For a long time, I resisted use of the term “Deep State.” The term seemed to connote a certain degree of Infowars/Alex Jones-esque conspiracy theorizing. Sure, the infamously Arabist denizens of the State Department permanent bureaucracy could always reliably be counted upon to oppose the foreign policy agendas of Republican administrations. But the proper remedy, it seemed to me, was to passionately argue that the ossification of any permanent bureaucracy necessarily redounds to the institutional interests of the Left. A condemnation of a purportedly subversive fifth column working within the executive branch, by contrast, seemed more properly the domain of the tin foil hat brigade.
But I was wrong. The Deep State is very, very real.
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