The True Existential Threat to Democracy - And Why It’s So Hard for Some People to See

“They’ve taken the Bill of Rights and boiled it down to just one.  You have the right to remain silent.”  – Swami Beyondananda

Watch the most recent Front & Center with Mike and Steve podcast here.

In December 2008, Bruce Lipton and I were writing the final chapter of Spontaneous Evolution.  Barack Obama had just been elected President, and I had just returned from a trip to Washington, D.C. – where people were literally dancing in the streets.

And why not?

We were done with Bush and Cheney, the Iraq War, and the neocon con.  It was time for hope and change.

So in this last chapter, A Whole New Story, Bruce and I proclaimed that Obama’s election was a sign the “evolution” was at hand.  Made sense to us.  We were, however, completely surprised – shocked actually – when one of Bruce’s colleagues told us that it was a mistake, that we were limiting our audience by taking a political side.

We looked at each other incredulous.  That woman – she must be … a REPUBLICAN!

Although we softened the “endorsement” a bit when we published the paperback edition a year later, still neither of us could imagine it possible that Republicans were even a part of our audience.

Meanwhile, a few months earlier I had begun working closely with transpartisan pioneer Joseph McCormick on a project he called “Reuniting America.”  His background was über conservative – devout Catholic, Army Ranger, Christian Coalition, and he even ran for Congress as a Republican.  However, after a “dark night” experience followed by an epiphany, he broadened his view.  He told me that when he read Howard Zinn’s People’s History of the United States, it helped him see the “missing information” that wasn’t part of his side’s “tribal” narrative.

It’s not that he stopped being a conservative.  He just expanded his perspective.  He and I became close friends and colleagues because even though we were “coming from” different perspectives, we were “going to” the same place – reuniting America and moving forward those two principles that are falsely set in opposition to one another …individual freedom, and collective wellbeing.  He and I both realized that only as those two are intertwined – and not sacrificed one for the other – could we secure our country’s future and heal the injustices and trauma of the past.

I remember him saying something I didn’t fully appreciate at the time.

Many of those involved with the transpartisan movement were from the progressive side, and Joseph said, “They don’t realize how condescending they can be.  Their attitude seems to be, ‘well, since we’re right and we have all the facts’ the end result of our ‘dialogue’ will be you agreeing with our point of view.”

My own perspective began to shift during COVID when I saw colleagues I knew and respected being de-platformed, and things I knew to be lies being sold as truth. I felt even more alienated and disheartened when other close colleagues ghosted me because I chose not to take the shot, and they began spouting the phrases implanted by mainstream media (“safe and effective” …“follow the science”) as if it were gospel truth.  Given the disparity between what I knew and what I was being told, I felt like the subject in Solomon Asch’s conformity experiments in the 1950s (go here https://signsoftheupwising.substack.com/p/yes-we-do-have-a-choice and read the section on “Herd Immunity Or Herd Mentality”).

During the lockdown, my wife Trudy and I took the time – just like Joseph McCormick had done – to step outside the tribal narrative corral, and we came to recognize that what was being termed “misinformation” was actually missing information, intentionally left out so as to manipulate public opinion.

Talk about irony deficiency!

Those same progressives who supported the free speech movement back in the day, who had been proud members of the American Civil Liberties Union, said nothing when viable treatments were de-platformed from the web, and even a Facebook group for vaccine-injured individuals to share stories and remedies was taken down.  A new Orwellian term was invented – mal-information, meaning something that is factually true but “narrative inconvenient.”

When RFK, Jr.’s book on the Real Anthony Fauci came out, a colleague gave it a scathingly negative review – while bragging he hadn’t bothered to read it.  When world-renowned propaganda expert Mark Crispin Miller, teaching his class on propaganda at NYU during the lockdown, presented some pre-COVID studies indicating that masks were ineffective at preventing transmission, his class was canceled, his colleagues called for his firing, and he was accused of “hate speech.”

Sadly, progressives, this is what “our” side has devolved to.

(I STRONGLY suggest if you click on nothing else, you take the 26 minutes to watch Amir Odom’s “Debunking the Biggest Lies Told About Trump”)

Meanwhile, on campus where the supposed purpose is seeking the whole truth together, another acquaintance who teaches at a California State University reported that in 2022, a group sought to set up a table on campus.  This group was perceived to be so off-the-charts toxic, they were prohibited from speaking.

So, who were they?  The Nazis?  The Klan?

Uh … it was the Young Republicans.

My acquaintance suggested inviting them for a dialogue and using the political differences as a teaching moment.  The powers in power refused.  Are progressive ideas so “weak” they can’t stand up to a challenge, a debate, or even a dialogue?

So, to go back to the opening paragraph of this post, I speak from my own experience of being so blinded by my progressive blinders that I dismissed and discounted any alternative perspective as irrelevant, if not downright dangerous.

I was one of those who compared Donald Trump to Hitler, and I have been humbled enough to see the jackboot is now on the other foot.

While I recognize all the “existential threats” of a Trump Presidency, the most important of which is a President who believes himself above the law, we must – all of us – face the clear and present danger of losing our right to free speech, not at the hands of Trump but by the administration currently in power.

This loss is invisible to many progressives for a couple of reasons.  First, too many insist on only believing what their side says, and instead of investigating the whole story, they settle for listening to what they are told.

As the Swami says, it’s one thing to have smoke blown up your ass.  It’s another to have second-hand smoke blown up your ass.  This level of political naivete reminds me of something happened back when people were questioning the official 9/11 narrative.  I heard a woman say, “Well, if it were an inside job we would have heard it on NPR.”

Secondly, censorship is not just what is blatantly broadcast for all to see – like the right-wing book banning in Florida and other red states – but that which is so under the radar, it can be conveniently ignored.

So, regardless of who you plan to vote for – or against – this November, I implore you to get the whole story and recognize that free speech is THE existential issue in this election.  It’s time to remove the blinders of “our side is right, and therefore we should be able to impose our narrative on everyone else.”

How different is this from the other side seeking to ban all abortion or books that don’t agree with their worldview?

At the end of this post are a few pieces to watch and ponder, including John Kerry and Hillary Clinton saying free speech threatens democracy.  Again, irony deficiency as in “the way to preserve our freedoms, is by taking them away.”

Remember the famous Martin Niemöller quote, “First they came for …”

Whoever they are coming for, any individual with conscience and integrity will find themselves on that list eventually.  Think of it this way – when has censorship ever protected people like you and me?

Censoring speech is always a tool of tyranny, and history bears that out.

Any worthy and functional idea can stand up to scrutiny – and often is made stronger when it is.  The ultimate purpose of censorship is not to prevent the spread of “vicious lies” but rather “vicious truths” that shine light on the endarkened corridors of power.

We encourage you to watch these video clips to gain a better understanding of what is happening in America.

U.S. Senator John Kerry - "First Amendment stands as a 'major block'..."hammer it out of existence...so you're free to implement change…”

Hillary Clinton: Censor Speech Or 'We Lose Total Control'! Part of RonPaulLibertyReport. They give many examples of the Democrats demanding that the government crack down on free speech.

The Constitution, Unplugged: Matt Taibbi on DarkHorse This is an excellent podcast where Bret speaks with Matt Taibbi on the subject of the censorship industrial complex. I particularly recommend watching this one start to end.

Just tell me the Truth! Debunking The Biggest Lies Told About Trump Amir Odom shows numerous clips of MSM taking out of context remarks made by President Trump and blatantly lying about what he said to fit a narrative.

May we choose wisely.

And regardless of the outcome, may we the people come together as a powerful independent force (remember, 51% of us now identify as independents), to fill the moral vacuum currently at the center of our society with a “sane and sacred center” --  so that the values and principles that the 90% of us who are not sociopaths hold in common become the foundational, noncoercive law of the land.

And regardless of our religious, spiritual or secular ethical beliefs, let us pray for the heart and soul of America.