De-Blob-ification: A User’s Guide
Since February, when AOC took her foreign policy trip to Germany, I’ve found myself in recurring conversations about a unique problem. Senators Brian Schatz and Chris Van Hollen have both publicly referenced it obliquely in recent weeks. The challenge, in a word, is de-blobification.
Any progressive or socialist presidency in the US would have to make the national security state relate to the world differently, and that means also undertaking an immense ideological project. A “left” policy cadre would have to de-blobify the Executive Branch if it’s to have any hope of bridling the excesses of American power and restoring bringing sanity to its foreign-policy judgment.
Blob is deservedly unflattering shorthand for national-security state functionaries—intelligence analysts, foreign service officers, and policy officials, but especially Washington’s think tank architecture. I resisted using the label “Blob” for years because its boundaries are porous. Wearing the uniform, serving in government, or even humping a think-tank gig does not inherently make you part of the Blob. But those are pretty good indicators!
Nevertheless, I’ve come around to Blob to characterize this milieu. If the agents of death who implement and intellectualize our ongoing regime of global violence can’t be sanctioned, they at least deserve a noxious label that allows us to name the enemy, so to speak.
Believing in the ideology of the national security state—American exceptionalism, primacy, and militarism—makes you part of the Blob. It a mindset that matters precisely because it finds expression in the kinds of policies you think are necessary, as well as the kinds of policies you never even think to think of.
Do you spend your days justifying forever-wars and ceaselessly growing military budgets while refusing any accountability for a history of poor strategic judgment? Do you speak in a language of “gaps”—missile gaps, silo gaps, deterrence gaps, surface ship gaps? Do you advocate for growing the defense-industrial base while the k-shape of the economy grows ever-sharper? Do you think the main problem with Trump’s wars is that he didn’t first seek congressional approval? Do you have a positive view of Palantir? Do you have any opinion about arming Israel other than no, don’t do it?
If you answered yes to any of this, you’re part of the Blob, honey. I hope you can taste the cucumber sandwiches through the blood in your mouth. No amount of bureaucratic process or technocratic language will exculpate you. Your existence in Washington testifies to the rot of the system. You’re standing in the way of America relating to the world more peacefully, and the world relating to the US more peacefully in kind.
There’s an added layer of complex devilry in this problem, because it’s not just the ideology of the national-security state that has to be contended with; it’s also what Zeeshan Aleem called the “MAGA state.” As part of MAGA’s counter-revolutionary project, Trump’s people have:
Purged large numbers of civil servants,
Stripped national-security workers of labor organizing rights,
Introduced partisan loyalty oaths and reactionary-ideology tests for new hires,
Distributed internal memos prohibiting contractors from hiring anyone who had worked at USAID, and
Built a cadre pipeline of MAGA-loyal “fellows” not just through traditional right-wing orgs like Heritage Foundation, but also through new institutions like the Conservative Partnership Academy, the Center for Renewing America, and the “Ben Franklin Fellowship” (it’s reactionary shit).
And this is just a partial list.
My sense is that a large portion of people working in government right now are numb to just how far-right the state apparatus itself has become. The administration puts the fear of god in you, your job is at risk if you have the wrong opinions, and you’re swimming in propaganda and Orwellian doublespeak meant to convince you that war is peace. Under those conditions, you’re going to internalize a lot of nonsense, and even when you can retain your critical faculties, you’re going to be too intimidated to follow any critical thought to its logical conclusion:
The Blob, in other words, is part MAGA now and scarcely realizes it. What this means is that a substantial chunk of de-blobification has to include de-MAGA-fication.
This is damn near impossible! But, as the saying goes, “Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.” Ironically, the Trump administration has modeled many tactics of de-blobification for us. We can just do a non-evil version of them.
Blacklist Primacists and Genocidaires
With few exceptions, the Democratic Party’s foreign policy cadre—those aligned with the Biden/Harris/Clinton wing of the party—should be banned from future political appointments. In a previous life, they had brought me into their world because I (lamentably) embodied the ideology of the national security state—exceptionalism, primacy, and militarism. I wouldn’t have described myself in those terms, of course, and neither would Bidenistas now, but those beliefs are underneath their shoddy track record of judgment.1 They are the vanguard of the Blob, and the Blob prevents the imperial presidency from being anti-imperialist.
The Blob’s people—many of whom are former friends—will not reform without accountability. They, even more than the bureaucracy, are the reason Biden’s foreign policy was so boastfully, unapologetically…lethal.
Political appointees are always vetted for alignment with the president, but part of that vetting in a social-democratic presidency should scrutinize closely what you were doing during the Biden administration and what you’ve been doing since. Were you working for a military contractor? You’re out. A lobbying or advisory “consulting” firm? You’re out. If private equity, venture capital, or a big AI firm appear on your resume, you got some ’splaining to do. And if you played any role in enabling US Middle East policy since October 7, 2023 but have not sought redemption, you should be blacklisted. In some (but not nearly enough) spaces, you already are and you just don’t know it.
The Democratic Party has no shortage of progressive foreign policy cadre to draw on, and I can count on two hands the number of them who got the chance to serve in the Biden administration. There’s no need to rely on the old experts who’ve helped drive the country (and the world) into the ground without a hint of remorse or self-awareness.
Fire the Brass
Pete Hegseth has slashed staff, consolidated offices, and removed nearly three dozen senior military officers. He did this to make the instrument of state violence unaccountable—and America’s growing list of war crimes suggests he has succeeded marvelously. I obviously don’t co-sign Hegseth’s goal, but as an approach, what he’s done corrects for a deficiency I saw in Obama’s Pentagon. Obama was both elastic and cynical enough that, over time, most Pentagon preferences became his preferences…and yet, there was still a lot of friction behind the scenes.
From the Afghanistan surge to the Syria “red line” to naming “great-power competition” with China, the White House under Obama struggled to control the Pentagon. Year after year, Obama got rolled on the military budget. If he would’ve just fired a few generals and admirals on key issues, it would’ve had a demonstration effect that forced more faithful implementation of the president’s intent. If the military can dutifully conduct war crimes, it can dutifully adapt to a new mission set that would require a much lower budget and smaller global force posture. And if any general officer circumvents the chain of command, colludes with Congress against the president, or so much as mutters out loud far-right ideas in pubic, they should be relieved of duty.
Purge Burrowers
Burrowers are de facto political appointees who’ve found a way to stay in government past their expiration date; ideological reactionaries who burrowed into the civil service. When I joined the Pentagon in ’09, a handful of Bush-era appointees had found a way to convert into career civil service billets. Even though their entry into government was as right-wing functionaries facilitating the Iraq War, they were able to skirt the rules of the system that says partisans must leave when their patron departs by simply being appointed under a hiring authority other than “Schedule C” (the authority for appointing political hires).
Burrowers are a massive problem. They harbor a unique animosity to the new president’s agenda, but they’re also going to maintain social ties to your political opposition outside the Executive Branch—a source of both leaks and lies.
It’s not too hard to sniff out the burrowers—the pool is limited to those who have been hired during the previous presidency. But if they’re in a career civil service billet, you can’t simply fire them…you must remove their billet, which usually requires consolidating offices or some other bureaucratic ninja tactic.
Discipline the Think-Tank-Industrial Complex
The mainstream DC think tanks operate on a theory of power, not change. That makes them prone to currying favor with the political appointees in any administration.
But given think tanks’ functional role promoting the interests of Wall Street, Big Tech, and the war industry (which is where most of their funding comes from), it’s not at all clear how Washington’s think tanks would respond to a social democratic (anti-militarist, anti-imperialist) foreign policy agenda. Will they subordinate themselves to government power as ever, or adopt an adversarial role on behalf of their anti-democratic donors?
Bringing think tanks into line may require both carrot and stick. A progressive government powered by a theory of change might benefit from—but certainly doesn’t need—a CSIS, Brookings, or CFR. Accordingly, all government contracts funding think tank research should be reviewed and suspended where the institution refuses an anti-militarist, anti-oligarch, pro-worker program.
The Trump administration has once again modeled some much-decried best practices in this regard.
The Pentagon and State Department have imposed strict vetting for any official or military officer before appearing at a public event (which is almost always hosted by a think tank). The Pentagon also cut ties to dozens of fellowships and exchange programs for military officers at think tanks and Ivy League universities because of their “liberal ideologies.” That’s a valid stick to use.
It’s bad enough that these sites of inter-elite mingling reproduce a ruling class that has no fidelity to the majority of Americans. But if those institutions also become bulwarks of hostility toward a progressive or socialist president’s agenda, then sanction might be necessary.
Restore Workers from the MAGA Purge
Tens of thousands of government workers have been forced out of federal service since 2025. They should be brought back. Perhaps not to their original positions, most of which no longer exist. But they should have preferential hiring treatment akin to veterans’ preference points, regardless of the terms on which they exited. Some workers retired early or found new careers and aren’t coming back; who can blame them? But some are likely still interested in public service under radically new management of the state.
Identify “Party” Cadre
Republicans have been very effective at creating career pipelines for young conservatives. They offer summer workshops, internships at right-wing publications, online trainings, short-term fellowships with reactionary institutions you’ve never heard of but sound vaguely patriotic. You can spend your life in an ecosystem that allows you to soak in right-wing ideology while paying your bills, gaining experience, and collecting signifiers that identify you as a party faithful each time a Republican president comes to power.
No such thing existed for Democrats when I was coming up, but over the past decade, the Blob has begun developing real pipelines for national-security hawks that resemble what Republicans have been doing for decades. Everywhere you look in DC, there are now fellowships and writing contests and gatherings of “Next Generation” this and that. They’re all funded by oligarchs and military contractors and foreign governments.
Drawing on a socialist and progressive foreign-policy cadre presupposes not just identifying but also building the cadre. The leading institutions that touch on progressive foreign policy in the US are the Center for International Policy, Win Without War, Institute for Policy Studies, and the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.2 Associating with Inkstick Media or Current Affairs is also positive sign. Where left foreign policy associationalism is strongest is in the podcast space, because it’s cheap. The left lacks the financial resources that the fascists and the Blob have, so we do what we can.
But we need to do a lot more on the cadre-building front. The venerable lefty zines are tightly gate-kept and operate on thin budgets. I’ve written for Dissent, The Nation, Jacobin, and Labor Notes exactly once each. I would’ve loved to do it more, but it’s unbelievably hard to publish! A young person has next to no shot at placing their writing in one of these places, and internships are incredibly rare.
But, as C.L.R. James said, “Every cook can govern.”
I happen to think that a socialist or progressive foreign policy project should not replicate how fascists and national-security hawks build their cadre. We don’t need an elite technocratic vanguard. For the most part, the ranks of a left policy cadre should not be full-time foreign-policy professionals. Because we believe in people power, we need organic intellectuals of the working class or of intersectional experience. People who exist the way most of us do, precariously, working jobs we don’t necessarily like but that pay the bills anyway. Those people will be anchored in what the “national interest” should mean far better than the lanyard class.
But to acknowledge that every cook can govern is not to say that they can do so without training or socialization.
I’m cooking up a project that will help on the margins with this task (of cadre training for foreign policy). But what we really need are short workshops, teach-ins, and credential builders—“Next Generation Fellows” and “Young Leaders” etc—for left foreign policy. These things don’t require a lot of money. They can be a way of giving people a network and relevant experience even as they hump a job at Whole Foods or work in the gig economy. Most important of all, these kinds of programmatic experiences help future presidential administrations identify who their people are, so they don’t get stuck like Obama did in ’08.
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I experienced a personal and professional rupture around 2020 that had been building for some time. I was intellectually radicalizing in response to the world’s changing conditions, but from a position as a foreign-policy insider—that was untenable. As my new way of seeing inevitably led me to critiques of the system and the Democratic Party’s thinking on foreign policy, I got policed out of Biden’s circle. That section of the party had zero tolerance of criticism—in public or private. Many were blindsided by Biden’s/Kamala’s support of genocide, but it merely exposed for all to see the stubborn militarism of the foreign policy machine I had personally run into in the preceding three years.
I’m leaving out a couple good eggs here. There are dozens more progressive foreign policy orgs but they vary widely in relevance, size, scope, etc.