Booz Allen Hamilton in the News

https://www.thedefensepost.com/2023/08/30/booz-allen-maryland-military-facility/

Articles about Booz Allen Hamilton always catch my eye as the company is well-known for its contract work with the CIA. Perhaps the most famous episode in recent years was in reference to Edward Snowden. The company is involved in all sorts of intelligence work, analysis, IT, and other forms of consulting and its one of those companies that straddles the military and intelligence spheres – in fact the line with a company like Booz Allen Hamilton is completely blurred.

Mammon, Technology, and the Road to Dystopia

https://www.npr.org/2022/03/18/1087446715/heres-how-americans-view-facial-recognition-and-driverless-cars

Some people embrace these new technologies and some don't. Some are concerned with the role they're playing in our lives and are afraid of what they're doing to society. Others are optimistic and filled with hope and even revel in their potential.

Rumsfeld: Evangelical Praises for an Unrepentant Mass Murderer

The legacy of George W Bush is being slowly rehabilitated. In many circles it is already complete. The dismal state of the country and world by the end of his presidency has been forgotten and re-written and he's been transformed into cute and bumbling Grandpa George.

But that's not what he was. He tore the Middle East apart, sowed cancerous seeds within American society and its judiciary, used technology for evil means and left behind a legacy of war, mass death, torture, kidnapping, assassination and the like. He was and is a monster and yet he was the darling of the American Evangelicals – one of their own. It's a testimony to the sad and degenerate state of American Christianity.

Covid-19: The Age of Masks and Facial Recognition

https://www.cnet.com/health/facial-recognition-firms-are-scrambling-to-see-around-face-masks/

It's one of the rare blessings of the Covid-19 era. My wife and I were talking about this a couple of months ago when the new reality started to settle on American shores. We were talking about it because as the pandemic was spreading, everyone was talking about tracking apps and government surveillance. Facial recognition had already been in the news for some time as it has been proliferating over the past couple of years.

Social Credit Scores Today and Tomorrow

https://www.thehour.com/opinion/article/Data-isn-t-just-being-collected-from-your-phone-15451658.php

The Snowden revelations in 2013 confirmed our fears that the Orwellian TIA (Total Information Awareness) programme had lived on despite the fact that it had supposedly been canceled by the Bush administration.

Surveillance and the Facial Recognition Non-Scandal

https://www.euractiv.com/section/digital/news/hundreds-of-us-police-departments-using-dystopian-face-recognition-app-report/

It's a scandal that continues to widen in its scope and yet in the United States nothing is being done, or even seriously entertained. In fact under Trump, surveillance technology continues to increase and law enforcement is being encouraged to use everything from facial recognition to sundry tracking systems. Some of the latest intrusions have been able to slip 'under the radar' as it were, under the aegis of combating illegal immigration.

Some Comments on the Mueller Probe

On this point it must be admitted that Donald Trump is right. The Mueller probe has destroyed lives. It is a case of McCarthyism reborn, a trend which seems to be popular these days. We're also seeing it (in a different form) with the #MeToo movement.

Under this type of investigation there's no assumption of innocence, there's no due process, the verdict all but precedes the investigation. The prosecutor is also the judge (in many cases) and guilt does not have to be based on evidence, but largely rests on association.

The ACLU Report on Immigrant Prisons and Children

The ACLU has released a shocking report on immigrant detention centres and in particular the state of children kept in these facilities. The media is covering this story but given the nature of the accusations one would think this would be a major scandal.*

Many Christians will dismiss the story because it finds it origins in an ACLU project, in this case with the University of Chicago.

Total Information Awareness (TIA) and DNA Data Collection

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/27/health/dna-privacy-golden-state-killer-genealogy.html

This new use of DNA is being marketed to the public. It's part of the anti-privacy normalisation campaign. Led by swindlers like Mark Zuckerberg we're told that authenticity demands transparency. These are the values of the new generation.

The Phony Debate Over Haspel and CIA Torture

The media has once again played a false card. This time it's in reference to their coverage of the Gina Haspel nomination. Now director of the CIA, Haspel was and is a controversial figure due to her sadistic reputation and participation in the Bush administration's post-9/11 torture schemes. 

The Totalitarian Enabler: Your Mobile Phone

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/06/phone-camera-microphone-spying

On one level it's just these avaricious companies that are after your data but of course if they can do it so can hackers.

Additionally we learned via Edward Snowden that the NSA is also attempting appropriate this data and in many cases has direct and unhindered access to it. I was pleased to note this article at least mentioned it. Many other media outlets no longer bother. It's yesterday's news.

Authoritarianism Transcends the Pseudo-Political Divide

Here are a couple of recent postings from The Intercept that I found to be relevant.

https://theintercept.com/2017/08/25/even-wikileaks-haters-shouldnt-want-it-labeled-a-hostile-intelligence-agency/

While the author (Biddle) is hardly friendly to Wikileaks, he raises some interesting points with regard to the direction the US government is heading. Mike Pompeo, head of the CIA seems to be leading the charge. Of course as I and many others have pointed out, there's been quite a reversal on Wikileaks by figures within the GOP and Trump Administration. During the campaign they praised Assange, now they want him dead.

Palantir the Harbinger of Doom

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/30/palantir-peter-thiel-cia-data-crime-police

Always cast as a means to stop figures like Bernie Madoff and child molesters, computer programs like Palantir actually represent an attempt by the Deep State to recapture the Internet.

Comey and Conservative Theological Liberalism

It is not my intention here to comment on the Comey-Trump scandal and all that goes with it. I hope to write something about these early days of Trump in the near future.

I found this article interesting because awhile ago I picked up on the Comey connection to religious education and the fact that he had been a Sunday School teacher in a United Methodist Church.

Suddenly this Niebuhr-related article tied it all together. His place in the grand order of things suddenly made sense.

Real World Elements in Jason Bourne (2016)

For those already initiated into the world of Jason Bourne and the re-booted movies of the 2000's, the story elements reflecting the MK-ULTRA revelations and many other aspects of the US Deep State are nothing new.

However I noticed several elements woven into the plot of the 2016 Jason Bourne film that were of interest and thus far I have not detected a great deal of online comment with regard to these points.

These themes grabbed my attention even though I must confess the movie was something of a disappointment. It had a lot of potential but failed to deliver in several areas. My intention here is not to write a review but simply highlight a few points that were of particular interest to me and my readers.

For those interested in the film, consider the following...

The Russian Hack or Leak... and Why it Matters

These articles are must reads for anyone who is wrestling with the Russian Hack narrative promoted by the Mainstream Media. This line is being utilised to promote a new wave of legislation, possible censorship, a culture of Red Baiting and possibly an escalation in US foreign policy aggression toward Russia.

Balaam Comes to Langley

https://theintercept.com/2016/11/23/mike-pompeo-religious-war/

Evangelicals have cause to celebrate. Pompeo is just the sort of man they want to see in power and especially at the head of an organisation like the Central Intelligence Agency.

Western Media Clampdown and the Cyber-Power Grab

https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/german-spy-agency-warns-of-rise-in-russian-propaganda-and-cyber-attacks/

The media is filled with calls for investigations into Russian hacking but no evidence is produced. Instead we're provided with 'secret assessments' and calls to trust the intelligence apparatus, despite the fact they have a long and proven track record of lying and attempting to manipulate the public.

Like the many narratives strung together in the wake of 9/11, this present attempt at spin is false and patently so on many levels.

Deep State Players in 1976

Cohn, Buckley and Felt

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKyxWeJA3I0

I find these old videos to be fascinating. This is just a clip. You can watch the full video on Amazon. This particular episode is interesting because you have 'former' CIA agent and founder of modern Conservatism William Buckley interviewing Mark Felt aka 'Deep Throat' though no one knew it at the time. This show takes place in 1976.

Varieties of the Drug War: The Duterte Model and the USA

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-philippines-drugs-death-idUSKCN10B03D

Duterte wishes to implement a police state. Interestingly a War on Drugs is a vehicle he is employing to bring this about. Under the pretense of cleaning up society, he's actually subjugating it and expanding his power.