The Network State Coup is Happening Right Now

Elon Musk's attempt to destroy the United States government isn't random chaos. It's the methodical execution of the "network state" blueprint.

Yet even as tech billionaires openly implement their well-documented playbook for dismantling American democracy, no one will dare say the words "network state" – except for Steve Bannon, unfortunately.

In a lengthy New York Times interview, Bannon attempts to discuss the network state but is quickly interrupted by Ross Douthat.

Bannon: Balaji Srinivasan and the network state — let’s talk about that. They’re not weird. They’re radicals.

Douthat: All right, the network state we can save for the next time I have you on. For now, let’s just focus on transhumanism —

Bannon: Hold it, we’ve got breaking news: Bannon’s actually going to be invited back.

Everything Elon Musk and his tech cronies are doing to our government is what Balaji Srinivasan spelled out in his network state cult manifestos – a tech CEO takeover of government, the purging of institutions, the rise of crypto corruption as a dominant economic force, the quest for new territory. But nobody wants to talk about it.

For those of you who are new to this newsletter, I spent last year writing a New Republic series on the network state. Sadly, everything spelled out in those stories is happening now. What Musk and Marc Andreessen are doing to our government is precisely what Srinivasan envisioned. A purge of Democrats, a merging of tech and right-wing forces to remake government and media institutions. Some reporters now observe that Musk is doing to the government what he did to Twitter, but Srinivasan was way ahead of them:

“Elon, in sort of classic Gray fashion ... captures Twitter and then, at one stroke, wipes out millions of Blues’ status by wiping out the Blue Checks,” he said, describing how a government could be reformed in a similar manner. “Another stroke … [he] renames Twitter as X, showing that he has true control, and it’s his vehicle, and that the old regime isn’t going to be restored.”

Musk's DOGE is a rebranding of Curtis Yarvin's RAGE (Retire All Government Employees). This is what's behind the buyout offers, firings, and elimination of entire departments. The strategy: Purge the government of civil servants and replace them with those loyal to a dictator. It's about gutting democratic institutions from the inside out and turning them into something else:

(The NYT finally got around to interviewing Yarvin last month. Read the full transcript here.)

The financial machinery is equally brazen. Tech billionaires are weaponizing their wealth and crypto to buy out American democracy piece by piece, replacing it with parallel institutions that serve their interests. When a presidential inauguration gets preceded by billions in memecoin profits, that's not coincidence – it's strategy. Trump's crypto ponzi windfall should be the end of his presidency, but it's only a glimpse of what is to come. Here's what they have in mind:

This transformation goes deeper than politics. It's fusing tech ideology with religious fervor to create something unprecedented: a techno-authoritarian new world order:

While the establishment press either cowers or kowtows, the architects of this takeover operate in broad daylight. Everything happening now has already been spelled out by the Nerd Reich tech bros manifestos, podcasts, and conferences: the tech CEO takeover of government, the institutional purges, crypto corruption becoming a dominant economic force, the quest for new territory. I didn't guess this stuff – I just listened.

The playbook is no longer theoretical. It's being executed step by step.

This network state coup isn't happening in secret. It's unfolding right in front of our eyes while our democratic institutions remain paralyzed in fear and/or denial.

Democracy isn't dying in darkness. The lights are on. We can see it all happening in real time. No, democracy is dying in silence.