How Democratic Politics Has Become Authoritarian

In response to the rise of Donald Trump and the explosion in dissenting media, a movement has emerged among political elites to further deprive the population of their democratic rights. This effort, as illustrated by Matt Taibbi in his 2016 articleIn Response to Trump, Another Dangerous Movement Appears, has been taken to chilling lengths by the Democratic Party, and by what Caitlin Johnstone calls the “McResistance” to Trump.

The role of which party gets to be the main purveyor of militarism and national security authoritarianism has switched over to the Democrats-the recent migrationto the party by neoconservatives like Robert Kagan has solidified this. Liberal media outlets like MSNBC are putting many former intelligence officials into their punditry positions. The Democratic Party is running numerous former intelligence officials as candidates in the 2018 midterms, so much that if Democrats take the House this year, these direct deep state alumni will make up half of the congressional Democratic caucus.

It’s a characteristic response from the Democratic establishment to the grassroots activists’ attempts to run non-corrupt candidates within the party: running even more Democrats who will serve the interests of the corporate state. But these are minor details within the echo chamber of ruling class propaganda. Diversions toward lurid Trump scandals, supposed Russia threats, and partisan attacks are constantly made, engaging the populace while a totalitarian state makes its moves.

“In 2003, the Democratic Party supported the Bush administration’s invasion of
Iraq and provided it with the necessary political cover,” reads World Socialist Website’s recent address to this issue, titled The Russian meddling fraud: Weapons of mass destruction revisited. “Now, the Democrats, along with their appendages among the organizations of the upper-middle class, are at the forefront of the campaign for war, employing neo-McCarthyite tactics to criminalize opposition while seeking to subordinate all popular opposition to the Trump administration to its right-wing and militarist agenda.”

Complete with the classic arms race media rhetoric, where Russia is absurdly portrayed as a threat to America’s exceptionally huge military stockpile status, this new Cold War infects the political conversation. Russia narrative skeptics have warned from the start that by feeding into the baseless claims about “interference” and “collusion” for partisan reasons, liberals are increasing dangers of conflict with a nuclear superpower. And now that the U.S. and Russia are in open military combat in Syria while the U.S. and Russia exchange nuclear threats, the narrative’s propagators can’t deny what a perilous game they’ve gotten us into.

Yet just by making these statements, I’m making myself a traitor and a Russian agent in the eyes of mainstream America. Those who share my views like to laugh at the constant charges of us being Kremlin stooges, but it is the new McCarthyism, and it poses a serious threat to democracy and free thought. Its effect is irrevocable steps toward World War Three. We can’t acknowledge the utter lack of evidence behind the charge that Russia has poisoned a former spy in Britain, which Theresa May is using to threaten retaliation against Russia. We can’t oppose the U.S.’ disastrous and criminal involvement in Syria, even as Russia has threatened this week to attack the U.S. if the U.S. carries out its plan to strike Syria again.

We should have anticipated that the establishment would respond in this way when its power became challenged. The deep state has constructed an alternate reality within its propaganda influence, a reality where all that goes against the political establishment is misguided “fake news” at best and foreign subversion at worst. And this shift has happened as easily as a change in the messaging of the corporate news outlets.

Right now, Democrats and some Republicans are demanding a $300 million Department of Homeland Security operation for fighting “Russian social media propaganda” to be put in the March 23 spending bill. Don’t lament these attacks, because they’re only in reaction to the threat we pose to the global oligarchy. Fight back against them. Call your representatives about opposing this spending bill, among the other actions we can take. Stand up for your right to a free and just society.