Know Thy Enemy

You may remember Big Mike Pompeo (although those of you who don’t are very fortunate). He was once our Secretary of State, the one who did the bidding of that genius of foreign policy, Donald (J for “Jack-Ass”) Trump. You will also recall the Don and Mike international accomplishments such as pulling out of just about every international cooperative treaty they could find, then negotiating an obviously worthless treaty with the Taliban; and, generally pulling the image and reputation of the United States down to a level just below that of Jeffrey Dahmer.

Well, Big Mike is now off into other literally “greener” pastures.  He is fund raising for his (and his orange mentor’s) brand of candidates.  Of course, although these efforts are clothed in an ardent desire to help others, Big Mike has really no purpose other than to help himself. The way it works is that the more money he can raise and give to different office seekers, the more those people will support him when he throws his massive bulk into the ring for the Presidential Prize (as distinguished from the Nobel Prize for which his diplomatic efforts provide him no chance whatsoever).

So, strap on your seat belts and get ready to read Pomp’s latest missives. One is called, “Never Give an Inch.” It goes, in part, like this:

“I recently started a new organization committed to electing more principled, America First conservatives in races all across the country.

So what type of candidates are we looking to support? People who never give an inch to the radical Left.

We need more leaders committed to defeating “woke” cancel culture and who are willing to put it all on the line to prevent America from ever becoming a socialist nation.

If you haven’t read between the lines of that appeal, there’s another one that makes the militaristic character of the whole enterprise very clear. Try this one:

Why should you become a GOLD Member in the Conservative Cavalry? Because there is too much at stake to give up. The Democrats will continue to push their “woke” agenda until America is fully transformed into a socialist nation. If top conservatives like you don’t step up, the Democrats will run rampant with their radical agenda.

So that is what we are up against – “The Conservative Cavalry”. It seems to me that the crowd who broke into the Capitol Building, wasn’t it? I guess if General Mike had more accurately said “The Insurrectionist Infantry” it would have been too obvious. That’s the army that is being organized to go up against the “woke cancel culture” – the “rampant radicals” who are trying to turn America into a “socialist” nation.

We must pay attention now to this caution light at the crossroads of democracy and totalitarianism. In his book, “A Brief History of Fascist Lies,” Frederico Finchelstein, the chair of the history department at the New School for Social Research, addressed the roots of anti-democracy and explained that it typically urges a return to the nation’s sacred past. He said, “In Fascism, mythical truth replaces factual truth in the myth of the nation.” So familiar? Also, the great social historian Hannah Arendt in her seminal book, “On Violence,” explained that power and violence are opposites; that violence appears when power recedes. When a group has power, violence is unnecessary, but every decrease in power is an invitation to violence.

The Pompeo/Trump crowd is populated with those who feel politically impotent.  To them, the “woke” and the minorities have stolen their power. This is their invitation to violence. Trump/Pompeo knows this, and they are catering to it.

We laughed at Donald in 2016. We learned better, at least I hope we did.  If we laugh now at Pompeo’s fund-raising rhetoric, the blame for the resulting devastation of our governmental system will belong to no one but us. 

Our children and grandchildren deserve better.