The image to the left here is John Lennon, age 68, in my never-humble opinion. If you find that shocking, or imagine I must be insane, then you should probably stop reading at this point. What I have to say will challenge your assumptions not just about him, but about pop culture and the notion that our tastes are generated from the bottom-up. Quite the opposite, our cultural tastes are handed to us from above, and by power of suggestion we adopt and perceive talent as others think we should. Thus do mediocre talents like Swift and Dylan become cultural icons.
However, for the love of Pete, it appears to me that John Lennon was a talented man above all others.
Bring on the Jewish house Radical!
I get a little squeamish when I see a “whistleblower” who not only survives, but maintains a high profile. Consequently, I pay very little attention to Sibel Edmunds and her Boiling Frogs Post. In a full spectrum dominance environment, all alternatives are false leads. There are whistleblowers out there. Like true public citizens throughout history, they rot in prison. Obama has made sure of that.
Nonetheless, even disinformation agents have to tell the truth now and then, if for no other reason than to maintain street creds. So it does not hurt to read what goes on BFP – currently, Dr. James Petras has a very nice piece up, Democratic Party “Progressives” as Political Contraceptives. He takes the sheepdog tradition currently filled by Bernie Sanders back only as far as Jesse Jackson – there have been countless others (Gary Hart, Eugene McCarthy), but it is worth reading.
Writers, ghosts and spooks
Back in the 1980s, hungry for fresh reading material, I wandered up and down the fiction aisles at our local library looking for books that had multiple copies on hand. These I knew would be popular, and so worth a look. In this manner I came across Robert Ludlum. I enjoyed his work, and read every one of his books. I was impressed that his heroes and villains could be of any nationality. Americans were not singled out as good guys, which was a nice relief from the constant barrage of patriotism and jingoism we get in the espionage/thriller mode.
The fix is on?
I was idly watching a football game yesterday, Jets versus Patriots. My kids are avid Jets fans, so I was pulling for them. But predictably the Patriots and two amazing players, tight end Rob Gronkowski and quarterback Tom Brady put on a clinic at the end, and the game was tied. In overtime, I assumed the better team. the Pats, would win.
For those who love to write …
I found this blog piece dead on – except numbers five and one, I am in agreement in total. It is called Top Ten Reasons I Love Writing.
Is Montana Wilderness Association a CIA front?
The title above is perhaps only partly in jest. Back in the early 1960’s, when there were people of integrity in the House and Senate, Congressman Wright Patman of Texas conducted an inquiry into CIA funneling of money through various foundations to intended donors who wanted to be free of the taint of spook money.
Continue reading “Is Montana Wilderness Association a CIA front?”
Full spectrum dominance
My readings lately have taken me back to the immediate postwar era, when CIA was just underway and one of its first goals was to train and contain the American intellectual class. It wasn’t hard – intellectuals are normally driven by an aversion or ordinary people, and are easily bought with money and a taste of power.
The task at hand was censorship, but done in such a way that it would not be called that. It was shaking hands with the velvet glove.
Of mythology and fake deaths
My older brother was a Catholic priest, and an excellent man. He was scholarly, wise and caring, so that the influence that he exerted over his parishioners was done for good. In private conversations I came to realize that he did not believe in the mythology of Christianity, and yet was happy to “preach the gospels” because within the mythology is a recipe for personal happiness without harming others. If it turned out that Jesus and Mary were not real, and all of the saints and martyrs were merely reincarnations of pagan gods, it did not matter. He used mythology for good.
Most people are simply not capable of grasping the hard cold reality of life as it is, and need their myths.
A primer in modern journalism
I have read the news article beneath the fold here several times, and my head is abuzz. I have never seen such a compact and orderly collection of euphemisms, politically correct grammar, and barely disguised attacks on public policy in one article. Phil Taylor, author of the piece, is to be commended. He’s surely an A student.
It is hard to know, however. His bio is sketchy, as are those of Michael Witt and Kevin Braun, founders of E&E Publishing, Taylor’s employer. (E&E = Environment & Energy.)
In Taylor’s article below the fold here, “White House in talks to reform budgeting, streamline NEPA,“ I have emboldened and underlined his disguised language. I suppose I’ll have to take it down soon, as it is available only on subscription. E&E is a very expensive group to subscribe to – between $2,000 and $150,000, according to this article. That is a tell – it means that E&E has an exclusive and private clientele who are willing to pay a lot of money for there service. (Read: Industry insiders, congressional aides, and lobbyists.) It’s an industry publication masquerading as a public interest group.
Below is a list of words used in the article, along with a translation. I speak fluent euphemism:
- Reform: To grease the skids for private wealth to exploit public lands.
- Streamlined logging: Access to public lands without restraint of laws or regulations. Clearcutting.
- Overgrown forest: Public land that industry has not yet been able to access due to laws or regulations.
- Bipartisan: The myth that the two parties are at odds with one another so that agreement protects divergent interests.
- Expedite: Used to convey a false sense of urgency and thereby bypass laws and regulations.
- “Wildfires” coupled with “Intensity“: Used to convey the impression that natural forest fires are “conflagrations” caused by lack of sound forest policy, that is, too many laws and regulations.
- Jobs: Code word for “profits.”
- Red tape: Code for laws and regulations.
- Legal threats: The right of the public to petition government for redress of grievances.
- Expedited forest treatments: Clearcutting.
- Protect and improve federal landscapes: Clearcutting.
- Restoration projects:Clearcutting.
- Make forests more resistant to catastrophic blazes: Clearcut.
- Categorical exclusions: Bypassing of laws and regulations.
- Collaborative process: Exclusion of the public from participation in process, working only with industry front groups.
- Federal Forest Resource Council: Industry front group.
- Bill Imbergano: Executive Director of Federal Forest Reserve Council, and registered lobbyist for American Forest and Paper Association.
- Active management, mitigate wildfire risks, improve wildlife habitat: Clearcut.
- “Economic base for our rural communities” (Montana Governor Steve Bullock): Profits. (He meant “jobs,” see above.)
The Taylor article is a primer on how to write on behalf of industry by clever use of coded language understood by insiders. I’ve never seen so much dishonesty and euphemism in one piece of journalism.
The moon walkings were a hoax?
Note to Reader: This blog post has been put “under review” as we have had growing pains in developing the technology we use to identify twins, replicas and zombies. The eyes behind the technology are getting better, so as you read this piece note that if you are troubled by its conclusions that we will be looking at it in more depth and with better eyes. For the time being, it is speculation.
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Michael Jackson retired from public life around 2001, and was replaced by a body double.
Body doubles are very common in intelligence, celebrity culture, business and politics. They work easily because most of us are just glancing without skeptical eye. For sake of security, body doubles are essential. High profile people need time alone. Powerful people have security concerns, so that body doubles can draw attention away from their real activities.
Below I wrote about Stephen Hawking being replaced by a body double. People have long contended that Paul McCartney was replaced in 1966 – I tend to agree with that, but now see that the Beatles were a project involving many people to promote them, write their music, script their appearances, so that the original McCartney might have merely stepped aside. Replacement would be unusual for a real phenomenon, but not so much for a PSYOP.
But then, the whole of the music business is fraught with impostors who only survive by power of suggestion. I remember recently listening to Crosby, Stills and Nash in a reunion appearance on the Tonight Show, and thought “Wow, these guys suck.” But their recordings were different, better instrumentation and sound effects, perhaps even some better voices added to make them sound less like the high school band. Bob Dylan has a mystique about him that allows him to survive inability to sing. There’s a joke about what a Deadhead says when he runs out of pot: “Man, this music sucks!”
But there is talent about us, some of it remarkable. The McCartney replacement is a very talented performer, as was John Denver. These are my generation – younger people can rattle off names of other truly talented performers for me.
And perhaps one of the most talented men I have ever seen in my lifetime was Michael Jackson.
I watched as MJ changed before my eyes from a black man to a white man. I did not question it. His heavily made-up face was creepy, and his dabbling with young boys turned me off. I reverted to Thriller Mike – that was the guy I wanted to remember. That album, like the work of the Beatles, was the effort of a group of talented behind-the-scenes people, but like the Beatles, the man who fronted for the whole effort was a talented performer.
I never occurred to me until I recently slapped my forehead with Hawking that the man to the left here is a different person than the one to the right, a body double, and not even a good one. Look at the nose! And, fer Chrissakes, he’s white.
I do not know what happened or why, but apparently the real Michael Jackson left the scene around 2001. Maybe he’d had enough of fame. He is probably still alive somewhere – if he is dead, it makes me sad. The fake MJ was scheduled to go on a world tour before his “death” in 2009, and I speculate that perhaps he just didn’t have enough talent to pull it off, so they pulled the plug on him. I don’t suggest for a second that they killed him, but did retire him permanently, faking his death. That too, I am learning thanks to Mr. Mathis, is not uncommon.
Of course it is disturbing that I did not suspect that replacement MJ was being foisted upon us due to our gullibility. But then again, power of suggestion is highly effective when we are not paying close and critical attention. If there is a motorcade going down the streets of Denver and I am told on the news that it is the president, no matter who is in that limousine, I will think it is the president. I have no reason to suspect otherwise.
So I’ve been had again. And will be in the future, again. But the celebrity culture is a huge cash machine, so there is great need to maintain the images of the celebrities. It was a mistake for Crosby, Stills and Nash to appear on Fallon and remind us just how much they suck at music. The handlers of fake Michael Jackson decided not to make that mistake, and I tend to think it was the right call. They drowned their replacement baby in the bathtub.
Smart move.
Piece of Mindful 