Saturday, January 14, 2023

Yes, Virginia, There IS a Deep State—and It Is Worse than You Think

 "Mention the term “deep state” in polite company and most likely no one will want to speak to you the rest of the evening. The deep state is what Wikipedia calls “discredited,” something reeking of conspiracies, false accusations, and the substitution of fantasy for the truth.

After the FBI raided Donald Trump’s home in Florida, Trump alluded to “deep state” actions, which brought predictable ridicule from the mainstream media. Trump was speaking conspiratorially, and if one follows the mainstream media these days, the only conspiracies are on the right. (You know, like the one in which the unarmed, ragtag January 6 rioters nearly overthrew the US government.)

After the recent revelations about how Twitter worked to hide the story of the infamous Hunter Biden laptop, Trump attributed the secrecy to a plot by the “deep state.” However, while the facts of the story really are outrageous, I don’t believe it was as much a secret conspiracy as a case of people being able to engage in certain actions with no political consequences.

Furthermore, journalist Matt Taibbi’s stunning revelations regarding FBI and CIA agents’ outright interference in the 2020 election via Twitter on the pretense that Russian operatives were spreading disinformation has further exposed both the involvement of federal law enforcement agents in partisan activities and the sad fact that those agents need not worry about being held accountable—especially if they are engaged in a “progressive” cause.

The Standard Deep State Narrative

One does not have to believe in a single conspiracy (not even about the 9/11 attacks) to understand that there really is what we can call a deep state. Indeed, what we might call the real deep state has nothing to do with conspiracies, secret meetings, and the like. Instead, this deep state operates in the open and in broad daylight, and that makes the deep state narrative an even greater threat than the secret cabal narrative."

Yes, Virginia, There IS a Deep State—and It Is Worse than You Think | Mises Wire