Monday, October 19, 2020

UFOs and Politics

Tom DeLonge has been expressing his political views on Twitter. After writing a line like that about DeLonge, reporters and bloggers typically give readers an obligatory few sentences about how he is the unlikely front man of an organization consisting of former defense officials and contractors who purport to research UFOs. We'll skip the intro since you probably already know about TTSA if you're reading my blog in the first place, but we could add that very little in the way of compelling evidence has actually been produced by those former officials and contractors. After decades of spooky stories and promises of forthcoming UFO Disclosure, we continue to have little more than hearsay to show for it.

While plenty of the burden falls on the shoulders of self-described scientists who plundered around Skinwalker Ranch, it's not all their fault. It's been three years now since Kean and company broke the AATIP story in the Times, and there are a whole lot of relevant assertions made in that article that still haven't been verified. The Times, its writers, and TTSA bear responsibility for that.

As we have explored on this blog and elsewhere, the Disclosure movement is a chronic staple of the UFO genre. It has endured some 70 years of public hearings, Congressional panels, and forecasts of big things to come. Nonetheless, many UFO advocates continue to suggest a Congressional hearing will, this time, reveal the secrets that are surely withheld.

Deeply withheld secrets, we might add, that allegedly seem to be rather puzzlingly made available to men like Luis Elizondo. These men, secrets purportedly in hand, apparently decided to launch a corporation with a stock securities strategy for fundraising rather than seek counsel from attorneys with expertise in national security and whistleblower law. It might indeed be considered reasonable to tap some brakes on the validity and objectivity of their insider knowledge that rests so heavily on taking them at their word.   

As DeLonge weighs in on the upcoming election, we could consider a prevailing point that towers above the support and criticism he receives: The UFO topic is married to the political arena. 

In order to realistically discuss possible Congressional hearings and initiatives (like the Rubio-backed effort to obtain a DoD appraisal of the UAP situation), we must consider political allegiances and related dynamics. Moreover, while some high profile characters state they support a nonpartisan approach and that politics should stay out of the UFO fray, their actions suggest somewhat otherwise.

As suggested in the above tweet, TTSA personnel and its friends of the program are fond of guest spots on the right wing, highly dubious FOX News. The "highly dubious" description I opted to use is not just my personal observation, but is in line with court filings by FOX itself. Attorneys argued on behalf of FOX that reasonable viewers do not take Carlson seriously and understand his segments to be hyperbole, as suggested in the screenshot below.

The seemingly ever present Nick Pope is also among those who frequent Carlson's show and discuss issues which many would argue he is not the least bit qualified to address, much less explain. The political leanings of Pope, who generally supports TTSA or most anything that keeps people talking about UFOs, may be explored at his Twitter account

UFO enthusiasts and TTSA fans, whether they like it or not, are somewhat forced to accept that Congressional support for the UAP topic is enmeshed with political issues. Acknowledging the political factor in the UFO arena is a sensitive undertaking for the talking heads because it lays bare the topic's often overlooked social complexity. It is often overlooked, both mistakenly and as an insincere matter of convenience, in lieu of promoting an overly simplistic and unrealistic model. UFO buffs might also consider why their preferred spokespeople, if they sincerely want to keep the topic as apolitical and nonpartisan as possible, congregate to talk about it on the defacto state media channel. 

7 comments:

  1. Political activists have been misrepresenting the meaning of what Tucker Carlson said in this matter. He was being sued for defamation over comments he made on his show about Karen McDougal. In law, statements that purport to be fact are potentially actionable, while statements of opinion are not. In this case, lawyers for Carlson were arguing that the comments he made about Ms. McDougal were clearly opinions, and not assertions of fact. This matter pertains only to the case involving Ms. McDougal, and has nothing to do with anything else Carlson said on his show. But political activists have been twisting this to mean that everything on Carlson’s show is fake.
    The court concluded that “Ms. McDougal has not offered a plausible interpretation that the statements Mr. Carlson made, when read in context, are statemen ts of fact. The Court concludes that the statements are rhetorical hyperbole and opinion commentary intended to frame a political debate, and, as such, are not actionable as defamation. In addition, as a public figure, Ms. McDougal must raise a plausible inference of actual malice to sustain her defamation claim. She has failed to do so.”

    Having said that, I agree that Carlson is being too credulous about UFO claims on his show. He does not seem to even realize that there is 'another side' to this question - people who are quite familiar with TTSA and the lot, and who can argue against what they are claiming.

    ReplyDelete
  2. One of the biggest problems UFO advocates historically have had to deal with is the "Giggle Factor" from the media.

    I fail to see how appearing on State TV helps overcome credibility issues.

    ReplyDelete
  3. When I was a teen UFOlogist in the 1960s, the UFO community seemed to have a predilection for right-wing politics. Things now seem very different. When the New York Times published its UFO revelations in December 2017, it was mostly the liberal East Coast media that ran with the story; Sarah Huckabee Sanders, by contrast, could hardly suppress her snickering when she spoke of UFOs. Senator Harry Reid, who's emerged as a major UFO advocate, has long been a particularly bitter critic of Trump, and of course John Podesta was Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign chairman. I acknowledge Tucker Carlson as an important counter-example, but on the whole it seems to me that New York Magazine hit on an important truth (March 20, 2018): “Every generation gets the abduction fantasy it deserves. Ours is ET versus Trump.”

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hi Jack,

    Just an aside: Tucker Carlson worked at CNN and hosted on MSNBC before his current job on Fox.

    ReplyDelete
  5. UFOs / politics has been on my mind lately, after realizing the locale of the famous BlueBook "Swamp Gas" case of 1966 was at uber-conservative Hillsdale College in Michigan. Strangely, the current Hillsdale wikipedia entry omits any reference to the legendary 1966 Ufo flap, famously researched by Hynek. It could be a coincidence, but its very odd to me that the place where the "Swamp Gas" cover story was rolled out is the same place that goes on to become synonymous with the championing of the supremacy of "Western culture". Controlling the narrative around this topic of course has tremendous political significance.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks for a refreshing look at the "Tucker Carlson/UFO" Phenomena. It seems obvious to me that TTSA and their handlers are using Fox and their state controlled media for traction. I was afraid to address my concern on Billy Cox De Void, because an obvious bias toward all things Trump (eg. Tucker Carlson). But what a venue to whip up ET paranoia and the control of the ETH narrative. Thank you.

    ReplyDelete