The superficiality of American political discourse, especially the casual lies told by contemporary politicians (like the charge made by Nikki Fried that Ron DeSantis reminds her of Adolph Hitler) got me to thinking about something endemic in American politics, specifically in the politics of the left, and that is the total obliteration of the truth.
No reasonable person, grounded in facts and truth, could even contemplate what Fried said - but that doesn’t stop them from making idiotic analogies.
F.A. Hayek, writing in “The Road to Serfdom” predicted our truthless society of today:
“A further point should be made here: Collectivism means the end of truth. To make a totalitarian system function efficiently, it is not enough that everybody should be forced to work for the ends selected by those in control; it is essential that the people should come to regard these ends as their own. This is brought about by propaganda and by complete control of all sources of information.
The most effective way of making people accept the validity of the values they are to serve is to persuade them that they are really the same as those they have always held, but which were not properly understood or recognized before. And the most efficient technique to this end is to use the old words but change their meaning. Few traits of totalitarian regimes are at the same time so confusing to the superficial observer and yet so characteristic of the whole intellectual climate as this complete perversion of language.”
Remember - that was written in 1944, nearly eight decades ago.
And under any functional definition, the Biden era Democrats are proving with each passing day that they have fully bought into a collectivist ideology.
Ignoring the fact America is NOT a democracy (it is a representative republic, something that, while it incorporates democratic processes, is something quite different), Democrats toss around the word “democracy” with the casual arrogance of someone tossing a Starbucks cup in the rubbish bin.
It has become a term as useless as the word “racism” because it is superficial, overused, and misapplied so often it means anything, therefore it means nothing.
The fact is when progressive Democrats say “democracy” is in danger (or is dying), it simply means their progressive agenda is losing. When they say America is increasingly isolated, it means America is looking out for itself and not trying to buy its way into the global collectivist club. When Democrats call their opposition “warmongers”, it means the opposition doesn’t want to continue a policy of appeasement. When Democrats complained that Trump was destroying the country, they meant that he is destroying the Obama/Biden legacy of leftist progressivism.
When Democrats say, “that’s not who we are”, it means that’s not who progressives are – to them, progressivism is the only legitimate ideology for America.
The penchant of progressive Democrats to ally themselves with America’s enemies is rooted in how little they care for our country unless they are in power. They make common cause with illegal immigrants, MS-13, Hamas, North Korea, Iran…and isn’t it interesting who Russia is back on the friends list now they no longer need a foil to continue their meme of Trump/Russian “collusion”.
Democrats are all in on the idea that the enemy of their enemy is their friend.
Following the traditions of their great Democrat presidents, Wilson and FDR, the Biden administration is willing to re-segregate America and pursue anti-Semitic policies. During Reconstruction, blacks were segregated because they were thought to be a lesser version of human – today, whites are presented as evil, “toxic” and the reason for all the world’s ills. Both policies were based on skin color, and both were/are wrong. Democrats ally themselves with the enemies of Israel, blaming the Jewish state for defending itself and not allowing the Islamic Arabs to push them into the sea.
The Biden administration proves what these leftists are willing to do to individuals who oppose them, look at what they did to candidate (and then president) Trump. Lying and spying – using the legal system to essentially extort people into pleading to something to make it stop. Now look at how they have used the pandemic responses to institute penalties for not getting vaccinated or wear an ineffective face covering. Using the unlimited resources and power of government to go after their political enemies, they are using your taxes to fund attacks on your liberty.
The process is the punishment – even for the innocent.
President Trump set fire to the curtain behind which progressive Democrats have hidden for decades, revealing progressivism as evil personified.
It is totalitarian, communist and an enemy of free people everywhere.
It is anti-liberty, anti-individual and anti-American.
And as Hayek noted, the end of truth.