"You capture the Soviet Union --I'm going to capture the states."-Thomas Roe to fellow Heritage Foundation member Robert Krieble
"You capture the Soviet Union --I'm going to capture the states."-Thomas Roe to fellow Heritage Foundation member Robert Krieble
Roe created the State Policy Network in 1992. to influence policy at the state level, allegedly after being urged to do so by Ronald Reagan. SPN currently has a network of think tanks in all 50 states.
This is decades in the making. It is a
sort of"civil war" but the thing is, it's a small group of wealthy people who are hoping to manipulate enough Americans into believing they have some kind of common in-group interest that will motivate them to fight against any Americans resistant to their takeover. Which, after actually typing that out, and reading it, I'm realizing that is also exactly what the American civil war was, there was just no way for people to be informed about who was actually pulling the country's strings at the time.That's why they exploit political, racial, and religious divisions. They don't actually care about any ideology. It's a tool to manipulate and control in order to further exploit groups to do their fighting for them.
The Heritage Foundation first infiltrated the government by providing Reagan with a copy of their Mandate for leadership, and getting him on board back in the early 80s.
Over 40 years later, they are back in the White House ready to implement Project 2025.
Since Reagan opened the door for them, America has gradually accepted that social benefits are handouts, but corporate welfare actually benefits all of America, because somehow corporations ARE people.
Citizens United was a huge victory for this wealthy group of individuals, because they now have to jump through fewer hoops/hide the source of money used to buy elections.
The Heritage Foundation has also created a network of nonprofit think tanks in all 50 states that pays to promote state level policy benefitting wealthy individuals and corporate donors while disguising it as "small government" representative of state residents.
The creator of this network was Thomas Roe, an early member of the Heritage Foundation. As Roe himself explained to another Heritage Foundation trustee, Robert Krieble, "You capture the Soviet Union -- I'm going to capture the states."
With the able and eager assistance of their dearest allies, the Dixiecrats desperate to restore Jim Crow.
My ADHD brain makes it difficult for me to focus on a full length book, and I'm not one of those people that can scan and retain information, so I have to confess I've never read her book, but I very much want to read Heather Cox Richardson's How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America
By the 20th century, Franklin Roosevelt called the South the nation’s No. 1 economic problem, resistant to unionization and social policies. Even today it leads indices for poverty and weak educational systems. The Jim Crow South was upended by the civil rights revolution. Yet even in defeat, its language of oligarchy and its opposition to progressive political and economic policies through an appeal to racism has been adopted by the modern Republican Party.
Sometimes people tell me I need to chill tf out and stop getting so worked up over this stuff, but I grew up in this world. I escaped and saw that it wasn't like that in other parts of the country, or even all of the south.
Now I see this shit happening in 2025, and so much has been destroyed in 3 months (just realized today actually marks 3 very long months). It feels like they're trying to make an entire country like the world I grew up in. I know there is no escape if they succeed, and I know it doesn't stop with the United States. I just can't accept that, and go on with life knowing that it doesn't have to be this way.