Is There a Deep State?

[Benjamin Cole]

Peter Dale Scott may have invented or popularized the phrase, "Deep State," in connection with what happened in the JFKA. Some have said, even here in this EF_JFKA, there is no such thing as a Deep State.

And, of course, it could be a matter of semantics, too. I use the term as shorthand for domestic and globalized intel ops, and military, State Department, DHS, etc. working on behalf of major party donors (globalist enterprises).  

Excellent author Mike Lofgren explained some of the more mundane yet important aspects of the Deep State in his book, The Deep State, written 2016. If you have never read that book, written by a longtime Congressional staffer, you are missing out. 

Interestingly, Matt Taibbi has noted the terms "Deep State" and "working class" have been dismissed as nut-job identifiers in the last 10 years. That's right, use the term "Deep State," and you are a right-wing fringe creature. 

Man, if there is no Deep State, why does media act as if it is a Deep State mouthpiece 99% of the time? 

This presentation by Taibbi is well worth pondering, and remember that if you say the Deep State was behind the JFKA, then you are marginalizing yourself. 

 

 

Edited September 5, 2023 by Benjamin Cole

[Matthew Koch]

Yes 

 

[Joe Bauer]

When Donald Rumsfeld says 2.3 trillions of dollars can't be tracked in Pentagon spending ( as well as untold trillions more in black budget spending over decades ),  Bill Clinton says on national TV that there is a secret government besides our elected government, national media is controlled regards certain areas of national security issues and in what they can report and how they report it, Presidents are kept from major secrets and told they don't have "need to know" security clearance, Supreme Court justices are bought and paid for by billionaires, international wealth is connected with mutual interests, Wall Street's most powerful can buy and make or break political candidates, and on and on ... I suggest this matrix of super wealth, power and control entities could be categorized as at least a major part of a deeper unknown to the public state.

And couldn't Dwight Eisenhower's Military, Industrial, Congressional Complex leaving office speech below logically be interpreted as an unelected, lack of constitutional oversight and restraint "deep state" warning one?

“Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense.

 

“We have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions.

Added to this, 3½ million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security alone more than the net income of all United States corporations.

“Now this conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence — economic, political, even spiritual — is felt in every city, every statehouse, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet, we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved. So is the very structure of our society.

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.”

 

 

Edited September 5, 2023 by Joe Bauer

[Paul Brancato]

And Licio Gelli attended Reagan’s inauguration. There is also the curious story told by Colonel Brandstetter, long time asset of US Army Intelligence living in Acapulco. Around the time that Gelli was evading Italian Justice Brandstetter was asked to find housing for someone that included coastal access and secret tunnel access along the shoreline. He later was told to forget it, but by then he had found both an appropriate piece of real estate and had figure out who the mystery purchaser was - Licio Gelli, in this case being aided in his search by unnamed US military figures. 

[Cliff Varnell]

HOW THE DEEP STATE CAME TO AMERICA: A HISTORY

https://warontherocks.com/2019/02/how-the-deep-state-came-to-america-a-history/

<q><emphasis added>

[T]he “deep state” became a part of the American lexicon...in early February 2017, just weeks after the inauguration of President Donald Trump, that news reports first mentioned the term’s increased use within the president’s inner circle. Over the following months the president and supporters of his administration publicly embellished upon the deep state’s meaning and significance, making it into a catchphrase for perceived internal adversaries within Washington. </q>

Edited September 5, 2023 by Cliff Varnell

[Cliff Varnell]

12 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Interestingly, Matt Taibbi has noted the terms "Deep State" and "working class" have been dismissed as nut-job identifiers in the last 10 years. That's right, use the term "Deep State," and you are a right-wing fringe creature. 

Right wingers hijacked those terms, re-defining them to fit fascististic narratives.

12 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Man, if there is no Deep State, why does media act as if it is a Deep State mouthpiece 99% of the time? 

Lemme guess where that %1 went...

October 28 to November 8, 2016 when CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News ran 24hour bash Hillary coverage of the last days of the campaign.

Am I right, Ben?

[Greg Doudna]

As I recall, Mike Lofgren’s use of the term “deep state” had nothing to do with “globalism” or a non-domestic-national meaning. Benjamin continually links those two terms by association, “deep state” and “globalism”, as if there is some definitional or obvious association or linkage. 

Also Lofgren’s use of the term was not conspiratorial, not referring to covert organized game plans (although as Adam Smith noted long ago, conspiracies seem to get hatched whenever two or more large businessmen types meet in this world, that is, conspiracies to defraud the public are as common as dirt, but that’s not what makes a deep state deep).

And third, Lofgren did not portray the “deep state” as under a central command leadership issuing top-down secret orders to far-flung extensions, as in classic global shadow government conspiracy theories.

it’s like in universities typically the president does fundraising and public relations and courts rich old ladies writing their wills for the endowment fund, whereas it’s the provost, name little known to the public, who actually runs the university day to day, makes all the key decisions. The provost is the “deep state” there. And in some large corporations, so it has been credibly told, often some highly competent executive secretary actually runs the enterprise while highly paid CEO’s get all the public credit. In my old department at the University of Copenhagen, there was a secretary like that. Impractical and more famous professors running around with better titles and salaries but that middle-aged secretary RAN that department (well I might add, rest her soul now). 

She was the “deep state” of that department. Meaning in Lofgren’s sense, where the power actually is, as opposed to where the power is said to be on paper. Nothing to do with globalism or a unified monolithic centralized-control hidden conspiracy. 

interesting how what begins as a neutral sociological systems-theory term becomes turned by association into a code word for something someone wants to demonize. 

Edited September 5, 2023 by Greg Doudna

[Ron Bulman]

JMO.  If there was a deep state in 1963 it consisted of the military industrial complex mentioned by Eisenhower in his 1960 farewell speech, Wall Street (see Battling, Dulles'es Roosevelsts and more) and the CIA.  It has progressed to today and the 1% own the MSM.

If there was/is a deep state, did/do they use smoke and mirrors or smoke on the water? Was there a Deep Purple?  Yes.  If you make it to the very end.  How wrong can you be?

 

 

[Bob Ness]

My take has always been there is a Deep State but not the cigar chomping back room cabal that seems to be insinuated in these discussions. I believe the Deep State is basically an outgrowth of bureaucracies that in and of themselves institutionally tend toward survival and foster those within them toward that aim. At the top of most of them are political appointees who may or may not have a firm grip on the true heads of the bureaucracy they lead, the deputies who are likely in career positions.

One of the advantages of an experienced politician is their familiarity with how the bureaucracies function. Inexperienced Presidents are routinely flummoxed by them unless their main advisors are good at fighting them. Bush-Cheney is a good example. The same with Obama and Biden and Reagan- Bush. Trump and Carter are bad examples IMO.

Kennedy and Johnson is an interesting dilemma to that theory. Maybe that pairing is an outlier.

Edited September 6, 2023 by Bob Ness

[Denny Zartman]

Is there an entrenched establishment of oligarchs and career politicians? Of course. There always has been. Are they all-powerful and omniscient? No. But the people here constantly complaining about the "Deep State" desperately want you to believe that they are. They want this idea of a shadowy, evil, all-powerful force out there, and then using a mental shell game try to trick others into believing that the entire US government is the Deep State - and, therefore, the enemy.

The people here constantly complaining about the alleged Deep State cannot explain how the alleged Deep State chosen candidate Hillary Clinton lost while the alleged Deep State foe Donald Trump won without contorting themselves into pretzels.

[Kirk Gallaway]

Is there a "deep state"?

 

The short answer is no. The state that is working against you that you should be most concerned about is the  one that's attempting to economically marginalize your existence or foothold in the middle class. There is nothing "deep" or hidden about this. There are no  conferences such as Davos where their sinister plans are carried out in secret. No it's business as usual. 

There are no conspiracies, they just all think alike. They have taken the levers of power from you without firing a shot, without people scarcely knowing how. So in essence calling this "deep" is not taking responsibility for all of us letting it happen over the last 40 years.

 

The reason you should be trying to figure out who killed JFK is because you care and have a desire to  get down to the truth. Or maybe there's a sleuthing aptitude you bring to it, which is fine too.  Get over this idea that exposing JFK killers as coming from the NSS will change the course of history and make the U.S. dismantle the War machine. It's just childish dreaming. You're not on a mission from God.

 

The idea that the U.S. is run by MIC, takes no account of the changes of the last 60 years. It's much bigger than the MIC. The MIC  and military spending only account for 3% of the total economy. Nobody plays favorites of one industry against the other. They are all invested in different degrees as the times dictate.

 

 

This idea that the MIC deep state is thwarting all efforts of peace is wrong. There just  isn't sufficient, actionable  political will toward world peace that would put  anybody's feet to the fire. To end on the most positive, possible note,  If there was a world peace movement that truly caught on throughout the planet*, to wind down government expenditures on Defense, (maybe brought on by external events, such as a nuclear escalation in the Ukraine war). it would definitely be opposed by the industry. But ultimately if it was out in the open and had the popular will of the peoples of the world, what could anyone really do? In the final analysis it's  just one industry, and it's not going to go out of business entirely. Both government and private allocations fluctuate over the course of time, and whole companies and national industries do, and have died.  

 

Though it sounds like a pipe dream. The average age of an America is 38. And they are much more likely to feel affected  about this than the truth about an assassination 60 years ago.

 

[Joe Bauer]

4 hours ago, Kirk Gallaway said:

Is there a "deep state"?

 

The short answer is no. The state that is working against you that you should be most concerned about is the one that's attempting to economically marginalize your existence or foothold in the middle class. There is nothing "deep" or hidden about this. There are no conferences such as Davos where their sinister plans are carried out in secret. No it's business as usual. 

There are no conspiracies, they just all think alike. They have taken the levers of power from you without firing a shot, without people scarcely knowing how. So in essence calling this "deep" is not taking responsibility for all of us letting it happen over the last 40 years.

Agree. 

And you can rationally say that by a huge majority "they" do think alike.

Their group think is basically summed up in Donald Trump's niece Mary Trump's best seller book title...

"TOO MUCH AND NEVER ENOUGH!"

Just like human psychology academics can come up with general predictive models for all kinds of social behavior starting in childhood (albeit under certain modifying conditions) there are ones that have proven to be accurate to noticeably interesting degrees.

In the realm of accumulators of great wealth and also highest political and military status and even criminal organization leadership it is obvious that many of those who achieve these lofty positions clearly do share common traits.

Just one:

Control freak tendencies.

Even in childhood, these are the kids who want to control the activities and games they initiate with other kids making sure they alone make up the rules and are in charge.

These types won't even play in equal status leadership games or associate with other kids unless they are in charge and the sole activity decision makers.

These control freak kids are aggressive in this behavior. And they can often bend other more compliant kids to their will.

I clearly remember kids I knew and grew up with being like this.

I had my own force of will. I would confront those that tried to boss me.

I had to develop self-defense mechanisms being the youngest of 7 brothers in a fatherless, welfare poor home.

All of whom felt I was the lowest on the totem pole as far as who could tell me what to do and say all the time. My next oldest brother had only one person he could boss around...me!  We fought physically a lot.

Our single mom could only try to break up our constant sibling rivalries ( serious fist fights ) with a broom stick and her largest sized spatula whackings.

I know my take here is non-academic and anecdotal but I trust my assessment of these control freak types as being more valid than not.

I have read many biographies of high wealth and power acquiring persons in our modern history era.

So many fit that control freak trait and from a young age it seems logical to associate them with it more than the huge majority of others in society.

And a large number of these great wealth and power accumulating persons keep that anti-social behavior trait their entire lives!

Like Mary Trump says...their wealth and power accumulation is "never enough!"

The accumulating and increasing of it is an uncontrollable obsession till their dying breath...imo anyways.

And so many heavily invest in and involve themselves in the political world as a means to not just keep their wealth and power, but to increase it.

Texas oil barons during JFK times. You name the richest since then...same thing.

And funding not just politicians who promote their interests, but even the most nefarious even dark criminal actions to enhance their interests.

LBJ was hugely financed by such power people and groups. Nixon too. Bush too.

The ultimate prize in these obsessive power grabs is our Supreme Court.

In 2000 we saw how such a biased court could exercise the benefitting will of such mentors.

They actually stepped in and stopped ( mind boggling ) a Florida Supreme Court approved counting of "all" their states votes in their 2000 presidential election. Only when they ( SCOTUS ) learned the race was tightening with Gore gaining votes by the hour and just a few hundred away from winning!

An unprecedented action, condemned as one of the most constitution mandated Supreme Court power abusing and violating ones ever...and stated as such by Vincent Bugliosi himself!

If you took the top 500 hundred thousand wealthiest Americans ( .15% of our population ) and truly discovered how much they ( as a group ) have invested in influencing our political system in their favor for decades through not just lobbying firms, but manipulation of political candidate choosing with hundreds of billions of dollars, including Supreme Court appointments ... I think it would be fairly easy to understand what the DEEP STATE may be about to a substantial degree.

And for one of our current SCOTUS members to be the willingly accepting recipient of a million dollars worth of giftings from just one ( very active far right wing agenda promoting ) billionaire just highlights how outrageously far this influence corruption has evolved.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 6, 2023 by Joe Bauer

[Matthew Koch]

Anyways, back on Topic 

 

[Matt Allison]

Oh the irony.

On 9/5/2023 at 1:16 AM, Benjamin Cole said:

I use the term as shorthand for domestic and globalized intel ops, and military, State Department, DHS, etc. working on behalf of major party donors (globalist enterprises).  

How about organized global crime?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13581

I cannot stress enough how much folks are going to want to prepare ahead and educate themselves about this issue.

[Matthew Koch]

On 9/8/2023 at 1:23 AM, Matt Allison said:

Oh the irony.

How about organized global crime?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13581

I cannot stress enough how much folks are going to want to prepare ahead and educate themselves about this issue.

Like when the Median Cartel supposedly killed Barry Seal for taking pictures of Sandinesta's loading Cocaine on is cargo plane that was flown into Mena Arkansas as part of Iran Contra? Many people think that CIA killed Seal because he had turned informant and was going to blow the whistle on Oliver North/Felix Rodriguez network.