Steve Bannon: A Dangerous Political Operative Gets Pass Into The White House [Opinion]

President-elect Donald Trump has made Steve Bannon his chief strategist. America should be very concerned.

According to CNN, white supremacist leaders are lauding Donald Trump’s decision of appointing the 62-year-old into the White House. White nationalist leaders and the “alt-right” movement had backed Trump during his controversial campaign over Muslims, Mexican immigration, and refugee relocation.

The 70-year-old politician had distanced himself somewhat from the divisive groups during his campaigns. However, Bannon’s appointment seems to be a pointer that Trump will push through his controversial policies. This is a move that hate groups are well in favor of, with former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke calling it “excellent.”

Duke, who lost his bid to be a Louisiana senator, said it was a good thing that Trump was sticking to the issues that he campaigned about. He added that Bannon was a brilliant advocate who would make sure the policies saw the light of day.

“The policies that President-elect Trump has developed during the campaign is a very good thing, obviously. So it’s good to see that he’s sticking to the issues and the ideas that he proposed as candidate. You have an individual Mr. Bannon who’s basically creating the ideological aspects of where we’re going. And ideology ultimately is the most important aspect of any government.”

Reince Priebus was named chief of staff the same day Bannon was given his position. Priebus is chairman of the Republican Party and his role has been seen as an appeasement for traditional Republicans. Bannon’s selection is more complicated, the “chief strategist and senior counselor” position was announced first, a subtle way of saying that his position was crucial and that only Trump would be more powerful than him.

This is a worrying thought.

Bannon headed the site Breitbart before accepting the role to spearhead the Trump presidential campaign. He took over running the site in 2012, when owner Andrew Breitbart died suddenly of a heart attack in 2012. Breitbart News was a right-wing news aggregation site when it broke out in 2007. However, by the time Bannon took over, it became something more sinister.

The site became a propaganda cartwheel inciting white Americans to hate while also promoting racist, sexist, anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic, and homophobic views. The website had a penchant for writing controversial and opinionated articles.

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Two weeks after the racial killings of African-American parishioners in South Carolina, Breitbart had encouraged readers to “Hoist the Confederate flag High and Proud.” According to former staffers, Bannon actively pushed his employees to look for negative stories about immigrants and encouraged the association of minorities to terrorism and crime.

During Bannon’s tenure Breitbart published articles that sought to safeguard white identity, protect western values, and repel multiculturalism. Some of their cringeworthy headlines included, “There’s No Hiring Bias Against Women In Tech, They Just Suck At Interviews,” “Would You Rather Your Child Had Feminism Or Cancer,” Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive And Crazy,” and “Political Correctness Protects Muslim Rape Culture.”

In another headline, conservative commentator Bill Kristol was mocked as a “Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew,” when he turned against Trump during his callous campaign. In another contentious headline, Gabby Giffords, a Democratic congresswoman shot in the head years ago, was referred to as “The Gun Control Movement’s Human Shield.” In another article, Caitlyn Jenner was mis-gendered on purpose under the headline “Trannies Whine About Hilarious Bruce Jenner Billboard.”

Bannon, a former Goldman Sachs banker and naval chief, had encouraged Donald Trump to call Hillary Clinton a stooge for the elites in a message that many people felt carried an anti-Semitic undercurrent. He was also the one behind Trump bringing three women who allegedly accused Bill Clinton of sexual assault to the second presidential debate.

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Bannon has also studied film making and in an interview revealed that he paid close attention to the works of Leni Riefenstahl. Riefenstahl, a top documentary maker, was the one responsible for Hitler’s potent propaganda films.

One of the dangerous trends evident in America today is the dizzying line between fact and fiction, between propaganda and the “distrustful” media — the reason why people would believe what they read on social media and not what they read in the papers or see on TV.

Trump is already showing signs that he would not allow traditional media be his mouthpiece, preferring to choose his own conduit to reshape the narrative and create a new reality to suit his political end. The scathing attack of established media sources will continue with new portals like Breitbart spearheading radical change.

Today, Breitbart is the most widely followed conservative website in America. It had 2.9 million readers in 2012, and in 2016, it is up to 17 million. Under Bannon’s leadership Breitbart has Texas, Jerusalem, London, and California editions, which has tripled the number of its staff members. His aim is to forge an international group of Breitbart outlets and push his cause of bringing down the system. The 62-year-old has also shown a penchant to build alliances with ultra-right wing politicians in Europe.

Al Franken Slams White Nationalist Steve Bannon as Unfit for the White House via @politicususa https://t.co/aqrwu0ef1W

— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) November 15, 2016

There has been a lot of condemnation regarding the choice of Steve Bannon by Trump. U.S. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi said, “there must be no sugarcoating the reality that a white nationalist has been named chief strategist for the Trump administration.” Jon Lovett, former speechwriter for Barack Obama, said, “with a white nationalist senior advisor, Trump is not just ignoring the impact of his rhetoric—he is actively terrifying the country.”

[Featured Image by Evan Vucci/AP Images]