Saturday, March 26, 2016

526 De uitspraken van Cruijff..grappig èn soms ijzersterk.

Ik was even 'incommunicado' en hoorde pas zojuistdat Cruijff 2 dagen geledenis gestorven.

Hier een aantal uitspraken.
De onderstreepte uitspraak gebruik is zelf heel vaak.



'Ieder nadeel heb zijn voordeel' en andere Cruijffiaanse uitspraken

Johan Cruijff stond niet alleen bekend als een voetbalfenomeen, hij behaalde ook geregeld de pers met zijn markante, eigenzinnige uitspraken. Er is zelfs een term voor: het Cruijffiaans. Een mix tussen voetbaljargon en Amsterdams. Voor velen onnavolgbaar, voor anderen briljant. ( Volkskrant

Andere bekende uitspraken

'You play football with your head, and your legs are there to help you'

The Guardian zette alle bekende quotes van Cruijff ook onder elkaar. 

'Why couldn’t you beat a richer club? I’ve never seen a bag of money score a goal'

'Sadly they played very dirty. This ugly, vulgar, hard, hermetic, hardly eye-catching, hardly football style... If with this they got satisfaction, fine, but they lost” – on the Netherlands’ 2010 World Cup finalists'

'Italians can’t win the game against you, but you can lose the game against the Italians'

'I only decided to become a manager when I was told I couldn’t'

Lees het stuk van The Guardianhier.
'Voetbal is simpel, maar simpel voetballen blijkt vaak het moeilijkste wat er is'

'Je moet schieten anders kun je niet scoren'

'Als je niet ken winnen, moet je zorgen dat je niet verliest' 

'In zekere zin ben ik waarschijnlijk onsterfelijk'

'Simpel is het moeilijkst' 

'Voetbal is een spel van fouten. Wie de minste fouten maakt wint'

'Je gaat het pas zien als je het doorhebt' 

'Ik maak eigenlijk nooit fouten, want ik heb enorme moeite om me te vergissen'

'Soms moet er iets gebeuren voordat er iets gebeurt' 

'Toeval is logisch'

'Als Italianen één kans krijgen, maken ze er twee'

'Ik ben overal tegen. Tot ik een besluit neem, dan ben ik ervoor. Lijkt me logisch'

'Als ik thuiskom van een televisie-analyse, vraagt mijn vrouw: wat heb je gezegd? Dan zeg ik: al sla je me dood.'

Cabaretier Joop Visser schreef vijf jaar geleden het lied 'Voetbal', bestaande uit Cruijffiaanse uitspraken. Beluister het lied hieronder.

525. Brussel. De islam krijgt weer de schuld. Àlle moslims zijn gevaarlijk.

De aanslag in Brussel deed veel stof opwaaien.
De moslims hebben het gedaan. Àlle moslims.

Dat verhaal wordt verspreid door precies dezelfde mensen als die welke verantwoordelijk zijn voor zo ongeveer àlle moslim-aanslagen:  the usual suspects zal ik ze maar noemen.

Ze controleren al 20 jaardeAmerikaanse buitenbland politiek, en al decennia de media. Maar de Westerse media hebben ze nooit zo volledig beheerst als nu.  ze maken het danook steeds bonter.

Laat ik ze voor het gemak 'de Neocons' noemen.
Ik houd het heel kort:
-- In 1979  heeft Amerika besloten om in Afghanistan aanwezige strijders te gaan steunen, trainen en betalen om aanslagen te plegen tegen de Russen.   Brzezinski vertelde het in 1979.

-- Sibel Edmonds zegt dat rond 1985 er een organisatie was ( The American-Turkish council) die vele miljoenen naar Turkije en omgeving stuurde; voor het goede doel zogezegd. (nato -binding) Maar wat niet bekend was is dat 33% van dat geld werd besteed om madrassa's van te stichten waar toekomstige jihadisten konden worden opgeleid.

-- De Tsjetsjeense opstand is door de VS op potengezet. Zie William Engdahl.

-- De burgeroorlog in Irak is door de neocons bewust uitgelokt.

-- Libië is door de neocons bewust vernietigd.

-- de VS maakt daarbij vooral gebruik vanSaudi Arabië. Dat land voert ( met overtuiging en gaarg)  uit wat de Neocons wensen.

In de openlijkheid doen ze alsof ze het moslim-extremisme verafschuwen. Maar in de praktijk gebruiken ze deze mensen.

Of de aanslagen in brussel zijnaangestoken door neocon-agenten, weet ik niet. Als je duivels creeert gaan die op bepaald momeent natuurlijk ook wel eens hun eigen gang.
En als je ziet dat alleen al onder Obama 950.000 moslims zijn gedood, dan is dat moslim-extremisme natuurlijk in feite maareen heel flauwe reactie op een veel groter misdaad.

Hieronder een weer geheel andere benadering, die ik hier wil her-publiceren omdat hij veel goede links heeft:

Heeft u al kennisgenomen van het Nederlandse Stay-Behind Netwerk?

 

Met het oog op de recente aanslagen is het wellicht interessant om eens kennis te nemen van het ‘Stay-Behind Network.’ Wist u dat er sinds de tweede wereldoorlog een undercover NAVO-leger actief is, verspreid over heelEuropa inclusief Nederland? Een geheim leger dat in Nederland actief is en voor een flink deel onder coördinatie staat van Amerikaanse inlichtingendiensten. Dat klinkt uiteraardvolstrekt ongeloofwaardig, maar lees toch even verder.
De historicus dr. Short schreef naar aanleiding van de aanslagen in Parijs“Ik wil mensen herinneren aan Operatie Gladio, die werd uitgevoerd tussen de jaren veertig en de jaren tachtig, waarbij de Verenigde Staten en hun NAVO-partners doelbewust Europese burgers doodden, terroriseerden en bang maakten om ze zogenaamd te beschermen tegen het communisme.” De operaties waar dr. Short het over heeft betreffen het Stay-Behind netwerk van de VS (het betrof de CIA uiteraard) en hun NAVO partners, waaronder Nederlandse inlichtingendiensten en het Nederlandse militaire apparaat.
Dit is het boeiende verhaal van het Stay-Behind netwerk:
Wat is het Stay-Behind Netwerk
Aan het einde van de tweede wereldoorlog kwam het moment van terugtrekking van militaire troepen. De rust was teruggekeerd – soort van, althans – en het besluit moest genomen worden dat men terug naar huis kon. Militair-strategisch gezien is dat besluit uiteraard dubieus, want duur veroverd grondgebied moet je natuurlijk niet zomaar prijsgeven.
De oplossing? Troepen achterlaten die van binnenuit (op eigen grond gebied dus) kunnen strijden tegen het communisme en andere waargenomen bedreigingen voor de overheid, de NAVO en de CIA. Dit kon natuurlijk niet openlijk plaatsvinden, dat zou immers leiden tot protesten en acties van Rusland, dit moest dus in het geheim plaatsvinden.
Wikipedia – niet bepaald de meest objectieve en waarheidsgetrouwe bron op dit gebied, maar toch – schrijft in een heel aardige samenvatting het volgende:
IN EEN STAY-BEHIND-OPERATIE ORGANISEERT EEN LAND GEHEIMEMEDEWERKERS OF ORGANISATIES OP ZIJN EIGEN GEBIED, VOOR HET GEVAL DAT HET GEBIED BEZET WORDT DOOR EEN VIJAND. IN DAT GEVAL ZOUDEN DE MEDEWERKERS DE BASIS WORDEN VAN EEN VERZETSBEWEGING, OF SPIONEREN ACHTER DE VIJANDELIJKE LINIES.
IN DE TWEEDE WERELDOORLOG BESTONDEN VERSCHEIDENE STAY-BEHINDORGANISATIES. TIJDENS DE KOUDE OORLOG STEUNDEN DE NAVO EN DE CIA STAY-BEHINDTROEPEN IN VEEL EUROPESE LANDEN, MET ALS DOEL ZE TE ACTIVEREN ALS DAT LAND OVERGENOMEN ZOU WORDEN DOOR HET WARSCHAUPACT OF ALS DE COMMUNISTISCHE PARTIJ AAN DE MACHT ZOU KOMEN IN EEN DEMOCRATISCHE VERKIEZING.
IN ITALIË, OOSTENRIJK, DUITSLAND, NEDERLAND EN ANDERE LANDEN WERDEN VEEL WAPENS GEVONDEN DIE TER BESCHIKKING STONDEN VAN DEZE “GEHEIME LEGERS”. DE BEKENDSTE VAN DEZE NAVO-OPERATIES WAS OPERATIE GLADIO.
Geheime NAVO-troepen en undercover CIA-commando’s die heimelijk in heel Europa operaties uitvoeren… Dit soort informatie staat uiteraard niet in je geschiedenisboeken, maar dat maakt het helaas niet minder waar.
De meest bekende “geheime” operaties van de CIA en NAVO op het Europese grondgebied waren de operaties in Italië, het Italiaanse Stay-Behind netwerk kreeg de naam Operatie Gladio. De NAVO/CIA-club in Italië is actief sinds de jaren 50, hun meest bekende werk betrof een aanslag op een Italiaans treinstation in 1980. Dit was op dat moment de grootste “terroristische aanslag” op Europees grondgebied, in werkelijkheid betrof het dus een professioneel klusje van de Italiaanse overheid, de NAVO en de CIA, ofwel terreur door eigen overheid. Lees meer over Operatie Gladio op WantToKnow.
Maak kennis met O&I – Operatiën & Inlichtingen
Wanneer we in Nederland spreken over Operatie Gladio is kennis benodigd over het Nederlandse Stay-Behind netwerk. Maak kennis met O&I. Hier staart de ‘geheime’ geschiedenis van het militaire apparaat je dus in het Nederlandse gezicht. De twee organisaties Operatiën en Inlichtingen (Operations & Intelligence) begonnen zogezegd als communicatiemiddel tussen Nederland en de Nederlandse regering destijds (illegaal trouwens) in het buitenland gevestigd.
[HET BETROF] TWEE ORGANISATIES (OPERATIËN & INLICHTINGEN, LATER A EN B GENOEMD) WELKE OP DEN DUUR WEL DOOR ÉÉN PERSOON WERDEN GECOÖRDINEERD MAAR ELK EEN EIGEN TAAK HADDEN. O&I WERD GEFINANCIERD DOOR HET MINISTERIE VAN DEFENSIE EN GELEID DOOR LEDEN VAN DE RAAD VAN STATE, ONDER ANDEREN DE OUD-VERZETSLIEDEN MARINUS RUPPERT EN THEO VAN LIER.
Over dit financieren door het ministerie van Defensie. Dat klopt technisch gezien, maar het is bekend dat dit soort inlichtingendiensten ook hun eigen inkomstenstromen verzorgen voor het budgetteren van operaties die uitgevoerd worden los van toezicht en financiering door het Ministerie. De regering verandert elke vier jaar, dat maakt van de regering en het ministerie uiteraard een organisatie die niet volledig ingelicht kan en mag worden. Bedenk immers eens wat er zou gebeuren als een communistische partij de verkiezingen zou winnen?
Niet alleen Inlichtingen, ook Operatiën
Dat O&I niet alleen ging over inlichtingen voor regering, overheid en koningshuis wordt uiteraard zeer snel duidelijk. ‘O’ gaat over het uitvoeren van geheime operaties op Nederlands grondgebied door professionele commando’s die worden voorzien van professioneel militair materiaal:
DE O-ORGANISATIE [..] BESCHIKTE OVER DUIZENDEN KILO’S EXPLOSIEVEN EN WAPENS DIE LAGEN OPGESLAGEN IN 40 GEHEIME ONDERGRONDSE BERGPLAATSEN. EEN WAPENOPSLAG DIE IN APRIL 1980 BIJ TOEVAL WERD ONTDEKT IN EEN LIMBURGS BOS, BLEEK, NAAR IN NOVEMBER 1990 BEKEND WERD, DEEL UIT TE MAKEN VAN O.
Onderdeel van het Stay-Behind netwerk zijn geheime wapenopslagen verspreid over heel Europa. Dit zijn professioneel beheerde voorraden van militair materiaal die paraat liggen om gebruikt te worden in Europa door de professionele commando’s in dienst van “onze” overheden en “onze” inlichtingendiensten.
Sabotage, Psychologie Oorlogsvoering, Falsificatie en… Propaganda middels de publieke omroepen
Wat weten we tot zover: er bestaan professionele undercover commando’s in Nederland, die opereren in opdracht van onze overheid, de samenwerkende inlichtingendiensten waaronder de CIA en uiteraard de NAVO. Deze professionals opereren echter grotendeels buiten het toezicht van de overheid en buiten het toezicht van normale overheidsmedewerkers en het oorlogsapparaat, operaties waarvoor geen verantwoording afgelegd hoeft te worden. Duidelijk een ongemakkelijke waarheid.
Dit alles speelt uiteraard ook buiten het zicht van journalistiek en grote media. De media mogen daarover uiteraard niet rapporteren, en wat blijkt, op die doofpot wordt actief toegezien. De medewerkers van het Nederlandse Stay-Behind leger van O&I zijn geen lieverdjes:
DE O-ORGANISATIE [..] WAS GERICHT OP HET UITVOEREN VAN SABOTAGES, OVERVALLEN EN LIQUIDATIES IN BEZET GEBIED [LLE: DAT WIL ZEGGEN GEWOON HIER IN NEDERLAND NA WO2 DUS!]. O WAS VOORZIEN IN DE SECTIES SABOTAGE, PSYCHOLOGISCHE OORLOGVOERING, VERBINDINGEN, FALSIFICATIE, OPERATIONELE FINANCIERING, SECURITY EN EEN SECTIE CODES. DE HUIDIGE VOORZITTER VAN DE RAAD VOOR DE JOURNALISTIEK EN VOORMALIG VOORZITTER VAN DE NCRV MR A. HERSTEL WAS ALS INSTRUCTEUR PSYCHOLOGISCHE OORLOGVOERING AAN O VERBONDEN.
De voorzitter van één van de grootste Nederlandse publieke omroepen was alsinstructeur Psychologische Oorlogsvoering in dienst van de Nederlandse overheid en het geheime Stay-Behind leger. En ineens zijn dus ook de publieke omroepen in beeld als middel van O&I. Op hoog niveau houdt het geheime O&I dus toezicht op (lees: beïnvloedt het) de media. Daarnaast is duidelijk dat O&I stiekem infiltreerde in de samenleving en ze via die weg hun operaties uitvoerde.
Grachtenpanden, Villa’s, Studiegenootschappen en Advocatenkantoren
Dat kan toch werkelijk niet waar zijn, toch? Helaas heb ik wat slecht nieuws mocht u die gedachte nog bezigen. Het wordt nog veel vreemder:
DE O-TAK VAN DE STAY-BEHIND-ORGANISATIE WAS AANVANKELIJK GEHUISVEST OP EEN ZOLDERETAGE AAN DE OUDE GRACHT IN UTRECHT, MAAR VERHUISDE LATER NAAR HET ADVOCATENKANTOOR VAN MEDE-OPRICHTER BOOTSMA IN DE BINNENSTAD VAN AMSTERDAM. LATER ZAT DE STAF VAN DE O-DIENST (CIRCA 12 PERSONEN) IN EEN VILLA AAN HET VONDELPARK ONDER DE DEKMANTEL VAN EEN HISTORISCH STUDIEGENOOTSCHAP, DE STICHTING HENDRIK VAN BORSELE. HET LAATST BEKENDE KANTOORADRES VAN O WAS DE ZWAAR BEVEILIGDE MARINEBASIS KATTENBURG BIJ HET CENTRAAL STATION IN AMSTERDAM.
Zolderetages aan de Oude Gracht, Amsterdamse advocaten kantoren, studiegenootschappen, villa’s aan het Vondelpark, de basis bij het Centraal Station, psychologische oorlogsvoering middels toezicht en manipulatie van media en de publieke omroepen, alles aangestuurd vanuit de O&I… Wat zegt dit over de objectiviteit en correctheid van het NOS journaal?
Het opheffen van O&I
Herinnert u zich nog het terugtrekken van troepen na WO2? De realiteit bleek duidelijk anders. Zogezegd is ook O&I opgeheven in 1992, maar zoals u ondertussen weet, dit soort organisatie worden nooit écht opgeheven het wordt alleen grondiger uit de geschiedenisboeken en financiële boeken gestreept:
KORT NADAT O&I OPGEHEVEN WAS EN ENIGE MEDEWERKERS MET WACHTGELD THUIS ZATEN, PLEEGDEN TWEE LEDEN HIERVAN (WAARONDER EEN MAJOOR) CHANTAGE MET VOEDSELVERGIFTIGING […] OM TE VOORKOMEN DAT ANDEREN OOK ZOUDEN OVERGAAN TOT DERGELIJKE ACTIVITEITEN WERDEN ALLEN WEER IN ACTIEVE DIENST GENOMEN.
En dit speelde in de jaren negentig, duidelijk ruim na WO2. Deze O&I operatie had als doel het in stand houden en uitbreiden van de operaties van O&I. O&I werd weer actief, en zo is het gebleven tot heden, ook al is formeel tussen 1992 en 1994 ontbonden.
OP 9 SEPTEMBER 2007 ZOND KRO REPORTER EEN 50 MINUTEN DURENDE DOCUMENTAIRE UIT OVER OPERATIËN & INLICHTINGEN, WAARIN ONTHULD WERD DAT WAPENS EN EXPLOSIEVEN UIT EEN GEHEIM DEPOT IN DE SCHEVENINGSE BOSJES IN DEN HAAG IN HANDEN WAREN GEVALLEN VAN DE GEORGANISEERDE MISDAAD. DE MILITAIRE INLICHTINGEN- EN VEILIGHEIDSDIENST HEEFT DE WAPENROOF – DE GROOTSTE UIT DE NEDERLANDSE GESCHIEDENIS – DESTIJDS IN DE DOOFPOT GESTOPT OM “ONGEWENSTE PUBLICITEIT IN DE GLADIO-SFEER” TE VOORKOMEN.
In 2007 waren de wapendepots dus nog in operatie. En in ieder geval ook in 2008 nog kreeg O&I zelfs officieel nog gewoon centjes van onze overheid, nog los van de inkomstenstromen die ze voor zichzelf hebben gerealiseerd:
OUD-MEDEWERKERS EN NABESTAANDEN VAN DE GEHEIME ORGANISATIE ‘GLADIO’ KRIJGEN JAARLIJKS BIJNA VIERHONDERDDUIZEND EURO ZWART UITBETAALD. HET GAAT OM ZO’N VEERTIG PERSONEN. DAT BLIJKT UIT ANTWOORDEN OP KAMERVRAGEN VAN PREMIER JAN PETER BALKENENDE (CDA).
De CIA heeft natuurlijk een oneindig diepe portemonnee en de NAVO zwemt ook flink in het geld. Van het CDA en de VVD hoeft de hedendaagse Gladio (Gladio/B, niet tegen communisme maar tegen islam) het niet meer te hebben, deze organisaties “verdienen” hun eigen geld wel. Toch liggen delen ervan ook vandaag de dag dus nog aan het overheidsgeldinfuus.
Gefeliciteerd, u heeft nu kennis van dingen die u niet behoort te weten
Het Stay-Behind netwerk is dus nog gewoon operationeel in Nederland. En ook buiten Nederland heeft elk Europees land zijn eigen undercover leger operationeel voor het uitvoeren van aanslagen, psychologische oorlogsvoering, falsificaties, etc. Hierin spelen de NAVO en de CIA een centrale rol. En u kent de CIA uiteraard van het opzetten van al-Qaeda en hun nieuwe spin-off ISIS.
De ministeries zijn daarbij ook ‘gewoon’ betrokken en overal verspreid in Nederland en de rest van Europa liggen wapenvoorraden paraat voor gebruik op eigen terrein tegen eigen bevolking. Wanneer die voorraden per ongeluk ontdekt worden, zoals in het Limburgse bos, wordt het afgedaan met een snoeiharde doofpot van de hoogste niveaus van overheid en media, en als het niet meer te ontkennen is wordt het verkocht als “criminele activiteiten.” Dit terwijl het feitelijk ‘gewoon’ het functioneren van eigen overheid en belastinggeld betreft.
En vergis je niet, ik zeg het nog maar eens expliciet: deze undercover militairen, hun missies en de uitgebreide wapenvoorraden zijn bedoeld om door de Nederlandse overheid tegen u als Nederlandse burger te gebruiken. Als onderdeel van deze missies staat nadrukkelijk ook de psychologische oorlogvoering tegen eigen bevolking! Dit is geen complottheorie, maar maatregelen genomen tijdens WO2 van origine om te strijden tegen het Communisme en die vandaag de dag gewoon nog steeds actief is.
Aanslagen van ISIS in Frankrijk en Brussel
Wanneer u vandaag de dag dus leest over aanslagen van ISIS in Frankrijk en zoals nu weermet de Gladio-stijl aanslag in Brussel en het ‘feit’ dat deze aanslagen geclaimd worden door de CIA dochterorganisatie ISIS… Dan is de kans dus direct al significant dat de aanslag door CIA/NAVO commando’s uit het Stay-Behind netwerk werden uitgevoerd.
De aanslag in Brussel werd dus mogelijk uitgevoerd door de Belgische Stay-Behind organisatie SDRA8, de professioneel getrainde commando’s in dienst van de Belgische overheid in samenwerking met de NAVO en de internationale inlichtingendiensten zoals de CIA, AIVD/MIVD en MI6. Zie daarbij ook het feit dat VRT-opnames uit Rusland uit 2011verspreide als zijnde opnames van de aanslag in Brussel. De aanslag in Brussel voldoetin ieder geval aan veel van de 15 valse vlag factoren.
Ook “onze” eigen overheid is waarschijnlijk actief betrokken geweest bij deze aanslagen. Zie daarvoor bijvoorbeeld deze berichten. Figuren als el-Bakraoui worden door Stay-Behind organisaties gebruikt voor deze aanslagen als geconditioneerde zondebok voor het maximaliseren van het effect van hun operaties, en worden daarbij snel als schuldig aangewezen door de media. Soms hebben de aangewezen zondebokken geheel geen participatie gehad bij de aanslag (James Holmes was haast volledig knock-out door alle aan hem toegediende drugs) of was de aanslag feitelijk zelfs niet bestaand (Sandy Hookbetrof een training en werd door de overheid en media verkocht als realiteit). Men heeft professionele crisisacteurs paraat staan en soms worden zelfs poppen gebruikt. Over falsificaties gesproken…
Deze gladio-stijl “terroristische aanslagen” hebben een specifiek doel
U weet ondertussen dat dit type overheidsterreur-aanslagen aanleiding zijn om duur verworven vrijheden van ons weg te nemen. Door de autochtone bevolking tegen Arabische migranten uit te spelen heeft men nu langdurig (met open einde) de noodtoestand uitgeroepen in Frankrijk, negatief reisadvies naar Brussel, overal strenger overheidstoezicht met camera’s, internet sleepnetten en volledig afluisteren door inlichtingendiensten, hacken door de politie, extreme fouillering op Schiphol, het doorzoeken van laptops, tablets en telefoons, etc. Wellicht wilt u nog even lezen over het 5 stappenplan wat ten grondslag ligt van dit alles? Zie eventueel ook berichtgeving over coercive migrations / migratiedwang.
Een vreemd verhaal, niet? Mocht u zich echter afvragen waarom alternatieve media steeds direct valt over dit type aanslagen, dan weet u nu dus waarom. Geloof mijn woord echter niet, u moet nooit iemand geloven die een mooi verhaal heeft, zeker niet de grote media, sites als Wikipedia en blogs als deze. Onderzoek zelf informatie over het Stay-Behind netwerk, Operatie Gladio in de jaren 80 en de Nederlandse O&I organisatie.
Met de aanslag in Brussel is dit politieke spel helaas nog niet uitgespeeld. Bedenk nu: Wat zou O&I, de NAVO, de CIA en de overige internationaal samenwerkende inlichtingendiensten als ook het Ministerie van Defensie nog in petto hebben voor Nederlands grondgebied? Iets met Schiphol lijkt duidelijk voor de hand liggend.
Op 6 april heeft u trouwens een zeldzame prachtkans om van u te laten horen over het buitenlandbeleid van de EU en NL.

Saturday, March 19, 2016

524 Economic Refugees and corruption, Turkey and cruelty. Plus: Trump and Sanders.


De vluchtelingen uit oorlogsgebieden ( Syrië, Irak, Afghanistan) bestaan meestal uit volledige gezinnen.
De economische vluchtelingen zijn geen gelukszoekers, maar óók vluchtelingen:  Ze komen uit landen als Marokko en Turkije en Pakistan waar de helft van de bevolking jonger dan 30 is en waar een onvoorstelbare corruptie heerst die het leven voor jongeren uitzichtloos maakt.

Hun vlucht is vaak mensonterend. Turkse politie laat soms groepen met elkaar vechten over wie er door mag: uitsluitend tot vermaak van de Turkse politieagenten.


       -----------------------

Jimmy Moglia  is een professor met veel kennis van Shakespeare.
Maar hij kan ook goede artikelen schrijven over de situatie in de wereld. 

Hier een artikel over Trump en zijn tegenstanders: http://thesaker.is/the-trouble-with-trump

En hier een artikel van 1 jaar geleden, waarin hij Bernie Sanders te kijk zet als een vriend van de 1%: 

Tuesday, March 08, 2016

523 Waarom wordt Trump zo extreem hard aangevallen? It's Israel, stupid !

Philip Geraldi heeft een analyse die mij erg aanspreekt.

Hij zegt: Trump wordt bijzonder hard aangevallen.
Beetje begrijpelijk, want Trump vindt dat hij zelfs familieleden van terroristen wil doden.
Dat gaat wel erg ver. Alleen: Bush en Obama doen niet anders.
En ze worden er nooit over aangevallen.  Waarom Trump dan wel?
Waarin verschilt Trump van de andere kandidaten?
Wat maakt hem zo bedreigend?

Dat  kan maar één ding zijn:  Trump staat niet blind achter Israel.
Hij wil vrede en wil dus ook naar de Palestijnen luisteren.

De andere kandidaten hebben allemaal joods geld nodig om hun campagne te financieren.
Trump niet. De anderen overbieden elkaar in pro-Israel-standpunten. Trump doet niet mee.
Dàt is de reden dat Trump  wordt zwart gemaakt.

Hij wil geen oorlog met Rusland ( een streven van de joodse Neocons), hij wil geen oorlog met Iran ( een streven van de Neocons) en hij wil vrede tussen Israel en de Palestijnenen (iets dat Netanyahu al helemaal niet wil, ook al beweert hij dat steeds. Lees Livia Rokach.)

Ik weet niet wat Trump zal brengen, dat is ongewis.  Maar erger dan Clinton, Cruz en Sanders zal het niet zijn.


Hier het artikel van Giraldi:

Hating on Trump
It could be about Israel
 RSS  

Trump
Now we all know that many of those who are hating on Donald Trump are doing so because he is threatening the cozy-crony-politico-predatory-capitalist system that has made so many of them fat and rich. He is intending to break their rice bowls as the Chinese would put it or, in a more American vernacular, the gravy train might be ending. To be sure The Donald is warning that he will do just that, even if he will find in practice, if elected, that turning the ship of state around might well be a task beyond the ability of any aspirant to the presidency.
But while pure self-interest might well be driving many of the chattering nonentities that populate our congress and the senior political appointee ranks in government there is something nevertheless extraordinary in the level of venom and sheer hatred that is being spewed at random about a potential Trump administration. It is not uncommon to read or hear that Trump is seeking to overturn the Constitution of the United States and establish a dictatorship that will promote his allegedly warped views of what must be done to correct America’s domestic and foreign policies, suggesting that our form of government is so fragile that it can be subverted by one man.
The anger directed against Trump is unique, one might note, as it also includes demands to somehow overturn the popular will expressed in primaries and caucuses to obtain a candidate that is more in tune with what the Republican establishment is seeking to promote as the “national consensus.” That Trump is voicing an overwhelming American middle class perspective on the evils of mass illegal immigration matters not a whit to the Mandarins whose only concerns on that issue center on the availability of a supply of cheap labor to clean their McMansions and swimming pools.
The anti-Trump effort is being well funded, has included notable defections to the Democratic Party, has led to lists of Republican politicians who will not accept a Trump nomination or support a President Trump, and has even produced calls for a third party neo-Republican entity to run against him. Some other reactions are stupid, including Canadian neocon Mark Dubowitz of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, calling for even more immigrants to the U.S., while talk radio extremist Glenn Beck has tweeted that if he had a knife and were able to get close to Trump he would have to keep on stabbing him.
To be sure, Trump has provided considerable fuel for the fire through his extraordinary ad libs about banning Muslims from the U.S., killing the families of terrorists and using torture. But mainstream politicians have already recommended and even done that much and more without the level of censure that Trump is receiving. Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush have engaged in widespread killing of civilians, torture and assassinating families of suspected militants, to include American citizens, without any of the invective being leveled at Trump.
Indeed, Trump would appear to have a more sensible foreign policy in mind, consisting of avoiding unnecessary wars and “regime changes,” honoring the multilateral negotiated agreement with Iran, engaging diplomatically even with heads of state that we consider to be adversaries and encouraging Russia to fight ISIS. His three current opponents have recommended “carpet bombing” areas controlled by ISIS, fusing Syrian sand into nuclear radiating glass, provoking wars with both Russia and China, arming Ukraine, punching Vladimir Putin in the nose and sending in thousands of American soldiers to the Middle East. They are not in the least bothered by fattening up the already fat national security state with trillions more dollars while domestic needs go unaddressed. So who is the crazy one?
But there is one significant difference between Trump and the “establishment,” be they Democrats or Republicans that has not been highlighted. I would suggest that quite a lot of the depth and intensity of what we are experiencing is actually about Israel. Trump is the first high level politician aspirant within living memory to challenge the notion that the United States must stand by Israel no matter what Israel does. Even while affirming his affection for Israel, he has said that Washington must be even handed in its efforts to bring about peace between Israelis and Palestinians, implying that Tel Aviv might have to make concessions.
Trump has also added insult to injury by delinking himself from the blandishments of Jewish political mega-donors, who largely call the tune for many in the GOP and among the Democrats, by telling them he doesn’t need their money and can’t be bought. His comments have challenged conventional interest group politicking in American and have predictably produced a firestorm reaction in the usual circles. Robert Kagan announced that he would be supporting Hillary, who famously has declared that she would immediately call Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu upon taking office as a first step in moving the relationship with Tel Aviv to “the next level.” It is to be presumed that Kagan and his fellow neocons will be experiencing a welcoming vibe from at least some of the Democrats as the neoconservatives have always been liberals at heart on nearly all issues except foreign policy, rooted by them in the “unshakable and bipartisan bond” with Israel.
It is my opinion that the “I” word should be banned from American political discourse. Ironically, many American Jews are themselves uneasy about the place occupied by Israel in ongoing political debates, recognizing that it is both unhealthy in a democracy and reflective only of the extreme views of the hardline members of their own diaspora community. It is also unpleasantly all about Jews and money since the Republicans and other mouthpieces now piling on Trump are motivated largely by their own sinecures and the Sheldon Adelson type donations that might be forthcoming to the politically savvy candidates who say the right things about the conflict in the Middle East.
Slate’s Isaac Chotiner has noted a particularly odd speech by Senator Marco Rubio in which he spoke of his single electoral triumph in Minnesota before immediately jumping to the issue of Israel, as if on cue or by rote. It is a tendency that is not unique to him. I read through the transcript of the GOP debate that preceded Rubio’s sole victory, which in part reflected a competition to see who could promise to do most for Israel. Senator Ted Cruz stated that he “would stand unapologetically with the nation of Israel…and the alliance with Israel.” Governor John Kasich declared that he’s “been a supporter of Israel – a strong supporter of Israel longer than anyone on this stage.” Senator Marco Rubio indicated that “I will be on Israel’s side every single day because they are the only pro-American, free enterprise democracy in the entire Middle East.” Ben Carson called Israel not only a strategic partner but also an element in America’s “Judeo Christian foundation” that can never be rejected.
Quite a few assertions about Israel made by politicians are, of course, nonsense. It is not in alliance with the United States and is not a democracy for starters, but the real question becomes why is Israel part of the debate at all? It is because of concerns that the deep pocketed donors like Sheldon Adelson will join his good friend Haim Saban in funding Hillary if candidates do not say what he expects to hear. Saban hasreferred to Trump as a “clown” and attacked him because he would be “dangerous for Israel.”
And then there is the recent attack of the Beltway Midgets, a “a strongly worded letter” orchestrated by Eliot Cohen, a former Condoleezza Rice State Department appointee whose attachment to Israel might well be regarded as demented, that attracted the signatures of more than one hundred self-described GOP foreign policy “leaders,” declaring that “We are unable to support a party ticket with Mr. Trump at its head.” Quite a few of the signatories are well known neocons, including Max Boot, Robert Zoellick, Michael Chertoff, Eric Edelman, Reuel Marc Gerecht, Daniel Pipes, Michael Rubin, Kori Schake, Randy Scheunemann, Gary Schmitt, Ray Takeyh and Philip Zelikow. Boot has vilified Trump as “emerging as the number one threat to American security.” All the signatories were passionate supporters of the Iraq War, which Trump has correctly disparaged as a catastrophic foreign policy failure, and all of them are describable as strong supporters of Israel.
The friends of Benjamin Netanyahu in the United States rightly fear that someday the American people and government will come to their senses and regard Israel as just another friendly foreign state, without any “special relationship” attached. To counter that possibility, the lashing out against any public figure who dares to criticize Israel is both immediate and visceral. Note, for example, the fate of former President Jimmy Carter who was virtually excommunicated by the Democratic Party after he condemned Israeli treatment of the Palestinians.
But what the neocon subset of Israel’s powerful lobby fears most is something quite different – becoming irrelevant. They have weathered being wrong about nearly everything but what they particularly fear is finding themselves without a major political party whose foreign policy they can manipulate because that would cut off their funding from defense contractors and pro-Israel zealots. They will have to give up the emoluments that they have accumulated since hijacking the GOP under Ronald Reagan. They might have to abandon their corner offices and secretaries and could even have to find real jobs. And what would the Sunday morning talk shows be like without the Cheshire cat grin of Bill Kristol?
The end of the hypocrisy driven neocon ascendancy in foreign policy will be welcomed by many. Dan McAdams of the Ron Paul Institute has described the Trump hating neocons as “…soft skinned and well-perfumed keyboard warriors who eagerly send America’s sons and daughters to be slaughtered in wars that achieve nothing but the ascendance of new ‘bad guys’ used to justify ever more wars. And all of it pays very nicely for them.” Exactly.


Thursday, March 03, 2016

522 The new Mind Control


One of the comments to this article:
https://wipokuli.wordpress.com/2012/12/17/psychological-operations-say-the-truth-in-a-way-that-it-will-be-rejected

Another comment:
Evolutionary psychological perspectives on human behaviour are now widely accepted by scientists. By laying out our current behaviour and working backwards we get to a point of understanding how such behaviour helped us survive or in other words; it is adaptive. Conformity and submission to authority is adaptive as it allows us to remain in the protective group. The effective means of manipulation is not to do with the technicalities as explained in the article above it is to do with understanding what the word consensus really means and understanding how that is manipulated. Group thinking is what really controls us as a species. The internet allows for the possibility of mapping the group mind at every level from an individual household to the global community and every level in between. That has been going on for decades in the mass media but the internet is deeper and more precise as it allows a far greater sense of individual choice as to what is read or watched. We are observed,collated, analysed and then we are fed information designed to mesh with our interests and viewpoints in a way which manipulates but there may still be room for us to find freedom if we gain sufficient insight into what is so frightening about being outside the group.



The New Mind Control

The internet has spawned subtle forms of influence that can flip elections and manipulate everything we say, think and do.

By Robert Epstein
March 02, 2016 "Information Clearing House" - "Aeon" - Over the past century, more than a few great writers have expressed concern about humanity’s future. In The Iron Heel (1908), the American writer Jack London pictured a world in which a handful of wealthy corporate titans – the ‘oligarchs’ – kept the masses at bay with a brutal combination of rewards and punishments. Much of humanity lived in virtual slavery, while the fortunate ones were bought off with decent wages that allowed them to live comfortably – but without any real control over their lives.
In We (1924), the brilliant Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin, anticipating the excesses of the emerging Soviet Union, envisioned a world in which people were kept in check through pervasive monitoring. The walls of their homes were made of clear glass, so everything they did could be observed. They were allowed to lower their shades an hour a day to have sex, but both the rendezvous time and the lover had to be registered first with the state.
In Brave New World (1932), the British author Aldous Huxley pictured a near-perfect society in which unhappiness and aggression had been engineered out of humanity through a combination of genetic engineering and psychological conditioning. And in the much darker novel 1984 (1949), Huxley’s compatriot George Orwell described a society in which thought itself was controlled; in Orwell’s world, children were taught to use a simplified form of English called Newspeak in order to assure that they could never express ideas that were dangerous to society.
These are all fictional tales, to be sure, and in each the leaders who held the power used conspicuous forms of control that at least a few people actively resisted and occasionally overcame. But in the non-fiction bestseller The Hidden Persuaders (1957) – recently released in a 50th-anniversary edition – the American journalist Vance Packard described a ‘strange and rather exotic’ type of influence that was rapidly emerging in the United States and that was, in a way, more threatening than the fictional types of control pictured in the novels. According to Packard, US corporate executives and politicians were beginning to use subtle and, in many cases, completely undetectable methods to change people’s thinking, emotions and behaviour based on insights from psychiatry and the social sciences.
Most of us have heard of at least one of these methods: subliminal stimulation, or what Packard called ‘subthreshold effects’ – the presentation of short messages that tell us what to do but that are flashed so briefly we aren’t aware we have seen them. In 1958, propelled by public concern about a theatre in New Jersey that had supposedly hidden messages in a movie to increase ice cream sales, the National Association of Broadcasters – the association that set standards for US television – amended its code to prohibit the use of subliminal messages in broadcasting. In 1974, the Federal Communications Commission opined that the use of such messages was ‘contrary to the public interest’. Legislation to prohibit subliminal messaging was also introduced in the US Congress but never enacted. Both the UK and Australia have strict laws prohibiting it.
Subliminal stimulation is probably still in wide use in the US – it’s hard to detect, after all, and no one is keeping track of it – but it’s probably not worth worrying about. Research suggests that it has only a small impact, and that it mainly influences people who are already motivated to follow its dictates; subliminal directives to drink affect people only if they’re already thirsty.
Packard had uncovered a much bigger problem, however – namely that powerful corporations were constantly looking for, and in many cases already applying, a wide variety of techniques for controlling people without their knowledge. He described a kind of cabal in which marketers worked closely with social scientists to determine, among other things, how to get people to buy things they didn’t need and how to condition young children to be good consumers – inclinations that were explicitly nurtured and trained in Huxley’s Brave New World. Guided by social science, marketers were quickly learning how to play upon people’s insecurities, frailties, unconscious fears, aggressive feelings and sexual desires to alter their thinking, emotions and behaviour without any awareness that they were being manipulated.
By the early 1950s, Packard said, politicians had got the message and were beginning to merchandise themselves using the same subtle forces being used to sell soap. Packard prefaced his chapter on politics with an unsettling quote from the British economist Kenneth Boulding: ‘A world of unseen dictatorship is conceivable, still using the forms of democratic government.’ Could this really happen, and, if so, how would it work?
The forces that Packard described have become more pervasive over the decades. The soothing music we all hear overhead in supermarkets causes us to walk more slowly and buy more food, whether we need it or not. Most of the vacuous thoughts and intense feelings our teenagers experience from morning till night are carefully orchestrated by highly skilled marketing professionals working in our fashion and entertainment industries. Politicians work with a wide range of consultants who test every aspect of what the politicians do in order to sway voters: clothing, intonations, facial expressions, makeup, hairstyles and speeches are all optimised, just like the packaging of a breakfast cereal.
Fortunately, all of these sources of influence operate competitively. Some of the persuaders want us to buy or believe one thing, others to buy or believe something else. It is the competitive nature of our society that keeps us, on balance, relatively free.
But what would happen if new sources of control began to emerge that had little or no competition? And what if new means of control were developed that were far more powerful – and far more invisible – than any that have existed in the past? And what if new types of control allowed a handful of people to exert enormous influence not just over the citizens of the US but over most of the people on Earth?
It might surprise you to hear this, but these things have already happened.
Google decides which web pages to include in search results, and how to rank them. How it does so is one of the best-kept secrets in the world, like the formula for Coca-Cola
To understand how the new forms of mind control work, we need to start by looking at the search engine – one in particular: the biggest and best of them all, namely Google. The Google search engine is so good and so popular that the company’s name is now a commonly used verb in languages around the world. To ‘Google’ something is to look it up on the Google search engine, and that, in fact, is how most computer users worldwide get most of their information about just about everything these days. They Google it. Google has become the main gateway to virtually all knowledge, mainly because the search engine is so good at giving us exactly the information we are looking for, almost instantly and almost always in the first position of the list it shows us after we launch our search – the list of ‘search results’.
That ordered list is so good, in fact, that about 50 per cent of our clicks go to the top two items, and more than 90 per cent of our clicks go to the 10 items listed on the first page of results; few people look at other results pages, even though they often number in the thousands, which means they probably contain lots of good information. Google decides which of the billions of web pages it is going to include in our search results, and it also decides how to rank them. How it decides these things is a deep, dark secret – one of the best-kept secrets in the world, like the formula for Coca-Cola.
Because people are far more likely to read and click on higher-ranked items, companies now spend billions of dollars every year trying to trick Google’s search algorithm – the computer program that does the selecting and ranking – into boosting them another notch or two. Moving up a notch can mean the difference between success and failure for a business, and moving into the top slots can be the key to fat profits.
Late in 2012, I began to wonder whether highly ranked search results could be impacting more than consumer choices. Perhaps, I speculated, a top search result could have a small impact on people’s opinions about things. Early in 2013, with my associate Ronald E Robertson of the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology in Vista, California, I put this idea to a test by conducting an experiment in which 102 people from the San Diego area were randomly assigned to one of three groups. In one group, people saw search results that favoured one political candidate – that is, results that linked to web pages that made this candidate look better than his or her opponent. In a second group, people saw search rankings that favoured the opposing candidate, and in the third group – the control group – people saw a mix of rankings that favoured neither candidate. The same search results and web pages were used in each group; the only thing that differed for the three groups was the ordering of the search results.
To make our experiment realistic, we used real search results that linked to real web pages. We also used a real election – the 2010 election for the prime minister of Australia. We used a foreign election to make sure that our participants were ‘undecided’. Their lack of familiarity with the candidates assured this. Through advertisements, we also recruited an ethnically diverse group of registered voters over a wide age range in order to match key demographic characteristics of the US voting population.
All participants were first given brief descriptions of the candidates and then asked to rate them in various ways, as well as to indicate which candidate they would vote for; as you might expect, participants initially favoured neither candidate on any of the five measures we used, and the vote was evenly split in all three groups. Then the participants were given up to 15 minutes in which to conduct an online search using ‘Kadoodle’, our mock search engine, which gave them access to five pages of search results that linked to web pages. People could move freely between search results and web pages, just as we do when using Google. When participants completed their search, we asked them to rate the candidates again, and we also asked them again who they would vote for.
We predicted that the opinions and voting preferences of 2 or 3 per cent of the people in the two bias groups – the groups in which people were seeing rankings favouring one candidate – would shift toward that candidate. What we actually found was astonishing. The proportion of people favouring the search engine’s top-ranked candidate increased by 48.4 per cent, and all five of our measures shifted toward that candidate. What’s more, 75 per cent of the people in the bias groups seemed to have been completely unaware that they were viewing biased search rankings. In the control group, opinions did not shift significantly.
This seemed to be a major discovery. The shift we had produced, which we called the Search Engine Manipulation Effect (or SEME, pronounced ‘seem’), appeared to be one of the largest behavioural effects ever discovered. We did not immediately uncork the Champagne bottle, however. For one thing, we had tested only a small number of people, and they were all from the San Diego area.
Over the next year or so, we replicated our findings three more times, and the third time was with a sample of more than 2,000 people from all 50 US states. In that experiment, the shift in voting preferences was 37.1 per cent and even higher in some demographic groups – as high as 80 per cent, in fact.
We also learned in this series of experiments that by reducing the bias just slightly on the first page of search results – specifically, by including one search item that favoured the other candidate in the third or fourth position of the results – we could mask our manipulation so that few or even no people were aware that they were seeing biased rankings. We could still produce dramatic shifts in voting preferences, but we could do so invisibly.
Still no Champagne, though. Our results were strong and consistent, but our experiments all involved a foreign election – that 2010 election in Australia. Could voting preferences be shifted with real voters in the middle of a real campaign? We were skeptical. In real elections, people are bombarded with multiple sources of information, and they also know a lot about the candidates. It seemed unlikely that a single experience on a search engine would have much impact on their voting preferences.
To find out, in early 2014, we went to India just before voting began in the largest democratic election in the world – the Lok Sabha election for prime minister. The three main candidates were Rahul Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal, and Narendra Modi. Making use of online subject pools and both online and print advertisements, we recruited 2,150 people from 27 of India’s 35 states and territories to participate in our experiment. To take part, they had to be registered voters who had not yet voted and who were still undecided about how they would vote.
unlike subliminal stimuli, SEME has an enormous impact – like Casper the ghost pushing you down a flight of stairs
Participants were randomly assigned to three search-engine groups, favouring, respectively, Gandhi, Kejriwal or Modi. As one might expect, familiarity levels with the candidates was high – between 7.7 and 8.5 on a scale of 10. We predicted that our manipulation would produce a very small effect, if any, but that’s not what we found. On average, we were able to shift the proportion of people favouring any given candidate by more than 20 per cent overall and more than 60 per cent in some demographic groups. Even more disturbing, 99.5 per cent of our participants showed no awareness that they were viewing biased search rankings – in other words, that they were being manipulated.
SEME’s near-invisibility is curious indeed. It means that when people – including you and me – are looking at biased search rankings, they look just fine. So if right now you Google ‘US presidential candidates’, the search results you see will probably look fairly random, even if they happen to favour one candidate. Even I have trouble detecting bias in search rankings that I know to be biased (because they were prepared by my staff). Yet our randomised, controlled experiments tell us over and over again that when higher-ranked items connect with web pages that favour one candidate, this has a dramatic impact on the opinions of undecided voters, in large part for the simple reason that people tend to click only on higher-ranked items. This is truly scary: like subliminal stimuli, SEME is a force you can’t see; but unlike subliminal stimuli, it has an enormous impact – like Casper the ghost pushing you down a flight of stairs.
We published a detailed report about our first five experiments on SEME in the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) in August 2015. We had indeed found something important, especially given Google’s dominance over search. Google has a near-monopoly on internet searches in the US, with 83 per cent of Americans specifying Google as the search engine they use most often, according to the Pew Research Center. So if Google favours one candidate in an election, its impact on undecided voters could easily decide the election’s outcome.
Keep in mind that we had had only one shot at our participants. What would be the impact of favouring one candidate in searches people are conducting over a period of weeks or months before an election? It would almost certainly be much larger than what we were seeing in our experiments.
Other types of influence during an election campaign are balanced by competing sources of influence – a wide variety of newspapers, radio shows and television networks, for example – but Google, for all intents and purposes, has no competition, and people trust its search results implicitly, assuming that the company’s mysterious search algorithm is entirely objective and unbiased. This high level of trust, combined with the lack of competition, puts Google in a unique position to impact elections. Even more disturbing, the search-ranking business is entirely unregulated, so Google could favour any candidate it likes without violating any laws. Some courts have even ruled that Google’s right to rank-order search results as it pleases is protected as a form of free speech.
Does the company ever favour particular candidates? In the 2012 US presidential election, Google and its top executives donated more than $800,000 to President Barack Obama and just $37,000 to his opponent, Mitt Romney. And in 2015, a team of researchers from the University of Maryland and elsewhere showed that Google’s search results routinely favoured Democratic candidates. Are Google’s search rankings really biased? An internal report issued by the US Federal Trade Commission in 2012 concluded that Google’s search rankings routinely put Google’s financial interests ahead of those of their competitors, and anti-trust actions currently under way against Google in both the European Union and India are based on similar findings.
In most countries, 90 per cent of online search is conducted on Google, which gives the company even more power to flip elections than it has in the US and, with internet penetration increasing rapidly worldwide, this power is growing. In our PNAS article, Robertson and I calculated that Google now has the power to flip upwards of 25 per cent of the national elections in the world with no one knowing this is occurring. In fact, we estimate that, with or without deliberate planning on the part of company executives, Google’s search rankings have been impacting elections for years, with growing impact each year. And because search rankings are ephemeral, they leave no paper trail, which gives the company complete deniability.
Power on this scale and with this level of invisibility is unprecedented in human history. But it turns out that our discovery about SEME was just the tip of a very large iceberg.
Recent reports suggest that the Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is making heavy use of social media to try to generate support – Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat and Facebook, for starters. At this writing, she has 5.4 million followers on Twitter, and her staff is tweeting several times an hour during waking hours. The Republican frontrunner, Donald Trump, has 5.9 million Twitter followers and is tweeting just as frequently.
Is social media as big a threat to democracy as search rankings appear to be? Not necessarily. When new technologies are used competitively, they present no threat. Even through the platforms are new, they are generally being used the same way as billboards and television commercials have been used for decades: you put a billboard on one side of the street; I put one on the other. I might have the money to erect more billboards than you, but the process is still competitive.
What happens, though, if such technologies are misused by the companies that own them? A study by Robert M Bond, now a political science professor at Ohio State University, and others published in Nature in 2012 described an ethically questionable experiment in which, on election day in 2010, Facebook sent ‘go out and vote’ reminders to more than 60 million of its users. The reminders caused about 340,000 people to vote who otherwise would not have. Writing in theNew Republic in 2014, Jonathan Zittrain, professor of international law at Harvard University, pointed out that, given the massive amount of information it has collected about its users, Facebook could easily send such messages only to people who support one particular party or candidate, and that doing so could easily flip a close election – with no one knowing that this has occurred. And because advertisements, like search rankings, are ephemeral, manipulating an election in this way would leave no paper trail.
Are there laws prohibiting Facebook from sending out ads selectively to certain users? Absolutely not; in fact, targeted advertising is how Facebook makes its money. Is Facebook currently manipulating elections in this way? No one knows, but in my view it would be foolish and possibly even improper for Facebook not to do so. Some candidates are better for a company than others, and Facebook’s executives have a fiduciary responsibility to the company’s stockholders to promote the company’s interests.
The Bond study was largely ignored, but another Facebook experiment, published in 2014 in PNAS, prompted protests around the world. In this study, for a period of a week, 689,000 Facebook users were sent news feeds that contained either an excess of positive terms, an excess of negative terms, or neither. Those in the first group subsequently used slightly more positive terms in their communications, while those in the second group used slightly more negative terms in their communications. This was said to show that people’s ‘emotional states’ could be deliberately manipulated on a massive scale by a social media company, an idea that many people found disturbing. People were also upset that a large-scale experiment on emotion had been conducted without the explicit consent of any of the participants.
Facebook’s consumer profiles are undoubtedly massive, but they pale in comparison with those maintained by Google, which is collecting information about people 24/7, using more than 60 different observation platforms – the search engine, of course, but also Google Wallet, Google Maps, Google Adwords, Google Analytics, Chrome, Google Docs, Android, YouTube, and on and on. Gmail users are generally oblivious to the fact that Google stores and analyses every email they write, even the drafts they never send – as well as all the incoming email they receive from both Gmail and non-Gmail users.
if Google set about to fix an election, it could identify just those voters who are undecided. Then it could send customised rankings favouring one candidate to just those people
According to Google’s privacy policy – to which one assents whenever one uses a Google product, even when one has not been informed that he or she is using a Google product – Google can share the information it collects about you with almost anyone, including government agencies. But never with you. Google’s privacy is sacrosanct; yours is nonexistent.
Could Google and ‘those we work with’ (language from the privacy policy) use the information they are amassing about you for nefarious purposes – to manipulate or coerce, for example? Could inaccurate information in people’s profiles (which people have no way to correct) limit their opportunities or ruin their reputations?
Certainly, if Google set about to fix an election, it could first dip into its massive database of personal information to identify just those voters who are undecided. Then it could, day after day, send customised rankings favouring one candidate to just those people. One advantage of this approach is that it would make Google’s manipulation extremely difficult for investigators to detect.
Extreme forms of monitoring, whether by the KGB in the Soviet Union, the Stasi in East Germany, or Big Brother in1984, are essential elements of all tyrannies, and technology is making both monitoring and the consolidation of surveillance data easier than ever. By 2020, China will have put in place the most ambitious government monitoring system ever created – a single database called the Social Credit System, in which multiple ratings and records for all of its 1.3 billion citizens are recorded for easy access by officials and bureaucrats. At a glance, they will know whether someone has plagiarised schoolwork, was tardy in paying bills, urinated in public, or blogged inappropriately online.
As Edward Snowden’s revelations made clear, we are rapidly moving toward a world in which both governments and corporations – sometimes working together – are collecting massive amounts of data about every one of us every day, with few or no laws in place that restrict how those data can be used. When you combine the data collection with the desire to control or manipulate, the possibilities are endless, but perhaps the most frightening possibility is the one expressed in Boulding’s assertion that an ‘unseen dictatorship’ was possible ‘using the forms of democratic government’.
Since Robertson and I submitted our initial report on SEME to PNAS early in 2015, we have completed a sophisticated series of experiments that have greatly enhanced our understanding of this phenomenon, and other experiments will be completed in the coming months. We have a much better sense now of why SEME is so powerful and how, to some extent, it can be suppressed.
We have also learned something very disturbing – that search engines are influencing far more than what people buy and whom they vote for. We now have evidence suggesting that on virtually all issues where people are initially undecided, search rankings are impacting almost every decision that people make. They are having an impact on the opinions, beliefs, attitudes and behaviours of internet users worldwide – entirely without people’s knowledge that this is occurring. This is happening with or without deliberate intervention by company officials; even so-called ‘organic’ search processes regularly generate search results that favour one point of view, and that in turn has the potential to tip the opinions of millions of people who are undecided on an issue. In one of our recent experiments, biased search results shifted people’s opinions about the value of fracking by 33.9 per cent.
Perhaps even more disturbing is that the handful of people who do show awareness that they are viewing biased search rankings shift even further in the predicted direction; simply knowing that a list is biased doesn’t necessarily protect you from SEME’s power.
Remember what the search algorithm is doing: in response to your query, it is selecting a handful of webpages from among the billions that are available, and it is ordering those webpages using secret criteria. Seconds later, the decision you make or the opinion you form – about the best toothpaste to use, whether fracking is safe, where you should go on your next vacation, who would make the best president, or whether global warming is real – is determined by that short list you are shown, even though you have no idea how the list was generated.
The technology has made possible undetectable and untraceable manipulations of entire populations that are beyond the scope of existing regulations and laws
Meanwhile, behind the scenes, a consolidation of search engines has been quietly taking place, so that more people are using the dominant search engine even when they think they are not. Because Google is the best search engine, and because crawling the rapidly expanding internet has become prohibitively expensive, more and more search engines are drawing their information from the leader rather than generating it themselves. The most recent deal, revealed in aSecurities and Exchange Commission filing in October 2015, was between Google and Yahoo! Inc.
Looking ahead to the November 2016 US presidential election, I see clear signs that Google is backing Hillary Clinton. In April 2015, Clinton hired Stephanie Hannon away from Google to be her chief technology officer and, a few months ago, Eric Schmidt, chairman of the holding company that controls Google, set up a semi-secret company – The Groundwork – for the specific purpose of putting Clinton in office. The formation of The Groundwork prompted Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, to dub Google Clinton’s ‘secret weapon’ in her quest for the US presidency.
We now estimate that Hannon’s old friends have the power to drive between 2.6 and 10.4 million votes to Clinton on election day with no one knowing that this is occurring and without leaving a paper trail. They can also help her win the nomination, of course, by influencing undecided voters during the primaries. Swing voters have always been the key to winning elections, and there has never been a more powerful, efficient or inexpensive way to sway them than SEME.
We are living in a world in which a handful of high-tech companies, sometimes working hand-in-hand with governments, are not only monitoring much of our activity, but are also invisibly controlling more and more of what we think, feel, do and say. The technology that now surrounds us is not just a harmless toy; it has also made possible undetectable and untraceable manipulations of entire populations – manipulations that have no precedent in human history and that are currently well beyond the scope of existing regulations and laws. The new hidden persuaders are bigger, bolder and badder than anything Vance Packard ever envisioned. If we choose to ignore this, we do so at our peril.