What, precisely, is a “Domestic Enemy”?
Greetings,
Members of Congress and the Judiciary, enlistees in the military and intelligence, even some local police jurisdictions swear oaths to defend the Constitution against “all enemies, foreign and domestic”. It seems easy enough to define and find Foreign Enemies, but what exactly are “Domestic Enemies”? Since they are threats from the inside, theoretically “just like us”, they could be much harder to spot. I believe Domestic Enemies, just like the foreign ones, are defined by their actions and I’ve compiled a helpful list to clear things up…
A “Domestic Enemy” would be an entity trying to harm American citizens, values, or systems from inside our country. Few, if any, Domestic Enemies openly announce themselves… after all, the insidious power of a Domestic Enemy lies in their “just like us” camouflage. But you can tell who they are if you keep your eye on the ball…
Looking around our country today, who are our Domestic Enemies? Is it “the Muslims”? Well, some of our enemies may be Muslim but “the Muslims” as a group aren’t harming us. Is it “the Mexicans”? Aside from wanting jobs their biggest crime seems to be a desire for citizenship… hardly enmity. How about the evil Liberals or the evil Conservatives? Each side makes proposals the other decries as the end of America, but for all their faults (and yes, each side hits many of the points on the list below) each side can also occasionally make plausible cases for good intent, if not results. We all may disagree with our political opponents, but that doesn’t necessarily make them Domestic Enemies.
If “not agreeing with someone” isn’t enough to make them an enemy, what is? I think Domestic Enemies actually work toward things that harm us, things we would immediately rebel against if inflicted on us by a Foreign Enemy. In our America, today, we definitely have Domestic Enemies. This isn’t an exhaustive list, but they’re the ones who…
- Work to destroy the American governmental and/or legal systems
- Work against the general welfare (or real welfare)
- Put corporate interests ahead of those of human beings and the Planet
- Spin facts to distort truth, or simply perpetuate outright lies
- Work to deny voting rights
- Work to weaken government protections
- Put personal profit before country
- Involve America in unnecessary conflicts
- Condone and promote torture or war crimes
- Weaken our food and energy security
So by this definition, exactly who are America’s Domestic Enemies? Are there people, groups, or entities that have done any, many, most, or all of the things on that list? I would be surprising exactly no one by suggesting members of past and present Administrations qualify as strong candidates, but what is surprising is exactly how closely they match every point on the list. Goals like those articulated by Steven Bannon’s; “deconstruction of the administrative state” or Grover Norquist’s “drown Government in the bathtub”, and now they’ve assembled dream team to do it. Leave aside the Judicial nominees or low-level hires; even leave aside the domestic enmity of the current President himself and just look at his Cabinet picks… uniformly, they are at best unqualified or corrupt and at worst actively antagonistic to the goals of the agencies they now head.
The Trump reality show is full of Domestic Enemies as cast members, but it’s simplistic and wrong to think they’re the only internal threats we face. In government, “representatives” like Mitch McConnell, Chuck Schumer, Paul Ryan, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Ted Cruz, and so many more line both sides of the aisle to desecrate American ideals and values. Outside government, a seemingly endless stream of individuals like Jeff Bezos, Eric Prince, and the infamous Koch brothers build money, power, and networks to monopolize capitalism, privatize our military, and lock Americans into a neo-feudal serfdom of endless war and zero opportunity.
We could, conceivably, fight even Domestic Enemies like these. A larger threat may come from the “citizens” we can’t imprison… the corporate “people”, without human empathy to temper their greed, and whose only DNA commands them to harvest profits today without consideration for tomorrow’s costs; privatizing profits while socializing the real expense. These Domestic Enemies include the worshipers of war along with the arms contractors and manufacturers locking us into endless war abroad and escalating violence at home, “food” conglomerates peddling processed food replacements while irreparably damaging the environment, strangling small farmers, ranchers, and grocers, those working against a single-payer system that saves lives and money, the increasingly dominant “information” companies providing corporate-friendly propaganda and precious little needed information.
It’s not hysterics or hyperbole to say America faces real threats from real enemies, foreign and domestic. Lots of people, for their own selfish reasons, are eager to tell us who those enemies are but they aren’t all telling us the truth. Who are the real Domestic Enemies? Pay attention to who’s actually harming us and why, and there’s the enemy, no matter what we’re told. The American People, bit by bit, are catching on. I’m waiting for the good Americans who have sworn that oath to protect and serve our Constitution, to take that Oath seriously and act against the real enemies threatening us now.
Make a great day,
Digging Deeper
There’s no shortage of links to support the abject assault on American values from every side so here are two of our radio ads from the dear departed KPOJ instead. They were written in 2010 and 2011, before Trump was even a gleam in Steve Bannon’s eye, yet they remain painfully relevant today. No need to rush to check them out… they’ll probably remain painfully relevant for years to come.
