Regarding the radicalization of the GOP: The John Birch Society

The best propaganda is that which, as it were, works invisibly, penetrates the whole of life without the public having any knowledge of the propagandists initiative. -- Joseph Goebbels

If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower

CONTEXT

As some people here probably know I was banned from 9 right wing politics sites for speaking inconvenient truth in ~2015-2017 and one in Feb. 2023. Back in the days before the GOP radicalized, I used to have respectful, rational discussions with old-fashioned conservatives who still believed in democracy and that an inconvenient fact was still a fact, not a lie. I thought that ended in ~2005-2006. The old-fashioned conservatives seem to have just melted away. Maybe most were RINO hunted out and banned like me. Maybe some were scared into silence and/or radicalized somehow. I'm not sure what happened, but something did happen. The rise of the JBS makes a lot of sense. 

One observer commented that what I was referring to was the rise of the John Birch Society (JBS) in the GOP. The the JBS took over and hijacked Republican Party elites and leadership, with few Republicans having even a clue about what had happened. It's all the same agenda and talking points from a few very wealthy people. They took over the GOP to use as vehicle for their own authoritarian right wing extremism views. All the that the extremists had to do to pull it off was change their name to the Tea-party and start up a propaganda mill promoted as "think tank" to convince people they're right and a news channel to promote radical authoritarian JBS propaganda.

Joseph Coors and the Koch Brothers father were founders along with heir to Brach candy. Early financial supporters of JBS included Rupert Murdoch and Fred Trump.

The JBS scheme to take power is very clever and effective. Joseph Coors founds the Heritage Foundation to be propaganda mill for JBS agenda's under guise of being a "think tank." The intent was to influence public opinion to accept JBS agenda as truth. Murdoch's Faux News presented and promoted the propaganda as legit and praises Heritage Foundation as something people can trust. Republican politicians who says they supports JBS propaganda gets a campaign donation from the Koch brothers. Maybe the JBS/Tea Party figured they could influence a Presidential race and promote their own candidate. If so, there's the son of Fred Trump, Donald, the JBS could give a platform to and support. 

Eisenhower[1] and even Orwell warned of the dangers of the JBS fascist extremism. It's a political movement by the elites solely to serve the elites at the expense of democracy and the public interest generally. And here we are today with tens of millions of deceived people, arguably unreasonably gullible, helping them destroy democracy and civil liberties.

Vox wrote this in March, 2023:

The fringe group that broke the GOP’s brain — and helped the party win elections

As the historian Matthew Dallek documents in his new book, Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the Far Right, the group would go on to grow from a small club of far-right businessmen into a sprawling, nationwide organization that claimed up to 100,000 members across hundreds of state and local chapters. Over time, the John Birch Society would leave its imprint on the Republican Party, pushing it to embrace more hardline positions on anti-communism, white supremacy, isolationism, and nativism.

But according to Dallek, who studies the history of American conservatism at George Washington University, the story of the Birchers’ role in the radicalization of the GOP is a bit more complicated.

“What I’ve tried to do is to draw not too straight a line from the 1950s to today, and to show — as historians try to do — that the radicalization of the GOP was contingent,” Dallek told me when I spoke with him recently. The Birchers’ ideas “were not really ripe in 1970 or [the] ’80s or ’90s, but they became ripe in the past 15 years. They were there for the taking, and as we know, people took them up and ran with them in very powerful ways.”

They didn’t like democracy, and they believed the only way to save the country was through a kind of shock education — through controlling the kinds of texts that kids and college students and other Americans were exposed to — and through direct action: setting up front groups and committees that could attack what they saw as the weak points in the communist line.  

On some issues, the fringe and the Republican establishment aligned, especially on culture war issues. But most of the time, the Birchers and their successors were very frustrated. They loathed Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, and some Birchers even said that Ronald Reagan was never to be trusted. On immigration reform, on internationalism, on military interventions, on free trade agreements, on conspiracy theories, and on the degree of explicit racism versus more coded or implicit racism, there were significant fissures.

So even though the fringe was part of the Republican coalition — especially during campaigns — we don’t want to oversell their power historically. The MAGA phenomenon is a more recent development, and I try to explain how our contemporary far right essentially adopted the Birchers’ ideological legacy as an alternative political tradition and eventually took over the Republican Party.  

The Birchers had a slogan that said, “We’re a republic, not a democracy. Let’s keep it that way.” That meant different things to different people, but they were quite opposed to the idea of multiracial democracy. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s recent comments and tweets about getting a “national divorce” and eviscerating the federal government — that does hark back to this Bircher idea that, “Hey, we’re a republic.”  

So I think that liberals forgot about the far-right opponents of democracy and of civil rights and voting rights. They were a more powerful presence than a lot of people acknowledged for many, many years — but now they’re easier to see.

That puts the timeline for BJS influence taking hold in ~2008. That must have been the radicalization I experienced in what I thought happened in ~2005-2006. Maybe my recollection of the time is off and maybe it was more like 2008-2009. 

It now makes sense why Trump and the other radical right authoritarian elites constantly refer to Democrats and liberals as communist tyrants, and why they dislike and attack democracy. That rhetoric and belief reflects core JBS dogma. It is inherently anti-democracy and civil liberties and pro-plutocracy-autocracy-kleptocracy, probably also significantly pro-Christian theocracy.

Q: Is it a real conspiracy or a crackpot conspiracy theory to think that JBS dogma and its conspiratorial mindset has had, and still has, a significant influence in radicalizing the GOP and in attacking and damaging democracy and civil liberties?

Footnote: 

1. The Financial Times writes:

You do not have to agree with Dallek’s thesis to find his book worth reading. The John Birch Society was founded in 1958 by Robert Welch, who having retired from his candy-making family business set about saving America from a red takeover. It was named after an American missionary, John Birch, who had been murdered by Chinese communists. Welch had the conspiratorial mindset of all such movement leaders. He thought Dwight Eisenhower, the then Republican president, was a communist agent, attributed the death of the alcoholic Joe McCarthy to foul play, and believed America was run by a cabal at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Intellectual consistency was never the Birchers’ hallmark. Their glue was belief in the hidden hand of plots, cabals and conspiracies against America. Birchers reviled John F Kennedy as another avatar of anti-American “one-worldism”. After JFK was killed in 1963, however, they saw the Warren-appointed inquiry as a cover-up for an alleged communist assassination. 

As is often the case, Welch combined an almost infinitely childish imagination with a ferocious organizing zeal. Bircher chapters were limited to 20 members apiece to ensure secrecy. Meetings were usually held in private homes. In that sense, Welch aped Vladimir Lenin’s Bolshevik methods. 

Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. 

Much of the Birchers’ story is instantly recognizable today. Welch urged members to build from the ground up by taking over school boards. One rallying cry was to give parents the right to veto immoral teaching, including sex education. Parents in Florida, whose governor, Ron DeSantis, has passed the “Don’t Say Gay” law that potentially criminalizes teachers, would find this familiar. Another goal was to abolish civilian oversight of police forces.

Bits: Media bias 1 and 2; Anti-GOP authoritarianism attack ad

Jim Hightower writes about media bias:

Here’s a story about media bias. Not the flagrant, pure propaganda that defines partisan outfits like Fox News, but the daily drip, drip, drip of slanted perspectives and loaded words that lard so many of the reports put out by establishment media outlets.

In particular, when these sources of supposedly “straight journalism” cover labor issues, environmental conflicts, consumer rights, tenant battles and such, they regularly slant their reports with corporate terminology, assumptions and viewpoints. For example, when auto workers launched their momentous national strike last week, so many mainline news stories were subtly-but-surely twisted to cast rich executives and shareholders as voices of reason victimized by union bosses.

Consider the Wall Street Journal’s Friday morning article announcing the UAW’s walkout. The story quickly plunged into an assertion by Ford’s CEO that the union’s leaders “refused to engage in a responsible manner.” In case readers missed this industry talking point, the Journal quoted another Big Three honcho four lines later, mouthing the exact same line. But… was the UAW really irresponsible, and—hello—could it be that the auto CEOs were the irresponsible players? The Journal didn’t inquire about these basic facts.

Then, the WSJ quoted a General Motors PR claim that it had “made an unprecedented offer to the union.” How grand! But “unprecedented” doesn’t mean good or fair. Was it? The paper offers no insight, though it does declare on its own that “a sharp increase in labor costs would come at a bad time.” Really? When would auto bosses and Journal editors consider it to be a good time for workers to get a pay increase? No follow-up to that obvious question.

The Journal also resorted demonizing UAW president Shawn Fain, gratuitously labeling him a “firebrand,” which the dictionary defines as “a person who kindles strife—a troublemaker.” A more honest depiction is that Fain—and the feisty UAW membership—are gutsy champions of economic fairness battling plutocratic greed. The actual troublemakers in this story are the auto chiefs and profiteers, along with their media protectors, who now assert that the autoworkers’ demands are “unsustainable.” The obvious question, as taught in beginning journalism classes, is unsustainable for whom?

Interestingly, while the Journal’s report portrays the autoworkers’ demand for a 40 percent pay hike over the next four years as an irresponsible ask, the paper doesn’t even whisper that the CEOs of this three trillion-dollar industry have recently pocketed 40 percent hikes in their take-home, now amounting to $21 million a year for Ford’s chief, $25 million for Stellantis’ boss, and $29 million for GM’s CEO.

This disparity is not secret information. Our little four-person Hightower Substack uncovered it with just a little digging. Media empires like the Wall Street Journal know the truth of it, too, but they’re in service to the existing hierarchies of power, even willing to abandon basic journalistic ethics to distort an inspiring news story of everyday people striving for a little more economic justice in our world.

______________________________________________

______________________________________________

FWIW, a while ago I posted a bit about the Hunter Biden lawsuit that prosecutes him for illegally owning a gun for 18 days. The WSJ reported on it and failed to mention that the gun law was rarely enforced. This violation is so common that it is called "lie and try." Lie and try is when people lie about their illegal drug use when applying for a gun and hope they can get the weapon they want. In 2017-2018 12 people out of at least 13,000 lie and try violators were referred for criminal prosecution of that law, i.e., less than 1 in 1,000. An attorney commenting on this said that Biden would very likely not have been prosecuted if his last name was not Biden.

That is another example of what Hightower was arguing. Rupert Murdoch corrupted and subverted the WSJ, especially the opinion page which now operates as a fulminating authoritarian radical right Republican Party propaganda monstrosity. And that is why my WSJ subscription got dropped a few years after he bought it in 2007. 

______________________________________________

______________________________________________

This is what the GOP has degenerated into.

Bits: DJT is a fibber; DJT getting jittery about time in jail; Racist USSC can undermine voting rights

Salon writes about what all of us already know, i.e., DJT is a chronic liar to tells whoppers all the time. The gigantic lie he is spewing now is that he is a "moderate" when it comes to abortion, despite him being the one responsible for getting rid of nationwide abortion rights:   

Trump is lying about his "moderate" abortion stance — he will ban it nationwide

Trump lies constantly, and history shows he and the GOP will repay evangelicals with a national abortion ban

This should be obvious, and yet, somehow, many in the press are being fooled by Trump's latest public posture about abortion, even though it's transparently dishonest. During his recent NBC News interview with Kristen Welker, Trump tried to strike a "moderate" pose on abortion. Referring to what the press misleadingly calls a "six-week" ban (it's really a two-week ban) on abortion in Florida, Trump said it was "a terrible mistake" for Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis to sign the draconian legislation.  

"We're going to agree to a number of weeks or months or however you want to define it," he said, boldly claiming, "Both sides will come together. And for the first time in 52 years, you'll have an issue that we can put behind us."  

The pomposity of that statement should have been a reminder that Trump should be assumed to be lying about his abortion position, just as he lies about most things. And yet, much of the press took his statements at face value, even going so far as to report that he had angered anti-choice activists, which of course, only helps bolster Trump's false claims of moderation.

Once again, the cluelessness and/or subversion-complicity of most of the MSM is on display. The MSM is betraying us to deeply corrupt radical right authoritarianism. At least this reporter for Salon, Amanda Marcotte, sees and speaks actual truth.

_________________________________________________

_________________________________________________

Rolling Stone reporting suggests that DJT is getting a bit nervous about a possible taxpayer paid vacation in prison:

IN THE PAST several months, Donald Trump has had a burning question for some of his confidants and attorneys: Would the authorities make him wear “one of those jumpsuits” in prison?

As the criminal cases against him have piled up, the former president and 2024 GOP frontrunner has wondered aloud in recent months about what life would be like if he’s convicted, and if appeals fail. While Trump publicly professes confidence [lying to the public, as usual], privately, three sources familiar with his comments say, he’s been asking lawyers and other people close to him what a prison sentence would look like for a former American president.  

Would he be sent to a “club fed” style prison — a place that’s relatively comfortable, as far these things go — or a “bad” prison? Would he serve out a sentence in a plush home confinement?

One can only hope for a “bad” prison, all appeals failed and no pardon.

_________________________________________________

_________________________________________________

Radical right authoritarian Republican USSC 

continues attacks on voting rights and free and fair elections 

The USSC (US Supreme Court) is going to hear for the 2nd time a lawsuit about an illegal districting map in Alabama. The state lost in federal courts, including the USSC, and was ordered for the 2nd time to draw a 2nd voting district that would give black voters a chance to elect a black politician. The state legislature redrew the map, but it still contained only one district where a black could be elected. The case is now back to the USSC for a second hearing on the 2nd map.

Slate describes how the authoritarian radical right Republican USSC can now sanctify and bless the Alabama map with just one black district:

In last June’s Allen v. Milligan, the court explicitly upheld a lower court ruling ordering that a second such district be created. Alabama—led by Republicans in the statehouse—spent the last few months declining the court’s explicit instructions. The new maps were drawn with a single majority-Black district. The district court issued a furious rebuke. Now Alabama has come back to the Supreme Court in an emergency posture requesting a green light to use their still-illegal maps, claiming that the decision in Milligan didn’t in fact mean what it said it meant.

Why? Because in his concurrence in Milligan, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, the determinative fifth vote in the case, signaled to the lawmakers that he’d be open to deciding the matter in their favor on a different theory that was neither briefed nor argued: Things might come out differently, he wrote, winkingly, if they came back armed with the argument that “even if Congress in 1982 could constitutionally authorize race-based redistricting” under the Voting Rights Act “for some period of time, the authority to conduct race-based redistricting cannot extend indefinitely into the future.” (He called the Voting Rights Act a form of “race-conscious redistricting” because it forbids states from diluting the votes of racial minorities, and measuring dilution requires consideration of race.) Alabama legislators reasonably think Kavanaugh’s in the bag based on “intelligence” that’s either an inside source or a straightforward reading of his Milligan concurrence. So they refused to follow the directives of the court in the hopes that in this go-round, they win.

Like with the climate deniers saying, “it's not climate change, it's just the weather” radical right Republican racists can say things like “it's not racism, it's just legal, rough and tumble politics.” 

I cannot understate how inimical and effective this USSC is and has been in gutting voting rights and free and fair elections. This is clear racist authoritarianism. Democracy with civil liberties, including voting rights, and a meaningful rule of law are high priority targets to be obliterated. People who cannot see the seriousness and urgency of the threat are far beyond sorely mistaken. Words fail me here.

The decision in this emergency filing should come fairly soon, maybe in the next month or two. For the 2024 elections, Alabama needs time to implement whatever map the radical authoritarians consider legal.

Trumplandia legal sagas: Attorneys suing attorneys

It's getting ugly out there ladies and germs. Rudi's attorneys are suing him for failure to pay his $1,360,196.10 bill. Naughty Rudi the Tooti Frutti. Here's some of the 8 page filing.

The summons

The heart of the matter

The signature page

It won't be long before we are all familiar with lawsuit filings. FYI, this case was filed in a New York Supreme Court. In New York, the Supreme Court is the lowest court. Trial courts include the Supreme Courts (unlike in the federal system), the Appellate Divisions of the Supreme Court, and the Court of Appeals, which is the court of last resort (similar to the Supreme Court in the federal system). That's ass backwards, but whatever.

Jeez, talk about a cheap law school with a crappy professor.

On the Meaning of the Post-Truth Concept and Its Effects

I originally posted this in April 2021, but the deafening clamor for it to be reposted has forced my hand. 😮

_________________________________________

A 2019 research paper, The Upsurge of Irrationality; Post-truth politics for a polarized world, discusses how researchers see the recent descent of political discourse into the mess it is today for tens of millions of Americans. It nicely describes what concepts such as post-truth mean and how they can influence thinking and political and social policy. The following are some quotes from the paper.

Truthiness

.... the term “truthiness”, coined in 2005 by the comedian Stephen Colbert and defined as “the quality of seeming or being felt to be true, even if not necessarily true.” So, truthiness is not necessarily falsehood or propaganda: it can be mere ignorance shaped by emotion, “gut feeling” and overreliance on intuitive thinking. Nevertheless, while truthiness was used primarily for political satire .... post-truth is not a joke any more.

Post-truth

Current social polarization has led to an upsurge of collective irrationality in which formerly underground unwarranted beliefs and radical discourses have become mainstream. .... controverted shared values have been replaced by alternative epistemologies shaped by identity-related empirical misconceptions that are at the core of current cases of “culture war.” This state of affairs has recently been called “post-truth.”

There are several interconnected concepts considered as major forms of collective irrationalism, such as pseudoscience, science denialism, fact  resistance, and alternative facts. Post-truth has emerged as a higher-order concept that describes the current sociological state of affairs in which all these forms of irrationality thrive. This recent term is defined as “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.”

The meaning of post-truth goes beyond being a fool or a liar — “in its purest form, post-truth is when one thinks that the crowd's reaction actually does change the facts about the lie (...) what seem to be new in the post-truth era is a challenge not just to the idea of knowing reality but to the existence of reality itself.” In this regard, although political lies have always existed, “post-truth relationship to facts occurs only when we are seeking to assert something that is more important to us than truth itself. Thus, post-truth amounts to a form of ideological supremacy, whereby its practitioners are trying to compel someone to believe in something whether there is good evidence for it or not.” So, while truthiness locates the responsibility for lying, post-truth is more vague and collectivist in this regard, providing no clear way to define who is responsible, when, and to what extent. Hence, post-truth gives rise to “a world in which politicians can challenge the facts and pay no political price whatsoever.” 

Comments

The paper’s author points out that there is reliable evidence to believe that unfounded beliefs in post-truth rhetoric is not just innocuous folklore. Adverse effects on political campaigns and regressive cultural backlashes have been documented, but the full ramifications are still playing out and thus unknowable. Counterproductive effects of motivated reasoning and false public opinion significantly adversely affect attitudes toward vaccination and climate change. Solid evidence also indicates that conspiracy theories containing post-truth content are also damaging.[1]

The paper’s concluding comments include these: “Post-truth is not an urban legend: it is a harmful collection of alternative epistemologies with a postmodern background that arises from the kind of intergroup struggles that shape the current polarized socio-political landscape. So, post-truth can be interpreted as a result of self-defensive cognition regarding social identity — a process that is fostered by social networks, perceived moral superiority, and partisan media that generate affective [emotion-based] feedback loops, strong perceived threats, and boost against ethical dissonance.” 

Footnote: 

1. The author writes: “The amount of negative social attitudes and outcomes associated with conspiracy theories is overwhelming. For example, they are associated with less pro-social behavior, science denial and misunderstanding, collective narcissism, moral absolutism, partisanship, Machiavellianism and personal willingness to conspire, political cynicism, unhealthy behaviors — such as the use of alternative medicine, anti-vaccination and unsafe sex —, prejudices, political extremism, and reduced intentions to decrease carbon footprint.” (citations removed)

Belief in false conspiracy theories can be downright dangerous to one’s health and to the health of democracy.

California files climate change lawsuit against big oil cos.

California is the 8th state to file a lawsuit claiming climate change damages arising from oil company propaganda that discredited belief in global warming. 

Some of the lawsuit:

INTRODUCTION 

1. In 2023 alone, the State of California has endured both extreme drought and widespread flooding, sprawling wildfires and historic storms, and an unusually cold spring and a record-hot summer. These extremes are devastating the State and destroying people’s lives and livelihoods, and they are accelerating. These extremes are the products of climate change, and climate change is the product of widespread combustion of fossil fuels. Oil and gas company executives have known for decades that reliance on fossil fuels would cause these catastrophic results, but they suppressed that information from the public and policymakers by actively pushing out disinformation on the topic. Their deception caused a delayed societal response to global warming. And their misconduct has resulted in tremendous costs to people, property, and natural resources, which continue to unfold each day. Californians and their families, communities, and small businesses should not have to bear all the costs of climate change alone; the companies that have polluted our air, choked our skies with smoke, wreaked havoc on our water cycle, and contaminated our lands must be made to mitigate the harms they have brought upon the State. This lawsuit seeks to hold those companies accountable for the lies they have told and the damage they have caused.

3. Defendants are large companies in the fossil fuel industry who have misled consumers and the public about climate change for decades. Defendants have known since at least the 1960s that fossil fuels produce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution that would warm the planet and change our climate. Defendants’ own scientists knew as early as the 1950s that these climate impacts would be catastrophic, and that there was only a narrow window of time in which communities and governments could take action before the consequences became catastrophic. 

4. Rather than warn consumers, the public, and governments, however, Defendants mounted a disinformation campaign beginning at least as early as the 1970s to discredit the burgeoning scientific consensus on climate change; deny their own knowledge of climate change- related threats; create doubt in the minds of consumers, the media, teachers, policymakers, and the public about the reality and consequences of the impacts of burning fossil fuels; and delay the necessary transition to a lower-carbon future.  

18. American Petroleum Institute 

a. Defendant American Petroleum Institute (API) is a nonprofit corporation based in the District of Columbia and registered to do business in California. API was created in 1919 to represent the American oil and gas industry as a whole. With more than 600 members, API is the country’s largest oil trade association. API’s purpose is to advance its members’ collective business interests, which includes increasing consumer consumption of oil and gas for the financial profit of the Fossil Fuel Defendants and other oil and gas companies. Among other functions, API also coordinates members of the petroleum industry, gathers information of interest to the industry, and disseminates that information to its members. 

b. Acting on behalf of and under the supervision and control of the Fossil Fuel Defendants, API has, since at least 1988, participated in and led several coalitions, front groups, and organizations that have promoted disinformation about the climate impacts of fossil fuel products to consumers—including, but not limited to, the Global Climate Coalition, Partnership for a Better Energy Future, Coalition for American Jobs, Alliance for Energy and Economic Growth, and Alliance for Climate Strategies. These front groups were formed to promote climate disinformation and advocacy from a purportedly objective source, when in fact these groups were financed and controlled by the Fossil Fuel Defendants and other oil and gas companies. The Fossil Fuel Defendants have benefited from the spread of this disinformation because, among other things, it has ensured a thriving consumer market for oil and gas, resulting in substantial profits for the Fossil Fuel Defendants.  

302. As a direct and proximate result of the Fossil Fuel Defendants’ failure to warn, their fossil fuel products caused the State to sustain the injuries and damages set forth in this Complaint, and will cause future injuries and damages to State as set forth in this Complaint, including, without limitation, damage to State property, State infrastructure, and natural resources. The State seeks compensatory damages for these injuries in an amount subject to proof. 

One question is whether lawsuits like this will make any difference. Another is how are damages going to be proved? This is the start of what will probably be a years long series of lawsuits and appeals. The polluters will fight tooth and claw against every allegation, probably even including denying they misled anyone about anything. This is the same game plan that the tobacco industry successfully used for decades to avoid liability for misleading people about cigarette-caused lung cancer. Eventually lawsuits took a bite, but in the meantime, profits kept rolling in while consumers remained deceived.