Public Intelligence Blog – Page 3098 – The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.

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Although the search yields appropriate results, this is a good opportunity to highlight the history and intent of the various mottos of this public intelligence endeavor.

Ex Veritate Potens. This was the motto of the Marine Corps Intelligence Center (MCIA), co-founded by Col Walter J. Breede III and his Special Assistant and Deputy Director Robert Steele. It was inspired by a mix of the US Naval Academy motto (Breede is USNA '68) and the CIA motto (Steele is a veteran of the CIA clandestine service).

Ex Sciencia Tridens + Ye Shall Know the Truth and the Truth Shall Set You Free (John 8:32)

When Open Source Solutions, Inc. (later Open Source Solutions Network, Inc.) was created, it adopted the informal MCIA motto, only to hear in 1994 from Winston Maiki (RIP) that the Latin was incorrect, that it should be E Veritate Potens (from truth, we (the people) are made powerful). And so it became.

OSS.Net, Inc. went out of business in 2008 and closed its tax records in 2010. The motto was adopted by its follow-on, the non-profit 501c3 Earth Intelligence Network, a Virginia corporation that is dormant at this time.

When Phi Beta Iota the Public Intelligence Blog was created a few years ago, several quotations were assembled for the About page, generally focusing on the importance of the truth and the cost of dishonesty and the corruption of the truth. At that time, founder Robert Steele refined a concept that has been on his mind since beginning to read about true cost economics as devised by Herman Daly, and composed the following:

The truth at any cost lowers all other costs.

More recently, inspired by the work of Doug Rushkoff and Venessa Miemis, and the long-running persistent championship of Michel Bauwens for Person to Person (P2P) global to local engagement, this web site, Phi Beta Iota the Public Intelligence Blog, devised a crude (Google translate) approximation of Connected We Are One: Connexum Sumus Unum.

Other translation sources became available, and Conexa Sunt Unum has been proposed. but not confirmed in part because Sunt appears to be external while Sumus is Of, By, and For We the People. We await the intervention of a qualified Latin scholar, greatly missing our #1 OSINT Analyst, Winston Maiki.

In passing, Robert Garigue (RIP) is the original pioneer of the concept that all security is about truth–not about force of arms or prevention. Security is about transparency, truth, and trust. One could spend a lifetime thinking about and acting on this Nobel-level insight. He is featured in the Phi Beta Iota Public Intelligence Blog, see Garigue–together with Winston Maiki, he is one of the many angels that watch over this righteous endeavor.

See Also:

About: E Veritate Potens

2011/09/04

Seth Godin: Focus on the Dissatisfied, Seeking Real Change

Blog Wisdom

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People looking for ‘more of the same' aren't actively looking

While there may be a lot of them, they're satisfied with what they've got, which means that they're hard to attract.

No, the real opportunity is in reaching out to the dissatisifed, to those in search of something new.

Phi Beta Iota: Obama was elected by an expanded “base” seeking more of the same; today, with the exceptions of Gary Johnson and Ron Paul, the Republican candidates are all focused on the wing-nut base. The “base” is roughly 20% on each end of the spectrum–Obama won with 30% of the total eligible voters–44% did not vote. That's the 44% that could elect a sane honest President and a sane honest coalition team in 2012–that 44% could be expanded to 66% by embracing the sane honest Republicans and the sane honest Democrats who are disgusted by the pervasive corruption and illegitimacy of the wing nut vs nanny state mobs that today define America to the rest of the world–“idiot America,” “predatory America.” We can do better.

2011/09/03

Reference: Understanding the Exponential Function

Movies, YouTube

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The Most IMPORTANT Video You'll Ever See (part 1 of 8)

2 million views for an old codger giving a lecture about arithmetic? What's going on? You'll just have to watch to see what's so damn amazing about what he (Albert Bartlett) has to say.

I introduce this video to my students as “Perhaps the most boring video you'll ever see, and definitely the most important.” But then again, after watching it most said that if you followed along with what the presenter (a professor emeritus of Physics at Univ of Colorado-Boulder) is saying, it's quite easy to pay attention, because it is so damn compelling.

Entire playlist for the lecture

Tip of the Hat to Paul Fernhout for the recommendation.

2011/09/032011/09/03

Richard Wright: Mike Vicker’s Trillion Dollar Adventure

04 Inter-State Conflict, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military

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Soldier, Thinker, Hunter, Spy: Drawing a Bead on Al Qaeda

By ELISABETH BUMILLER

New York Times, September 3, 2011

EXTRACT:

“I just want to kill those guys,” Mr. Vickers likes to say in meetings at the Pentagon, with a grin.

. . . . . . .

As covert American wars — in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia — continue in the second decade after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, so will the questions of legality, morality and risk that go along with them.

. . . . . . .

In Mr. Vickers’s assessment, there are perhaps four important Qaeda leaders left in Pakistan, and 10 to 20 leaders over all in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. Even if the United States kills them all in drone strikes, Mr. Vickers said, “You still have Al Qaeda, the idea.”

Read full article….

Phi Beta Iota: The insanity of it all is hard to fathom. Vickers is a male counterpart to Fran Townsend. The US Government, “in our name,” is spending over a trillion a year (that it borrows) for elective wars and global assassinations that are pissing off millions of people, while the “Undersecretary of Intelligence” spends all his time trying to kill the dirty dozen. All we can do at this point is recommend a close reading of Paul Fernhout: Open Letter to the Intelligence Advanced Programs Research Agency (IARPA).

2011/09/03

Berto Jongman: Iraq Suicide Bombing Results + RECAP

09 Justice, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 11 Society, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, IO Deeds of War, Military

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Open source assessment of a devastating terrorist tactic.

Free But Must Register

or full PDF

2011-09-03 Iraq Suicide Attack Study

200 coalition soldiers were killed in 79 suicide bomb events during 2003–10. More Iraqi civilians per lethal event were killed than were coalition soldiers (12 vs 3; p=0·004).

Suicide bombers in Iraq kill significantly more Iraqi civilians than coalition soldiers. Among civilians,
children are more likely to die than adults when injured by suicide bombs.

Phi Beta Iota: The US Government is delusional if not maliciously deceptive in focusing on Al Qaeda and on suicide bombing as a “threat.” Terrorism is a tactic, and nothing more than a traffic accident in the larger scheme of things. Suicide bombings are also directly correlated with the invasion and occupation of foreign Muslim countries by US forces. Duh. In passing, we grieve to observe that we now have more military personnel committing suicide than are being killed in action.

2011/09/03

Koko: CIA and Libyan Intelligence VERY Close, Including Rendition–meanwhile Fran Townsend Excels at Being a Vacuous Bimbo

07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War

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Koko Sign: Who is this blond vacuous bimbo that keeps appearing on television with nothing serious to say? Yes, we gorillas know that vacuous bimbo is a tautalogical redundancy, it just seemed appropriate.

Documents shed light on CIA, Gadhafi spy ties

From Ben Wedeman, CNN

September 3, 2011 7:15 p.m. EDT

Includes video.

Tripoli, Libya (CNN) — Documents seized at the Libyan intelligence headquarters have revealed a surprisingly close relationship between the CIA and their counterparts in the Gadhafi regime.

. . . . . . .

Fran Townsend, CNN counter-terror analyst who worked as President George W. Bush's homeland security adviser, said that when suspects were transferred to any country, not just Libya, U.S. officials asked the government for assurances that they wouldn't violate human rights of the person in question.

Read full report…

Phi Beta Iota: CNN lost its integrity when Ted Turner left, and it has not had anyone really serious on the national security account for a while. Koko is right–Fran Townsend is an idiot who knows nothing. These are trying times–if CNN is serious about getting back into analytics, they need to change their linen.

2011/09/032011/10/22

Chuck Spinney: Hill Staffer Expose of the GOP

11 Society, Articles & Chapters, Civil Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Government, InfoOps (IO), IO Deeds of Peace, IO Impotency, Methods & Process, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Threats

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My very close friend Mike Lofgren, and Republican of the Old School, one of the smartest people I have ever met, backs out of the Capital Hill Saloon with both guns blazing. Knowing the truly dedicated people like Mike in government over the years is one of the things that made my 33 years in government service both a privilege and honor for which I will remain ever thankful.

Chuck Spinney
Ste Maxime, France

Goodbye to All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult

by: Mike Lofgren,

Truthout, 3 September 2011

Barbara Stanwyck: “We're both rotten!”
Fred MacMurray: “Yeah – only you're a little more rotten.”
– Double Indemnity (1944)

Those lines of dialogue from a classic film noir sum up the state of the two political parties in contemporary America. Both parties are rotten – how could they not be, given the complete infestation of the political system by corporate money on a scale that now requires a presidential candidate to raise upwards of a billion dollars to be competitive in the general election? Both parties are captives to corporate loot. The main reason the Democrats' health care bill will be a budget buster once it fully phases in is the Democrats' rank capitulation to corporate interests – no single-payer system, in order to mollify the insurers; and no negotiation of drug prices, a craven surrender to Big Pharma.

But both parties are not rotten in quite the same way. The Democrats have their share of machine politicians, careerists, corporate bagmen, egomaniacs and kooks. Nothing, however, quite matches the modern GOP.

Full safety copy with added emphasis below the line.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Hill Staffer Expose of the GOP”