Donald Trump may not be very bright and some have even questioned his sanity, however, the real madman behind this administration’s crazy conspiratorial agenda is his chief strategy advisor Stephen Bannon. At the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Bannon admitted what we already knew, namely that the Trump administration has a plan to tear down not only environmental regulations but all regulations along with a host of government institutions and agencies. This administration has already started to dismantle environmental regulations but this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Bannon sits on the Principles Group of the National Security Council (NSC). This is unprecedented for a White House strategist, but it speaks to the power the man has in this administration. In addition to being an anti-Semite and a white supremacist, Bannon is something far more sinister. He is an eschatologist who subscribes to the arcane branch of theology that is concerned with the end of the world or of humankind. He is fixated on the Last Judgment, something Bannon associates with what is called the “Fourth Turning”.
The eradication of government
In the CPAC interview, Bannon revealed the deconstructionist agenda of this administration he said Trump’s cabinet picks were selected to dismantle the departments and agencies that they were tapped to head. If one does not examine it too closely it fits into the conservative belief in small government. However, contrary to conservative orthodoxy it both expands and entrenches the power of the Executive branch.
At CPAC Bannon talked about the “deconstruction of the administrative state”. Referring to his administration’s desire to end regulations and economic oversight. He went on to bluntly state that the Trump administration is filled with people who are charged with destroying the very departments or agencies they are tasked to run. “If you look at these Cabinet nominees, they were selected for a reason, and that is deconstruction,” Bannon said.
We are talking about killing the federal agencies that have helped to improve and protect American lives for decades. It should be clear that we have already seen movement in this direction. Trump’s war against the EPA started very early in his term. The EPA is now being directed by Scott Pruitt a climate denier and stalwart advocate for the fossil fuel industry. Pruitt’s LinkedIn page describes him as a “leading advocate against the EPA’s activist agenda”. To demonstrate that he lives up to his billing he sued the EPA a total of 14 times over environmental regulations. To make matters worse he usually did so on behalf of the fossil fuel industry. Make no mistake about it this administration will end federal regulations including those that protect clean air and clean water.
We are also talking about Rex Tillerson who is now the Secretary of State. He is the former CEO of Exxon one of the most corrupt companies on earth. His goal is to remove sanctions against Russia so that oil drilling operations can commence in the Russian Arctic.
Former Goldman Sachs executive and opponent of financial regulations Steve Mnuchin is now the head the U.S. Treasury. Both Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and Department of Energy secretary Rick perry have called for the defunding or the complete eradication of the departments they now head. Betsy DeVos the Secretary of Education wants to end public education as we know it and force public schools to teach Christian dogma.
We are talking about a systematic purge of important federal oversight. This includes labor laws, housing standards, anti-discrimination laws, financial protections, food and drug safety and national education standards. The Trump administration is being aided by a Congress beholden to corporate interests. Some members of the GOP are trying to kill the EPA outright, others have begun whittling away at environmental protections and selling off public land.
Opposition to free and fair media
Like Trump, Bannon is an enemy of the free press. In his twisted world view, the media is in league with Islam and an expansionist China to undermine Judeo-Christian America. During his CPAC speech, he called the news media “the opposition party”. This is part of the campaign to prevent people from accepting the truth about Trump and his administration. This is an evil stroke of genius used by numerous despotic regimes throughout history. If successful, democracy itself is imperiled.
“If you look at the opposition party and how they portrayed the campaign and how they portrayed the transition and how they portray the administration, it’s always wrong,” Bannon added, “Just like they were dead wrong on the chaos of the campaign and just like they were dead wrong on the chaos of the transition.”
He is far crazier than you think
Bannon is far more dangerous than most people realize. He is the architect of Trump’s attacks on government and the press and as such he poses a serious danger to Americans quality of life as well as to the institution of democracy. As explained by Daily Kos:
“Bannon is a fanatic, a clear and present danger to the America we all know and care about. Unfortunately, his fanaticism, poured into the ear of someone as fundamentally incurious and vain as Donald Trump, brings us closer to the wholesale destruction of this country than any of us could have expected in our lifetimes.”
The truth about Bannon’s agenda is even worse than the destruction of democracy. If you want to really understand Bannon you need to understand the theories that he promotes. The fact is he is batshit crazy. He believes a war is coming and not just any war but an apocalyptic war which Bannon believes is part of the Fourth Turning in American history.
The Huffington Post did a great job exposing Bannon’s insane conspiratorial agenda, “What we are witnessing,” Bannon told The Washington Post last month, “is the birth of a new political order.”
Bannon’s views are premised on the work of the generational theorists William Strauss and Neil Howe. According to Bannon’s interpretation of this theory US history is marked by four major events: The American Revolution, the Civil War, World War II and finally the coming apocalypse called the Fourth Turning.
Strauss and Howe published The Fourth Turning in 1997, it focuses on the final, apocalyptic part of the cycle. As explained in the book: “This new regime will enthrone itself for the duration of the Crisis. Regardless of its ideology, that new leadership will assert public authority and demand private sacrifice. Where leaders had once been inclined to alleviate societal pressures, they will now aggravate them to command the nation’s attention.”
Strauss and Howe’s predictions suggest that we might “spare modernity but mark the end of our nation.” Or, they said, we might face “the end of man,” in a global war leading to “omnicidal Armageddon.” In Bannon’s version of the Fourth Turning war is inevitable.
Bannon told an audience at the Liberty Restoration Foundation, a conservative nonprofit, in 2011 that war is coming. Now that he is part of the ruling American administration we could argue that it is already here. “This movement,” he said in November, “is in the top of the first inning.”
Bannon wants to protect the Judeo-Christian West from “expansionist Islam” and “expansionist China”. During a 2016 radio appearance he said, “They are motivated. They’re arrogant. They’re on the march.”
“We’re going to war in the South China Seas in the next five to 10 years, aren’t we?” Bannon asked during a 2016 interview with Reagan biographer Lee Edwards. “We are in an outright war against jihadist Islamic fascism,” he said in a speech to a Vatican conference in 2014. “And this war is, I think, metastasizing far quicker than governments can handle it.”
“We’re gonna have to have some dark days before we get to the blue sky of morning again in America,” Bannon warned in 2010. “We are going to have to take some massive pain. Anybody who thinks we don’t have to take pain is, I believe, fooling you.”
Just in case you are still not convinced about Bannon beliefs take a look at these excerpts and judge for yourself.
In case you want to drill down even deeper into the crazy conspiratorial labyrinth that is the secret agenda driving Bannon check out his documentary film “Generation Zero”. This Citizens United documentary explains that we need to tear up treaties, name enemies and change the culture. To Bannon, an apocalyptic war is a crucible for the kind of change he wants to see, as such he is hell-bent on helping to bring about the end times.
