This election is not typical of the Republican Party, I must admit. Really weird things have happened all around. But, it is indefensible that, among scores of other things, this year's Republican candidate has:

- Openly called for Russian state agencies to investigate his opponent. This is, in my mind, tantamount to treason. It's also unprecedented in American history. I couldn't even see this coming from Nixon on his worst days.

- Trump's new campaign manager, Paul Manafort, has worked with former Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos and pro-Russian Ukrainian candidate Viktor Yanukovych to campaign.

- Openly praised not just Russian pseudo-democratic authoritarian Vladimir Putin, but also Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, North Korea's Kim Jong-un, former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, and Syrian autocrat Bashar al-Assad. He was even endorsed by the North Korean leader along with Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe and received praise from Putin. A bit troubling since Russia has virtually no freedom of the press and Putin has abused insider politics to maintain power for far longer than was constitutionally allowed in a neo-Stalinist manner. North Korea has an absolutely horrific human rights track record and a strange amalgamation of far-left and far-right ideology. Gaddafi was a supporter of utopian socialism and Arab/African nationalism. Assad is considered an authoritarian and is accused of numerous war crimes. Not exactly the group of men that I'd want to be associated with if I were a Republican presidential candidate, but whatever.

- Trump's campaign was more or less uninvolved in the straight-outta-the-1950's 2016 Republican Party platform. That is, except for softening the language regarding the defense of Ukraine. Sounds like a conspiracy theory? Politifact has my back. Trump’s policies and rhetoric have been so pro-Russia that a former acting CIA chief has called him an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.

While it may seem like this is the first time that America's right wing has been strongly tied to authoritarians abroad, it's not. Bill Buckley, who I consider the man behind the New Right, was an unapologetic supporter of Spanish fascist Ferdinand Franco and Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, mostly because they were anti-Communist. He also supported Joseph McCarthy’s Communist witch hunt. But no support for Iranian socialist and anti-Communist Mohammed Mossadegh (then again, he was ousted prior to the formation of the National Review). Go figure. Henry Kissinger, under the direction of Richard Nixon, helped to prop up the Pinochet regime in Chile and also supported Pakistan during the genocidal Bangladeshi Liberation War. The “Chicago Boys”, Chilean economists who studied economics at the University of Chicago under noted libertarian economist and Reagan advisor Milton Friedman, used their political power to exploit Chile to the benefit of American corporations. Fred Koch, father of the infamous Koch Brothers, built 15 oil refineries in the Soviet Union under Stalin and also helped build an oil refinery in Nazi Germany. Former U.S. Senator and family patriarch Prescott Bush profited from his involvement with Nazis through Brown Brothers Harriman. Even worse, the Reagan administration and many other conservatives (including ones still in office) embraced the racist apartheid system in South Africa

The point of all this is not just to vilify Republicans for praising and even supporting authoritarians all around the world for over 50 years, especially with their branding as the party of “freedom and liberty”. Imagine what Republicans would say if JFK was openly supportive of the Soviet Union. He wasn’t; he was a staunch anti-Communist and his younger brother actually worked for HUAC under Joseph McCarthy. Imagine if Lyndon Johnson was closely tied to communist China. He wasn’t. He actually employed hawkish strategies against Vietnam to deter China. Imagine Democrats endorsing Robert Mugabe’s anti-white government. The only real example of a liberal in a prominent position who was supportive of the Soviet Union was FDR’s next to last veep, Henry Wallace, during his failed 1948 presidential bid. Wallace was very critical of Truman’s foreign policy and regarded as “soft on Communism”, but most of his criticism came from the liberal establishment, not conservatives. All Democratic candidates from Truman until the fall of the Soviet Union were anti-Communists, yet conservative media personalities from Rush Limbaugh to Bill O’Reilly have castigated rank-and-file Democrats as though they were card-carrying Communists.

This double standard is quite strange when paired with another tactic that has been used by high-profile conservatives: undermining the government’s authority. Nixon’s campaign scuttled peace talks in South Vietnam to give him a better chance at being reelected. There is an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that Reagan officials directly negotiated with Iran to keep their hostages until Reagan got in office. This was given even more credence when the Iran-Contra affair came to light. The Iran-Contra affair occured when Reagan administration members were caught illegally selling arms to Iran (under an arms embargo at that time) to fund the Nicaraguan contras (right wing rebels who regularly committed human rights violations), who were not permitted to receive any more funding from our country. The most recent examples of undermining our government's authority would be the 47-senator letter to Iran that was intended to hinder the Iran nuclear deal, an invitation to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to speak before Congress without informing the Commander in Chief, and support from Republicans towards the ultra-conservative Saudi dictatorship.

Despite these facts, Republicans have consistently called liberals “anti-American”. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has called Obama “the most radical president in United States history” while also saying that the Affordable Care Act will lead us towards authoritarianism, totalitarianism, and the end of democracy. Obama is, according to DW-Nominate, the most moderate Democratic president since the end of World War II. On the other hand, George W. Bush is actually the most conservative Republican president since the end of World War II. This only leaves me wondering where this rhetoric will end and whether liberals will begin to castigate conservatives as anti-American or servants of Russia (doubt it). That'd be quite the twist.