I got no beef with Russia. Every danger to democracy I see was born and raised right here in the USA.

Trump folds in the face of the Deep State and decides he does not want to have an “accident”… As Chuck Schumer says, f-ckin- with the spooks is “stupid”

The CIA website is mad ludicrous

The electoral level

The interests of the rich and of corporations are the only concern of the elected parts of our government, as John Podesta told us, “I guess it takes a study to point out the obvious.” If you have empirical evidence of oligarchy, a systematic study of decades of legislation from Princeton, confirmed in a secret email of the servant of the oligarchs, what you get is a fact.

The United States is not a democracy: John confirmed the FACT in an email. What this system is, well, make up a term. Oligrachy seems to work.

Debate is over on the subject of whether or not the creaky 18th century constitution, overlaid with a thick coat of corruption and money, qualifies as a democracy: it does not. But the story only gets worse.

What would happen if, despite the fraud, despite the need to “buy” airtime to run a campaign, despite the undemocratic structure of primaries and general elections, despite the propaganda of the corporate media, a movement that is really democratic and for the people were actually to take over the government? How much latitude would such a government have?

The Deep State

Chuck Schumer, the condescending, banker-friendly, East Coast, 46 years in congress, representative of Democrats, said that Trump was stupid for picking a fight with the intelligence community.

This one quote sums up a tremendous amount of politics over many decades. Schumer seems to assume that there is a threatening Deep State underneath our electoral politics. He would never dream of challenging the idea that an unelected group of armed agents with unlimited government budgets might influence what elected government officials can say or do. Schumer is a shadowy creature of the oligarchy who survives by avoiding light. To challenge and eliminate a threat to democracy as great as the “intelligence” community would require bravery and ethics, and those things look “stupid” to Schumer.

17 agencies

We have probably all heard that 17 security agencies support the conclusion that Russia hacked the US election. Back in 2002, Colin Powell said that 16 agencies supported the idea that Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction. I guess we grew one new agency?

What are these 17 agencies called? How much in aggregate do we spend on the magic 17? What good things have they ever done for the people of the United States? Would it make more sense for a country to have one security-intelligence or a whole bunch of them competing with each other?

Serious questions ignored while silly nonsense is the talk of Washington

Well, we know we don’t have a democracy on the “voting” level of government. Do we also have a network of fiends under that level? Is the network of securities agencies a Deep State? Could a democratically elected government eliminate the CIA and NSA and dramatically reform the FBI if this theoretical government wanted to make serious changes to these agencies?

These questions about why we do so much spying seem like serious questions to me. What, if any, role Russia had in hacking John Podesta’s and the DNC’s email seem like trivial and silly questions.

Any threat posed by Russia, Iran or Syria (on one hand), or by Isis, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar (on the other), or by China, pale in comparison to the threat posed to Americans by the NSA, the CIA and, potentially, the FBI. The CIA has clearly undone democracies in Chile. The CIA admits to dealing with “with coup-plotters, false propagandists and assassins.” The CIA has undone democracy in Guatemala. The CIA has overthrown and killed elected leaders in Iran and the Congo. Meanwhile, the NSA gathered up everyone’s email and then lied to congress about it. Sounds pretty Deep-Statey to me.

If the Deep State can lie to congress, who is really in charge? Not congress for sure.

What good have the spies ever done for the people of the United States? Bad “intelligence” (manipulated) got us into Vietnam (Tonkin Gulf) and Iraq (WMD). These agents were surprised by the fall of communism. If they couldn’t get these historic questions right then they lost and should be put out of our misery.

Elected President of Congo. Murdered by the CIA. That’s called “hacking” an election.

Until World War II, we didn’t have permanent spy agencies. On the CIA’s kid’s page (get them while their young), in addition to non sequitur clip art of kids that will not be working for the CIA, the fact that we did not have a permanent spy agency from 1776 to 1941 is obvious and beyond dispute.

We would be safer as a people without the CIA and the NSA. They have done nothing but harm to us as a people, nothing but harm to our democracy, and they are always wrong.

They are wrong again about Russia influencing the 2016 election.

Trump would be right to ignore them. He would be righter (to speak Trumpish) to defund them for their partisanship and fake news tendencies. He would be even rightier to defund them for being a threat to our democracy at home, or to appoint Edward Snowden head of the NSA, but that it beyond possible to even dream.

Trump appears to be caving to the Deep State. Is it any surprise? Chuck Schumer assures us the Deep State exists, and he should know, he’s been in congress since he was 23. I’ll take him at his word.

The Iranian people elected this man. He made the mistake of thinking the oil under Iran belonged to its people. The CIA took care of him.

The FBI released a report (apparently with CIA help) that has been widely criticized. Here and here. Does the report represent what the CIA, or the NSA, or the FBI really think about this Russian hacking story? By the agencies, I guess I mean the majority of the people who work at these agencies. You know, the Deep State.

Here is a mainstream, oligarchs perspective: On Politico, an ex-CIA chief, a Democrat, says that Trump is out of line for not respecting the CIA. Anonymous sources tell the Mainstream Media they know who exactly hacked the DNC from 2015 to the Wikileak DNC release just before Democratic Primary in July 2016.

Some Republicans joined the corporate/Clinton wing of the Democratic party in insisting that the Russian hacking story is significant. However, few Republicans are sticking their necks out on this one and as time goes on, fewer seem to be joining the bandwagon. John McCain is the most prominent of these Neocons.

If you spend your whole life respecting the democratic process, never questioning the validity of the electoral process over decades of left wing activism, as this man in Chile did, you are somehow a threat to democracy? CIA “hacked” him.

The mainstream temper tantrum had an effect on Trump. After a month of this stuff, Trump released a statement (which, given its grammatical structure, he did not write himself).

I have tremendous respect for the work and service done by the men and women of this community to our great nation. While Russia, China, other countries, outside groups and people are consistently trying to break through the cyber infrastructure of our governmental institutions, businesses and organizations including the Democrat National Committee, there was absolutely no effect on the outcome of the election including the fact that there was no tampering whatsoever with voting machines. There were attempts to hack the Republican National Committee, but the RNC had strong hacking defenses and the hackers were unsuccessful. Whether it is our government, organizations, associations or businesses we need to aggressively combat and stop cyberattacks. I will appoint a team to give me a plan within 90 days of taking office…

Basically, it seems like someone in Trumpland, probably KellyAnne Conway, or maybe Reince Priebus, noted that Republicans don’t usually beat up on the military or anything quasi-military, or anything that looks like authority, institutions like the CIA and FBI, as Trump has been doing lately. So this person wrote this statement that tries to make a little nice-nice with the CIA and Trump agreed to release it.

Trump didn’t say he was going to do anything about past hacking, and again repeated that 1) if Russia did hack the DNC, it’s kinda their fault; 2) if Russia did hack into the DNC, that is not why the election turned out as it did; and 3) he does not say he agrees with the idea that the Russians did hack into the DNC or John Podesta.

Presidents, schemidents. The CIA doesn’t mind getting rid of foreign presidents. And American ones? They could do that too, right? But no, the Russians! Big and Bad!

Still, that statement is a bone to the Deep State. He respects them. They don’t have anything to worry about with Trump. Schumer is wrong and they don’t need to kill him.

Trump is a con man. A true patriot would cut their funding and go ahead and get shot (or have airplane trouble, or catch a strange new kind of flu, or ….)

Then we could at least see the present danger of our own Deep State.

What have the Russians ever done to me? When have the Russians ever undermined American democracy more than our own demogogues and spooks?

No Deep State, no Isis.

No Deep State, no endless war.

The military industrial complex is not something a politician can eliminate from the budget. They got us.

Revolution would be nice, but, then, we do have internet, cars, mortgages and all the processed food we can eat. Crappy education and health care, but hey, we got chips.