Internal divisions

Posted on December 13, 2016 by

 

The election of Donald Trump is provoking internal divisions within the deep state, leading to some very interesting disclosures. Indeed, there is a battle being waged for influence and control in the presumptive Trump administration.

It might be useful to reexamine Mike Lofgren’s essay describing the deep state, to help suss out how and why this battle is being prosecuted. Lofgren was a congressional staff member for 28 years specializing in national security and possessing a top secret security clearance.

“There is another government concealed behind the one that is visible at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue, a hybrid entity of public and private institutions ruling the country according to consistent patterns in season and out, connected to, but only intermittently controlled by, the visible state whose leaders we choose.

The deep state is the big story of our time. It is the red thread that runs through the war on terrorism, the financialization and deindustrialization of the American economy, the rise of a plutocratic social structure and political dysfunction. 

The deep state does not consist of the entire government. It is a hybrid of national security and law enforcement agencies: the Department of Defense, the Department of State, the Department of Homeland Security, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Justice Department.” 

Lofgren says that members of the deep state, while pretending to be neutral technocrats with America’s best interests at heart, “almost invariably believe in the “Washington Consensus”: financialization, outsourcing, privatization, deregulation and the commodifying of labor. Internationally, they espouse 21st-century “American Exceptionalism”: the right and duty of the United States to meddle in every region of the world with coercive diplomacy and boots on the ground.”

So far Trump has resisted the daily presidential briefing by the CIA in favor of briefings by his nominee to be national security adviser, former Defense Intelligence Agency head General Michael Flynn.

Now, there’s the new CIA report alleging Russian meddling in the US election to favor Trump rather than Clinton. This report should be understood as a direct attack on the new administration by the CIA, who favored Hillary for president.

If you will recall, the CIA is strongly committed to regime change in Syria as part of its foreign policy mandate. Also, the CIA director, John Brennan, is very close to US ally Saudi Arabia, having served as the CIA station chief there before being named Obama’s national security advisor, and, then head of the CIA. Saudi Arabia is also committed to regime change in Syria, providing clandestine support with the U.S., Qatar and other Gulf States.

The dirty little secret of the war on terror is that for all the rhetoric about fighting terrorists the US is happy to use them to advance policy goals. To that end, the CIA has been funneling weapons and money through Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar and others who provide direct and indirect support to groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda. This support has allowed al-Qaeda and their fellow terrorist organizations to establish strongholds throughout Syria, including in Aleppo.

The goal of such support for the Sunni terrorists attacking Syria is the creation of a Salafist principality” in east-Syria and west-Iraq. Gulf countries’ and Israeli lobbyists have called for such an occupation strategy. A U.S./Saudi controlled proxy entity that interrupts the “Shia crescent” from Iran over Iraq and Syria to Lebanon and holds the ground for a planned natural gas pipeline from Qatar to Turkey and onto Europe.

Meanwhile, Syria is supported by Russia. And, Trump has promised to mend relations with Russia. The Russian and Syrian hope may be that a Trump administration will abandon the present regime change policy.

Intelligence, and foreign policy expert, Marcy Wheeler, helps unpack all of this, and what it portends for the deep state going forward.

“First, if Trump comes into office on the current trajectory, the US will let Russia help Bashar al-Assad stay in power, thwarting a 4-year effort on the part of the Saudis to remove him from power. It will also restructure the hierarchy of horrible human rights abusing allies the US has, with the Saudis losing out to other human rights abusers, potentially up to and including that other petrostate, Russia. It will also install a ton of people with ties to the US oil industry in the cabinet, meaning the US will effectively subsidize oil production in this country, which will have the perhaps inadvertent result of ensuring the US remains oil-independent even though the market can’t justify fracking right now.

The CIA is institutionally quite close with the Saudis right now, and has been in charge of their covert war against Assad.

This story came 24 days after the White House released an anonymous statement asserting, among other things, “the Federal government did not observe any increased level of malicious cyber activity aimed at disrupting our electoral process on election day,” suggesting that the Russians may have been deterred.”

So, what is the purpose of such a leak, as Trump prepares to take office?

Here’s Marcy again. “The propaganda effect of these leaks will be to dampen any movement of a Trump administration towards more friendly relations with Russia. Any such move by Trump will be responded with a chorus “but Russia hacked our election” even though there has been zero evidence or proof produced that such was indeed the case.”

The plot thickens.

Posted in neoconservatives, neoliberals | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The political/economy of empire

Posted on December 10, 2016 by

 

The US is an empire, in case you hadn’t noticed.

The political/economy of the US empire is the deep state.

The deep state in America is largely composed of the military/industrial/complex, the oil and gas industry, and Wall Street. The policies that they pursue shape and influence the economic and foreign policies of the American empire to their benefit.

When people think of empire, they imagine Roman legions, wars of conquest, and slave labor. Or Great Britain with its army of public servants administering a far flung empire where the sun never sets. These and other traditional empires tended to be about the acquisition of fertile lands or resources, the enslavement of people for exploitation, and the conquest of trade routes.

The US empire is of a different nature. It’s a corporate empire, where weapons, energy and finance play an outsized role. The US system of military bases straddling the world is not part of territorial occupation, but rather serves to maintain a stable of client states that US banks and corporations can dominate. In that way, the US employs its military to perpetuate American corporate preeminence.

The US empire has evolved from WWII, when the US sought to maintain its empire of client states by overthrowing leftist governments and installing pliable right-wing dictators or army officers. Think–Iran with the shah, or Guatemala with Colonel Armas.

The US empire of the 21st century is much less concerned with who rules its client states. Now, left-wing or right-wing governments are ok. The US empire uses market forces, such as trade agreements, debt bondage, and structural adjustments administered by the IMF, to control these governments.

In fact, the market can often succeed where military efforts of conquest fail. Take Vietnam. 40 years after the US was defeated by the Viet-Cong, and forced to retreat, Vietnam has largely acceded to US led globalization, including engaging in free-market reforms, privatization, and submission to IMF structural adjustment programs. After defeating the US militarily, they’ve been conquered by economic means, and surrendered to debt bondage and structural adjustments.

This reliance on economic means to maintain the US empire is what gives Wall Street its outsized role in national affairs, and why it’s been the leading member of the American deep state. It’s also why the Obama administration bailed out the banks instead of homeowners in the wake of the Wall Street crash of 2008. After all, Wall Street banks are essential to maintaining the American corporate empire, while homeowners are not.

The problem for the US empire in 2016, is that with it’s economic and financial power waning, military superiority seems to be the chief means by which U.S. imperialism can attempt to maintain global domination.

The election of Trump, exposes deep divisions within the deep state. What we see is that the incentives for the various members of the deep state are out of alignment. The empire of chaos thing certainly works for the MIC, while for energy and finance, endless war makes it hard to do business.

In my opinion, Trump intends to advance the US corporate empire, but in a different manner. Trump’s cabinet selections so far show finance losing out while energy and weapons are prospering

Stay tuned.

Update: Marcy, at Emptywheel says-–“It seems there’s a fight for the brain of Trump, even while he seems to be preparing to delegate all this stuff to his advisors.”

 

 

Posted in neoconservatives, neoliberals | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Member Berries

Posted on December 6, 2016 by

 

To retake our country from the deep state we will have to end the American empire.

To end the American empire we have to challenge the narrative of American exceptionalism, that has been promulgated with the help of a corporate media that’s become undistinguishable from a state-controlled media. For example, the American media is always pro-war, and always pro-corporate-empire in accordance with US foreign policy.

American exceptionalism fuses the symbols of the state with those of the Christian religion, where actual knowledge is less important than fervent belief.

Most Americans have a Disneyfied version of US history, where America is the indispensable nation, laboring to spread peace and democracy.

Thanks to this corporate media portrayal, America’s real history of slavery, genocide and empire, is magically scrubbed away.

The election of Donald Trump with his campaign slogan–Make America Great Again, has appealed to this Disneyfied version of history, and also exposed the longing among his supporters for an imaginary golden-age of America. 

All of this was recently satirized by South Park, in an episode entitled Member Berries. The member berries, are small purple berries that utter nostalgic phrases that reflect American history–as imagined by straight, white, Christian-conservatives.

Member when Reagan was president and there weren’t so many Mexicans around and no gays?

The brutal reality facing Trump is that he will need to end the US empire to Make America  Great Again. He will also have to move past trite appeals to a member berry past.

Since we have two political parties I would be remiss if I didn’t address the Democrat’s use of a false and misleading history. After all, the Democrats have their very own member berries. Take the recent election loss–the Democrats, rather than examining Hillary’s shortcomings as a candidate, and their shitty policies, blamed it on the nefarious Russians.

Member when Hillary lost because Putin hacked our election?

Then, there’s the fact that both parties rely on the neoconservatives to articulate US foreign policy, even though this is the gang that couldn’t shoot straight and has been responsible for a series of cascading failures, from Afghanistan, to Iraq, to Libya, and now Syria. The neocons also use member berries as part of their Straussian deception.

Member when Saddam gave nerve gas to Al Qaeda so they could crop dust American cities?

As you can see from these examples, member berries aren’t just an appeal to an imaginary past. They are part of a sophisticated and ongoing ruling narrative, deployed to maintain the corporate empire and deep state.

This narrative is starting to break down, hence the hysterical reaction to the “fake news” controversy. In my opinion, this is largely due to fact that the US empire is falling apart, and the effects are starting to be felt here at home.

With a military budget almost the equal of all other countries put together and hundreds of military bases around the world, the US is drastically overextended. In the meantime, much of our country is descending into third-world status. Our elite living in their urban bubbles may not see this but in much of the fly-over parts of the country, where the people who actually fight America’s wars come from, and go back to with their PTSD, missing limbs, addictions and related financial burdens, there is a serious concern about the costs and failures of our belligerent foreign-policy.

And now Trump inherits the failing US empire, and deep state that’s frantic to put off this eventuality. I wonder if they’ve informed him of all the sordid details of empire? Be nice to be a fly on the wall for that conversation.

Back to the duopoly. Both Republicans and Democrats use misleading narratives and member berries to lure their supporters into voting against their self-interests.

As writers and intellectuals, we need to challenge this misleading narrative forcefully.

Going further, it’s not enough to simply challenge the dominant narrative of American exceptionalism that both parties use to maintain control. We need to offer our own narrative–where we can save the American republic by ending the American empire–and use the resources to rebuild our infrastructure and our manufacturing capability, while embarking on a post-carbon economy, putting millions of Americans back to work.

If we had something besides a corporate media, we might be able to discuss such proposals.

Instead we get member berries.

Update: Don’t think for a second that our elite are immune to the effects of member berries. I’m amazed at how much of he US political, economic, and media elite exist inside a Beltway bubble of group-think; reading the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New York Times and Politico, and watching CNN, Fox and MSNBC.

Update 2: New York City and Washington D.C. liquor stores are now stocking Member Berry wine.

 

 

Posted in neoconservatives | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Stage–2

Posted on November 29, 2016 by

 

US neoliberal and neoconservative elite are going through the stages of grief in the wake of the election of Donald Trump.

Judging by the recent McCarthy-style smear campaign in the Washington Post, they’re still stuck at anger.

On Thursday, the Post published a new article by Craig Timberg complaining of a “flood” of so-called fake news supported by “a sophisticated Russian propaganda campaign that created and spread misleading articles online with the goal of punishing Democrat Hillary Clinton, helping Republican Donald Trump and undermining faith in American democracy,” To advance this conclusion, Timberg points to PropOrNot, an organization of anonymous individuals formed this year, as having identified “more than 200 websites as routine peddlers of Russian propaganda during the election season.” 

Ironically, the Washington Post, along with the New York Times, published the ultimate “fake news story”–Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction—justifying the invasion of Iraq.

The real crime of those on the list is challenging the Washington consensus, where neoliberal economic and neoconservative foreign policies are sacrosanct. According to new McCarthyism–either you must accept everything the US government says and does at face value, believe it implicitly and support it whole-heartedly, or else you’re a Russian dupe.

Damn, they’re on to me.

The fundamental source of the Post’s hysterical accusations is that our ruling elite has lost control of the narrative. Hence the anger, and hysterical and frantic efforts to marginalize and discredit any dissenting narratives that undermine or question the power of our corrupted, self-serving ruling elite.

The neocons who supported Hillary are especially butt-hurt. After all, just last month they were preparing for a much more muscular foreign policy when Hillary assumed the presidency, as this article at The Washington Post, in October, made clear.

“In the rarefied world of the Washington foreign policy establishment, President Obama’s departure from the White House — and the possible return of a more conventional and hawkish Hillary Clinton — is being met with quiet relief. 

The Republicans and Democrats who make up the foreign policy elite are laying the groundwork for a more assertive American foreign policy via a flurry of reports shaped by officials who are likely to play senior roles in a potential Clinton White House.

It is not unusual for Washington’s establishment to launch major studies in the final months of an administration to correct the perceived mistakes of a president or influence his successor. But the bipartisan nature of the recent recommendations, coming at a time when the country has never been more polarized, reflect a remarkable consensus among the foreign policy elite.”

The neocons dream of a more assertive foreign policy (read: more war) under a Clinton presidency is not to be.

So sad.

If Trump can break with the neocons on the idea of endless war it would go a long way towards helping make his presidency bearable.

The US neoliberal economic consensus, embraced by Clinton and other prominent Democrats, has also taken a hit, and they have reason to be angry. The election of Trump has thrown a wrench into the reliable neoliberal economic policies that our bi-partisan elite have pursued for the last 40 years.

Sanjay Reddy, Associate Professor of Economics, The New School for Social Research, argues that the election of Trump, “promises to reshape the entire global order, and the complaisant forms of thought that accompanied it.” Reddy is especially critical of economists who pushed neoliberal economic policies, even as they have been repeatedly demonstrated as ruinous for most of the worlds population.

“Mainstream economics championed corporate-friendly trade and investment agreements to increase prosperity, and provided the intellectual framework for multilateral trade agreements. Economics made the case for such agreements, generally rejecting concerns over labor and environmental standards and giving short shrift to the effects of globalization in weakening the bargaining power of workers or altogether displacing them; to the need for compensatory measures to aid those displaced; and more generally to measures to ensure that the benefits of growth were shared.  For the most part, economists casually waved aside such concerns, both in their theories and in their policy recommendations, treating these matters as either insignificant or as being in the jurisdiction of politicians.  Still less attention was paid to crafting an alternate form of globalization, or to identifying bases for national economic policies taking a less passive view of comparative advantage and instead aiming to create it.”

Reddy says, that, rather than being neutral observers, neoliberal economists, “actively provided rationales for financialization, in the form of the efficient-markets hypothesis and related ideas; for concentration of capital through mergers and acquisitions in the form of contestable-markets theory; for the gentrification of the city through attacks on rent control and other urban policies; for remaking of labor markets through the idea that unemployment was primarily a reflection of voluntary leisure preferences, etc.”

The election of Trump is a repudiation to the elite ruling orthodoxy in America. The American people voted for a change from the destructive neoliberal and neoconservative policies our elite have insisted on following.

The bi-partisan ruling elite hate the idea of their loss of power, prestige, and most of all their control. So they’re lashing out in anger.

As George Orwell predicted, telling the truth is now regarded as a hostile act.

Update: Under attack.

“Over Thanksgiving weekend, the Washington Post legitimated a thin, amateurish site whose principals have libeled not only Naked Capitalism but also Ron Paul’s institute, former Reagan Administration officials David Stockman and Paul Craig Roberts, well-respected progressive stalwarts, such as Counterpunch, Truthout, TruthDig, and Black Agenda Report, as supposed Russian propaganda outlets with foreign “coordinators.” Moreover, with no supporting evidence whatsoever, this site called for everyone on its list to be investigated by the FBI and DoJ for Espionage Act violations.

The common denominator for all these websites seems to be skepticism about the failed Clinton coronation.”

 

 

Posted in neoconservatives, neoliberals | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Like Ike

Posted on November 22, 2016 by

 

Before he took office, President Obama professed his admiration of President Reagan. Lately he’s behaving like President Eisenhower.

Eisenhower, after creating the military-industrial-complex and nascent deep state, famously warned against it. As he was leaving office.

Many Americans remember Eisenhower’s farewell speech and have a nostalgia for his time in office. However, a careful reading of the history of his administration offers a much darker interpretation. The men that Eisenhower choose to cary out his foreign policy–John Foster Dulles, as Secretary of State, and Allan Dulles, as head of the CIA–turbo-charged the Cold War and embarked the US on a fateful program of corporate imperialism. Projecting the dangers of communism, the Dulles instituted a massive arms build-up, while deposing recalcitrant Third-World governments. On their watch, Iran and Guatemala were overthrown, and pliable dictators installed.

Now it’s Obama turn. After helping inequality explode, Obama warns of the dangers of inequality. As he’s leaving office.

As President Obama prepares to depart, it’s more imperative than ever for us to understand his legacy.

In hindsight it appears that Obama was a chameleon. While conservatives saw him as a Kenyon-Muslim-Socialist, herding them down the road to serfdom, liberals viewed him as their community-organizer-savior who would usher in the new–New Deal.

Neither view was correct, as Obama has turned out to be another corporate neoliberal.

When it comes to inequality, Obama neglects to mention that when he entered the White House in 2009 he had a historical opportunity to address runaway inequality. In the aftermath of the Wall Street crash the country was angry at the bankers that had caused the crash and eager for bold leadership.

Obama soon demonstrated that he wasn’t really interested in serving the public but in protecting Wall Street.

On 27 March 2009, Obama secretly told the chieftains of Wall Street assembled at a private meeting inside the White House, «My Administration is the only thing between you and the pitchforks». «You guys have an acute public relations problem, and I want to help… I’m not out there to go after you. I’m protecting you».

This protection should be viewed in light of Obama’s financial benefactors. After all, Obama allowed Citigroup to select the men who would serve in his administration. Chief economic advisor Lawrence Summers, whose advice to President Bill Clinton in 1999 had encouraged him to terminate FDR’s Glass-Steagall separation of consumer-banking from investment-banking (Wall Street’s casinos). And, Timothy Geithner, who was the G.W. Bush era’s N.Y. Federal Reserve Bank President and thus king of Wall Street, became U.S. Treasury Secretary. Geithner went on to foam the runway with American homeowners to cushion a bank crash landing, causing millions of evictions.

Thus did Obama cement into place the massive inequality, he’s now at pains to decry. «Poverty Rose In 96% Of U.S. House Districts, During Obama’s Presidency». And, the income and wealth of the billionaires soared like at no time since 1923-1928. Meanwhile, the share of income and wealth of bottom 90 % wealth holders» both declined.

President Eisenhower’ favorite pastime in office was playing golf with wealthy industrialists.

Likewise, Obama enjoys golfing with his wealthy benefactors.

After January, he’ll have plenty of time to work on his game.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in neoconservatives, neoliberals | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Don’t mourn, organize

Posted on November 15, 2016 by

 

Trump is going to end the world, as we know it.

Or, something.

Liberals are always more energized and pugilistic when a Republican president gains power.

My biggest peeve with liberals, is that they were aghast at the behavior of Bush, but couldn’t be bothered when Obama was committing the same crimes. The only difference was that Obama represented team Blue. That, and he was much more articulate, with a lovely, intelligent wife, and two beautiful daughters.

My liberal friends are just convinced that Obama could never be as bad as Bush.

Except, that he was.

It’s all about moral consistency. If something is evil, it’s evil, no matter who’s doing it.

And, let’s be honest, the Democratic party has abandoned working-class people and progressive economic policies. Instead the Democrats have embraced financial neoliberalism, where the policies of deregulation, privatization, austerity, and corporate trade have devastated America’s once vibrant middle-class. These Americans living standards have declined precipitously. They’ve lost their jobs, they’ve lost their pensions, and they’ve lost much of their safety net. They see a bleak future for their children.

These Americans used to be reliable Democratic voters. They even voted for Obama. Once Senator Bernie Sanders lost the nomination, the Democrats hardly made any effort to recapture these voters.  Perhaps because their candidate, Hillary Clinton, was the very embodiment of the establishment policies that has created so much misery for these groups. These voters instead went for the change candidate–Trump–though there’s a pretty good chance his policies will make their position worse.

My liberal friends, while rightfully upset, need to see this as a historic opportunity.

When activist Joe Hill was waiting on death row he wrote a letter to union organizer, Big-Bill Haywood, urging him: “Don’t mourn, organize.”

The same principle applies in the wake of Trump’s surprise victory.

Even though progressives and liberals are upset and depressed, with more than a few threatening to move to Canada, they need to realize that now is the chance to put their outrage into action and gear up for a long struggle.

Naked Capitalism is running a series this week to remind us that, “The nut of the matter is this: you lose, you lose, you lose, you lose, they give up. As someone who has protested, and studied the process, it’s plain that one spends most of one’s time begin defeated. That’s painful, humiliating, and intimidating. One can’t expect typically, as in a battle, to get a clean shot at a clear win.”

In my opinion, it’s time to go on the offensive, and develop public policies that are universal. Progressives have been on the defensive for so long that they’ve forgotten how to articulate a positive agenda for what a progressive world would look like. We need to never forget that Bernie Sanders demonstrated conclusively that progressive policies are popular with the American electorate.

“The only way out of these dead ends lies in committing to a defined agenda of institutionalized, economic justice because this affects all. Social justice cannot be secured absent economic justice. Any such agenda is going to be anti-corporate, anti-poverty, pro-education (and job re-education), and pro-regulation. It has to be citizen-based outside of existing political parties. This kind of program can be articulated as pro-community rather than pro-faction if the organizing is done. This has to be pursued from a defined agenda, unapologetically, and from a pro-citizen(ship) position regardless of other more discrete goals.”

As I’ve said before–with great change comes great opportunity. Milton Friedman and the movement right understood this concept and had a program–neoliberalism–ready when New Deal policies faltered in the 1970’s. It’s the same thing for progressives. If you want a better world, start thinking about how to make it so.

Despite all the doom and gloom, the election of Donald Trump actually represents an unprecedented opportunity for change in both political parties and a chance to reform the underlying political and economic power structures in the US.

As Margaret Mead, the great democratic campaigner, said: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

Let’s get busy.

 

Update: Joe Hill also sent another letter in which he implored Haywood, “Could you arrange to have my body hauled to the state line to be buried? I don’t want to be found dead in Utah.”

Posted in neoconservatives, neoliberals | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

For the good of the country

Posted on November 11, 2016 by

 

How did a monster like Trump win?

The short answer is that Hillary was a uniquely horrible candidate, as I detail here. She was also the establishment candidate in an anti-establishment election. The Democratic Party also bears a large part of the blame by sabotaging Bernie Sanders, the Democratic candidate who offered populist economic policies instead of identity politics, and could have beaten Trump, as polling data bears out.

The longer answer is historical, and may shock and surprise many of you. After all, you didn’t learn what I’m about to detail in school.

Since the early 1930’s powerful Republican elite have committed crimes against our republic, while Democrat elite have largely refused to investigate or hold them responsible. The rationalization for this was that the exposure of these crimes would be divisive, so these crimes were kept secret, for the good of the country.

Essentially, the conservative ruling elite has been protected from the destructive consequences of its predatory dominance by a serial failure to hold them accountable.

More importantly, along the way a false narrative and history has been established.

The election of FDR and the implementation of the New Deal was a shocking development to the ruling elite of America. This loss of power and prestige was so traumatic that many of them contemplated changes to our representative system of governance. Gazing at Europe for inspiration, Mussolini and Hitler, came in for special praise. Now, here were leaders who understood how to mesh government and big business together with minimal interference from pesky workers.

The Republican elite also attempted a coup against their nemesis, FDR.

Like I said before, they don’t teach this in school.

The coup never progressed very far and the plotters weren’t all that clever. The Marine Corps general they tapped to lead their coup–Smedley Butler–was a true patriot, and promptly informed the Roosevelt administration of the nefarious plan. FDR, for the good of the country, kept this plot a secret and went about the business of helping America recover from the Great Depression.

The corporations that had helped foment the coup showed their gratitude by withholding investments in the US, while aiding in the rearmament of Nazi Germany. One of the darkest secrets of the pre-war era, was that US corporations and banks financed German reconstruction under the Nazis, especially their rapidly expanding armaments industries, in exchange for priceless industrial patents. This funding of German industry continued through World War II and involved some of the most powerful and well known US corporations, such as GM, Ford, and IBM. It also involved powerful US banks and investment houses, and influential Republicans, like George W.’s grandfather, Prescott Bush, and the Dulles brothers, Allan and John Foster.

After the war Democrats failed to hold these Republican officials and the banks and corporations accountable for this treason. For the good of the country, of course.

Did Republicans appreciate this gesture?

Hell no.

Emboldened Republicans responded by playing the hardest of hardball. After Truman’s surprise victory over Dewey, bitter Republicans attacked the Truman administration over supposed communists infiltrating government at all levels, with the insinuation that the New Deal was basically a communist front. The House Un-American Activities Committee, with Joseph McCarthy and Richard Nixon playing key roles, led the way in using the Red Scare to pummel the Truman administration as being weak and overrun with communists. The effect was to seriously weaken and discredit the New Deal reforms and turn the American people against them.

In my opinion, this Cold War hysteria never would have gotten the traction it did if the Democrats had exposed the connection between the Republicans and the Nazis. With passions against the Nazis running high after the war with the revelations of the Holocaust, there would have been scorn and revulsion at the treason of these men and institutions.

Jumping ahead to to 1968, Democratic president LBJ had announced that he would not run again for president, and was working to end the Vietnam war by negotiating with the North and South Vietnamese governments. Richard Nixon, the Republican, was running for president against Democrat Hurbert Humphrey, after the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. According to investigative reporter Robert Parry, in his book, America’s Stolen Narrative, there exists strong evidence that Nixon’s campaign secretly sabotaged the peace talks in an October surprise as a way of ensuring Nixon’s victory. LBJ learned of this treason through NSA intercepts but was convinced to keep quiet after Nixon’s victory, for the good of the country.

Again, in 1980, according to  America’s Stolen Narrative, there is strong evidence that Ronald Reagan’s campaign officials carried out their own October surprise by meeting with Iranian officials and sabotaging the negotiations that the  Carter administration was engaged in to return for the hostages seized by the Iranian Guards when the Shah was allowed into the US for medical treatment. Even though Carter and many other Democrats suspected this treason, there never was an investigation. Again, for the good of the country.

In the wake of 9/11, Bush administration officials, led by Dick Cheney and Karl Rove, attacked Democrats for being weak on terror and engaging in moral equivalence with a hostile enemy. However, recent history shows these very same Al Qaeda terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center were created and sustained by Republican national security officials and deployed as a means of foreign policy to this day. But of course, timid Democrats did not challenge this false narrative after 9/11 because it might distract from the War on Terror and wouldn’t be good for the country.

In 2008, after eight catastrophic years of Bush, Obama was elected on a pledge of “Hope and Change.” Immediately Obama announced that he would look “forward and not backward.” For the good of the country, of course. A lot of good Obama’s magnanimity got him. As soon as Republicans saw they were in the clear, they turned around and repaid him by obstructing everything he tried to accomplish. From the moment Obama entered office, right-wing conservatives embraced the posture of hell-bent opposition. Recall, in Jan. 2009, hate radio host Rush Limbaugh expressed his hope that Obama fails. One month later, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell proudly embraced Limbaugh at a conservative conference. The fringe rhetoric of far right activists had quickly become the de facto governing strategy of the Republican leadership, as they adopted a posture of obstructionism.

As you can see from these numerous examples, there is a clear pattern of Republican crimes, followed by Democratic timidity and failure of accountability. The Republicans have learned that they can get away with it, and emboldened have turned around and projected these crimes onto the Democrats. The result has been a triumph of conservatism, where the left spends all of its time fighting off these faux scandals while the right goes on the offensive, cheered on by a media that’s learned where its career advancement lies.

All done, for the good of the country.

I’ve used the phrase, for the good of the country, throughout the essay, and I’m sure many of you understand that I’m being facetious, so let’s unpack it shall we? For the good of the country is a phrase our ruling elite likes to toss about, but it hardly means for the good of the country. I suspect that, for the good of the country, really means, for the good of the deep state. And, the deep state is made up of: the military/industrial complex, Wall Street, the oil and gas industry, and powerful corporations. In my opinion, the rise of the deep state in America traces directly back to the collusion between our conservative elite and the Nazis. The secretive nature, reliance on violence, and belief in a corporate/state fusion are all hallmarks of fascism.

The result of these crimes and lack of accountability has been the creation of a false and misleading narrative and history. Americans don’t know where to place the blame for the shit-circus their life has become. They may not understand the details, but they know that something has gone tragically wrong, and that all the elite institutions, including corporations, the government, and the media have been complicit.

This election was an anti-establishment election with the American people essentially offering up the one finger salute.

Come on down, President Trump.

Update: Matt Taibbi, reprising Hunter S. Thompson, at Rolling Stone, puts the blame where it belongs.

“Trump made idiots of us all. From the end of primary season onward, I felt sure Trump was en route to ruining, perhaps forever, the Republican Party as a force in modern American life. Now the Republicans are more dominant than ever, and it is the Democratic Party that is shattered and faces an uncertain future.

And they deserve it. The Democratic Party’s failure to keep Donald Trump out of the White House in 2016 will go down as one of the all-time examples of insular arrogance. The party not only spent most of the past two years ignoring the warning signs of the Trump rebellion, but vilifying anyone who tried to point them out. It denounced all rumors of its creeping unpopularity as vulgar lies and bullied anyone who dared question its campaign strategy by calling them racists, sexists and agents of Vladimir Putin’s Russia.”

 

 

Posted in neoconservatives, neoliberals | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment