A new book by the chief architect of Project 2025, the highly controversial policy plan for Trump’s second term, calls on right-wingers to “burn out the corruption” in American institutions and organizations deemed hostile to conservatives. Images of fire and flames are used repeatedly. The purpose is
The news was announced after a speech at the White House on Thursday, two days after Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris in the US presidential election. On the occasion, Joe Biden called on Americans to “lower the temperature” after months of bitter political battles.
Kevin Roberts, president of the far-right Heritage Foundation, weaves together classic quotes and clichés (“It’s time to fight fire with fire”) and metaphors of forest fires and Smokey Bear, as well as the FBI, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. , The New York Times, “Every Ivy League College,” and even the Boy Scouts of America.
Roberts’ book, “Dawn’s Early Light: Take Back Washington to Save America,” will be published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy, but it turns out the book is already controversial. This summer, news organizations used review copies to report on violent depictions in the preface of Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, President Trump’s pick for vice president, and on Roberts’ own violent language and Project 2025. He emphasized both initiatives. Mr. Roberts’ original subtitle, “Burn Washington Down” and “to Save America,” also attracted attention, as did the inflammatory language of the promotional materials.
Publication was delayed until after Election Day after President Trump tried to distance himself from the book and Project 2025, including by lying about not knowing Roberts. Now that Trump has won, Roberts’ impassioned comments are likely to once again alarm progressives.
Roberts begins with a quote from Virgil’s Aeneid: “My soul is kindled and I rise in anger to take revenge on a dying land,” Roberts writes. “In 2020, our country was on fire.
“Some of those conflagrations caused more than $1 billion in damage (controversial claim) in some of America’s largest cities (calling for racial justice after police killing of George Floyd)” There were also deliberate arson attacks, including during peaceful protests. Others were more unintentional, such as the record-breaking California wildfires that burned more than 4 million acres of some of the most beautiful forests.
“In fact, all of these fires were related. It is born out of a conspiracy against civilized society, against common sense and ordinary people.
“…Whether it’s Black Lives Matter (BLM) in the cities or the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in the countryside…the strategy is the same: destroy the reified institutions that define the American way of life. , and replacing it with ideological commitments” and bureaucratic mandates.
“It’s time to fight fire with fire.”
Alluding to Project 2025’s salient aims, including political purges of the federal government and legal attacks on groups including women and LGBTQ+ Americans, Roberts continued: To protect this country forever, conservatives cannot simply keep putting out fires. We must be brave enough to start the attack, attack the match and start a long, controlled burn.
“Fuel is plentiful. Like dead trees in a forest, many American institutions are completely hollowed out… Decadent and rootless, these institutions serve only as a haven for corrupt elites. Meanwhile, , they block out the light and suck out the nutrients that new American tissue needs to grow. They don’t need to be reformed if America is to prosper again. includes:
“All Ivy League universities, FBI, New York Times, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Department of Education, 80% of ‘Catholic’ higher education, BlackRock, Loudoun County Public School System, Boy Scouts of America, Bill & Melinda Gates. Foundation, World Economic Forum, Communist Party of China, and National Endowment for Democracy. ”
Roberts did not elaborate on the qualifications for the list. However, this article contains one name that may be offensive to right-wing readers. That means the financial giant BlackRock is a major investor in the president-elect’s social media company, Trump Media & Technology Group. Larry Fink, the billionaire co-founder of BlackRock, has been linked to the Trump administration’s appointment as Treasury secretary.
Looking from Virgil and composer Gustav Mahler to Smokey Bear, Roberts says the U.S. Forest Service mascot may not acknowledge his purpose. But he insists. “Any good conservationist will tell you that fire is an essential part of the cycle of life…Without regularly managed burns, fires will eventually occur and forests will not regenerate. Instead, it will be destroyed.”
Roberts has advocated burning down the FBI, saying his goal is to “inspire a neo-conservative movement to reignite the flames of American tradition and empower real Americans to take back our country.” Despite this, he says he is a representative of the “Creative Party.” against “the party of destruction, those who seek to abolish the existing order in the name of liberation, freedom, and progress.”
Roberts’ fiery imagery and rhetoric doesn’t end there. Elsewhere, he likens progressive policies to Dutch elm disease, saying that infected bodies must be “immediately incinerated.” “The only way to revive an organization worn down by age, decline, and bloat is to burn down what is rotten.” We also meditate on the nature of fire itself.
“Human domestication of fire is fundamental to human culture,” Roberts muses. “That’s the interesting thing about fire. It’s a flame that’s so ephemeral, it flickers from moment to moment, but in its ephemerality it’s eternal. Of all the elements, fire is the most associated with transformation, rebirth, and change. You cannot start a flame without turning the fuel into fire at some cost. But for this very reason, fire requires attention to continuity. Unlike, fires go out…fires have to be continually cared for.”
Especially if it’s set under the Boy Scouts of America.
