How the CIA writes history
theintercept.com
theintercept.com
I think the internet has done a lot to help escape the typical narrative. For one example, there is a stark difference between what young and older Americans think of Israel because of where both groups get their news.
Now, sure, there is a natural tendency with the internet for conspiracies to form. In particular if you hang out all day with extremists. But I'd prefer to have that problem than the alternative problem of most public discussion coming from a dozen or less large corporations.
edit: it's a serious question
What isn't being said today because of the way speech and power is structured in the USA? Is there really any voice out there whose words substantially threaten the government? Whenever such a voice gets loud enough, out come the battalions of cops with riot gear, armored vehicles, and chemical weapons. The mainstream media never questions this clockwork logic: it must be as natural as the sun rising and setting in such a society.
It is almost a truism that any institution of power will renege on all of its promised rights towards those who would curb or abolish its power. We know after the fact that the government of the USA has done so towards many, many people whom it felt threatened it.
Let's try an experiment: you post some of the things that you think aren't being said, and we'll all see what happens.
Say whatever you want whenever you want; they're watching, but don't care enough to interfere if you're a nobody. Nobody will bother you until you have a following, and nobody will bother you in meatspace until you have a massive and physically active following.
Does anyone believe they live in a pure "free society"? There is a deep state beneath every nation.
Like a rational mind exists atop lower forms, higher forms of social organization exist atop lower ones. Democracy is built on intrigue, is built on naked violence. Just as true for smaller countries with smaller deep states.
I was trying to say that just because you're the best doesn't mean you're "free".
The press is owned by the state, making the freedom of the press a little difficult.
Because of the high taxes and plentiful regulations, your only options for employment are huge corporations or government.
Hardly what I call freedom.
Switzerland, on the other hand, is more free. Mostly because the majority of citizens have some wealth.
Many people associate more government programs and freebies with freedom. In reality, it only creates dependent groups of people and gives more control and power to the government. The exact opposite of freedom.
In Sweden, there are a couple of TV channels (SVT) and a few radio channels (SR) which are run according to the "public service" model.
The existence of SVT/SR is protected by the constitution and they are funded by a kind of flat tax on media receivers while still managed independently of the government (the majority coalition has no direct power over public service).
Anyone familiar with SVT/SR or the public service model understands that they aren't "state media" in an authoritarian sense, most obviously because there is a plurality of commercial channels too.
There is no state press whatsoever, and the existing commercial papers are mostly center-right liberal, except for the venerable social democratic Aftonbladet.
I work at a small startup in Stockholm so I'm existence proof that there are options other than huge corporations or the state....
Of course there are problems, but your criticism seems misinformed and exaggerated.
In the U.S., hate speech is legal unless it will immediately lead to violence or a criminal act--the so-called "fighting words".
So, distasteful as hateful speech is, there is an example of how the U.S. protects a free society.
Patrick Stewart has a great line at the end of TNG 4x21 "The Drumhead"[1]
[V]illains who twirl their mustaches are easy to spot.
Those who clothe themselves in good deeds are well camouflaged.
...
[Admiral Satie] or someone like her will always be with us,
waiting for the right climate in which to flourish – spreading fear
in the name of righteousness. Vigilance, Mr. Worf. That is the price
we have to continually pay.
Oh sure, the level of rational discourse has certainly fallen off and most news outlets are now heavily slanted to one party or the other - but the mere idea of having the ability to raise your voice is something that is rare in this world.
Even the countries that people always point to (Scandinavia, Europe) have their own issues which are not dissimilar from those in the US.
It's like when you have a job and you complain how horrible the place is you work at because of a,b,c and d. So you leave and go to another big company because they don't have a,b,c and d problems. Within two months, you suddenly realize that now this company has other issues and drive you nuts because if f,g,h and i problems.
You want an "actual free society" go live on an island, and be a government of one. That's the only way you'll have the utopian vision I'm sure you're thinking about.
In India or China no records are ever made public, if they are the people asking for information are simply killed off in a dark street.
In USA you have a good opportunity to clip the wings of CIA and others. A small chance but still a positive chance.
Sorry, but this is absurd. People that are asking for information are usually harassed and threatened. They don't kill people like flies. This kind of rhetoric is meant to paint black and white portraits of the world, and is simply inaccurate.
And even here people are concerned about the reach of the US's intelligence agencies.
Are you actually proud to compare favorably to them? Is that as high as you want to set the bar? Surely there is little to be gained from continually pointing out you're better than the lowest. Aim higher.
I mean, congrats for being competitive against high school teams, but man, you gotta move up into the big leagues if you are serious.
Go and learn how societies like Switzerland, Norway, Australia and France operate, and compare yourself to them. You will learn something, which will help you improve something. Comparing yourself to the bottom of the list teaches you nothing, which improves nothing
That said, the comment I was answering implied the US is an unfree country. That is simply not the case. To illustrate this, let's see how some other countries, including the ones you named, compare to the US.
Freedom House ratings[1] for selected countries (100 is best):
Switzerland: 96
Norway: 100
Australia: 98
France: 91
Canada: 99
Russia: 22
China: 16
United States: 90
So the US is roughly equivalent to France, one of the countries you named. Russia is lousy, as expected, but certainly not the worst.
[1] https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/freedom-world-...
Two private individuals donated their personal papers to a private institution, and the CIA asked, but certainly did not compel, the private institution to remove them from the public collection. If you assume that this is simply pure coverup of an embarrassing episode, then the bad guy is really Georgetown (which I say as an alumnus.)
- It's ~2180 words long
- It takes ~600 words (10 paragraphs) of stumbling around before the author reminds themselves of what we're actually here to talk about: the CIA rewriting (or erasing in this case) history
- It takes another ~500 words (9 more paragraphs) before the article actually mentions the factual thing that happened that this article is about (document collections removed from public view).
People can write how they like, and it might just be that you enjoy the way this person writes, and so enjoy the process of working through this prose to the meat of his point.
However, I can't help but think that if this was shorter, and if it got to the heart of the issue quicker, more people might finish reading and comprehending it, and actually learn what the article is trying to get across.
§ I'm not from the US so when I say we I really more mean you (if you're from the US) but you get the gist
in addition to burying even just the ideas in a mass of words, i think it frustrating and detrimental to also bury sources beyond discovery.. why every online article fails to have a hyperlink biblio at the bottom baffles me
your criticism reminded me of another cia classic: the simple sabotage field manual(o); succinctly summarised here(i):
> Insist on doing everything through "channels.
"Never permit short-cuts to be taken in order
to expedite decisions.
> When possible, refer all matters to committees for
"further study and consideration." Attempt to make
the committees as large as possible -- never less
than five.
> Haggle over precise wordings of communications,
minutes, resolutions.
> Advocate "caution.""Be "reasonable" and urge your
fellow-conferees to be "reasonable" and avoid haste
which might result in embarrassments or difficulties
later on.
> "Misunderstand" orders. Ask endless questions or
engage in long correspondence about such orders.
Quibble over them when you can."
> Don't order new working materials until your current
stocks have been virtually exhausted so that the
slightest delay in filling your order will mean a
shutdown.
> Insist on perfect work in relatively unimportant
products, send back for refinishing those which have
the least flaw. Approve other defective parts whose
flaws are not visible to the naked eye.
> When training new workers, give incomplete or
misleading instructions.
> Multiply paperwork in plausible ways. Start duplicate
files.
(i) http://www.business.com/company-culture/coworker-sabotoging-...
When possible, refer all matters to committees for "further study and consideration."
Advocate "caution.""Be "reasonable" and urge your fellow-conferees to be "reasonable" and avoid haste which might result in embarrassments or difficulties later on.
"Misunderstand" orders.
Insist on perfect work in relatively unimportant products, send back for refinishing those which have the least flaw.
Sounds like the way things normally roll at many departments and teams in certain BigCorps we know and love, without anyone actually doing these things with an attempt to be disruptive. It's just "the way things always work around here."
have you seen samantha bee's piece on super delegates where she breaks down the rest of the metaphor of the "great and powerful"?(o)
you do realise the whole point was that oz wasn't powerful, right?
oz is just a midwestern snake oil salesman displaced to a fantasy land
full of cowards, heartless people, and strawmen
If the CIA paid $500,000 per "settlement" and 1000 people left their service between 1960 and 1974, then it's obviously a cool half billion dollars.
In other words, make something up ... then bury a note deep at the end of the end-notes that admits the numbers are "estimates". Who says you have to play fair?
The US government has sovereign immunity to lawsuits, and a weaker right to petition the government in the constitution. I had wondered about this a bit, but here's at least a clear example of a case where you might plausibly want your government to not be bound by a civil contract.
In reality, I'm sure commercial contracts aren't actually granted immunity. It's just an example.
I wonder if it makes sense to do any of these:
* Ban the government from being able to sign an NDA for a commercial contract. Maybe some exceptions for military use.
* Require approval from the local, state, or federal legislature before the local, state, or federal executive branches can sign NDAs(since NDAs are effectively mini-laws that constrain the government).
* Allow NDAs, but have a public list of (Agency, Supplier) pairs for which NDAs exist
What does work is if you can find a bunch of servers or networks like IPFS or BT or what have you, publish your censorship-prone data there, and then just publish the hash to the block chain signed by the the author's key. You'd need an index of some sort also.
Then if someone wants to read the censor-prone document, they'd retrieve it from wherever they can find it, check the hash from the blockchain, and then know it was authentic.
The police have their own issues, but they are very much in the public eye.
In a different country, perhaps the author would be disappeared and we'd be arrested for discussing such things. Overt confrontation makes it very clear who the evildoers are and directly polarizes the population. The lack of it is what makes our strain of totalitarianism so insidious.
Instead, we're given a choice at every step of the way. It's the path of least resistance to pay taxes, pick from the manufactured selection of republicrat celebs, and not engage in direct action against our occupiers. Individuals can buck the easy choice for a short time, but eventually any individual will get tired, find their place to fit into the system, and kick the can down the road for the next generation.
It is back. Reading a book right now how Putin fights Cold War II. It's not pretty.
It is in german though.