Spying
 

Echelon is not just a S Jersey mall that is not doing very well. It is an international communications eavesdropping system run by UK, Canada, US, Australia, and New Zealand. Two major stations are in Menwith Hill UK and Bad Aibling in Bavaria Germany. The EU government recently took testimony that the US government was using intercepts of EU governments to aid US defense industries. The evidence was quite damning. But apparently the facilities were considered important enough even to Europeans.

However the Bavarian state government has finally had enough and ordered the Bad Aibling station closed. Why now? Throughout the world are repeated reports of other US spying efforts that were recently exposed in a leaked memo. This news story is keep popping up in international news stories but is ignored domestically:
UN launches inquiry into American spying This is how Watergate started. Silly little story just like this one that, if true, was damning evidence of total disregard for rule of law. Few remember Watergate. Almost no newspaper would touch it. The electronic media was even less cooperative. The electronic media refused to even touch the Pentagon Papers. And so Watergate festered for years, all but being totally ignored by most major news organizations. Watergate was just this kind of story. What makes it more intriging is that the George Jr Administration is staffed by people with the same ethics as Halderman and Erlichmen.

The US at one point claimed it would easily have the votes in the UN Security Council for a war resolution. Did this exposed 'dirty tricks' operation completely reverse countries such as Chile, Mexico, and Cameroon - once declared sure bets for US support? I would most certainly suspect so. This last month, US relations even with close US friends such as Canada and Mexico have hit all time lows. After this story, even the UK now demands Tony Blair better have that UN resolution if he expect any support even from his own labor party. But ironically, this leak gets no play in the US press.

You left out 007, Derek Flint, and Matt Helm.

What the fuck kind of conspiracy theorist do you call yourself, greenhorn?

I'd say the story has no traction because we already know how our government operates. We got used to operating like a rogue nation during the Cold War. While creating a new enemy, we've gotten a little sloppy. Eventually, we'll be THE rogue nation on everbody elses watch list.

Rogue, heck. This is normal. Everyone spies on everyone else. Dirty tricks are pretty much standard too. Remember the conspiracy thread a while back, when I posted about the Zimmerman telegram?

The naive also believed a president could never be a crook. What part do you have a problem with? The part where the US government used Echelon to assist US defense industries to obtain European contracts? Some live in a Rush Limbaugh world. Anything not first approved by Rush must be 007 conspiracy theory? But then Watergate was also some conspiracy fantacy. Clearly top White House people do no such things. At least the naive believed that nonsense then and today.

The Observer puts together a curious set of facts very similar to what the Washington Post published before Nixon's second reelection. Those blind loyalists also accused the Washington Post of conspiracy theorists.

Is the Observer accurate? It has credibility - especially if the UN Secretary General is investigating. What makes The Observer more credible is the integrity of this president and many of his top advisors. Had this been Gerald Ford or Jimmy Carter, then this Observer article would have less credibility. But the George Jr administration sees everything in terms of "god is on our side" meaning they have very little credibility. They even use this 'god' concept to justify the Bush doctrine of preemption - that we have the right to attack anyone who may be a future enemy.

Using Echelon in this corrupt manner would not be beyond such mentalities who have no respect for basic human rights and very little respect for the Bill of Rights when it gets in their way.