Trump, Biden & A Deep State Showdown

The interesting rhythm of history suggest a decisive moment has arrived in the relationship between presidents and the Military-Industrial Complex.

History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme. That adage has been attributed to Mark Twain, and it seems to apply with what’s going in the ongoing legal saga between Donald Trump and the Deep State.

Trump was supposed to be sentenced for the bogus convictions in the New York case yesterday. Instead, thanks to the Supreme Court’s decision on presidential immunity, the case has to be re-evaluated. While the made-up charges against Trump in that case don’t fall under the immunity umbrella, some of the evidence introduced does. Thus, the merits of the entire trial have to be reassessed and maybe thrown out.

But for now, Trump’s sentencing date has been rescheduled for September 18. That’s a date with a certain rhythm in American history—September 18 was also the date the CIA was founded, back in 1947.

Most people sense that America is going through something more profound than a hotly contested presidential election. Many of us believe that a period of history is ending. Some call it a “Fourth Turning,” to indicate the completion of a cycle. But that still leaves the question of exactly what is concluding.

I would submit that the Era of the Deep State—which we define here as the Iron Triangle of corporations, government agencies and a compliant media—is what is coming to some sort of ending. The Military-Industrial Complex (MIC), fueled by the CIA, is at the heart of that.

In the years since the CIA’s founding—even though the American people of all political hues are generally inclined toward non-intervention, the United States has intervened all over the world.

Robert F. Kennedy, a notorious CIA critic—undoubtedly influenced by the fact that the agency may have murdered his father and almost certainly killed his uncle—still separates the agency into two categories. The first is the large number of normal agents who just do their jobs, collecting intel that elected officials can use to make decision. That’s not the issue.

It’s the second group—the smaller number of agents who effectively run black ops all over the world and politicize intelligence to build support for foreign wars—that are at the heart of the Deep State.

But doing that requires at least some credibility. The tragic lie of WMD in Iraq was hardly the first lie the intelligence community propagated, but the horrific consequences—a 19-year war capped off by an utterly ignominious withdrawal—made it a last straw.

If you ever doubt how much that politicized WMD intelligence changed the political landscape, watch this clip of a 2016 GOP primary debate between Trump and Jeb Bush. Trump blasts away over the decision to invade Iraq—”They lied! They said there were weapons of mass destruction. There were none. And they knew there were none.”

What’s striking is that this Republican audience is strongly booing Trump’s blunt truths. As someone who’s been anti-intervention for my entire adult life, while also mostly operating in the GOP context, I can tell you what a typical reaction that was for the Republican primary electorate.

Today though, Trump draws crowds by the thousands and wins some of his loudest cheers for the reminder that he is historically unique in the post-WW2 era for not having started any new wars.

That also meant that Trump was at odds with the intelligence community from the moment of his election. Even before he was inaugurated in January 2017, the tension was building. Obama’s outgoing CIA director John Brennan—the man who orchestrated a 2014 coup in Ukraine that set the stage for our current crisis—was a leader in pushing the Russia Collusion Conspiracy Theory.

After one incident where Trump hit the intelligence community in a tweet, the Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, was doing an interview with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow. Maddow, the most vocal media voice in pushing the misinformation about Russia Collusion showed Schumer the tweet.

You can watch the clip here. But this single sentence from Schumer says it all:

“You take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday of getting back at you”

How was this comment anything but a five-alarm fire on the state of American democracy!? A sitting Senator had just publicly said that the CIA would take revenge on the man voters had elected to run the executive branch.

In other words, the intelligence community saw themselves as more powerful than their boss. And let’s face it—they were right.

The most blatant display of rigging the 2020 presidential election had nothing to do with disputes over late-night ballot drops. It was when 51 intelligence agents disgraced themselves by saying that Hunter Biden’s laptop—filled with hard evidence on the bribes his father had taken—was “Russian disinformation.” This was government actors leveraging their presumed status as “unbiased” experts to influence the election on an issue that 17 percent of Biden voters in battleground states told exit pollsters would have changed their mind.

Trump’s battle with the intelligence community continues on in the classified documents trial down in Florida. That trial has hit its snags due to the myriad of screwups by the Justice Department, the likely lack of constitutional authority by the independent prosecutor, and the fact they have a judge at least vaguely interested in fairness. That’s all to the good, although it will leave unresolved the bigger question of why unelected bureaucrats in the MIC get to decide what information people who have won national elections get to have or not have.

What Goes Around Comes Around

Joe Biden has done the Deep State’s bidding for his entire political career. He did their bidding in 2008 when he was the one who had to keep an eye on Barack Obama, to make sure the latter didn’t get too carried away with some of the left-wing populist instincts that had fueled his upset win over war hawk Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary.

Whether it was Biden or Obama’s eager willingness to play ball with those who could reward him or destroy him, it worked—while Obama did begin work on his key campaign promise to start withdrawing troops on Iraq, he also gave the intelligence community a multitude of bombing campaigns, the overthrow of Libya, and a massive domestic surveillance program that was exposed by the heroic Edward Snowden.

Joe Biden was there for all of that. He was the man the Deep State anointed to be the beneficiary of their 2020 rigging. The 51 intelligence agents who ran cover for his corruption were just the most notable example. There was also the massive effort to clear the field in the Democratic primaries, where Biden had gotten crushed in his first three primaries and was well on his way to losing. But, led by Obama behind the scenes, the Deep State made sure its media platforms got in line, and they hammered Democratic voters with a message that Biden was the only one who could beat Trump. It worked, and a party that clearly wanted Bernie Sanders allowed themselves to be manipulated by their Trump hate.

But today, Joe Biden has become a liability. The Deep State can no longer hide his cognitive decline. Even though the task of removing him as nominee has massive—and probably insurmountable—legal and financial difficulties, the number of Democrats coming out against Biden staying in the race continues to grow by the day.

Shortly after Biden’s disastrous June 27 debate performance, campaign consultant Paul Begala went on CNN to issue a warning to Democratic politicians—don’t be the first to come out against Biden. “Their career would be over” is how Begala described the consequences that would befall those who crossed Biden.

But the throw-down didn’t work. And who was the first one to come out against Biden? Adam Smith, the ranking Democratic member of the House Armed Services Committee. Then last night, after Biden’s make-or-break press conference, the first one to jump up and say Biden should step aside was Jim Himes, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Community.

Am I reading too much into the fact that these committee assignments mean that these are the two House Democrats most directly connected to the MIC? Maybe. But it certainly seems noteworthy. They clearly don’t fear Begala’s threats. Almost as though an even more powerful force than the president is behind the dissident House members.

The Deep State that elevated Biden is now seeking to take him down. It’s ironic that last night’s presser, where he fought for his political life, took place on the same date that Trump was supposed to be sentenced. History doesn’t repeat itself. But it does rhyme.

There’s so much more to the Deep State than the MIC. Big Pharma is no less powerful, as are the financial institutions, agriculture, the education industry, and much more.

But the intelligence community is who Trump has been battling with from Day One. The rhythm of September 18, from the CIA’s founding to Trump’s scheduled sentencing might just be a strange coincidence. Or, it could be those little ways Divine Providence has of communicating its markings on human history.

Whichever you believe, I think that’s the era of American history that’s ending. The question that remains is who and what is to follow.