At the Olympics, French authorities will likely take no lessons from disgraced U.S. Secret Service chief Kimberly Cheatle. They don’t want any surprises. But if Cheatle’s incompetence resembles the sloppy routines of Third World police, the French approach resembles the nervous preparations of a paranoid wartime dictator.
The fears are largely understandable: For our baguette-loving compatriots, the stakes are high: More than 10,000 athletes will take part in the Olympic Games, which will be held across the city of Paris.
Tyrants do not gain power on a platform that openly expresses their contempt for freedom. They gain power by appealing to our humanity and offering us protection and safety.
The authorities Expect it With 15 million visitors (Paris has a population of just over 2 million, slightly more than San Antonio), 45,000 police officers have been drafted into the task, but authorities say it’s still not enough.
And they’re probably right.
The frequent terrorist attacks in Paris have made the country’s political situation even more unstable than usual in recent times. In our modern age of total war, terrorists no longer respect the ancient Olympic tradition of enforcing peace. Just ask the Israelis. The recent assassination attempt on President Trump is fueling a new wave of geopolitical instability that no one wants. More on this later.
The stench of war is in the air. France has once again become a fighting ground. Our fellow French people cannot even enjoy pastries and fine cheeses.
France has remained at its highest threat level for almost a year, after a decade of soul-shattering terrorism that has hit concert venues, schools and streets.
Police have thwarted at least one terrorist plot to attack a soccer match during the Olympics — in May. As Ward Bond’s character in Rio Bravo tells the story’s besieged heroes, “If you’ve ever seen a man grabbing a bull by the tail, it’s you.”
It’s often said that the justice system itself is overburdened and perhaps overwhelmed, so the French intelligence service has turned to AI for help, using cyber techniques that humans don’t fully understand. should not do Add that to the mix?
Their “trust us, we won’t infringe on your rights” attitude meets all the criteria for dystopian glee that leaves a nation of citizens shivering and full of regret as they scan barcodes for dirty water, because by the time these experimental measures are made permanent, people will never have their privacy back. The elites will not hand over their wartime gear, like the insufferable roommate who will never be kicked out.
Tyrants don’t gain power on a platform that openly expresses their contempt for freedom. They gain power by appealing to our humanity and offering us protection and safety.
Perhaps this far-reaching, mysterious weapon will effectively save lives, keep the Olympics alive, and allow America to continue to dominate this ancient athletic festival. French authorities will rein in and remove AI surveillance at the end of the 33rd Olympiad. They will be extremely transparent about everything. Perhaps we will all learn the lesson that AI is merely the best extension of humanity. Digital utopia. Maybe.
I considered this conundrum a few months ago. A lot has happened since then, so I thought it was worth revisiting the issue in light of the escalating conflict gripping the Western world.
Culture Wars
When the CIA was founded in 1947, it pledged to use American culture as a weapon in its mission. Invented a trend The Abstract Expressionist movement’s non-artistic artworks inspired the Soviet Union.
Like most CIA operations, this one came to light accidentally. God knows what CIA terrorism we don’t know about.
The power and success of a secret service can be measured by its visibility. When a country’s intelligence agency is bad, everyone sees it busy at work. When a country’s intelligence agency is successful, no one can be sure what it is doing, how it is doing, why it is doing it, or if it is ever telling the truth.
The American Central Intelligence Agency is undoubtedly the best. Based on the little information we have about the agency’s activities, its history is a nightmare, as eventful and suspicious as the Central American drug lords. Or maybe the CIA would use the illegal drug trade to create a revolution.
We usually only learn about the CIA’s nasty experiments and operations when an insider somehow leaks the data, perhaps by accident, but when you’re dealing with an agency that thrives on subterfuge and disinformation, it’s hard to know what’s true.
Because maybe they really do have our best interests at heart. Let me go on record as saying that this is something I wholeheartedly believe 😉
Hello, fellow extremists?
Have the assassination attempt on Donald Trump and the Secret Service’s failings (or machinations) fundamentally altered our relationship to security and surveillance?
On one side of the quagmire we have France, with its uniform national surveillance system that is willing to infringe on rights in the name of security, and on the other side of the US, where a former president is protected by security measures that seem to have been collectively created by a group of waiters on the night shift at Denny’s.
This has frustrated some prominent lawmakers who have turned to the Secret Service to neutralize violent, erratic extremists who like to write boring manifestos full of clichés and typos.
Politicians of all parties are venting their anger over Kimberly Cheatle and the failures of an agency she no longer leads. The House Oversight Committee showed rare bipartisan unity this week, with even AOC badmouthing the disgraced Cheatle. It’s good to see everyone singing together in harmony, even if it’s just to scapegoat.
At the same time, this solidarity should shake us to our core: if high-profile politicians are worried about their safety, what chance do the rest of us have? We ordinary people have no well-supplied shelters.
The assumption here is that sloppy surveillance led to the attempt on Trump’s life. But can a modern political state tolerate such incompetence? When Trump is involved, anything can happen. Probably not. The campaign against Trump appears to be a coordinated attack by influencers toying with the entire culture of government and the media with the dexterity and ease of a gamer holding a controller.
More and more people are finding the hatred for Trump so uncontrollable that they are asking, “Why do we need to get rid of him?”
What does it mean when people condemn Trump at this point? Who are their so-called allies? Are the Machiavellians willing to destroy democracy in the name of protecting it?
I am not saying that the intelligence agencies are to blame for the assassination attempt, but it is increasingly difficult to believe that the greedy pursuit of Trump is morally or legally justified. And if it is not, then we are witnessing power at its most blatant and deranged.
The problem is that it’s nearly impossible to tell when a professional liar is lying.
Paradoxically, to some extent, we Hope American intelligence is good at surveillance. We must never give our enemies the advantage.
But their methods seem to cross the line more often than not. They shouldn’t use sorcery on their own people, but their sorcery is top-notch, so we can only be suspicious of it. Tracking the bait and disinformation is exhausting.
We know this in a variety of ways, like the overwhelming public response to so-called “white supremacist groups” whose ski-masked recruits dress like federal agents, look like federal agents, and act like federal agents, which means that the masked activists are either federal agents or political combatants protected by federal agents.
We know this, but we can’t be totally sure because the Federal Government would never admit it. So we smell a massive plot and manipulation. And no one likes to be lied to, especially when the intentions seem nefarious. Would they really make up a neo-Nazi movement? Why?!
This action is doubly offensive following the Secret Service’s inept response to a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
The criminal is free to survey the surrounding area, Drone Like a toddler flying a kite. I’ve covered many Trump rallies over the years, and they’ve all been meticulously guarded. The Secret Service I know is muscular, tall, defiant and intimidating. No surprise there.
When a Trump rally comes to town, the full military apparatus is deployed and helicopters soar like falcons. The clown show we witnessed on July 13 fell so far short of this standard that public opinion is unanimous in its incredulity, which could only be attributed to incompetence.
Federal agents don’t “fail” that badly. They don’t have these types and quantities of accidents. Right? Are they really that bad at psy-ops? Or is their sloppiness part of a larger calculation?
Technology exposes, reveals, and increasingly unmasks, hopefully unmasking all the balaclava-wearing “white supremacists” in their crisp white khakis and state-issued boots who march in perfect rhythm out of their U-Hauls.
These coals keep the fire going and the conspiracy theorists alert and warm.
