Month: July 2013

The Program from Hell Aflame in Fraud, Waste and Abuse by John Stanton…

“[US Army] Training and Doctrine Command and Tradoc Intelligence Support Activity should consider conducting an investigation, to determine the true extent of spillage incidents perpetrated by HTS employees and contractors, to preclude possible embarrassment in the wake of the Bradley Manning trial/decision.” Source

“The training location at HTS has so much politics, manipulation, gossip and unfair treatment that it is sickening.” Source

“The DOD should consider conducting an inquiry to determine if there was any improper relationship between the former HTS program director, and the founder of Oberon, later absorbed by CGI, or any other DOD employees. DOD should consider reviewing all awards, bonuses, compensatory time, overtime, or time off approved or endorsed by Mr Y for Ms Z between August 2011 and June 2013. Where there is smoke, there is fire…any disinterested observer will find unusual activity and high amounts of compensation disguised as legitimate work channeled in her direction. More serious allegations are likely to follow.”

“Nothing seems to change except the downward spiral of HTS seems to be accelerating.” Source

“…they [studies] have been absorbed in a vast database which often renders it nearly impossible to sparse vital from redundant data — an endemic issue…Most interesting, perhaps, is the change in the products…the volume of reporting has significantly decreased as there seems to have been very few studies conducted since December 2011. Secondly, the standard of the products is remarkably sub-par. Problems can be noted everywhere from the methodology all the way to the final production which, in turn, makes the findings questionable…” Source

According to sources budget cuts will arrive at the US Army’s Human Terrain System (HTS) at the end of July 2013. As is common in this age of austerity, senior leadership everywhere are figuring out who to keep and who to drop. At HTS the situation is no different. One of the senior staff members at HTS in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, has sent a must-have list to HTS handlers in Virginia to ensure that the “new curriculum” will be taught according to specifications.

“This list has the names of the employees who will stay at HTS after the budget cut on July 31st and unfortunately this list has the senior staff member’s close friends only. CGI [the prime contractor] is conducting an ethics compliance investigation now against this senior staff member and two faculty members. The investigation against them started last week but it has been hidden from the US Army leadership ” said sources.

One focus of the investigation is against a social scientist instructor on the HTS staff who, while employed by HTS, traveled to Turkey for two weeks to speak for the NATO, which is considered a conflict of interest, because she is an HTS instructor and shouldn’t work for any other organization at the same time. Instead of taking leave time during these two weeks of traveling she recorded her hours using HTS code and her supervisor approved it.”

The other area of interest is a PhD who was hired to teach Team Leader students. The PhD invited students to his house and “partied” with them. According to a source, the Doctor allegedly “sometimes gets very drunk” with the students “This kind of relationship between faculty and students is considered against CGI’s fraternization policy,” said the source. Sources also allege that a senior staff member “bullies employees—even though they are hard working and dedicated–to reduce their value in front of the government leadership.” This makes them easy targets for release during budget cuts. And benefits the senior staff member’s friends.

According to a source, these matters involve basic “ethics standards” and—if handled correctly– could “improve the operation of HTS.” The source has praised CGI for its efforts but, apparently, more needs to be done.

One of the Research Managers at HTS, according to sources, is “one of the most qualified instructors in HTS” but a senior staff member and his posse are allegedly trying to undermine the research manager’s scope of work. An attempt to merge the Research Managers Individual Track Training class with the Social Scientists Individual Track Trainings apparently being made to benefit the senior staff members cronies. “The social scientist instructors can teach this class with the research manager which will allow the senior staff member to keep his two social scientist friends in HTS training,” said a source.

Other sources had this to say about the US Army Program.

“BAE should consider conducting an independent inquiry to determine if one of their former employees and a senior military officer provided insider information to CGI-Oberon, insuring they would get the new contract and that the former employee would be hired as a site manager.”

“TRADOC/TRISA should consider having the HTS curriculum reviewed by an independent academic group to evaluate its value and relevance, who prepared that curriculum, and their credentials.TRADOC/TRISA should consider conducting an investigation to determine what happened to the HTS curriculum it contracted subject matter experts to develop prior to March 2011, and why it was not used. TRADOC/TRISA should consider conducting an investigation, to determine why there is such a wide discrepancy between what HTS students are taught, how they are/were deployed, and what they actually produced.”

John Stanton has written nearly 115 articles—based on 110 plus sources—over the past four years, from 2008 to 2013. Many of those stories but not all are contained in a new July 2013 Amazon Create Space book titled, US Army’s Human Terrain System: 2008-2013, The Program from Hell. The book is dedicated to the lives wasted and damaged (and the Sources, of course) by negligent civilian and military leaders.

Posted by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

Wall Street, US Congress, Obama Cash-in

by John Stanton

“Despite being the richest country in the world, poverty remains an important social issue in the United States. All too often poverty in America is used as a political weapon by both political parties to galvanize their voting base. What is lost in the midst of such politicking is the crony connection of corporations that have positioned themselves to profit from poverty. The welfare programs we use to attempt to alleviate poverty actually play directly into the plans of companies that lobby on behalf of legislation lauded as anti-poverty programs. Rather than overcoming poverty, these programs line the pockets of their promoters. Such crony connections must end.” Government Accountability Institute

According to the US Census Bureau’s Median Value of Debt by Household (2011), the median household debt (both secured and unsecured) for 35-44 year old was $108,000 (USD); for those 45-54, $86,500; and for 55-64 age group it was $70,000. The data in the Census Bureau report also shows that the less formally educated one is the less debt one has.

The median debt for someone with no high school diploma is $20,000 (with a high school diploma is $42,000), while the median debt for a holder of a graduate or professional degree is $130,705. So while America’s educational leaders say that a college degree will likely lead to increased income over the years, they don’t mention that secured and unsecured debt increases the “smarter” one becomes.

Debt for You, Profit for Them

Maybe Americans should dump the pursuit of a college degree particularly in the face of rising interest rates for federal student loans and increased tuition and ancillary fees at colleges and universities across the land. High interest rates (the cost of money) on student loans can also serve as a barrier to college entry. Perhaps the “hidden hand of the market” is sending a message of some sort, that the financially sound path is to get an education in the 21^st Century trades that combine, say, computers and engines or computer systems and networks. Add a Cisco or Microsoft certification to the tradecraft and a job for life is possible. But buyer beware, earning an Associate’s Degree earns you a median debt of $63,000.

Moreover pushing the myth that a college education is a must-have in the USA tends to generate excellent profits for investors, and makes college/university presidents, administrators and senior faculty, quite comfortable. Take the case of Sallie Mae. According to the Huffington Post’s September 2013 report Sallie Mae Profit Boosts College Endowments and Pension Funds As Students Pay More, “University endowments and teachers’ pension funds are among big investors in Sallie Mae, the private lender that has been generating enormous profits thanks to soaring student debt and the climbing cost of education…previously unreported investments [obtained by Huffington Post] mean that education professionals are able to profit twice off the same student: first by hiking the cost of tuition, then through dividends and higher valuations on their holdings in Sallie Mae, the largest student lender and loan servicer in the country, which profits by charging relatively high interest rates on its loans and not refinancing high-rate loans after students graduate and get well-paying jobs. Sallie Mae is a former government-sponsored enterprise that was fully privatized in 2004 and now trades publicly as SLM Corp…

Sallie Mae reported $939 million in net income last year, the highest since 2006. The publicly-traded company, which enjoys a government guarantee on most of its $174 billion in assets, has been profitable in eight of the last 10 years, generating a cumulative $7.3 billion profit. Its shares have risen 54 percent over the past year, outpacing the 19 percent gain in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index, America’s benchmark equity gauge…The endowments of Furman University, Harvard University, Mount Holyoke College, and University of Michigan all hold stakes in Sallie Mae through their investments in Highfields Capital Management, a hedge fund that manages more than $11 billion and is the second-biggest Sallie Mae shareholder… Pension funds for teachers and other school employees such as the New York State Teachers’ Retirement System, State Teachers Retirement Board of Ohio, Pennsylvania Public School Employees Retirement System, New Mexico Educational Retirement Board, Teacher Retirement System of Texas and California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) also own significant chunks of Sallie Mae, as does asset manager TIAA-CREF, which oversees retirement funds for teachers, among others… Federal records show the company spent more than $1.4 million lobbying members of Congress last quarter.”

Rockefeller, Obama Nest Eggs Turn Gold

The Government Accountability Institute has an eye-opening study titled Profits from Poverty: How Food Stamps Benefit Corporations. Published in September 2012, the report indicates that three corporations dominate the “food stamp market.” One of the three, and the largest in the USA, is JP Morgan with 24 state contracts. It is the leading provider of Electronic Benefit Transfers, or EBT’s, that channel funds for food to those impoverished Americans that qualify for government assistance. Coming in at the number two slot is Affiliated Computer Services. This firm was acquired by Xerox Corporation in February, 2010. It has a total of 15 state contracts. The third is eFunds Corporation, a subsidiary of Fidelity National Information Services (not connected to Fidelity Investments) and owns 10 state contracts for EBT services and one U.S. territory.

“Originally conceived as a means to prop up sagging crop prices to support American farmers, the Food Stamp Program, now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, has exploded into a welfare program that costs tax payers a record $75.67 billion in 2011. Almost everyone has heard this [tired] story, but few realize that only three corporations have cornered the market for providing SNAP services to the needy and destitute. According to JP Morgan, the largest food stamp industry player, the business of food stamps ‘is a very important business to JP Morgan. It’s an important business in terms of its size and scale…. Right now volumes have gone through the roof in the past couple of years or so. The good news from JP Morgan’s perspective is the infrastructure that we built has been able to cope with that increase in volume.’ And JP Morgan has good reason to be pleased, since the bank profits from programs designed to help the poor.”

SNAP and JP Morgan? SNAP and Xerox? That the poor and needy of America earn profits for JP Morgan and Xerox seems wacky. Welcome to the accelerating Age of Austerity in the USA. Nothing, absolutely nothing must interfere with the free flow of capital in the USA.

More’s the pity in this tale of bleeding the middle to lower classes dry is how the political system was used to increase the level of profits for JP Morgan. According to the Profits of Poverty report by the Government Accountability Institute “[we] uncovered a clear trend of increasing contributions to the Agriculture Committee members of both the [US] House and Senate on the part of JP Morgan…The US Department of Agriculture and its presidential appointees also influence the direction of program policy. This can be seen in the development of broad based categorical eligibility. JP Morgan’s donations to political campaigns also show a clear trend. During the 2008 presidential election, Barack Obama received more than twice the contributions of John McCain: $807,000 for Obama compared to McCain’s $345,505. After Obama’s election, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act made two important changes to existing SNAP policies. First, it increased SNAP benefits by 13.6 percent. Second, it actively encouraged states to adopt broader rules to increase SNAP caseloads. From 2009 to 2012, 32 states adopted the interpretation. The first change creates a stronger incentive for individuals to enroll for food stamps, and the second change accommodates this increase in enrollment. All of this, working together with an underperforming economy, sets the stage for increasing profits for the companies providing EBT services. The more persons enrolled in the program, the more money the EBT industry makes.”

We Need More Poor, Insecure Americans!

Members of the US House and Senate are savvy hustlers, particularly when they are able to rig the system so that corporations can corner markets, reap profits and increase share value. It is a wonderfully devious and perfectly legal system for the rich to get richer and the middling senator or representative to join the ranks of the rich. The Center for Responsive Politics, a must visit for anyone wishing to understand how the US political really works, lists the investment portfolios of many in the US Congress. But for an excellent case study in cronyism, we turn back to the Profits of Poverty report and the tidy relationship between JP Morgan, Congress and the White House.

“Unfortunately, the crony connections do not stop with congressional lobbying. Several members of Congress and the executive branch have significant investments in JP Morgan stock. President Obama has up to $1 million in a private client asset checking account. In 2010, then White House Chief of Staff William M. Daley also had invested up to $5 million with JP Morgan. In 2007, West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller had over $50 million with the bank. Increasing profits for JP Morgan in turn means increasing returns for investors. EBT card systems were guaranteed expansion on December 13, 2010, when President Obama signed the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act. This legislation requires all states to develop and implement the use of EBT cards for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) by October 1, 2020. According to the most recent participation data released by the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service, WIC served 8.9 million consumers in FY 2011, which means that EBT card providers are looking at many new customers thanks to the legislation. The expansion of the EBT program did not happen in a vacuum. In fact, JP Morgan was lobbying on issues related to the use of EBT cards in the WIC program during 2009, months before the Healthy-Hunger-Free Kids Act was introduced in the Senate.”

Corporations Wage War on Unemployed

American employees are generally viewed by American corporations/businesses as a necessary evil, a burden to the shareholders and profit margins. That view is reflected openly in the US House and Senate, the Executive Branch and even in the US Supreme Court (pro business rulings, Citizen’s United, etc.). With the Great Recession of 2008 lingering still and with unemployment hovering at 15 percent (unofficial), business owners large and small are not shy about speaking distastefully about the slovenly American worker who wants a living wage, health insurance, some vacation and the security of unemployment benefits when markets leave town.

ADP, the giant payroll and benefits operator in the USA, and around the globe, puts it so, “Your workforce helps you earn money. But it’s also costing you a ton of money. So here’s the million dollar question: how can you maximize the value of your people and minimize what you spend on managing them?” Stated more bluntly, How can you bleed productivity out of your employee whilst paying him/her as little as possible and reducing benefits?

Equifax is well known to all American employees. Equifax, along with Experian and Trans Union, dominate the credit scoring industry in the USA. Credit scores of the type Equifax provides are not unlike College Board’s SAT scores. Both scores are predictors: one for the ability to pay debt with interest, and the other for academic performance at the college/university level. As such, low SAT scores significantly reduce the chances of getting into a long sought after school or even a job (some employers now require SAT scores). Multiple SAT tests may be required to push up the scores and, of course, the fee based SAT testing means more profit for the College Board. In similar fashion, low credit scores can mean the difference between refinancing a brutal interest-only mortgage loan or not. It may also mean being unable to co-sign for that student loan for the daughter.

Equifax is in the profitable business of fighting on behalf of corporations for unemployment claims. It is also the owner of Talx/Equifax Workforce Solutions which was featured in a New York Times article titled Contesting Jobless Claims Becomes a Boom Industry. Equifax apparently engaged in underhanded practices aimed at individuals claiming unemployment benefits. Hearings are typically conducted at the state level to determine the legitimacy of claims but employers do not normally have the staff available to attend and protest them all. Enter Equifax: its website states that for one company it serviced “in 2009, the increase in the number of hearings attended resulted in $342,676 in liability avoided. For 2010, this amount was $663,913.”

The street offers the only escape. Otherwise: Workers of the World! Capitulate!

John Stanton is a Virginia based writer. Reach him at cioran123@yahoo.com

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

Leaving for the village. Most likely I will not do a whole bunch of internet work while gone. We have bought the paint, rollers, brushes and other items. It is time to paint the village home. Sveta has picked her color and I bought the base paint and the color addition and will blend it myself. I taught Sveta a new thing, she is learning about latex enamel paint. Most paint in Russia is oil based enamel and I discovered that Leroy Merlin in Moscow has a painters dream in stock…

Who says that we are not civilized in Russia? So that cup of delicious coffee is extra special this morning as plans for the village are finalized. Yesterday I worked on the car and got her ready for the trip. All is perfect…

I also bought the items necessary to do body work on the car. It is time to fill some rust areas and get her looking better. This all means that while I will post a couple of articles and show the village home before and after. Also might show the car before and after. It means that I will not be regular on the site for a week…

Oh and Sveta loves orange (bright orange to be exact) and I had to do some arm twisting to tone the orange color way down, or else we would have a neon orange village home by the time Sveta was done… 🙂

Leaving Monday morning real early and will be back at the end of the week…

Yippy it is village time again. See ya in a few days…

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

Ukha is a clear broth Russian soup made from fish. Usually fish heads included and do not use saltwater fish. Only freshwater fish will make this the treat that it is. It seems that Russians believe that smaller fish make a better soup, so it is up to you what fish you use. I use salmon as it is cheap and comes in huge pieces in Russia. Thence I have to skim several times to get the excess fat off. It is a fish broth with fish fillets and rarely are vegetables put in, in any quantity…

Ingredients to make Fish Stock:
1 small onion, diced
1 small carrot, diced
1 small stalk celery, with leaves, diced
5 cups water
2 twist of lemon peel (yes – soup needs this for correct flavor)
salt and pepper to taste
1 bay leaf or two
2 lbs of fish including heads and tails if so desired

Ukha:
1 lb white fish fillets, sliced into 6 serving pieces
6 thin slices of lime
2 tbsp finely cut fresh dill leaves

Make the Soup:
Slowly bring all fish stock ingredients to a boil in a large saucepan. Including heads and tails…
Skimming excess oil and froth when necessary…
Partially cover pan, and cook (boil) at a medium heat for 20-30 minutes…
Then bring broth quickly to full boil and lower in the fish fillets into the broth…
Reduce heat to low…
Simmer filets for 3-4 minutes–until the fish is just done and white…
Carefully lift the fish fillets out and put into flat soup bowls…
Pour hot stock on top and squeeze a little lime juice into each bowl. (Vegetables are not necessary to serve, in this soup, they just add flavor. If diced correctly and small they will cook away to nothing anyway…)
Lay a thin lime slice on top, and sprinkle with fresh dill…
Serve at once… (Sveta likes sour cream on hers and no lime!)

Whoever gets the bay leaf, gets good luck…

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

One huge difference between Russia and the USA, is what I am thinking about today. This difference is really huge and is really important in the world of pharmaceuticals. It is not the fact that I buy (what you call prescription drugs) in Russia, the same drug as in America, at a minuscule cost compared to the American counterpart. It is the fact that all my so called prescription drugs in America are not prescription drugs in Russia. That is a huge difference…

I am told what to use by a doctor and unless what they prescribe is a narcotic such as morphine, then I just walk to the nearest drugstore and buy what I need. No prescription, no hassle and no games. They can prescribe morphine and it would have to be bought at a special place and with a prescription. So not all drugs are prescription-less, just very deadly addictive ones…

Now this is leading me to explain something and if you get bored easily, then it is time to go. For now I will explain why what I said above is important to me and should be to you…

In America it is common place to  go to the doctor and if you need a drug to get better, he writes a prescription and almost all drugs fall under this category. At least drugs that can do any good to help you. There is a huge business in America that caters to placebo cures and Russia is no different than that. I am not talking about over the counter drugs, such as NyQuil and such…

Example: I took 15 pills this morning for my heart condition, diabetes and other issues. All but maybe two of those pills are prescription in America. The two that are not, are a vitamin and a liver helper pill (Sveta thinks that I should take those to make things better and I do not argue.) In America I would have to have a little piece of official paper that would be verified and re-verified to make sure that I was not some type of terrorist and getting drugs to end the world or something stupid like that, to even get all these drugs…

Now that is the dollar and the ease of how it is better in Russia than America with prescription drugs, but there is a real reason that this is much better, the way it is done here in Russia…

In Russia people know what they are taking and they know what they take it for. People in Russia study the drugs and there side effects and other things before they go and start taking a bunch of pills. Other words, they know what they put in their mouth before they put it in their mouth and swallow it. They are not a bunch of dumb blind sheep (Like I was!) as they are in the western world over prescription drugs and such…

I use to blindly take my prescription and walk into the drugstore and walk out and never know what I took. I took it because I have been told by a doctor to take it and that is that. That is wrong…

Sveta taught me something and I have watched many Russians do it since she taught me. I do it now also. We research the drug before we use it…

Sveta studies what the drugs are that I am suppose to take. She looks them up on the internet, she talks to the pharmacist, she asks people on forums and if she is happy that I should take them. Then she helps me get the right pills. Then we read about the dosage requirements (Never trust any doctor on dosage!) and find that usually we need to adjust what the doctor said…

Oh – I know that sounds sacrilegious to an American, but I am here to tell you that doctors are human and humans make mistakes. I make mistakes and we all make mistakes. If I am taking pills, then I want to know what I take, why I take it and I do not want to take more than what I need. I was not always this way and believe you me, it is better for you…

So to tell you what is a good example of one thing I am taking is this: Vessel Due-F (Sulodexide) – I am taking 20 days of injections and then around 30 days of pills. I will do this twice a year from now on and as long as I live. We studied the drug and studied some more. Now I am taking it. It will help me, but never cure me. The best I can do in my life is to extend my life functions a little longer and this drug may help in that aspect… (Cost is negligible for this treatment! $25 dollars for whole treatment!)

I walk into the drug store and tell the nice lady behind the counter that I need Vessel Due-F ampules and she knows just what I mean. I buy needles and the ampules and am on my way, maybe not happy at the thought of sticking a needle in my leg 20 times, but I am happy…

Never once do I need a prescription and if the nice lady pharmacist thought that I should be careful with this drug, she would speak up immediately and make it clear  that I should maybe do this or this or this and she would not hesitate. For that is her job…

I am a hundreds times more informed about what I am taking in Russia, than I was in America. This is all due to how different the system is and what responsibilities lie with who. In America, people never take responsibility for anything, but in Russia there is no one else to blame it on, as the system does not coddle people…

I have learned that I should be informed and that I should know what I am taking. Even if I do not like taking it, I should have the knowledge and I have a sweet Russian woman that has taught me that is important… 🙂

Oh and (Western) prescription drugs in Russia! Cheap, available in generics, no hassles and informative…

That is why I love Russia…

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

MOSCOW – Former US spy agency contractor Edward Snowden planned to meet with Russian activists, lawyers as well as representatives from other organizations on Friday, the Interfax news agency reported Thursday…

Will be update after we find out if it is true or not…

Update Friday, July 12th, 2013: US fugitive whistleblower Edward Snowden requested political asylum in Russia, one of the participants of the meeting at Sheremetyevo airport said.

Fugitive US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden on Friday told a group of activists in a meeting at a Moscow airport that he wanted to claim asylum in Russia because he is unable to fly on anywhere else.

Human Rights Watch representative Tanya Lokshina told the Interfax news agency that Snowden told participants “he wants to stay here” while public chamber state advisory body member Olga Kostina said that Snowden would request asylum in Russia.

Snowden wants to stay in Russia – HRW officer

Former CIA employee Edward Snowden wants to stay in Russia, which he said at a meeting with human rights activists at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport on Friday.

Snowden “wants to stay here and cannot fly to Latin America for the time being,” Tatyana Lokshina, a deputy head of the Moscow office of Human Rights Watch, said.

Snowden asked the rights activists attending the meeting to help him obtain asylum in Russia, she said.

“Yes, it’s about asylum in Russia,” Lokshina said when asked whether Snowden had asked for help.

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

President Obama Channels Lord Cromwell: Great Statesmen Tamper with Packets by John Stanton

Glenn Greenwald’s Snowden dossier concerning the American Leviathan’s practice of harvesting, storing and analyzing the information/conversations of its own and the world’s political, military, economic and cultural gate keepers is fascinating. This is so not due to the technological sophistication and global reach of the USA’s intelligence capabilities, but for what it implies about the current state and future of the collective nation-states known as Western Democracies. And it undercuts nearly every ideal in the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights, leaving the dry, functional and core text of the US Constitution as the last mooring line to—paraphrasing Russell Crowe in the movie the Gladiator—“The dream that was once the United States.” It also challenges the foundations of the “free” market and “free will”: but more on that in a moment.

Critics of surveillance technologies and intelligence gathering–and advocates of the nebulous concept of selfhood and privacy– would do well to school themselves by studying the documents that outline America’s national security strategy. Most all of these are publically available at a collection of websites: DTIC, Cryptome, Public Intelligence, Cryptocomb, and the National Defense University, et al. If critics do not understand their opponents and their thinking—as Sun Tzu once advised—then building a convincing case against the ills of the world is a Vaudevillian exercise. Further, the willful ignorance by proponents and opponents of the history of spying, surveillance and even privacy cripples the thinking of both sides. Absent availing oneself of learning, there can be no meaningful discussion on matters of this import.

It is absolutely vital to visit with the historical literary record as it is critical to understanding the philosophy and foundations of the Western world’s approach to intelligence gathering, surveillance and the role of the state/church, corporation and individual in that process. Brushing off this vast literary goldmine is done at one’s own peril.

Literature to the Rescue!

As authors David Rosen and Aaron Santesso point out in the exceptional The Watchman in Pieces: Surveillance, Literature and Personhood (Yale 2013), the matter of individuality or personhood—and how much “others” (state, society) should legitimately know about that individual–is a centuries old matter dating, at least, back to the Middle Ages. The topic was the subject of some of the Western world’s top practitioners of poetry and prose, along with heavyweight political and cultural philosophers and critics. Among them: Swift, Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Richardson (Clarissa), Hume, Mill. James, Adam Smith, Pope, Defoe, Locke, Bentham, Thomas More, Goffman (dramaturgy).

Is President Barack Obama’s—or for that matter G.W. Bush and W.J. Clinton’s–thinking all that different from Cromwell? Is it a surprise that the US Postal Service, Telecoms and ISP’s collect metadata? Sure, the speed of exchange has changed and the human geospatial landscape has altered, but the core thinking remains the same. It is important, of course, not reach-back and pulling forward thoughts that are out of place in the 21^st Century. But, as evolutionary social animals, one core absolute appears to hold: What in the world are other people thinking about me or us? Who is watching?

According to Rosen and Santesso, “For [England’s }Cromwell it had been perfectly clear that a state controlled post ‘might be made the agent in discovering and preventing many wicked designs daily contrived against the piece and welfare of the commonwealth, the intelligence whereof could not be communicated except by letters’…Samuel Moreland in the service of Charles II subsequently helped develop a system of opening , copying and resealing letters passed through the post office…The [Secret Office] ‘had tricks to open letters more skillfully than anywhere in the world…It was not possible to be a great statesman without tampering with packets.” And, as Rosen and Santesso point out, it is to Elizabeth the First’s Francis Walsingham that history turns for “the beginnings of a surveillance bureaucracy ahead of its time.”

It bears repeating. America’s national security apparatus has made very clear its intention—through Military Information Support Operations (MISO)—to favorably shape the civilian consciousness of those who seek to burden America’s national interests as defined though America’s Instruments of National Power (DIMEFLIP). In short there are no other interests in the world except for those that favor the United States of America. And that is stated as plain as day in President Obama’s National Security Strategy of the USA, “The United States will protect its people and advance our prosperity irrespective of the actions of any other nation…”

What clearer statement of audacity or of Empire does one need? With this in mind, the Snowden revelations transmitted through The Guardian (UK), Der Spiegel (Germany) and El Globo (Brazil) do not nearly move to the level of shock and awe. With an informed knowledge of the relevant history, one would expect this activity from the Lord Protector of the United States Republic, President Obama.

The immediate threat, as it has been throughout Western history, to the status quo is how to prevent 85 percent of the public from realizing that their collective role amounts to little more than stage hands (voters, consumers) and stunt doubles (soldiers, intelligence operators) that allow the great actors (politicians, military leaders, academics, corporate bosses, legacy journalists) to flit across the global stage armed with the tools of egotistical of noblesse oblige to stop, or start, the next act in human suffering—maybe even one that may involve American lives. These individuals would become cannibals to maintain their respective positions of power. Do we not have enough to fix in the USA? Can we divert at least some small portion of the national security budget to American education, dying cities, hungry and homeless people? Can some of the corporate loopholes be closed?

Pat Buchanan of the very readable American Conservative put it best. “This is thus their [Egypt’s] problem, not ours, most Americans believe, and our influence is receding there, even as that of the British, French and Russians did before us. Let them work it out. Testifying to this truth is the tape of Secretary of State John Kerry inspecting his yacht off Nantucket as the Egyptian regime fell, and Obama, after a brief National Security Council conclave, heading off for the golf course on the July 4 weekend, then on to Camp David.”

Now What? THINK!!!

Assuming the United States national security apparatus can collect and analyze the thoughts, conversations, strategies and tactics of its own leaders/citizens, and nation states, transnational enterprises the world over, what are the implications for Western representative democracies (fragile prospects anyway)? With worldwide anti-austerity protests increasing each year, there is much for yacht owners like John Kerry to worry about. Controlling the citizen rabble by homogenizing them via uniformed dress, divining their thoughts–and potential revolts—and filling their minds with ideological or consumerist propaganda is something that Thomas More thought about long ago in his work Utopia.

Can Western corporate nation states, led by the American national security and money printing machinery, homogenize and reshape citizenry to adapt to a collective and individual life of austerity? As the nation state like the USA is stripped clean of any powers save those of national security and the servicing and protection of commerce, who or what center of gravity holds the States of the Union together? Is the US national and corporate machinery—with the assistance of media, academia and cultural leaders—now in a position to fit an American president with the mask of all seeing divine monarch?

And if the Americans have the dirt and thoughts on everyone in their own country (credit scores, medical procedures, party affiliation, sexual orientation, habits, travel) what is the point of the false dram of elections other than an elaborate charade? Does diplomacy matter anymore? With full spectrum knowledge attained by American’s, what is negotiation, treaty or summit other than a theatrical production? And what becomes of opinion and identity? Who is one really but what one consumes from what society, the “Other”, provides? Just where is that information floating in the electromagnetic spectrum coming from and why is it there?

Fomenting social tyranny in order to get “thinkers” to comply with the narrative of the moment becomes a simple task it seems. One can hear it: “Did you hear about that statement in the court room drama on CNN? Nope, did not. What’s wrong with you, don’t you watch TV? Did you at least see the article in the Post or the Times? Nope, did not. Then how can you know what you are talking about?”

So what could be done with a database that housed the lives of a generation of domestic and foreign citizens, say from age 18-56, and was analyzed some years hence using supercomputing machinery and software programs that would provide predictable pattern analysis for the control of an entire society? Match that treasure trove of information with oncoming revolutions in evolutionary psychology, genetic engineering and pharmaceuticals (on the latter see Insatiability by S. Witkiewicz and Murti-Bing pills) and the formula for the redesign of humanity, and the utopian dream of a managed society, will be realized. That development may be a necessity. The way the human species is destroying itself and the Earth there may likely be no other choice. Living on another planet in current evolutionary form is not an option. Perhaps the human animal is evolution’s idea of a joke.

But wait! This just in!

Sources report that a new American interstellar space probe known under the code name Lancelot Link Wind (LLW) will be launched in the hopes of defending the Earth from an alien invasion. The spacecraft with its dark matter propulsion system is designed like the black granite monolith in Stanley Kubrick’s movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Inside the monolith lives an aquatic resident cyber database known as Submariner Clapper (SC) and consists of a mix of video, audio, text, and pictures of six billion human beings collected over a ten year period. According to a member of the Beyond the Director of National Intelligence (BDNIC), “We recognize here at BDNIC that there is a chance that LLW [Lancelot Link Wind] may float around in space forever. It may not even make it out of the damn solar system! But we have our EIM {Earth in Mind] here. Do you remember that scene in 2001 when everyone is jumping around the monolith screaming and throwing bones in the air? Well, we figure that if an alien species finds LLW and activates the SC, and listens in, it’ll drive em *&^%#@! crazy and they’ll avoid this watering hole forever. After all, we have no greater mission than the protection of the American people and some other people too.”

John Stanton is a Virginia based writer. Reach him at cioran123@yahoo.com

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

The talk going around in Russia is that the government will be reimbursing for the financial loses during the collapse of the Soviet Union. I understand that some people were reimbursed in the past and now the chances are getting better that the rest will be at least somewhat financially better than before…

I understand that 345.5 billion Soviet Rubles were lost after the break-up of the Soviet system. Under the new situation in the works, 4 (four) Russian rubles would be given for every 1 (one) Soviet-era ruble lost.

Hmm…

Seems I remember that a USSR ruble was not that far off in price to the dollar. Like I remember seeing it at .9 to 1 several times. But I know that had to have been on the way to collapse, so probably about .5 to 1 at the time of Soviet collapse…

That means that Russians while are lucky to get some money back. It still does not make up the difference. After I figured out what it would mean to do a direct 1 to 1 payback. I can see why Russia can not do it! We are looking at 30 plus trillion rubles added to the bottom line and that would make a mess of everything…

So on the news the Ministry of Finance has sent a draft law to the Duma, where it requests to return Soviet – era savings by 2021. Or at least a facsimile of those savings…

I guess something is better than nothing and the money is a shot in the arm for all who get it…

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

I found the definition for stupid today. I mean real unadulterated stupidity. The kind of stupidity that only can be accomplished by a serious stupid brain fart. The serious kinda of stupid that is equated to governments. Stupidity that is so stupid that the government has forgotten how being stupid is really stupid in the first place. This is the stupid government that runs our country and that makes us stupid also…

WASHINGTON, July 9 (Xinhua) — The White House on Tuesday rejected a Russian claim that the Syrian rebels had used chemical weapons in their fighting against the government troops.

We all know that the terrorists in Syria used the western supplied chemical weapons against the people and are using the ignorant stupid west to permit the fact that they used chemical weapons and blame it on Syria, as a good thing…

I am stupid for allowing my stupid government to continue and since no one seems to see how stupid it is, then I guess I will rant to the wall and hope you see that the US government is stupid…

Unless it is just plain evil and that my friend is a whole other set of very serious issues…

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…

The Russian ambassador to the United Nations says that firsthand evidence shows that militants, and not the Syrian army, have manufactured sarin nerve gas and used it during an attack near the city of Aleppo in March.

On Tuesday, Ambassador ‪‎Vitaly‬ Churkin said that Russian experts collected samples at the site of the attack in the region of Khan al-Assal, where over two dozen people, including 16 Syrian troops, died on March 19.

The samples were examined at a laboratory in Russia which is certified by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), and the results of the analysis prove that a missile fired by the militants was filled with sarin, he stated.

“The results of the analysis clearly indicate that the ordnance used in Khan al-Assal was not industrially manufactured and was filled with sarin… The projectile involved is not a standard one for chemical use. Hexogen, utilized as an opening charge, is not utilized in standard ammunition. Therefore, there is every reason to believe that it was armed opposition fighters who used the chemical weapons in Khan al-Assal,” Churkin said.

He went on to say that he had also delivered the evidence to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

Britain, France, and the United States have accused the Syrian government of using chemical weapons. Damascus has denied the charges, saying it was actually the militants who used chemical weapons on several occasions.

On June 13, US Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes claimed in a White House statement that the Syrian government “has used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, on a small scale” against the foreign-backed militants “multiple times in the last year.”

In response, the Syrian Foreign Ministry said, “The White House published a statement full of lies about the use of chemical weapons in Syria, based on fabricated information, through which it is trying to hold the Syrian government responsible for such use.”

On June 15, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the materials collected by the Obama administration allegedly proving that Syrian troops used chemical weapons would not meet the requirements of the Hague-based OPCW.

The Syria crisis began in mid-March 2011. Many people, including large numbers of security personnel, have been killed in the violence, and several international human rights organizations say the foreign-sponsored militants have committed war crimes.

The Syrian government says the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country, and there are reports that a very large number of the militants are foreign nationals.

Post by Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…