On the Imbalance of Political Terror
The primary aim of politically active libertarians is to limit and reduce the size and scope of government, as well as to eliminate as much state power as possible. The means of doing this has consisted of forming libertarian political parties and think tanks, voter education efforts, and allying with members of major political parties on key issues. But a competent strategist must always subject one’s strategies to the available evidence. Over the past half-century, the state has grown tremendously in both power and influence, reaching into every aspect of our lives. This has occurred despite continuous activism in pursuit of the opposite result. It is thus time to consider a different strategy, one which may seem counterintuitive at first but which has far more likelihood of success than continued face-value efforts to limit state power.
Many libertarians and rightists have realized that the modern liberal democratic state is an inherently left-wing institution. Even the soi disant conservatives in such systems of governance hold positions on issues that would be far to the left of acceptable opinion in a traditional monarchy or stateless propertarian society. Whenever an authentic right-wing and/or libertarian movement does manage to take power in a democratic state, it does not last long. Whether by elections, assassinations, or coups d’état, its leaders are removed and its reforms are reversed in short order by establishment hacks who are incensed that anyone dared to disrupt their progressive vision. They then double down on leftism, accelerating the destruction of society, which leads some to believe that right-wing activism will always fail.
There are several explanations for this state of affairs, but there are four aspects of anti-progressive political movements which might be remedied to great effect. First, when libertarians and/or rightists gain political power, they tend to take a principled stand against using that power to reward their friends, punish their enemies, funnel money into their activist organizations, disrupt their opponent’s activist organizations, and engage in social engineering. But leftists have no such scruples about using the state as a weapon to advance their agenda, deftly wielding this dark power to push society toward their dystopian ideals.
Second, the left has gained a stranglehold on the institutions of power. Neoreactionaries refer to these collectively as the Cathedral. The Cathedral consists of bureaucrats, regulators, non-governmental organizations, the establishment press, and most of academia, which tow a nearly consistent party line. These are headed by and staffed mostly by people who share incorrect basic assumptions and perverse incentives which lead them to act in a manner threatening to both tradition and liberty. Though libertarians and rightists have had some success at gaining political figurehead positions, they rarely do any significant infiltration, restructuring, or demolition of the Cathedral. This means that the leftist establishment can continue pressing its thumb on the scales of demographics and public opinion, thus making future attempts at thwarting their efforts more difficult.
Third, leftists have shown themselves to be far more willing to engage in direct action, such as street violence, social harassment and stigmatization of their opponents, and economic ostracism. Though rightists tend to balk at the social disorder that such methods cause, and libertarians tend to dismiss such methods as anti-libertarian even when they are not, refusing to use a weapon that is in play and being used by the enemy is tantamount to willfully entering into a boxing match with one’s hands tied behind one’s back.
Fourth, few moderate leftists are willing to denounce the most extreme elements of their faction, silently acquiescing to rioters who have no respect for private property or even the lives of anyone who is remotely right-wing. Conversely, the right and the libertarians (or what passes for them) seem obsessed with respectability, purging anyone who leftists might deem beyond the pale from polite conservative/libertarian (or cuckservative/cuckertarian) society. While it would be best if both communists and neo-Nazis could be relegated to the fringes of society, it makes no sense to run out one’s most ardent and willing fighters if the other side will not do the same.
The combination of these four factors produces an imbalance of what may be termed political terror, which may be defined as the use of violence, threats, fear, and intimidation by one political faction in a society against its opponents. This imbalance strongly influences a wide range of activities throughout a society, including government legislation and regulation, business practices, media bias, academic curricula, and limitations on the free exercise of fundamental natural rights. All of these activities are skewed in a leftward direction because there is currently no fear that the right will engage in its own social engineering to offset leftist efforts. For the sake of both liberty and tradition, this must change. Let us now consider what forms this change may take.
Principles, Political Autism, and Realpolitik
The first problem is mainly the result of political autism on the part of libertarians, and insufficient ardency and/or authenticity on the part of rightists. Libertarians must come to understand that although using the state is not the ideal option, their apparent refusal to overthrow the state by force means that the state will remain in operation and be used by someone, which will be their enemies if it is not them. Rightists must come to understand that conserving the status quo is not only undesirable but impossible, if for no other reason than entropy. To have any hope of restoration without collapse, the right must push against progressivism and attempt to reverse the degenerative course charted by the left. Both must realize that a set of principles that leads to consistent failure is a set of principles worthy only of abandonment, and both must purge the leftist entryists from their ranks.
Let us consider what this may look like in practice by considering several examples. The IRS targeting scandal outraged many conservatives, and for good reason. The state’s revenue collection arm was being used as a weapon against the political speech of opponents of the then-current regime. Many congressional hearings were held, including the infamous Lois Lerner hearing. But as satisfying as it would have been to see Lerner behind bars (not that there was any serious effort to put her there), that would not be the best political strategy. It would be far more effective in the long-term for a Republican administration to use the IRS as a weapon to attack left-wing foundations and activist groups, deny them tax-exempt status, meticulously audit them, and prosecute any violations to the fullest extent of the law. Once that is done, Congressional Democrats would be far more likely to entertain proposals to abolish the IRS, their activist base having been on the business end of it.
Another ongoing debate concerns the limits of freedom of speech, especially on college campuses. Left-wing activists claim that anything to the right of Marxism is hate speech and must be silenced, following the teachings of Herbert Marcuse and Karl Marx himself on the subject. For now, most libertarians and rightists are insisting that the antidote to speech that one dislikes is more speech rather than less. Though some success is being had by showing up and speaking despite leftist protests, it may be more fruitful for libertarians and rightists to agree that freedom of speech may be overrated and seek to ban communist propaganda rather than hate speech. Such a ban should be as vague and fear-provoking as the hate speech laws which muzzle rightists, particularly outside of the United States. And of course, any non-critical discussion of hate speech would count as communist propaganda. The end goals of such a measure are both to suppress radical leftists and to show moderate leftists that any power they wish the state to have can and will be used against them when they are not in power, so limiting state power would be wise.
The use of the state’s monopoly on law to sue companies which are disfavored by leftists and allow them to settle lawsuits by donating to third party non-victims instead of helping people who have actually been harmed by those companies is a known problem. According to a recent report, the Obama administration effectively funneled $3 billion into the coffers of left-wing groups through such methods. This is part of the reason why large corporations can be counted on to side with the left on the various social issues of the day. Congressional Republicans argue that such an abuse of power should be stopped, and there is merit to that argument. But again, the more effective course may be for rightists to funnel such funding into their groups in order to balance the scales. This would both make leftists think twice about such tactics and provide an opening for libertarians, who could appeal to companies who wish to be free of extortion from both left and right. Meanwhile, large corporations would be less hasty to jump on board with the leftist agenda du jour, as they would have a backlash to think about when the right next comes to power.
That demographics are destiny is a fact clearly established by historical precedent. The use of immigration policy to alter the demographics of Western countries has been a leftist project for decades. Mainstream consevatives seek immigration reform, while populists like Donald Trump are willing to build border walls and restrict immigration. But this alone will not undo what leftists have done to the genetic stock of Western nations. If a libertarian immigration system is not an option, and no one is willing to do what would be necessary to make that option available, then immigration policy will remain a tool of social control which could be used by the right to counter leftist policies. This could consist of repatriating foreign arrivals, repealing birthright citizenship, and offering asylum to imperiled white people in sub-Saharan Africa to offset non-white third-world immigrants. The latter policy would be particularly effective at both angering the left while also demonstrating their hypocrisy and anti-white racism. The left would be less likely to use immigration policy to advance their agendas in future if the right shows a willingness to both reverse their maneuvers and make counter-maneuvers.
There are many more examples that could be discussed, but the general pattern should be clear. Reverse a leftist policy, then impose a counter-policy to further undo their efforts. Make life difficult for leftists, just as they have made life difficult for their political opponents. Stop adhering to rules which are designed by the left but never followed by them.
Besiege the Cathedral
The second concern is the result of decades, if not centuries, of leftist infiltration and commandeering of universities and media outlets, which have been the occupations of choice for sophists since the historical Cathedral in the form of the Catholic Church lost its formal secular power. The result has been generations of people thoroughly indoctrinated with leftist thought. Some of these people took bureaucratic and regulatory positions in government, while others founded and worked at leftist NGOs. This played a large role in shifting society leftward toward democracy, socialism, and communism. Fortunately, there is much that can be done to besiege the Cathedral, and some of it is already being done.
The root of the Cathedral problem is the government education system because it is there that the next generations of leftists are minted. Libertarians would seek to eliminate this system in favor of private alternatives, and they are not wrong in theory. The private alternatives which already exist should be promoted and encouraged, perhaps officially. National departments of education should be abolished in favor of local control of school curricula, and governments should be extricated from the student loan business. This would do much to reduce both the power and reach of leftists in academia. But as long as government schools and universities exist, some political faction is going to use them to promote their agendas and employ their members. If rightists and libertarians can infiltrate such institutions and take over teaching positions, they will be able to prevent future generations from being fed leftist propaganda. The power of the purse may also come in handy, as a right-wing administration could deny grants and other funding to professors who are clearly biased in favor of leftism while funding researchers in what are currently politically incorrect endeavors. Nothing would make leftists support private education and homeschooling like the possibility of their children being taught a reactionary curriculum.
The spread of dissident thought is far easier in the age of the Internet, and opponents of the progressive agenda have taken advantage of this opportunity. This must be done to an even greater extent, and attempts by the establishment to censor right-wing and libertarian content must be stopped. Free market methods of addressing this problem include crowd-funding and creating alternative social media platforms, and these methods have demonstrated some success. State power could help here by holding all companies that receive government funding to the standards of conduct that the government is supposed to follow, which (in the United States) means that most major social media companies could be given an ultimatum to stop censoring rightists and libertarians or lose all government funding and contracts. Alternatively, a right-wing administration could give illiberal progressives a taste of their own medicine by encouraging social media platforms to censor leftists instead of rightists. Finally, the state could be set against the establishment press by increasing taxes and regulations on them while granting a free hand to alternative media and independent journalists. These measures should be effective at disabusing leftists of the idea of silencing speech that they dislike.
Another obstacle is presented by NGOs, which will take whatever actions they can against the implementation of the strategies outlined in this article. It is best to shut down and ban NGOs in order to rid the system of their influence, as it is far easier to do this than to try to infiltrate them while doing everything else recommended in this article. Note that most of the activities associated with shutting them down and banning them would fall under some other recommendation made in this article.
Finally, the Cathedral could be weakened by restoring the power of the real Cathedral, i.e. the church. But in a society that is increasingly reliant upon reason and evidence while being increasingly skeptical of faith and divine revelation, this is highly unlikely to be implemented despite its historical efficacy of providing a check on state power. It is therefore more useful to stick to secular solutions to the problems at hand.
The Ground Game
The third disparity is caused by the very nature of the average right-wing activist versus the average left-wing activist, and this problem will be exacerbated by the solutions to the first two problems as leftists take to the streets to protest right-wing social engineering policies. The rightist is more likely to have a family to support, a job to worry about losing, and other such concerns than the typical Antifa member. This may change if the economy continues to stagnate, thus leaving more right-wing people out of work, keeping them from forming families, and pushing them in a revolutionary direction, but it remains a problem for now. Anti-communists are also far behind radical leftists in fundraising, organization, strategy, tactics, volunteers, and much else. The deep state is clearly in league with the leftists as well, seeing that the FBI would rather investigate patriot groups than communist rioters.
That being said, there are some recent successes on this front. 4chan’s /pol/ community has done an excellent job of identifying masked Antifa members so that they can be prosecuted for their crimes. In other words, Internet trolls are doing the jobs of government investigative and national security agencies for them. The Antifa loss in Berkeley, Calif. on April 15 has tempered their activity somewhat, as has the fact that the police there and elsewhere have begun taking the threat posed by Antifa more seriously. No longer are they being allowed to wear masks in public, which is already illegal in many places. The presence of firearms on both the Antifa side and the rightist side in Pikeville, Ky. on April 29 helped to keep the peace there, which was not a factor in Berkeley, Calif. or Auburn, Ala. Public opinion also seems to be turning against Antifa, despite the best efforts of the establishment press.
The trend is positive, but more must be done. More of the comprehensive strategy against Antifa should be implemented, especially declaring them a domestic terrorist organization. More lawyers and medical personnel are needed to get anti-communists out of jail and tend to any wounds they sustain. More security personnel are needed to make sure that libertarian and right-wing speakers are safe. Donors who can put their capital against the capital of George Soros and others like him are needed to provide funding for grassroots counter-terrorism. Above all, more libertarians and rightists must show up against the leftist hordes because they appear to behave far less dangerously when they are outnumbered.
However, it is important not to go too far in this regard. Just because Antifa makes violent threats to shut down events does not mean that we should also resort to terrorist activity, even if that would meet the lex talionis standard being advocated more generally in this article. Antifa also use explosives and other area-effect weapons, which should generally be avoided because they are likely to harm innocent bystanders. That said, it is necessary to walk up to the line, even if crossing it would be counterproductive. For example, descending upon a venue that is hosting a leftist speaker in order to heckle and disrupt the event would be fair game, as would informing the employers of Antifa members who have jobs of the nature of their employees in an effort to get them fired. Radical leftists use both of these tactics against their political opponents, so turnabout is fair play.
Unholy Alliances
The fourth problem is the result of leftist infiltration into right-wing and libertarian circles in the forms of neoconservatism and left-libertarianism. This has led to an obsession with respectability in the eyes of the left, which in practice can only mean conformity with leftist agendas. The problem began in earnest for the right with William F. Buckley’s purges at the National Review, and although it was always present at some level within the modern libertarian movement, Samuel Konkin bears much of the blame for this. One does not have to like white nationalists, fascists, or any other far-right group to realize that they are an asset in a street battle against the left and that however bad they might be, communists are even worse. Thus, the first order of business is to stop denouncing such people, at least until the left is either defeated or willing to denounce its violent extremists. Then, and only then, may the worst elements of the right be jettisoned. Second, those who insist on playing respectability politics and purging people toward that end must themselves be purged. The difficulty of this will vary widely, as leftist infiltrators vary widely in how much resistance to their agendas they must face in order to become sufficiently triggered to leave libertarian or rightist groups, but most will leave once it is clear that they and their ilk are no longer welcome. These two measures, if thoroughly implemented, should move the balance of the political scales away from the left and toward the center.
Response and Counter-Response
Leftists will respond to this new strategy from libertarians and rightists in one of three ways. Some will complain but take no meaningful action. These people may more or less be ignored. Some will come to their senses after decades of using the state as a means to their ends after seeing firsthand that, as the quote frequently misattributed to Thomas Jefferson goes, a government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take away everything you have. These people will suddenly appear to become libertarians, with degrees of sincerity ranging from zero to absolute. It is best to treat them as repentant sinners, accepting them for the moment but keeping a watchful eye on them for any relapses into leftist advocacy. But others will only be angered, hardened, and emboldened by such an approach. They will take to the streets and riot like nothing seen in recent times. The only solution to this problem is to violently suppress and physically remove them, as they are unrepentant aggressors who have proven incorrigible by lesser measures.
It must be noted that some elements of the right are enemies of liberty as well, and there is a significant danger associated with empowering them to defeat the left. But if history is any guide, even the worst authoritarian rightists cause no equal in death or destruction to that caused by communist regimes. Nor can they, as right-wing statists at least show some nominal concern for ethical norms of private property and non-aggression, even if they frequently violate those norms. Communists, on the other hand, seek to completely abolish these norms and accomplish their goals by any means necessary. It is thus a matter of priorities to physically remove communists first and then find a way to toss whoever our Pinochet might be from his own helicopter.
Conclusion
What is being advocated here will understandably make many right-wing and libertarian people uncomfortable. After all, this proposal moves in the opposite direction from where both generally wish to go, and both are rightly skeptical of the idea that anyone alive today is qualified to use state power to engineer society. But qualified or not, as long as that power exists, someone is going to be using it for that purpose. If no one is willing to do what is required to dismantle that power, then we are faced with the stark choice of using it when we get a chance or leaving it to the enemies of liberty to continually engineer society against us without meaningful counter-engineering on our part. If we cannot have non-aggressive peace with the left, then the only remaining options are the aggressive peace of mutually assured destruction or a political civil war between leftists and their opponents. The implementation of this proposal is guaranteed to provide one or the other. This concludes the proposal for restoring a balance of political terror.
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