Terrorist Creep.
Anyone who believes that all laws should always be obeyed would have made a fine slave catcher.
—John J. Miller
We had a shooting up here in Canada the other day. Like most things Canadian it was a modest, self-effacing affair, nothing that even a couple of losers from Columbine would write home about: a single death, a geriatric hero. A Prime Minister cowering in the closet, scribbling back-of-the-napkin notes on how best to exploit this unexpected opportunity.
He didn’t have to think very hard. Harper’s always seemed almost pathetically eager to turn Canada into a wannabe iteration of the US— think the dweeby eight-year-old, desperate to emulate his idolized older brother— and the Patriot Act has, I suspect, always been his Beacon on the Hill (or his Castle Anthrax grail-shaped beacon, depending on your cultural referents). So our beloved leader is once again trying to resurrect all those measures he couldn’t quite sneak into C-52, or C-10, or C-30— all those measures that no sane citizen would ever oppose, unless of course we chose to “stand with the child pornographers“. You know the list: lowered evidentiary standards. Increased powers of police surveillance. Increased powers of detention and “preventative arrest”. Increased data sharing with the US.
Basically all that stuff they were doing anyway with impunity, only now more of it will be legal.
But here’s an interesting proposition: new legislation making it illegal to “condone terrorist acts online“. The money shot from Ivison’s story:
There is frustration in government that the authorities can’t detain or arrest people who express sympathy for atrocities committed overseas … Sources suggest the government is likely to bring in new hate speech legislation that would make it illegal to claim terrorist acts are justified online.
Read that again, just to make sure you’ve got it. We’re not talking about real hate speech here. We’re not talking about advocating genocide, or gay-bashing, or threatening real violence of any type. We’re talking about looking at people the government doesn’t like and saying You know, maybe those people have got a point. We’re talking about criminalizing statements like— oh, for example, “Omar Kadhr was a kid on a battlefield, under attack by the US Military: why wouldn’t he fight back?”
And don’t even get me started on what they’d do with this.
It would be bad enough if it stopped there. I don’t think it will. Look what happened in the US, once the word “terrorism” acquired its magical power to short-circuit higher brain functions and call down showers of government cash at the invocation of its name. It took about thirty seconds for anything any right-wing nutbar didn’t like to be reclassified as a terrorist act. Here, for example, is a piece of US legislation that would literally define taking pictures of animal abuse as an act of terrorism.
Stolen from Dennis Meneses, I think…
Call it “Terrorist Creep”.
Harper has always taken his lead from his idols to the south— perhaps that’s why, just a couple of weeks ago, a bunch of bird-watchers got threatened with a tax audit after writing a concerned letter on the plight of honeybees affected by government-approved pesticides. (Nor is this an isolated incident. Harper’s ideological antipathy to science is notorious around the globe. I’ve heard first-hand accounts of government biologists being reprimanded for using the term “tar sands” instead of “ethical oil” in casual conversation, of field biologists being told there’s no need to monitor wildlife populations this year because they already did that last year. Just last week the Union of Concerned Scientists— one of the few US organizations Harper does not seem eager to emulate— sent our esteemed PM an open letter signed by 800+ scientific professionals, protesting the routine muzzling of Canadian scientists by their own government.)
If it’s an act of terrorism to document instances of industrial animal abuse, what about documenting governmentally-induced disasters from the collapse of Atlantic cod populations to the toxic catastrophe spreading across northern Alberta? What about whistleblowing the wholesale spying on Canadian citizens? What about writing a polite letter of concern about colony collapse disorder?
What about just publicly sympathizing with the folks who are doing those things?
So far, it’s legal to say “Yay Edward Snowden” when his revelations uncover abuses by the Canadian government. But at least one MP quoted in Ivison’s story seem to think we need “new offenses” on the books.
A segment of society—the largest segment, in all likelihood — believes that we all have a duty to obey The Law, whether we agree with it or not. Society, they say, isn’t some kind of Red Lobster buffet where you get to pick and choose what statutes to obey. If everyone availed themselves of the freedom to decide right and wrong for themselves we’d have— why, we’d have Anarchy! (The argument generally ends there; nobody feels especially compelled to spell out what exactly would be wrong with anarchy, presumably because its consequences are so self-evidently horrific. Although it seemed to work well enough on Annares.)
But there’s a down side. If they pass a law saying you can’t criticize the government, you gotta shut up and like it. If the law says that flinching while being attacked by the police is “resisting”— or even “assault”— there’s not much you can do about it. Historically there are so many laws allowing the government into your bedroom— telling you what kind of sex you’re allowed to have, or which way you have to swing if you want The Law to regard you as Human— that we’ve had to store them out in the garage. (Here in Canada, you’re SOL if you get pleasure out of pain; a lot of BDSM between consenting adults is illegal because you’re not allowed to consent to “assault” whether it gets you off or not.)
This little statute over in the corner sends you to jail for documenting cases of animal abuse. That big five-hundred-kilo behemoth on the coffee table says the gummint can do whatever it likes to whoever it brands a “terrorist”, and that one with the FISA tattoo on its butt says Big Telecom isn’t liable if they help the gummint do that. And if the law presumes guilt unless you can prove innocence— well, that’s just the Canadian Tax Code.
We’ve already seen laws down south, lurking in the shadows, that define you as a terrorist if your ethics run sufficiently counter to Big Agro. Now, up here, we’re hearing whispers behind closed doors that maybe we should criminalize the mere suggestion that “terrorists”— whoever they are this week1— might have a point. And most folks will shrug and say Yeah, it sucks, but you know. Gotta obey the Law.
Personally, though? If someone were to take another crack at Parliament— get into the House of Commons with a loaded Tavor, mow down everyone on the blue side of the aisle— I might just say, let’s not be hasty.
Maybe they’d have a point.
Peter, Peter, Peter. You are going to get in trouble with that last bit…
You know, down here in the States we call persons expressing such sentiments “Patriots” and the media usually warns us to beware of such sentiments since they only ever lead to joining tax-dodging militias that invariably wind up being given excessive coverage by FOX news over grazing their cattle on federal lands without the proper permits. I’ve seen this before and nothing saddens me so much as watching those poor cows being forced into railroad cars at the wrong end of a shock prod. Please, Peter, don’t let yourself be labeled a Patriot! Think of the poor defenseless cows! Whatever will become of them?
Really, ask anyone in the ruling party. Patriots only ever cause trouble for the cattle, to say nothing of the way they rile up the sheep.
😉
Greg,
Maybe, but not alone:
https://twitter.com/MonaHol/status/528272481728356352
Speaking of GG, wasn’t it crazy that this happened just before he was touring the place?
Also, good to note that the plan to deploy the Achilles Desjardins of the world has been in the thought processes of those who rule us since the early 80s. UK plan to use psychopaths to maintain order in case of nuclear war:
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29804446?post_id=1561617851_10202703869788834#_=_
I have nothing to add of value except an OT link
http://www.nanowerk.com/spotlight/spotid=34328.php
“Brain Jelly” sounds more marketing friendly than head cheese, probably…
Would they still have a point if they mowed down everyone on both sides?
Meanwhile left-wing nutbars reclassify jihadist terrorism as ‘workplace violence’…
Anything’s possible in America. It’s a beautiful country.
One should be fair though – the draconic US laws were passed with bipartisan support. No one wanted to be seen as ‘soft-on-terrorism’..
I’m in agreement that these two losers are no more ‘terrorists’ than any other drug-addled violence prone individual out there, and no special security response is needed other than improved funding for detox and psychological programs.
I think the larger question here is the massive incompetence of CSIS, the RCMP and CSEC on their own terms. There hasn’t been a single ‘terror’ plot on national soil other than the ones that they had a hand in creating.
The only thing these agencies are good at is harrassing environmentalists, indiginous activists &tc.
They need LESS power and more competence, period.
Have you considered moving someplace EU ?
[breenvoice]
It’s nicer here.
Fuck no. It isn’t. And you can get locked up for being a jerk online. Or expressing the wrong kind of opinion. Seriously – most places in EU, if you stood up in a public park and expounded on the irrationality of the average voter you’d be breaking the law.
EU is also overpopulated. Not to mention it has no fucking perspective at all. Between the energy issue and the long-term problems coming from it bordering mid-east and Africa, two areas that are never going to do ‘okay’. And are full of people with no future and no perspective there.
Personally, I’d love to move to western N’am. Sparsely populated, beautiful nature, etc. Politics be damned.
Greggles,
While your conclusions sound a lot like what I would say about the US equivalents, let me underline that again: this occurred just days before Greenwald was to make an appearance in Ottawa.
https://mccoyote.wordpress.com/2014/10/29/still-more-wicked-game-updates-not-quite-outliving-usefulness-edition/
This is practically S.O.P. now. Back to Pete’s post, I’d want to carbon date the ink on the napkin very carefully.
Oh, see this one as well. Shooter’s mother is on the immigration board.
https://mccoyote.wordpress.com/2014/10/23/more-surreptitious-intimidation/
What are we, stupid?
Okay, I should have specified the jurisdiction more precisely, since EU is nonhomogenous.
Let’s take Netherlands.
It’s a very sweet jurisdiction.
There are no laws about “online jerks” in the Netherlands, you’d have to go way above and beyond and outright threaten violence, or harass a minor online in a certain rather specific manner in order to qualify for real-term prosecution.
What opinions are we talking about?
😉
Because you’d have to be some nazi holocaust-denying racist to seriously trip up most EU laws, let alone Dutch law (BTW, holocaust denial is technically legal in the Netherlands as long as it is being expressed as a scientific hypothesis about history and not just, you know, a jumble of outright fabrication and thinly veiled racial hatred 😉 Of course, there’s the challenge of expressing it that way… 😉 )
Do tell more.
So, yeah, EU is a nice place (with some parts of it being less nice than others, of course)
I dunno, but that McCoyote person is a classic paranoid schizophrenic of the ‘CIA is trying to mind-control me through microwave weaponry’ leaflet kind.
We have them here too. There’s even an austrian dude who’s spammed the entire capital city with leaflets warning about the dangers of microwave mind control. I’ve seen them glued to lamp posts almost everywhere.
Someone could have saved him a huge amount of time by advising you can mitigate the effects of mind control devices by taking neuroleptics…
whoever,
I’m trying to understand your comment. Are you stating that the shootings were somehow engineered to happen in order to discredit Glenn Greenwalds reporting?
Well, suppose I observed in print that the Old Testament, taken literally, is pretty much like Mein Kampf. That’d get me in legal trouble. It’s technically true, however, 95% of Jews don’t take it literally and think that Jews that do, like the late Rabbi Ovadia are assholes.
I do recall Geert Wilders getting into legal trouble for saying something about the Quran. Probably because he correctly observed the Mo had a chip shoulder the size of Ararat on his shoulder in regard to Jews, who pooh-poohed his claim that he’s a prophet…
Also, can you say in Netherlands that universal franchise sucks because voters are easily bamboozled and largely irrational? This has been documented extensively in scientific papers, and to me it seems they declared democracy is ‘fine’ because fortunately not everyone gets bamboozled by the same asshole most of the time. Except when they do, like in Hungary, where Orban won a supermajority some time ago and rewrote the constitution to his liking.
If I said that in say, Slovakia or Czech Republic, I’d be commiting a felony, that is, advocating a policy that might lead to someone’s inalienable political rights curtailed. Czech Republic’s pretty consistent in this, they banned a commie youth organisation for example.
I can’t. But I suggest you read this book.., it has interesting observations and comparions of SE Asia and Arica.
Unemployment in Europe is already quite high among less qualified and young people. Considering the number of ongoing crises in the regions I mentioned and the consequent hopes of people therein to relocate to some less abysmal locale, preferably one with a robust welfare net (it’s interesting that while say, Sweden and Romania are equally peaceful, refugees in EU don’t gravitate towards Romania..). This of course is going to put a strain on finances and it’s not something that can go on for a long time.
@Y
Geert Wilders (double ‘e’, due to increased amounts of Dutch) didn’t have many legal problems in the Netherlands (for those lazy to google, it’s the dude who commissioned Fitna) and his political career is actually doing rather fine (he’s a leader of an important political party in the Netherlands).
The worst of his legal trouble was with UK which had him banned from entering UK for some time, with the ban being eventually overturned.
And as far as I know you can criticize universal franchise in the Netherlands (as long as you don’t combine it with calls for violence or something like that), though don’t quote me on that
“less qualified” will be unemployable (outside porn, prostitution, and totally-not-prostitution-I-just-like-having-a-live-in-personal-driver 😉 ) within several decades.
“more qualified” might hold out a mite longer, depending on how this whole artificial intelligence thing plays out, but will eventually become unemployable outside certain trust-sensitive and legacy niches.
If anything, EU is a nice testbed for post-employment policies.
As to African immigrants, whom you dislike so mightily, you might like Netherlands even more then, because it’s rather hard to immigrate there (being a highly trained professional, a famous cultural figure, or having a lot of money is strongly advised).
Belgium is also quite fine, btw, though not as thoroughly free-speech positive.
Peter:
Thanks for writing this blog. Someone has to make it known that we don’t all buy the Dear Leader’s bullshit, and it may as well be you because, well, you’ve be to jail before. You can count on me to contribute to your defense fund when the RCMP, CSIS, and the NeoCon’s private security firm come after you. Until then, get under their skin.
If Canada were imitating the US, wouldn’t they insist on arming more people?
Yup. And scrapping the Long Gun Registry was a start.
@01: You’re seeing the Netherlands through glasses so rose-coloured they might as well be opaque. Just two months ago, a law was proposed in parliament covering the exact thing Peter is upset about; making it a criminal act to condone terrorist acts, or any acts of a terrorist organisation. Admittedly, it was proposed by an opposition party, but they’ve been pushing it in various incarnations since 2005, and the political pendulum is swinging their way again, not even backed by the force of a terrorist attack.
This is the country where various persons known to be opposed to the monarchy were ‘preventatively’ detained, and even locked up in insane asylums, during the coronation. Where non-violent protesters holding signs were arrested, then released without charge. Not because any of these people posed a threat, but to prevent them from ‘ruining the party’.
Citizens are now frequently taken into custody because they are suspected of having travel plans that lead to Syria. It’s not at all clear that they intend to join the Islamic State, or even participate in acts of terrorism. This is something our politicians boast about. Why? Because they know the voters like it.
We used to be world leader in the number of telephone taps, until our government declared that even the number of telephone taps carried out by the intelligence and police services was a state secret.
I really don’t want to turn this into a discussion about the politics of the Netherlands, but I have the sinking feeling that you’re one of my countrymen, and you’re suffering from the typically Dutch form of cognitive dissonance that probably makes you agree with some or most of these things while still proclaiming the country to be a liberal paradise with a straight face.
Y.,
Actually, I am that McCoyote person, have met paranoid schizophrenics and am not that, I assure you. I am definitely gonzo in my approach, but you’d have to walk around in my shoes for while to understand why.
Really, you should take a closer look. The source material is generally historical documents and investigative reporters. The fact remains, Lois Lane, Ted “Unabomber” Kaczynski and “Whitey” Bulger were all subjects of CIA mind control experimentation and killed people. While that is not proof of causality, it is enough to wonder.
James Eagan Holmes’ father, accountant at FICO just when LIBOR scandal broke. Both Greenwald in Ottawa and Matt DeHart facing deportation after having viewed FBI investigative docs on CIA.
And the history under the “Red Scare” was very similar, a LA COINTELPRO, SRPOINTER, MINARET, etc and we have a similar recipe in the War on Terror: Islamophobia.
While it would be unwise of me to confirm or deny any particular citizenship (I do pride myself on being pretty good at this elusive “internet anonymity” shtick 🙂 ) I have to point out that my birthplace is a non-EU location where hideous traditional values obscurantism , unhindered police brutality and political corruption permeate the society so thoroughly that even US of A looks positively liberal.
Thus, upon familiarizing myself with Netherlands (and I have had opportunity to familiarize myself with the laws of several EU jurisdictions and even some of respective political contexts, for reasons I will probably rather refrain from discussing as well) I have found it to be profoundly attractive. Imperfect, perhaps, but attractive.
Detaining of non-violent protesters is, of course, shameful, bad and should be subject to public scrutiny and formal investigation, but it is not a terrible thing (especially since no charges were brought against the protesters), merely a bad one
So, while Netherlands is not a liberal paradise (and for the record, I never made a claim of “paradise” 😉 ) but definitely better off than US of A or, say, most other EU jurisdictions (and unlike so many other liberal EU states, the Netherlands are quite strong on support for human bodily autonomy and not “easy” on immigration, which are things I personally respect and support)
I live in the country and can say with some certainty that the long gun registry was not stopping anyone here in Canada from getting armed.
This little burg in the heart of Alberta’s oil country is awash with guns. The treaty agreement that the federal government still honours provides every adult status Indian in each of the four surrounding reserves with $5.00 (not adjusted for inflation after 109 years) and a box of ammunition every year. Their choice. Just the other day I found a box of Winchester 410 on my front seat that someone had stuffed into my unlocked vehicle probably a case of vehicular mistaken identity.
Status card holders don’t need a PAL, they just need an elder to vouch for them.
For all that, gun crimes (apart from unlawful possession usually as a result of a checkstop) are surprisingly rare.
I didn’t mean to get wrapped up in this topic, I just came by to give you this picture that I found on the internet. Seems like you should have it.
http://down.ccgaa.com/dw/attachments/day_130607/1306070800fc9c8075de2d5bf2.jpg
Peter, you are way smarter than I am and I admire your no bullshit approach to the many stupid things we are doing to the planet and each other – but I think you’re off base on this one.
You’re right, Harper would effectively like to turn our country into a police state – I also think it’s pretty clear from the reaction I’ve seen, that Canadians have (1) NOT been terrorized by two assholes with more mental issues than extremist philosophies (2) we’re collectively happy that our reaction has NOT been over the top – Harper, maybe. The rest of us – not so much and (3) we will not take kindly to seeing more rights and freedoms abrogated in the name of safety.
As for your comment about the scrapping of the long gun registry – sorry, but that’s not well thought out. Unlike our neighbours to the south, legal ownership of firearms in this country is not simple nor is it easy. Don’t get me wrong – I do NOT wish to turn this into another debate about gun control, rather, I’d like to see some serious consideration about the best way to ensure that firearms are controlled but not confiscated and the resources are best spent to make that happen. The long gun registry spent billions on another bureaucracy that didn’t help the police. My brother-in-law is a cop and yes, I asked him how he felt. Short answer – we already know if a person is a legal gun owner when the police respond to a call – we all have to be licensed. Knowing what KIND of firearms a person owns is (almost) irrelevant – so long as you know firearms are present the police can act accordingly.
Given the events of the past week, MOST law abiding gun owners would much rather see the resources wasted on the long gun registry, spent on things like better mental health care, better help for folks with drug addictions and perhaps most of all, more concentration on addressing root causes of violence, instead of the symptoms.
Instead of a backhanded endorsement of the next “terrorist” who does a better job in Parliament, how about we all get off our collective asses and use the system that still exists to put some good folks in a position to better govern this country. “Good” laws have never resulted in good governance – not unless there a good PEOPLE to write and enforce them. You do a great job of challenging your readers to think about stuff that’s often uncomfortable. But it’s easy to criticise – not so easy to lead.
I made a (small) contribution to your defence when you got busted last time and I’d be happy to contribute to your defence if this blog gets you in (more?) trouble – but I suspect there’s a lot of folks who would prefer to see folks with principles – like yourself – run for office. Critical thinking is good – cynicism – not so much.
Deckard,
Deckard, those are positive, optimistic things to say and if {even the investigative reporter who brought us the Matt DeHart exclusive has fallen into the CanadaIsNowImportantCuzTerrorism crowd} your system is still working, if Canada doesn’t have as many authoritarian, reactionary dipshits as the US, maybe you’ll weather the storm without what has happened here.
Here, the system is irrevocably broken. Inspector General after Inspector General has been reported as corrupt. The DoD short-circuited theirs and removed his independence where civil liberties are concerned. The CIA budget, first time in history it has been revealed, was about $47B pre-9/11. Since then, it jumped to about $147B. NSA similarly, but ridiculously for an operation that literally collects every phone call, fax, email, etc. on planet Earth sits at only about $100B.
Now, anyone who understands Washington at all knows that every, or almost every, dollar must be spent in order to get as much or more the NEXT year. What the fuck has CIA been spending it on, if NSA has been doing all we now know at 2/3s?
Additionally, a lot of this, about 70% for NSA, is outsourced, privatized, spying for profit. This then creates private spy corps who look for more to do. This comes very close to what they are doing:
http://www.prwatch.org/news/2014/10/12646/rick-berman-exposed-new-audio-detailing-tactics-against-environment
It’s not just the treehuggers and “socialists” desirous for a raise being targeted either. Just happens to be the subject that time.
And this is exactly what got Barrett Brown in trouble. Private NATSEC companies like Carlyle Group’s Booz Allen Hamilton, largely Saudi and UAE investors; Ron Paul backer Peter Thiel’s Palantir, who went after reporters and supporters of Wikileaks on behalf of Bank of America; by the way, Thiel wants to shut down CIA. Not a bad idea except he clearly wants to make that 70% 100% private ownership of the government. This is the very definition of fascism and presents just the kind of dystopic future depicted in the Rifters trilogy. Then there’s Stratford and HB Gary Federal, another pair of covert buzzards attempting to hasten the death of the middle class and therefore the stability of the country. By the way, some decent case to be made that Alex Jones is a Stratfor/CIA disinfo agent.
We have a huge mess. You don’t want to go there.
Now that was a very pithy quote.
I did not know that human brains had “helical symmetry”. It may take a while for me to even know what I make of that research…
A different point, perhaps. Less focused.
This happened a lot in Canada too, during the G20. There were cases of people being rousted from their beds at 2am at gunpoint and held without charge. Just in case. Also people got arrested for failing to obey search and seizure laws that didn’t actually exist. Our Chief of Police bragged about it afterward.
I didn’t mean to imply that— I just cited it as an example of Harper playing to the right-to-bear-arms crowd, vis-a-vis his adoration of all things Murrican.
No! Who are these guys? Website’s in China, but “Ares Art” shows up in Tehran and various places on Google. This for a video game or something?
My fear is not that we’ll take kindly to anything; my fear is that those things will happen whether we take kindly to them or not. After all, we didn’t take too kindly to police overreach, abuse, and downright assault at the G20, but it happened anyway. We don’t take it kindly when Toronto cops shoot some mentally-disturbed teenager to death without cause, or beat the crap out of some Jamaican dude whose only crime was to wait at a 7-11 so that he could offer to act as a witness in the wake of a robbery, or shake down restaurant owners in the local theatre district to pay off their debts to organized crime. We don’t like it when police leave people out to freeze to death in snowbanks, or taser them to death for no good reason, or wear obscured badges while attacking nonthreatening civilians. We don’t like it when they plant evidence, and lie under oath. We don’t “take kindly” to any of this. Somehow it keeps happening regardless.
And that’s just the stuff we actively disapprove of. Last I heard, Canadians didn’t really give a shit about things like extraordinary rendition to countries that torture, or the rights of child soldiers like Omar Kadhr, because Harper and his cronies have successfully painted them as terrorists. So I don’t expect to see much of a groundswell against “preventative detention”, at least so long as the government can paint the targets of those practices as brown-skinned others who worship a different sky fairy than we do. Canadians, I’m sad to say, just seem to kind of take it when told to, whether they like it or not.
One of the few things that gives me hope is the backlash that erupted when Vic Toews tried to claim that anyone opposed to online government surveillance was pro-pedophile. He had to walk that back in a hurry. But even that hasn’t stopped them from trying to institute those measures regardless; they just keep trying to sneak them into omnibus bills and hope no one will notice. And I imagine they’ll keep right on doing that.
Yeah, okay. It was an off-handed comment— and again, I wasn’t trying to make any kind of detailed critique so much as simply point out another way that Harper leans ‘Murrican.
C’mon, Deck— I admit I’ve fantasized on occasion about what I could do as King, but do you really think I’d have a hope in hell getting elected with these “principles” of mine? I’ve compared the prevailing economic models to delusional games of AD&D for geeks with MBA’s. I don’t think jobs should trump life-support, I think we should choose inconvenience now to avoid catastrophe in twenty years. I pity people of faith, I fear their leaders, and for the most part I hold their beliefs in contempt. I routinely use the word “fuck” in casual conversation. And I refuse to stop doing any of that stuff. On principle.
Bill Maher put it a lot more succinctly when told that he should run for political office: “I think that drugs are good and religion is bad. Now find me a campaign manager.”
I’ll never be in power. The most I can do is keep poking at those who are— and even then, it’d be the height of arrogance to expect them to even notice.
My fear is not that we’ll take kindly to anything; my fear is that those things will happen whether we take kindly to them or not. After all, we didn’t take too kindly to police overreach, abuse, and downright assault at the G20. We don’t take it kindly when Toronto cops shoot some mentally-disturbed teenager to death without cause, or beat the crap out of some Jamaican dude whose only crime was to wait at a 7-11 so that he could offer to act as a witness in the wake of a robbery, or shake down restaurant owners in the local theatre district to pay off their debts to organized crime. We don’t like it when police leave people out to freeze to death in snowbanks, or taser them to death for no good reason, or wear obscured badges while attacking nonthreatening civilians. We don’t like it when they plant evidence, and lie under oath. We don’t “take kindly” to any of this. Somehow it keeps happening regardless.
And that’s just the stuff we actively disapprove of. Last I heard, Canadians didn’t really give a shit about things like extraordinary rendition, or the rights of child soldiers like Omar Kadhr, because Harper and his cronies have successfully painted them as terrorists. So I don’t expect to see much of a groundswell against “preventative detention”, at least so long as the government can paint the targets of those practices as brown-skinned others who worship a different sky fairy than we do. Canadians, I’m sad to say, just seem to kind of take it when told to, whether they like it or not.
One of the few things that gives me hope is the backlash that erupted when Vic Toews tried to claim that anyone opposed to online government surveillance was pro-pedophile. He had to walk that back in a hurry. But even that hasn’t stopped the Harper administration from trying to institute those measures regardless; they just keep trying to sneak them into omnibus bills and hope no one will notice. And I imagine they’ll keep right on doing that.
Yeah, okay. It was an off-handed comment— and again, I wasn’t trying to make any kind of detailed critique so much as simply point out another way that Harper leans ‘Murrican.
C’mon, Deck— I admit I’ve fantasized on occasion about what I could do as King, but do you really think I’d have a hope in hell getting elected with these “principles” of mine? I’ve compared the prevailing economic models to delusional games of AD&D for geeks with MBA’s. I don’t think jobs should trump life-support, I think we should choose inconvenience now to avoid catastrophe in twenty years. I pity people of faith, I fear their leaders, and for the most part I hold their beliefs in contempt. I routinely use the word “fuck” in casual conversation. And I refuse to stop doing any of that stuff. On principle.
Bill Maher put it a lot more succinctly when told that he should run for political office: “I think that drugs are good and religion is bad. Now find me a campaign manager.”
I’ll never be in power. The most I can do is keep poking at those who are— and even then, it’d be the height of arrogance to expect them to even notice.
It’s a matter of degree and perspective. There was no formal investigation; there was an apology. Flowers, even. But then the exact same thing happened again; a single silent, non-violent protester carrying a cardboard sign arrested, then released. And again, over the course of several weeks. It’s not an accident when you keep doing it.
You may find the Netherlands attractive still; I wonder what you’ll think in ten years.
In some ways, USA-style police brutality bothers me a lot less than the police forces participating in the carefully orchestrated, non-violent and very civil detention of people deemed to be politically dangerous.
“But even that hasn’t stopped them from trying to institute those measures regardless; they just keep trying to sneak them into omnibus bills and hope no one will notice. And I imagine they’ll keep right on doing that.”
That’s the eternal problem with terrorists… you can stop attacks over and over again and nobody really notices, but if they manage to get through your defenses once, they’ve scored a victory it’s hard to walk back from.
Well, it stands to reason that people involved should file formal complaints, and maybe save up some cash for a lawyer and see if a case can be made.
I mean, it’s a polite and civilized form of nuisance on part of State’s servants, so it stands to reason one should respond in kind – with polite and civilized countermeasures.
Incidents will eventually add up to the point that a convincing case for harassment can be made.
And yes, it is to some extent, a matter of degree and perspective, but I think there is a fundamental difference between outright violence, abuse, and fabrication of criminal cases, and being a mild and nonviolent nuisance (and nonviolent temporary detention is, at worst, a nuisance)
This is an interesting position that is essentially the polar opposite of my own.
Could you go into more details regarding your reasoning, or is it a “feel thing” ?
[…] Watts of No Fucking Icons dislikes the political uses of terrorism by the Canadian […]
Peter Watts,
Ares Wong is, I’m fairly sure, Chinese, not Tehranian. I tried to find out more but something is blocking my access to a lot of Chinese websites. If I can find the game that the concept art was made for I will send a followup.
Peter Watts,
Well it’s “beyond Turing” so they’re obviously not messing about.. 🙂
Found a couple more concept art pieces of the milzombie and some screenshots from the game
http://www.zkx.cc/nzsxmg.html
And the artist’s gallery
http://www.leewiart.com/space/9382.html
Looks like a resident evil inspired fps, lot of those about nowadays
Dude, lay off the credence sacraments.
Whitey Bulger subject of CIA mind control experiments? The dude who played Boston’s FBI like a violion and used it for safe disposal of his own rivals, rival gangs and such? It’s kind of obvious that if MKUltra did anything to Bulger it wasn’t effective. He was a violent thug before and after the experiments.. though apparently he was a well-read violent thug with penchant for thick history books? Doesn’t seem in character for a potato-eater. Perhaps the LSD did him good..
Unless the above stuff is ..fiction, I’m pretty sure you have an auditory hallucination problem. I’ve had only a few of those in my life, never voices, just sounds, in response to stress and sleep deprivation and it was exasperating. Not being able to trust one’s senses, even for a short time.
And that is likely the biggest part of our problem – what’s the line? – “The best lack all conviction, while the worst/ Are full of passionate intensity.
I’d say you don’t lack conviction (and don’t get me wrong, I think you’re one of the good guys … and I say FUCK a lot too) and there are a lot of others who share your views. I also think things are changing and folks are getting … pissed off. When folks get sufficiently pissed off, change can happen – I’d just like to see that happen without the violence that seems to characterize “real” change. Maybe Pik Botha figured that out when Robin Williams offered: “Mr Botha, there are three million whites and fourteen million blacks in your country. Does the name Custer mean anything to you?”
Seems to me the folks in Quebec sent a pretty clear message to the politicians of ALL stripes in the last Federal election – you ALL SUCK – so we’re gonna go with these other guys. Who knows what might result if the rest of the country had followed suit.
Here’s the bottom line – things are changing, and the “old white guys (of which I guess I am one … so are you … sort of) aren’t “getting it.” But for the assinine gerrymandering in the US, the Republicans would be toast. The young folks aren’t paying attention to the media campaigns of all politicians – cause most of them think that still means TV commercials. Worst of all, the income inequity is going to drive folks to DEMAND change that will happen in an ordered response by government to place some limits on corporate raping and pillaging …. or someone will remind them about the 1% vs 99% thing and how THAT relates to Custer.
That’s why we need good folks to lead … and frankly a somewhat more reasonable version of I like drugs and I dislike religion could be very successful. I know you’d have my vote!
Police brutality is a great mobilizer of outrage. When you see police brutality, you stop trusting the cops. When police brutality is televised, people (even those in barely democratic governments) start protesting. Any autocrat knows; as soon as your police fires on the crowd, you’ve lost.
Quietly lifting people from their beds, well, you don’t see it, you don’t hear about it, and as a good law-abiding citizen, you’ll probably assume that those arrested did something wrong. And they were released, so what’s there to be angry about?
It’s much more clean, much more efficient to arrest a few known troublemakers before a demonstration than it is to arrest them afterwards.
And this is going to get more important; I’d like to point you (and others here) to the article Reshaping Terrorist Networks in the most recent issue of Communications of the ACM. Just reading the blurb will tell you most of what you need to know; the authors have developed a heuristic for identifying linchpin persons in a network of terrorists, and, more importantly, predicting what will happen if they are ‘removed’. While the authors give an example where a peaceful method was used to destabilize a violent organization, there’s nothing preventing the same software from being employed to efficiently target violent methods against a peaceful organization.
Now combine that algorithm with social networks, software that’s basically designed to make it entertaining and fun to give the government regular updates about your friends and family, and you’ve got a system that can tell you who is going to make trouble before they even know it themselves.
Remember the media gushing about the “Social Media revolutions” in the Middle-East? The people in power took note, and the next time they’re going to be prepared.
Spain might be an interesting case study soon, Podemos, a black swan new political party less than 2 years old is currently polling as the winner of the next elections, after the government party has been rocked by a ridiculous amount of corruption scandals that has shaken even their traditional conservative constituency.
2 party systems are stable… until they aren’t.
Our esteemed host might feel this is beneath him, or be too embarassed to point it out, but I have no shame, so, I’d just like to point out that the Goodreaders’ Reader Choice poll’s first round is started here: https://www.goodreads.com/choiceawards/best-books-2014
They’ve chosen a short-list of nominees for each category, and many worthy names (including Echopraxia) aren’t on it… however, in the first round, write-in votes are considered, and I believe the top five write-ins make it to the second round.
Now, I, personally, would never presume to tell you who you should vote for, if you think one of the regular nominees, or some other book is the best sci-fi book of the year, vote for that, but I don’t think I’m alone in thinking that there’s been a notable absence on the official list: the long-awaited followup to one of my favorite books, a thrilling books that’s filled with not-quite-human but still extremely compelling characters, on a journey towards the hottest place in the solar system on a search for a transcendant experience, experiencing some deep self-exploration and facing uncomfortable truths along the way…
I speak, of course, of the second book in the series The Erotic Space Adventures of Captain Rod Thrustgood of the USS Penetrator, Lust on the Ocean Planet of the Cat People.
That’s where my vote’s going!
…
Edit: Oh, damn, just noticed… technically that was published just before the cut off date! Well, then I guess I’ll go with Echopraxia
Y.,
Not sure what credence sacraments means.
Awesome quote chosen, thanks for that. Not really auditory hallucinations, more like involuntary thoughts. At the time I wrote that, despite having read Blindsight endnotes, had only learned of the Frey effect aka microwave hearing and had completely forgotten about SONY’s toy. Not sure if I’ve ever actually had any auditory hallucinations. Definitely something fishy about my near dreamstate/half awake, half asleep and some noise from suspicious renters above just after Squidgate exploded.
But drugging people is also very well established in the historical record and even the reason for doing so: discrediting witnesses:
Senate on MKULTRA, 1977, from a CIA draft memo from ’55:
“1. Substances which will promote illogical thinking and impulsiveness to the point where the recipient would be discredited in public.”
And they hired John Mulholland to teach them how to administer it.
As for Bulger, why would you think anything he did would be outside what CIA wanted? They are not DoJ and there are at best infrequent turf wars over informants and whether or not to prosecute, between FBI and NYPD for example.
And most of that is half a century old. I really don’t see the opposition to considering it possible when there’s motive and a historical paper trail.
http://fas.org/blogs/secrecy/2013/10/invention-secrecy-2013/
What we’re talking about is mostly brainhacking. Ample evidence of research, ample motives for doing so. Because some people are, or behave, crazy, doesn’t negate that.
PS: At the time, there were 17 known major US intelligence agencies, DHS being added after 9/11. To quote Led Zeppelin, sometimes words have two meanings.
Is there any evidence for something like voice-to-skull outside of blogs of people who appear to be schizophrenic? I mean, studies, research, etc.
As far as I know, the only technological way of inducing auditory hallucinations is sticking electrodes into the speech center of the hemisphere which is mute. That makes people hear voices, you know, advice, admonition, etc.
Y.,
Yes, there is. Many years of research, demonstrated in 1973/1974 via radio wave hearing effect. Then moved on to microwave hearing. Am told that, when used in normal mode, it feels like sound is coming from about 6″ behind your head. But it is also usable in subliminal mode per the US Army. They since deleted it and more:
http://mccoyote.wordpress.com/v2k/
Those changes after I contacted the OIG. Sure I’m not the only one. But the Federation of American Scientists kept a copy.
All wends into BIZARRE, PANDORA, the Moscow embassy microwave bombardment–though that was likely more about powering Theramin’s untraceable bugs, and yet another…no, not the CIA trained, armed group from Syria, not the Egyptian goddess and TV show, but the Institute of Science In Society aka ISIS:
http://mccoyote.wordpress.com/sub119/
All of these backed up by FOIA, public docs, reporting from places like NYT, WaPo, Defense Electronics, Defense News, etc.
http://mccoyote.wordpress.com/mind-affecting-technology/
1. the Frey effect is due to selective heating within the ear, and the sounds produced from there are not like normal speech, sound weird. Accompanied by headaches, pinprick feeling etc because of high energies involved.
2. even if someone could use the same effect to reproduce normal sounding speech, this kind of ‘weapon’ would also affect bystanders especially in crowded conditions and would require precisely tracking the individuals head for extended period of time and maintaining correct distance. I’m pretty sure you still hear your inner voices if you’re riding a packed bus, in a plane etc.
3. Moscow embassy was irradiated by microwaves in order to operate bugging devices there. The health effects were studied, and were far lower ..
http://www.ehjournal.net/content/11/1/85
4. Regarding Jose Delgado, the guy was a charlatan. Sure, if you stick an electrode into someone’s head, that’s gonna have an effect. But there’s no record of anything serious to back up his assertions that it’s possible to influence moods of animals with EM..
If it was possible to manipulate cat moods via microwaves, I’m pretty sure by now Chinese or perhaps the Swiss would be marketing and selling pet management remotes.
Y.,
Your 3rd and 4th points I have made on my blog. Implant mania is one of the things I believe to be not happening, ateaat for the reasons typically given.
Frey effect, aka radiowave auditory effect, again, was only the beginning. And I don’t think either of us know enough about what’s changed to really know what all kinds of clever methods could be employed re targeting. Assuming subliminals, there’s MAC addresses to target any connected device and why not just refer to the target by name so other unconscious minds ignore the message? Then there’s Woody Harris’ HSS, which specifically has a very tight beam.
Another thing I meant to include in the previous post was that, according to the still official after all these decades US document on brainwashing/torture states that hallucinations can arise from isolation and psychological trauma alone. I had never read nor heard that before. I don’t discount that as part of the equation. What I point up is the but-for principle. In my case, if that ever happened, it would not have but for the incursion of the US NATSEC community into my life. Ergo, still their doing.
Link to PDF here. Really, check out the Manning link as well. Why brainwash someone who admits guilt?
http://mccoyote.wordpress.com/2014/04/27/cia-brainwashing-document/
Let me guess – the US NATSEC community became involved in your life in your mid twenties?
Subliminals have never even been conclusively shown to affect such simple stuff as what advertised product to buy. The idea that you can make a ‘targed subliminal’… Oh well.
The closest thing to subliminal influences we have is priming done in studies, but it’s effects while detectable are in no way mind control.
(rofl)
You don’t think anyone ever tortured someone else for revenge? Manning hugely embarrassed the Federal Gov’t.
Y.,
Mid twenties, maybe. But was entirely unaware of it until mid 40s and had what appeared to be a very normal life until then. Not schizophrenia, though I understand the desire to believe that as more comfortable and in line with the cover that people like Ewan Cameron, Luther Wilson Greene, and likely R. Fuller Torre liked/like to use. It has been coined the Martha Mitchell effect after the wife of the Watergate co-conspirator.
I’m not too sure about your assertion that subliminals don’t work. In fact, the US Congress, conducting 1984-themed hearings, not only found that it did but was stonewalled on DoD involvement by one of the experts who said he could not discuss it. They found that stores absolutely could reduce shoplifting and employee theft by using them under the sound played in the store. The difficulty was in finding the right messages. In any case, advances in ultrasound–in the back of both Blindsight and Echopraxia–are at least something to be considered. See also notes 9 and 18 of the latter.
For the reverse of preventing crime, think there was a case where “liberate the money” worked on a bank teller who, “help me steal the money” would not. This was dramatized in an episode of CSI. And then there was the hypnosis studies where an atheist was made religious and then the opposite.
From WaPo:
”
In 1961, a top CIA scientist reported in an internal memo that “the feasibility of remote control of activities in several species of animals has been demonstrated…Special investigations and evaluations will be conducted toward the application of selected elements of these techniques to man,” according to “The CIA and the Search for the Manchurian Candidate,” a 1979 book by former State Department intelligence officer John Marks.
”
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/spy-talk/2010/11/cia_brain_experiments_pursued.html
And here’s another favorite, using electromagnets to disable the brain’s “moral compass:”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1262074/Scientists-discover-moral-compass-brain-controlled-magnets.html
That’s an interesting point about Manning, but surely there are better ways to get revenge than following THE manual on brainwashing. Again, the details…
Old boys in DoD were very much against repealing DADT and a gay {actually transgender} INSCOM soldier winds up doing this but is turned in by a gay hacker. Not to mention all the signs of Manning’s falling apart prior to the whole thing and his counselor’s failure to revoke his classified access. It’s all in the record.
Your use of the term mind control is precisely why I tend not to use it unless I must. What difference does it make, really, if I am able to “trick”/PSYOP/manipulate you into a course of action I desire or have a remote control just puppeteering you around? When you are not aware of the capability and motives of the former, it operates close enough to the latter for…as my science teacher used to say…for government work.
By that kind of reasoning, we can hypothesize that US DOD/CIA/WHATEV have strong-AI, hiveminded gengineered war-crows, and self-aware combat memes that can deploy over vanilla TV signal.
Wait what ?
How the hell do you use a networking device’s MAC to keep a narrow beam pointed at a precise angle at a human head?
Anyway, my point from previous discussion remains unchanged, targeting someone for high-tech / multi-actor harassment campaign is extremely challenging in terms of logistics and contingency management, as well as relatively inefficient (especially if you have the damn efficient alternative of hacking their PC remotely and depositing a stash of ceepee there via non-persistent malware, followed by a nice tip to the relevant authorities).
If some underhanded spooks wanted to get some vanilla dude (writer, musician, run-of-the-mill political candidate) out of the picture, they would just frame him as a pedo (maybe would even pay a hundred grand to a child prostitute to testify against their target in court), instead of deploying a Rube Goldberg machine of narrow-beam smart-targeting Frey emitters and weaponized subliminal thingamaboobies against a third party in an attempt to make said third party to target their intended target.
You know what ?
they should put me in charge of them underhanded spooks.
NSA, do you copy? Are you still there? 😉
Of course, “could not discuss it” can also be used to hide the issue that untold amounts of money might have been wasted on subliminal technologies that do not produce a measurable, directed, exploitable result.
Subliminals-which-work is a kind of “holy grail” tech, much like economically feasible fusion with a cheap fuel cycle and “strong” AI.
The difference is that stuff that falls under PSYOP/manipulation is very, very vanilla and was around for ages, while mind-control is a term usually reserved for exotic technological solutions that may or may not exist.
Re: hypothetical CIA/NSA/DHS/NWO/ETC weapons
I’ll just leave this here:
http://zapatopi.net/blackhelicopters/
01,
Talking several methods, MAC address for subliminal sound, a la acoustic psychic-correction, Russian variant CIA snatched in early 80s. And I don’t see anyone finding fault with the 1961 memo Marks got through FOIA. By the way, I’ve absolutely no idea how that works. Clearly not using subliminal suggestions on animals.
And not that simple {yet} re mindless band of zombies. Again why I prefer Senate’s choice of behavioral modification over mind control term. We’re typically talking a few seconds, one action where “normal” folks are concerned. To get a target to perform things he would not normally do requires effort and typically drugs if he or she is not already susceptible due to mental illness. This is a very broad topic, my link provided several known to exist technologies and hints at advances since most of them are at least 40 years old. Again see the 1955 draft memo, re substances that make hypnosis easier.
The point, though, is no matter how ridiculous behavior becomes, no matter how different as a whole, we jump at whatever obvious or provided explanation given us. I like the text I saw on a pic I saw recently: “Conspiracy Theorist: One Who Questions the Words of Known Liars.”
Except in my case this is not a hobby, a whim, or the side-effects of paranoia. It is from experience and research due to attempting to figure out how various “magic tricks” as Clarke might call it, were done. That said, think I like Stross’ quote even better, more insidious. Just seems like Nature.
This, my posts here, are in part thought experiment. How do you convince people, even smart people, that something they either never experienced, or never realized that they experienced, is real? It is tragicomical. While on the one hand the truth has set me “free,” on the other it’s practically out of Greek myth to be one of the folks predicting doom and to not be believed. Like watching a trainwreck in slo-mo.
But then that’s the sad part. Much of my effort these past five years has been aimed at attempting to convince someone who KNOWS what it is, how it works, etc. to blow the whistle. Really, though, I can’t blame him for not wanting to be murdered and/or tortured for doing so. It’s very easy to look around and think people are suckers, so why bother helping them? And that I think is why there is such a disparity between how the IC is depicted on TV, and how they really only serve banks, multinationals, and oligarchs and protecting their own organizations from scrutiny. It’s me, me, me.
Hard to blame myself for failing at mission: impossible.
Slight clarification re mass zombies….
Tea Party
Arab Spring
Police Gone Postal
etc.
All possible examples. Esp. the first. Recall Olbermann and others investigating that people disrupting town hall meetings on HCR were “paid shills.” No evidence of that ever emerged. Rather, I think something like emotional contagion in that case.
Emotional contagion has been around forever, of course. Salem witch trials, Dr. Mudd, the Hindenberg kidnapping, etc. That’s not the point.
The point is, they have gotten so much better at it that you had best start viewing it as near-mind-control out of a sense of self-preservation. Think that’s what I’ve been trying in part to convey. See GCHQ slides re sociology, psychology, etc. all being leveraged toward manipulation of opinion as reported by NBC and Glenn Greenwald.
Then see things like FBI pretending to be journalists and Brit IC spying on lawyers. This is not a slippery slope, more like skiing on an avalanche.
See also, CIA veteran and CNN Middle East expert Robert Baer’s interview about running TV stations:
”
You mentioned the financing and control of the media, how did this take place?
It is already known that some CIA agents were responsible for writing the official statement that news anchors would read. Of course the news readers did not know anything as they received their instructions from their bosses who received instructions from his boss who was our (CIA) man. There was one overall task and that was to incite hatred and nationalism through television and for differences between the people to really stand out.
”
http://www.ebritic.com/?p=213256&wpmp_tp=1
MAC address for subliminal sound? Is that, like, a metaphor? A joke ? Care to link to docs or something?
Anyway, my salient point isn’t about nitpicking the feasibility of different hypothetical tech, but the sheer operational irrationality of using it to achieve something as trivial as silencing a civilian.
I mean, assume I’m a TLA with magical subliminal shitfuckery capabilities, and I absolutely hate some John Doe The Writing Dude.
I can:
1) risk exposure and deploy special operations personnel and highly classified technology to influence some George Doe Average so that he goes and screws with John Doe The Writing Dude
2) use relatively trivial and easily deniable techniques to stuff John Doe The Writing Dude’s PC full of childpron while paying a child prostitute to testify against him (thus locking John up for a long time and branding him as a kiddie fiddler).
Do note that (2) does not require deploying any physical assets, classified or otherwise, unless John Doe The Writing Dude is very, very serious about his IT security (he most likely isn’t).
Why would I, evil TLA bother to go with (1) when (2) is so much easier, requires much less exposure, and is plausibly deniable in the extreme (if else fails, “hackers dunnit!”) ?
You obviously understand what a MAC address is. It identifies the device uniquely. Any device carrying sound can also carry subliminal sound. No doc required, that is a very simple deduction. There is a system, forgotten name, used by FBI, that adds their server in between a target and the web. They can control what the target sees. Not difficult to imagine same with radio, streaming sound, phone calls. Didn’t realize I was supposed to leak secret documents here that I don’t have because I was never an insider.
Think typically scenarios such as you’re describing serve more than one purpose. It happened to VA whistleblower Kernan Manion:
http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/navy-officials-smear-shrinks-performa
Am told through mutual acquaintance.
Training and ensuring that the operatives remain without conscience is another besides silencing witnesses.
You do know we have lots of spies and, as noted above, CIA’s budget, for example, is 50% more than collect-it-all NSA’s. And it’s not their money. I answered this question above: they must find shit to spend it all on or be reduced the following year.
Then there are the private contractors with the private clients who went after reporters and their families. Think I covered that one too.
http://www.thenation.com/article/166421-ron-paul-wants-abolish-cia-his-largest-donor-builds-toys-it
Anyway, funny story. This Miller kid, who went to North Korea and tore up his visa, has a brother in the USAF, a pilot. Then Clapper runs over and, rather than the typical “we’ll bomb you” muscle flexing, makes some promise behind the scenes and gets him out before China and the NK can start digging too deeply into what motivated his actions. Watch for unhappy home, fight with brother, or some other after school special explanation in the coming days.
http://www.nate-thayer.com/mystery-u-s-prisoner-in-north-korea-emerges-brother-of-matthew-miller-was-u-s-pilot-in-s-korea/
Sound devices don’t (usually) have MAC.
Networking devices have MACs. If your claim is that you can hijack some streaming session and inject subliminal sounds into vanilla audio stream, then it is theoretically conceivable, but MAC address of victim’s NIC has little to do with it.
Errrrr… this is neither as insidious as any scenarios previously described here, nor somehow “TLA/military specific”.
It’s reprehensible, but in a banal way. There’s nothing particularly unthinkable, special or novel about doctoring internal records to retaliate against a whistleblower.
There are many less stupid (and less risky) ways to spend money than to use highly classified “special measures” to trigger some oddball Xanathos gambit against a civilian third party or somesuch.
Again, at no point I contend that TLAs don’t embellish and/or don’t “go after” third parties (journalists et. al. ), merely that using highly exotic hypothetical (bordering on SCP-foundation-y) technology and fragile, contrived gambits involving “mind controlled” proxies is an exceptionally strange way to go about this.
Ah. Point of link was merely to let you know who Kernan is. A mutual acquaintance, former IC, stated that he appears to have been subject to some kind of electronic harassment. See also former Honduran Pres. Zelaya mentioning microwave weapons in interview w/Amy Goodman in Oct 09. In November, she was detained by Can BGs, just weeks before you-know-what.
As for the expenditure/manpower thing, had I taken more time, I’d have likely just pointed to the last time we went through this nonsense:
https://mccoyote.wordpress.com/coint/
According to Congress, it was a perfect storm of corruption and incompetence at all levels and in two branches of government. Imagine that with ten times the budget.
Well, we are talking proxy wars, proxy distractions, proxy PSYOPs. Nothing new but now harder to trace because sometimes even the proxies don’t know who is pulling their strings.
One more thing, I am careful, believe it or not, in jumping to conclusions based on experience, etc. But I have seen thrice, read once, some indication that multiple people being affected potentially at once, as Y suggested might happen w/a wide beam or wave broadcast. The reading, well I saw the video when it was discovered, was about at least a few people in Afghanistan dreaming about the WTX falling, or similar…some didn’t seem to even know the buildings existed necessarily. OBL said if one guy’s dreams were any closer, he was going to have to kill him.
Now certainly I can rattle off other explanations… Memes, echoes of the 92 bombing, rumors, etc. But imagine for a moment really beating a hornet’s nest with a fiery stick and then pointing the angry hive in the direction desired. That’s closer to what I mean: behavioral mod than mind control per se. Manipulation without necessarily the target being aware, thinking it’s their idea. And we have that question about free will anyway what with unconscious doing the driving and consciousness believing that it is. Quite the mess.
01,
Silenced premiered/premiering at IDFA. Good doc.
http://www.idfa.nl/industry.aspx