The I See NOTHING Players

by

JANSEN ESTRUP

Today, 18 January 2017, the CIA released 13 million declassified documents, so I suppose it is safe to talk about some of this stuff now.

This time next year we'll have forgotten our latest anxieties and setbacks. Many of us will be recalling the 50^th anniversary of the infamous Tet Offensive which was so pivotal in the American War, as it is called in Southeast Asia.

We'll remember other things, too, such as The Pueblo Incident, Lyndon Johnson's decision to forgo another term.

But we probably will not recall Richard Nixon's treasonous sabotage of the peace agreement Johnson had worked out to end the Vietnam War (H.R. Halderman's notes in John A. Farrell's forthcoming book, “Richard Nixon: The Life” confirm LBJ's objections to Nixon's treason in the week before the 1968 election) because it was not revealed to the public until many years later after Nixon resigned in disgrace (Nixon and Halderman secretly promised the South Vietnamese government a 'better deal' if they rejected the peace accord – and this resulted in five more years of war, 29000 American and at least a million Vietnamese deaths).

So this incident, coming just days before the 1968 election, is not remembered as the first Republican 'surprise' in the final days of a presidential campaign.

Often cited is Ronald Reagan's secret agreement with Iran's leaders to hold our hostages until after the 1980 election in order to cripple Jimmy Carter's re-election bid. The Iran-Contra scandal may be familiar to history buffs, but few others.

In 2000 our own Supreme Court tipped the scales for George W. Bush, who lost the popular vote and was headed for loss in the Electoral College as well until the recount was stopped.

And now, in 2016, we have an apparent collusion between former and future enemies to install an obvious loser to the Oval Office … and We The People suffer yet again. But war wins and so do those who profit from war.

Anymore we don't seem to care who we dance with just so there is some bump and grind at the end.

It has taken 50 years but the pattern is now well established. Ruthless Republicrats steal elections, and dynamic Democats act 'shocked, shocked I tell you' … and jilted.

And then they go blind with foreseeing the future with dazzled eyes until the next time something 'shocking' happens.

And so the dance goes on until there comes to be a third party to cut in from time to time, or even a fourth to square off the angles. Oh, sure, such bedfellows often change allegiances and partners, but with a foursome they can all still be Americans with American values – or at least there will be humans.

The CIA intel trove contains a lot of 'alien visitor' data and nonsense. Maybe that is why we dance so dangerously with the insubstancial.

And yet somehow that is too old fashioned in so world-weary a home planet. Perhaps it is time to spread our wings and flee the nest with our starry eyes. Haven't we always been promised a destiny midst the stars?