I’m not going to put this as an answer because you said you didn’t want to hear it, but I don’t think you’re in any danger. The problem is not very serious now, and has been more serious in the past without coming to anything.
To get a sense of where I’m coming from I’d encourage you to read up on the history of communist movements in the United States, especially in the 1920s (sometimes called the First Red Scare, and IMO the closest the US has ever come to communist overthrow). The history of anarchism in the US is closely related, at least in that period (no one had invented anarcho-capitalism yet I don’t think, certainly it wasn’t widespread), so study that too. To brutally summarize an interesting period, USG dealt with a real threat of communist revolt through a mixture of infiltration/police action (disrupting the leadership of communist movements and unions generally) and worker’s-rights concessions (giving the rank and file some of what they wanted, and so sapping their will to smash the state).
For contrast, study the October revolution. Technically speaking, how was it carried off? How many people were required, and what did they have to do? How were they recruited?
Also I’d encourage you to interrogate that “1% to 5%” figure pretty closely, since it seems like a lot of the problem is downstream of it for you. How did you come to believe that, and what exactly does it mean? Do you expect 1% of Americans to fight for communist revolt, as Mao’s guerillas did? If not, what proportion do you expect to fight? How does that compare to the successful revolutions you’ve read about?
It might also be useful to role-play the problem from the perspective of a communist leader, taking into account the problems that other such leaders have historically faced. Are you going to replace all US government institutions, or make your changes under the color of existing law? Each institution will have to be subverted or replaced—the army especially, but also the Constitution, Supreme Court, existing federal bureaucracies, and so on. Think through how you might solve each of those problems, being as specific as you can.
Again, I know you said you didn’t want this, but sometimes when you look through your telescope and see a meteor coming toward the earth, it’s going to miss.
It’s definitely a fair suggestion that I should inform myself better on the actual history of communist ideology in the United States. If I’m scared by what I read, then I will have a better idea of what the problem is. If what I find out doesn’t scare me, I’ll be relieved, and leave with a better understanding of astronomy.
I’m not going to put this as an answer because you said you didn’t want to hear it, but I don’t think you’re in any danger. The problem is not very serious now, and has been more serious in the past without coming to anything.
To get a sense of where I’m coming from I’d encourage you to read up on the history of communist movements in the United States, especially in the 1920s (sometimes called the First Red Scare, and IMO the closest the US has ever come to communist overthrow). The history of anarchism in the US is closely related, at least in that period (no one had invented anarcho-capitalism yet I don’t think, certainly it wasn’t widespread), so study that too. To brutally summarize an interesting period, USG dealt with a real threat of communist revolt through a mixture of infiltration/police action (disrupting the leadership of communist movements and unions generally) and worker’s-rights concessions (giving the rank and file some of what they wanted, and so sapping their will to smash the state).
For contrast, study the October revolution. Technically speaking, how was it carried off? How many people were required, and what did they have to do? How were they recruited?
Also I’d encourage you to interrogate that “1% to 5%” figure pretty closely, since it seems like a lot of the problem is downstream of it for you. How did you come to believe that, and what exactly does it mean? Do you expect 1% of Americans to fight for communist revolt, as Mao’s guerillas did? If not, what proportion do you expect to fight? How does that compare to the successful revolutions you’ve read about?
It might also be useful to role-play the problem from the perspective of a communist leader, taking into account the problems that other such leaders have historically faced. Are you going to replace all US government institutions, or make your changes under the color of existing law? Each institution will have to be subverted or replaced—the army especially, but also the Constitution, Supreme Court, existing federal bureaucracies, and so on. Think through how you might solve each of those problems, being as specific as you can.
Again, I know you said you didn’t want this, but sometimes when you look through your telescope and see a meteor coming toward the earth, it’s going to miss.
It’s definitely a fair suggestion that I should inform myself better on the actual history of communist ideology in the United States. If I’m scared by what I read, then I will have a better idea of what the problem is. If what I find out doesn’t scare me, I’ll be relieved, and leave with a better understanding of astronomy.