If anyone dares to say anything good about Russia, the wrath of the national-security-state god and its loyal followers will come crashing down on him. Unless America somehow changes direction, this national policy of hatred of Russia is likely to last for years, if not decades.

This anti-Russia mentality is nothing new. We can go all the way back to the post-World War II period and find it there as well. In fact, both hatred and fear of Russia (and the entire Soviet Union) became the central feature of American life after the war and has continued ever since.

One irony in this was that the Soviet Union had been a partner and ally of the United States during the war. Both nations had worked together to defeat Nazi Germany. President Roosevelt even had friendly meetings with Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, in which he agreed that Russia could control Eastern European countries after the war.

After the war, however, Russia and the Soviet Union became Public Enemy Number 1. Every American was expected to hate and fear them. In fact, hatred and fear of Russia became the justification for the conversion of the federal government from a limited-government republic to a national-security state. That's when the federal government — or, to be more precise — the national-security branch of the government — acquired omnipotent, totalitarian-like powers, such as assassination, torture, and indefinite detention.