The Distraction That Is Russiagate

Democrats and the corporate media have pissed away nearly two years on Russiagate. That’s nearly two years the Democrats haven’t needed to pretend that they care about progressive issues and the media didn’t have to pretend to do journalism. From the very beginning, they have treated it as though it is a point beyond discussion, while simultaneously giving you inadequate information to make the decision for yourself. Think about it: they have been absolutely convinced by evidence so scant that they have had to beat it into our skulls 24/7 in order for us to accept it. Meanwhile, even as they tell us there is no argument to be made against the official narrative, they actually want us to argue about Russiagate.

They want us to argue about Russiagate because it helps them to frame the debate. They want us to argue about Russiagate because it is another box they can lock us in, just as we had the endless transgender bathroom debate before that. Because even if we disagree with the Russiagate narrative, it forces us to discuss it, address it, become distracted by it. It halts all discussion of other matters, matters that are vital to humanity but inconvenient to those who wish to direct us and rule us.

I myself have been forced to argue against the Russiagate Narrative (formerly known as Russian Hacking, Russian Interference, Russian Meddling, etc.) rather than discuss ways to combat the disastrous policies of Donald Trump. That I am arguing from a position different than the Democrats does not make me less distracted than them.

In the same way sophists in the Middle Ages wiled away their mental energy pondering how many angels could dance on the end of a pin, the Democrats and mainstream media have got us all aware of Buff Bernie images, even if you scoff at the idea that it matters. Two freaking years of this. For two freaking years, your hatred of all that Donald Trump represents has been diverted from you actually taking action and instead allowed you to believe that higher powers in the media or our intelligence agencies are going to restore democracy. You must know deep in your hearts only the people themselves can do that.

Your two years of being distracted has done absolutely nothing to make our democracy more secure. You have merely granted more authority to institutions that were already far too powerful and influential. These institutions that have whipped you into a frenzy have done nothing to insure our information pipelines are giving you informed opinions from trustworthy sources. They have not fought to reduce undo influence by powerful entities both domestic and foreign. I don’t know how I can spell it out for you more clearly than others before but I am obliged to try: if you give too much of your trust to institutions, it will inevitably lead to abuse of power by those institutions. This is not a warning, because you granted the media and the intelligence agencies your undo faith a long time ago and now we are seeing the result. Well, some of us are—many seem oblivious.

As bad as distraction can be, the obedience demanded by the media is still worse. “Just say it, say Russia interfered!”, they demand. Like a cult leader, they will repeat their assertions endlessly. Only they are no cult but an all-pervasive power, like the Catholic church in the time of the Spanish Inquisition, one that demands unanimity of thought. In such an atmosphere, dissent is heresy. Where once you were accused of being possessed or in consort with the devil, now you are called a Putin puppet. The burden of proof is not on them. They only need to speak and you are expected to accept what they say uncritically. They are God’s messengers bringing forth divine revelations from the unseen and unknowable great power, who are you to question them?

It is an assertion of dominance and a demand for obedience of those few still outside the fold, those dangerous free thinkers, those non-canonical blasphemers.

What role if any did Russia play in the 2016 election? We will never know because the media and our government do not feel it is their role to inform us but rather to keep us compliant. The one message they wish to convey? "Obey." And this is what Russiagate is all about, because Russia or your own natural skepticism caused you to doubt your media and your government. And rather than the media demonstrate their essential trustworthiness, they instead demand your trust.

58 years ago, former General and then President Eisenhower warned us of a military industrial complex he saw coming together. At that time he said, “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”

It is now 58 years later and the unhealthy and democracy-killing collaboration of great power has grown unimpeded. Where once intelligence agencies had to covertly insert agents into the mainstream media, they now overtly do so and no one seems to care. The path from Eisenhower’s warning to our present situation is obvious to anyone willing to walk it, but let me make it even clearer for you. To paraphrase our 34th president, every Raychel Madow show, every Adam Schiff comment, every meme showing Trump and Putin kissing, signifies in the final sense a distraction from the poisoning of our waters, the warming of our planet, the extinction of animal species. It distracts from the very real problems we are facing in our nation: income inequality, corporate takeover of our media and every other facet of our lives, and the monitoring and spying capacity over U.S. citizens that not even George Orwell could imagine.