Brief note on international developments before moving the substance of the essay. Israel is at war. These are not terrorist attacks. This is a paramilitary operation. I’m not a weapons expert but I am curious to know whether the weapons use are associated with the glut produced by the US proxy war with Russia via Ukraine. This is almost certainly the case, but evidence would be useful to press the case. I will be publishing an essay soon on the US proxy war with Russia via Ukraine and make comparative points with the US proxy war with the Soviet Union via Afghanistan. Today, I want to once more take on the problem of the one-party state.
On Thursday, my university hosted Nina Turner, Democratic Party member and co-chair of the Bernie Sanders campaign for president in 2016 and 2020. I was present at the event and her talk, “Democracy Isn’t Going to Save Itself,” was impressive in terms of performance. Moreover, despite my criticisms of Turner (see The Appeal to Identity: Bad Politics and the Fallacy of Standpoint Epistemology), I agreed with most of what she had to say since, I, too, am pro-labor and pro-woman.
However she said something that revealed the deep false consciousness that pervades today’s left. Asked by a student why he should vote for Democrats when they are no better than Republicans, after agreeing with him that on most things there is no difference between the parties, she argued that, in a world where the choice is between neoliberalism and neofascism, one has to oppose the force that kills you faster. Judging from the audience’s response, mostly composed of progressive students and almost exclusively, yours truly excepted, progressive faculty and administrators, the audience appeared to know who the neoliberals are. But do they know who the neofascists are? I’m confident that they think they do. But they don’t.
See my recent essay The Battle for the Soul of a Nation: Indicators of the Fascism that Marks the Present Moment. The situation becomes clearer everyday, and it has been clear enough for a long time now: We are witnessing the establishment of a one-party state in what future historians will record as the end of a short-lived republic called America—if history is even allowed to be recorded. The neofascism Turner and other Democrats use to scare people into voting for them is in fact on the same side as the neoliberalism she frames as the lesser of two evils—it’s the Uniparty, comprised of Democrats and establishment Republicans, which represents corporate power.
Asked about what to do about populist conservatives, the “MAGA extremists,” Hillary Clinton responded that “there needs to be a formal deprogramming of the cult members.” That’s tens of millions of farmers, small businessmen and women, and working class Americans—the tens of millions Clinton dubbed the “deplorables” in 2016. “They’re racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic,” she said back then. Now they’re “cult members.” Her words are chilling. Hear them for yourself:
She’s talking about reeducation camps. You may counter that she’s speaking metaphorically. Perhaps. Probably not. She’d do it if she thought she could. At any rate, it expresses the authoritarianism that inheres in her politics. She’s not even trying mask her authoritarianism anymore. Neither is the President.
It’s been just over a year now since President Biden delivered his notorious speech “Battle for the Soul of the Nation.” Throwing Hitlerian shapes against a fascistic backdrop, a backdrop so belligerent that CNN altered the color of its broadcast of the event, shifting its blood red to pink wash, Biden warned America about the existential threat posed by populist conservatism.
“Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans are a threat to the very soul of this country,” Biden tweeted a few days later. “MAGA Republicans aim to question not only the legitimacy of past elections but elections being held now and into the future.” (Recall Molly Ball’s February 2021 mopping up article in Time Magazine “The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign that Save the 2020 Election” and what it told us about election integrity going forward.)
Yesterday, William Arkin of Newsweek confirmed what we already knew (and I have been reporting for a while now): “Donald Trump Followers Targeted by FBI as 2024 Election Nears.” “Newsweek spoke to over a dozen current or former government officials who specialize in terrorism in a three-month investigation to understand the current domestic-security landscape and to evaluate what President Joe Biden’s administration is doing about what it calls domestic terrorism,” Arkin writes. (See MDM is the New WMD: DHS Issues a New NTAS Bulletin; Elite Hankerings for Obedience.)
According to information provided by the FBI, the count of open cases related to domestic terrorism surged by 357 percent over the last eight years. In fiscal year 2013, there were 1,981 open cases, and by fiscal year 2021, this number had grown to 9,049. Additionally, the FBI has reported a notable increase in the number of investigations pertaining to domestic violent extremism and domestic terrorism. Since the spring of 2020, these investigations have more than doubled, reaching approximately 2,700 by the conclusion of fiscal year 2022.
One might think that the chaos caused by Antifa and Black Lives Matter, especially in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, would account for many of these cases and investigations, but Newsweek’s analysis clearly shows that the main target has been Trump supporters. These data have been extensively cited by the media to support claims of a substantial domestic terrorism threat.
The FBI’s response to Newsweek: “The threat posed by domestic violent extremists is persistent, evolving, and deadly. The FBI’s goal is to detect and stop terrorist attacks, and our focus is on potential criminal violations, violence and threats of violence. Anti-government or anti-authority violent extremism is one category of domestic terrorism, as well as one of the FBI’s top threat priorities.”
There’s a key word in that last sentence that reveals the motive behind the harassment of parents who speak up at school board meetings and Christians who oppose abortion, as well as the raiding the homes of patriots who express libertarian and conservative sentiments on social media (which have resulted in deaths at the hands of law enforcement): anti-authority.
The FBI reassured Newsweek, “We are committed to protecting the safety and constitutional rights of all Americans and will never open an investigation based solely on First Amendment protected activity, including a person’s political beliefs or affiliations.” Right.
At the same time, leading political figures and the corporate state media are spreading panic about supposed rightwing extremism, and DHS and the FBI increasing surveillance and harassment of populist conservatives, the leader of populist conservatism is being dragged through show trials in a federal and multi-state coordinated constellation of lawfare actions. What follows is adapted, with commentary, from a compendium of these cases recently compiled by the Associated Press.
Judge Arthur Engoron, presiding over the entirely contrived civil fraud case in New York, resolved the primary claim before the trial’s commencement, ruling that Trump habitually misled banks, insurers, and others by inflating the value of assets in documents used for deals and loans. Engoron is now tasked with deciding on six remaining claims brought forth by New York Attorney General Letitia James, including conspiracy, falsification of business records, and insurance fraud allegations.
All the loans acquired in these instances have been paid in full with interests. None of the lenders brought complaints. If Trump is found guilty, he and his family could lose their business empire. Indeed, this appears to be the point of the prosecution. Watch this and tell me whether this is malicious prosecution by political operatives or a politically-neutral pursuit of justice.
The ongoing civil fraud trial against Trump in New York is just one of the numerous legal challenges he currently faces. In addition to this case, Trump confronts a daunting array of ninety-one felony charges spread across four separate criminal cases in Washington, New York, Florida, and Georgia. If convicted, he could potentially face significant prison time.
Special Counsel Jack Smith, appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland, has spearheaded two federal investigations related to Trump, both of which have led to charges against the former president. The initial charges emerged in June, accusing Trump of mishandling classified documents at his Florida estate. The indictment alleged that he repeatedly sought assistance from aides and lawyers to conceal records sought by investigators, and he carelessly displayed sensitive information.
A superseding indictment in July expanded these charges, alleging that Trump attempted to have surveillance footage deleted at his Mar-a-Lago estate after FBI and Justice Department investigators visited in June 2022 to collect classified documents he had taken from the White House. This indictment also accused him of unlawfully retaining a document he allegedly showed to visitors in New Jersey.
In total, Trump faces forty felony charges related to the classified documents case, with the most severe carrying a maximum twenty-year prison sentence. US District Judge Aileen Cannon has set a trial date of May 20, 2024, which may coincide with the latter stages of the presidential nominating process and potentially after the Republican nominee is determined but before the official nomination at the Republican National Convention.
Smith’s second case against Trump was revealed in August when Trump was indicted on felony charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results leading up to the violent January 6, 2021, US Capitol riot. The four-count indictment includes charges of conspiracy to defraud the US government and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, specifically the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in Congress. At the core of the case is the claim that Trump repeatedly falsely claimed victory and attempted to persuade state officials, Vice President Mike Pence, and Congress to overturn the legitimate election results.
That Trump was already prosecuted on these charges by the House of Representatives and acquitted on all of them by the Senate seems not to bother Smith at all. The constitutional prohibition of double jeopardy notwithstanding, the trial is scheduled for March 4, 2024, in federal court in Washington. (See The Unprecedented Resort to Lawfare—Is it Desperation or Provocation?)
In March, Trump became the first former US president to face criminal charges when he was indicted in New York on charges related to hush money payments made during the 2016 presidential campaign to conceal allegations of extramarital affairs. Trump has pleaded not guilty to thirty-four felony counts of falsifying business records, each carrying a maximum sentence of four years in prison. These charges stem from checks written to his lawyer Michael Cohen to reimburse payments to porn actor Stormy Daniels, who claimed an affair with Trump in 2006.
Trump is also charged, alongside eighteen other individuals, including former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, with violating the state’s anti-racketeering law by scheming to unlawfully overturn the 2020 election results. The indictment accuses Trump and his allies of suggesting that Georgia’s Republican secretary of state could manipulate votes in Trump’s favor, harassing an election worker accused of fraud, and attempting to convince Georgia lawmakers to ignore the voters’ will and appoint a new slate of Electoral College electors favorable to Trump.
One defendant, bail bondsman Scott Graham Hall, has pleaded guilty and agreed to testify in further proceedings. The other eighteen defendants, including Trump, maintain their not guilty pleas. Trial dates for Trump and the other defendants are yet to be determined.
Meanwhile, at least one media outlet has blurred out the face of a black criminal offender. CBS New York affiliate reports “An 18-year-old Brooklyn man is facing murder charges in the deadly stabbing of New York City activist Ryan Carson, police sources tell CBS New York. Elijah Westbrook has the latest from the scene.” The name of the murderer is Brian Dowling. The affiliate has scrubbed the page, but the original story was archived by Yahoo! Finance.
We will see if this sets a trend. I’m expecting soon they will start removing race from the publicly-available crime statistics, as they do, for example, in Sweden. As of this morning, the FBI has not updated the Crime Data Explore (CDE) since 2020. The Uniform Crime Report (UCR) archive stops at 2019. That’s the doing of Biden’s DoJ and FBI, the organs responsible for publishing these data.
You know that crime has exploded over the last several years. You see it in your cities and towns. Many of you also know that blacks are drastically overrepresented in the most serious crimes. In fact, despite representing only around six percent of the population, black males are an absolute majority of the perpetrators of murder and robbery. (See How to Misrepresent the Racial Demographics of Mass Murder; Is It Guns?; The Truth About Gun Violence.) Might the rise of crime and violence in America and their demographic profile have anything to do with the failure of the FBI to update the numbers? I think it’s safe to assume so.
The pattern is very clear: If the perpetrator of mass murder is a white man, especially if he has a racist manifesto, it’s nonstop for days frantic handwringing over the problem of white supremacy. Yet most mass murder occurs in majority-black neighborhoods, coming in the form of gang warfare, and is perpetrated by black men. You wouldn’t know that from the media coverage. Soon you won’t be able to know any of this in the official statistics. You won’t know that black-on-white violence is far more common than white-on-black violence (Race and Violent Death in America; Why are there so Many More White than Black Victims of Interracial Homicide?). Not that most people know this anyway. Indeed, many believe it’s the opposite. You won’t know that, controlling for benchmarks and situational factors that the police are more likely to shoot a white man than a black man relative to population—or that white men account for most of those men shot by the police (see, e.g., Lethal Police Encounters and Criminal Violence; Perpetuating the Big Lie About Lethal Police Encounters; Debunking Mythologies Surrounding the American Criminal Justice System).
Meanwhile, the FBI is going after Trump supporters across the nation. The DHS and the FBI have deemed the greatest threat to the internal security of the country “MAGA extremists,” while under the Biden regime, millions of military age men have poured across our southern border, tens of thousands of American youth killed by the fentanyl they’re bringing with them, while urban crime soars.
This New York Times op-ed by David French, “How MAGA Corrupts the Culture of the Working Class” is illustrative of the elitism that pervades corporate state media. MAGA is an expression of a large swath of working class culture. That’s why Clinton called Trump supporters “deplorables”: it’s a euphemism for the nineteenth century construct “dangerous classes.” The elite don’t want the masses to participate in politics unless they are confident they will advance the interests of the elite.
All of this—imprisoning leaders of the populist-nationalist movement and intimidating the rank-and-file—has in back of it goal and function of disrupting a mass movement that aims to restore democratic-republican principles and practices to the American Republic. We are witnessing in real time the establishment of a one-party state. This is the neofascism Democrats can’t admit to because it’s the character of the corporate state they represent.
Some folks might want to have that conversation with their family about what to do when there’s the knock on the door and bright lights outside. That conversation should also include how to best protect your person when you’re out and about. Crime and disorder are not always only emergent from the conditions. Sometimes chaos is a political strategy.
freedom and reason 