US State Department Admits Plans To Meddle In Hungary’s Democracy

Originally appeared at Zero Hedge

As we noted last week, hypocrisy may be the only consistent guiding principle of US foreign policy.

The Rex Tillerson State Department will pump $700,000 into Hungarian media to remove Viktor Orban.

TheDuran’s Alex Christoforou writes:

When another nation state uses media to communicate it’s point of view, its flagged as a foreign agent, a “bad actor”, and often declared as an “act of war (i.e. RT).

When the US government uses its petrodollar strength to insert its agenda into another country’s politics it’s branded “democracy and human rights programming”.

According to The Gateway Pundit, Rex Tillerson State Department is spending over $700,000 to defeat PM Orban in Hungary.

The deep state is vehemently opposed to Orban’s nation statism…his conservatism and his stance against open borders. For the neo-liberal cabal under the watchful eye of George Soros, Orban must go.

In his speech accepting his party’s endorsement, Orban said he was fighting against “globalist” views that threaten the EU’s Christian nations and their moral foundations, for which he blamed Soros.

“Some countries in Europe decided to transcend Christianity and their own national character,” he said. “They want to step into a post-Christian, post-national era.”

“To execute Soros’s plan they want to root out governments which represent national interests around Europe, and that includes us,” he said. “They act like Soviet agitprop agents once did. We old war-horses know them by their smell.”

Breitbart.com reports…

The U.S. State Department has courted controversy by announcing it will plough $700,000 into Hungarian media, angering the country’s anti-globalist, conservative government.

The funding was announced by U.S. Chargé d‘Affaires David Kostelancik, who has previously appeared to openly criticise the Trump administration by alluding to “apparent inconsistencies in [U.S.] foreign policy” and remarking that “not every criticism of the government is ‘fake news’.”

Breitbart London spoke to a State Department official who confirmed it supports what it calls “democracy and human rights programming” in many countries, and that its intentions in Hungary — a NATO ally — are to “support media outlets operating outside the capital … to produce fact-based reporting and increase their audience and economic sustainability”.

The State Department also echoed Kostelancik’s claim that too many Hungarian news outlets are sympathetic to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s popular conservative government — which has earned powerful enemies by opposing the European Union on mass migration, building a highly effective border wall, and exposing the network of European politicians deemed “reliable allies” by billionaire open borders campaigner George Soros.

As we previously concluded, perhaps it’s inaccurate to accuse the US government of hypocrisy in this case. After all, pressuring RT America with the intent of silencing the news network and spending our tax dollars propping up US-friendly media outlets in the Hungarian countryside are actually two sides of the same coin: the US government will tell you what kind of media you are allowed to consume.

If you are a media network in the United States that allows voices who oppose Washington’s neocon-dominated foreign policy they will shut you down. If you are a news outlet in the Hungarian countryside that spews the US party line, they will prop you up. Both cases are the same: your media will toe the US government official line or else.

*  *  *

Note to Washington: This is not 1950. Hungary has been a fully free and democratic country with plenty of free elections under its belt. It does not need you to come in and attempt to manipulate its newspapers and broadcast media. What would you do if China sent in a few million dollars to prop up US publications who agreed to push the Beijing line? What about if Tehran sent some money to publications pushing the Ayatollah party line? You cannot even tolerate RT America — which is largely staffed by Americans but dares to feature prominent Americans who challenge the neocon foreign policy line. Hands off Hungary!

Note to Viktor Orban: You risked arrest — and worse — in June, 1989 when you directly confronted the communists who were occupying your country. Now that Hungary’s freedom has been won — in no small way due to your efforts — do not allow Washington’s neocons to take it away from you! If you do not confront this violation of Hungarian sovereignty, the neocons will continue to increase the pressure. The neocons want you out! Just this week, neocon commentator Anne Applebaum wrote that you are a “neo-Bolshevik” who has “little to do with the right that has been part of Western politics since World War II, and…no connection to existing conservative parties.” Do a little research and you will notice that Applebaum is a member of the International Advisory Council of the Center for European Policy Analysis — the organization your own government funded for a big conference this summer! Neocon knives are out for you. You’d be smart to make a better assessment of who are your friends and enemies in the United States…before it’s too late.