The Politicalization of Everything

The politicization of every facet of American life is tearing the nation apart.

There was a time, not so long ago, when you watched a sporting event and didn’t care about which candidate the athletes voted for, or which party the team owner contributed to. You bought groceries based on the product, not the politics of the manufacturer. When you watched entertainment shows, you weren’t bombarded with propaganda. Journalists were encouraged to confine their opinions to the editorial page.

But then China developed a “social credit” system as a method to exert tyrannical control over every aspect of their citizens’ lives, a concept picked up by American college campuses. Leftists turned it into an obsession. They called it “Intersectionality,” defined as an “ytical framework for understanding how aspects of a person’s social and political identities combine to create different modes of discrimination and privilege.”

Woke politicians signed on, reaching its high (or low, if one favors personal freedom) during the Biden Administration. The whole power of government was turned into a partisan weapon for the purpose of perpetuating left-wing ideals.

Hermeet Dhillon, writing for Imprimis, called out the politicized Department of Justice for its actions. “…the DOJ today appears to be increasingly motivated by partisanship. Compounding the problem, it has access to the powers of the modern surveillance state…the DOJ was in the midst of a year-long campaign of spying on Project Veritas—a campaign that involved no fewer than 19 clandestine subpoenas, orders, and warrants obtained from nine magistrate judges. The secrecy of this spying campaign was maintained through the use of wide-ranging gag orders, including at least two that were obtained without notice to the judge overseeing the Project Veritas case. Through this spying campaign, we now know that the DOJ obtained approximately 200,000 Project Veritas emails from Microsoft and countless text messages (and heaven knows what else) from Apple, Google, Uber, and other still unknown companies.”

The Wall Street Journal provides this example: “In an effort to ’promote diversity and inclusion,’ the State Department is funding “drag theater performances” in Ecuador through cultural grants. “

National Review adds this: “Beginning in fiscal year 2023, the Department of Energy will require applicants for research funding to explain how their research projects will incorporate the tenets of diversity, equity, and inclusion.”

Even the Pentagon signed on. Consider this note from American Military News: The Air Force has taken ‘full responsibility’ for leaking a confidential personnel file of a service member and Republican congressional candidate, which revealed a sexual assault she suffered on duty in Iraq… The Air Force leaker gave the files to a Democrat research firm in the lead-up to the midterm elections.”

The corporate world became a battleground. Corporate executives who opposed the Chinese Social Credit system in America spoke out at their own risk. A New York Post article describes one instance: “Jennifer Sey was Levi’s brand president and on track to be the jeans company’s CEO. But when she complained online about extended school closures and their effect on children, she was attacked and falsely labeled a “COVID denier” who wanted to get former President Donald Trump re-elected. Levi’s management gave her a choice: Shut up or leave. As she explains in her new memoir, “Levi’s Unbuttoned,” Sey felt she had to quit her dream job on principle… Sey explains how many of today’s CEOs — lacking any backbone, yet desperate to be seen as ‘good’— cave to performative woke mobs.”

Internet search engines were among the most virulent advocates of this politics over truth concept. Fox News has reported that “Google is manipulating search engine results to harm Republicans in critical Senate races, according to the Media Research Center. “

Not surprisingly, since colleges have been the leading advocates of the Chinese concept of “social credit,” education has been on the front lines of the problem. A Heritage study found that “our children are being indoctrinated. The education system designed to teach them how to think critically has been weaponized by the radical left to push an anti-American agenda… the left propagandizes through the normalization of its views and positions as nonpolitical.”

Much more unites us than divides us. By attempting to permeate every aspect of life with Leftist propaganda backed by various forms of social and financial punishment, these social credit antagonists seek to achieve goals which they could not win at the ballot box.

Illustration: Pixabay

Quick Analysis

Ukraine’s Frozen Conflict

As we approach winter in the northern hemisphere, the war in Ukraine is beginning to resemble a “frozen conflict” from many perspectives. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the media he hopes the war will end faster once President-elect Trump takes over in January. Opinions in Moscow, however, differ from that of the Ukrainian leader. Russian President Vladimir Putin argues that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) needs to exclude Ukraine from joining in “exchange” for peace. If it does not, he says, then no end to the war is in sight. So far there is no Christmas solution. Several NATO countries, according to Vladimir Socor of the Jamestown Foundation, are tentatively considering “coalitions-of-the-willing” to provide security for Ukraine outside of the formal NATO framework. There is, however, no collective mechanism today under which such an arrangement is viable. According to the NATO Charter, while Ukraine is a NATO partner country, it may not join as a full member since it has not fulfilled the requirements for membership. That has not stopped NATO and allies from continuing “to provide Ukraine with unprecedented levels of support, helping to uphold its fundamental right to self-defence,” according to the organization. Socor says that keeping Ukraine out of NATO will not advance peace with Russia. Waiting for a peace settlement, he suggests, would only serve to encourage Moscow to continue the war indefinitely. Although the Biden Administration officially withdrew its support for Ukrainian membership in 2021, NATO maintains an “open door” policy toward membership-seeking countries. The current White House position led the way for European states to oppose Ukraine’s membership saying that a decision should be delayed until “conditions are met.” Biden pushed for changing “open door” to a “bridge” metaphor. It is not intended as an across-the-board NATO policy and has been implemented in the past on a case-by-case basis, says Socor. “The alliance’s open-door policy was not fully insulated from Russia’s non-statutory blocking power, and NATO-aspirant countries’ path toward membership was not always irreversible.” Russia has successfully blocked states like Georgia from joining, first in 2008 and again after the war in Ukraine began in 2014. Russia recognizes the value add of Ukraine to NATO is enormous and that Kyiv has a better case than some other nations. Putin’s invasion was, in part, intended to foreclose that option. By 2021, Moscow was pushing hard to maximize its war objectives, which included further annexations of Ukrainian territory. A main goal for Putin was, and is, to ensure there is no Ukraine left to join NATO. As President-elect Trump prepares to assume office in January, he is faced with the historical challenges presented by the war. Post-conflict security guarantees were the center of several proposals made during the 2023 military stalemate. The incoming Trump Administration has yet to outline how it intends to handle the Russia-Ukraine war. Analysts in Washington believe that the new Administration will expect its European allies to guarantee the majority of Ukraine’s security needs. As we approach 2025, several European nations have acknowledged that they do not view Ukraine as eligible for NATO membership as it would draw the organization into the middle of the conflict. Others want to wait until the war is over or pending a “peace” settlement before considering Ukrainian membership. Socor reports that some “influential voices” are suggesting that “Kyiv should join NATO after “freezing” the war along a stable armistice line, de facto accepting Ukraine’s partition, with NATO security guarantees applying de jure to the government-controlled territory only.” This would mean starting accession talks soon with the actual talks to commence only after a ceasefire is in place. Trump arrives in Washington at a time when Putin’s hybrid strategies of war in Ukraine have eviscerated commonly-held differences between war and peace. “Absent a political consensus in NATO over Ukrainian membership, certain European allies, including France’s President Emmanuel Macron, are holding informal consultations about post-conflict security guarantees to Kyiv by NATO members outside of NATO’s framework,” according to the Jamestown Foundation. The Biden Administration downplayed the discussions on possible forms of military assistance and defense industry cooperation by sending only an Assistant Secretary of State. For a European peace to hold the Trump Administration would need to formally extend the United States’ nuclear deterrence to Ukraine. Options under discussion in Europe include a “coalition of the resolute” to deploy forces to Ukraine as part of a possible armistice package, deterring further Russian attacks, says Secor. European officials are also debating, without any agreement, whether its military forces could perform non-combat logistical roles to free Ukrainian forces to fight. None of the possible courses of action has moved forward as all eyes are waiting on the incoming Trump Administration for clues about its intended level of support for a NATO framework and other non-NATO proposals. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.