On Sun, Aug 30, 2009 at 6:23 PM, Barrett Brown<
barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi, Luke-
>
> I wanted to see if you might be interested in this piece I've just written
> on Oliver North's defense of civilian contractors in Human Events. I've
> pasted the piece below.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Barrett Brown
> Brooklyn, NY
> 512-560-2302
>
> One Cat, Two Cats, Red Cat, Oliver North is a Fascist Nut
>
> Oliver North is upset. It seems that the Pentagon's increasing reliance on
> civilian contractors has been receiving a minor degree of scrutiny as of
> late, a development he characterizes as involving "threats of inquisitions,"
> which is literally true insomuch as that Congress will perhaps make some
> inquiries into the matter. Naturally, North has been adverse to
> congressional oversight ever since Congress forced him to lie about the
> crimes he had committed in service to what he once called the "neat idea" of
> selling weapons to Iran. He is no big fan of the media, either; both, North
> says, are today motivated by some sort of sinister pacifism. "Disparaging
> and de-funding civilian contractors is just one more way of disarming
> America," he explains in the pages of Human Events, itself reportedly the
> favorite magazine of the president who once fired him.
>
> Now, one might point out that objections to private suppliers of men and
> arms are nothing new and have in fact been made by several prominent
> American statesmen who obviously had no desire to see American disarmed, and
> that such a fact would certainly seem to refute the argument that those who
> make such objections are necessarily seeking to disarm America. In fact, I
> was planning to point this out myself - but for some bizarre reason, North
> beats me to it:
>
> In the opening days of World War II, then Sen. Harry Truman became famous
> for threatening to “lock up” civilian contractors for producing sub-par
> munitions, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower ominously warned against the
> threat of a “military-industrial complex.”
>
> So after setting out to establish that those who criticize contractors are
> wacky peace creeps, North cites the Supreme Commander of the Alllied Forces
> in Europe and the fellow who dropped two atom bombs on Japan as having
> criticized contractors. This is a very interesting strategy, akin to
> claiming that all cats are red and then backing up one's assertion by
> pointing out two cats who are blue. But North, who no doubt thinks his
> argument is going very well at this point, suddenly decides that what he's
> actually arguing is that the two blue cats were only somewhat blue and thus
> don't count, but that other, bluer cats may be found today:
>
> However, [the anti-contractor rhetoric of Eisenhower and Truman] is pale by
> comparison to the viscera now being aimed at civilian contractors supporting
> the campaigns in the land between the Tigris and Euphrates and in the shadow
> of the Hindu Kush.
>
> Our colonel does not cite any examples of these mainstream objections which
> he deems so much more critical than Eisenhower's characterization of the
> military-industrial complex as something we must guard against lest "the
> weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes,"
> itself about as critical as critical gets. He doesn't cite any mainstream
> objections of a more critical nature because they don't exist; in order to
> top Eisenhower's warning, a fellow would basically have to claim that
> civilian contractors are secretly assembling a nuclear arsenal with which to
> destroy the world in service to some ancient Sumerian deity. Though he can't
> actually identify any of these terrible things that have been said about our
> nation's apple-cheeked mercenaries, North knows exactly who's been saying
> them.
>
> “Contractor” is the new “dirty word” in the so-called mainstream media - and
> in Washington.
>
> Of course, contractor is also a dirty word among some military men,
> including several I have spoken to over the years, but North's policy has
> always been to portray Washington and the media as being in effeminate
> opposition to members of the armed services, who must always be in agreement
> with himself. At any rate, North claims that the non-existent objections
> that are somehow more serious than Eisenhower's meta-objection are leading
> to some unprecedented and disheartening trends at the Pentagon:
>
> In April, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced plans to hire 30,000
> additional DoD employees to cut the percentage of work being done by
> contractors. The FY 2010 Defense Budget request replaces nearly 14,000
> contractor personnel with government employees - even though the “lifetime
> cost” - counting government benefits and retirement - will more than double
> the expense to American taxpayers.
>
> So, in the midst of two wars and numerous operations elsewhere, the
> Department of Defense hires 30,000 employees who will be entirely
> accountable to the Department of Defense and our nation's rules of
> engagement rather than to Blackwater (which, of course, has now changed its
> name to "Xe" lest it be associated with itself), and suddenly North is
> worried that too much money is being spent on the military. Here's a fun
> little parlor game: try to find an instance besides this in which North has
> expressed concern about excessive military spending. And here's a fun little
> parlor game that you can actually win: Google "Oliver North military
> spending" and click on the first link that comes up, which itself turns out
> to be a Fox News article North wrote just a few months ago in which he calls
> on the federal government to increase military spending:
>
> But the Obama administration and their supporters on Capitol Hill need to
> understand that when it comes to spending, there are few things government
> can do that has a more immediate, positive effect on jobs and the overall
> the economy than expenditures on national defense.
>
> Good point, Ollie. Perhaps the DoD could hire 30,000 new employees to assist
> with the national defense. It might just be crazy enough to work.
>
> Like any truly mediocre thinker, North does not anticipate the obvious
> counterpoint to his sudden and disingenuous call for fiscal restraint via
> increased mercenary deployment - the counterpoint that price-gouging, late
> deliveries, and shoddy worksmanship on the part of his beloved contractors
> have already cost the American taxpayer billions in wasted dollars, with a
> few of these incidents having resulted in injuries and even deaths among our
> troops. Here is a man who cannot see two steps ahead of his own argument and
> who does not seem to recall things he himself wrote months ago or even just
> a few sentences prior, as if he were a goldfish with thumbs and a keyboard
> and a crack pipe that somehow works underwater.
>
> North is not content to assail the federal government for doing what he
> recently told it to do or to blast the mainstream media for things it hasn't
> actually done - he is also compelled to attack the media for failing to
> report things that it has in fact reported countless times:
>
> Though it’s unlikely to make the lead story in any of the mainstream media,
> contractors are performing tasks that U.S. government entities either cannot
> do - or that cannot be done as economically.
>
> Ready for another parlor game? Google "civilian contractors Iraq" without
> quotes and read the two mainstream news stories that immediately come up.
> The first of these is a CBS report from 2006 in which several contractors
> are interviewed about the risks they faced in Iraq and the injuries that
> their swell employers have refused to treat. The second is a CNN piece from
> 2004 that explains everything North says is unlikely to be explained about
> the important role that contractors can serve in U.S. military operations,
> and does so without a single word of criticism. Spend a few more minutes
> searching and you'll find other stories in the same vein, all written and
> published within the purview of the mainstream media, no doubt by accident.
>
> There are legitimate reasons for the Pentagon to employ civilian contractors
> and outside firms to assist with a variety of tasks both at home and abroad;
> there are also legitimate reasons to call attention to the problems that
> have come up as a result. But there is no legitimate reason to cry
> "dolchstoss" each time serious concerns are voiced by the media, our elected
> representatives, or even members of the military; to deem such objections as
> being motivated by hatred for the armed forces or by a desire to see
> American disarmed, one would have to be an ignorant crypto-fascist like
> Oliver North. That lets Oliver North off the hook, of course.
>
> On Wed, Aug 12, 2009 at 6:46 PM, Luke Mitchell <
luke@harpers.org> wrote:
>>
>> Dear Barrett -
>>
>> Thanks for the look. I am always glad to mock religion, of course, but
>> I don't think this one is right for us. Best of luck with the piece,
>> though, and thanks again for thinking of Harper's.
>>
>> All best,
>>
>> Luke
>>
>> On Tue, Aug 11, 2009 at 8:22 PM, Barrett Brown<
barriticus@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > Luke-
>> >
>> > I wanted to check to see if you'd be interested in a piece I just
>> > wrote,
>> > perhaps for use on the Harper's website. I currently serve as a
>> > contributor
>> > to Vanity Fair, The Huffington Post, Skeptic, and The Onion, and my
>> > other
>> > work has appeared in dozens of publications including National Lampoon,
>> > McSweeney's, American Atheist, and
nerve.com. My first book Flock of
>> > Dodos:
>> > Behind Modern Creationism, Intelligent Design, and the Easter Bunny was
>> > released in 2007 (with a back-cover blurb from Matt Taibbi, among
>> > others);
>> > my second is set for publication next year. I also serve as director of
>> > communications for Enlighten the Vote (formerly known as GAMPAC), a
>> > political action committee dedicated to advancing the Establishment
>> > Clause
>> > as well as providing support to atheist candidates for public office.
>> > I've
>> > appeared on Fox News and other, more reasonable outlets.
>> >
>> > The article in question is pasted below; it's an allegedly humorous
>> > narrative of my experiences with posing as a devout Muslim on the
>> > internet.
>> > Let me know if this interests you or if you might like to receive other
>> > queries from me in the future.
>> >
>> > Thanks,
>> >
>> > Barrett Brown
>> > Brooklyn, NY
>> > 512-560-2302
>> >
>> > Confessions of a Phony Internet Muslim
>> >
>> >
>> > It was never my intention to be an atheist. For one thing, atheism
>> > is
>> > impolite; intentionally or not, denying society's gods is a reproach to
>> > society itself. The wise man economizes his reproachfulness.
>> >
>> > Worse, atheism is boring. An atheist can dream of space elevators
>> > that
>> > would allow us to mine the moon and self-replicating nanobots that could
>> > till the soil in places where food would not have grown previously, but
>> > so
>> > can a Christian, and Wiccans can have nightmares about such things.
>> > Meanwhile, the Christian also awaits Christ, the Muslim awaits the
>> > Mahdi,
>> > and the Jew awaits the Messiah which hopefully does not turn out to be
>> > Christ or the Mahdi.
>> >
>> > So I decided to take a vacation from atheism. But eating acid at the
>> > Vatican was out of the question for a number of reasons, largely
>> > financial.
>> > Actually becoming religious would be somewhat problematic insomuch as
>> > that I
>> > serve as director of communications for a pro-atheist political action
>> > committee. Instead, then, I created an alter-ego for myself, becoming a
>> > devout Muslim going by the name of Ali Desu Hussein. And then I got on
>> > the
>> > internet.
>> >
>> > My intention was to argue with Christians as a Muslim. This is
>> > harder
>> > than it sounds. Mostly, I got myself banned from Christian message
>> > boards
>> > immediately after posting the following:
>> >
>> > In the name of the Prophet, peace be upon him-
>> >
>> > I have come to bring you the truth of Islam, the religion of peace.
>> > Surely
>> > does the world itself cry out to you in testimony of this truth, but
>> > just as
>> > surely do its cries fall on deaf ears. Surely does the breath of Allah
>> > move
>> > over the waters, and just as surely does the Christian believe this to
>> > be
>> > the breath of Jesus, when, after all, it was Allah, as noted above.
>> > Surely
>> > surely surely.
>> >
>> > But I wanted to have a dialogue, not simply to immediately convert
>> > others
>> > to Islam by way of such theological magic bullets as the message above.
>> > My
>> > Islamic Mr. Hyde would need a YouTube account.
>> >
>> > YouTube, like the internet at large, is what the Holy Land would
>> > have
>> > been like during the Crusades if everyone in the Holy Land had too much
>> > free
>> > time on their hands. Groups once relatively isolated from each other now
>> > mingle freely, if unproductively. Evangelicals of a certain sort post
>> > damning animated narratives of Mormon theology which, sadly, are largely
>> > accurate; Muslims of a certain sort post clips of talking lions who are
>> > apparently Muslims themselves; Jews of a certain sort post videos of
>> > other
>> > Jews speaking at great length about something which I'm not entirely
>> > clear
>> > on because it is boring and I turned it off.
>> >
>> > Then, there is the infinite debate over the infinite. Now was my
>> > chance
>> > to truly play the role of the believer, to walk a mile in the shoes of
>> > someone sitting at their computer in bare feet. I didn't have a camera,
>> > but
>> > this was probably for the best insomuch as that I would have had to pick
>> > up
>> > a lot of empty beer bottles and move them out of the way, and I'd just
>> > recently gotten them all organized the way I like them. But visuals are
>> > unnecessary anyway; aside from videos and video responses, YouTube
>> > theologians also ply their ancient trade by way of old-fashioned text,
>> > which
>> > was sufficient for their predecessors, particularly when coupled with
>> > the
>> > sword.
>> >
>> > If I was to do the work of Allah on as grand a scale as I was
>> > planning,
>> > allies would be needed. Luckily, I came across TheFollower72, a fellow
>> > Muslim who appeared to be quite active in his own social network
>> > proselytizing insomuch as that his user page was heavy on comments left
>> > by
>> > others. But all was not well. One exuberant YouTuber had posted the
>> > message,
>> > "Go Christianity!!!" Clearly, my new friend was under virtual siege by
>> > some
>> > virtual Tueton. And there seemed to be treachery afoot even from our own
>> > alleged brethren; one user calling himself AyatollahKhomeini123 had left
>> > the
>> > following warning: "Please block and delete the user who is going
>> > around by
>> > the name of bakhtash. He is an evil munafiq akhee, and a shahan shahi
>> > royalist pig who has disguised himself as a Moslem but in reality he is
>> > a
>> > back stabber who be-friends with you making you thinik he is a moslem
>> > and
>> > then stabs you by revealing his own true identity as an anti Islam. Down
>> > with bakhtash. Allah o Akbar. Khomeini Rahbar." But the plot thickened;
>> > bakhtash himself had left this similar warning: "Please block and delete
>> > the
>> > users and comments that are only negative against Islam and or are
>> > hypocritical!, the false user 'AyatollahKhomeini123' is a munafiq
>> > akhee, he
>> > is a shahan shahi royalist pig whom in this account does a lot of bad
>> > things!"
>> >
>> > It was clear that I couldn't trust even my alleged coreligionists;
>> > any
>> > one of them could be a royalist pig or even a false Muslim. I would have
>> > to
>> > be a false Muslim on my own. I resolved to face this task with all the
>> > bravery of a talking lion.
>> >
>> > My next move was to contact the YouTube account of the Worldwide
>> > Church
>> > of God, a Christian sect founded by Herbert Armstrong, himself one of
>> > the
>> > most prominent prophets of the mid-20th century. I left a friendly
>> > message
>> > and got a similarly friendly response: "Greetings Friends! Praise the
>> > Lord
>> > Brethren and may God Bless the United States of America!" So far, so
>> > good.
>> > But then another, more traditional Christian intervened lest I
>> > eventually be
>> > converted to Lord Bretherenism or what have you. "Bro, the Worldwide
>> > Church
>> > of God is a dangerous cult," he explained. "This Herbert guy you are
>> > speaking to talks to the dead do not listen to him." This didn't bother
>> > me;
>> > if I was actually speaking with "this Herbert guy," then I, too, talk to
>> > the
>> > dead insomuch as that Herbert Armstrong died in 1986; it would be
>> > hypocritical of me to think less of him for doing the same thing. Also,
>> > I'd
>> > already made cruel fun of Armstrong in an article I'd written concerning
>> > the
>> > history of Evangelical prophecy, so it would have been awkward to speak
>> > with
>> > him further anyway, dead or not. Plus I'm just kind of neurotic.
>> >
>> > It was time to approach the resident atheists, so I posted a couple
>> > of
>> > comments on their videos to the effect that Islam is the way and the
>> > light
>> > and whatnot. This turned out to be a mistake; atheists can be very, uh,
>> > prolific. One non-believer left three long messages on my user page in
>> > quick
>> > succession, each filled with grandiloquent denunciations of the one true
>> > faith. "We are apostates of Islam," wrote a user named CrissyFrog. "We
>> > denounce Islam as a false doctrine of hate and terror... We strive to
>> > bring
>> > the Muslims into the fold of humanity. Eradicate Islam so our people can
>> > be
>> > liberated, so they can prosper and break away from the pillory of
>> > Islam...
>> > Quran is replete with scientific heresies, historic blunders,
>> > mathematical
>> > mistakes, logical absurdities, grammatical errors and ethical fallacies.
>> > It
>> > is badly compiled and it contradicts itself. There is nothing
>> > intelligent in
>> > this book let alone miraculous." I realized I was bored, having
>> > accidentally
>> > encountered my own opinion.
>> >
>> > But the ultimate cyber-novelty was still to be had - I would allow
>> > myself to be converted from Islam to Christianity. Covertly, I began
>> > interviewing candidates, finally deciding upon a fellow going by the
>> > handle
>> > of ps35ffi. The exchange went as follows:
>> >
>> > ps35ffi: Who was Jesus? What does the Koran say about him? That he was
>> > a
>> > prophet? What does the Koran say about it's prophets?
>> >
>> > AliDesuHussein: Qur'an says many things about the prophets my friend,
>> > but
>> > most important to know is that Muhammed (peace be upon him) is final
>> > prophet:
>> >
>> > 1. Allah
>> > 2. ???
>> > 3. Prophet!
>> >
>> > [Note: The Reader may recognize that bit as having been derived from an
>> > old
>> > South Park episode. Or the Reader may not, in which case it is mine.]
>> >
>> > ps35ffi: Does it not say that what the prophets say is Allah's word and
>> > should be obeyed?
>> >
>> > AliDesuHussein: Absolutely my friend, it does.
>> >
>> > ps35ffi: Ok my friend. Yeshua said I am the way the truth and the life,
>> > no
>> > one cometh to the Father but by me.
>> >
>> > AliDesuHussein: where does it say this?
>> >
>> > ps35ffi: In my text, it's in John 14.6
>> >
>> > That, I decided, was enough evidence for Ali Desu Hussein. I sent my
>> > new
>> > spiritual advisor a private message to the effect that I was going to
>> > need
>> > to think very heavily on these matters. He was clearly pleased.
>> >
>> > And thus it was that I gave this fellow a gift beyond measure: the
>> > belief that he had managed to win over a religious enemy to his own,
>> > true
>> > faith. Overcoming the bad manners inherent to my atheism, I had
>> > performed
>> > the greatest act of politeness that the world had seen since Christ.
>> > Then I
>> > pirated a bunch of games.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>
>