Links 7/31/14

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1. TimM July 31, 2014 at 7:06 am

   >Why Does Google Employ a Pro-Slavery Lunatic?

   Who cares? She is a private citizen and should feel free to say whatever she wants without its becoming a PR event for her employer. She is participating in debate so write all the articles about her opinions you want but don’t frame them in terms like “why doesn’t her employer fire her for espousing these beliefs?” when those beliefs have nothing to do with her job.
2. banger July 31, 2014 at 8:01 am

   RE:The Media Ignores the CIA in Ukraine

   Let’s put it another way–the MSM and the CIA are very intimately intertwined. And this is logical. Why wouldn’t a secret unaccountable organization within government with a long history of nefarious projects try to run the most important political institution in the most powerful government in the world? Information/propaganda is a weapon which in today’s world outranks nuclear arms. It is the chief instrument of control of the U.S. population. Creating a completely and obviously false Narrative about the most critical issues we face today is a piece of political engineering that I believe outclasses anything I have seen in history. Even the MSM’s narrative on historical events half a century back that can be proven wrong in less than a minute stand as erect today as they ever did. And the miracle is, even if people are skeptical of the Narrative they act as if the Narrative were true because not doing so would make social interaction and daily life next to impossible. The CIA and its leading lights always had a wonderful concept of the intricacies of social engineering and mind-control. People will “believe” even things they know to be false in order to blend with society since human beings are more deeply social as neuro- and social-science have shown pretty conclusively.
   1. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 8:34 am

      Stop it. You’re going to break the Wurlitzer.
      1. Murky July 31, 2014 at 3:12 pm

         Yeah. Mainstreaming the CIA as the prime mover of political events in Ukraine is pretty much nuts. Ukraine’s political landscape has indigenous elements that can’t be ignored. These things include domination by oligarchs, systemic corruption of state officials, and money laundering operations. If Banger so desperately needs to tag the major evil Western influence in Ukraine, well then here it is, and it ain’t the CIA. It’s Western banking institutions and their great willingness to launder oligarch’s dirty money, that has been so very damaging to Ukraine’s economy and political system.

         The following article is a concise history of what has gone wrong in Ukraine since independence in 1991. The article’s title says it all, ‘Looting Ukraine: How East and West Teamed Up to Steal a Country’. Written and researched by Oliver Bullough, July 2014.

         http://www.li.com/docs/default-source/publications/ukraine_imr_a4_web.pdf
         1. Doug Terpstra July 31, 2014 at 5:26 pm

            There is such an enormous, incontrovertable record of CIA anti-democratic right wing intervention worldwide since WWII, that CIA meddling should be the default presumption in any coup anywhere a democratically-elected leader is deposed or murdered. The list of known countries targeted probably exceeds the exceptions:. A partial list: Syria (1949/2014), Iran, Guatemala, Tibet, Indonesia, Cuba, Congo, Iraq (1963), Dominican Republic, S Vietnam, Brazil, Ghana, Chile, Argentina, Afghanistan (1979), Turkey, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Haiti, Panama, Honduras, and others, including Iraq and Afghanistan again of course.

            The CIA is the president’s private army and the largest secret police force in world history. To assume it is not involved anywhere Great Game intrigue is afoot is profoundly naive. Absence of evidence is never evidence of absence where the CIA is concerned. It is mostly invisible, like an ill wind, an unholy spirit. You see only the wreckage in its wake.
            1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 6:28 pm

               “CIA meddling” – a fabulously ambiguous and imprecise term which covers everything from distributing a view leaflets to directly carrying out a violent assassination.
               1. Doug Terpstra July 31, 2014 at 7:36 pm

                  Yes, thanks, let’s be more explicit in the aforementioned countries and strictly limit activities to state terrorism, murder, and regime change. You may have confused the CIA with Mormons or Jehovah’s Witnesses. It’s a common mistake ;-)
            2. Murky July 31, 2014 at 7:45 pm

               Doug,

               You and Banger are stuck on this fantasy of CIA world domination. Well, just maybe a nation’s native institutions are not always so easily manipulated, subverted, or brought under control by foreign spies from abroad. If you had read the article I posted, you would understand just how oligarchs, not American spies, have political power in Ukraine. And you’d understand that no foreign intelligence agency on the planet has multiple billions in spare change that’d be required to buy off these oligarchs.

               What Carolinian wrote below fits here. Wall street has more control over the planet than does the CIA. In Ukraine it’s the same. It’s the oligarchs, not American spies, that have political power.

               No doubt there will be more rant about how the CIA has Borg-like control over all humanity. Yawn.
               1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 9:46 pm

                  @Murky. +1000. Further, it is preposterous to claim that “CIA meddling” is invariably on the anti-democracy side.
                  1. Doug Terpstra August 1, 2014 at 1:32 am

                     You say “invariably”; I didn’t, but coups are not democratic by definition, so… I guess your choice of words fits. Also none of the 20+ “regime changes” I referenced above were democratic or pro-democracy. All were anti-democratic. Please name some counter examples.
               2. Doug Terpstra August 1, 2014 at 1:21 am

                  Where did Banger or I write that the CIA dominates the world or that it is omnipotent? Refute my comment if you can, not your own ventriloquism.

                  Indeed Wall Street and AIPAC are trying to dominate the world, but just who do you suppose controls the CIA? All wars and coups are banksters wars. The CIA are their jackals, but when assassinations, covert ops, dirty wars and coups fail, then the military is engaged. Putin, not democracy, stopped the process in Syria; Ukraine is payback, and the CIA is mired in it. (Carolinian acknowledges this too; s/he questions only the meddling in US media)

                  You and FF should read Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins for an eye-opener on the process. It’s been done over and over for many decades, but few Americans are aware of it. Read what Tioxon wrote, Gaianne, and links and other book recommendations like Legacy of Ashes. The CIA is MUCH more than an “intelligence” agency; it’s a private army and the world’s largest secret police force. There is much more beneath the surface in the Great Game, the Grand Chessboard, than you’re aware of.
               3. legendary bigfoot August 1, 2014 at 4:41 am

                  The misapprehension you seem to have about “spies” is the key to your confusion here. We know that the agency is not simply an executive branch agency; it is a movement comprised of well educated Ivy League technocrats empowered to do anything necessary to further the goals of America. What is good for GM is what is good for America-the business of America is business. So the big business interests that fund the elections and sponsor the media have a paramilitary wing and a state department of their own. They have banks like BCCI and Nugen Hand, airlines like Air America and Evergreen, entree into the social and political circles of every country including our “enemies” (Manuchar Ghorbanifar, the Saudi Bush brother, Saddam Hussein at one time). The mafia is the other side of the coin of capital and empire-a high risk, high return lifestyle with fast ascents and descents.
                  It’s not like its a big secret-it is simply difficult to distinguish the scope of the connections. Rove wasn’t lying when he said his little bit about our empire. By the time we see what happens the next thing is already underway.
   2. James Levy July 31, 2014 at 8:35 am

      I have a question for you. I believe pretty strongly from the historical record that men like Bismarck and Palmerston knew the difference between the “narratives” they fed the public and what the lowdown really was. When and why does anyone think that gap closed, because for the life of me I think that Bush and Obama and most of the other clowns who have been running this place for quite some time have no conception that what they choose to believe and what is really happening are not identical, that rhetoric and reality dovetail. Is this because in a mass society you have to buy the delusions in order to sell them? Can they really think that they can boss Russia around, crap on it with sanctions and CIA covert ops, and even use military force to get them to “back down” (i.e. stop asserting their own national interest) without serious, perhaps globally devastating, consequences? Because they are certainly talking and acting that way. Where is Ike in 1956 when Hungary blew up? Where is even old man Bush stopping the invasion of Iraq in 1991 because he saw clearly what an invasion and occupation would bring? Where are the grown ups, because today’s elite seem to act like feckless, spoiled children who demand that reality bend to their whims.
      1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 4:10 pm

         @James Levy. You raise an excellent point which can be honed to a razor’s edge by comparing Bush Junior with Bush Senior. Although one hesitates to put Bush Senior in the same league as Bismarck and Palmerston, he still can be viewed as a competent statesman (constrained by the worldview of the Republican Party of his time, of course), whereas his son governed like a “feckless spoiled child” (as you say).

         How did this happen? Why wasn’t Bush Senior able to impart his (relatively) superior statesmanship qualities to his son? It seems part of the answer lies in why Bush Senior was unable to translate his policy successes into a second term, whereas his son, despite all of his policy failures, was able to get re-elected. Today’s public just doesn’t appreciate the old-school Republican WASP virtues, which Bush Senior still possessed to some extent. Seeing this, Bush Junior had to brand himself as a “born-again” Evangelical from Texas, who took pride in his lack of “book learning,” and adopted an extremely unsubtle and unsophisticated foreign policy (“you’re with us or against us” “we don’t negotiate with terrorists”) which satisfied his Evangelical base, as well as the neocon right and the Israeli Likud party operatives who infiltrated his Administration. But the broader issue is why this “style” resonates with enough of today’s voting public to result in a two-term Presidency.
         1. James Levy July 31, 2014 at 8:09 pm

            An excellent response. Thanks. But those Evangelicals were there for the Monkey Trial in the 1920s. They’ve been there since the Second Great Awakening. Why is it now that they have the ear of those in charge? The Democrats have been loath to mobilize lower-class constituencies for fear that they will then have to pay them off. How is it that the Republicans have mastered the art of mobilizing groups that were once marginal without having to cough up many concrete concessions, especially economic ones? It’s a very puzzling development.
            1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 9:54 pm

               Have you looked into Walter Dean Burnham’s research on voting patterns? I was shocked at how Jim Crow laws also prohibited a large percentage of whites from voting – sometimes up to 90%! Thus, one unremarked aspect of the 1964 Voting Rights Act was to allow these whites to start voting again (along with AAs, of course). One upshot of large numbers of heretofore excluded Southern whites starting to vote again, en masse, might be to make a candidate like Bush Junior more readily electable.
   3. skippy July 31, 2014 at 8:38 am

      “And the miracle is, even if people are skeptical of the Narrative they act as if the Narrative were true because not doing so would make social interaction and daily life next to impossible.” – Banger

      skippy…. Weaponizing one of our species most powerful instinctive drives… has to be more diabolical than even Dante could describe…
      1. Doug Terpstra July 31, 2014 at 1:05 pm

         Are we talking peer pressure or sex? Mind control has so many levers.
         1. skippy July 31, 2014 at 6:30 pm

            Gezzz Doug please don’t tell me the tide has gone out in your life, instigating such thoughts… snicker…

            I thought I was being inclusive of all the toys – full immersion – aka – creating – reality for humans rather than – discovering – reality.

            Skippy… I wonder if the singularity would choose to – believe things – just for a false sense of security….
   4. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 10:06 am

      So the world is being run by the CIA? It is true that some journalists were on the CIA payroll during cold war days. However you might supply some links or evidence that this is still true now, or that it is widespread.
      1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 10:57 am

         @Carolinian. I share your confusion. It seems that some of the NC Commentariat believe that the slightest breath of CIA “involvement” in some event that occurs in a foreign country is enough to confer CIA “sponsorship” to said event. The Counterpunch article linked to above is sadly typical of this line of thinking.

         By similar logic the entire American Revolution should be understood as the outworkings of a plot hatched by the French Duc de Choiseul. After all, there was plenty of French “involvement” with the American rebels – in the form of arms, munitions and supplies – even before France officially committed its troops near the end. Everything we’ve read about the American rebels being motivated by the desire to rid themselves of British oppression is actually propaganda manufactured by France’s “deep state.”
         1. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 11:15 am

            I’m sure the CIA is involved in Ukraine. Brennan keeps showing up, saying that he just happened to be in the neighborhood. My point was that any assertion that the CIA is running a mind control op in this country needs some evidence.
         2. Generalfeldmarschall von Hindenburg July 31, 2014 at 11:28 am

            In a way that’s true. But don’t forget the Freemasonic movement and the Hellfire Club. The CIA doesn’t “run the world” but sociopaths and authoritarian paranoiacs inside it use it as a vehicle for their own schemery.

            Elite groups meddle in everything, always looking for levers to maximize power and self aggrandizement and to bring absurd political ideologies to life. It happens in the office you work in. You think it doesn’t happen at the top levels of state machinery?
         3. Banger July 31, 2014 at 12:45 pm

            Ok then what exactly is the combat/covert op part of the CIA for then? Do you know the history of CIA operations? Obviously not. The official Narrative works for you ok, I get it. I have done my due diligence over many decades and slowly evolved to what I know to be true–this is not some psychotic paranoid delusion.

            Your example is, frankly, absurd. First those who critique us deep politics types always say “well then you think everything is a plot” is pathetic. How is that an argument? That’s just a taunt and doesn’t deserve an answer.
            1. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 1:14 pm

               I know a lot more about the CIA than you seem to think I do. I’m responding to your opening claim.

               “Let’s put it another way–the MSM and the CIA are very intimately intertwined.”

               Evidence?

               As for who runs the world, my choice would be Wall Street. You can argue that the CIA is their instrument and you can certainly see the hidden hand of some sort of US involvement in places like Venezuela and Ukraine–both of considerable interest to the financial moguls. Still I doubt the media are ignoring any CIA involvement in Ukraine because they are on the CIA payroll. As Vidal said, the elites don’t need to conspire…they have a shared interest. Reporters take their orders and cues from newspaper owners.
               1. psychohistorian July 31, 2014 at 2:06 pm

                  So, who owns Wall Street?

                  I think our government is “owned” by the same people that own Wall Street……(the Western world financial system) And they get the CIA information before the government leaders do……wouldn’t you?
               2. different clue July 31, 2014 at 9:12 pm

                  R. Buckminster Fuller believed a version of that. He used to say that “C I A” stood for ” Capitalism’s Invisible Army”.
            2. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 2:02 pm

               OK, I’ll bite. What’s your methodology for distinguishing outcomes that are the result of “plots” from those that are not? Because that’s where I see these threads veer, all the time. (I like the tribalism of “us deep politics types.” Just… Yikes.)
               1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 2:15 pm

                  Exactly! Methodology is key here.
               2. Banger July 31, 2014 at 5:27 pm

                  That’s pathetic Lambert. Come on, blaming me for tribalism when the mainstream including most of the left ignores deep politics and won’t review or read books that prove various events qualify to be looked at under the “deep” designation. I challenged you before on the LA Coroner’s Report on the RFK assassination that, essentially absolves Sirhan–you did not respond and are unlikely to because such things are just too “insane” yet there it is.

                  So if I’m right and Noguchi is right then Sirhan is innocent of the killing of RFK so doesn’t that mean something? I’m using that as an example–there are thousands of pieces of evidence that contradict the official Narrative about but they are unlikely to be looked at or debated so naturally those of us who come to different conclusions feel ostracized rather than engaged in healthy debate.
            3. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 2:26 pm

               @Banger. You’re oversimplifying my position. I do not swallow the “official Narrative” hook line and sinker. I often read your comments and appreciate your perspective. But my example of France’s involvement in the American Revolution is not absurd. I’m genuinely curious how you would distinguish: (i) France’s clandestine and subversive activities in America prior to its Revolution (prior to the time when it sent troops); from (ii) America’s clandestine and subversive activities in Chile prior to 1973. If we say (a la Chomsky) that the CIA “overthrew” Allende, or that the US Gov’t “put” Pinochet in power, then shouldn’t we also say that France “overthrew” Britain’s colonial government, or “caused” the American Revolution? If we do say that, doesn’t it suggest that our methodology is giving far too much weight to the foreign government’s subversive activities, and far too little to the local population’s beliefs and attitudes? Are people like George Washington and John Adams just mindless zombies whose actions can be directed by a large infusion of foreign cash? At what point to a foreign government’s subversive activities rise to the level appropriate to be described as the main, or (even) sole “cause” of what takes place in another country?
               1. hunkerdown July 31, 2014 at 4:42 pm

                  Perhaps not George and John, but Alexander Hamilton was the Bob Rubin of his time.
               2. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 4:47 pm

                  In other words, how “deep” is “deep,” and is that even an interesting or useful concept?
                  1. different clue July 31, 2014 at 9:15 pm

                     Bloggers like Sibel Edmonds and Jeff Wells (at Rigorous Intuition 2.0) and other such might have useful contributions to a discussion about that. Not to say that Shallow Politics is any less important. Many things happen in shallow water. Lake Okechobee is a shallow lake and many things live there and happen there.
               3. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 6:29 pm

                  For starters, Benjamin Franklin was an honored, active, very high member of Les Neuf Soeurs, with all that this implies. He followed the rules to “join or die” and act accordingly, as did many other founders of the Republic. Behind closed doors he likely whispered: “I do what I’m told” as Christine Lagarde declared openly in her January 2014 speech before the National Press Club audience.
            4. Gaianne July 31, 2014 at 5:55 pm

               Thanks Banger. I usually appreciate you comments, and I certainly do this time.

               Care is needed though. People need to believe what they were taught in high school civics class and will reject both mathematics and physics rather than acknowledge evidence pointing toward the Deep State.

               To the point at hand: The Deep State may try to control everything (it seems to try) but certainly it does not. What does it control? When you set about to answer that and connect the dots you end up in a very fuzzy world, where a few things are certain, some things are likely, and a lot of things are possible but unsure. Navigating that fuzzy world requires more subtlety than most people are willing to allow in their everyday black-and-white thinking. Also more care for truth and accuracy than most people can muster.

               The Deep State is happy for you to believe your high school civics, but when that breaks down for you you can end up in an arduous journey of personal work. The realization that most of what you believe to be true is in fact mere fabricated, clumsy lie is alarming, and the ensuing search for what is true is not easy.

               Care is needed at every step of the way. It is essential to avoid black-and-white thinking, and for several reasons. First, the opposite of a lie is not the truth. Secondly, a well crafted lie will be designed so that its opposite also serves the purposes of deception. (It is almost as useful to the CIA for you to think that it is all-powerful as to think that it engages in no wrongdoing.) Thirdly, sometimes dots that look connected turn out not to be, and it takes time and patience to both entertain the possibility, and then decline the connection in the light of further evidence.

               To return to specifics: Does the Deep State control the US media? The answer is obviously yes. This has been shown many times, but most recently with the crash of the Malaysian Airliner in Ukraine/Novorossiya. As of this writing, the airline definitely seems to have been shot down (rather than crashing from accidental mechanical failure) but exactly how and by whom has not yet been established. Despite this, the US media from the first hours blamed the crash on Russia and Novorossiya. It did this without citing evidence, and with a complete uniformity of voice. Unity of voice is good from the standpoint of propaganda, but is never a sign of truthful reporting. But the true peculiarity of the episode shows when you look outside the US to see correspondents still asking the old journalistic questions of Who? What? When? Where? and Why? The absence of these questions in the American media shows that it no longer has and informational function. It has a disinformational function.

               The argument I have made is about the overall shape of circumstances. I see some people have dredge up specific old examples of the CIA fixing the news. Which is a different kind of evidence and very good. Which is to say that are many lines of argument and approaches to inquiry that lead to this same conclusion. The CIA is not the only important entity comprising the Deep State, of course.

               The key point is that–although the Deep State does not control everything–it is a higher level of government than the US Congress, President, and Supreme Court.

               And it operates in secret.

               –Gaianne
               1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 6:33 pm

                  Quite true, and most people cannot begin to tolerate the shock and despair of knowing. “To know is to suffer” said a prophet millennia ago. It’s a safe bet that most Americans will not suffer pain and grief voluntarily, much less tolerate it so that is ceases to become incapacitating. Banger proves his tolerance of this “human condition” admirably.
               2. different clue July 31, 2014 at 9:19 pm

                  There are lots of little media which are free to operate without Deep State Control. They may all be under tight scrutiny and may be targeted if they start influencing “too many people”. But if the number of “too many people” using these little media rose too fast for the Overt and Covert apparatchiks of control to
                  keep up, then these “suddenly-not-so-little” media could spark all kinds of passive rebellion, uncivil obedience, etc.; among large chunks of population.

                  What if a million people read NaCap, for instance? What if a million people subscribed to Acres USA?
         4. Ed July 31, 2014 at 1:44 pm

            The funny thing about this comment is that the role of Hortalez & Co, the degree of French influence on American policy, and the degree that the war turned into a straightforward struggle between the British and the French and the Spanish as the war went on, is greatly downplayed in American history books. The degree to which the French were supporting the rebels was also kept concealed from the public in the initial years. And the “British oppression” aspect is propeganda.
            1. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 2:06 pm

               @Ed. I am aware of what you describe, and agree that these elements are downplayed in most American history books. But even after we adjust the “mainstream” American narrative of the Revolution to account for these subversive elements and foreign agents of intrigue, it would still be incorrect to flatly state that the American Revolution was “caused” by France, or Hortalez @Co, etc. At most, these are only minor links in the causal chain. The same point holds when assessing the CIA’s involvement in non-U.S. affairs. Too often, people like Chomsky or Peter Dale Scott give way too much credit to the CIA’s role in foreign affairs, such that virtually any event in any country is said to be “caused” by the CIA. It’s absurd. A more subtle and refined approach is called for.
               1. Ed July 31, 2014 at 2:16 pm

                  Fair enough, you can use the term “facilitated”.

                  Most of the conquistadors’ armies in Mexico and Peru were made up of Indians. But we still speak of the Spanish conquest of Mexico and Peru, even though what happened on the ground was more like intervening in a civil war.
               2. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 6:39 pm

                  Tom Perkins makes plain the brutality of the CIA’s deeds for “banking” and “business”.
         5. Paul Tioxon July 31, 2014 at 2:56 pm

            Why CIA Director Brennan Visited Kiev: In Ukraine The Covert War Has Begun
            Forbes Magazine April 2014

            Ukraine is on the brink of civil war, Vladimir Putin has said, and he should know because the country is already in the midst of a covert intelligence war. Over the weekend, CIA director John Brennan travelled to Kiev, nobody knows exactly why, but some speculate that he intends to open US intelligence resources to Ukrainian leaders about real-time Russian military maneuvers. The US has, thus far, refrained from sharing such knowledge because Moscow is believed to have penetrated much of Ukraine’s communications systems – and Washington isn’t about to hand over its surveillance secrets to the Russians.

            If you have any doubts that the battle is raging on the ‘covert ops’ front just consider today’s events in Pcholkino where Ukrainian soldiers from the 25th Airborn Division handed over their weapons and APC’s to pro-Russian militiamen and pretty much surrendered. The Ukrainian commander was quoted as saying “they’ve captured us and are using dirty tricks”. This is the kind of morale-busting incident that can spread quickly. It doesn’t happen spontaneously and it often begins with mixed messages, literally – messages purporting to come from the chain of command but actually originate from the enemy’s dirty tricks department.

            http://www.forbes.com/sites/melikkaylan/2014/04/16/why-cia-director-brennan-visited-kiev-in-ukraine-the-covert-war-has-begun/
      2. Ken Nari July 31, 2014 at 11:48 am

         Well, lets start near the beginning, and go forward. You might begin in 1924, when Hoover took over the BOI and set up a domestic spy agency answerable to no one that would show how to build an organization that could conduct illegal undercover operations both domestic and abroad.

         Read any recent biography of Hoover, maybe Medsger’s, Summer’s or Gentry’s.

         Then read the Seagrave’s “Gold Warriors.” Even if 1/10th is true, that’s enough. Then read “The Politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia.” After that “The Brothers” by Kinzer (about the Dulles boys) and a book or two by H. Bruce Franklin, and a few more by Paul Dale Scott. Chalmer Johnson’s writing is all good too. Then Sutton’s “America’s Secret Establishment.” You don’t need to read all of Hugh Thomas’ monumental history of Cuba — just start around p. 1,370 to get a good picture of The CIA’s bonding with organized crime. John Gibler’s “Mexico Unconquered” and “To Die in Mexico” are good for understanding the drug wars and where off-the-books money comes from. Also Jefferson Morley’s “Our Man in Mexico.” James Douglass is alway good too.

         I’d probably Wiki “Operation Gladio” “Iran-Contra Affair” and “False Flag.” You could Google Philip Marshall and “The Big Bamboozle” to see if that interests you, and also see Richard Clarke’s take on Michael Hastings’ death.

         I could go on, but why? You’re probably just going to say, as Banger expects, that while you know all this is true, you just don’t believe it.
         1. Ken Nari July 31, 2014 at 11:50 am

            My reply was meant to be to Carolinian’s “So the world is being run by the CIA?”
            1. Gaianne July 31, 2014 at 6:03 pm

               OMG! Your last paragraph (about Carolinian) was spot on!

               At some point you just have to laugh!

               –Gaianne
         2. Generalfeldmarschall von Hindenburg July 31, 2014 at 12:09 pm

            That’s Peter Dale Scott. And thanks for the reading list.
         3. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 12:51 pm

            Like, so what? Still waiting on evidence that the CIA is running a mind control op in this country in the here and now.
            1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 2:00 pm

               Oh, no. No. Another hairball.
            2. Paul Tioxon July 31, 2014 at 3:03 pm

               After leaving The Washington Post in 1977, Carl Bernstein spent six months looking at the relationship of the CIA and the press during the Cold War years. His 25,000-word cover story, published in Rolling Stone on October 20, 1977, is reprinted below.

               THE CIA AND THE MEDIA

               How Americas Most Powerful News Media Worked Hand in Glove with the Central Intelligence Agency and Why the Church Committee Covered It Up

               BY CARL BERNSTEIN

               In 1953, Joseph Alsop, then one of America’s leading syndicated columnists, went to the Philippines to cover an election. He did not go because he was asked to do so by his syndicate. He did not go because he was asked to do so by the newspapers that printed his column. He went at the request of the CIA.

               Alsop is one of more than 400 American journalists who in the past twenty‑five years have secretly carried out assignments for the Central Intelligence Agency, according to documents on file at CIA headquarters. Some of these journalists’ relationships with the Agency were tacit; some were explicit. There was cooperation, accommodation and overlap. Journalists provided a full range of clandestine services—from simple intelligence gathering to serving as go‑betweens with spies in Communist countries. Reporters shared their notebooks with the CIA. Editors shared their staffs. Some of the journalists were Pulitzer Prize winners, distinguished reporters who considered themselves ambassadors without‑portfolio for their country. Most were less exalted: foreign correspondents who found that their association with the Agency helped their work; stringers and freelancers who were as interested in the derring‑do of the spy business as in filing articles; and, the smallest category, full‑time CIA employees masquerading as journalists abroad. In many instances, CIA documents show, journalists were engaged to perform tasks for the CIA with the consent of the managements of America’s leading news organizations.

               WORKING PRESS — CIA STYLE

               To understand the role of most journalist‑operatives, it is necessary to dismiss some myths about undercover work for American intelligence services. Few American agents are “spies” in the popularly accepted sense of the term. “Spying” — the acquisition of secrets from a foreign government—is almost always done by foreign nationals who have been recruited by the CIA and are under CIA control in their own countries. Thus the primary role of an American working undercover abroad is often to aid in the recruitment and “handling” of foreign nationals who are channels of secret information reaching American intelligence.

               Many journalists were used by the CIA to assist in this process and they had the reputation of being among the best in the business. The peculiar nature of the job of the foreign correspondent is ideal for such work: he is accorded unusual access by his host country, permitted to travel in areas often off‑limits to other Americans, spends much of his time cultivating sources in governments, academic institutions, the military establishment and the scientific communities. He has the opportunity to form long‑term personal relationships with sources and—perhaps more than any other category of American operative—is in a position to make correct judgments about the susceptibility and availability of foreign nationals for recruitment as spies.

               “After a foreigner is recruited, a case officer often has to stay in the background,” explained a CIA official. “So you use a journalist to carry messages to and from both parties”

               Journalists in the field generally took their assignments in the same manner as any other undercover operative. If, for instance, a journalist was based in Austria, he ordinarily would be under the general direction of the Vienna station chief and report to a case officer. Some, particularly roving correspondents or U.S.‑based reporters who made frequent trips abroad, reported directly to CIA officials in Langley, Virginia.

               The tasks they performed sometimes consisted of little more than serving as “eyes and ears” for the CIA; reporting on what they had seen or overheard in an Eastern European factory, at a diplomatic reception in Bonn, on the perimeter of a military base in Portugal. On other occasions, their assignments were more complex: planting subtly concocted pieces of misinformation; hosting parties or receptions designed to bring together American agents and foreign spies; serving up “black” propaganda to leading foreign journalists at lunch or dinner; providing their hotel rooms or bureau offices as “drops” for highly sensitive information moving to and from foreign agents; conveying instructions and dollars to CIA controlled members of foreign governments.

               Often the CIA’s relationship with a journalist might begin informally with a lunch, a drink, a casual exchange of information. An Agency official might then offer a favor—for example, a trip to a country difficult to reach; in return, he would seek nothing more than the opportunity to debrief the reporter afterward. A few more lunches, a few more favors, and only then might there be a mention of a formal arrangement — “That came later,” said a CIA official, “after you had the journalist on a string.”

               Another official described a typical example of the way accredited journalists (either paid or unpaid by the CIA) might be used by the Agency: “In return for our giving them information, we’d ask them to do things that fit their roles as journalists but that they wouldn’t have thought of unless we put it in their minds. For instance, a reporter in Vienna would say to our man, ‘I met an interesting second secretary at the Czech Embassy.’ We’d say, ‘Can you get to know him? And after you get to know him, can you assess him? And then, can you put him in touch with us—would you mind us using your apartment?”‘

               Formal recruitment of reporters was generally handled at high levels—after the journalist had undergone a thorough background check. The actual approach might even be made by a deputy director or division chief. On some occasions, no discussion would he entered into until the journalist had signed a pledge of secrecy.

               “The secrecy agreement was the sort of ritual that got you into the tabernacle,” said a former assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence. “After that you had to play by the rules.” David Attlee Phillips, former Western Hemisphere chief of clandestine services and a former journalist himself, estimated in an interview that at least 200 journalists signed secrecy agreements or employment contracts with the Agency in the past twenty‑five years. Phillips, who owned a small English‑language newspaper in Santiago, Chile, when he was recruited by the CIA in 1950, described the approach: “Somebody from the Agency says, ‘I want you to help me. 1 know you are a true‑blue American, but I want you to sign a piece of paper before I tell you what it’s about.’ I didn’t hesitate to sign, and a lot of newsmen didn’t hesitate over the next twenty years.”

               “One of the things we always had going for us in terms of enticing reporters,” observed a CIA official who coordinated some of the arrangements with journalists, “was that we could make them look better with their home offices. A foreign correspondent with ties to the Company [the CIA] stood a much better chance than his competitors of getting the good stories.”

               Within the CIA, journalist‑operatives were accorded elite status, a consequence of the common experience journalists shared with high‑level CIA officials. Many had gone to the same schools as their CIA handlers, moved in the same circles, shared fashionably liberal, anti‑Communist political values, and were part of the same “old boy” network that constituted something of an establishment elite in the media, politics and academia of postwar America. The most valued of these lent themselves for reasons of national service, not money.

               The Agency’s use of journalists in undercover operations has been most extensive in Western Europe (“That was the big focus, where the threat was,” said one CIA official), Latin America and the Far East. In the 1950s and 1960s journalists were used as intermediaries—spotting, paying, passing instructions—to members of the Christian Democratic party in Italy and the Social Democrats in Germany, both of which covertly received millions of dollars from the CIA. During those years “we had journalists all over Berlin and Vienna just to keep track of who the hell was coming in from the East and what they were up to,” explained a CIA official.

               In the Sixties, reporters were used extensively in the CIA offensive against Salvador Allende in Chile; they provided funds to Allende’s opponents and wrote anti‑Allende propaganda for CIA proprietary publications that were distributed in Chile. (CIA officials insist that they make no attempt to influence the content of American newspapers, but some fallout is inevitable: during the Chilean offensive, CIA‑generated black propaganda transmitted on the wire service out of Santiago often turned up in American publications.)

               According to CIA officials, the Agency has been particularly sparing in its use of journalist agents in Eastern Europe on grounds that exposure might result in diplomatic sanctions against the United States or in permanent prohibitions against American correspondents serving in some countries. The same officials claim that their use of journalists in the Soviet Union has been even more limited, but they remain extremely guarded in discussing the subject. They are insistent, however, in maintaining that the Moscow correspondents of major news organizations have not been “tasked” or controlled by the Agency.

               The Soviets, according to CIA officials, have consistently raised false charges of CIA affiliation against individual American reporters as part of a continuing diplomatic game that often follows the ups and downs of Soviet‑American relations. The latest such charge by the Russians—against Christopher Wren of the New York Times and Alfred Friendly Jr., formerly of Newsweek, has no basis in fact, they insist.

               CIA officials acknowledge, however, that such charges will persist as long as the CIA continues to use journalistic cover and maintain covert affiliations with individuals in the profession. But even an absolute prohibition against Agency use of journalists would not free reporters from suspicion, according to many Agency officials. “Look at the Peace Corps,” said one source. “We have had no affiliation there and they [foreign governments] still throw them out”

               The history of the CIA’s involvement with the American press continues to be shrouded by an official policy of obfuscation and deception for the following principal reasons:

               ■ The use of journalists has been among the most productive means of intelligence‑gathering employed by the CIA. Although the Agency has cut back sharply on the use of reporters since 1973 primarily as a result of pressure from the media), some journalist‑operatives are still posted abroad.

               ■ Further investigation into the matter, CIA officials say, would inevitably reveal a series of embarrassing relationships in the 1950s and 1960s with some of the most powerful organizations and individuals in American journalism.

               Among the executives who lent their cooperation to the Agency were Williarn Paley of the Columbia Broadcasting System, Henry Luce of Tirne Inc., Arthur Hays Sulzberger of the New York Times, Barry Bingham Sr. of the LouisviIle Courier‑Journal, and James Copley of the Copley News Service. Other organizations which cooperated with the CIA include the American Broadcasting Company, the National Broadcasting Company, the Associated Press, United Press International, Reuters, Hearst Newspapers, Scripps‑Howard, Newsweek magazine, the Mutual Broadcasting System, the Miami Herald and the old Saturday Evening Post and New York Herald‑Tribune.

               By far the most valuable of these associations, according to CIA officials, have been with the New York Times, CBS and Time Inc.

               The CIA’s use of the American news media has been much more extensive than Agency officials have acknowledged publicly or in closed sessions with members of Congress. The general outlines of what happened are indisputable; the specifics are harder to come by. CIA sources hint that a particular journalist was trafficking all over Eastern Europe for the Agency; the journalist says no, he just had lunch with the station chief. CIA sources say flatly that a well‑known ABC correspondent worked for the Agency through 1973; they refuse to identify him. A high‑level CIA official with a prodigious memory says that the New York Times provided cover for about ten CIA operatives between 1950 and 1966; he does not know who they were, or who in the newspaper’s management made the arrangements.

               The Agency’s special relationships with the so‑called “majors” in publishing and broadcasting enabled the CIA to post some of its most valuable operatives abroad without exposure for more than two decades. In most instances, Agency files show, officials at the highest levels of the CIA usually director or deputy director) dealt personally with a single designated individual in the top management of the cooperating news organization. The aid furnished often took two forms: providing jobs and credentials “journalistic cover” in Agency parlance) for CIA operatives about to be posted in foreign capitals; and lending the Agency the undercover services of reporters already on staff, including some of the best‑known correspondents in the business.

               In the field, journalists were used to help recruit and handle foreigners as agents; to acquire and evaluate information, and to plant false information with officials of foreign governments. Many signed secrecy agreements, pledging never to divulge anything about their dealings with the Agency; some signed employment contracts., some were assigned case officers and treated with. unusual deference. Others had less structured relationships with the Agency, even though they performed similar tasks: they were briefed by CIA personnel before trips abroad, debriefed afterward, and used as intermediaries with foreign agents. Appropriately, the CIA uses the term “reporting” to describe much of what cooperating journalists did for the Agency. “We would ask them, ‘Will you do us a favor?’”.said a senior CIA official. “‘We understand you’re going to be in Yugoslavia. Have they paved all the streets? Where did you see planes? Were there any signs of military presence? How many Soviets did you see? If you happen to meet a Soviet, get his name and spell it right …. Can you set up a meeting for is? Or relay a message?’” Many CIA officials regarded these helpful journalists as operatives; the journalists tended to see themselves as trusted friends of the Agency who performed occasional favors—usually without pay—in the national interest.

               “I’m proud they asked me and proud to have done it,” said Joseph Alsop who, like his late brother, columnist Stewart Alsop, undertook clandestine tasks for the Agency. “The notion that a newspaperman doesn’t have a duty to his country is perfect balls.”

               From the Agency’s perspective, there is nothing untoward in such relationships, and any ethical questions are a matter for the journalistic profession to resolve, not the intelligence community. As Stuart Loory, former Los Angeles Times correspondent, has written in the Columbia Journalism Review: ‘If even one American overseas carrying a press card is a paid informer for the CIA, then all Americans with those credentials are suspect …. If the crisis of confidence faced by the news business—along with the government—is to be overcome, journalists must be willing to focus on themselves the same spotlight they so relentlessly train on others!’ But as Loory also noted: “When it was reported… that newsmen themselves were on the payroll of the CIA, the story caused a brief stir, and then was dropped.”

               During the 1976 investigation of the CIA by the Senate Intelligence Committee, chaired by Senator Frank Church, the dimensions of the Agency’s involvement with the press became apparent to several members of the panel, as well as to two or three investigators on the staff. But top officials of the CIA, including former directors William Colby and George Bush, persuaded the committee to restrict its inquiry into the matter and to deliberately misrepresent the actual scope of the activities in its final report. The multivolurne report contains nine pages in which the use of journalists is discussed in deliberately vague and sometimes misleading terms. It makes no mention of the actual number of journalists who undertook covert tasks for the CIA. Nor does it adequately describe the role played by newspaper and broadcast executives in cooperating with the Agency.

               THE AGENCY’S DEALINGS WITH THE PRESS BEGAN during the earliest stages of the Cold War. Allen Dulles, who became director of the CIA in 1953, sought to establish a recruiting‑and‑cover capability within America’s most prestigious journalistic institutions. By operating under the guise of accredited news correspondents, Dulles believed, CIA operatives abroad would be accorded a degree of access and freedom of movement unobtainable under almost any other type of cover.

               American publishers, like so many other corporate and institutional leaders at the time, were willing to commit the resources of their companies to the struggle against “global Communism.” Accordingly, the traditional line separating the American press corps and government was often indistinguishable: rarely was a news agency used to provide cover for CIA operatives abroad without the knowledge and consent of either its principal owner, publisher or senior editor. Thus, contrary to the notion that the CIA insidiously infiltrated the journalistic community, there is ample evidence that America’s leading publishers and news executives allowed themselves and their organizations to become handmaidens to the intelligence services. “Let’s not pick on some poor reporters, for God’s sake,” William Colby exclaimed at one point to the Church committee’s investigators. “Let’s go to the managements. They were witting.” In all, about twenty‑five news organizations including those listed at the beginning of this article) provided cover for the Agency.

               In addition to cover capability, Dulles initiated a “debriefing” procedure under which American correspondents returning from abroad routinely emptied their notebooks and offered their impressions to Agency personnel. Such arrangements, continued by Dulles’ successors, to the present day, were made with literally dozens of news organizations. In the 1950s, it was not uncommon for returning reporters to be met at the ship by CIA officers. “There would be these guys from the CIA flashing ID cards and looking like they belonged at the Yale Club,” said Hugh Morrow, a former Saturday Evening Post correspondent who is now press secretary to former vice‑president Nelson Rockefeller. “It got to be so routine that you felt a little miffed if you weren’t asked.”

               CIA officials almost always refuse to divulge the names of journalists who have cooperated with the Agency. They say it would be unfair to judge these individuals in a context different from the one that spawned the relationships in the first place. “There was a time when it wasn’t considered a crime to serve your government,” said one high‑level CIA official who makes no secret of his bitterness. “This all has to be considered in the context of the morality of the times, rather than against latter‑day standards—and hypocritical standards at that.”

               Many journalists who covered World War II were close to people in the Office of Strategic Services, the wartime predecessor of the CIA; more important, they were all on the same side. When the war ended and many OSS officials went into the CIA, it was only natural that these relationships would continue. Meanwhile, the first postwar generation of journalists entered the profession; they shared the same political and professional values as their mentors. “You had a gang of people who worked together during World War II and never got over it,” said one Agency official. “They were genuinely motivated and highly susceptible to intrigue and being on the inside. Then in the Fifties and Sixties there was a national consensus about a national threat. The Vietnam War tore everything to pieces—shredded the consensus and threw it in the air.” Another Agency official observed: “Many journalists didn’t give a second thought to associating with the Agency. But there was a point when the ethical issues which most people had submerged finally surfaced. Today, a lot of these guys vehemently deny that they had any relationship with the Agency.”

               From the outset, the use of journalists was among the CIA’s most sensitive undertakings, with full knowledge restricted to the Director of Central Intelligence and a few of his chosen deputies. Dulles and his successors were fearful of what would happen if a journalist‑operative’s cover was blown, or if details of the Agency’s dealings with the press otherwise became public. As a result, contacts with the heads of news organizations were normally initiated by Dulles and succeeding Directors of Central Intelligence; by the deputy directors and division chiefs in charge of covert operations—Frank Wisner, Cord Meyer Jr., Richard Bissell, Desmond FitzGerald, Tracy Barnes, Thomas Karamessines and Richard Helms himself a former UPI correspondent); and, occasionally, by others in the CIA hierarchy known to have an unusually close social relationship with a particular publisher or broadcast executive.1

               James Angleton, who was recently removed as the Agency’s head of counterintelligence operations, ran a completely independent group of journalist‑operatives who performed sensitive and frequently dangerous assignments; little is known about this group for the simple reason that Angleton deliberately kept only the vaguest of files.

               The CIA even ran a formal training program in the 1950s to teach its agents to be journalists. Intelligence officers were “taught to make noises like reporters,” explained a high CIA official, and were then placed in major news organizations with help from management. “These were the guys who went through the ranks and were told ‘You’re going to he a journalist,’” the CIA official said. Relatively few of the 400‑some relationships described in Agency files followed that pattern, however; most involved persons who were already bona fide journalists when they began undertaking tasks for the Agency.

               The Agency’s relationships with journalists, as described in CIA files, include the following general categories:

               ■ Legitimate, accredited staff members of news organizations—usually reporters. Some were paid; some worked for the Agency on a purely voluntary basis. This group includes many of the best‑known journalists who carried out tasks for the CIA. The files show that the salaries paid to reporters by newspaper and broadcast networks were sometimes supplemented by nominal payments from the CIA, either in the form of retainers, travel expenses or outlays for specific services performed. Almost all the payments were made in cash. The accredited category also includes photographers, administrative personnel of foreign news bureaus and members of broadcast technical crews.)

               Two of the Agency’s most valuable personal relationships in the 1960s, according to CIA officials, were with reporters who covered Latin America—Jerry O’Leary of the Washington Star and Hal Hendrix of the Miami News, a Pulitzer Prize winner who became a high official of the International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation. Hendrix was extremely helpful to the Agency in providing information about individuals in Miami’s Cuban exile community. O’Leary was considered a valued asset in Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Agency files contain lengthy reports of both men’s activities on behalf of the CIA.

               O’Leary maintains that his dealings were limited to the normal give‑and‑take that goes on between reporters abroad and their sources. CIA officials dispute the contention: “There’s no question Jerry reported for us,” said one. “Jerry did assessing and spotting [of prospective agents] but he was better as a reporter for us.” Referring to O’Leary’s denials, the official added: “I don’t know what in the world he’s worried about unless he’s wearing that mantle of integrity the Senate put on you journalists.”

               O’Leary attributes the difference of opinion to semantics. “I might call them up and say something like, ‘Papa Doc has the clap, did you know that?’ and they’d put it in the file. I don’t consider that reporting for them…. it’s useful to be friendly to them and, generally, I felt friendly to them. But I think they were more helpful to me than I was to them.” O’Leary took particular exception to being described in the same context as Hendrix. “Hal was really doing work for them,” said O’Leary. “I’m still with the Star. He ended up at ITT.” Hendrix could not be reached for comment. According to Agency officials, neither Hendrix nor O’Leary was paid by the CIA.

               ■ Stringers2 and freelancers. Most were payrolled by the Agency under standard contractual terms. Their journalistic credentials were often supplied by cooperating news organizations. some filed news stories; others reported only for the CIA. On some occasions, news organizations were not informed by the CIA that their stringers were also working for the Agency.

               ■ Employees of so‑called CIA “proprietaries.” During the past twenty‑five years, the Agency has secretly bankrolled numerous foreign press services, periodicals and newspapers—both English and foreign language—which provided excellent cover for CIA operatives. One such publication was the Rome Daily American, forty percent of which was owned by the CIA until the 1970s. The Daily American went out of business this year,

               ■ Editors, publishers and broadcast network executives. The CIAs relationship with most news executives differed fundamentally from those with working reporters and stringers, who were much more subject to direction from the Agency. A few executives—Arthur Hays Sulzberger of the New York Times among them—signed secrecy agreements. But such formal understandings were rare: relationships between Agency officials and media executives were usually social—”The P and Q Street axis in Georgetown,” said one source. “You don’t tell Wilharn Paley to sign a piece of paper saying he won’t fink.”

               ■ Columnists and commentators. There are perhaps a dozen well known columnists and broadcast commentators whose relationships with the CIA go far beyond those normally maintained between reporters and their sources. They are referred to at the Agency as “known assets” and can be counted on to perform a variety of undercover tasks; they are considered receptive to the Agency’s point of view on various subjects. Three of the most widely read columnists who maintained such ties with the Agency are C.L. Sulzberger of the New York Times, Joseph Alsop, and the late Stewart Alsop, whose column appeared in the New York Herald‑Tribune, the Saturday Evening Post and Newsweek. CIA files contain reports of specific tasks all three undertook. Sulzberger is still regarded as an active asset by the Agency. According to a senior CIA official, “Young Cy Sulzberger had some uses…. He signed a secrecy agreement because we gave him classified information…. There was sharing, give and take. We’d say, ‘Wed like to know this; if we tell you this will it help you get access to so‑and‑so?’ Because of his access in Europe he had an Open Sesame. We’d ask him to just report: ‘What did so‑and‑so say, what did he look like, is he healthy?’ He was very eager, he loved to cooperate.” On one occasion, according to several CIA officials, Sulzberger was given a briefing paper by the Agency which ran almost verbatim under the columnist’s byline in the Times. “Cycame out and said, ‘I’m thinking of doing a piece, can you give me some background?’” a CIA officer said. “We gave it to Cy as a background piece and Cy gave it to the printers and put his name on it.” Sulzberger denies that any incident occurred. “A lot of baloney,” he said.

               Sulzberger claims that he was never formally “tasked” by the Agency and that he “would never get caught near the spook business. My relations were totally informal—I had a goodmany friends,” he said. “I’m sure they consider me an asset. They can ask me questions. They find out you’re going to Slobovia and they say, ‘Can we talk to you when you get back?’ … Or they’ll want to know if the head of the Ruritanian government is suffering from psoriasis. But I never took an assignment from one of those guys…. I’ve known Wisner well, and Helms and even McCone [former CIA director John McCone] I used to play golf with. But they’d have had to he awfully subtle to have used me.

               Sulzberger says he was asked to sign the secrecy agreement in the 1950s. “A guy came around and said, ‘You are a responsible newsman and we need you to sign this if we are going to show you anything classified.’ I said I didn’t want to get entangled and told them, ‘Go to my uncle [Arthur Hays Sulzberger, then publisher of the New York Times] and if he says to sign it I will.’” His uncle subsequently signed such an agreement, Sulzberger said, and he thinks he did too, though he is unsure. “I don’t know, twenty‑some years is a long time.” He described the whole question as “a bubble in a bathtub.”

               Stewart Alsop’s relationship with the Agency was much more extensive than Sulzberger’s. One official who served at the highest levels in the CIA said flatly: “Stew Alsop was a CIA agent.” An equally senior official refused to define Alsop’s relationship with the Agency except to say it was a formal one. Other sources said that Alsop was particularly helpful to the Agency in discussions with, officials of foreign governments—asking questions to which the CIA was seeking answers, planting misinformation advantageous to American policy, assessing opportunities for CIA recruitment of well‑placed foreigners.

               “Absolute nonsense,” said Joseph Alsop of the notion that his brother was a CIA agent. “I was closer to the Agency than Stew was, though Stew was very close. I dare say he did perform some tasks—he just did the correct thing as an American…. The Founding Fathers [of the CIA] were close personal friends of ours. Dick Bissell [former CIA deputy director] was my oldest friend, from childhood. It was a social thing, my dear fellow. I never received a dollar, I never signed a secrecy agreement. I didn’t have to…. I’ve done things for them when I thought they were the right thing to do. I call it doing my duty as a citizen.

               Alsop is willing to discuss on the record only two of the tasks he undertook: a visit to Laos in 1952 at the behest of Frank Wisner, who felt other American reporters were using anti‑American sources about uprisings there; and a visit to the Phillipines in 1953 when the CIA thought his presence there might affect the outcome of an election. “Des FitzGerald urged me to go,” Alsop recalled. “It would be less likely that the election could be stolen [by the opponents of Ramon Magsaysay] if the eyes of the world were on them. I stayed with the ambassador and wrote about what happened.”

               Alsop maintains that he was never manipulated by the Agency. “You can’t get entangled so they have leverage on you,” he said. “But what I wrote was true. My view was to get the facts. If someone in the Agency was wrong, I stopped talking to them—they’d given me phony goods.” On one occasion, Alsop said, Richard Helms authorized the head of the Agency’s analytical branch to provide Alsop with information on Soviet military presence along the Chinese border. “The analytical side of the Agency had been dead wrong about the war in Vietnam—they thought it couldn’t be won,” said Alsop. “And they were wrong on the Soviet buildup. I stopped talking to them.” Today, he says, “People in our business would be outraged at the kinds of suggestions that were made to me. They shouldn’t be. The CIA did not open itself at all to people it did not trust. Stew and I were trusted, and I’m proud of it.”

               MURKY DETAILS OF CIA RELATIONSHIPS WITH INDIVIDUALS and news organizations began trickling out in 1973 when it was first disclosed that the CIA had, on occasion, employed journalists. Those reports, combined with new information, serve as casebook studies of the Agency’s use of journalists for intelligence purposes. They include:

               ■ The New York Times. The Agency’s relationship with the Times was by far its most valuable among newspapers, according to CIA officials. From 1950 to 1966, about ten CIA employees were provided Times cover under arrangements approved by the newspaper’s late publisher, Arthur Hays Sulzberger. The cover arrangements were part of a general Times policy—set by Sulzberger—to provide assistance to the CIA whenever possible.

               Sulzberger was especially close to Allen Dulles. “At that level of contact it was the mighty talking to the mighty,” said a high‑level CIA official who was present at some of the discussions. “There was an agreement in principle that, yes indeed, we would help each other. The question of cover came up on several occasions. It was agreed that the actual arrangements would be handled by subordinates…. The mighty didn’t want to know the specifics; they wanted plausible deniability.

               A senior CIA official who reviewed a portion of the Agency’s files on journalists for two hours onSeptember 15th, 1977, said he found documentation of five instances in which the Times had provided cover for CIA employees between 1954 and 1962. In each instance he said, the arrangements were handled by executives of the Times; the documents all contained standard Agency language “showing that this had been checked out at higher levels of the New York Times,” said the official. The documents did not mention Sulzberger’s name, however—only those of subordinates whom the official refused to identify.

               The CIA employees who received Times credentials posed as stringers for the paper abroad and worked as members of clerical staffs in the Times’ foreign bureaus. Most were American; two or three were foreigners.

               CIA officials cite two reasons why the Agency’s working relationship with the Times was closer and more extensive than with any other paper: the fact that the Times maintained the largest foreign news operation in American daily journalism; and the close personal ties between the men who ran both institutions.

               Sulzberger informed a number of reporters and editors of his general policy of cooperation with the Agency. “We were in touch with them—they’d talk to us and some cooperated,” said a CIA official. The cooperation usually involved passing on information and “spotting” prospective agents among foreigners.

               Arthur Hays Sulzberger signed a secrecy agreement with the CIA in the 1950s, according to CIA officials—a fact confirmed by his nephew, C.L. Sulzberger. However, there are varying interpretations of the purpose of the agreement: C.L. Sulzberger says it represented nothing more than a pledge not to disclose classified information made available to the publisher. That contention is supported by some Agency officials. Others in the Agency maintain that the agreement represented a pledge never to reveal any of the Times’ dealings with the CIA, especially those involving cover. And there are those who note that, because all cover arrangements are classified, a secrecy agreement would automatically apply to them.

               Attempts to find out which individuals in the Times organization made the actual arrangements for providing credentials to CIA personnel have been unsuccessful. In a letter to reporter Stuart Loory in 1974, Turner Cadedge, managing editor of the Times from 1951 to 1964, wrote that approaches by the CIA had been rebuffed by the newspaper. “I knew nothing about any involvement with the CIA… of any of our foreign correspondents on the New York Times. I heard many times of overtures to our men by the CIA, seeking to use their privileges, contacts, immunities and, shall we say, superior intelligence in the sordid business of spying and informing. If any one of them succumbed to the blandishments or cash offers, I was not aware of it. Repeatedly, the CIA and other hush‑hush agencies sought to make arrangements for ‘cooperation’ even with Times management, especially during or soon after World War II, but we always resisted. Our motive was to protect our credibility.”

               According to Wayne Phillips, a former Timesreporter, the CIA invoked Arthur Hays Sulzberger’s name when it tried to recruit him as an undercover operative in 1952 while he was studying at Columbia University’s Russian Institute. Phillips said an Agency official told him that the CIA had “a working arrangement” with the publisher in which other reporters abroad had been placed on the Agency’s payroll. Phillips, who remained at the Times until 1961, later obtained CIA documents under the Freedom of Information Act which show that the Agency intended to develop him as a clandestine “asset” for use abroad.

               On January 31st, 1976, the Times carried a brief story describing the ClAs attempt to recruit Phillips. It quoted Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, the present publisher, as follows: “I never heard of the Times being approached, either in my capacity as publisher or as the son of the late Mr. Sulzberger.” The Times story, written by John M. Crewdson, also reported that Arthur Hays Sulzberger told an unnamed former correspondent that he might he approached by the CIA after arriving at a new post abroad. Sulzberger told him that he was not “under any obligation to agree,” the story said and that the publisher himself would be “happier” if he refused to cooperate. “But he left it sort of up to me,” the Times quoted its former reporter as saying. “The message was if I really wanted to do that, okay, but he didn’t think it appropriate for a Times correspondent”

               C.L. Sulzberger, in a telephone interview, said he had no knowledge of any CIA personnel using Times cover or of reporters for the paper working actively for the Agency. He was the paper’s chief of foreign service from 1944 to 1954 and expressed doubt that his uncle would have approved such arrangements. More typical of the late publisher, said Sulzberger, was a promise made to Allen Dulles’ brother, John Foster, then secretary of state, that no Times staff member would be permitted to accept an invitation to visit the People’s Republic of China without John Foster Dulles’ consent. Such an invitation was extended to the publisher’s nephew in the 1950s; Arthur Sulzberger forbade him to accept it. “It was seventeen years before another Times correspondent was invited,” C.L. Sulzberger recalled.

               ■ The Columbia Broadcasting System. CBS was unquestionably the CIAs most valuable broadcasting asset. CBS President William Paley and Allen Dulles enjoyed an easy working and social relationship. Over the years, the network provided cover for CIA employees, including at least one well‑known foreign correspondent and several stringers; it supplied outtakes of newsfilm to the CIA3; established a formal channel of communication between the Washington bureau chief and the Agency; gave the Agency access to the CBS newsfilm library; and allowed reports by CBS correspondents to the Washington and New York newsrooms to be routinely monitored by the CIA. Once a year during the 1950s and early 1960s, CBS correspondents joined the CIA hierarchy for private dinners and briefings.

               The details of the CBS‑CIA arrangements were worked out by subordinates of both Dulles and Paley. “The head of the company doesn’t want to know the fine points, nor does the director,” said a CIA official. “Both designate aides to work that out. It keeps them above the battle.” Dr. Frank Stanton, for 25 years president of the network, was aware of the general arrangements Paley made with Dulles—including those for cover, according to CIA officials. Stanton, in an interview last year, said he could not recall any cover arrangements.) But Paley’s designated contact for the Agency was Sig Mickelson, president of CBS News between 1954 and 1961. On one occasion, Mickelson has said, he complained to Stanton about having to use a pay telephone to call the CIA, and Stanton suggested he install a private line, bypassing the CBS switchboard, for the purpose. According to Mickelson, he did so. Mickelson is now president of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, both of which were associated with the CIA for many years.

               In 1976, CBS News president Richard Salant ordered an in‑house investigation of the network’s dealings with the CIA. Some of its findings were first disclosed by Robert Scheer in the Los Angeles Times.) But Salant’s report makes no mention of some of his own dealings with the Agency, which continued into the 1970s.

               Many details about the CBS‑CIA relationship were found in Mickelson’s files by two investigators for Salant. Among the documents they found was a September 13th, 1957, memo to Mickelson fromTed Koop, CBS News bureau chief in Washington from 1948 to 1961. It describes a phone call to Koop from Colonel Stanley Grogan of the CIA: “Grogan phoned to say that Reeves [J. B. Love Reeves, another CIA official] is going to New York to be in charge of the CIA contact office there and will call to see you and some of your confreres. Grogan says normal activities will continue to channel through the Washington office of CBS News.” The report to Salant also states: “Further investigation of Mickelson’s files reveals some details of the relationship between the CIA and CBS News…. Two key administrators of this relationship were Mickelson and Koop…. The main activity appeared to be the delivery of CBS newsfilm to the CIA…. In addition there is evidence that, during 1964 to 1971, film material, including some outtakes, were supplied by the CBS Newsfilm Library to the CIA through and at the direction of Mr. Koop4…. Notes in Mr. Mickelson’s files indicate that the CIA used CBS films for training… All of the above Mickelson activities were handled on a confidential basis without mentioning the words Central Intelligence Agency. The films were sent to individuals at post‑office box numbers and were paid for by individual, nor government, checks. …” Mickelson also regularly sent the CIA an internal CBS newsletter, according to the report.

               Salant’s investigation led him to conclude that Frank Kearns, a CBS‑TV reporter from 1958 to 1971, “was a CIA guy who got on the payroll somehow through a CIA contact with somebody at CBS.” Kearns and Austin Goodrich, a CBS stringer, were undercover CIA employees, hired under arrangements approved by Paley.

               Last year a spokesman for Paley denied a report by former CBS correspondent Daniel Schorr that Mickelson and he had discussed Goodrich’s CIA status during a meeting with two Agency representatives in 1954. The spokesman claimed Paley had no knowledge that Goodrich had worked for the CIA. “When I moved into the job I was told by Paley that there was an ongoing relationship with the CIA,” Mickelson said in a recent interview. “He introduced me to two agents who he said would keep in touch. We all discussed the Goodrich situation and film arrangements. I assumed this was a normal relationship at the time. This was at the height of the Cold War and I assumed the communications media were cooperating—though the Goodrich matter was compromising.

               At the headquarters of CBS News in New York, Paley’s cooperation with the CIA is taken for granted by many news executives and reporters, despite tile denials. Paley, 76, was not interviewed by Salant’s investigators. “It wouldn’t do any good,” said one CBS executive. “It is the single subject about which his memory has failed.”

               Salant discussed his own contacts with the CIA, and the fact he continued many of his predecessor’s practices, in an interview with this reporter last year. The contacts, he said, began in February 1961, “when I got a phone call from a CIA man who said he had a working relationship with Sig Mickelson. The man said, ‘Your bosses know all about it.'” According to Salant, the CIA representative asked that CBS continue to supply the Agency with unedited newstapes and make its correspondents available for debriefingby Agency officials. Said Salant: “I said no on talking to the reporters, and let them see broadcast tapes, but no outtakes. This went on for a number of years—into the early Seventies.”

               In 1964 and 1965, Salant served on a super-secret CIA task force which explored methods of beaming American propaganda broadcasts to the People’s Republic of China. The other members of the four‑man study team were Zbigniew Brzezinski, then a professor at Columbia University; William Griffith, then professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology., and John Haves, then vice‑president of the Washington Post Company for radio‑TV5. The principal government officials associated with the project were Cord Meyer of the CIA; McGeorge Bundy, then special assistant to the president for national security; Leonard Marks, then director of the USIA; and Bill Moyers, then special assistant to President Lyndon Johnson and now a CBS correspondent.

               Salant’s involvement in the project began with a call from Leonard Marks, “who told me the White House wanted to form a committee of four people to make a study of U.S. overseas broadcasts behind the Iron Curtain.” When Salant arrived in Washington for the first meeting he was told that the project was CIA sponsored. “Its purpose,” he said, “was to determine how best to set up shortwave broadcasts into Red China.” Accompanied by a CIA officer named Paul Henzie, the committee of four subsequently traveled around the world inspecting facilities run by Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty both CIA‑run operations at the time), the Voice of America and Armed Forces Radio. After more than a year of study, they submitted a report to Moyers recommending that the government establish a broadcast service, run by the Voice of America, to be beamed at the People’s Republic of China. Salant has served two tours as head of CBS News, from 1961‑64 and 1966‑present. At the time of the China project he was a CBS corporate executive.)

               ■ Time and Newsweek magazines. According to CIA and Senate sources, Agency files contain written agreements with former foreign correspondents and stringers for both the weekly news magazines. The same sources refused to say whether the CIA has ended all its associations with individuals who work for the two publications. Allen Dulles often interceded with his good friend, the late Henry Luce, founder of Time and Life magazines, who readily allowed certain members of his staff to work for the Agency and agreed to provide jobs and credentials for other CIA operatives who lacked journalistic experience.

               For many years, Luce’s personal emissary to the CIA was C.D. Jackson, a Time Inc., vice‑president who was publisher of Life magazine from 1960 until his death in 1964.While a Time executive, Jackson coauthored a CIA‑sponsored study recommending the reorganization of the American intelligence services in the early 1950s. Jackson, whose Time‑Life service was interrupted by a one‑year White House tour as an assistant to President Dwight Eisenhower, approved specific arrangements for providing CIA employees with Time‑Life cover. Some of these arrangements were made with the knowledge of Luce’s wife, Clare Boothe. Other arrangements for Time cover, according to CIA officials including those who dealt with Luce), were made with the knowledge of Hedley Donovan, now editor‑in‑chief of Time Inc. Donovan, who took over editorial direction of all Time Inc. publications in 1959, denied in a telephone interview that he knew of any such arrangements. “I was never approached and I’d be amazed if Luce approved such arrangements,” Donovan said. “Luce had a very scrupulous regard for the difference between journalism and government.”

               In the 1950s and early 1960s, Time magazine’s foreign correspondents attended CIA “briefing” dinners similar to those the CIA held for CBS. And Luce, according to CIA officials, made it a regular practice to brief Dulles or other high Agency officials when he returned from his frequent trips abroad. Luce and the men who ran his magazines in the 1950s and 1960s encouraged their foreign correspondents to provide help to the CIA, particularly information that might be useful to the Agency for intelligence purposes or recruiting foreigners.

               At Newsweek, Agency sources reported, the CIA engaged the services of’ several foreign correspondents and stringers under arrangements approved by senior editors at the magazine. Newsweek’s stringer in Rome in the mid‑Fifties made little secret of the fact that he worked for the CIA. Malcolm Muir, Newsweek’s editor from its founding in 1937 until its sale to the Washington Post Company in 1961, said in a recent interview that his dealings with the CIA were limited to private briefings he gave Allen Dulles after trips abroad and arrangements he approved for regular debriefing of Newsweek correspondents by the Agency. He said that he had never provided cover for CIA operatives, but that others high in the Newsweek organization might have done so without his knowledge.

               “I would have thought there might have been stringers who were agents, but I didn’t know who they were,” said Muir. “I do think in those days the CIA kept pretty close touch with all responsible reporters. Whenever I heard something that I thought might be of interest to Allen Dulles, I’d call him up…. At one point he appointed one of his CIA men to keep in regular contact with our reporters, a chap that I knew but whose name I can’t remember. I had a number of friends in Alien Dulles’ organization.” Muir said that Harry Kern, Newsweek’s foreign editor from 1945 until 1956, and Ernest K. Lindley, the magazine’s Washington bureau chief during the same period “regularly checked in with various fellows in the CIA.”

               “To the best of my knowledge.” said Kern, “nobody at Newsweek worked for the CIA… The informal relationship was there. Why have anybody sign anything? What we knew we told them [the CIA] and the State Department…. When I went to Washington, I would talk to Foster or Allen Dulles about what was going on. … We thought it was admirable at the time. We were all on the same side.” CIA officials say that Kern’s dealings with the Agency were extensive. In 1956, he left Newsweek to run Foreign Reports, a Washington‑based newsletter whose subscribers Kern refuses to identify.

               Ernest Lindley, who remained at Newsweek until 1961, said in a recent interview that he regularly consulted with Dulles and other high CIA officials before going abroad and briefed them upon his return. “Allen was very helpful to me and I tried to reciprocate when I could,” he said. “I’d give him my impressions of people I’d met overseas. Once or twice he asked me to brief a large group of intelligence people; when I came back from the Asian‑African conference in 1955, for example; they mainly wanted to know about various people.”

               As Washington bureau chief, Lindley said he learned from Malcolm Muir that the magazine’s stringer in southeastern Europe was a CIA contract employee—given credentials under arrangements worked out with the management. “I remember it came up—whether it was a good idea to keep this person from the Agency; eventually it was decided to discontinue the association,” Lindley said.

               When Newsweek waspurchased by the Washington Post Company, publisher Philip L. Graham was informed by Agency officials that the CIA occasionally used the magazine for cover purposes, according to CIA sources. “It was widely known that Phil Graham was somebody you could get help from,” said a former deputy director of the Agency. “Frank Wisner dealt with him.” Wisner, deputy director of the CIA from 1950 until shortly before his suicide in 1965, was the Agency’s premier orchestrator of “black” operations, including many in which journalists were involved. Wisner liked to boast of his “mighty Wurlitzer,” a wondrous propaganda instrument he built, and played, with help from the press.) Phil Graham was probably Wisner’s closest friend. But Graharn, who committed suicide in 1963, apparently knew little of the specifics of any cover arrangements with Newsweek, CIA sources said.

               In 1965‑66, an accredited Newsweek stringer in the Far East was in fact a CIA contract employee earning an annual salary of $10,000 from the Agency, according to Robert T. Wood, then a CIA officer in the Hong Kong station. Some, Newsweek correspondents and stringers continued to maintain covert ties with the Agency into the 1970s, CIA sources said.

               Information about Agency dealings with the Washington Post newspaper is extremely sketchy. According to CIA officials, some Post stringers have been CIA employees, but these officials say they do not know if anyone in the Post management was aware of the arrangements.

               All editors‑in‑chief and managing editors of the Post since 1950 say they knew of no formal Agency relationship with either stringers or members of the Post staff. “If anything was done it was done by Phil without our knowledge,” said one. Agency officials, meanwhile, make no claim that Post staff members have had covert affiliations with the Agency while working for the paper.6

               Katharine Graham, Philip Graham’s widow and the current publisher of the Post, says she has never been informed of any CIA relationships with either Post or Newsweek personnel. In November of 1973, Mrs. Graham called William Colby and asked if any Post stringers or staff members were associated with the CIA. Colby assured her that no staff members were employed by the Agency but refused to discuss the question of stringers.

               ■ The Louisville Courier‑Journal. From December 1964 until March 1965, a CIA undercover operative named Robert H. Campbell worked on the Courier‑Journal. According to high‑level CIA sources, Campbell was hired by the paper under arrangements the Agency made with Norman E. Isaacs, then executive editor of the Courier‑Journal. Barry Bingham Sr., then publisher of the paper, also had knowledge of the arrangements, the sources said. Both Isaacs and Bingham have denied knowing that Campbell was an intelligence agent when he was hired.

               The complex saga of Campbell’s hiring was first revealed in a Courier‑Journal story written by James R Herzog on March 27th, 1976, during the Senate committee’s investigation, Herzog’s account began: “When 28‑year‑old Robert H. Campbell was hired as a Courier‑Journal reporter in December 1964, he couldn’t type and knew little about news writing.” The account then quoted the paper’s former managing editor as saying that Isaacs told him that Campbell was hired as a result of a CIA request: “Norman said, when he was in Washington [in 1964], he had been called to lunch with some friend of his who was with the CIA [and that] he wanted to send this young fellow down to get him a little knowledge of newspapering.” All aspects of Campbell’s hiring were highly unusual. No effort had been made to check his credentials, and his employment records contained the following two notations: “Isaacs has files of correspondence and investigation of this man”; and, “Hired for temporary work—no reference checks completed or needed.”

               The level of Campbell’s journalistic abilities apparently remained consistent during his stint at the paper, “The stuff that Campbell turned in was almost unreadable,” said a former assistant city editor. One of Campbell’s major reportorial projects was a feature about wooden Indians. It was never published. During his tenure at the paper, Campbell frequented a bar a few steps from the office where, on occasion, he reportedly confided to fellow drinkers that he was a CIA employee.

               According to CIA sources, Campbell’s tour at the Courier‑Journal was arranged to provide him with a record of journalistic experience that would enhance the plausibility of future reportorial cover and teach him something about the newspaper business. The Courier‑Journal’s investigation also turned up the fact that before coming to Louisville he had worked briefly for the Hornell, New York, Evening Tribune, published by Freedom News, Inc. CIA sources said the Agency had made arrangements with that paper’s management to employ Campbell.7

               At the Courier‑Journal, Campbell was hired under arrangements made with Isaacs and approved by Bingham, said CIA and Senate sources. “We paid the Courier‑Journal so they could pay his salary,” said an Agency official who was involved in the transaction. Responding by letter to these assertions, Isaacs, who left Louisville to become president and publisher of the Wilmington Delaware) News & Journal, said: “All I can do is repeat the simple truth—that never, under any circumstances, or at any time, have I ever knowingly hired a government agent. I’ve also tried to dredge my memory, but Campbell’s hiring meant so little to me that nothing emerges…. None of this is to say that I couldn’t have been ‘had.’”.Barry Bingham Sr., said last year in a telephone interview that he had no specific memory of Campbell’s hiring and denied that he knew of any arrangements between the newspaper’s management and the CIA. However, CIA officials said that the Courier‑Journal, through contacts with Bingham, provided other unspecified assistance to the Agency in the 1950s and 1960s. The Courier‑Journal’s detailed, front‑page account of Campbell’s hiring was initiated by Barry Bingham Jr., who succeeded his father as editor and publisher of the paper in 1971. The article is the only major piece of self‑investigation by a newspaper that has appeared on this subject.8

               ■ The American Broadcasting Company and the National Broadcasting Company. According to CIA officials, ABC continued to provide cover for some CIA operatives through the 1960s. One was Sam Jaffe who CIA officials said performed clandestine tasks for the Agency. Jaffe has acknowledged only providing the CIA with information. In addition, another well‑known network correspondent performed covert tasks for the Agency, said CIA sources. At the time of the Senate bearings, Agency officials serving at the highest levels refused to say whether the CIA was still maintaining active relationships with members of the ABC‑News organization. All cover arrangements were made with the knowledge off ABC executives, the sources said.

               These same sources professed to know few specifies about the Agency’s relationships with NBC, except that several foreign correspondents of the network undertook some assignments for the Agency in the 1950s and 1960s. “It was a thing people did then,” said Richard Wald, president of NBC News since 1973. “I wouldn’t be surprised if people here—including some of the correspondents in those days—had connections with the Agency.”

               ■ The Copley Press, and its subsidiary, the Copley News Service. This relationship, first disclosed publicly by reporters Joe Trento and Dave Roman in Penthouse magazine, is said by CIA officials to have been among the Agency’s most productive in terms of getting “outside” cover for its employees. Copley owns nine newspapers in California and Illinois—among them the San Diego Union and Evening Tribune. The Trento‑Roman account, which was financed by a grant from the Fund for Investigative Journalism, asserted that at least twenty‑three Copley News Service employees performed work for the CIA. “The Agency’s involvement with the Copley organization is so extensive that it’s almost impossible to sort out,” said a CIA official who was asked about the relationship late in 1976. Other Agency officials said then that James S. Copley, the chain’s owner until his death in 1973, personally made most of the cover arrangements with the CIA.

               According to Trento and Roman, Copley personally volunteered his news service to then‑president Eisenhower to act as “the eyes and ears” against “the Communist threat in Latin and Central America” for “our intelligence services.” James Copley was also the guiding hand behind the Inter‑American Press Association, a CIA‑funded organization with heavy membership among right‑wing Latin American newspaper editors.

               ■ Other major news organizations. According to Agency officials, CIA files document additional cover arrangements with the following news‑gathering organizations, among others: the New York Herald‑Tribune, the Saturday‑Evening Post, Scripps‑Howard Newspapers, Hearst Newspapers Seymour K. Freidin, Hearst’s current London bureau chief and a former Herald‑Tribune editor and correspondent, has been identified as a CIA operative by Agency sources), Associated Press,9 United Press International, the Mutual Broadcasting System, Reuters and the Miami Herald. Cover arrangements with the Herald, according to CIA officials, were unusual in that they were made “on the ground by the CIA station in Miami, not from CIA headquarters.

               “And that’s just a small part of the list,” in the words of one official who served in the CIA hierarchy. Like many sources, this official said that the only way to end the uncertainties about aid furnished the Agency by journalists is to disclose the contents of the CIA files—a course opposed by almost all of the thirty‑five present and former CIA officials interviewed over the course of a year.
               COLBY CUTS HIS LOSSES

               THE CIA’S USE OF JOURNALISTS CONTINUED VIRTUALLY unabated until 1973 when, in response to public disclosure that the Agency had secretly employed American reporters, William Colby began scaling down the program. In his public statements, Colby conveyed the impression that the use of journalists had been minimal and of limited importance to the Agency.

               He then initiated a series of moves intended to convince the press, Congress and the public that the CIA had gotten out of the news business. But according to Agency officials, Colby had in fact thrown a protective net around his valuable intelligence in the journalistic community. He ordered his deputies to maintain Agency ties with its best journalist contacts while severing formal relationships with many regarded as inactive, relatively unproductive or only marginally important. In reviewing Agency files to comply with Colby’s directive, officials found that many journalists had not performed useful functions for the CIA in years. Such relationships, perhaps as many as a hundred, were terminated between 1973 and 1976.

               Meanwhile, important CIA operatives who had been placed on the staffs of some major newspaper and broadcast outlets were told to resign and become stringers or freelancers, thus enabling Colby to assure concerned editors that members of their staffs were not CIA employees. Colby also feared that some valuable stringer‑operatives might find their covers blown if scrutiny of the Agency’s ties with journalists continued. Some of these individuals were reassigned to jobs on so‑called proprietary publications—foreign periodicals and broadcast outlets secretly funded and staffed by the CIA. Other journalists who had signed formal contracts with the CIA—making them employees of the Agency—were released from their contracts, and asked to continue working under less formal arrangements.

               In November 1973, after many such shifts had been made, Colby told reporters and editors from the New York Times and the Washington Star that the Agency had “some three dozen” American newsmen “on the CIA payroll,” including five who worked for “general‑circulation news organizations.” Yet even while the Senate Intelligence Committee was holding its hearings in 1976, according to high‑le
               1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 4:42 pm

                  Ah, Joseph Alsop. Good times.
               2. Paul Niemi July 31, 2014 at 7:34 pm

                  “I have only made this letter longer because I have not had the time to make it shorter.” — Blaise Pascal. Presenting your point in fewer words does take more work, but I can’t fathom why that huge thing was pasted in above. It took pressing the “page down” button 21 times for me to skip over it. The thing doesn’t fit with what other people are doing.
               3. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 9:38 pm

                  Lambert, doesn’t this look like “The Lives Of Others” with a spit shine? You have quite a rockin’ discussion going on here today. No place like NC.
            3. Paul Tioxon July 31, 2014 at 4:22 pm

               Covert Action Information Bulletin

               Founded by Phillip Agee, inter alia

               https://archive.org/details/AV_153_154_155-COVERT_ACTION

               I would not reduce considered statements and put words into other people’s post with statements like, the CIA runs the world, when I have not seen any claim for that here. But the extent of not only the CIA but also the other 17 secret intelligence services in the Federal government is not hard for someone who uses a computer to read nakedcapitalism. If you managed to find your way here, you can manage to follow up on the names provided, such as Phillip Agee, or Frank Morrow or Joseph Trento.
               Proof, is more than a post on the internet. The living witnesses to history, including myself, who lived through the Viet Nam war and the Nixon Police State and the aftermath of Senate and Congressional exposures of the CIA, The DIA, The NSA, The FBI present a transmission of cultural capital that is invaluable, but you will have to follow up the leads and directions provided. I can not recount a life time of living and learning as the formal proof requested by many who ask for links, and more and more documentation. This site is at best, a teach in and consciousness raising which all by itself is monumentally important. But if you do not take what you find here and use it to build stronger ties with the social relationships you already have or forge new ones, do not expect to be converted driven to some ultimate truth and completely transformed. Just be glad people share as much as they do and not bilk you out of your hard earned money.

               The Huston Plan

               http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/church/reports/vol2/html/ChurchV2_0004a.htm
               1. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 6:46 pm

                  Apply those impressive reading skills to what I said including

                  “It is true that some journalists were on the CIA payroll during cold war days. However you might supply some links or evidence that this is still true now, or that it is widespread.”

                  Still waiting. And btw a link will do. You don’t have to post entire articles. It doesn’t really make your argument more impressive.
                  1. TedWa July 31, 2014 at 7:08 pm

                     With the “freeze” on the free press with exposing almost anything being called espionage and a national secret, and the incarceration of reporters – how would there be any links? Just because the evidence isn’t overwhelming doesn’t mean it’s not going on. It could just mean the reports and reporters are being squashed by heavy handed government. If the NSA is everywhere, don’t you think the other agencies are too?
                  2. Glenn Condell July 31, 2014 at 7:57 pm

                     If I held a gun to your head and demanded that for your life you answer truthfully the question ‘Do you believe the documented practice of the CIA (or indeed alphabet intel agencies generally) having journalists on the payroll is still widespread today? – what would you say?

                     Evidence, in these times, is becoming the last refuge of the defiantly optimistic; those that prefer to imagine that the absence of evidence is evidence of absence. Which is fair enough – where evidence is obscured (or perhaps non-existent) the position you end up with relies to a large extent on your own disposition. Both stances – tending toward either suspicion or trust – have merit, but without evidence neither can take high ground from the other; both in fact are, without sufficient facts, grounded in faith.

                     Given the reality that even the possibility of salient evidence (or maybe the possibility of it ever reaching public scrutiny unmolested) is on the decline, that disconnect will continue, and widen. Cui bono from that, eh?

                     You could be waiting a long time for those ‘articles’ I reckon.
                     1. skippy July 31, 2014 at 8:21 pm

                        What would people think if they considered, the CIA was never created to protect the citizens, but, to insure the longevity of an ideology and who it served.

                        Skippy…. Hay its summer already… fancy that!
                        1. Glenn Condell July 31, 2014 at 11:16 pm

                           Not sure of the CIA motto but I bet it’s not as honest as the Mossad’s. We might not like to deal with hairballs, but hairballs is all we get.

                           If this is winter, we’re going to have to invent a new word for summer when it arrives…
                  3. Paul Tioxon July 31, 2014 at 8:35 pm

                     Not least interested in impressing people like you. You are not the target.
         4. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 3:10 pm

            @Ken Nari. That’s a decent reading list, but we shouldn’t forget that many of these books are aimed at a certain market niche which is made up of people who are fascinated by conspiracy theories and government intrigue. We shouldn’t fall into the trap of thinking these authors are unbiased and are providing the “straight dope” on what our government is really up to. These authors have an agenda of their own. They have books to sell, and the market they sell to is likely to be disappointed by any conclusion that backs up the “mainstream media narrative” or that does not involve some elaborate clandestine conspiracy theory which puts USGovt in as bad a light as possible.

            With authors like these, it’s worth asking: how does this author “know” that the CIA has done all that he/she claims it has done? Unlike most US government agencies, the CIA does not make its activities known to the public. Nor does it provide a budget or account for its expenses in any public document. (This is one reason why the CIA is un-constitutional, but I digress.) It’s even hard to use a FOIA request to find out what the CIA is up to. Often, it takes a full-blown Congressional Committee (e.g., the Church Committee re CIA activities in Chile) or Presidential action (like Clinton declassifying documents) to find out DEFINITIVELY what the CIA has done – and even then these reports are often heavily redacted. That being so, it seems that, at most, we can only determine what CIA does to a degree of probability, and almost never with any certainty. Yet, many of the authors you cite will claim to know – to a CERTAINTY – what the CIA has done.
            1. Fíréan July 31, 2014 at 4:28 pm

               “Legacy of Ashes” , by Tim Weiner.
               ‘This book is on the record — no anonymous sources, no blind quotations, no hearsay.’
            2. hunkerdown July 31, 2014 at 4:47 pm

               Hey Lambert, I don’t suppose you have one of those word highlighting plugins to hand, where you might link every instance of the words “conspiracy theory” to Husting’s “Dangerous Machinery” paper? I wonder whether the U of Boise Press would pay a few pennies for that. :)
            3. Banger July 31, 2014 at 5:41 pm

               You don’t know what you are talking about because you haven’t looked into those “niche” books by people you probably are writing fiction, unlike, say the NYTimes view of the world. Did you ever wonder why they are niche books? Because mainstream reviewers are, generally, not allowed to review them.

               So now look at the evidence and don’t make general statements because finding out the truth frightens you. I always repeat the obvious smoking gun which the Coroner’s Report on the RFK assassination that showed RFK was shot at point blank range from the back (Sirhan shot at the front and no closer than two feet from RFK and, at any rate, there were more than nine shots (Sirhan’s gun only had nine shots) as numerous witnesses and sound analysis has proven. I also challenge you to find fault with heavily researched books like Family of Secrets say or books by Jim diEugenio all meticulously researched.
               1. Gaianne July 31, 2014 at 6:14 pm

                  Again thanks.

                  The one thing we know for sure about the assassinations of the 1960s (Kennedy, King, and Kennedy) as well as about the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001 is that the official narrative for each of these events is a lie.

                  In all cases the laws of physics are violated, and a good bit of logic as well.

                  The fact that lies were both promulgated and accepted has many implications, and some of those lead back to the Deep State.

                  What did happen? That is less certain.

                  But we know what did not happen.

                  –Gaianne
               2. FederalismForever July 31, 2014 at 6:17 pm

                  oh, NO! “Family of Secrets” is TERRIBLE! Just because it’s “heavily researched” doesn’t mean Baker’s research methodologies aren’t highly questionable.
      3. afisher July 31, 2014 at 12:20 pm

         Legacy of Ashes – Tim Weiner has a brief history of the CIA, under 600 pages. That or ignorance is bliss.
      4. Lord Koos July 31, 2014 at 1:21 pm

         It is well-known that the CIA recruits journalists, business people, etc especially those posted to other countries. Journalists are among the most useful assets, as they typically travel, meet a lot of people, and see a lot of things, and as a bonus can write articles that have the CIA stamp of approval. To think that this doesn’t happen is naive to say the least.
         1. ambrit July 31, 2014 at 5:37 pm

            Agreed. I have a personal experience that suggests that the “Deep State,” for want of a better term, vets possible recruits as early as High School.
            1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 9:50 pm

               As infants, rather. “Clubbiness” is inheritable.
         2. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 6:44 pm

            We now know that George Plimpton et al. at The Paris Review, and Gloria Steinem, were “sponsored” by the CIA, in addition to several “artists.”
   5. diptherio July 31, 2014 at 10:09 am

      The thing is, it’s gotten to the point where so many people know that they’re only acting as if the narrative is true, that speaking the actual truth doesn’t get you rejected like it used to. Not nearly as bad, anyway. I’ve noticed that I don’t get much in the way of push-back now, from people that I used to, when I go off about media lies or corrupt politicians. People who used to say, “you’re exaggerating,” now just say, “you’re right but I don’t know what we can do about it.”

      I think our society has largely passed through the denial stage now, and has entered into a despondent acceptance of reality. It’s like we went from saying, “There’s no way I’ve got cancer, the tests must be wrong!” directly to “Ah, f*** it, I’m just gonna lay on the couch, shoot heroin and watch sitcoms. My life’s over anyway, what’s the point?”
      1. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 10:25 am

         Check out that Perstein thingie in links. People knew back in the 1970s that the country was on the decline–back then it was thought that the Japanese were going to displace us–but then Reagan came along and the vast American capacity for denial kicked in along with the aptly named (by his VP no less) voodoo economics. It’s been all smoke and mirrors ever since. At this point there doesn’t seem to be much that can be done other than wait for the big collapse. The power relationship between the elites and ordinary people needs a serious rebalancing and only external events are likely to bring that about.
      2. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 6:54 pm

         Da. It’s hard to get through the seven stages of grief, and the grief that goes with recognition of centuries of treachery, outright treason, deceit, theft, exploitation unto death by those we “trust” is devastating, a “loss of innocence” of searing pain, not least because we feel how stupid we’ve been to “believe” in the worth of our leaders, our representatives, our priests, of all those we have trusted in our singularly “American” naive way. The hardened cynicism and crooked ways of “Old Europe” was something that even our founding “elites” wanted to escape when coming to America. See how long that lasted?

         Most, when disillusioned, try their best to “join the Big Club” — a story as old as recorded time.
   6. mundanomaniac July 31, 2014 at 10:31 am

      Banger, I appreciate your comment brotherly at 10:00 am and 10:25 am
      mundanoamaniac
   7. Ulysses July 31, 2014 at 10:37 am

      The best way to counter the brainwashing of the official narrative is to actively resist evil, thus creating a new narrative of principled challenges to the status quo. Here’s a group of brave folks upstate who are doing exactly that: http://upstatedroneaction.org/
      1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 1:08 pm

         thanks for the link. Powerful… “When my nephew was 5 years old, he asked his mother, “Where is father?” My sister replied, “Your father was killed by a computer.”

         “Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards.”
         Huxley, Ends and Means
   8. Paul Tioxon July 31, 2014 at 4:33 pm

      CBS News has hired former acting director of the CIA, Mike Morell, as their senior security correspondent. Morell has been a frequent guest on CBS’ Face the Nation, where he has disseminated CIA propaganda and misleading information, raising questions about CBS’ journalistic integrity. Morell also works for Beacon Global Strategies, a DC consulting firm which peddles its government connections to defense contractors, raising even more questions about his role at CBS.

      December 23, 2013

      On December 23, 2013, Morell appeared on Face the Nation, where he promoted the government’s campaign to prosecute Edward Snowden. On this day Morell stated:

      “He violated the trust put in him by the United States government. He has committed a crime, in my view. You know a whistleblower doesn’t run. A whistleblower does not disclose information that has nothing to do with what he says his cause is which is the privacy and civil liberties of Americans. You know if I could talk to Mister Snowden myself, what I would say is, Edward, you say you’re a patriot, you say you want to protect the privacy and civil liberties of Americans, you say that you wanted Americans to have a debate about this and to make up their mind about what to do about this. Well, if you really believe that, if you really believe that Americans should be the judge of this program, then you should also believe that the Americans should be the judge of your behavior in this regard. So if you are the patriot that you say you are, you should come home and be judged. “

      Morell also made the following statement, which is now known to be false, thanks to Snowden’s disclosures:

      “The-NSA is not spying on Americans. I think that is a perception that some have out there. It is not– it is not– it is not focused on any single American. It is not reading the content of your phone calls or my phone calls or anybody else’s phone calls. It is focused on this metadata for one purpose only, and that is to make sure that foreign terrorists aren’t in contact with anybody in the United States.”

      http://www.dailycensored.com/corporate-cbs-news-the-cia/
      1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 4:41 pm

         A Flexian infestation…
         1. hunkerdown July 31, 2014 at 4:49 pm

            How does one control a flexian infestation, anyway? Orkin won’t touch ’em.
   9. Abe, NYC August 1, 2014 at 1:23 am

      With respect, the article is almost all conjectures and guesswork. I don’t think there’s anyone in the world who has heard of CIA and doubts it is involved in Ukraine, or any of the other 192 countries of the globe. The real question is, what role did it play in the events in Ukraine?

      Brennan went there months after the revolution, when it was clear Russia was preparing a civil war. A key relevant news that the article didn’t even bother mentioning is that FBI and CIA agents were sent to Ukraine in May 2014 to assist with mounting a counter-insurgency (looks fairly credible and didn’t get mainstream attention). By that time Crimea was gone and the insurgency in the East was in full swing.

      But what role did US intelligence services play in Ukraine before the overthrow of Yanukovych? The only fact I can find which is supposed to shed light on it is Nuland’s leaked conversation.

      I’ve read it time and again. At that time Victoria Nuland was trying to broker an agreement between Yanukovych and the opposition. What is clear from the conversation is that a US official supposed to act as an honest broker, is anything but. Once again, you’d be crazy to believe otherwise. She is actively trying to achieve an outcome where certain opposition leaders come to power and others fall by the wayside.

      And that’s it. Not a hint of any secret operations, agents of influence, drawing in the army or other power structures. Only a pompous diplomat trying to strong-arm an agreement, likely overreaching.

      I don’t know how many times I’ve quoted Craig Murray already, and as a former UK ambassador he knows a thing or two of these games. “You can’t start a revolution…. A military coup you can certainly start… the latter is a CIA specialty” While it’s entirely possible that US special services were involved int he coup that brought Yanukovych, there is no evidence of that, only conjectures (and it’s totally implausible that CIA could have caused mass protests lasting months). You might with equal justification claim that Yanukovych was brought down by Russian secret services, who used the resulting unrest and power vacuum to annex Crimea in a brilliantly planned and executed operation.
      1. Doug Terpstra August 1, 2014 at 2:27 am

         Excellent Craig Murray link, very thoughtful and well-informed analysis by a principled diplomat.

         Also, allow me to suggest this edit for your narrative: “While it’s entirely possible that [“Russia was preparing a civil war”], there is no evidence of that, only conjectures…”
3. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 8:02 am

   re Wife Beating gets a Standing Ovation…”The league knows that no matter how many players beat their wives, no matter how many tax dollars it shelters, no matter how much kidney failure and traumatic brain injury it continues to overlook, we, the fans, will keep coming back, asking for more.”

   “A group experience takes place on a lower level of consciousness than the experience of an individual. This is due to the fact that, when many people gather together to share one common emotion, the total psyche emerging from the group is below the level of the individual psyche. If it is a very large group, the collective psyche will be more like the psyche of an animal, which is the reason why the ethical attitude of large organizations is always doubtful. The psychology of a large crowd inevitably sinks to the level of mob psychology. If, therefore, I have a so-called collective experience as a member of a group, it takes place on a lower level of consciousness than if I had the experience by myself alone.”
   Jung, The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious
   1. Ed July 31, 2014 at 9:07 am

      My browser can’t access the article. I assume that this is about a Baltimore Ravens player accused of beating his wife, from the comment and the title. Some Baltimore Ravens fans want the player to keep playing on the team. So what is with that?

      1. The article’s claim that Baltimore Ravens fans are OK with wife beating, or a wife beater playing for the Ravens, could be false. Its easy for reporters to round up a few idiots willing to make outrageous quotes for these sorts of stories.

      2. The spousal abuse allegations could be false. They are often outright false or greatly exaggerated. NFL fans know this. Some have been put through the drill themselves.

      3. None of the fans has to actually live with the accused player, so he presents no threat to them. But he has a real job in entertaining them by playing football. Firing people for non job related character or morality problems is basically for people holding make work jobs. If the employee has an actual function and getting rid of him will meaningfully harm the organization, there will be an attempt to protect him.

      So you are probably overthinking this.
      1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 9:41 am

         let’s play Fill in the Blank:
         ”The __________ knows that no matter how many ___________ beat their wives, no matter how many tax dollars it shelters, no matter how much kidney failure and traumatic brain injury it continues to overlook, we, the ____________, will keep coming back, asking for more.”

         last time an ‘Ed’ suggested i was over thinking i found myself being ‘handled’ for a shearing (hint, im still here)

         “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. …We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. …In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons…who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.”
         Edward L. Bernays, Propaganda
         1. Paul Niemi July 31, 2014 at 10:46 am

            The young Jung had pondered the question: What is consciousness? It was a puzzle until an event he experienced on a trip to Africa (”Memories, Dreams, Reflections”). In a village, a child was lost to a crocodile, but the villagers immediately told Jung it was not really a crocodile, it was obviously a shaman from a village a couple miles away. From that experience, he inferred the main requirement for consciousness to be a deductive awareness of self, because one’s knowledge of cause and effect is not possible without one knowing what is me and what is not me. On a more philosophical level, it illustrates the difference between Eastern and Western systems of knowledge, where in the Western tradition (and at the most basic level) I can know myself by recognizing what I am not, and in the Eastern tradition, by contrast, the self is encouraged to seek oneness in confluence with family and universe. I do believe crowds behave at a lower level of consciousness, but I wanted to try to fill in a little background for that.
            1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 7:01 pm

               “Crowds and Power” by Cannetti.
      2. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 9:42 am

         ” I assume that this is about a Baltimore Ravens player accused of beating his wife…..”

         Well, aren’t you the sharp one, Ed.

         But you forgot one possibility. Maybe she was just “aksin’ ” for it. Maybe she was just being annoying. Maybe she just deserved it. If it actually did happen, of course. If some “idiot” didn’t just make it up. (There was a security tape of him, dragging her out of an elevator, unconscious, by the way.)

         It’s too bad your “browser can’t access the article.” YOU were mentioned in it. The part about “lowest common denominator”–in the human sense.

         As for the “overthinking” comment, I’m wondering how you would know. You’ve got to master “thinking” first. Like thinking about actually reading the article before you embarrass yourself.
         1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:13 am

            Ed is right, the reason for someone to be fired is violation of his contract (or abandonment of a job) due to a conviction. Due process.
            1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 10:26 am

               “Due Process”…to the highest bidder with the deepest pocket(s)
            2. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 10:41 am

               Last time I checked, domestic abuse IS a crime. This guy wasn’t even CHARGED. And, per your comment, for obvious reasons.

               Football players have been charged with crimes before and even jailed, let alone fired. Admittedly, the crimes were far more serious than merely beating up women.

               Michael Vick was not only fired but went to prison for DOG FIGHTING and Plaxico Burress was fired and imprisoned for carrying a gun without a permit and SHOOTING HIMSELF.

               If this guy wasn’t a football player, they’d have slapped him in a private prison and thrown away the key so fast it’d make your head spin.
               1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:45 am

                  This guy wasn’t even CHARGED.

                  Why not?
                  Have the divorce papers been filed?
                  1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:48 am

                     If it’s on film, seems the wife/GF would have a irrefutable case w/ an enthusiastic attorney. First time it’s happened? hard to believe. She presumably has a restraining order now , right?
                  2. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 11:30 am

                     Well, now you get to the crux of it.

                     Actually she was his “girlfriend” at the time of the incident and has since become his “wife.” A choice she will have plenty of chances to regret, I have no doubt, if she lives to tell the tale. This is NEVER a one-off.

                     It has long been established that this is exactly why this particular crime is so prevalent and insidious–the pressure to ignore what happened and believe it will never happen again is immense. I can only imagine the pressure that she was under in this case. The whole damn city of Baltimore would have been screaming for her head.

                     Which is why most “law enforcement” recognizes the need to take the perpetrator into custody when abuse occurs regardless of what the victim says. Keep in mind, this guy hit her so hard he knocked her out. The video shows him dragging her from the elevator UNCONSCIOUS. HE would have been taken off the football field long before HE got knocked unconscious for HIS own protection according to NFL rules.

                     The whole idea that everything’s fine as long as the victim doesn’t “press charges” is old as dirt. And just as bogus. And everybody KNOWS it. In high profile, big money cases such as these, however, it’s just too convenient not to play that oftentimes deadly card.

                     Why don’t you guys know this?
                     1. MtnLife July 31, 2014 at 1:11 pm

                        I’m not sure if you know but BOTH of them got arrested for attacking each other. I’m not in any way condoning hitting a woman, especially to the point of unconsciousness, but she is definitely not an innocent here. The police have footage from the casino that is unreleased. I’m sure if he had started it they would have thrown the self-defense label on whatever she did so that seems to implicate her as the initiator of violence. Until they release the video there is no way to no whether he straight cocked her or if she was attacking him, say from behind, and in trying to get her off him (a la a Jay Z – Solange rematch with no bodyguard) accidentally hits her in the temple with his elbow. So maybe you should postpone the lynching until we know all the facts and not just rely on “because that’s how it happens in most cases” (which I’m an in no way denying). If this is a case of his fault and the cops/team/wife swept everything under the rug (again, entirely plausible but unproven), I imagine, to buy her cooperation, they included a golden parachute in their pre-nup if he so much as looks at her funny.
                        1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 1:29 pm

                           why the postponement? the league didn’t postpone the timeout in the corner…they know b/c he told them. you can hear the lawyers… ‘get in front of this and be done with it’.

                           i guess its too bad she can’t take a hit from one of our gladiators and move on with her 20.00 stuffed in her pocket
                        2. optimader July 31, 2014 at 1:30 pm

                           “I’m not sure if you know but BOTH of them got arrested for attacking each other.”
                           Performance art?

                           No one deserves to be assaulted or killed, but I certainly have less sympathy in affluent celebrity cases where the victim is making a risk/reward lifestyle decision vs poor people forced by circumstance.
                           OJ Simpson’s wife (and her BF) certainly didn’t deserve being murdered, but why was she still with him?

                           “The whole damn city of Baltimore would have been screaming for her head.”
                           Hyperbolic speculation

                           “HE would have been taken off the football field long before HE got knocked unconscious for HIS own protection according to NFL rules”
                           Is that true? I don’t watch football, but aren’t they ever taken of the field unconscious after a big hit? They certainly did when I was a kid
                           1. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 2:35 pm

                              OK, Opti, you’ve got to get out more.
                           2. optimader July 31, 2014 at 3:31 pm

                              OK, Opti, you’ve got to get out more.
                              Amen to that Kat!.
                              But I still wouldn’t know who any of these NFL asshats are by name. OK, one would have to be under a rock to not know about the OJS case as it permeated all media all the time, but this contemporary nonsense? I really am not tuned into any of this salacious domestic media sh*t, I think it a waste of personal bandwidth.
                        3. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 1:56 pm

                           Oh, brother. How condescendingly “fair and balanced” of you.

                           Don’t look now, but this is exactly the justification israel is using to excuse its pulverizing of Gaza.

                           We’re richer and bigger and stronger and could stop if we wanted to without consequence. But we don’t want to. And YOU started it.
                           1. MtnLife July 31, 2014 at 3:56 pm

                              You’re right, your actions are similar to Gaza. How different is it that Israel started the crackdown on Gaza because three Israeli teens were absolutely, positively “murdered by Hamas” (later proven to be false) because that’s the “most likely scenario” and you ready to crawl down Rice’s throat without seeing the actual incident? How come you are for a “fair and balanced” look at everything else but “eff it, he’s obviously guilty” here? Since they have video of them attacking each other, why are you defending (or at least not condemning) an obviously violent woman? I already stated I’m against violence against women. I’m not defending Rice. I’m asking to see the rest of the evidence before convicting him. If he’s the aggressor I’ll hand you the rope. If it’s her just don’t lose your zeal for the jugular. Since it’s seems obvious you’ve been the victim before I’ll offer up a big “I’m sorry” from the rest of us respectable gentlemen. I don’t like wife beaters nor do I like leaders of kangaroo court lynch mobs. Your analysis and opinion is usually dead on but you seem a little emotionally attached here. No, to head off your strawman, that was not a sexist remark saying something about emotional women. I’d say the same thing if a white guy who was beat up by a bunch of black guys and therefore judged all black men to be guilty of all violent accusations leveled at them.
                     2. Paul Tioxon August 1, 2014 at 12:30 am

                        Plenty of guys know what my father taught me, that if you hit a woman you are not a man. He did not qualify this with only if she is married and won’t press charges, or she is only a girlfriend, or whatever. He had a lot of simple declarative statements that stood on their own like that about men and women. He didn’t need to quote Hannah Arrendt or Reinhold Neiburh or who ever. He mostly got upset when reading or watching the news when these kind of stories came up, about women being beaten, anyone old beaten and hurt and the statement was always the same, over and over, they are not men. He did not go onto say what they were. What should be done to them. It is a good thing he wasn’t there because he had another saying. Better to be in jail than in the grave. He was in the Navy and among his many duties was Navy Shore Patrol in Norfolk. This was after WWII after spending years in the Philippine jungles fight the Japanese. He locked up a lot of drunken marines and sailors, among others. Especially the ones that would hit the women in the bars. He was called the sheriff. We have too many corrupt cops and not enough sheriffs that can keep the order in the social order.
               2. optimader July 31, 2014 at 11:09 am

                  Plaxico Burress
                  Don’t know who he is, but is it illegal to shoot yourself, I honestly don’t know.. or was it for an illegal discharge of a firearm in a residential area or such?
                  1. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 11:41 am

                     He was a football player.

                     It’s “illegal” if they say it’s “illegal.” If they don’t want it to be, it’s not.

                     You’re on this site a lot. Ever heard of TBTF banks?
                     1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 12:56 pm

                        Bifecta
                        Violent game and violent fans

                        A former Royal Marine and ‘loving dad’ has been battered to death in the street as he left a rugby game in South Africa.

                        Horrified witnesses said ‘placid’ Brett Williams, 29 – a South African-born British citizen – was severely beaten and kicked by a group of fans after accidentally bumping into a man after the match.

                        The murder followed a game between Durban Sharks and Melbourne Rebels on Saturday, and happened outside the home side’s supporters’ club.
                        1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 7:05 pm

                           Can “A Clockwork Orange” paradigm for progress be far behind?
                     2. optimader July 31, 2014 at 1:16 pm

                        Ok Katniss , you forced me to search this morons name..
                        So note to Plaxico : if you insist on being a nightclub gangsta w/a cocked gun tucked in your panties a Glock is a bad choice becasue they don’t have on/off safeties, but I guess he already had that object lesson.

                        Regarding his prosecution, if the Wiki entry is accurate, the “they” you refer to was a grand jury, and it sounds to me like they did the right thing, as well his employer. Excellently, his union didn’t even prevail for him financially. reads to me that this D-bag was appropriately spanked.

                        Accidental shooting[edit]

                        On November 28, 2008, Burress suffered an accidental, self-inflicted gunshot wound to his right thigh at the New York City nightclub LQ on Lexington Avenue in New York City when his Glock pistol in the pocket of his black-colored jeans began sliding down his leg; apparently in reaching for his gun, he inadvertently pressed the trigger, causing the gun to fire.[22] The Manhattan District Attorney stated Burress was in fact wearing jeans.[23] The injury was not life-threatening and Burress was released from an area hospital the next afternoon.[24] Two days later, Burress turned himself in to police to face charges of criminal possession of a handgun.[25] It was later discovered that New York City police learned about the incident only after seeing it on television and were not called by New York-Presbyterian Hospital as required by law. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg called the hospital actions an “outrage” and stated that they are a “chargeable offense”. Bloomberg also urged that Burress be prosecuted to the fullest extent, saying that any punishment short of the minimum 3½ years for unlawful carrying of a handgun would be “a mockery of the law.”[26][27] Burress had an expired concealed carry license from Florida, but no New York license.

                        On December 2, 2008, Burress posted bail of $100,000.[28] Later in the day, Burress reported to Giants Stadium as per team policy for injured but active players and was told he would be suspended without pay[29] for the remaining four games of the 2008 regular season for conduct detrimental to the team. In addition, the Giants placed Burress on their reserve/non-football injury list,[30] meaning he was ineligible to return for the playoffs. Burress was also scheduled to receive $1 million from his signing bonus on December 10, 2008, initially withheld by the team.[31] The NFL Players Association filed a grievance, saying the team violated the collective bargaining agreement and challenging the suspension and fine received by Burress.[32] A Special Master in arbitration subsequently ruled that the Giants must deliver the entire $1 million to Burress, as per the collective bargaining agreement. “To think that a player could carry a loaded gun into a nightclub, shoot himself and miss the rest of the season but get to keep his entire signing bonus illustrates one of the serious flaws in the current system,” said Giants co-owner John Mara in a statement afterward.[33]

                        On December 23, 2008, a search of Burress’ New Jersey home by the Totowa, New Jersey police, the New York Police Department, and investigators from the Manhattan District Attorney turned up a 9 mm handgun, a rifle, ammunition and the clothing believed to have been worn by Burress on the night of his accidental shooting.[34] On June 12, 2009 Burress’s attorney Benjamin Brafman announced that he had been unable to reach a sentencing agreement.[35]

                        Burress asked a Manhattan grand jury for sympathy during two hours of testimony on July 29, 2009.[36] On Monday, August 3, 2009, prosecutors announced that Burress had been indicted[37] by the grand jury on two counts of criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree, and a single count of reckless endangerment in the second degree, both felonies.[38][39]

                        On August 20, 2009, Burress accepted a plea deal that would put him in prison for two years with an additional two years of supervised release.[37] His sentencing was held on September 22, 2009. Burress hired a prison consultant to advise him on what to expect while in prison.[40] In January 2010, Burress applied for and was denied a work release from prison.[41] On June 6, 2011, Burress was released from a protective custody unit of the Oneida Correctional Facility in Rome, New York.[42][43]
                        1. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 2:29 pm

                           Read it before I commented. Wanted to get my “facts” straight.

                           Point is, he didn’t hurt anybody else. Only himself. And he paid BIG TIME. Stupid is as stupid does, but stupid is not a crime. Would that it were.

                           But he didn’t hurt anybody else.

                           Not so in Baltimore.

                           How different would this outcome have been if he would have killed her or caused permanent brain damage?

                           Two words: Oscar Pistorius.
                           1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 3:22 pm

                              “Plaxico Burress was fired and imprisoned for carrying a gun without a permit and SHOOTING HIMSELF…
                              Read it before I commented. Wanted to get my “facts” straight.”

                              He was not charged with shooting himself. He pleaded on two felonies, criminal possession of a firearm and reckless endangerment (presumably discharging said weapon in a public place.

                              “But he didn’t hurt anybody else.”
                              He surely did in so far as the wreckless endangerment count. He depreciated the public safety which hurt everyone in the nightclub that just incidentally were not struck by the bullet.

                              “How different would this outcome have been if he would have killed her or caused permanent brain damage?”
                              I would speculate it would then be elevated to
                              Manslaughter/1st degree murder in the case of the former and aggravated assault and/or attempted manslaughter/murder in the case of the latter.

                              Katniss,
                              Oscar Pistorius?
                              I must lead a sheltered life, I had to look up who he is too. What conclusion am I to draw? I’ll admit to not knowing the facts of the case, but the trial isn’t over is it? Based on my superficial reading, another object lesson fornot having loaded handguns in the bedroom.
                              http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider_Sabich

                              Who you did make me think of was:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaco_Pastorius
                              sad case, perhaps the best bass players from the fusion jazz era.
                              RIP Jaco
                           2. curlydan July 31, 2014 at 4:14 pm

                              This is a reply to optimater because I find myself in total agreement with Katniss but can’t find the reply link to right comment. Yes, Ray Rice would be taken off the field instantly if found with even the most minor signs of a concussion. Hell, the Chiefs (Kansas City Chiefs of the NFL since you don’t get out much) had about 3 really good players pulled from their recent playoff game with the Colts due to possible concussions. So yes, they are offered more protection–maybe because the attendance of 70K+ fans paying $100+ per ticket and $25+ per parking space demands a long-term investment, unlike the inattention given to those not blessed with abnormal size, speed, and muscle.

                              P.S. I always was incredulous about the reaction and punishment in the Plaxico Burress case…you think Johnny Manziel (Cleveland’s new QB) would have gotten the same punishment for the same offense?
                           3. optimader July 31, 2014 at 7:00 pm

                              Curly,
                              “Yes, Ray Rice would be taken off the field instantly if found with even the most minor signs of a concussion.”
                              I’m confident if you were to talk to a neurologist, they would not be able to establish what, (my rewording): “the signs of a most mild concussion” in fact are.
                              Its all BS, football players are concussing each other throughout every game

                              “So yes, they are offered more protection”
                              And that’s great, the team owners want to demonstrate they are using “best available technology” and are being “proactive”.

                              All with the objective of preserving the Brand and firewalling future liability.The fact of the matter is no matter what equipment, smoke and mirrors are thrown at the concussion phenomena it is a matter of simple physics. Regardless of what “shell is put on the egg, the G-force of the brain colliding with the cranium remains.
                              Higher velocity illustration of the endpoint are are highspeed auto racing accidents wherein the driver is traumatically decelerated and blood vessel/capillary wall are ruptured. It really doesn’t mater what protective gear they are wearing w/ this type of injury.. Football? Maybe not so a dramatic singular event, death of a thousand cuts instead.

                              I recall reading an interview of Jim McMahon a year or two ago, the Chicago Bears quarterback of my vintage. He confirms that he has early onset dementia with symptomatic personality changes, aggressive mood swings ect. Basically he is packing it in an Arizona trying to maximize time w/ his family before he forgets who they are.
                           4. optimader July 31, 2014 at 7:15 pm

                              BTW Curly,
                              Kat was kindly suggesting I get out more, don’t confuse that with don’t get out much!
                              We perhaps just find our recreation in different places..
                  2. ambrit July 31, 2014 at 5:47 pm

                     It is illegal to try and kill yourself. A friend of ours was charged with that. We mustn’t go and degrade useful productive resources now, can we.
                     1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 6:26 pm

                        I think it was unintentional but if he did hit the femoral artery and bled out in a minute or so, that might have been another posthumous felony to award him with?
                        Just kidding.

                        These professional sports are populated with thugs, the NFL NBA etc are utterly uninteresting to me. I feel bad that I’m indirectly subsidizing these clown w/ my tax dollars.

                        Ray Rice ?
                        Johnny Manziel ?
                        Plaxico Burress ?
                        Man I am soooo far out of the domestic sports loop I am pathetic..
         2. Whine Country July 31, 2014 at 10:29 am

            Ed touched a nerve, did he?
            1. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 10:51 am

               Obviously he “touched” one of mine. The question is, why didn’t he touch one of yours?
               1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 12:41 pm

                  its always a pleasure to witness your bulls-eye skill…no blood no mess
               2. Whine Country July 31, 2014 at 5:47 pm

                  He did. I posted above that the phrase bread and circuses came to my mind. I’s just that I’m a little more subtle than you and try to focus on the issue and not the person who carries it. In the language of the author of the phrase, panem et circenses, it is meant to describe the attitude of the citizens of Rome at the time of its death spiral. Apropos to the times I am suggesting. Also, in the words of those times the term ad hominem comes to mind. To Ed and his ilk, the NFL is their circus. Like it or leave it, but do not make Ed the point. With no disrespect to any person intended, the reality of this thread is that it is just another form of contemporary “circus”. Go ahead and vent, I am sympathetic to the views expressed, but the truth is that the dialogue is really accomplishing too little to justify the personal attacks. The venting circus is the only thing holding most from taking up Ulysses’ calling of yesterday and firing up the guillotines.
                  1. ambrit July 31, 2014 at 5:49 pm

                     We have steampunk guillotines now? Goody!
                     1. Ulysses July 31, 2014 at 11:45 pm

                        Steampunk and West Coast funk!
                        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acT_PSAZ7BQ
                        Very suitable for playing at work, lol
      3. optimader July 31, 2014 at 9:43 am

         Could be a signs of steroid abuse or early onset dementia

         “Firing people for non job related character or morality problems is basically for people holding make work jobs.”
         If a policy was instituted for firing people accused social behavior related legal infractions, there would be a spike in unemployment. The military come to mind.
         The notion professional athletes have a supplemental role as moral examples in our society is as absurd as it would have been for Romans to apply that standard to Gladiators. Football is intrinsically an activity focused on ultraviolence that aggregates people that have violent tendencies. Demonstrably that behavior can be reinforced through brain damage and/or drug abuse directly related to that sport. So far this is considered socially acceptable consequential damage intrinsic to the sport.
         1. cwaltz July 31, 2014 at 7:53 pm

            Uh the military DOES fire members for repeated bad behavior. I’m pretty darn sure that a military member that discharged his weapon at a club and then beat the crap out of his partner would be looking at a discharge.

            Just because it doesn’t make the news because military folks aren’t celebrities doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.

            http://www.ncbar.com/lamp/2010%20CLE/Domestic_Violence_Military_Response_and_Regulations%201.pdf
            1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 8:57 pm

               CWaltz

               I didnt have discharging a fire arm in a nightclub in mind , I was thinking about a reflection from a USN brass, may have been during the tailhook episode?, in anycase he said to the effect, “If moral turpitude were prosecuted in the USN there would be no one left to operate ships or aircraft..”
               What is a more historic meme for bad behavior than sailors on shore leave?
   2. Banger July 31, 2014 at 9:21 am

      Great comment–and the American football says a lot about USA’s culture and its collective unconscious. Symbols, collective institutions like sports, movies can tell us a deeper story about who we are. What do you suppose football says about us in the USA? Why are we so fascinated? What is it about war that Americans love and crave? Look at popular video games–what gives here? Are males automatically drawn towards war? Does Hedges’ book War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning apply here?
      1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:05 am

         “What do you suppose football says about us in the USA?”
         That NFL fans are more sedate and prefer a more vicarious role in sports related violence than their counterpart soccer(football if you prefer) fans in the rest of the world?

         …Russian fans accused of displaying neo-Nazi banners during the country’s opening World Cup match in Brazil, RT looks into the origins and the current state of Russian football hooliganism.

         …Soccer Referee Killed And Quartered By Fans In Brazil After Fatally Stabbing Player: POLICE

         …At least 50 people were killed when gunmen in two minibuses sped into a town on Kenya’s coast, shooting soccer fans watching a World Cup match

         …A Brazilian soccer fan was killed when he was struck in the head by a toilet bowl hurled from stadium stands as supporters of rival clubs clashed in the northeastern World Cup host city of Recife

         …At least 93 people were killed and more than 180 others were injured today when soccer fans surged forward in severely overcrowded stands at a match in the northern English city of Sheffield

         …On this day in 1971, 66 football (soccer) fans are killed in a stampede at a stadium in Glasgow, Scotland,

         Ad Infinitum…
         1. Banger July 31, 2014 at 12:22 pm

            Interesting because soccer hooliganism has little to do with the sport itself which is, by American standards, quite sedate. It can get rough but the point of the game is not, like basketball, to hit people. You can play soccer and hit no one whereas in USA football you have to hit people as part of the game.
            1. curlydan July 31, 2014 at 4:18 pm

               Unfortunately, soccer is not a sport without danger. Even now, when I do a header while playing with my son, it kind of rocks my brain a bit.

               From:
               http://www.headcasecompany.com/concussion_info/stats_on_concussions_sports

               Concussion Rates per Sport

               The below numbers indicate the amount of sports concussions taking place per 100,000 athletic exposures. An athletic exposure is defined as one athlete participating in one organized high school athletic practice or competition, regardless of the amount of time played.
               •Football: 64 -76.8
               •Boys’ ice hockey: 54
               •Girl’s soccer: 33
               •Boys’ lacrosse: 40 – 46.6
               •Girls’ lacrosse: 31 – 35
               •Boys’ soccer: 19 – 19.2
               •Boys’ wrestling: 22 – 23.9
               •Girls’ basketball: 18.6 – 21
               •Girls’ softball: 16 – 16.3
               •Boys’ basketball: 16 – 21.2
               •Girls’ field hockey: 22 – 24.9
               •Cheerleading: 11.5 to 14
               •Girls’ volleyball: 6 – 8.6
               •Boys’ baseball: Between 4.6 – 5
               •Girls’ gymnastics: 7
         2. MtnLife July 31, 2014 at 1:48 pm

            It seems almost as if there is a necessary amount of violence needed with every sport. Whether it comes on the field or in the stands doesn’t seem to matter as long as the target number is hit. In your soccer example the safest place to be is on the field and the worst in the stands. Look how many fights break out amongst parents at baseball games. In all my years of playing lacrosse I have never once seen a fight on the sidelines. That’s because we’ve met the quota on the field. Lacrosse is the most violent and dangerous team sport in the world – where else can you legally beat another human being with a stick, titanium no less, and have both sides call it fun? The Native Americans who created it called it the closest thing to war.
            As for health effects (commotio cordis is blunt force trauma to the chest causing cardiac arrest): “The mortality risk for lacrosse players as a result of commotio cordis (.63 deaths per 100,000 person-years) was significantly greater than any other sport except hockey (.53 deaths per 100,000 person-years) and baseball (.24 deaths per 100,000 person-years), even though those sports also employ hard and solid projectiles (e.g. pucks and baseballs).”
            http://www.momsteam.com/sports/risk-sudden-cardiac-death-from-ill-timed-blow-chest-commotio-cordis-highest-in-lacrosse-hockey#ixzz394HObpZY

            IIRC the Collosseum only had trouble in the stands when they didn’t feed enough Christians to the lions or have enough gladiator deaths. Seems the progress of civilization has changed little.
      2. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:08 am

         “What is it about war that Americans love and crave?”

         Is an American condition or a human condition?
         1. hunkerdown July 31, 2014 at 4:56 pm

            The social drinker vs. the alcoholic.
      3. Whine Country July 31, 2014 at 10:28 am

         “American football says a lot about USA’s culture and its collective unconscious.”

         The phrase “Bread and circuses” comes to mind.
         1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 11:06 am

            “The phrase “Bread and circuses” comes to mind.”
            Absolutely, strategies of control repeat through history.
            In one of the more historically pure forms, what do te goings on in the Bullfight Colosseum err.. Arena say about Spanish culture?
      4. Paul Niemi July 31, 2014 at 11:47 am

         Let’s contrast football in America with tug of war in Japan. Both are team sports, yet one accentuates the individual and the other one the group. In football, the focus follows the ball from one individual to another, and only one person at a time can score. In tug of war, the group wins or loses together, with no single person standing out. In football, the comments are something like, “Did you see what he just did?” It is a showcase of the individual, in the context of a game between two opposing teams. Western culture accentuates the separateness of personalities, and respects the egos that protect each person’s uniqueness, so games that permit individuals to stand out from the crowd are in keeping with Western norms. On the other hand, Eastern culture de-emphasizes the individual while accentuating the family or group, so games that involve working together like tug of war are popular.
         1. Robert Dudek July 31, 2014 at 1:37 pm

            How then do you explain the fact that highly individualistic sumo is most deeply connected sport to the Japanese psyche.
            1. Kurt Sperry July 31, 2014 at 5:06 pm

               I was thinking the exact same. I used to watch the highlights of all the big sumo tournaments when they were part of the NHK Tokyo English language news rebroadcast by PBS. Very similar skillset to being an NFL interior lineman.
            2. Paul Niemi July 31, 2014 at 7:05 pm

               To explain the individualistic nature of Sumo, I would point out that it is associated with Shinto, the original native religion of Japan, and it is as old. It is the influence of the Buddhist religion, which came later, that de-emphasizes the individual.
               1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 7:21 pm

                  Thanks Paul for your post of insights today…i never miss your swirls.
                  1. Paul Niemi July 31, 2014 at 8:27 pm

                     I enjoy myself here, and I get to be with some very bright people and keep learning.
      5. Skeptic July 31, 2014 at 4:13 pm

         What does anyone expect from American and now Global Sportz, including Olympics, FIFA, etc. They are all controlled, mostly in a monopolistic fashion, by the 1% to pacify the 99% and to sell and shill their shoddy, useless, damaging products, like booze, fats foods, snake oils, glitzy autos, Mephones, etc. This includes college sportz all the way down to tiny tykes who sport the logoes and advertising of the 1% corporadoes. Look also to all those public subsidies also which are proven to be wasted cash. Who pays for all those Military Flyovers and Honor Guards they roll out at the stadia?

         Yet, most people, even some alternative folk have their favorite teams and events. I have often seen alternative people sporting logoed athletic gear and hats, shoes, etc. Shilling for their enemies, the 1% Owners. If the 99% want to hang themselves, the 1% will happily provide the Ballpark, admission charged of course.
         1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 7:15 pm

            No one yet has mentioned sports betting, that Kissinger specialty.
4. Butch In Waukegan July 31, 2014 at 8:03 am

   Here is Greg Palast’s short bio of Paul Singer (pre Judge Griesa). There’s an interesting tidbit about Singer’s “support” for gay marriage.
   1. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 9:52 am

      Link damaged….corrected

      http://www.gregpalast.com/the-vulture-chewing-argentinas-living-corpse/
5. vidimi July 31, 2014 at 8:07 am

   http://www.gregpalast.com/getting-into-massas-drawersthe-truly-creepy-details-of-the-congressmans-behavior/
6. James Levy July 31, 2014 at 8:12 am

   About this Russian threat thing…

   Russia is no threat. It would have a tough time gobbling up Ukraine. It’s power projection capacity is very limited, and beyond its immediate borders it can’t fight a war successfully.

   That said, I am starting to dimly see what the idiots in Washington and Tel Aviv imagine when they use the word threat. It means that Russia and the Palestinians are threatening to possess enough strength and self-confidence that they can’t be pushed around at will. The Americans and Israelis are actually terrified, not of being defeated and overrun (which isn’t going to happen), but of not being obeyed! Both ruling elites seem to have a pathological need to be feared and obeyed. Any threat to this is meant with the most brutal response. Such are the dangerously weak psyches running these two nuclear-armed states. What pathetic jerks these people are.
   1. thepanzer July 31, 2014 at 2:12 pm

      Yup. And the reason they’re over-reacting to “threats” is due to fear based on knowing they’re losing control. So expect both nations to behave even more unhinged as time goes on. Ironically, the more radical the violence they unleash the less control they’ll have as time goes on. The cycle will continue until the US economy and the petro-dollar finally buckle, and uncle Sam can no longer give a blank check to Israel and itself. But the next few decades are going to be a rough and bloody ride to get there.
   2. Banger July 31, 2014 at 5:49 pm

      There is no threat from any of the corners the official Narrative claims–the whole National Security State is a racket as General Smedley Butler claimed. We are threatened by the finance oligarchs and the State not anyone else other than the usual array of criminal gangs whether narcos or whatever.
7. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 8:33 am

   Argie bankers say their gov pulled the rug out from under them:

   According to trusted sources in the financial sector, minutes before [economic minister Axel Kicillof’s] press conference [at the Argentine consulate in New York], an agreement between the banks and Elliott was practically sealed.

   In principle, the entities of Adeba [Argentine Banking Association] were willing to purchase the vulture funds’ debt, valued at $1.75 billion. Their offer consisted of a first payment of $200 million to be followed by two others: one of $300 million in September and another $100 million in November.

   From 2015, when the RUFO clause lapsed, the Argentine government would cover the rest of the payments and buy the debt held by the private entities.

   But, as it became known in the City [Bs As financial district], Kicillof’s harsh speech undermined the proposal from the banks. Argentine stocks traded after hours in New York reacted immediately with heavy losses.

   “It was not clear in the speech that the government would support us,” argued a banker. “What Kicillof doesn’t understand is that each of his outbursts cost us $100 million,” let slip the source on condition of anonymity.

   And so, fearing that the Argentine government would not comply from January with its part of the bargain, the holdouts demanded from the banks a payment of at least $900 million (not $ 600 million as before), which would have stymied the negotiations.

   “Tomorrow morning will be a new ‘D-Day’,” said another banker. “Meanwhile, the negotiators stopped everything awaiting further instructions,” he said cryptically.

   http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1714507-la-argentina-esta-en-default-no-llego-a-un-acuerdo-con-los-fondos-buitre
   1. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 9:16 am

      La Nación got hold of the banks’ indemnification proposal to the Argentine central bank:

      Buenos Aires, 29th July 2014

      We are pleased to address Mr President to inform you that the undersigned banks intend to purchase domestic bonds subject to the Fiscal Agency Agreement, whose current holders did not not participate in the exchange in 2007 and are currently in litigation [case citation], and the legal and judicial rights inherent therein.

      With the understanding that this operation is convenient for national interests, in general, and the financial system in particular, we ask the Central Bank of Argentina that, for the purposes of enabling the same, admit that the assets and liabilities generated or derivatives thereof are to be incorporated into the financial statements of the banks without affecting current compliance with their technical relations or the rest of the regulations issued by the Central Bank.

      We also request that, if necessary, foreign exchange authorizations be granted that correspond to making this operation viable, as well as providing that assets received be valued at a minimum of their acquisition cost.

      Without further ado, we salute you with our highest consideration.

      Messrs

      Banco Central de la Republica Argentina

      President Juan Carlos Fabrega

      S_______________ / _____________________D
      1. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 9:16 am

         First sentence ‘domestic’ should be ‘national bonds.’
         1. Chauncey Gardiner July 31, 2014 at 12:17 pm

            http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-07-31/argentine-bonds-halt-two-day-rally-after-non-payment-on-debt.html

            … “Buenos Aires-based newspaper Ambito reported today that banks including Citigroup Inc. (C) have agreed to buy defaulted bonds from Elliott Management Corp. and other holders, paving the way for Argentina to resume paying its debt. Cabinet Chief Jorge Capitanich said in the capital that the government isn’t involved in talks with private parties.”
            1. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 12:56 pm

               These rumored bank deals might be connected with credit default swaps which they wrote.

               Meanwhile, The Economist offers a little perspective:

               ON JULY 30th Argentina defaulted for the second time in 13 years, and for the eighth time in its history. That makes it one of the world’s most serial sovereign defaulters.

               Nine of the top ten defaulters are from Latin America, although many have shown no trace of the debt-default disease for decades. That, alas, is plainly not the case for Argentina.

               http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2014/07/daily-chart-23
               1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 1:59 pm

                  If only the banksters hadn’t been forced to lend to them!
                  1. Chauncey Gardiner July 31, 2014 at 2:33 pm

                     Bingo!… Debt as a power and control tool. Where was the underwriting responsibility in this sad chapter, or was there something else in play?
         2. Alejandro July 31, 2014 at 12:25 pm

            A feeble op-ed is certainly an improvement over the gossip column, but still…finance with the sophistic-aided support of politricks keeps munching away at the somnambulated host. The distinction between parasitic and saprophytic becomes blurrier without a forensic audit and the clouds of illegitimacy that this implies. No ‘Public’ forecasting of cloudiness with increasing chance of rain. Also not clear is how the weather might affect the flight of certain birds.
   2. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 7:45 pm

      How did the top ten “Wall Street Banks” on the hook as Singer counterparties in the CDS deal figure into this treachery? It was Michael Hudson who wondered who Singer had on the (meat)hook to pay him, if Argentina did not. “Crooked” doesn’t begin to cover the nefarious double-crossing, triple-crossing bankster hedge class.
8. trish July 31, 2014 at 8:36 am

   re Artist encourages fly larvae to build themselves solid gold shells

   These are pretty cool creatures. incidentally, caddisflies are not flies. they are their own order of insects, Trichoptera, and are indeed closely related to moths and butterflies. (I showed this link to my son- he felt the need to correct this).

   we once found a little caterpillar (Synchlora aerata) in a sea of wild mint called that covered itself with the flowers (looked like a moving mint flower!) for camouflage (vs the defensive shell for the caddisfly).
9. mark July 31, 2014 at 8:49 am

   This is a very interesting, well made documentary from David Suzuki, the Nature of Things, about beavers saving streams and wetlands, and being reintroduced. Three separate segments, including the last one about a man in Quebec who realized that he could direct their building activity by placing recordings of running water, in the location he wanted them to build.

   Also a section about people doing similar work in North West USA.

   http://www.cbc.ca/player/Shows/ID/2363183150/
   1. Carolinian July 31, 2014 at 9:59 am

      Cool. Beavers can be destructive if there are trees that you care about. In our local park they had to put hardware cloth fencing around the submerged trunks of growing cypress trees.
      1. different clue August 1, 2014 at 3:03 pm

         The beavers might well say that we are destructive in our obstruction and pre-emption of wonderful beaverdam sites for our own “no beavers allowed” purposes. Indian Nations persons might well think in a similar manner.

         Perhaps we can learn to start repecting the many ecosystem services and enhancements ( water retention, flat beaverdam meadow buildup, etc.) that beavers used to provide here. Perhaps we could decide to let beavers restore themselves and all the surrounding beaverlands
         in at least some parts of the country.
10. James Levy July 31, 2014 at 9:06 am

    From the Perlstein interview at Salon:

    “My favorite discovery in this regard was when Samantha Power is chosen to be ambassador to the U.N.; she’d written a magazine article in 2003 in which she wrote American foreign policy needed a “historical reckoning” for crimes “committed or sponsored.” That’s the kind of reckoning we were having in the 1970s, with the Church committee. Marco Rubio brought this up in her confirmation hearing and asked her for examples of the crimes, and the response was that America is the greatest country in the world and has nothing to apologize for. So that’s where we’re at today.”

    Whatever people want to say about Chris Hedges, can you find a better example of the gutless death of the liberal class? Of the betrayal of the educated bourgeoisie for a shot at power and notoriety? Did she get 30 pieces of silver with that ambassadorship?

    People like to say, “such has it always been”, but when the Army lawyer said to McCarthy “have you, in the end, no shame?” it still struck a cord among plenty of Americans. Today, if I asked any Obama or Bush appointee the same question, they’d laugh in my face.
    1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 7:49 pm

       They are hardened whores, and we must face it.
11. Ulysses July 31, 2014 at 9:53 am

    From the linked article: “Police in New York City are said to be examining some 18,000 license plate numbers, looking through social media, poring over cell phone communications, and possibly collecting DNA in an investigation into who climbed the Brooklyn Bridge late at night to plant two bleached-white American flags.

    Officers are looking for “a skateboarder and four others” believed to be in their late teens or early 20s. Investigators have not had luck in using facial recognition software on security footage gathered from the site.”

    These types of pranks always make authoritarians very nervous, since it exposes the fact that they don’t control us as much as they would like to believe. Imagine if a fraction of this investigative energy was focused on putting obviously criminal banksters like Jamie Dimon behind bars!!
    1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 10:24 am

       “a fraction of this investigative energy was focused on putting obviously criminal banksters like Jamie Dimon behind bars”…

       “Whether the mask is labeled fascism, democracy, or dictatorship of the proletariat, our great adversary remains the apparatus—the bureaucracy, the police, the military. Not the one facing us across the frontier of the battle lines, which is not so much our enemy as our brothers’ enemy, but the one that calls itself our protector and makes us its slaves. No matter what the circumstances, the worst betrayal will always be to subordinate ourselves to this apparatus and to trample underfoot, in its service, all human values in ourselves and in others.” Simone Weil
       (yep, what she said)
    2. diptherio July 31, 2014 at 10:57 am

       I’m glad to hear that there is so little actual crime going on in NYC that the NYPD can devote all their resources to figuring out which teenagers are clever enough to pull off this pretty sweet, and harmless, prank. I’m sure if anything of more import were going on in the city, they’d be focused on that, right? [/sarc]

       Every Halloween some goddamned geniuses manage to place a pumpkin on the steeple of our university main hall clocktower. It’s amazing…and no police time (that I know of) has ever been devoted to figuring out whodunit.
       1. Fíréan July 31, 2014 at 12:04 pm

          Re. Brooklyn Bridge prank.
          In Berlin, Germany, no deep investigation using face recognition nor dna, or other, was required to reveal the artist who performed this “prank” (july 19 2014 )
          http://www.whudat.de/nsa-in-da-house-light-projection-onto-us-embassy-in-berlin-5-pictures-clip/

          (This is a link to a German website, if wishing to view at a usa website, or other language site, search : Oliver Bienkowski “nsa in da house” )
       2. Katniss Everdeen July 31, 2014 at 12:10 pm

          I sure don’t know what you all are giggling about. The US doesn’t do innocent “pranks” anymore.

          By the time this is over, skateboards will be considered WMD.

          Homeland Security doesn’t take kindly to being made fools of.
          1. ambrit July 31, 2014 at 5:58 pm

             It’s more of a case of being exposed for the fools they already are. (As for skateboards, et. al.; have you ever slowed down in some ‘inner city’ environment and looked for all the “No ——ing” signs? It gets really absurd after a while. The act of forbidding something ends up being the justification for the Police Power used to do the suppressing.)
12. mundanomaniac July 31, 2014 at 10:00 am

    is it possible that NC missed something?

    http://astromundanediary.blogspot.de/2014/07/walking-over-ther-market.html
13. mundanomaniac July 31, 2014 at 10:25 am

    sorry I posted No. 2, intended was this No. 1
    http://astromundanediary.blogspot.de/2014/07/mundanomaniac-in-apokalyptic-times.html
    1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 10:44 pm

       This is called “link whoring.” Stop it. It’s a Rule #1 violation.
14. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:42 am

    Anti-Surveillance Camouflage for Your Face The Atlantic
    This is more honestly a BS article about how to be a Gen Whateva fashion public spectacle.

    “…On the first day, it wasn’t until I left my friends that I started running into problems. In an organic market that also functions as a bar and deli, two women asked me why I had the make-up on. I tried to explain…”

    Skimmed the article in vane looking for any indication of demonstrated efficacy

    Robby, News Flash… try large sunglasses, preferably mirrored, and a hat if you want to be less of a public spectacle next time you want to “avoid surveillance”..
    1. optimader July 31, 2014 at 12:44 pm

       HAHA Gotta love my spellcheck marm! vane =vain
15. diptherio July 31, 2014 at 10:46 am

    Re: U.S. economy back on track

    Consumer spending growth, which accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, accelerated at a 2.5 percent pace, as Americans bought long-lasting manufactured goods, mostly automobiles, and spent a bit more on services.

    Don’t suppose that uptick in car sales has anything to do with the new sub-prime car loans Wall Street is so eager to make, package, and sell-off…no, nothing at all. And a “bit more” on services, eh? One suspects that this might be the effect of previously un-insured persons now paying monthly premiums for nearly un-usable insurance.

    “Firming fundamentals”…still not buying it. Oh, and let’s not forget that savings is up. Savings and spending, you might recall, are inverse. So how are sales and savings increasing at the same time? I mean, being on a 4 percent yearly growth trajectory surely means that sales in the economy must be increasing, right? But so is savings…so what’s going on here?
    1. craazyboy July 31, 2014 at 12:33 pm

       Big raises for everyone is the only other variable that can change. Or price deflation can do it too…maybe imputed rents (40% of CPI) came down a lot, making the GDP deflator show a big uptick in real growth?

       A case of congressional election season reality (imputed rents at the BLS) positively impacting our “real GDP growth” numbers, perhaps?

       I could look into it further to see if my theory holds up, but that would require some effort on my part, so I don’t think I’ll bother :)

       Besides, it’s easy to fudge the “initial” report data anyway, and revisions 2 and 3 come months later after “firmer” data is collected. Then there is channel stuffing by the automakers, (Gubmint Motors..hahaha Republicans) and shipping a car to a dealer is counted as a sale in GDP data! But making lots of junk car loans will clear the new car lots sooner or later. The repos go to auction later, but that doesn’t matter.

       But remember the really good part is if you have some savings and are looking for a little yield, you can buy some securitized consumer loan products that pay out 4% or 5%!
       1. diptherio July 31, 2014 at 1:11 pm

          Here’s another head scratcher: GDP is up but…

          The GDP report comes amid several reports pointing to an economic slowdown. Late last week, a number of consumer-oriented companies posted weaker-than-expected sales figures and projections, including Amazon, the largest online retailer, Wal-Mart, the largest brick-and-mortar retailer, and Visa, the credit and debit card transaction company.

          Of course, one expects the numbers to be fudged. It’s just gotten to ridiculous levels with the conflicting data. I guess that’s what happens when your economic stimulus plan consists of giving free loans to rich people…
          1. diptherio July 31, 2014 at 1:13 pm

             quote is from the WSWS link below.
          2. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 2:25 pm

             If there were no conflicting data, we’d all be rich. Meanwhile, the Conference Board leading economic index is still rising steadily (see chart on second page):

             http://www.conference-board.org/pdf_free/press/PressPDF_5241_1405674010.pdf
16. Banger July 31, 2014 at 10:53 am

    The Gaza situation unwinding before our eyes is a stunning spectacle of Anglo-Zionist political priorities. The way the media is playing this story goes beyond the absurdity of the way they have been playing Ukraine.

    I recommend reading the link supplied above “The Logic of Israeli Violence” which gives a pretty good list of things the Israelis are targeting–the idea is to keep Gaza unable to create a viable economy and reasonable life. This all reminds me of child abuse. The parents re-enforce the negative behavior by their own even more negative behavior and over-reaction to trivial. Affairs. Clean up your room! No. No? I’ll show you–and then the child is beaten within an inch of its life. And then the parent wonders why the child turns up in juivee. WTF? The Israel/Palestine conflict could have been solved long ago but all the actors on all sides wanted, in my view, the conflict to fester for their own political reasons. Now it’s too late. The only solution is a “final solution”–that is, I believe, now Israeli policy. Removal of Arabs from both the West Bank and Gaza. It certainly would be more merciful and, in the long run, cheaper for the U.S. to pay to relocate these people elsewhere with decent compensation packages. Does anyone out there have another solutions?

    Whatever you may think–you cannot get Israel to change policies. It has nuclear weapons and will use them if it has to. It has infiltrated the U.S. National Security State at all levels particular intel. It, as far as ME policy is concerned owns Congress and the MSM. What chance is there for any other solution but more of the status-quo, i.e., constant war and tension. If Israel were Northern Ireland a similar peace could have been brokered but not there?
    1. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 2:33 pm

       ‘The only solution is a “final solution”–that is, I believe, now Israeli policy. Removal of Arabs from both the West Bank and Gaza. It certainly would be more merciful and, in the long run, cheaper for the U.S. to pay to relocate these people elsewhere with decent compensation packages.’

       You’re making a couple of big leaps there. One is concluding that the Arabs should leave rather than the Israelis, simply because of ‘facts on the ground.’ And second, that somehow it’s our responsibility to pay for it.

       US aid to Israel since 1948, adjusted to cumulative 2014 dollars, is in the neighborhood of a half trillion. And look at the genocidal mess it made.

       Best U.S. option at this point would be to rend its clothes, beat its chest, loudly proclaim ‘we are worthless,’ and then exit the building via the back door.
       1. MikeNY July 31, 2014 at 5:23 pm

          ITA.

          Yes, we played a big part in breaking it, but we can’t fix it.
       2. Banger July 31, 2014 at 5:54 pm

          Facts on the ground are what counts. Politics is not a contest of competing sermons but a display of force. Some sermons have had force and power when spoken by fearless giants like MLK–but that sort of person comes along rarely.
          1. Glenn Condell July 31, 2014 at 8:17 pm

             ‘The only solution is a “final solution”–that is, I believe, now Israeli policy. Removal of Arabs from both the West Bank and Gaza. It certainly would be more merciful and, in the long run, cheaper for the U.S. to pay to relocate these people elsewhere with decent compensation packages. Does anyone out there have another solutions?’

             Removal of Israelis to behind the Green Line would be (a) fairer, (b) cheaper, and c) far more effective. Threaten to withhold aid, that would concentrate their minds wonderfully. If the settlers have to go somewhere, there’s plenty of room in Birobizhdan, and an existing population that would welcome them.

             ‘Facts on the ground are what counts’

             Huh? That sounds a bit defeatist coming from you. To paraphrase Downing, fixing the morality around the facts, in fact.

             ‘Some sermons have had force and power when spoken by fearless giants like MLK–but that sort of person comes along rarely.’

             He was special, agreed, but sermons of force and power on this issue are legion. However no sermon can move mountains if no-one hears it. Even King couldn’t have gained traction if his tirades went unreported and unnoticed. Also, celebrities, actors and singers and even some pollies are clearing their throats in much greater numbers than before. Israel is creating a lasting global opposition, and it seems almost to be willing this on.

             We should not give up in the face of murderous intransigence, or wait for a saviour to come along.
             1. different clue August 1, 2014 at 3:13 pm

                Yes. It would cost less money to pay off a half million illegal settlers in the West Bank, Arab East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights and forcibly remove them from those places than it would cost to pay off 4 million or so Palestinians from Gaza, the West Bank, and Arab East Jerusalem. It might require more concentrated violence to remove the illegal settlers because it would require a civil war by the Lesser Israel Israelis against the Greater Israel Israelis.
                That is a civil war which Israel should have had when Rabin was assassinated and a bare majority of Lesser Israel Israelis might have been scared and bitter enough to crush the Greater Israel Israelis into utter submission to following the Oslo Process all the way to a Free State of Palestine outcome. It may be too late for the Lesser Israel Israelis to win such a civil war now. Their only alternative may be a mass exodus and a washing of the hands with regard to the Greater Israel Israelis and their Greater Israel.
       3. YY July 31, 2014 at 9:48 pm

          Fixing Gaza or fixing the West Bank may be mechanically possible with mass “exodus” and re-population elsewhere on some other culture’s soil displacing some other people. Alternately a total genocide may be viewed as a fix. But a fix to what problem? Even with absence of Palestinians to complain, the current Israeli mindset as manifest in the “democratic” consensus isn’t going to change. The reason for the mindset can be a threat as far away and theoretical as the Iranian nukes or back in history 60 years. One can kick the can down the road another 50 years to really entrench the mindset currently driving the cruel wanton killing in Gaza. What is needed an acceptance of historical wrongs/injustice/warts and coming to terms with it. No one is guilty of what occurred before one was born. but they are certainly responsible, to whatever extent, of what goes on today. Confuse the two and no progress is possible.
    2. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 8:01 pm

       The real “final solution” is to make “Israelis” hit the road. I do think most Americans would consent to another Big Israeli Reservation in Alaska or TX (already in the making), like the so-called “Jewish retirement colonies” already multiplying in the States. But, no. This is about the RothMonarchy Uber Alles in Tel Aviv and the splendid revenge of “next year in Jerusalem” the Finance Messiah cometh to rule and reign over all the Earth, it’s about the global supremacy of that One Square Mile in “London” – with heavies in D.C. doing their dirty work.
17. sd July 31, 2014 at 11:22 am

    Iceland is sending its former Prime Minister and hard core neoliberalist, Geir Haarde, to the US as an ambassador. The hilarious part is that he was the PM when their economy blew up. He’s a well known puppet for barking mad David Oddsson.
    While Icelandic politics may look provincial, I’d argue they are the proverbial canary in the coal mine.
    1. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 12:54 pm

       lawd, he can continue to whine from over there… what is being aligned here??

       During the trial, he said: “None of us realized at the time that there was something fishy within the banking system itself, as now appears to have been the case.
       I think it’s illogical to think that I or anyone else in the government could have reduced the size of the banks to a greater extent than was done at the time.”
       …more shivers
       1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 8:03 pm

          He said this under oath, right?
    2. Kurt Sperry July 31, 2014 at 5:35 pm

       My Icelandic acquaintances are definitely doing a big WTF about this.
18. Tyler July 31, 2014 at 11:28 am

    US economy grew at 4.0 percent in second quarter – http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/07/31/econ-j31.html
    1. craazyboy July 31, 2014 at 12:04 pm

       Sure it did.
       1. Eureka Springs July 31, 2014 at 12:52 pm

          Hey, I hear business in Honduran refugees is booming, particularly children… and bullets and bombs on Palestinians, Syrians, Iraqis and Ukrainians…. potentially Russians… the biggest, most explosive growth 777 jackpot of all.

          If the hole in my pocket grew 4%, yet I dropped less change in the pocket while everything from insurance to internet went up… and I had to replace a window ac unit (crapified, less than 5 year old) three times in one week just to get a working new unit… did the economy growing really mean anything?
19. EmilianoZ July 31, 2014 at 11:32 am

    Can we have some news of yesterday’s meetup in SF? It would be a good idea if after each meetup an attendee would volunteer to write a short account. Proust started his career writing witty accounts of soirees mondaines in Parisian salons. They were published in newspapers such as Le Figaro. So, it’s not a genre to sniff at. I’m sure witty things worth recounting were said by Yves and others.
    1. nobody July 31, 2014 at 12:55 pm

       Excellent suggestion.
    2. abynormal July 31, 2014 at 1:14 pm

       maybe what happens in the meet-up, stays in the meet-up’)
       1. ambrit July 31, 2014 at 6:06 pm

          Sort of like a meeting of the Illuminati?
          1. Paul Tioxon August 1, 2014 at 12:37 am

             Those who know don’t say, those who say, don’t know. Shhhhhhhh!!!
20. EmilianoZ July 31, 2014 at 11:38 am

    US re-provisions Israel munition-wise:

    http://www.businessinsider.com/us-provides-ammunition-israel-attack-un-school-2014-7
    1. Jake Mudrosti July 31, 2014 at 4:19 pm

       There they go:
       “S.2673 – A bill to enhance the strategic partnership between the United States and Israel.”
       Sponsor: Sen. Boxer, Barbara [D-CA] (Introduced 07/28/2014)
       https://beta.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate-bill/2673/cosponsors
       Number of cosponsors at the time of this posting: 80
       1. Andrew Watts July 31, 2014 at 6:37 pm

          It’s an election year. Campaign money.

          NOM NOM NOM.
          1. Jim Haygood July 31, 2014 at 6:47 pm

             Pander to the 2.5 percenters: works every time … till it doesn’t.

             Someday that big dam on a sandy foundation is gonna crack.
       2. Glenn Condell July 31, 2014 at 8:28 pm

          Wasn’t she one of the few sane Congress-critters during ‘let’s invade Iraq 2’?

          I guess blood is thicker than patriotism, or something. The trick seems to be in managing to elide one with the other.
21. Benedict@Large July 31, 2014 at 1:28 pm

    Regarding O-Care rollout problems, the administration from the start refused to work with people willing to identify problems. They wanted Yes Men, and in DC, there were no shortage. This explains why the failure of a timely roll-out was so late. Insiders certainly knew much earlier, and it was obvious to me simply by the lack of chatter that usually comes out when a major project is hitting its marks.

    These same Yes Men also refused to identify that the interface could not do what is was supposed to do because what was being asked was impossible. The top laugher, and one I tried to bring to the forefront even as the law was being written, is that the law pretty much required a person’s income to be known before they ever made it. Now that’s something people In DC would think possible, given they are salaried and do know this in advance, but out in the real world, and in particular the world to which the interfaces would be marketing, these sorts of things are not known. (Typical DC disconnect.) Part-time workers, private contractors simply can only guess at this, and O-Care was not designed as guessing-friendly (those it should have been and would have been if realists had been put on staff up front).
    1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 2:09 pm

       Yes, the ObamaCare rollout shows utter dysfunction. That Obama was swanning around praising the site days before launch is so….. so… I don’t even know where to begin, and of course the political class just hums and whistles and looks in some other direction. I tend to think that Obama isn’t capable of hearing bad news (“no drama”). So people don’t tell him anything and pray things don’t blow up. This is a highly unfortunate characteristic for any Preznit to have, especially since there was been rather a lot of bad news about.
       1. thepanzer July 31, 2014 at 2:21 pm

          I’ve wondered before, does he just avoid the google entirely?

          I for one, will be popping large bags of popcorn to watch Obama spend the next few decades explaining, to an every more angry and scape-goat searching populace, why exactly he sat on his ass on climate change, resource depletion, letting the surveillance state do whatever it wants, and all the other messes he’s been “leading from behind” on.
          1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 4:53 pm

             Ha. You might like this patter song. “In enterprise of martial kind”–
             1. Paul Tioxon August 1, 2014 at 12:54 am

                Lambert,
                I’m sorry, I really could not understand one phrase in that entire song, which I’m sure is witty. For the most part my Irish bias for England and it’s culture ends with Monty Python and the Beatles, the Stones, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and Fairport Convention etc. In the odd chance that others have no idea what was being said in yr clip, may I offer something from Column B. Classic American Broadway Musical, which at least I can understand, not that I didn’t try twice.

                THE COUNTRY IS IN THE VERY BEST OF HANDS from LIL ABNER
                The more things change the more they stay the same, except for farm parity.

                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwqPBlSxb-0
          2. different clue August 1, 2014 at 3:17 pm

             He’ll be too busy counting all his beautiful money and getting his beautiful daughters married to bond sharks to bother listening to what the non-rich majority might say about him or anything else.
22. TreatyLawonYourAssForever July 31, 2014 at 2:55 pm

    Ooh, look, National Clandestine Service sleeper cells at State franticly trying to obstruct justice for their *ss-raping, d*ck-slitting, live-burying, waterboarding, knee-pulping bosses like Brennan and Rodriguez and Cofer Black.

    “These interrogation methods were debated in our free media, challenged in our independent courts, and, just two years after their introduction, restricted by an act of our Congress [Yeah, IN 1994] sponsored by Senator John McCain and overwhelmingly backed by members of both of our political parties. In 2008, both the Democratic and Republican candidates for president disavowed the use of torture. [Whereupon head torture scumbag Barack Obama then refouled three poor bastards to Algeria for thorough flensing.]”

    And those are all the questions they can think of? You want questions, wait till the CAT gets them by the short hairs in November. These rough tough torture cowards love to beat em up when the troops bring em in and tie em up so that it’s safe, but when it’s time to get their day in court they’re all afraid in tearful sissy tantrums. Ollie North and G. Gordon Liddy took their medicine but these chickenshits, Brennan and Rodriguez and Cofer Black, are ever-so-scared of jail.

    Are you quite sure Jose took care of all the tapes?
    1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 4:45 pm

       No, silly, he kept copies! Wouldn’t you? (In fact, the elite version of solidarity is everybody having tapes on each other, at least plausibly.)
       1. hunkerdown August 1, 2014 at 12:40 am

          Funny how they want us to pretend we’re islands and abstain from even the slightest independent judgment on others, innit.
    2. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 8:20 pm

       Etched deeply into Brennan’s face is the message: I am evil beyond any measure you can imagine, don’t fck with me.” Knee-breaking has been superceeded by an act much more agonizing and long-lasting: the torturer with muscular thighs hits his knee with full force into the outer mid-thigh sciatic nerve to produce excruciating pain beyond imagining in the victim not once, not twice, not thrice, but scores of time, stopping only after the death of the victim. Only diabolical fiends, sadistic monsters, design and do this killer conditioning. They are in the CIA and all “intel” black ops regimes commonly referred to collectively as “the CIA.” The name for this quality of evil behind such “exquisite” torture putting the Marquis de Sade to shame, is “psychosis.” Deal with it.
23. Oregoncharles July 31, 2014 at 3:41 pm

    “Anti-Surveillance Camouflage for Your Face”
    Strange and beautiful. A living Captcha. i read the whole essay, which is rare, especially if it isn’t political. But it also casts an odd light on the world we live in.
    1. ambrit July 31, 2014 at 6:10 pm

       That and Putins putting out a decent reward for the “breaking” of Tor tell us reams about our common distress.
24. Tre*tyL*wonYour*ssForever July 31, 2014 at 5:44 pm

    Damn straight, Jose’s psycho, not stupid. You know who else got tapes, up the kazoo? Who knows where all the bodies are buried? СВР! Their response to US interference in Ukraine has been a stream of bloodcurdling disclosures, effectively suppressed behind the USG’s iron curtain but irrevocably out there. Astounding, delegitimating stuff: NPT breaches corroborating Sibel Edmonds worst, most gagged hints; 9/11 treason blow-by-blow; Boston Marathon gotchas; faptacular pedophilia dirt. Shows you what competent spooks can do. There is boocoo, how you say, adverse information to be had, as US government black sites are not just penal camps but death camps. The term lawfare was coined as a pejorative but it’s been the keystone of Iran’s defense posture for a generation, and now it’s Russia’s too.
25. optimader July 31, 2014 at 7:34 pm

    https://www.behance.net/gallery/17266001/Animals-in-Moir-2
26. optimader July 31, 2014 at 7:37 pm

    http://jgklausner.com/work/oreo-cameo
27. skippy July 31, 2014 at 7:56 pm

    Wellie it seems the C-suite has now entered the battlefield – (AP) — A demoted worker shot and critically wounded his company’s CEO before fatally shooting himself Thursday inside a downtown Chicago high-rise office building in the city’s bustling financial district, police said.

    Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy said a worker at a technology company at 231 S. LaSalle St. pulled a gun after entering the 17th-floor office to meet one-on-one with his CEO. There was a struggle for the gun, and the CEO was shot twice before the gunman fatally shot himself, McCarthy said.

    http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20140731/NEWS07/140739962/ceo-shot-in-chicagos-financial-district

    skippy… hunting season is open???
    1. toldjaso July 31, 2014 at 8:23 pm

       Deep in your heart you know that this is all part of our “programming” by the Masters. “Killers R Us.”
    2. MtnLife July 31, 2014 at 9:15 pm

       Wow, it seems my creative writing episode about being a CEO maximum wage bounty hunter came true! Where do I get my tags? I’ve always thought an executive would look simply stunning over the mantle. Maybe a banker in the corner holding a foreclosure note all scary like. Would make a great conversation piece.
    3. optimader July 31, 2014 at 10:24 pm

       http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20140731/NEWS07/140739962/ceo-shot-in-chicagos-financial-district

       A guy trying to downsize a small business, demoting a guy instead of offing him. Tragic on many levels actually, for the victim, his family, the shooters family and all the surviving employees and their families.
       1. Lambert Strether Post authorJuly 31, 2014 at 10:48 pm

          “59-year-old offender.” He knew he’d never get another job.
          1. optimader August 1, 2014 at 12:39 am

             Although he wasn’t fired, he surely lowered his chances for a career change.

             Small company, big job titles, if you look at his Linkdin page he has every job listed since college. You’d think he’d at least spell the names correctly?
             I think it’s a case of just another delusional guy w/ a handgun having a vanity meltdown. A real shame.
             For me, he’s another college Psych Major data point.

             http://www.linkedin.com/pub/tony-defrances/10/959/799?trk=biz_employee_pub
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28. hunkerdown August 1, 2014 at 12:34 am

    Five South American nations break off FTA talks with Israel Channel 4
29. different clue August 1, 2014 at 3:29 pm

    The beavers did not rate nearly as many comments here as I had hoped they would. They were indeed an ecosystem-improvement species and could become so again if permitted. Leave it to beavers indeed.
    The article also pointed up the destructiveness of cattle as now deployed in the Western Public lands. Is there any way to manage cattle there so as to prevent the destruction, or are these descendants of the Aurochs
    ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurochs ) uniquely and inherently unsuited to life in a landscape where no Aurochs ever lived?
    Regardless, the possibility of massed millions of beavers throughout the high-altitude watersheds of the West holding billions of gallons of water in beaverdam reserve is one of the most important potentials revealed in this article.
    The West used to be able to count on having a reliable snowpack expand every winter to trickle-release water downstream every spring/summer/fall. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowpack
    Increasing global warming will mean decreasing snowpack of decreasing reliability. What will hold upstream water in reserve when it is too globally warmed for snowpack to do the job anymore? Massed millions of beavers? Just as the word “snowpack” now refers to the overall net total of all the water stored as winter snowfields by each spring, perhaps the word “beaverpack” could refer to the overall net total of all the water
    stored by beavers with their beaverdam ponds. How big a beaverpack could hundred million beavers give us?

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