I DON’T GET IT…..BUT I’M WILLING TO LEARN

I DON’T GET IT…..BUT I’M WILLING TO LEARN

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

We are entering the silly season…..that’s right, it’s when people, both men and women start acting like preachers, go around wearing those fake smiles, looking like that big ole fat Cheshire cat, kind of satisfied, but always looking for more. It’s the season when honesty is stretched right to the breaking point, and often is stretched past it, and snaps. It’s a time when the United States is looking for a few good people, both men and women…..and mostly they ain’t it!

 

It’s a time when everybody wants to be fresh as paint, or at least give off that appearance, these people actually go around kissing babies, and glad-handing…..shaking hands with everybody that they meet. It’s a time when the media, all media, tends to lose itself in all the hype that they themselves are writing. Cooler heads do not prevail, but who can blame the media, they shovel what their given by campaign organizations without so much as a thought to credible investigation…..investigation costs money, and anyways, this is the era of “one hour news coverage”.

 

I’m sure by now, without much effort you’ve guessed what I’m talking about…..(no you don’t get three guesses), if you haven’t guessed by now you’re an idiot and won’t catch my drift anyways. The silly season is none other than the presidential election cycle that gets longer and longer with each passing election. It’s a way that these dudes and dudettes (female dudes) want to operate when they’re campaigning, they don’t have to make any decisions, they just state what they stand for and move on to the next campaign stop.

 

To be a candidate in today’s world, first and foremost, you’ve got to be some sort of masochist; the abuse that’s piled on political candidates is unreal. With little exception, in every election, whether for the president of the United States or the dog catcher of Pleasant Valley, you’ve got to be prepared for the worst and most brutal mud-slinging in your life. Wherever there’s a bit of power, money and some dinky benefits, look out, you’re usually in for a no holds barred fight to the finish.

 

EVERYBODY’S GOT SKELETONS IN THEIR CLOSET

Today’s political campaigns, I think, are different than at any time in the history of the United States. The vast amounts of money involved in politics today can be used to dig up all sorts of political dirt; from a candidate’s most overt of acts to the most innocent…..nothing is safe.

 

I am not saying that today’s political campaigns, candidates and their committee’s can “take the cake” for their political snarling and cavorting around like their lily white, far from it. The present time in the country’s history of political skullduggery does not have a corner on the market of mud-slinging, it’s just reported in an almost unending coverage, and is now slanted (liberal or conservative) by whichever media source one might watch, read or listen to.

 

There’s all types of political scandal…..it’s one of the big reasons that I never considered a political career, I don’t want anybody rummaging around in my closets. Without a doubt my favorite dirt that has resulted from messing around in a candidate’s closet is…..what else, a sex scandal.

 

To my way of thinking there’s nothing better than a juicy, clandestine affair with all sorts of innuendos, hidden cameras, love notes, or better, texts. Sex scandals have been around since the late 17^th century…..at the very beginning of the 13 colonies…..before there was a real United States.

 

I’m talking about a time in the country’s history when it was a struggle just to shoot enough game to keep everybody fed, and the biggest job was to stay alive, warm, and provide some sort of roof over one’s head. Secretary Treasury Alexander Hamilton had an affair with Maria Reynolds while both were married to other people. Ms. Reynolds husband blackmailed dirty old Al, forcing him to confess, which damaged his already controversial career.

 

Down through the annals of American history sex has played a key role in exposing the country’s top political officials to their weaknesses and, at the time, tarnishing their image, careers and families. It seems that during the early days of the United States white political figures actually enjoyed the charms of the slaves that they had in their charge on their plantations…..even Thomas Jefferson.

 

I’m not talking about those scandals that were propagated during a term in office; I’m talking about what I would call BEFORE OFFICE or (BO). I guess during a time in a person’s life when he, or she, seems to sew wild oats, or committed financial or business indiscretions before they decided to seek a public office where they’d need the citizen’s electoral support.

 

AND DON’T GIVE ME THAT TIRED OLD CRAP EITHER

And please spear me; I ain’t got time for an opinion about which political party is worse in how they practice their politics, I swear they’ve both used the same books, and been taught by the same people.

 

There’s a Federal Election Commission, founded in 1975, is manned by six members who serve six year terms, and are nominated by the president and confirmed by the US Senate. The terms are staggered so that every couple of years the sitting president has to appoint two people that need to be confirmed before they can take office.

 

Their job is to enforce limitations and prohibitions on contributions and expenditures of federal campaign laws, to keep track of all contributions over $200 along with each donors home address, employer and job title. This “database” goes back to 1980. Private organizations are legally prohibited from using this data to solicit new individual donors…..but may use the data to solicit Political Action Committees…..kinda defeats the purpose doesn’t it?  

 

There are all sorts of rules, regulations and laws that have been established to monitor the country’s political process. Sadly in many cases the view is at best murky, and left to the individual’s interpretation.

 

I’ll say it once again about one of the United States institutions, like many other of these staples of the country…..it needs changing, upgraded, and put on a level playing field. But the first thing that needs to be done is for us, the people to wise up, and quite this stupid partisan bickering, it’s what the politicians count upon to help them maintain the status-quo.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

DO TERRORISTS REALLY HATE AMERICANS, AND WHY

DO TERRORISTS REALLY HATE AMERICANS, AND WHY

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

Most all conservatives say that “terrorists hate Americans” and it seems as if bunches of liberals are beginning to feel the same way. Me personally…..well I’m kind of at a crossroads in my thinking on the subject. There is no way that I believe that all Muslims hate Americans, it’s simply to implausible to consider.

 

Anymore, whenever I have a dilemma regarding world issues I tend to dig deeply into as many sources as I can (both pro and con) to help me make a somewhat learned conclusion to whatever issue is at hand. Now I do realize that the opinion that I arrive at won’t always be correct, and that my opinion on some issues is kind of a work in progress, but I search for my opinion.

 

However; there are people out there who rely completely on a single source for their opinion…..and frankly these people are dangerous. These people are like a guy who has a permit to carry a concealed weapon, but is completely unhinged mentally. It’s only a matter of time until this joker looses it and shoots people.

 

I’ve listened to George W. Bush types who talk about the Taliban, Al Qaeda, or the entirety of the Muslim people, and religion, and how they hate us. And even in the early stages of the War on Terror,\ (after September 11, 2001) I simply couldn’t wrap my mind around people hating the United States simply because we…..were.

 

I have blogged many times, and written newspaper articles about war and the human degradation that it has wrought. And I wondered exactly what the United States track-record has been throughout history with regards to the invasions that have been initiated by the U.S. The discovery of this countries record (America) was somewhat overwhelming. The subject was way too involved to write a blog or even an article about…..so I broke the information that I’d gotten down to just the 20^th century, and the 1^st decade and a half of the 21^st century. And the information that I got was really eye-opening.

 

I used Zoltan Grossman’s research material titled From Wounded Knee to Syria: a Century of U.S. Military Interventions, and the list is just partial. Grossman used the Congressional Record, (23 June 1969), 180 landings by the U.S. Marine Corp History Division, Ege & Makhijani in Counterspy, (July-August, 1982), Instances if Use of United States Forces Abroad, (1793-1993) by Ellen C. Collier, and Ellsberg in Protest & Survive.

 

I further broke the information down to include only those incidents after 1945, and included what I considered just the Middle East, and looked at the Foreign Policies of the United States regarding these nation states, and our invasions of these states. The results weren’t only interesting; they were provocative with regards to the reaction of the fringe elements of some of these states.

 

Egypt, 1956, nuclear threat; Lebanon 1958, occupation against rebels; Iraq, 1958, nuclear threat; Iraq, 1963, CIA killed president, brings Ba’ath Party to power; Middle East, 1973, nuclear threat; Iran, 1980, nuclear threat; Libya, 1981, Naval jets; Lebanon, 1982-84, expel PLO; Iran, 1984, Air force jets; Libya, 1986, topple Qaddafi government; Iran, 1987-88, intervention of Iraq-Iran war; Libya, 1989, naval jets; Saudi Arabia, 1990-91, Iraq invasion of Kuwait; Kuwait, 1991, royal Kuwaiti family returned to throne; Iraq, 1991-2003, no-fly zone over Kurdish north, Shiite south; Afghanistan, 1998, attack on former CIA training camps; Iraq, 1998, weapons inspectors; Yemen, 2000, USS Cole bombed; Afghanistan, 2001-15, overthrown Taliban, hunt Al Qaeda fighters; Yemen, 2002, attack on Al Qaeda sites; Iraq, 2003-11, Saddam regime; Pakistan, 2005, CIA missile attack on alleged Al Qaeda sites; Syria, 2008, Al Qaeda site; Yemen, 2009, Al Qaeda site; Libya, 2011, bombing of Qaddafi government during uprising of rebel forces; Iraq, 2014, air strikes against Islamic State insurgents; Syria, 2014, air strikes against Islamic State insurgents.

 

The United States has used its military might 27 different times to fiddle around with Middle Eastern countries, without exception…. to further United States foreign policies. Now, if somebody invaded the United States 27 different times over the past fifty something years…..how would you react…..exactly?

 

MEDIA AND AUTHORITY FIGURES

In the beginning…..after September 11, 2001, all manner of media and governmental figures repeated again and again that Middle Easterners hated American citizens only because of the freedom and prosperity enjoyed by her citizens. Missing from the early explanation of the hatful feelings towards the U.S. was the historical context of the U.S. role in the Middle East, and for that matter, the rest of the world. Many of the U.S. foreign interventions, especially Middle Eastern interventions were explained away with a wave of the hand, and the assurance that military intervention was necessary to protect freedom and civilians.

 

Of course many American citizens now realize that protecting people’s rights was not the number one priority, especially if there was petroleum potential involved. For various reasons that the United States military and foreign policy seems to have boxed themselves into a corner in the Middle East. It’s the damned if you do, and damned if you don’t syndrome, people have come to rely on U.S. intervention, monetary support as well as a care package kind of support with food, medicine, and even drinking water.

 

The United States military or remnants of it through the CIA or private contractors seem to be going back into an area, or country continually that was just left, citing “mission accomplished” ceremonies complete with banners, speeches, and awards.

 

Quick trips through history…..post World War II point to numerous invasions or interventions, as I’ve already listed. Whether in the Middle East, Vietnam, Central America, or the Persian Gulf, the overbearing effort was to spread an ideological agenda (such as defending capitalism) or an economic agenda (such as protecting oil company investments). In the few cases where the U.S. military toppled a dictatorship, it was done in a way that actually prevented the country’s people from overthrowing their own dictator first, and installing a new democratic government more to their liking. The Pentagon is very keen in determining exactly who and how a new regime will be placed into power.

 

WHY DO TERRORIST HATE AMERICAS

For me the answer is easy, it’s not convoluted, and isn’t shrouded in a misty fog in secrecy…..the answer actually shouts out at anybody who’ll listen. It’s like the line in that 1980’s song…..”Get off my back.” I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, “the United States does not need other countries natural resources, petroleum, precious metals, and whatever else these Middle Eastern countries might have”.

 

Am I an isolationalist, absolutely, until we take care of our own…….which I’ve said 1000 times before, the rest of the world can simply kiss my behind. The United States is being broken from the inside-out. It won’t be a terrorist attack, or a nuclear device that does the country in, it’s be the elitists, the power mongers, Capitol Hill, industry, and all political parties!

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!

         

INSTANT REPLAY…..BEWITCHED, BOTHERED, AND BEWILDERED

INSTANT REPLAY…..BEWITCHED, BOTHERED, AND BEWILDERED

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

Indisputable evidence, those two words have completely changed the way that we watch sports events on television. At the stadium or arena it’s not so bad, extra beer drinking time or a quick trip to the bathroom. But I got to tell you, all this high tech stuff puts a burr in my pants creating a sensation that I’m having a hard time getting used to.

 

Just the other night at the college football World Series between Oregon and Ohio State there was a stoppage of play twice so that officials could check to see whether their calls were right. One was a catch, the other a score, both were obvious (at least to me) yet the zebras had to get conformation from…..wait a minute, I turned the channel before I found out where the referee was checking to, like New York, Washington D.C. or…..maybe even the Vatican in Rome…..who really knows for sure. I hate instant replay.

 

I got to wondering last summer during Major League Baseball how many different stoppages there were to either confirm, or overturn umpires calls, and how long it took extra to get the calls right. The number of times was pretty easy…..however I couldn’t find where anybody kept an accurate record of the added time that the effort took.

 

For me, if I was attending a baseball game, I’d have been pee-od…..in most stadiums beer sales are cut off either in the 7^th or after the 7^th inning. So if they add an extra 5 or 10 minutes that a game takes, and it’s in the 7^th or after when these disputes arise…..I’m beerless, and mad as hell at the same time.

 

Now don’t get me wrong, my life doesn’t revolve around partaking in fermented libation, in fact I hardly drink…..unless I’m alone or with somebody…..and that goes double for a sporting event, hell, its why I never got involved with church league softball, you can’t drink after the games, it’s one of life’s cruel little rules, no alcohol at church sponsored activities.

 

By this time you’ve probably come to understand that I’m not a big proponent of instant anything, hell I don’t even like instant coffee or oatmeal. I like the real thing; in fact I don’t even like instant jell-o. Any kind of athletic contest especially that pits man against man, or women against women, there’s going to be mistakes, it’s the very essence of the game…..any game.

 

Baseball is by far the purest of sports ever devised, and yet it’s full of errors, mistakes, and faulty human judgment. It’s one of the reasons that I so love baseball, it’s how human the game can be. Throwing to the wrong base, walking a hitter, as a hitting striking out, being thrown out stealing, or attempting to advance that extra base, or making an error in fielding, or throwing…..God I love that game.

 

And any of you young guys who would accuse me of not being able to change with the times…..I can only say…..”Damn right, and I’m proud of it.” Change simply for change sake isn’t always the wisest thing to do; some things in life are best left unchanged.

 

I suppose some of you change-bots like the seeming non-stop chatter between the announcer and the color guy when you’re listening to a sports broadcast either on national coverage, or regional coverage of your favorite team. I hate stupid conversation in a broadcast that means less then next to nothing.

 

But I really hate instant replay…..more then I hate nonsensical conversation on my game of the week broadcasts. Babe Ruth is rolling over in his grave right now (he reads my blogs all the time), the Babe was a purest, he’d drink the night before a game and come out the next day with a hangover and stroke a couple of homers, do his bandy-legged trout around the bases and grab a hotdog in the dug-out. Do you think he’d be a proponent of instant replay…..I don’t think so.

 

EARMONN BRENNAN

What in hell is an Earmonn Brennan, is it edible, or is it a tool of some sort…..the answer to both guesses is an emphatic NO! Turns out that Earmonn Brennan is a sports writer for ESPN, and wrote an article a couple of years ago about instant replay. Brennan maintains that there are two schools of thought on instant replay, the traditionalists who romanticizes the human side of sports, those who poetically talk about the freshly cut grass, the smells, sounds, and the thrill of the games.

 

Then there’s the technocrats who marvel at man’s technical advances, and the cybermetrics that seem to overtaking certain aspects of how strategy is interjected into the games. These are the kinds of sports fans who talk about which professional athlete is the most juiced, or the most steroid-enhanced baseball or football player in the game today.

 

Brennan figures that it’s just a matter of time before baseball will do away with umpires and some sort of sensor system will be installed at ball parks that are capable of calling balls, strikes and outs…..on the bases. He also has some wild-eyed hare-brained idea about replacing referees in basketball and football…..but I got a headache reading his crap.

 

Brennan talks about streamlining the use of instant replay in basketball…..and on this point Earmonn and I agree. Earmonn has a really valid point and I applaud his candor. I think that instant replay in college basketball, and professional basketball should be streamlined RIGHT OUT THE FREEKEN DOOR never to be seen again!

 

HISTORY OF INSTANT REPLAY

The beast has been around, actually since 1955 when, during the 1955 season, Hockey Night in Canada used a “wet-film” (kinescope) in replay, which aired several minutes after the play. Videotape was introduced in 1956, with the Ampex Quadruplex system, however it was incapable of displaying slow-motion, instant replay or freeze-frames. I wonder if that 1980’s song Freeze Frame came out of this period.

 

Of course the inventive human mind kept tinkering with the idea throughout the 1960s and ‘70s, and by 1965 had devised an instant replay machine that could do quite a bit of instant replaying, but it was a “mother” to haul around…..it weighed 1,600 pounds.

 

People in the industry of television kept devising different types of operations in an effort to see the games that people play on the profession level until we’ve been given this wonderful crystal clear…..most of the time replay that is 100% concise, with absolutely no doubts.  I wonder how the Detroit Lions, or the Dallas Cowboys feel about instant replay, or how they feel about officials huddling up to debate a call on the field…..I’m just spit-balling here, but I’ll be neither cares much for the innovation.

 

Look it’s really simple why there is instant replay in today’s professional sports games, gambling boys and girls. Gambling on sports…..of almost any kind and on any level is undocumented, however educated guesses place the amount in the trillions each year.

 

So why is there instant replay in sports, easy, the numbers runners, the bars, the criminal element, and the few states that have legal gaming…..and organized crime. That’s right, organized crime…..and that’s according to the FBI.

 

So the next time your settled into that easy chair of yours, you know, that chair with the toilet built in, and the little six pack cooler on the side,(that ACTION CRAPERCHAIR) and you got to take a break because the referees or umpires have to check a call because some stupid coach or manager throws his little hankie on the field…..you’ve got organized crime to thank.

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!

IS U.S. PAYING FOR BOGUS AFGHAN COPS?

IS U.S. PAYING FOR BOGUS AFGHAN COPS?

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

Anybody who reads much of my stuff knows that I put a whole bunch of faith in statistical information…..it’s like the guy said “Follow that money trail, and there you’ll find the answers”. Now there’s this investigation and audit that’s been conducted by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction…..or SIGAR. I am so sick and tired of the military needing catchy, cute names for everything that they do, believe me, these catch phrases do not give the military credence to what they’re doing.

 

To a degree, my opinion of law enforcement here in the United States could be called a “bogus enforcement agency”…..at times anyways. That is our problem, it doesn’t involve anybody else, and it’s for damn sure that the United States isn’t receiving any foreign aid for the country’s policing problems.

 

But when I read about billions of good old green backs being wasted on law enforcement outfits in Afghanistan, I tend to get a pretty quick case of the red-ass. And the amount is $3.6 billion dollars, which seems to be paid in part to Afghanistan cops that don’t even exist, what in hell is up with that.

 

The United States, since the end of the Jimmy Carter presidency, has been pretty quick on the draw when it comes to international trouble and the U.S. foreign policies. It’s the “Don’t tread me attitude” that many in government have taken. Well gee wise, since 2000 (that would be before September 11, 2001), the United States has taken up arms, or more precisely bombs, 39 different times or more than 2.66 times each year.

 

So I suppose when somebody gets their uniform medals tarnished over the hint of improprieties with regards to United States taxpayer funds…..it should just be considered as part of the problem with the role that the U.S. has in the world in the early part of the 21^st century. Or as Dick Cheney says, “There’s people that want to kill us out there.”

 

However for me, I personally take exception to the laissez-faire attitude that Washington and the Pentagon has when doling out our money for reconstruction, or policing actions, or training foreign countries how to play cops and robbers.

 

Now you got to remember that it actually isn’t the United States military that is doing the training of Afghanistan’s key-stone cops, no-sir-ee, that would simply make the situation much clearer, that way accountants, and those people who are supposed to keep track of progress could be easily identified and held accountable.

 

People like former Oklahoma City policeman, Sonny Hurtado (a current General in the U.S. military), is in charge of training the Afghan police department for NATO. In addition there is training help and aid that is being contracted out to the likes of Xe (formerly Blackwater) and DynCorp.

 

A whole host of people in and out of the U.S. government believe that the task of training should not be assigned to private contractors, and say that the training of Afghanistan law enforcement is doomed from the outset because the focus will be on defeating the Taliban rather than fostering community-oriented policing.

 

HERE’S THE KICKER

It is estimated that the United States is spending $300 million dollars a year on salaries for Afghan cops who don’t even exist…..which I already mentioned…..but I figure it bears repeating. Could it be lax oversight and poor record-keeping…..and people speaking the universal language, money, that is exacerbating an already poor system worse…..of course.

 

The United States spent about $93 billion in military and economic assistance for Afghanistan from the Taliban’s ouster in late 2001 through September 2013, the Congressional Research Service (CRS), said last year. The U.S. and other donor nations fund about 60% of Afghanistan’s national budget, the special inspector general said.

 

It is imperative that there be a viable, effective police force, along with an army as key elements which would allow the United States to withdraw its military, and letting the Afghanistan government and people to take responsibility for its own security.

 

Since 2002 the United States has spent $15 billion dollars alone to train, equip and sustain the Afghan police, according to the just completed audit report. There’s no time-clock, no sign-in regiment (except for some officers) and no oversight to tell when Afghan law enforcement personnel actually work. Me…..I’d love to have that kind of a job, however, it wouldn’t be in Afghanistan.

 

“This command (police training) is committed to achieving dramatic results in Afghan National Police (ANP) salary payments process,” this in a December 1 memo which was included in the audit report.  “There is no doubt that there is still more to accomplish, but the past 90 days we have applied significant rigor to the letters of commitment to enforce fiscal discipline and improve oversight,” this again from the audit committee.

 

So let me get this straight…..it’s been since 2002 that the United States, NATO and the other allies have been attempting to create a solid police force that will enforce Afghanistan’s laws, and enforce and capture law breakers. That would be 12 years of effort…..I guess I’d have to question the veracity of the effort, I mean it only takes a women 9 months (or there abouts) to deliver a baby, how long is it going to take Afghanistan to stand on its own two feet?

 

The United States spent billions in Iraq in an effort to create a law enforcement presence in that country, and as I recall, the effort didn’t work out too well. I seem to recall reading an article that said President Obama was talking about sending military troops and advisors back into the country because of the lawlessness.

 

Here’s a kind of different idea, why not give these idiots 90 days to get their stuff straight because we’re going to move on out. That’s right, until there’s no more hunger here in the U.S. that there’s no more homelessness here in the United States, and U.S. citizens aren’t wanting for medical care, we’re pulling up stakes and concentrating on our own. Now…..to me, that’s a hell of an idea…..let’s just do it!

HAVE A NICE DAY!

INTELLIGENCE AS AN ACTIVITY IN U.S. GOVERNMENT

INTELLIGENCE AS AN ACTIVITY IN U.S. GOVERNMENT

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

Ok, so it goes, there’s some bad guys over there, it doesn’t matter which state, or street they’re on, it’s just that they’re bad guys and they need to be watched…..clandestinely. They’re different, or they have strange customs and wear weird cloths…..point is, they aren’t like us. What has just happened here with this scenario…..can anybody tell me, huh, no, well I can, either one or two people, or a group has been profiled by somebody with a bit of juice in government, any level of government, and they’ve started the ball rolling on a plan to keep an eye on these people because…..well, since I’m not the one with juice, I don’t know…..but the juice-man does.

 

Gathering intelligence on foreign as well as domestic individuals has been going on for a long time, the difference between then and now is the fact that today…..the gathering has been refined, and the scope of potential targets to be watched has grown exponentially. The average person doesn’t really think about it, but whenever you walk down the street in your town, or when you drive your vehicle on some streets, you are being filmed. When you grocery shop, or go to your favorite department store, your picture is being taking.

 

My friends, this is the age of distrust, and it’s getting worse and worse with each passing day, and the authority figures, those people who actually seem to be attempting to protect us from…..us are overjoyed with their new gadgets and newfound leeway to practice their craft. And the best part of the entire equation is the fact that most of the people that are being spied on, you and me are paying their salaries and for their new surveillance toys.

 

A LONG, LONG, LONG, LONG HISTORY OF SLEUTHING IN THE U.S.

With little exception people like to know about their friend’s dirty laundry, it’s a bit of power that one might hold over another…..just in case they ever need it…..and the worse the better. During the Revolutionary War, General George Washington was an avid and crafty user of intelligence, and was a consummate practitioner of the intelligence craft.

 

In a letter that General Washington wrote to one of his officers in 1777, Washington wrote that secrecy was the key to success of intelligence activities: “The necessity of procuring good intelligence is apparent and need not be further urged-All that remains for me to add is, that you keep the matter as secret as possible. For upon Secrecy, success depends in most Enterprises of the & for want of it, they are generally defeated, however well planned.”

 

Also during this period, Washington wasn’t the only person to understand what intelligence gathering might mean during a military conflict. In 1775 the Continental Congress created the Committee of Secret Correspondence whose job was to gather foreign intelligence from people in England, Ireland and elsewhere on the European continent in the prosecution of the war.

 

In January of 1790, at President Washington’s urging Congress established the Contingent Fund for Foreign Intercourse (also known as the Secret Service Fund). In July of 1790 $40,000 was appropriated for the fund, and by 1793 the budget had grown to $1 million and represented 12% of the overall budget of the United States. While congress required the President to certify the amounts spent, it also allowed him to conceal the purpose and recipients of the funds.

 

The House of Representatives, in 1846, challenged the provision of secrecy of the funds given for intelligence gathering, their purpose, or how the money was spent. However President Polk, citing national security grounds (even 169 years ago there was a question of national security) refused to turn over more specific information on the use of the funds.

 

The interest in national security and intelligence gathering as a tool by the Executive appears to have waned in succeeding administrations after the War of 1812 until the Civil War when, intelligence was credited with Lee’s defeat at Gettysburg and the Union’s defeat at Chancellorsville. At war’s end, the Bureau of Military Intelligence was disestablished; however the Secret Service was established in 1865 to combat counterfeiting currency.

 

Strangely in the years after the Civil War the use of intelligence for foreign policy was not expanded, but there was an expansion of domestic intelligent capabilities. In 1908 the Justice Department’s Bureau of Investigation (forerunner of the FBI) was established out of concern that Secret Service agents were spying on members of Congress. By 1916 the Bureau had expanded from 34 members focusing primarily on banking issues to more than 300 agents with an expanded charter that included internal security.

 

Surprisingly during World War I U.S. clandestine Intel gathering lacked a coordinated intelligence effort, due to an open door policy by President Woodrow Wilson. Wilson disdained the use of spies and was suspicious of intelligence gathering efforts and agencies.

 

However prior to the United States entrance into the war, British intelligence intercepted a document known as the Zimmerman Telegram, and the decrypted information from a German Ambassador telling of a plan to induce Mexico to join Germany against the United States in return for Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico…..if Germany won the war.

 

President Wilson used this captured communiqué as part of his reasoning to enter the war in his address before a joint session of Congress in 1917, urging the United States to declare war on Germany. The entering of World War I in the spring of 1917 led directly to the formation of the U.S. Signal Intelligence Agency by the United States Army which was known as MI-8, and was charged with decoding military communications, and providing codes for use by the U.S. military.

 

In 1919, at war’s end, MI-8 was transferred to the State Department, and became known as the Black Chamber, and focused on diplomatic rather than military communications. Black Chamber did have some well publicized success, such as the 1921 interception and decoding of Japanese diplomatic traffic. The intelligence gained was used to support U.S. negotiation at a Washington conference on naval disarmament.

 

However despite the success of Black Chamber, President Hoover, citing Secretary of State, Henry Stimson statement that “Gentlemen do not read each other’s mail,” Hoover returned the agency to a military orientation under the Army Signal Corps.

 

Until the late 1930’s intelligence agencies saw their resources cut substantially with one exception, the Justice Department’s Bureau of Investigation which saw a marked expansion of not only its mission, but its workforce, and budgetary expenditures. This all had to do with one man, J. Edger Hoover, who was named director in 1924. By 1935 Hoover, the Director of the Bureau saw his bureau’s name changed to the Federal Bureau of Investigation…..FBI.

 

WORLD WAR II

In the years previous to the United States entry into World War II saw American interest in developments in Europe and the Pacific intensify dramatically, prompting both formal and informal efforts to gather and analyze as much foreign information as possible. President Roosevelt relied heavily on American and British citizens traveling abroad to provide him with intelligence on the intentions of other leaders.

 

One of these European travelers was William “Wild Bill” J. Donovan who had an extensive military, law enforcement career and was an aficionado of intelligence through his service in World War I.

 

In July of 1941 President Roosevelt appointed Donovan as Coordinator of Information to form a non-military intelligence organization. Using the British intelligence model as a template for his new agency, Donovan created an analytical staff that would eventually supply information that would be presented to the President.

 

Of course most all bets were off when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, which exposed a horrific failure of American intelligence. Deemed to be casual, and uncoordinated, with insufficient attention to certain collection requirements, especially from the Army and Navy which resulted in a failure to provide timely dissemination of relevant information to key decision makers, the United States created the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in June 1942.

 

“Wild Bill” Donovan was appointed OSS director, and was responsible to the newly organized Joint Chiefs of Staff. Plus its analytical responsibilities carried over from the non-military organization, the OSS was chartered to carry out clandestine operations against the Axis powers on a worldwide scale.

 

The OSS was the precursor to what we have today known as the Central Intelligence Agency, or the CIA. Donovan was, and is the founder of the Central Intelligence Agency, and I suppose a boney finger of accusation can be pointed at “Wild Bill” for the plight and sometimes mess that we, as a nation today find ourselves.

 

SPOOKS

Today we’ve got 7 departments with 19 elements, which are within these 7 federal executive departments. It all sounds confusing to me…..but I believe that’s the way it is supposed to be. In addition to the 19 elements we have splinter groups that nobody can get information on. It’s the “if I tell ya, I gotta kill ya” thingy.

 

Guesstimates, well educated guesstimates place to total employment of these spook-groups at between 200,000 and 300,000. The budgets…..well my friends, I attempted to look that up on my trusty computer but got the old ACCESS FORBIDDEN, and was referred to intelligence.gov. That’s where I decided to end this blog…..I don’t want any black sedan’s with Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith knocking on my front door.

HAVE A NICE DAY!

 

A FEEL-GOOD ARTICLE

A FEEL-GOOD ARTICLE

(FRAZER CHRONICLE)

(All the News That Nobody Else Will Print)

I’ve really liked the past five or six weeks, “Allah Petro” isn’t making quite as much money as in years past. Of course now we read that just because gas is cheaper at the pumps doesn’t necessary equate into a better long term situation for us consumers…..we can’t win can we. I guess there’s places in Wisconsin where gasoline prices per gallon are under $2…..man I’d like some of that petro.

 

“Lower gas prices will hurt long term,” now there’s a group of words that simply won’t roll off the tongue no matter how many times you say it. Leave it some a fellow by the name of Gary Janosz, and a posting on Chicoer.com to burst my bubble.

 

Janosz says that “low gas prices have a short-term benefit to consumers, but in the long run hamper any efforts to become energy independent.” Well (holy magumbow) I wasn’t worried about the long term, I just wanted to enjoy my extra gas today, seems as if there’s always somebody dousing my “happy, happy.”

 

This Janosz guy talks about low prices today will “hasten the inevitable energy crisis when global supplies become depleted.” David Walton talks about “gas usage increases when prices drop, and I can only concur…..Cha-yea. He, Walton, talks about the laws of supply and demand, and the unquenchable thirst of gasoline in the U.S. So when the price per gallon at the pumps drop, more gas is consumed. U.S. automakers rejoice because the demand for SUV’s, luxury sedans and full-sized pick-ups returns.

 

However when the price for a gallon of gasoline increased (according to Janosz) “mass transit use jumps, airlines cut routes, consumers buy the most fuel efficient cars (usually imports), and recreation machines, snowmobiles, and jet skis are throttled back…..and car pooling becomes popular again”.

 

THESE GUYS GOT ALL SORTS OF DOOM AND GLOOM GOING ON

With low gasoline prices titillating consumers to use more, those same low prices stifle innovation. According to Janosz, “alternatives to gasoline powered vehicles stops completely, because nothing is ventured unless there’s an immediate profit creation.”

 

“No U.S. company is willing to bet on alternatives to gasoline-powered vehicles when proven profit available is from the same old product. There is simply no demand for alternatives and efficiency when gas prices are low.”

 

These poor petroleum companies, those poor oil drillers, and the poor oil field workers, I’m sure their Christmases weren’t quite as cheery as when the price for a gallon of gas was like $3.75.9 last Christmas season. Guess what “boys”, I don’t care, my Christmas was just fine, in fact I can’t recall a better holiday season.

 

Gasoline companies, the Shell’s and the BP’s are going to ride that petroleum pony for all it’s worth for as long as they can. The United States Federal Government resides in the back-pockets of the petroleum companies…..and pretty much the same can be said for the world’s governments. There is so much money, and so much power related to petroleum, could it be any other way.

 

THERE IS NO CONSPIRICY, IT’S HOW THEY DO THEIR BUSINESS

Ok I suppose the next thing you think I’m going to say is that there’s some sort of conspiracy that’s going on…..sorry to disappoint, I’m not, pretty much because there isn’t any conspiracy…..it’s how world authorities and the petroleum companies operate. Didn’t you ever wonder why government drags their collective feet whenever there’s an environmental impact study done, and the figures are either altered, or the story comes out on a week-end. Come on people…..wise the hell up.

 

If you want to keep driving that Suburban, or that lovely Cadillac, in the long run you’ll be paying, “on average” $3.75.9 for a gallon of gas. In many cases those SUV drivers can afford the higher gasoline prices. Oh sure there is a bit of validity connected with people cutting back a bit on when and where they drive to…..but not very much, unless these people aren’t like me.

 

The petroleum industry gets all sorts of kickbacks and subsidies, and although their taxation rates can be as much as 45%, well pal, if I make a cool $1 billion a year, and I gotta pay $450,000,000, I guess I’d be able to live on $550,000,000…..SOMEHOW.

 

Petroleum makers employ millions of people all over the globe; they pay gazillions of dollars for all sorts of stuff. They also pay decent wages, so in effect they got workers in their proverbial back pockets also…..I wonder if their pockets are getting full with all of those people in there?

 

WHETHER IT’S GAS OR DIESEL IT DOESN’T MATTER

When gasoline prices go down so do diesel prices, but never as much, that’s because when gas prices started their decline from say $3.80.9 per gallon, diesel fuel prices were at about $4.20.9 a gallon. So when gasoline is $2.99.9 a gallon, diesel fuel will have dropped to about $3.69.9.

 

Regular people (those with gas banger engines) don’t pay attention to what fuel prices are…..just the trucker and the trucking companies. When a gallon of diesel fuel is $3.50 a gallon, it will cost, to fill both saddle tanks (with an average of 90 gallons per tank) an average trucker $630.00…..a huge bite.

 

Petroleum companies have their profit margins penciled in; they can fall back on a different product when one seems to be out of demand. Gee, I’m just about done with this blog, and we didn’t even talk about the laws of supply and demand. I tried to look them up, “the laws,” but couldn’t find them in any law books.

HAVE A NICE DAY!