sam Woolley. Photos by AP.]

You can contact me at william.arkin@gawker.com, and follow us at @gawkerphasezero. If you are into the theater of being underground, you can anonymously deliver tips through the Gawker Media SecureDrop. I’m open to your input and your questions, tough questions.