what do you think of what happened in
Boston when we were looking for pressure
cooker and two teenagers you know and
then they took over the whole city and
shut it down and to me that look a whole
lot like martial law yeah um oh God I
can't believe see this is why I didn't
want to give this talk because I knew
that we have this conversation and now
it's on the record all right let me take
a step back and no no you how we have to
deal with it let me take a step back and
a deep breath cuz this is a very painful
thing to talk about um
so all over the world we know it's well
established uh the state department
intelligence agencies engage in theater
and it's what they do at spycraft to
create um spectacles and events
that people may not realize are
spectacles and events but that well like
the um the overthrow of mosad in the 50s
in Iran uh they they'll funnel money to
protesters they'll you know fly people
in to infiltrate protesters they'll
create fake newspapers and so on so we
know that this happens in countries
around the
world I believe that a law has been
passed in the United States I think it's
part of the defense authorization act I
need to confirm this that pardon me now
makes it legal to propagandize American
citizens is that do we know about that
yeah it's true and is it in the ndaa OR
is in something else do we know it's a
separate bill it's a separate bill and
it's been passed it's now law do we know
what years ago two years ago do we know
what the name of it is I don't remember
but I reported on it oh thank you will
you send me the link yeah thank you so
what this means is and I you know as a
journalist to say these words just I
can't tell you with what a heavy heart I
say them but we've entered an era in
which it is not crazy to assess news
events to see if real or not
real and in the United States as well as
overseas and in fact it's kind of crazy
not
to now you know there's so much uh hype
about what I just said and so I want to
be very clear about it so it can't be
taken out of
context you know there's pardon me this
kind of reflexive vilification of anyone
speculating about that because they
become a conspiracy theorist right well
just bear with me you know I've often
thought about this because our
intelligence agencies and for I respect
spies I mean you know who are doing like
before it got out of control I believe
we need intelligence I believe we need
intelligence agencies I don't think
there's anything dishonorable about
being in the intelligence Services if
you obey the Constitution and the law um
but all over the world our intelligence
services are engaged in conspiring to
create outcomes that's their job that's
how they're successful so now that it's
legal to propagandize in the United
States uh it doesn't surprise me that
there's more and more um products coming
up in popular culture more and more
events in the news stream that seem to
be to my eye to be
subsidized uh let me give you some
examples of that I'm not talking about
Boston right now I'll I'll get to that
we also talked earlier about
infiltrators right and how they provoke
violence this is well established so if
we know that infiltrators by the police
NYPD they've been documented or other
police
forces dress up like people they're not
and provoke violence why is it
Unthinkable that there might be
spectacles that might drive an outcome
in the news stream let me give you a
couple of quick examples and all I'm
saying is we unfortunately and I have to
say this to my fellow journalist
journalists as well we've entered a time
in which we need to be very skeptical
about the news stream and look at it
critically and ask for more verification
and more inquiry and that's just being
good reporters and it makes it like this
there's spectacle fed into the news
media in China there's spectacle fed
into like Chile how did Pino you know
engage in his coup he created a
photographs of a cache of weapons that
the terrorists had you know hidden was
it real was it not most historians think
it wasn't I mean this is like Not
Unusual you know in the process of
creating a close Society
so
if laws have made it legal to
assassinate American citizens and legal
to propagandize them why should it be
crazy or weird to think that that might
be for a reason right all right I saw
the movie
uh Zero Dark 30 thank you very much and
I have worked on two presidential
campaigns so I recognize political
talking points and I wrote a piece
saying this reads like the Pentagon
signed off on the script because there
were like chunks of political talking
points identifiable to anyone who's
worked in Washington right and you don't
come up with those if you're a writer
writing a screenplay um and everyone was
very upset it was very controversial and
scandalous but in fact belatedly a news
story came out saying that in fact the
Pentagon had I think subsidized some of
it but had certainly consulted directly
on the script and I see more and more TV
shows about the CIA and more and more TV
shows about spies and gigantic
Blockbusters in which surveillance is
normalized and gigantic Blockbusters in
which people are tortured to get them to
talk in a way that might exonerate
people who actually tortured people to
get them to talk in Guantanamo and
there's all this money being pumped into
these
unaccountable you know terrorism
fighting things and now there's no law
preventing that money from going through
front organizations right into popular
culture so that's of interest to me
and so another thing I want to say and
there's so many people waiting to ask a
question but I just need to say this is
I'm skeptical of certain news events
that seem more theatrical than the norm
or I want to ask questions about them
because I was in CNN once recently and
they were reporting a story about a
water skier who had been
decapitated on a lake between Mexico and
the United States and it had something
to do with ter you know a terrorism
threat right and I was like decapitated
water skar sometimes you hear these
things and it's like so novelistic
you're like real life doesn't work that
way like these are so novelistic
someone's cominging up with it to make
it stick in the popular imagination or
it just makes you think well I'd like to
document that I'm a reporter what's the
source and I and it kept being just this
one guy judge araho in Texas I may be
mispronouncing his name he's a very cons
yes yeah he was the source he was the
source he was the source and I have this
wonderful Facebook Community all over
the world and I went on Facebook and I'm
like Mexican Facebook community
is there any reporting about a beheaded
water skier in this Lake in this place
in Mexico and they're like no there's
what are you talking about there's
nothing like that there's doesn't exist
so I turned to the CNN producer and said
do you have a second source for this
story and it was all over the news all
over the news all over the news and
they're like uh and they checked and
it's like nope just this guy judge
whatever and I'm like well can you find
a second source and they were blushing
and embarrassed and they looked and they
confessed that they didn't have a second
source which if you know what journalism
is you're supposed to Doc you know
confirm it with two sources so ever
since that experience of CNN is running
with this no one's verifying it
journalists aren't in a position to
follow up on anything anymore because
budgets are slash and there's no
investigative reporting um all this
nonsense can enter the media stream for
purposes that have to do with advancing
agendas because no one's checking that's
all I want to say about that um can I
take more questions I so Boston I I
guess my feeling about any of these
things is let's investigate we need to
investigate we need to ask better
questions we need to interview the
doctors at the hospital we need to
interview the victims we need to you
know get all the footage ourselves we
need to train journalist citizens to be
journalists and to have websites and I'm
I'm busy building one as a startup where
citizen journalists can document events
so that we're not leaving it to The
Gatekeepers