Legal statute requiring those persons lobbying on behalf of a foreign government or other entity to register such with the U.S. government.
Folks like Mike Flynn and Jared Kushner ran afoul of this law during their time in the US government.
History of FARA
The Foreign Agents Registration Act, often abbreviated as FARA, is a United States law passed in 1938. The purpose of FARA is to ensure that the U.S. government and the people of the United States are informed about the source of information (propaganda) and the identity of people trying to influence U.S. public opinion, policy, and laws on behalf of foreign principals.
The Act requires every person who acts as an agent of foreign principals in a political or quasi-political capacity to make periodic public disclosure of their relationship with the foreign principal. This includes activities, receipts, and disbursements in support of those activities. Disclosure of the required information facilitates evaluation by the government and the American people of the statements and activities of such persons.
The Act is administered and enforced by the FARA Unit of the National Security Division (NSD) of the United States Department of Justice.
FARA does not restrict publishing of materials or viewpoints; rather, it requires agents representing the interests of foreign powers to disclose their relationship with the foreign government and information about related activities and finances.
Originally, FARA was passed in 1938 in response to concerns about German propaganda agents in the United States in the years leading up to World War II, but its usage has evolved over time. The Act has been amended several times, most significantly in 1966 when its scope was narrowed to focus more specifically on agents working in a political context.
Non-compliance with FARA has become a more prominent issue in recent times, with several high-profile investigations and prosecutions related to the Act. The Act received significant media attention during and after the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, when it was invoked in investigations related to foreign interference in the election — particularly Russian election interference.
Propaganda is a form of communication that aims to influence people’s beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors towards a particular cause, idea, or ideology. It involves the use of persuasive influence techniques to shape public opinion and to create a favorable image of a person, group, or organization, while discrediting or demonizing its opponents.
Propaganda can take many different forms, including posters, speeches, films, radio broadcasts, social media posts, and news articles. It can be used for political, social, religious, or commercial purposes, and it is often associated with authoritarian regimes or totalitarian societies.
One of the key characteristics of propaganda is its use of emotional appeals, rather than rational arguments, to sway people’s opinions. Propagandists often appeal to people’s fears, hopes, bigotries, or prejudices, and use catchy slogans, symbols, or images to make their message more memorable and persuasive. They may also use repetition, exaggeration, or distortion of facts to reinforce their message and to create a sense of urgency or crisis.
Disinformation at scale
Another key feature of propaganda is its use of selective or biased information to support its claims and to discredit opposing views. Propagandists may use half-truths, rumors, lies, or Big Lies to create a false or misleading picture of the situation, and to manipulate people’s perceptions of reality. They may also use censorship or propaganda techniques such as suppression of dissent, demonization of opponents, or use of fear to create a chilling climate of fear and intimidation.
Propaganda can also be used to create a sense of unity or identity among a group of people, by emphasizing their shared values, beliefs, or interests, and by portraying outsiders or enemies as a threat to their well-being. Propaganda can thus be used to mobilize people for a common cause, such as a war or a political campaign, or to reinforce existing social norms and values.
However, propaganda can also have negative consequences, such as creating divisions, fostering hatred, or suppressing dissent. It can lead to the dehumanization of other groups or individuals, and to the justification of violence or discrimination. Propaganda can also undermine democracy by limiting people’s access to accurate information and by creating a distorted view of reality.
To resist propaganda, it is important to be critical of the messages we receive, to question the sources and motives of the information, and to seek out alternative perspectives and sources of information. We should also be aware of our own biases and prejudices, and strive to be open-minded and tolerant of different opinions and viewpoints.
McCarthyism refers to the anti-communist political repression and paranoia that swept the United States in the 1940s and 1950s, beginning during the tenure of its originator: Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy from Wisconsin. It was a period of intense fear and suspicion of communism during the Cold War that manifested in government investigations, trials, and blacklisting of individuals suspected of being communists or communist sympathizers. The era was marked by a pervasive fear of subversion and betrayal, as many Americans believed that communists were working to infiltrate and undermine American institutions.
The roots of McCarthyism can be traced back to the early 20th century, when communism was viewed as a major threat to Western democracy. The Russian Revolution of 1917 and the rise of the Soviet Union fueled anti-communist sentiment in the United States, which intensified during the Red Scare of the 1920s. However, it was not until after World War II that anti-communist fervor reached its peak.
National anti-communist paranoia
In 1947, President Harry S. Truman issued Executive Order 9835, which established a loyalty program for federal employees. The program required all federal employees to undergo a background check and sign a loyalty oath, swearing that they were not members of the Communist Party or affiliated with any other subversive organization. The program was intended to weed out any suspected communists from the federal government, but it soon became the basis for a broader campaign of anti-communist witch-hunts.
In 1950, Senator Joseph McCarthy rose to national prominence with his claims of widespread communist infiltration in the federal government. In a speech in Wheeling, West Virginia, McCarthy claimed to have a list of 205 known communists in the State Department. He provided no evidence to support his claim, but the speech propelled him to the national spotlight and began a period of intense media fascination with the Senator’s provocative claims.
Over the next several years, McCarthy became the face of the anti-communist crusade. He chaired the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and conducted public hearings and investigations into suspected communist activity. Many of his targets were innocent, and his tactics often included intimidation, character assassination, and guilt by association.
Army-McCarthy hearings
McCarthy’s tactics eventually led to his downfall. Between April and June of 1954, he conducted televised hearings to investigate alleged communist influence in the Army. The hearings were a disaster for McCarthy, as he made unfounded accusations and engaged in verbal attacks on witnesses. As the hearings progressed, McCarthy’s behavior became increasingly erratic and confrontational. He bullied and intimidated Army officials and witnesses, often interrupting them and accusing them of lying. His behavior turned public opinion against him, and the hearings marked the beginning of his decline.
The turning point of the hearings came when Army counsel Joseph Welch famously confronted McCarthy after he had attacked a young lawyer in Welch’s law firm:
“Senator, you’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”
Joseph N. Welch, Army chief counsel
The exchange was a defining moment in the hearings, and it marked the beginning of the end for McCarthy’s political career after millions of Americans witnessed his aggressive demagoguery. In fact it went on to become one of the most famous moments in the history of congressional hearings, and is often cited as an example of the power of a well-timed and well-delivered rhetorical response.
The hearings ultimately failed to uncover any evidence of communist infiltration in the Army, but they did expose McCarthy’s reckless and abusive tactics and damaged his reputation. They also demonstrated the power of televised hearings in shaping public opinion and holding government officials accountable.
Historical influence of McCarthyism
McCarthyism had far-reaching consequences for American society. Thousands of people were investigated, blacklisted, and lost their jobs or were denied employment on suspicion of being communist sympathizers. The entertainment industry was particularly hard hit, with many actors, writers, and directors being blacklisted for their political beliefs. The unfounded smears against Hollywood contributed to a negative sentiment on the right-wing that continues even to this day.
The era of McCarthyism also had a chilling effect on free speech and political dissent. Many people were afraid to express their opinions or engage in political activism, for fear of being labeled a communist or communist sympathizer. The era demonstrated the dangers of political repression and the importance of protecting civil liberties and freedom of expression.
McCarthyism was a dark period in American history that was characterized by political repression, paranoia, and fear of communism. It was fueled by the perceived threat of subversion and betrayal, and it led to the persecution of innocent people, the erosion of civil liberties, and a chilling climate of fear and suspicion. The legacy of McCarthyism serves as a cautionary tale about the dangers of political repression and the importance of protecting free speech and civil liberties in a democracy.
Many people around the world were shocked in the aftermath of World War II. How could “polite” society break down so utterly, so swiftly, and so zealously? Why did authoritarian personality traits come to dominate human affairs, seemingly out of nowhere? How thin is this veneer of civilization, really?
The authoritarian personality is characterized by excessive strictness and a propensity to exhibit oppressive behavior towards perceived subordinates. On the flip side, they treat authority figures with mindless obedience and unquestioning compliance. They also have an aversion to difference, ambiguity, complexity, and diversity.
How did they get this way? Are people born with authoritarian personalities, or is the authoritarian “made” predominately by circumstance?
Authoritarian personality studies
A braintrust of scholars, public servants, authors, psychologists, and others have been analyzing these questions ever since. Some of the most prominent thinkers on the subject of authoritarianism were either themselves affected by the Nazi regime, or lived through the war in some capacity. Other more recent contributions have built on those original foundations, refining and extending them as more new history continues to unfold with right-wing behavior to observe.
It’s also no accident this whole Twitter takeover drama is happening just before the mid-terms. The right-wing needs to inject some juice into the splintering base, some of whom are wavering as the actual (intentionally) obscured vision of the GOP leaks out (i.e. destroy government altogether).
Great Replacement Theory is a conspiracy theory animating the radical right wing that claims non-white immigrants are being brought to the U.S. and the west to “replace” white voters with their woke political and cultural agenda. Those who believe this white supremacist ideology see routine immigration policy as a white genocide and extinction of the white race. They also point to low birth rates among white europeans and the promotion of multiculturalism, or “wokeness,” as responsible for the alleged effects.
The term “Great Replacement” was popularized by French writer Renaud Camus in his 2011 book “Le Grand Remplacement.” According to Camus, the alleged replacement is a result of the European elites intentionally allowing mass immigration and promoting multiculturalism to undermine national identity and traditional Western culture.
The Great Replacement Theory has been widely discredited and criticized by experts, as it is based on misinformation, selective data, and biased interpretations. It is important to note that this theory often fuels xenophobia, bigotry, racism, and anti-immigrant sentiments, and has been linked to a number of far-right extremist attacks worldwide.
Demographic changes in Western countries are driven by a complex interplay of factors such as economic migration, political instability, globalization, and changing birth rates. These factors are not part of any orchestrated plot, but rather reflect broader social, economic, and political trends. Unfortunately, it’s in the interest of the right-wing to keep its rabid base riled up — and the Great Replacement Theory conspiracy is an effective tool for generating anger and injecting vitriol into the broader political discourse.
Some of us have been boning up on this topic for about 6 years already, while others are just tuning in now based on the horrors of recent events. It can be overwhelming to come in cold, so here — don’t go it alone! Take this:
Putin’s war against the west
President Biden “declassified” an intelligence analysis many of us had arrived at some time ago: Russian president Vladimir Putin is a cruel revanchist leader who will stop at nothing to claw out a larger legacy before he dies. His goal is nothing less than reconstituting the former Soviet Union and restoring the “glory” of the Russian empire of yesteryear. And for some reason he thinks the world community is going to let him get away with his delusional fever dreams of conquest — as if fever dreams of Mongol domination are still de rigueur.
Putin has hated democracy for a long time — since before the Berlin Wall fell where he was stationed in East Berlin as a young KGB agent, taking the news hard. Now, he has many fifth column confederates aiding and abetting him from within the United States — a number of them brazenly, and openly. It is getting harder and harder for those treasonous types to “hide out” in the folds of disinformation, misinformation, and plausible deniability. The play is being called — and everyone will need to decide if they’re for democracy or authoritarianism.
Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, is a broad measure of a nation’s economic output. It includes the value of all goods and services produced within a country’s geographic borders over a specified amount of time; often a year, for comparative annual GDP studies.
Or: How Milton Friedman destroyed Western civilization, the neolliberalism story.
An economic ideology first theorized in the 40s and 50s by scholars, it was brought to popular attention in the 1970s by the works of economist Milton Friedman and novelist Ayn Rand among others. It grew in popularity and became widely adopted in U.S. economic policy beginning with Ronald Reagan in the 80s.
The essential heart of neoliberalism is the idea of the rich as top performers and job creators, driving the economy forward through their achievements and innovations; and that societies work best with little government regulation and where citizens are shaped to work according to market principles. Its adoption as a major driver of policy effectively undid many of the gains to middle class opportunity created by the New Deal, FDR‘s ambitious public works project that pulled the nation out from the grips of the Great Depression following the 1929 crash on Wall Street.
Neoliberalism is the dominant economic orthodoxy in the modern era. It is both a political and a financial ideology, with the following extremist beliefs:
Antigovernment sentiment — Their pitch is that all governments, including democratic ones, threaten individual liberty and must be stopped (or “drowned in the bathtub,” in the words of anti-tax zealots and movement conservatives).
Free markets should conquer governments — They claim, absurdly, that the toppling of self-governance would improve both economies and individual liberties.
The victory of markets is inevitable and there is nothing you can do about it — The fall of the Soviet Union and Cold War Communism was deemed the “end of history” by neoliberals, who believed that laissez-faire free market capitalism would inevitably triumph over all other forms of economic and political systems.
Economies work best when governments don’t intervene — Neoliberals want to prevent the powers of government from interfering with their ability to cut corners, dump industrial waste, pay fair wages, offer benefits, adhere to safety standards, engage in deceptive advertising, commit tax evasion, and so on — while continuing to supply them a steady stream of the public’s money via unpaid for tax cuts that balloon holes in the deficit. They fight against regulation tooth and nail, and try to claim that markets operate “naturally” as if under something akin to laws of physics — while failing to mention that there are no markets without regulation, without standards of fairness, without a justice system to enforce contracts and do its best to ensure a relatively equal business playing field.
The alchemy of neoliberalism will transmute greed into gold for everyone — The neoliberal promise is about spreading wealth, freedom, and democracy around the world — at the barrel of a gun, missile, or drone if necessary. Neoliberals consider greed to be the essence of human nature, and have modeled an entire societal system around this most base of human instincts. They claim, improbably — and surely many are True Believers — that narcissism and the aggressive pursuit of power and wealth will somehow magically create peace, happiness, and riches for everyone.
The insistence that governments and self-rule should be subordinated to the ultra-rich, to the oligarchs — that, to me, is the core essence of why this framework is evil. The staggeringly dissonant conviction about transforming sociopathy into global peace is a very close second.
Since the 1970s and accelerating with Reagan years, wealthy elites in the right wing have been spending gobs of their ill-earned wealth on creating a conservative movement echo chamber of think tanks, talk radio, literature, televangelists, YouTube streamers, and more — it is the vast right-wing conspiracy Hillary Clinton warned us about. It most certainly exists, and it most certainly is aggressively pursuing its political aims to disenfranchise the American people as fully as possible, so as to better walk away with an absurdly unjust share of the mutually created wealth by the wealth of intelligent and diligent labor here in the United States.
Common whites
It appeals to the MAGA crowd because it allows them to vicariously tag along with the rich and powerful right-wing bigots who flaunt and dangle their wealth in front of the plebes by which to entice them to open up their wallets and send in a meagre donation for this or that white victimhood fund that does nothing but enrich the scam artists who run it as a hollow shell. It validates their hardcore white supremacy and casual racism alike, provides the sadistic satisfaction of attacking their enemies (symbolically and/or literally), gives them something to do and believe in, and keeps them entertained while their pockets are being fleeced in broad daylight.
Neoliberalism has succeeded in undermining some of the last shreds of democratic infrastructure and civic goodwill in society at this point in American political history. The defenses brilliantly architected by the Founders to ensure checks and balances would manage the power games in Washington to within workable levels have frayed even further under 4 years of Trump, and the vitriol of the January 6 coup attempt and insurrection that’s fueled further right-wing Big Lie entrenchment and domestic terrorist extremism.
Democracy is in crisis, and neoliberalism the culprit of this hostage story.
At least Joe Biden is correct in his analysis of the solution: we should tax the rich.
It feels like the 1930s all over again — and with good reason. The rise of American fascists and right-wing extremism around the world has been a known trend for decades, and America’s past flirtations with fascism had been largely swept under the rug by the then anti-semites who tried to put a stop to FDR‘s New Deal and prevent the U.S. from getting into World War II.
Those fascists, butthurt over America’s overwhelmingly popular decision to enter the war and stop Hitler from exterminating the Jews, seethed with jealousy at the post-war “liberal consensus” that flourished alongside the booming US economy, propelled first by the war effort and later by the peacetime success of the New Deal‘s long shadow and the burgeoning of the American middle class.
The American fascists turned into the John Birch Society, and the McCarthyites, and the Libertarians, and the Moral Majority, and the Gingrich Revolution, and the Tea Party, and the MAGA / QAnon stew sloshing around mass media. The kooks on the far right — the kind of ilk so cray cray that even William F. Buckley excommunicates you from the Republican Party — have taken over the hen house now. Outrage sells, as Facebook well knows — and as two-bit dictators around the world have bribed Mark Zuckerberg to brainwash the masses using the most inanely illogical propaganda prolefeed, the world tilts dangerously towards authoritarianism and the end of our democracy as we know it. And with it, all hope for truth and light into the future for some time to come — the equivalent of a political meteor hitting the Earth.
The American fascists are still around, and now they have tools of propaganda that Goebbels could never have even wet dreamed of. They’re more powerful and more well-connected — to other sociopaths, malignant narcissists, and other pathological cult-leader types who might be of transactional service to each other from time to time. Many of them cling to ideas of Christian nationalism and Strict Father Morality. We’d be wise to keep an eye on these folks.
Name
Type
Location
Known for
Greg Abbott
Politician
Texas
The 48th governor of Texas since 2015 who has presided over multiple energy grid disasters, a self-induced economic fiasco at the border, and ghoulish vigilante legislation designed to terrorize women seeking abortion services, and a perversion of the child sex trafficking apparatus to instead target and tyrannize trans youth
Roman Abramovich
Foreign agent
Russian oligarch close to both Putin and Trump
ACU Strategic Partners
Foreign agent
A company seeking to build nuclear power plants in the Middle East in partnership with a sanctioned Russia company; Mike Flynn was working for them without having disclosed it to the US government as required.
Sheldon Adelson
Businessperson
Las Vegas, NV
CEO billionaire of the Sands Corp casino empire (died, 2021)
AggregateIQ
Corporation
Canadian data firm connected to Cambridge Analytica parent company SCL Group that played a role in spreading Brexit propaganda
Roger Ailes
Media personality
Deceased
Primogenitor of Fox News whose downfall came over dozens of women testified to his decades of sexual assault and blackmail behaviors
Todd Akin
Politician
Missouri
Politician who lost his Senate race to Clairse McCaskill in 2012 when he made the comment on TV about women having a way to "shut the whole thing down" to avoid becoming pregnant if raped.
Nelson W. Aldrich
Ali Alexander
Extremist
One of the primary organizers of the Stop the Steal rally on January 6 that turned into and/or attempted to mask a coup attempt
Samuel Alito
Judge
Washington, DC
Supreme Court Justice who penned a draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, riddled with Christian nationalist tropes and arbitrary Originalist interpretations
American Energy Alliance
Non-profit
A tax-exempt nonprofit that advocated for corporate-friendly energy policies. Koch's Freedom Partners donated $1.5 million in 2012.
American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)
Non-profit
Corporate-funded nonprofit that writes legislation for Republican legislatures, including spearheading the efforts to wrest partisan control over election results in 49 states.
Americans for Prosperity
PAC
The Koch Brothers' Libertarian political advocacy arm
Philip Anschutz
Businessperson
Colorado
CO oil and entertainment billionaire and founder of Qwest Communications
Michael Anton
Lee Atwater
Political Operative
Infamously brutal Republican strategist for Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush who promoted the "abstraction" of racism via Southern Strategy and ran the infamous Willie Horton ad against Michael Dukakis in 1988.
Michele Bachman
Politician
MN
Minnosota Republican politician who was the first woman in her state to be elected to the House of Representatives, she is known for her extremist Dominionist views
Steve Bannon
Media personality
Houseboats
Former Breitbart provocateur who joined the Trump administration as a key advisor and dark propagandist for Trump intent on sowing chaos
Ross Barnett
William Barr
Public Sector
Donald Trump's Attorney General who shielded him from public awareness of his crimes, corruptions, and compromises during the 45th presidency.
Maurice Barres
Author
France
French nationalist author in the early 20th century who introduced Great Replacement theory
Louis Beam
White Supremacist
Roy Beck
White Supremacist
Executive Director of NumbersUSA, member of the white supremacist Tanton Network
Andy Biggs
Politician
AZ
House Republican subpoena'd by the January 6 Commission for his role in the attempted coup
Black Legion
Extremist
Michigan
Secret society of black-hooded terrorists working in MI against labor unions and labor organizers in the 1930s. Legionnaires talked of staging a coup to oust FDR and imposing a fascist regime in the United States
David Bogatin
Oligarch
NYC
A top figure in the Russian mafia who bought 5 luxury condos in Trump Tower to launder money, he admitted in 1987.
Jacob Bogatin
Oligarch
David Bogatin's brother, and a partner of notorious Russian mob moss Semion Mogilevich
John Wilkes Booth
Criminal
Deceased
Stage actor and Confederate sympathizer who shot Abraham Lincoln in the back of the head in April 1865, a few months after his re-election in 1864.
L. Brent Bozell
Extremist
BFF of William F. Buckley and author of Conscience of a Conservative to support Barry Goldwater's candidacy in 1960.
Harry and Lynde Bradley
Kochtopus
Midwesterners who built their wealth on defense contracts
Andrew Breitbart
Media personality
Founded both Brietbart and the Huffington Post
Anders Breivik
Extremist
Oslo, Norway
Mass murderer who killed 77 people in Oslo, Norway as inspired by the white supremacist ideology of Great Replacement theory
Mo Brooks
Politician
Huntsville, AL
House Republican from Alabama subpoena'd by the January 6 Committee for his role in the attempted coup
Brother's Circle
Criminal
Organized crime gang pursued by then-FBI head Robert Mueller circa 2011
Michael Brown
Ferguson, MO
Unarmed black man killed by the police in Ferguson, Missouri, sparking a series of riots in the city.
Pat Buchanan
Politician
Washington, DC
Politician and paleoconservative who worked for presidents Nixon, Ford, and Reagan before running against incumbent George H.W. Bush in 1992; widely considered a bigot, racist, and antisemite.
William F. Buckley Jr
Media personality
Doug Burley
Political Operative
Founding and leading both The Family and the National Prayer Breakfast of right-wing power brokers
Cambridge Analytica
Corporation
London, UK
Data firm implicated in the propaganda campaigns of both Brexit in 2015 and Donald Trump in 2016 that stole hundreds of millions of Facebook profiles and mined the treasure trove of information for weaknesses to manipulate in attempts to persuade
Renaud Camus
Author
France
French writer and critic who created the recent 2011 formulation of the Great Replacement Theory
Tucker Carlson
Media personality
NYC
Fox News evening opinion anchor and fish stick heir who promotes the Great Replacement conspiracy theory to his primetime audience of older white men.
Doug Casey
Businessperson
Ayn Rand devotee and "anarcho-capitalist" who specializes in how to profit from turmoil
Michael Catanzaro
Lobbyist
Partner at the CGCN Group lobbying firm who headed "energy independence" for the Trump transition team.
Cato Institute
Think Tank
Madison Cawthorn
Politician
NC
Center to Protect Patient Rights
Kochtopus
Dark money group funded by the Kochs to attack the ACA with fearmongering and vitriol
Mike Cernovich
Media personality
CGCN Group
Lobbyist
Lobbyist for the Koch brothers
James Chaney
Activist
Neshoba County, MS
One of 3 civil rights activists murdered by local white supremacists when engaging in non-violent civil disobedience, along with Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman
Jeremy Joseph Christian
Extremist
Portland, OR
stabbed 3 people who tried to intervene while he was hurling anti-Muslim slurs at 2 young women in Portland, OR
Chris Christie
Politician
Former governor of NJ and former Trump supporter and transition team lead who became a Trump critic
Michael Cohen
Businessperson
NYC
Donald Trump's personal lawyer, sentenced to 3 years in federal prison for felony crimes, including campaign finance crimes
Steven A. Cohen
Businessperson
Finance (SAC Capital Advisors)
Roy Cohn
Political Operative
Deceased
Lawyer who represented Senator Joseph McCarthy in the infamous televised 1954 hearings, and later went on to become a mafia-connected fixer in NYC and mentor to budding real estate developer Donald Trump
Competitive Enterprise Institute
Think Tank
Washington, DC
A Washington think tank that had been bankrolled by fossil fuel industries, particularly the Kochs.
Continental Resources
Corporation
Oklahoma
OK-based shale oil company with a large and profitable fracking operation
Coors brewing family
Koch Investor
Colorado
The Coors gave money to Oliver North to fund the Iran-Contra operation
Council of Conservative Citizens (CoC)
Ted Cruz
Politician
Texas
Jefferson Davis
Kim Davis
Public Sector
Kentucky
Former county clerk of Rowan County, KY who defied a US federal court order to issue marriage licenses to gay couples in 2015
Devos family
Koch Investor
Founders of the Amway marketing empire; Betsy DuVos was the Secretary of Education under Trump
Amadou Diallo
New York
a West African immigrant mowed down by 41 shots from police when leaving his apartment on February 4, 1999.
James Dobson
Media personality
conservative talk-show host and fundamentalist Christian who strongly advocated spanking and corporal punishment be applied liberally to children
Chester Doles
Former KKK leader who runs the white supremacist American Patriots USA. Nearly beat a Black man to death in 1993. Marched in 2017 in Charlottesville.
Rod Dreher
Extremist
Benedict Option author and traditionalist
Dinesh D'Souza
Media personality
Conservative gadly who alleged that Obama was "African" in outlook rather than American, absorbing his "radical" views from his Kenyan father
Doug Ducey
Politician
AZ
Governor of Arizona
Aleksandr Dugin
Extremist
Russia
Russia's primary fascist political philosopher and originator of Eurasianism conspiracy theory
David Duke
White Supremacist
John Eastman
Political Operative
Ran against Kamala Harris in 2010 for California AG, then showed back up in 2020 to write an outrageous op-ed that Newsweek for some reason actually published, that claimed that she was "secretly" not a US resident and therefore not eligible to be the VP! Now the Kamala Harris birther
Myron Ebell
Political Operative
Outspoken climate change skeptic, who headed the Trump transition team for the EPA
Election Integrity Project California
Extremist
Election fraud group working with Leonard Leo
Larry Ellison
Businessperson
Gave $5 million to Marco Rubio
Cassandra Fairbanks
Jerry Falwell, Jr
Televangelist
The Family
Lobbyist
Shadowy DC group with tremendous sway in Congress and around the world, following a distorted "strongman Jesus" version of Christianity.
The Federalist Society
Extremist
Scott Fitzgerald
Politician
WI
House Republican
Michael Flynn
Cult Leader
For America
PAC
Nathan Bedford Forrest
Fox News
Corporation
Free Congress Foundation
Freedom Caucus
Politician
Freedom Partners
Kochtopus
The Koch Brothers' secretive donor club.
FreedomWorks
Extremist
Matt Gaetz
Politician
Kevin Gentry
Kochtopus
VP of Special Projects and VP of the Koch Foundation
Greg Gianforte
Politician
body-slamming Guardian reported Ben Jacobs while running for a GOP House seat in Montana
Newt Gingrich
Media personality
Tim "Baked Alaska" Gionet
White Supremacist
Rudy Giuliani
Politician
NYC
GiveSendGo
"Christian" donation platform
Barry Goldwater
Politician
AZ
Seb Gorka
Political Operative
Billy Graham
Madison Grant
Political Operative
Close personal friend of Herbert Hoover who helped draft the exclusionary Immigration Act of 1924 -- the Stephen Miller of his day. His "Passing of the Great Race" was beloved by Hitler as "his bible."
Chuck Grassley
Politician
Senator
The Great Awakening
Marjorie Taylor Greene
QAnon
GA
Eric Greitens
Politician
MO
Harold Hamm
Kochtopus
Billionaire founder of Continental Resources, an OK-based shale company with large fracking business & one of the charter members of the Kochs' donor circle.
James Henry Hammond
Extremist
Warren G. Harding
Politician
Enthusiastically supported the white-supremacist work of Lothrop Stoddard et al
Billy James Hargis
Extremist
Orrin Hatch
Politician
Sen. Orrin Hatch raised concerns about funding certain entitlement programs. “I have a rough time wanting to spend billions and billions and trillions of dollars to help people who won’t help themselves, won’t lift a finger and expect the federal government to do everything,” he said.
Josh Hawley
Politician
MO
Missouri Senator funded by Peter Thiel who gave the January 6 mob a fist bump on his way in to object to certifying the electoral count
Matthew Heimbach
Extremist
White nationalist and one of the founders of the Traditionalist Workers Party
Jesse Helms
Politician
Leona Helmsley
Diane Hendricks
WI
The wealthiest woman in Wisconsin at $3.6 billion
Heritage Foundation
Think Tank
Washington, DC
Honest Elections Project
Extremist
A conservative legal organization connected to Leonard Leo that files legal briefs to SCOTUS opposing mail-in ballots and other voting reforms that help more people to vote,
Herbert Hoover
Politician
Washington, DC
White supremacist and wealth supremacist, he was adamant about doing nothing to help people during the Great Depression.
Mike Huckabee
Politician
Laura Ingraham
Media personality
Fox News host
Andrew Jackson
Politician
Deceased
US President
John Birch Society
Extremist
Andrew Johnson
Politician
Deceased
US President
Chuck Johnson
Media personality
Alt-right super troll
Ron Johnson
Politician
Wisconsin Republican Senator who supported Donald Trump, promoted ivermectin for covid, and said he wasn't afraid of the January 6 mob because they were white people
Alex Jones
Media personality
Host of InfoWars, the 9/11 conspiracy show that put the genre on the map
Jim Jordan
Politician
OH
A long-time Tea Party hyena, the Congressman known as Gym once helped his buddy cover up decades of sexual abuse of young wrestlers in their care.
Judicial Education Project
Extremist
A legal group tied to Leonard Leo, working to advance conservative takeover of the judiciary.
Islam Karimov
Oligarch
Uzbekistan
Former Communist official who became the first president of Uzbekistan in 1991, and remained the country's dictator until his death in 2016.
Alex Kaschuta
Media personality
Right-wing podcaster
Brett Kavanaugh
Judge
DC
Dr. D. James Kennedy
creating a Dominionist "conversion" playbook
John F. Kennedy
Politician
Deceased
Robert F. Kennedy
Politician
Deceased
Anna Khachiyan
Martin Luther King
Activist
Deceased
Civil Rights leader in the 1960s, and enemy of Southern politicians
Charlie Kirk
Media personality
Walter Kirn
Author
MT
Up in the Air author and disaffected former member of the American intellectual class
KKK
White Supremacist
Bill Koch
Businessperson
Charles Koch
Kochtopus
Kansas
industries: pipelines, oil refineries, lumber and paper, coal, chemicals, commodity futures, etc.
David Koch
Kochtopus
Deceased
industries: pipelines, oil refineries, lumber and paper, coal, chemicals, commodity futures, etc. (now deceased)
Fred Koch
Kochtopus
Kansas
Father of Charles and David, Fred Koch was an early and fervent acolyte in the ultra-conservative John Birch Society
Frederick Koch
Businessperson
New York
David Koresh
Cult Leader
Waco, TX
Ku Klux Klan (see KKK)
White Supremacist
Kylie Jane Kremer
David Lane
White Supremacist
Member of the white supremacist group The Order who coined the 14-word slogan popular with Great Replacement adherents: "We must secure the exisatence of our people and a future for white children"
Ken Langone
Businessperson
Founder of Home Depot
Lyndon LaRouche
Cult Leader
Robert LeFevre
Kochtopus
Charles Koch's mentor, a quasi-anarchist, who said, "government is a disease masquerading as its own cure"
Leonard Leo
Extremist
Chairman of the Federalist Society, a legal organization working to pack the courts with conservative judges.
Marine Le Pen
Politician
France
Honor Levy
Liberty Counsel
Christian special rights group
The Liminal Order
William S. Lind
Political Operative
Kelly Loeffler
Politician
Georgia
Insider trading immediately upon arriving at her unelected Senate seat when her husband, President of the NYSE, found a way to have some money arrive at Brian Kemp, the Governor, who appointed her.
Dana Loesch
Media personality
NRA spokeswoman
Sen. Huey Long
Politician
Deceased
Thomas Mair
Extremist
Assassin of British MP Jo Cox, who was outspoken against the UK's Brexit campaign
Paul Manafort
Lobbyist
Clarence Manion
Blake Masters
Politician
AZ
John McAfee
Businessperson
Deceased
Sen. Joseph McCarthy
Politician
Deceased
Senator best known for his demagoguery against alleged Communist agents in the US government during the Cold War in the early 1950s
Kevin McCarthy
Politician
CA
Michael McKenna
Kochtopus
Lobbyist and President of MWR Strategies lobbying firm, who have the Koch brothers as clients
Timothy McVeigh
Extremist
Oklahoma City, OK
White supremacist McVeigh was a disgruntled former military guy who took up with the white power movement and executed the Oklahoma City bombing -- as inspired, he said, by enacting "revenge" for Waco.
Andrew Mellon
Businessperson
Rebekah Mercer
Oligarch
Daughter of NY hedge fund manager Robert Mercer; she helped guide the Trump transition team following the 2016 election, and funded right-wing social network Parler
Robert Mercer
Oligarch
Father of Rebekah Mercer and longtime right-wing donor
MicroChip
Pro-Trump bot-king
Stephen Miller
Extremist
Michael Milken
Cleta Mitchell
Extremist
OK
Lawyer who represented various right-wing entities including the NRA, and was considered the "fringe of the fringe" -- at age 70 she "represented" Trump during his telephone call to Brad Raffensperger asking him to find ~11,000 votes
Semion Mogilevich
Criminal
Notorious Russian mob boss
Stefan Molyneux
Media personality
Alt-right troll
Sun Myung Moon
Cult Leader
Leader of the Moonie cult and self-proclaimed deity, Mr Moon served time in federal prison for tax fraud, among other charges.
Roy Moore
Politician
AL
Trump-backed politician and pedophile who narrowly lost the Alabama Senate race to Doug Jones in 2018.
JP Morgan
Businessperson
Rupert Murdoch
Oligarch
Fox News owner famous for his amoral media
Jack Murphy
Benito Mussolini
MWR Strategies
Kochtopus
Lobbying firm for the Koch brothers
Dasha Nekrasova
neo-Nazis
Extremist
Terry Nichols
Extremist
Blew up the Oklahoma Federal Building with Timothy McVeigh
Richard Nixon
Politician
Ralph Norman
Politician
House Republican who skirted the metal detectors to enter the House floor after the January 6 insurrection
NRA
Extremist
National Rifle Association
NYPD
Public Sector
New York Police Department
Barack Obama
Politician
Chicago, DC, Los Angeles
The 44th President of the United States, and the first black person to hold the job. He was widely loathed by the Right despite his positive record.
John M. Olin
Kochtopus
Chemical and munitions company titan
Viktor Orban
Politician
Radical right president of Hungary and Putin supporter
The Order
White supremacist group
Candace Owens
Extremist
Matt Parrott
Extremist
Co-founder with Matthew Heimbach of the Traditionalist Workers Party
Laszlo Pasztor
Norman Vincent Peale
Businessperson
Christianity as a business man's religion
Mike Pence
Media personality
Donald Trump's VP
Rick Perry
Politician
Scott Perry
Politician
House Republican who skirted the metal detectors to enter the House floor after the January 6 insurrection
Jordan B Peterson
Academic
A sort of hero figure to the incel crowd
William Pierce
Pioneer Fund
A white supremacist group set up for "race betterment" in 1997 at a private club.
Jeanine Pirro
Media personality
Fox News host known for having a bit of a drinking problem and a brash on-air personality
Mike Pompeo
Public Sector
Sec of State after the firing of Rex Tillerson; former CIA Director; former Republican congressman from KS and largest recipient of Koch campaign funds in all of Congress
Jack Posobiec
Media personality
Lewis Powell
Businessperson
Wrote a 1971 memo that rallied the largely white and male business community around a plan to dismantle the New Deal and the liberal consensus
Sydney Powell
Political Operative
Also Associates with UFO believers and anti-vaxxers
Proud Boys
Extremist
Militia group involved in the January 6 coup attempt
Thomas Pyle
Businessperson
president of the American Energy Alliance, funded by Exxon and the Kochs
QAnon
QAnon
Conspiracy theory about Democratic pedophiles that recycles Nazi ideology
Jean Raspail
Author
France
French author of the 1973 Camp of the Saints novel about migrants organizing to take over France; the racist fiction inspired the white power movement of the 1980s, Steve Bannon, and a host of other fascist movements in Europe, America, and around the world
Nancy Reagan
Media personality
Deceased
Ronald Reagan
Politician
Deceased
Actor and Republican who became the 40th President from 1981 through 1989
Kyle Rittenhouse
Pat Robertson
Televangelist
Dylann Roof
George Romney
Mitt Romney
Politician
UT
Murray Rothbard
Extremist
Dave Rubin
Richard Mellon Scaife
Koch Investor
Heir to the Mellon banking and Gulf Oil fortunes, and Koch donor
David Schnare
Political Operative
"Free-market environmentalist" who accused the EPA of having blood on its hands, who joined climate change denier Myron Ebell on the Trump transition team for the EPA
Stephen Schwarzman
Finance
Rick Scott
Politician
Jeff Sessions
Politician
AL
Marc Short
Political Operative
Ran the Koch Brothers' secretive donor club, Freedom Partners, before becoming Mike Pence's senior advisor during the 2016 presidential transition
A racist publishing company, part of the Tanton Network, that published the white nationalist novel Camp of the Saints
Richard Spencer
White Supremacist
Balaji Srinivasan
Businessperson
State Policy Network
Kochtopus
Funded in part by the Kochs
Dan Stein
White Supremacist
President of Tanton Network organization FAIR
Lothrop Stoddard
White Supremacist
Author of the 1920 book The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy
Roger Stone
Lobbyist
Richard Strong
Businessperson
Strong Capital Management Mutual Fund
Sen. Robert Taft
Politician
John H. Tanton
White Supremacist
Michigan
White nationalist who organized The Tanton Network of 13 anti-immigrant organizations
Tea Party
PAC
Intensely antitax group
Peter Thiel
Businessperson
Los Angeles, CA
Eccentric Silicon Valley billionaire and pocketbook for the New Right project
Clarence Thomas
Judge
Washington, DC
Ginni Thomas
Political Operative
Washington, DC
Three Percenters
Extremist
Militia group who had a heavy presence at the January 6 attempted coup
Traditionalist Workers Party
Extremist
Turning Point USA
Extremist
Charlie Kirk's right-wing PR organization
Unabomber
Criminal
Unification Church
Cult Leader
Unite the Right
Activist
Charlottesville, NC
Charlottesville, NC event in 2018 where white supremecist groups marched with tiki torches, and activist Heather Hyer was killed by a right-wing extremist who drove his car through the crowd.
University of Texas at Austin
Academic
Austin, TX
JD Vance
Politician
OH
Venture capitalist and Peter Thiel acolyte running for Senate in Ohio
Ricky Vaughn
Ruben Verastigui
Criminal
DC
Former RNC and other GOP offices staffer who made social media ads for the Trump campaign and was later arrested with child porn on his phone after a DHS sting.
John Vinson
Extremist
Head of the Tanton Network-backed anti-immigrant hate group American Immigration Control Foundation (AICF)
George Wallace
Politician
Alabama
Joe Walsh
Media personality
Kelli Ward
Politician
AZ
GOP Chair
Ron Watkins
Extremist
Identified as the most likely suspect to be Q of QAnon
Randy Weaver
White Supremacist
Naples, ID
Vicki Weaver
White Supremacist
Naples, ID
Weev
White Supremacist
Andrew "Weev" Auernheimer
Paul Weyrich
White Supremacist
Arch-deacon of the New Right ultraconservative movement and hugely influential figure who founded the Heritage Foundation, Council for National Policy, and ALEC.
White Citizens Councils
White Supremacist
Geert Wilders
Darren Wilson
Public Sector
Police officer who brutally killed a Black man, Michael Brown, in Ferguson, MO in 2014.
Data literacy is the newest frontier. The world of information has a pale twin universe of disinformation, deep fakes, fake news, and true believers — keeping track of reality will become more and more important and valuable into the future.
RussiaGate: Russian hacking of the 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2022 US elections
Bestiary: Principal actors in Russian interference with US democracy
It’s not just here at home in the US that fascism seems to have taken root in the population. There are many burgeoning nationalist movements resurrecting right-wing populism around the world, and as per many experts’ warnings, right-wing authoritarianism is on the rise around the globe.
Many of the right-wing populist thatches that have sprung up are at least in part, seeds planted by Vladimir Putin in his quest for Russian revanchism against the West following the end (or so we thought…) of the Cold War. Rumoured to be the richest man in the world by far, the former KGB agent was working in East Germany when the Berlin Wall fell, and has been pursuing his Lost Cause grievance ever since.
As such, it would be foolish not to see what’s happening here in America as part of a broader wave of right-wing populism and authoritarian fever that is very dangerous. We need to find out a lot more information about how all these puzzle pieces fit together, and get to the bottom of the real conspiracy clearly going on — if we can find it through all these smokescreen conspiracy theories clogging the propaganda waves.
Here’s a list of some of the extreme right-wing parties on the rise around the globe:
Country
Flag
Party
Abbreviation
Austria
🇦🇹
Freedom Party
FPO
Belgium
🇧🇪
Flemish Block
VB
Britain
🇬🇧
UK Independence Party
UKIP
Britain First
National Front
Czech Republic
Freedom and Direct Democracy
SPD
Denmark
🇩🇰
Danish People's Party
DPP
Finland
🇫🇮
True Finns
France
🇫🇷
National Front
FN
Germany
🇩🇪
Alternative for Germany
AfD
Patriotic Europeans Against Islamization of the West
Or, DADA vs. MAGA. Defense Against the Dark Arts was like the women’s self-defense class of Hogwarts — it taught you how to prepare yourself for the evil that was out there lurking and waiting for you out there. This course of DADA will follow suit, aiming to offer ways to detect, defend, and defeat the cultism rising in America and beyond.
It will be a work in progress over time, so please bear with me as I assemble learnings from a number of sources.
The internet, social media, seemingly infinite channels of entertainment and franchises in gaming are but tips of the giant iceberg that now competes for our time and attention. The number of options to choose from has scaled exponentially over the past several decades — but our amount of time to spend has not increased whatsoever. If anything, it’s decreased
A technique of torture and compliance, brainwashing is used in many contexts to control victims. From personal relationships and marriage to cults and high demand groups, all the way up to the scale of nation-states, removing or reducing independent thinking and action in a person or population gives the brainwasher enormous power and advantage.
The word’s origin is from a Chinese term meaning “forcible indoctrination to induce somebody to give up basic religious, social, or political beliefs and attitudes in favor of a belief system imposed by the brainwasher.” It’s also been referred to as mind control, thought reform, undue influence techniques, or coercive persuasion — and is a form of highly unethical emotional and psychological manipulation.
Thought reform
Brainwashing is essentially a method of inducing a false personality into a target, after breaking them down psychologically. There are many different methods and techniques employed, from disinformation and sleep deprivation to hypnosis to emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. The goal of this “thought reform” project is to remove the individual’s agency and train them to follow the orders of the cult or high-demand group.
Seemingly normal, totally “average” people can fall under the sway of brainwashing techniques in use by cults much more easily than one might think. Cults and abusive organizations prey on people at vulnerable times in their lives, when they are most suggestible and least likely to mount an opposition. People who have gone through a loss, or a major life change, or are feeling particularly adrift may be lured by the sway of a deceptive organization. It can be very exhilarating to feel plugged in to an intense community after going through a period of grief or anxiety — almost irresistable, to some.
7 brainwashing tactics
isolation — separating you from family and friends, or any kind of support network who may provide alternative and negative views of the abuser
monopolization of attention — they seek to have the target orient their entire world around the abuser, leaving them little time to think about anything else
weaken your resistance — wearing down your defenses over time, so their messages take firmer hold
give occasional indulgences — providing temporary relief or even pleasure contributes to the overall program of intermittent reinforcement, to induce dependency on the abuser for stimulation of any kind
demonstrates “all-knowingness” — becomes an absurd moral authority on your entire life, presenting the truth about your inner self and past history with more omniscience than you yourself possess. They know you better than you know yourself — and you believe them!
destroy all sources of joy — the brainwasher needs to ensure that they are the sole source of pleasure and pain, for complete operant conditioning control over the target. All other pleasures in life are eradicated or eroded.
degradation and humiliation — if the target gets close to figuring out the truth about the power imbalance and impropriety of the abuser’s behavior, the abuser will immediately begin a scathing shame campaign to punish the temerity of daring to stand meekly on one’s own
Brainwashing in politics and religion
Use of brainwashing by communist officials in China, Korea, and Vietnam gained attention in the U.S. in the mid-20th century. The brainwashing technique is also used by gangs, cults, and organized crime networks to control both members and outgroups.
Perhaps most commonly it is associated with fringe religious groups like the Peoples Temple, Unification Church (or Moonies), Children of God, Branch Davidians, Heaven’s Gate, Aum Shinrikyo, The Manson Family, and thousands of other cults less well known. Sometimes the brainwashing is intended to limit the followers’ access to the outside world, and sometimes it is about grooming them to perform criminal acts from financial crimes to murder to starting a race war.
Important research
Many interdisciplinary minds across multiple fields have studied the topic of brainwashing and undue influence, or have contributed significantly to our understanding of behavioral influence. Here are some highly consequential thinkers, researchers, and experiments on the subject:
The following list must be prefaced with some caveats about painting with broad strokes, and acknowledging everything is a distribution and Not All Republicans espouse all of these things to the same degree or even at all. Nevertheless, both the extremism and the polarization in our political system is the highest in recent memory — certainly in the totality of my Generation X memory, and by all accounts the highest since the 1930s. Extremism is high on both the Left and the Right, but research shows it’s been growing much more extreme on the Right.
And in many ways it feels like we are living through something akin to the 1930s, again. The rise in authoritarian regimes and totalist thought and linguistic patterns is troubling and dangerous. The United States never had an armed insurrection take over the Capitol building prior to January 6, 2021. America has had many periods of brutality in its past and present, but historically speaking nothing like the recent decades of escalating mass shooter events.
What can explain the religious devotion to a failed businessman and failed President on the Right? Loathe him through we might on the Left, Trump is revered on the Right for espousing the “virtues” of a traditional hierarchical society, and for giving coded approval to America’s most shadowy extremist groups that he would be finding excuses to look the other way if they chose to strike. They both held up their ends of the bargain, with would-be assassins in tactical gear assaulting the nation’s lawmakers as they certified the 2020 election results as mandated by the Constitution, and paid puppets in the Senate letting them all off the hook… technically speaking, that is.
Trump looked the other way, but only for another 14 days — until Joe Biden was sworn in as the 46th President of the United States. With a new sheriff Merrick Garland in town, all bets are off regarding leniency for the nation’s most vile and seditious lot who stormed the Capitol and disrupted the peaceful transfer of power for the first time in US history — a sad day for the country and its venerable history of managing to keep the republic.
This will be a work in progress, as usual. And a tool for discussion — we’re going to need it for the coming years.
