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by Charles Hugh Smith
March 09, 2017
from
CharlesHughSmith
Website
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The battle raging in
the Deep State (aka 'The
Secret-Shadow Government') isn't just a bureaucratic battle - it's a
war for the soul, identity and direction of the nation.
When do the unlimited powers of the Intelligence/Security agencies
threaten America's domestic and global national interests?
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The
CIA and its political enablers claim the agency's
essentially unlimited powers, partially revealed by
Wikileak's Vault 7, pose no threat
to America's interests, since they are intended to "defend" American
interests.
This is the rationale presented by neocon CIA allies in both
political parties:
the CIA can't
possibly threaten America's interests because the CIA defines
America's interests.
This is the wormhole down
which civil liberties and democracy have drained.
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It is an extraordinarily
defining moment in American history when the director of the FBI
publicly declares that there is no such thing as
"absolute privacy" in the U.S.
In effect, privacy is now contingent on the level of interest the
Security State has in the private conversation/data.
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If we read
the U.S. Constitution, we do not
find such contingencies:
civil liberties are
absolute.
Post-1790 presidents have
temporarily mooted civil liberties in time of war, and the CIA-led
camp of the Deep State has justified its unlimited powers by
effectively declared,
"a state of war is
now permanent and enduring."
So what's left to defend
if America has become the enemy of civil liberties and democracy,
i.e. become a totalitarian state ruled by Security Services and
their political henchmen and apologists?
I have long suggested that the tectonic plates of the Deep State are
shifting as the ruling consensus has eroded.
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Some elements of the Deep
State - what I call the progressive wing, which is
(ironically to some) anchored in the military services -� now
view the neocon-CIA (Security State)-Wall Street elements as
profoundly dangerous to America's long-term interests, both
domestically and globally.
Read "Is
the Deep State Fracturing into Disunity?"
(March 14, 2014)
I have suggested that this "rogue Deep State" quietly aided
Donald Trump (by subtly undermining
Hillary Clinton's campaign) as
the last best chance to save the nation from the neocon's over-reach
that the Establishment's Wall Street-funded leadership (Bush,
Clinton, Obama, et al.) has overseen - including granting the CIA
and its allies virtually unlimited powers unhindered by any
effective oversight.
Read "Does
a Rogue Deep State Have Trump's Back?"
(January 18, 2017)
This profound split in the Deep State has now broken into open
warfare.
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The first salvo was the
absurd propaganda campaign led by Establishment mouthpieces The New
York Times and The Washington Post claiming Russian agents had
"hacked" the U.S. election to favor Trump.
This fact-free propaganda campaign failed - having no evidence
didn't work quite as well as the NYT and Wapo expected -� and
so the propaganda machine launched the second salvo, accusing Trump
of being a Russian patsy.
The evidence for this claim was equally laughable, and that campaign
has only made the Establishment, its propaganda mouthpieces and the
neocon Deep State look desperate and foolish on the global and
domestic stages.
The desperate neocon Deep State and its Democratic Party allies went
to absurd lengths to undermine Trump via the "Boris and Natasha"
strategy of accusing Trump of collaborating with the Evil
Russkies, even going so far as to briefly exhume former
President
G.W. Bush from deep-freeze to
make a fool of himself, saying,
the Trump-Evil
Russkies connection should be "investigated."
Now the rogue elements
have launched a counterstrike - Vault 7.
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Here is one example of
how quickly the CIA's over-reach has been absorbed by the body
politic:
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I highly recommend
reading Wikileak's summary of Vault 7:
Vault 7 - CIA Hacking Tools Revealed.
We now know that the CIA maintained a special program (UMBRAGE)
to mimic Russia-based hackers and create false trails back to
fictitious "Russian hackers."
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A number of highly
experienced analysts who reviewed the supposed "Russian hacks" had
suggested the "evidence" smelled of false trails -� not just
bread crumbs, but bread crumbs heavy-handedly stenciled "this is
Russian malware."
The body count from Vault 7 has not yet been tallied, but it
wouldn't surprise me if former President
Obama and his team eventually end up as political
casualties.
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Non-partisan observers
are noting all this over-reach occurred on Obama's watch, and it
hasn't gone unnoticed that one of Obama's last executive orders
stripped away the last shreds of oversight of what could be "shared"
(or invented) between the Security Agencies.
Indeed, the entire leadership of the Democratic Party seems to have
placed all their chips on the increasingly unviable claim that the
CIA is the squeaky clean defender of America.
Vault 7 is not just political theater - it highlights the core
questions facing the nation:
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What is left to
defend if civil liberties and democratically elected
oversight have been reduced to Potemkin-village travesties?
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If there are no
limits on CIA powers and surveillance, then what is left of
civil liberties and democracy?
Answer: nothing...
The battle raging in the Deep State isn't just a bureaucratic battle
- it's a war for the soul, identity and direction of the nation.
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Citizens who define
America's interests as civil liberties and democracy should be
deeply troubled by the Establishment's surrender of these in favor
of a National Security State with essentially no limits.
Americans tasked with defending America's "interests" globally
should be asking if a CIA/NSA et al. with unlimited power is
detrimental to America's soft and hard power globally, and toxic to
its influence.
The answer is obvious:
a CIA with unlimited
power and the backing of a corrupt Establishment
and media is more than detrimental to America's soft and
hard power globally - it is disastrous and potentially fatal to
America's interests, standing and influence.
Those of us on the
sidelines can only hope that the progressive wing of the Deep State,
the rogue elements who see the terrible danger of an unlimited
National Security State, will succeed in undermining the
powerful political support for this toxic totalitarian regime...
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