Speaking of Privilege: Obama Addresses His Constituency

Right. I got this.

It can be interesting to watch and to parse Presidential Press Conferences especially as they have become rarer and rarer.

His Serenity doesn't much do the formal Press Conference routine, preferring appearances on teevee gabshows and one on one interviews to get his message across, no matter how imperfect, muddled or irrelevant that message may be.

I've long been of the opinion, of course, that His Serenity is the willing tool of others, particularly those who own his ass. Which means the banks and Wall Street together with a shadowy group of corporate execs and government "retirees."

For example, it was obvious that Obama became a tool of House Cheney right quick, as soon as Miz Liz started yapping about whatever it was her father was telling her to yap about. The clue was that Obama yielded almost instantly and has never deviated from his assigned course, for he is corrected promptly.

Exactly what command and control House Cheney has over The Government would be interesting to learn, especially what agencies they use to accomplish their nefarious ends (many say they operate directly through the CIA, which gives some perspective on the whole NSA Thing... but that's getting ahead of myself.)



The Friday presser was interesting for a number of reasons, one being his proposed "reforms" of the NSA surveillance shop to more fully comport with the constitution, or what passes for it these days. Interesting.

A theory bandied about early on suggested that the Snowden Thing and the subsequent NSA Thing were limited hangout operations to avoid exposure of Something Else (I can guess what it might be) that would curl one's hair, if you know what I mean.

Because the NSA Thing has been very carefully managed (whether by Greenwald is an open question; I suspect not, as the editors' appearance on Charlie Rose was remarkable for its lack of mention of Greenwald), I have had the strong suspicion that the underlying struggle here is between the spookeries, specifically the CIA and NSA over which will dominate the New World Order.

Palace intrigue, dontchaknow.

The story of which spookery will be in the permanent top dog position is one of the fundamental stories of Empire from time immemorial, and here we are, nascent Imperial America, attempting to lord it over the far-flung colonies and outposts and satrapies and tributary peoples.

Same as it ever was.

His Serenity was actually in quite good form on Friday, eager to appear On Top Of It, the old, "I got this" Obama who was so appealing back in the day. As performance art, it was quite a show.

But who, exactly, was he performing for? The "legitimate" media, of course. But someone else, too.

Snowden/Greenwald? Strangely, that came to mind as I watched his little song and dance. Was he trying to show them something, too? Interesting, if so.

Then there was the whole Putin sequence. Striking in and of itself. That Putin and Obama lack a certain... chemistry... has been obvious for quite some time. Contrast with Medvedyev and Obama is obvious. But then, what else is obvious? Of course. Medvedyev was Putin's performing monkey. Who is Obama's string-puller?

We still can't say for certain. And this being a situation where actual rule is dictated by committee or committees, rather than by a singular tyrant, we'll probably never be able to say -- except that the Cheneys continue to exert undue influence.

Snowden's asylum in Russia is itself a message from the spookeries to the spookeries. Both the China and the Russia gambits evoke plenty of Cold War memories, and they make it easy to assign to Snowden the role of "defector," but these are Modern Times and there's no place to defect to any more where you won't be caught up in the muddle of neo-liberalism and post-Cold War Imperialism. They are universal predicates now.

But it's clear enough that China is the model for the Future, has been for some time now, and Russia is something like the the alternative model of the same future. In other words, we're on the path to adopt one or another model (or a hybrid of both) as our own social and political future. Indeed. The spookeries are deeply, intimately involved in the social and political engineering to ensure the adoption of the appropriate model.

It seems to me that the CIA took on Russia as a "project" and has maintained its interests there ever since, rejecting NSA influence and involvement. From the indications of the Snowden revelations, China seems to have become an NSA "project" in rivalry with the CIA operation next door.

In that regard, I think it is reasonable to speculate that Snowden was/is a CIA mole sent to the NSA to kneecap the agency before it got too far above itself.


That's as may be. For his part, Obama was clearly sent out to meet with his constituency in the media after he was schooled by the various spooks and their factional advocates on what was needed. That would be some "reforms" -- which is exactly what he proposed.

The point is, as I've maintained all along, institutionalizing a system of exemptions from NSA spying, which looks pretty much where all this movement for "reform" is going.  Because some business interests have experienced a slight reduction in revenue thanks to these revelations, and there has been a lack of control on industrial spying in any case, exemptions for the corporate community, and hold harmless protections are the most important matters to be handled promptly.

Meanwhile, "greater transparency," and "civil liberties protections" are offered as bait for the multitudes. They're meaningless,  but whatever.

A "website" would be good, too.

All this does -- if any of it happens -- is ensure that the surveillance continues.

Which is the point, of course.

Surveillance to what object? Control, certainly. For whom?

The great unanswered question, ne?