The way Mike Benz explains the world, crazy things seem to make sense, but it is at its core, a dark and deep corruption that for most us, has been operating for our whole lives. It is, though, depressingly easy to believe that people with virtually unaccountable power, even those who start with good intentions, end up at the gates of hell, discussing "heart attack guns".

For the deep state, the dark art of influencing elections started on foreign governments, but once the CIA and State Department had honed the skills they needed, and broken every rule, what would stop them doing the same thing on domestic politics "to save democracy"? In a sense, it is as if a World War II no-holds-barred mentality has lived on to this day.

If what Mike Benz says is correct, there is no way that those who apparently influence elections all over the world will give up that power easily, especially in the most important election.

Mike Benz: Speedrunning The History Of The Intelligence State
Presented Hillsdale College, transcribed at RealClearPolitics

Something has gone very wrong — that intelligence, which is supposed to serve the state, has subsumed it.

The CIA was formed in 1947 and the first election they rigged was, allegedly in Italy in 1948.  Just 12 days after that election a document was written called "The Inauguration of Organized Political Warfare" by George Kennan. It was kept secret and declassified nearly 60 years later in 2005. In it, Kennan admits the government has been conducting political warfare and says they cannot leave "unmobilized our resources for covert political warfare." They had begun three months ago "specific projects in the field" and now needed to create a covert political warfare operations directorate.

After World War II the CIA were afraid the communists were going to win in Italy. According to Benz, they spent the equivalent of $250 million US dollars (adjusted for inflation) to swing things in favor of their preferred candidate. They coopted, used, and exploited churches and charities. They beamed the US messages through Voice of America, and Radio Free Europe. They assessed that 60% of the voters would have chosen the communists if the CIA hadn't intervened.

…they set up a vast spawn of Italian news networks to create a surround sound inside that country to broadcast U.S. propaganda and messaging. We funneled aid money through churches and charity fronts to mafia and union street muscle. We worked with Hollywood to project Greta Garbo films and others into the country.