New Russian Investigations Committee "Not a Monster of 1937", Says Its Head

Acting Chairman of the Russian Investigations Committee Aleksandr Bastrykin has said that the new Investigations Committee will not be another NKVD. [The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs, or NKVD, was the public and secret police agency in the period of Joseph Stalin and was largely responsible for executing political repression orders]

"When people say that we want to set up an NKVD (by merging various investigations bodies to form one Investigations Committee) and that we will be slaughtering people all over the place, this are blatant unscrupulous lies," Bastrykin said at a meeting of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia faction in the State Duma today. He was telling deputies about the president-proposed draft law on establishing a single Investigations Committee in Russia.

Bastrykin said he was bewildered by statements by some deputies "directly saying that you are creating some kind of monster, a monster of 1937". Bastrykin said he could not understand such a position and categorically rejected the possibility.

There is no need to hurry with establishing a single Investigations Committee in Russia, he said, stressing that this was his personal opinion. "It should be established but this should be done in a natural evolutionary way, in a calm fashion, without revolutions or hysterics," Bastrykin said.

~ more... ~

Musical Innerlube: Pierre Bastien - Avid Diva

Pierre Bastien (born 1953 in Paris) is a French musician, composer, and instrument builder. He began building mechanical-based musical instruments at an early age, using items such as metronomes, cymbals, and pulleys. In 1977 he began collaborating with Pascal Comelade and composing music for dance companies. He performed in ensembles such as Operation Rhino, Nu Creative Methods, and Effectifs de Profil.

Bastien has collaborated with artists such as Robert Wyatt, Jac Berrocal, Jaki Liebezeit, Pierrick Sorin, and Issey Miyake. He has released material on record labels such as Lowlands, Rephlex, Tigersushi, and Alga Marghen. He has also completed a doctorate on 18th century French literature, his thesis being on pre-surrealist Raymond Roussel.

Government Builds Vast Domestic Spying Network: Report

The US government is building a vast domestic spying network to collect information on Americans as part of expanding counter-terrorism efforts, the Washington Post reported Monday.

The unprecedented network involves local police, state and military authorities feeding a growing database on thousands of US citizens and residents, even though many have never been charged with breaking the law, the Post reported, citing numerous interviews and 1,000 documents.

The apparatus breaks new ground in the United States -- where domestic security measures traditionally have faced legal limits -- and raises questions about safeguards for privacy and civil liberties.

There was no immediate comment on the report from the Department of Homeland Security, which has built up the network with billions of dollars in grants to state governments since the September 11, 2001 attacks.

The effort is driven by concerns about "homegrown" terrorism, with a spate of recent cases involving US citizens or legal residents accused of plotting attacks on American soil.

The information compiled on Americans is supposed to help the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but the program's efficacy remains unclear while rights groups worry about the effect on civil liberties, the Post wrote.

"It opens a door for all kinds of abuses," Michael German, a former FBI agent at the American Civil Liberties Union, told the paper. "How do we know there are enough controls?"

~ more... ~

A Riot Of Their Own

Ian Hernon looks at the long history of violent protest in [the UK] and its various social and political consequences (Tribune Magazine):

Riots have always been a part of British political life, for better or worse. Both protestors and the coalition should better understand that when violence is unleashed – by whichever side – the outcomes are unpredictable. Volatile force on the streets can advance or damage a cause, bring down a government or strengthen it, have a desired result or lead to a surprising one.

The general definition of a riot is a demonstration which turns violent due either to provocation or aggressive aims. The protest movement invokes Peterloo and the poll tax, but things have not always been so clear-cut. Protests have been a counterweight to oppression, or an opportunity for plunder and revenge, or a conduit for passion and anger. American President Calvin Coolidge said: “The only difference between a mob and a trained army is organisation.”

Rioting featured in all the British revolutions which overthrew absolute rulers and created our imperfect form of parliamentary democracy. It was part of the tidal waves of history and the smaller ripples of localised disputes. The instigators were generally the oppressed. Martin Luther King said: “A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.”

But the cause was not always noble. A London mob marked the coronation of Richard I in 1189 by massacring the Jewish community. The 18th century saw riots against Roman Catholics, the Irish, dissenters, foreign actors, gin tax, bawdy houses, the naturalisation of Jews, French footmen and a change in the calendar as well as against high food prices, enclosures and greedy industrialists. In 1789, the anti-Catholic riots in London whipped up by a retired naval officer, Lord George Gordon, involved a 50,000-strong mob, raged for five days, destroyed Catholic churches and homes and left 285 dead, 173 wounded and 139 arrested – 24 of whom were later hanged.

The Gordon riots were put down by military might in defence of the intended victims. In the decades that followed, the reverse was true. The 19th century opened with the titanic struggle against Napoleon and continued on the home front with a bloody period of civil insurrection and repression. The sheer pace of the Industrial Revolution sparked a revolt against the machines. The Luddites lost their clashes with the state and scores were hanged in 1812. An influx of veterans swelled the ranks of the unemployed once Bonaparte was finally defeated. The corn laws and a disastrous harvest caused famine among the working classes, and there was a growing clamour for electoral reform boosted by newspapers which were read avidly by the newly literate. Riots, marches and monster rallies shook the ruling elite and pushed it into increasingly draconian counter-measures.

~ more... ~

How Cues and Programming Work in Mind Control and Propaganda

... Propaganda techniques are similar in many ways to programming techniques. One could say a person is being programmed when being propagandized. The combination of vision and sound on TV make a person more suggestible. Most people get their news from TV. Once a person is overly emotional or numbed out, they become more suggestible and less likely to critically think about their choices. Subliminal learning is then enhanced.

According to Sargant, various types of beliefs can be implanted in people after brain functioning has been disturbed by fear, anger or excitement. These cause heightened suggestibility and impaired judgement. These group manifestations may be classified as the herd instinct, they appear most strongly in wartime and periods of common danger.
Prolonging the time between giving a signal and the reward or giving an unexpected shock or alternating positive and negative signals and not giving the reward can also cause dramatic changes in patterns of behavior. Sargant describes Edward’s conversion techniques. In brain-washing and eliciting confessions an induced sense of guilt is important to achieve. This is also common when programming survivors. Anger against external and internal enemies nationally can be used to make the masses suggestible, like our war against Iraq. Examples in our media today are all too obvious. It is unfortunately too easy to direct people’s attention away from the fraudulent elections in our country and the outright thievery (like Enron) of the rich corporations against the populace, by creating enemies (like Iraq) and fear (like different color codes against apparently almost nonexistent threats).

Skinner believed that the environment controls the behavior (operant conditioning). Behavior is shaped and it is continued by its consequences. Operant behavior is behavior that operates on or manipulates the environment to produce consequences. This is like the bird in the Skinner box being conditioned to peck at the button to get the food. Organisms act to eliminate or avoid harmful stimuli. The consequence of this action is called a reinforcer. A negative reinforcer is aversive, the organism attempts to eliminate the aversive stimuli. People react to negative stimuli by moving away, acting aggressively or by initiating the desired behavior.

People can also be conditioned this way. A person will act, speak or dress a certain way to gain approval or to avoid insult. According to Skinner, freedom is not dependent on the feelings the contingencies generate, but it is dependent on the contingencies of reinforcement. In other words, it is not how you feel, but the result that determines your action. He believed that the ideas of a culture are the social contingencies or the behaviors they generate, the reinforcers are the society’s values. In cultural evolution, acquired practices (not genetic) that promote survival are transmitted.

Feelings are by-products of the controlling social practices. A cultural designer needs to accelerate the development of practices that develop appropriate social behavior through consequences (like laws). The malevolence or benevolence of the society depends on the social programmers, in our case those that control the media and television. Malevolent social programmers will cause wars, extreme poverty and suffering, like we see in the United States. But Skinner also believe that people make the environment which in turn controls them. Therefore people can have control, if they take it.

How can we avoid being programmed and propagandized ? (From smart issue #30)

From FactNet (about Coercive Persuasion listed under sources):

“The subjects easiest to influence are usually young, trusting, gullible, and non-critical people from protective backgrounds or people who may be particularly vulnerable because of some recent unsettled transition (my note: survivors may also fit in this category)…the rejects are likely to be individuals who have easy access to accurate, critical, or counterbalancing information. Insolent, self-centered, street-wise, highly critical or recalcitrant individuals are generally culled out…” Though everyone is susceptible to some degree.

1) Try to find out both sides of the story.

2)Learn about propaganda and mind control techniques and learn how to recognize them. If necessary, learn to avoid those using these techniques (this may be online or offline.) The media and advertisements may be a good place to start either learning about these techniques or avoiding them. At times, advertisements don’t even discuss the product or its attributes at all.

3) When in a potential situation where you can be MC’ed or propagandized, learn how to recognize the feelings of going into a meditative state and learn some of the techniques for getting out of these states. “Conference trigger management and safety” is available at http://members.aol.com/ smartnews/page5/NBpresentation99.htm I believe that avoidance of these situations is usually the best way to keep from being MC’ed or propagandized.

4) The user of propaganda or mind control techniques may exhibit a “lack of morals,” lying and/or disregarding the rules of the debate, list, group or society. This is similar to the “us vs them” or may be justified by “the ends justify the means” arguments organizations may use.

5) Try to use your gut feelings. If something doesn’t feel right, step back or remove yourself from the situation. I believe that a legitimate group or organization will give an individual the time and room to make their own choices. ...

~ more... ~