IT SIMPLY WILL NOT GO AWAY!

(John Pike, Steven Aftergood, Intelligence Resource Program)

(John D. Negroponte, Bloomberg, Joshua Brustein)

(Nicole Gaouette, Allen Holmes, Laura Poltras)

(Marcel Rosenbach, Der Spiegel)

(Al Jazeera, Frazer Chronicle)

Some people just don’t have any common sense, others are arrogant, and some wear those little American flag lapel pins, and proclaim that they have the best interest of the United States at heart…..and shouldn’t be questioned. These are usually conservative right wing wackos who figure that the sun rises and falls with whatever the United States wants, or does.

I really can’t understand, or figure these people out, where did they get the huge pompous attitude that they wear on their shoulders that makes them bend at the belly button line when they walk, presumably from the weight. I have little interest in what kind of fellow Edward Snowden is, he could be a patriot for all I know, and it wouldn’t make any difference to me.

For whatever reason the United States seems intent on gathering intelligence on everybody, old people in retirement homes, mothers, babies, factory workers, teachers, truck drivers, and the cop on the corner…..and those are just some of the Americans that are targeted.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that almost without exception the United State’s intelligence community is intent on gathering volumes of information that is stored in some of the biggest warehouses in existence on the planet today.

I’ve read that whenever some of the intelligence computers are turned on, entire town’s lights dim, and I ain’t talking about middle town America, I’m talking Denver, or Chicago, or Newark, New Jersey. Can you imagine the electric bill, holy smoke that would be a back breaker for me.

To explain the U.S. intelligence community today would take somebody with a higher clearance than I have…..I don’t have one, and don’t want to have one.  I’m sure that there are attachments connected, and I’ve never been very good with attachment deals.

 

EDWARD SNOWDEN, LOVE HIM OR HATE HIM, THERE AIN’T NO MIDDLE GROUND

Is he a savior, or a criminal, for me the jury is still out on those questions, but I will say one thing, what he did sure as hell shook up our intelligence community. I believe that that was a good thing; it’s an impossibility for the U.S. to arbitrarily set up spying installations anywhere around the world and collect information without stepping on some toes.

I don’t think Germany is going to resurrect the 3^rd. Reich, and follow a mustached Angela Merkel, the chances are slim and none. Gathering intelligence on the German top politician seems extremely pointless, and hopeless.

Giving up information of a sensitive nature (according to experts) at the least can be troubling, and at the worst can put American lives in danger. I have a somewhat different opinion on what Snowden did, and I’m not sure that I buy the “I’m a concerned citizen that wants to make a wrong…..right.” I’m not sure that Snowden has all his marbles, you know, a bottle or two short of a six pack. I think that maybe Eddy boy did it for a thrill pure and simple.

Whatever he is, Snowden sure as hell has caused a firestorm in the intelligence community…..and maybe that’s a good thing. These spook agencies tend to take themselves way too serious, and for some insignificant computer specialist, or programmer to blow the lid off an entire division of U.S. intelligence is kind of cool.

Snowden has been called all sorts of names, some I can’t repeat because this is a family blog, but a hero, a whistleblower a dissident, a traitor and a patriot are just a few. According to Snowden, his sole motivation was to inform the public as to that which is done in their name, and inevitably that which is done to them.

I’m personally not too interested in what makes Edward Snowden click; I’ll leave that analyses to the headshrinkers. For me, this entire episode has illustrated to me that a huge department of our government is out of control…..and if that’s a fact, well then Edward Snowden is a hero and a patriot.

THE INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY

At the present time, the U.S. intelligence and security agencies number at least 54 agencies, I say at least, because very few people know for sure how many there really are. In addition to the number of independent agencies, there are 28 department heads, and a buddle of employees, maybe as many as 200,000 men and women, or more. Hell, I live in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and that figure is more than twice the size of the homes in Packer Country.

These departments or agencies include selected tactical military intelligence and security organizations, as well as those responsible for security responses to transnational threats, to include terrorism, cyber warfare, computer security, covert employment of weapons of mass destruction, narcotics trafficking, and international organized crime.

While the budget and the number of employees are classified, the numbers are supposed to be know by the Office of Management and Budget, by both the Senate Select Committee on intelligence and the Defense subcommittees in both houses of Congress, and by the Director of National Intelligence…..but, don’t hold your breath…..something tells me that these figures aren’t only classified, but their so muddled that nobody knows.

And the budget for these jokers, pick a number and take a seat, I’m sure nobody knows for sure what it costs to run as many as 54 intelligence agencies and the people to man the positions that would be necessary to keep us safe and warm at night in our collective beds.

To be involved with an intelligence or security agency would be, I’m sure, an exciting romantic and viable career. Being on the cusp of action, of change, and of discovery I’m sure makes for an extraordinary life-style.

A power unto themselves is how these people operate, total impunity no matter the act, or action…..after all what they do is making the United States a safer place to live.

THESE GUYS ARE BUILDING A ROAD TO THE FUTURE…..AND BEYOND

Perpetual can be a tricky word, in does mean forever, or re-occurring, kind of scary to think about when the talk is about a human program that is at its very best…..shadowy. But that’s what PRISM is, a spy program that right out of science fiction or espionage books. And it’s been in operations since 2007, so you’d figure that that all the bugs have been eliminated.

The program began in 2007 in the wake of the passage of the Protect American Act under the President George W. Bush administration, and its presence wasn’t known until Snowden leaked its existence in 2013. He said along with the leak that he exposed, that Americans didn’t really understand the extent of the intelligence apparatus’s information gathering…..he hit the nail on the head with that one.

You know I’ve always had a problem with programs that takes the drudgery out of everyday life, like governmental programs to ease the effort, or some dink from across the street coming to your aid when you really don’t need the help, and are capable of doing whatever yourself.

There seems to be a cloak that our federal government wants to wrap us under…..and frankly I don’t think that we need it. In the illustrious words of many of our politicians, all we wanna do is protect you, and the homeland. There was another fella that talked like that, and he just wanted to protect, and to guide his people in the right direction…..his name was Adolph Hitler.

We need to take back the power that our forefathers fought and died for to give us…..freedom and independence, I don’t recall any mention of a program the likes of Prism, If we don’t cut this activity right now, cause it’s way past nipping it in the bud time, we’re doomed to continue the same way that we are going, and it’ll only get worse.

HAVE A NICE DAY!