Already some years ago my “Shadow” talked to me pretty extensively about an office for open source intelligence which had been run by DNI but was soon punted to the CIA, always at the same smallish campus in Reston, Virginia. My “Shadow” described accurately and in detail not only their analysis of gray literature such as standout blogs, perhaps peer-reviewed journals and such like, but also their playing with such authors so as to bait them into providing perspective on whatever issue.
I had never heard of such a thing – as I’m not my “Shadow”, right? – so it sounded like conspiracy theory quagmire. I mean, how could one play chess upside down, inside out, back to front and have the pretense that analysts will have the clarity not to analyze themselves in the process? This is the existential extremity of what ends up being counterintelligence with oneself. No one carrying out such an analysis can long survive not reading themselves into whatever dynamic. Unless there is fearless humility (rare, right?) so as not to use themselves as a standard of everything, it’s all an exercise of arrogant power. Is it worth anything? Sure, for what it’s worth. There must be some good people who have not worn themselves out on an adrenaline rush of being on top of whatever situation because of some will-to-power. There must be…
From time to time the blog will get hits from named servers in the stats that read Central Intelligence Agency, with I.P. locators landing on the roof of OSC in Reston. Those claimed hits are always on posts which would be of interest to such analysts, so that any named hit is like a friendly nod for what was written from the perspective of whatever outside-of-the-box skill sets possessed by the author. Fine.
But what happens when, because of the unrepeatable world-view of any author, who will surely sometimes have a take on issues contrary to the ever changing status quo (we’re all human, right?) he is subject to being cancelled by whomsoever, a cancelling which will also take down that which is considered to be of value for the common good? The very point of gray intel is to get non-systemic points of view, right?
Well, that’s all good when there is a healthy first amendment. But when the arrogance of some think to have control of all that there is, the thirst for the power of destruction takes over as lockstep as fear regulating the action of the cowardly. And then what do we have? Them as our saviors? No thanks. Jesus is my Savior.
This blog is been hit by the cancel culture quite strongly in the past months. This is provable in many ways, one of which is the email system. I’m able to see inside the inboxes of others whom I assist, such as Father Gordon. Only, say, one in five posts might make it to his inbox. And that is also the reported experience of others, to the point now of their getting no notifications at all. Some receive some, some receive all, some receive nothing. But it’s all in the direction of nothing at all.
It’s about enough to make me go dark. There’s a certain freedom in that. There are many things to do in life for the Lord. So, yeah, I’m thinking about going dark pretty heavily in these days. It is what it is. If the intel crowd think that one in a thousand posts is worth the effort to follow, well, they know how to reverse any such cancelling, but it’s the will to do it that’s the question. My advice to them, whatever they think about the authors of the gray lit that they analyze, is to keep their friends close and their enemies closer.
I’d like to put up, say, a homily later today on the Most Holy Trinity, and maybe, say, a Flower for the Immaculate Conception. But those are what is most offensive to the cancel crowd. Religious integrity and honesty, a life lived with the Lord is quite uncontrollable by any government. That’s why there have been hundreds of millions of martyrs this past century, the most bloody century in the entire history of mankind. And I’m concerned about being cancelled? I’m such an idiot. But a happy “scum of the earth” (to reference Saint Paul). ;-)
ARISE! LET US BE GOING! 