"Network Propaganda": But What About Trump-Russia?

 

I can guess what right wingers will say in response to Network Propaganda. They will raise the issue of Trump-Russia.  After all, they will say, the mainstream media spent the first two years of the Trump term chasing after an imaginary conspiracy between Trump and Russia, arguing that he was in on hacking his opponent's e-mails and leaking them to the public.  They will ask what the authors have to say about the mainstream media chasing after conspiracy theories and getting caught up finding an imaginary channel of communications between the Trump Campaign and the Russian intelligence community.

The most obvious retort is that this means the mainstream media were behaving exactly like the rightwing media, so take the beam out of your own eye before you criticize the mote in ours.  My response is two-fold. First, yes, the mainstream media succumbed to paranoia and sensationalism in covering Trump-Russia.  Although the individual events they covered were true, the tendency to see a great conspiracy there, rather than wrong but disparate events, was a serious mistake.  Nonetheless, this is what the rightwing media does all the time.  The mainstream media is still more reliable, despite this lapse.  But it does not excuse the lapse.

The book focuses on the election and does not say much about reporting on Trump-Russia, and rightly so.  There was very little such reporting during the election.  This bar graph lays out the total reporting. Of all stories, Clinton e-mails tops out at over 65,000 mentions.  The second most common mention of of Hillary are various scandal stories about the Clinton Foundation at over 20,000. No policy story about Clinton even breaks 20,000.

For Trump, on the other hand, the number one story is immigration (40,000 mentions), followed by jobs (20,000).  Five scandals each fail to break 10,000, with Russia being the smallest.  The issue simply did not get enough play to have any effect whatever on the election.  In fact, it seems fair to assume that one reason the press focused so much on Trump-Russia was by way of making up for its singular focus on Hillary's e-mails, which did much to throw the election to Trump.

The book also offers a good refutation to anyone who says that being so hounded by false accusations explains, though it does not excuse, Trump's claim that the 2020 election was rigged.  Trump made exactly the same claim in 2016 when he expected to lose.

Finally, the book offers several cases after the election of the mainstream media making mistakes that were unfair to Trump and correcting them.  Some dealt with Russia; some did not (pp. 214-221).  In one such story, ABC falsely reported that Michael Flynn was going to testify that Trump instructed him to contact Russian officials during the campaign.  This was corrected within hours and the reporter suspended for four weeks (p. 216).  In another, CNN mistook the date that Wikileaks sent Donald, Jr. a decryption key to its e-mails, falsely indicating that he received the key before the e-mails were made public.  The Washington Post spotted the error, and CNN issued a correction by the end of the day.  A Time reporter mistakenly reported on inauguration day that a bust of Martin Luther King had been taken down.  He promptly apologized and issued a correction. The same happened when a Washington Post reporter prematurely reported that half the seats at a Trump rally were empty.  (They later filled up).  CNN falsely issued, and corrected, a report that James Comey would say that Trump was a target of investigation.  Another incorrect story, by CNN, created the impression that a conversation with a sanctioned Russian investor was under investigation.  Three reporters lost their jobs over the story.  The only story the authors found that was not retracted dealt with a claim that the Trump Administration suppressed a report on climate change.

So, this is seven stories, four addressed to Russia and three not. The authors make the point that among the mainstream media, it is prestigious to spot an error in a rival publication's story and point it out, and shameful to make a mistake.  In the rightwing media, what matters is whether a story serves the ideological narrative, and retractions are made only under threat of suit.

"Network Propaganda": A Small Thing that Bothered me

I admit it is a small thing, but one particular thing in Network Propaganda eats away at me -- the three dimensional graph above.  News coverage of immigration apparently deviated from the usual rule that the center-left, center, and left media formed one cluster and the rightwing media formed another, with almost not center-right.  In this case, there were enough differences that one axis was not enough -- the authors felt the need for three.  Unfortunately, they neglected to label the axes, so I am not sure what they mean.

The authors did note that the difference between rightwing and mainstream media on immigration was not just how friendly or hostile they were.  Rather, rightwing media tended to equate all immigration with Islam and terrorism, while mainstream media (accurately) portrayed most immigration as coming from Latin America. Leftwing media also focused on the war in Syria and refugees, actually giving more emphasis to Muslims that center and center-left, but seeing Muslims as victims, rather than terrorists. Presumably that is the X-axis -- the degree to which outlets discussed Muslims.

White nationalist and neo-Nazi websites were more openly racist than any mainstream sites, including mainstream rightwing sites, and rife with anti-Semitic conspiracy theories not seen anywhere else.  The biggest words in their word clouds were "Jew" and Jewish," words not seen in any other word clouds.  Presumably the y-axis is antisemitism, a subject seen in white nationalist and neo-Nazi articles but not anywhere else.

The authors also make clear that the center-right has a different pattern, not seen anywhere else, as evidenced by the National Review, Reason, and Red State, which are all positioned apart along the z-axis.  Unfortunately, the book never says what made the center-right different, or what the z-axis is.  It is frustrating.

"Network Propaganda": What is the Remedy

 

So, granting (as I think we must) the conclusions in Network Propaganda, what are we to do about it?

On this, the authors are not optimistic.  A wide array of proposed measures for regulating the internet fail because they don't address the underlying problem of asymmetric polarization.  

The ideal solution, the authors say, is the rise of a facts-based center right media that gives accurate information with a conservative slant.  However, there is no evidence of any desire for such an outlet.*  The thrill of ever-escalating outrage and radicalization is simply too hard to break.

Their only other alternative is not to let the rightwing noise machine bleed over into the mainstream media.  Only about 30% of the population are chronic outrage addicts.  Our best bet is to contain them and reach out to the remaining group who lean Republican, but can be swayed by reality, or are low information.

Because rightwing narratives invariably bleed over into the mainstream. The mainstream media are also sensitive to accusations of liberal bias and determined to counteract them.  Right wingers know of this sensitivity and use it to work the refs.  The authors lament the traditional media view that objectivity means giving equal time to both sides and never favoring one over the other.  That is not objective journalism when one side is lying an the other is telling the truth, albeit with some errors.  In the case of the 2016 election, new media were well aware of how utterly unqualified Trump was to govern. They remained consistently hostile throughout the election.  But in order to maintain balance, they had to treat Hillary as just as bad. Hence the e-mails.  Furthermore, any story, no matter how false, that gets enough circulation makes its way into the mainstream press simply to prove that the mainstream media is not liberally biased.

The authors' advice is to stop doing that and instead to base reporting on what is factually accurate, regardless of what politicians and rightwing outlets say.  I am certainly in favor of that.  In fact, the Trump presidency witnesses a certain resurgence in serious investigative journalism, and major outlets realized they could not rely on anything Trump said and would have to do their own investigation instead.

Unfortunately, we are now back to business as usual, treating a man who attempted to overturn an election as just another candidate an treating his 91 felony counts and Joe Biden's age as equivalent.

The Great Rightwing Noise Machine, Described in "Network Propaganda"

Network Propaganda: Manipulation Disinformation, and Radicalization in American Politics takes 387 pages -- large pages with small writing -- to say what was obvious even without it -- the rightwing media is different.  The centrist, center-left, and even leftwing media share a common basis in facts and commitment to factual accuracy.  The rightwing media is indifferent to such things and only wants to serve an ideological agenda. Center right media has almost disappeared.  Though 387 pages (not counting end notes), Network Propaganda is made more readable by large numbers of graphs and tables, all illustrating the obvious.  It goes on, chapter after chapter, making this blindingly obvious point and illustrating it by more graphs and tables.  

But frustrating as it is to be constantly hit over the head with the obvious, chapter after chapter, it raises a disturbing question. A strong democratic conservative party is key to the health and survival of democracy.  By that standard, the US is in big trouble. Is access to accurate, reality-based journalism essential to the existence of a democratic conservative party?  Because if it is, the US is in even bigger trouble.

The book also has some interesting designations. It classifies most major news outlets -- the Washington Post, New York Times, Politico, CNN, and network news except for ABC -- as center-left.  In the center it places ABC news, the Wall Street Journal, The Hill, Reuters and the Associated Press. Some people might see the Wall Street Journal and The Hill as center-right, but Network Propaganda classifies media by their consumers and identifies these publications as centrist because they attract about equal numbers of center-right and center-left viewers/readers.  All these publications tend to clump together and have similar reporting.  There are intemperate far-left publications every bit as stridently partisan and untethered to facts and publications on the right.  But they do not have a significant following and feel the pull either to join the fact-based community or lose followers.*  

What Network Propaganda sees as "mainstream" rightwing news is disturbing -- Fox News, of course, and talk radio. Also Bretibart, which became a major publication during the 2016 election.  Even Zero Hedge, a notorious conspiracy site, is discussed as a mainstream rightwing publication. The center right has no significant following.  There are no middle brow general news sources on the center right,** only a few boutique publications like the National Review and Reason, with no large popular following.

Of course, at this point right wingers might concede all these points and dismiss them as proof of pervasive liberal bias in our news media, which leaves conservative audiences no choice but to seek out alternative outlets.  The authors proceed in painstaking detail to outline why this is not true, to show that mainstream publications make a sincere attempt to ground their reporting in facts, to reject stories that fit a narrative but are not accurate, and to acknowledge error when made.  Rightwing publications freely trim the facts to fit their narratives and never admit error, no matter how egregiously false a story.  As an example, the book cites a quote from one of Tony Podesta's hacked e-mails:

CHAI would like to request that President Clinton call Sheik Mohammed to thank him for offering his plane to the conference in Ethiopia and expressing regrets that President Clinton’s schedule does not permit him to attend the conference. 

 The Daily Caller ran this quote, omitting the section declining the offer, and expressing outrage that Clinton never reported this flight as an in-kind donation to the the Clinton Foundation.***  There are other examples I will cite in another post.

So, granting the current state of our media, how did this situation come about?  Network Propaganda dismisses as unimportant much cited factors such as internet technology spreading rumors, fringe sources entering the mainstream, monetized fake news, Russian hack and leak, or search algorithms manipulating users.  Asymmetrical polarization of the news predates the internet.  Fringe and fake stories to not gain significant following unless promoted by a major node of communication.  Russian propaganda was only convincing to people who wanted to believe it.  Algorithms -- thus far -- have minimal impact.  The authors did acknowledge that algorithms may have to be addressed in the future, but considered them of minimal effectiveness at the time.

So what is driving asymmetrical polarization of news?  The authors see historical roots.  In the 19th century, objective journalism was not even a concept.  The entire press was unabashedly political.  Some healthy democracies continue in this model today.  In the 20th century, the idea arose that journalists should be objective and report facts, rather than promote and agenda.  This model reached its culmination following WWII.  Most of the population got its national and international news from the three networks, NBC, ABC, and CBS.****  Each city had a newspaper that addressed mostly local news.  Radio stations were also highly localized and were dedicated mostly to local news and music. And even in this environment, the right wing regularly complained about pervasive liberal bias in the news and complained that they were shut out and confined to small publications, well out of the mainstream.  

The authors point out that there was leftwing criticism as well. They attribute the rise of the rightwing media to changes in technology and regulatory framework that removed barrier to their entry.  Cable allowed television stations to escape regulatory constraints, including the Fairness Doctrine. CNN was the first cable network to offer an all news format.  Satellite broadcasting extended the range of radio stations.  FM radio offered better quality music, so AM responded with talk radio.  With the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine, Rush Limbaugh was able to begin his show, which proved an immense hit and paved the way for countless imitators.  It sounds as if the authors believe that when historians write the story of how US democracy failed, blame will fall, first and foremost, not on Rupert Murdoch, but on Rush Limbaugh.

But that raises an awkward question that the authors shy away from.  They hold themselves out as bold truth tellers, saying that polarization of this country is not equal, that the right wing is to blame, and that the rightwing media is not equivalent to the mainstream or leftwing media. But they do not confront to next and most obvious question.  Is the real, underlying problem the audience?  It the real reason that the right wing media has gone off in such a different direction from the rest of the media because some 30% of the population can't handle complexity and don't want to be bothered with unwelcome fact -- they just want a simple narrative telling them that they are the forces of good fighting the forces of evil?

The authors dismiss that concept as "not necessary" to their theory of asymmetric polarization.  Instead, they postulate that, as a matter of pure historical accident, the right wing broke away from the mainstream media before the left did, and that as a result, the left rallied around the mainstream media and came to trust it.  They propose that if things had played out slightly differently, it might have gone the other way.

Color me unconvinced.  The authors do present one piece of empirical evidence to support their claim that media has radicalized its listeners, rather than vice versa.  The present polls showing that in 1998, Republicans were only slightly less likely to trust mainstream media than Democrats -- 52% versus 59%.  (Independents clocked in at 53%).  In 2000, all parties' trust in media had fallen and was now 47-53-53, still with only a slight divergence.  Over the ensuing years, Republican trust in mainstream media fell to 31% and stayed stable -- until the Trump candidacy, at which point it fell to 14%.  (P. 325).  So that is something.

On the other hand, the authors also grudgingly acknowledge that the Republican coalition is more cohesive than the Democratic coalition, and that this greater cohesion may lead members to cohere around a relatives small but disciplined set of outlets all telling the same story, rather than a broad, undisciplined array of sources that can be fact checked against each other.

Given long term rightwing hostility to mainstream media, dating back to at least the 1940's, I am inclined to believe the underlying problem is the audience, which media messaging has both enlarged and radicalized.

____________________________________

*Nor does Network Propaganda address the distinction between what might be called low-brow, middle-brow and high-brow outlets, or between general news and specialty news.  In general, I would classify low-brow as tabloid-level news, middle brow as most mainstream programs and publications, and high brow as news "journals."  And, generally speaking, general news is a middle-brow phenomenon, with low brow publications focusing mostly on sports and gossip, and high brow publications writing in-depth articles about fairly narrow topics.

**At least by the authors' definition of the Wall Street Journal and The Hill as centrist.

***Just for the record, the e-mail does seem to imply that Clinton had accepted rides on private airplanes, including of non-citizens in the past and was only declining this one because of a scheduling conference.  I do not know the law and ethics here, other that the obvious point that there is no legal or ethical obligation to make a tax disclosure of a plan flight one did not take.

****Time and Newsweek were also national news magazines.

Volume V, Part 5, George Papadopoulos

 

Part 5 of Volume V, pages 464-526 (62 pages) concerns George Papadopoulos, the minor advisor whose unguarded comments about his contacts with the Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud started the FBI investigation in the first place.  George Papadopoulos was a young up-and-comer (29 at the age of the campaign) who appears to have had some ties in Europe, particularly Greece (as his name suggests, Papadopoulos is Greek-American and appears to have active ties to his ancestral country).  He ended up marrying one of his contacts -- an Italian attorney who (for what it is worth) also knew Mifsud (p 470).  

He also appears to have been young and inexperienced, but highly ambitious, and eager to have a larger role and greater influence than he had the experience to handle. This made him vulnerable to getting in over his head and being manipulated by more experienced operators.  The Committee certainly did not find that Papadopoulos every wittingly served Russians interests, but they regarded him as a useful idiot for the Russians (p. 467).  He appears to have wanted to be the campaign conduit for various high-ranking foreign contacts, conveying information between his contacts and the campaign, but never putting the parties into direct contact, lest he undermine his own importance.  The Committee did not have to opportunity to interview Papadopoulos or many of his foreign contacts directly, but they did have access to his e-mails and also interviewed his contacts with the campaign.

George Papadopoulos

Papadopoulos reported to Sam Clovis, Team Trump's senior policy advisor.  He got the job largely because Team Trump had a dearth of policy advisors and could not afford to be too demanding.  In March, 2016, about the time he joined Team Trump, Papadopoulos met Joseph Mifsud, a British-Maltese professor believed to have significant ties to the Russian government and Russian intelligence services.  Mifsud seemed initially uninterested in Papadopoulos until he learned that the later was a member of the Trump campaign, at which point he became interested.  Mifsud introduce Papadopoulos to Olga Polonskaya, a Russian national whose exact role the Committee was unable to determine.  Mifsud, however, appears to have greatly exaggerated Polonskaya's role and led Papadopoulos to believe that she was Putin's niece.  She appears to have served as an intermediary between the two men.  In April, Mifsud introduced Papadopoulos to another intermediary -- Ivan Timofeev, Director of Programs at the Russian International Affairs Council (whatever that is, p. 481).  Mifsud also sought to arrange a meeting between Trump and Putin, which Papadopoulos eagerly pitched to the Trump Campaign, but was regularly rebuffed.

On April 26, 2016, after returning from a conference in Moscow, Mifsud told Papadopoulos that the Russians had "dirt" on Hillary Clinton, in the form of "thousands" of e-mails. When Papadopoulos asked Mifsud how he knew, Mifsud answered, "They told me."

What are we to make of that?  First, this was just two weeks after Fancy Bear's first breach of the DNC server.  This would have been quite recent news at the time.*  At this time neither Papadopoulos nor any other member of the Trump campaign (with the possible exception of Manafort) knew about the DNC or Podesta hacks.  They did know about the deleted e-mails from Hillary's server. Since Mifsud did not specify which e-mails, it seems most likely that Papadopoulos assumed that he was referring to the deleted e-mails and not the suspected hack. Indeed, it is not even clear that Mifsud knew the source of the e-mails.  It seems mind-boggling to think that the Russians would have let a foreigner in on such sensitive information.  

Second, this looks very much like an attempt to set up the kind of back channel of communications that so many people suspected. A foreign national with ties to Russian intelligence is reaching out to a low-level campaign staffer operating outside the US with highly sensitive information.  Indeed, Mifsud even offered to be the campaign's liaison to Europe and/or Russia (p. 495).  While it is far from clear what is going on here, it certainly looks like an attempt to set up a back channel of clandestine communication that would be too obscure to attract attention.  Third, it that was what was being attempted, it failed.  And fourth, if this was an attempt that failed, it seems odd that no further attempt was made to set up a back channel.  Yet there is no evidence of any further such attempt.**

Sam Clovis

Interestingly, if this was a failed attempt to set up a back channel of communications, it appears to have failed for two reasons.  One is that Papadopoulos does not appear ever to have informed the campaign of the lead he received.  The other is that the campaign in general, and Paul Manafort in particular, rebuffed all attempts to set up a meeting with Putin.

Famously, Papadopoulos did tell the Australian Ambassador to Britain about this communication.  (Meeting described in tedious detail, with about three paragraphs redacted).  It was this conversation that ultimately led to the investigation.  Papadopoulos also continued to attempt, unsuccessfully, to set up a meeting between Russian leadership and the Trump campaign. He also mentioned the emails to the Greek Foreign Minister who (according to Papadopoulos) seemed strangely unsurprised, as if he already knew (pp. 497-498).  The Committee found no evidence that Papadopoulos ever passed on this information to the campaign (p. 498).

This seems very strange.  It fairly boggles the mind that Papadopoulos would tell two foreign diplomats about the extraordinary tip, yet never pass the news on to his superiors in the campaign.  Yet no such evidence was ever found.  No e-mails or texts ever conveyed this information to the campaign.  Granted, Papadopoulos may have recognized that such sensitive materials should not be committed to writing.  (And yet he blurted them out to two foreign diplomats?).  But no one with the campaign appears to remember such a conversation either.  And yes, granted, campaign members had motives to lie.  But remember the danger of the conspiratorial mindset.  If there is evidence of such communications, that is proof that they took place.  If there is not evidence, that shows how well it was hidden.  That way lies madness.  The fact that nothing -- for better or worse -- ever came of such an imagined communication, is strong reason to believe they never took place.***

Manafort in particular seems to have opposed any meeting between the Campaign and the Russian government.  This appears to be a pattern.  It was Manafort who warned the Trump campaign not to contact Wikileaks directly, but to go through Roger Stone.  It was Manafort who warned Junior and Jared not to expect too much to come of the meeting with Russians.  And now Manafort is working to quash any effort by Papadopoulos to set up a meeting with the Russians.  Given that even as he was doing these things, Manafort was also secretly sending campaign date to a Russian spy, it seems safe to assume that he did not have any legal or moral objections to any of these things.  What is going on here?

I can see two possible explanations.  One is that Manafort was loyal to the campaign, even if he was not loyal to his country, and believed that Russian contacts were best left to a professional, like himself, and that involving amateurs was dangerous.  The other was that he was pursuing his own, self-serving agenda and feared being found out if the campaign opened any other Russia contacts.  I have no idea which is more plausible.

Nothing else in the report seems significant.  After Manafort departed, the campaign seems to have seen Papadopoulos as a dangerous loose cannon and told him not to make public statements without clearing them first.  Pages 509-511 are mostly redacted, but are a rare case in which it is easy to tell what is under the redaction. This section appears to be about the conversation with an FBI informant that was detailed in the Inspector General's Report.  Finally, the section on Papadopoulos (pp. 524-526) addresses counter-intelligence concerns about his activities.  The Committee clearly has such concerns.  However, those concerns are redacted, except for one paragraph addressing Papadopoulos' lies to the FBI and one that Mifsud departed the US on February 11, 2017 and has not returned.

NEXT:  Carter Page

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*Recall also that Russia's civilian intelligence service, a/k/a Cozy Bear, had broken into the DNC server months earlier, but never used the information to sway the campaign.

**Except, of course, for Paul Manafort secretly channeling polling data and perhaps other information to a Russian spy, and the campaign encouraging Roger Stone to pass on information about Wikileaks.

***At one point Papadopoulos apparently told the FBI that he told Clovis about the e-mails and Clovis was "upset."   However, he also said he was not sure the memory was accurate.  (P. 486, footnote 3159.  Main text giving context to the footnote is redacted).

Some Final Thoughts on Opposition to Aiding Ukraine and the Federal Budget

So, as the House gears up for a budget fight and government shutdown, this seems like a good time to raise the issue of budget wars in general an opposition to aid to Ukraine in particular.  The House Freedom Caucus has put out a statement of extremely vague demands, most of which have nothing in particular to do with the budget.  The Freedom Caucus wants:

1. Tougher border measures;
2. An end to "weaponization" of the Justice Department;
3. An end to "woke" military policies;
4. No "blank check" in military aid to Ukrain
5. Funding in separate bills, rather than one omnibus bill..

Look, at the risk of pointing out the obvious, none of these are, in any meaningful way, budget cuts.  Tougher border measures means spending more, not less.  Defunding investigations of Donald Trump and whatever the Freedom Caucus deems "woke" in the military are sums so miniscule that they scarcely even count as cuts.  Ending aid to Ukraine (which the statement hints at but does not actually call for) would be a cut spending, but not a significant one.  And separate bills might give more opportunities for cuts, but so far the Freedom Caucus does not appear to have offered specifics that would make any difference.  COVID funding is also a favorite, but so far the best Republicans can offer in terms of real cuts is general, across the board spending cuts, with the exception of a few favored programs.

In other words, the government shutdown is not, in fact, about the budget.  Government shutdown is a convenient hostage for the Freedom Caucus to use in order to demand and end to a few select programs that it has ideological objections to, in the guise of budgetary concerns.

And just to be clear, there is nothing wrong or hypocritical with having ideological objections to any particular government program.  I strongly disagree with the Freedom Caucus in their ideological objections, but I do not see a problem with ideological objections per se.  What is hypocritical is to phrase objections to a very narrow and specific sub-section of government spending in terms of budget cutting.  The fact is that cutting out everything anyone sees ad ideologically objectionable is not going to make even a dent in the total deficit.  Any serious attempt to reduce spending is going to mean cutting programs that people like.  

I can only assume that the Republican Party has had a libertarian branch opposed to all government spending in blanket terms for so long that many Republicans only know how to express their opposition to a government program in terms of blanket opposition to spending, rather than expressing their particular ideological concerns to a particular item.

All of which lead to the question of military aid to Ukraine.  Again, I get that Republicans tend to express their opposition in terms of a blanket opposition to spending, but once again, we are not going to make even minimal impact on the budget deficit by ending military aid to Ukraine.  That is a sign that the real objection is ideological and not budgetary.

So what is the ideological objection?  I will assume that some really do fear WWIII and some really do want Russia to win.  But my guess is that this is not the primary issue for most, and certainly not for the base, which also broadly opposes such aid.

My guess is that the primary reason so many Republicans oppose aid to Ukraine is a longstanding opposition to any foreign aid of any kind whatever.  Any underlying that appears to be a belief that spending US taxpayer money on people who are not US taxpayer is a kind of theft.  Keep in mind here that spending money in ways that harm non-citizens, i.e., wars, such as absurd proposals to invade Mexico, is not seen as theft, on the assumption that any harm to non-citizens is done in order to advance the interests of US citizens.  But the thought that anything could benefit both non-citizens and US citizens (or at least interests) is unthinkable.

And, I will add, that this outlook closely matches Trump's general approach to foreign policy, which assumes that the US should not have allies because having allies means taking actions for the benefit of other countries, and not solely for the US. And that it is this outlook, rather than a general opposition to war in general, that underlies the long-term rightwing tradition of isolationism.

The Other Reason Republicans Have it out for Hunter Biden

 It's simple, really.  It is a warning to any Democrat who dares to seek the presidency that that if you go after an office that Republicans regard as theirs by right, they won't just bring the full weight of the Great Right Wing Noise Machine down on you.

They're coming after your children, too.