I mean, I feel kind of lame for even posting about this because unless you were stupid (or on the payroll) you knew it was either the US or an ally, and if an ally the US was involved.
Turns out it was the US and Norway. Seymour Hersh.
Of course he had to post this on his substack because not a single mainstream outlet will publish it.
A Dalek commented how surprising the CIA’s competence was in this operation, but what I find interesting is how effective media control is now: if no one will cover it, did it even happen? The level of control over the media is astounding, and the majority of it is tacit, I doubt the CIA had to call outlets and say “don’t publish Hersh”, the people in charge know what their job is and do it without any threats, then see themselves on the same side as the CIA and if a truth is too inconvenient, well, it isn’t important.
It really does remind me of the early post 9/11 and Iraq War period, where you just couldn’t tell the truth and be heard on anything mainstream, and trying was a career death sentence.
And yeah, I do think this is worse than it was in the past. The old media was corrupt and often complicit, too often, but it wasn’t this bad. A combination of almost every media asset being owned by just a few companies and the Ivy League takeover of journalism jobs, which used to be working class, has made the vast majority of the media little more than collaborators with the powers that be.
I’m a bit of a broken record on this, but I still find it extraordinary that they lied about Corbyn about 80% of the time. Amazing.
Anyway, Norway (who made 40 billion more a year from taking sales from Russia) and the US who has also made a mint selling Europe natural gas, turn out to be the nations responsible for destroying Nord Stream, which I’d say was an act of war. Turns out the nations with the most to gain were the criminals. What a surprise. (Though I did think Poland might have been involved, as they had other things to gain. Turns out greed was the primary factor, not ideology.)
Dog bites man. It is tedious that this had to be proved. The amount of cycles wasted by intelligent people proving what is obvious to anyone who isn’t a moron or dishonest is pathetic. (And this nonsense is why I rarely bother proving the obvious any more. It’s just meant to waste cycles and anyone asking for proof of the obvious is not an honest interlocutor.)
Note: corrected “cover” to “publish”, which was my original intent.
The results of the work I do, like this article, are free, but food isn’t, so if you value my work, please DONATE or SUBSCRIBE.
DMC
The early smart money was on MI6, who apparently had a pre-existing plan. But in retrospect, Norway had plenty to gain, what with the gas sales and all.
mago
I was accepted to CU Boulder’s journalism school in 1987, but declined for diverse reasons.
One of a few sound life decisions.
profan
Moonofalabama has interesting additional details on the story, particularly with regard to the timing of the operation and detonation
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/02/some-small-corrections-to-seymour-hershs-new-nord-stream-revelations.html
NR
Ian, a quick search turns up this article, published yesterday:
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/white-house-says-blog-post-nord-stream-explosion-is-utterly-false-2023-02-08/
While it does lead with the White House denial, it does also mention Hersh’s article.
Ian Welsh
Should have written “publish it” rather than cover it. That was the intent, corrected, not made.
Curt Kastens
What really pisses me off is that the countries that had the most to lose from the destruction of this pipeline, Germany, and the countries of central europe, are not able to damned thing to get revenge for this event. They can not even point out who the most likely culprits were. The BND and the BKA are completely possessed by US domination.
The Vichy French demonstrated more independence from the Nazis than the BND and BKA can muster against the Americans.
carborundum
I’m pretty skeptical that Hersh’s assessment of events is complete or even accurate. It seems to rest on three principal pillars:
1) Attacking this type of target at these depths is difficult, necessitating the use of military clearance divers.
2) A 48 hour gap between loading the target and detonation was all that could be managed and then the White House then wanted command detonation capability at the last minute.
3) Hersh has information from an indeterminate number of anonymous sources corrobrating all this.
Quite apart from the really messy depiction of the supposed oversight authorities and reporting required, this doesn’t make a whole heck of a lot of sense to me. There was a time when a 260 foot tri-gas (presumably closed circuit) dive was a significant technological feat, but that hasn’t been true for fair while. There’s quite a large number of people with experience in industry that could make that dive, so I don’t see why milpers would be required. Similarly, looking at the Swedish ROV footage from one of the attacks, it does not look to the result of very sophisticated charges.
I don’t know why Hersh is fixated on 48 hour timers. There are timers out there supporting arbitrary initiation timing weeks, months or even years in the future. The limiting factor is how long the battery lasts and the drift off baseline time is negligible for this purpose. Looking to command detonation capability, why, if I’m trying to be sneaky, would I use an acoustic signature from air deployed sonar buoy, dropped off a military aircraft? That means I’m using an initiation chain that only a state actor can use, in an environment where the opposition is at a point of relative strength (the Russian equivalent of SOSUS has got to be wall to wall there, given the strategic importance of the AO). Me, I’m going to go with something like a little RPV of any one of hundreds of vessels in the area. If Hersh’s account is true, these guys used an overt military platform *and* didn’t offset the detonation by more than a few hours, which would be trivial to do and would greatly obscure the source. That just doesn’t make sense.
All of this sounds like a mess of coulda, shoulda, woulda with a side of Tom Clancy whipped up from sources that are either anonymous or theoretical. Sorry, but my experience with Hersh is that he’s prone to adding two and two and getting 14.3. Basically this boils down to him saying “trust me” which I just don’t. Read too much of his stuff with too high a fraction of BS.
Curt Kastens
Anyways I am glad that you informed me about about the Hersch article. At least now there is at least a public record of a “conspiracy theory” 🙂 of how the US and not the Russians blew up the North Stream Pipeline.
Curt Kastens
By the way, I socialize very little outside of my own family. But with the small number of Germans that I have spoken with, all over 55, none have disagreed with the assertion that the US did it or condomed an ally doing it. Milions of Germans must be stunned at how blatantly their news media, especially state run news media, is lying to them with such a straight face.
Tallifer
Seymour Hersh lost credibility when he denied Assad’s war crimes and the Skripal poisoning.
Curt Kastens
Just got our gas (heating and hot water) bill for 2022. We made a 1/3 reduction in the number of kilowatts that we used for the year and we did not even make an effort to reduce our gas usage until September. Despite that our monthly prepayment will be going up from 250 Euros per month to 400 Euros per month. That shows how much that the prices have risen for Germans because of the war of aggression against Russia. I understand that the Geman government is going to be reimbursing some of these new high costs. But that it self was an opportunity cost.
Mark Level
Yes, Ian if one isn’t wearing the Neolib-MIC-MSM ideological blinders, just as with Bush-Cheney (Nuland, Blinken et al) lies & war crimes going back to the Iraq War the lies are right out in the open for all to see. Recently Naked Capitalism did an excellent piece about the current US-NAF0-Banderist instigated civil war in the Slavic lands noting the likely result, with a header to the effect of “What if Ukraine Loses the War and the MSM never reports it?” This is a likely outcome, predicted by knowledgeable sources who work very hard to be unbiased and NOT wear the blinders like “The Duran” (Mercouris and Christoforos), MoonofAlabama, etc. . . I mean, anyone who is watching who doesn’t display bad faith (like one commenter above?) might notice the exact same sources who opposed the Iraq clusterf^ck invasion with 1 million (mostly civilians) killed, 2.5 million displaced as refugees (internal and external), $5 trillion plus (& counting, many mangled victims still getting Veterans Affairs payouts, some of whom Bush “painted,” & whom he said in interviews felt no misgivings about their being maimed or disabled for life) are saying the same thing about this idiocy– names like Scott Ritter (UN weapons inspector & former USMC who called out the lies at the time), Max Blumenthal, MoA, Hersh (who revealed the My Lai massacre, also covered the Pentagon papers, etc.), the folks at Consortium News, etc!! Oh, but these are all “Putin puppets”, he is now the HItler of the Year– just as Saddam was after U$ “we” gave him 100% support (& basically installed him in power earlier) to instigate a massive war with Iran which he lost. Oh, & “we” shot down a civilian airliner with 200+ innocents aboard because “U!S!A!” Now to be fair the US did pay out millions of taxpayer $$$ for the deaths of the innocents subsequently (good thing, otherwise it could’ve been used for “Socialist” basic health care or something equally insidious which our Betters won’t allow), & also the city of San Diego gave the sailors on the ship that killed the innocents a victory parade & Bush Sr. shared the memorable quote about the U.S., “I will never apologize for the USA!! I don’t care what the facts are!” So yes, suck it Native Americans, black Mississipians deliberately given no treatment for syphilis during the Tuskegee experiments, “MOVE” members bombed and killed, shot down when running out of the bombed house (including children) and their black neighbors whose houses also burned down in Philadelphia, Frank Rizzo’s (Klan) city and don’t you forget it!! . . . same old, same old, as you say, Dog Bites Man, since the US is a “Shining City (or factory? no, those are mainly shipped to China now) on a HIll”, WE are noble and good even when committing international terrorism, threats, bold-faced lying (Biden openly stated repeatedly Nordstream would be taken out), etc. The MSM will spew nothing but lies, the same lickspittles will swallow them (“Sy Hersh is evil, he loves Assad, he loved Saddam, he loves Putin”) and the killing and impoverishing will continue ad infinitum. Anyway, the US empire has run its course, just like in Rome when you deny your own population social mobility you no longer even have recruits for your unending wars, so thankfully it will soon be China’s & Russia’s and India’s (etc.) century . . . They may in the long run do as badly as the US (likely so, I was never “starry eyed about Xi Jingping” as a former Chickenhawk war-lover on this site called me), but at least in the short term I believe they will improve the lot of their citizens with basic needs (per Maslow) like affordable health care, education, infrastructure such as roads and affordable Internet access, etc. which the Exceptional USA elites have told the populace quite clearly they’re never gonna get (so shut up about it and vote every 2 years for the “lesser evil”). I didn’t comment on your earlier thread about Embarrassment at even being human, but yes, as a Murican that’s where I am when I look at the Predators that rule “US” & the media-doped, passive, easily triggered walking wounded that put up with the abuse as it becomes more flagrant and open.
Curt Kastens
Not surprsingly The German press is savagely attacking the HIrsch report. That he probably has no credibility outside of a very limited circle could be why he was allowed to get someone to tell him something along the lines of the truth.
But that anyone who is not brain dead would even need to be told by someone else that it was the US, directly or indirectly, that blew up the pipe, shows that they are really out of touch with reality. Or, the value their place in the system more than they value resistence to the system. The US leadership was the only group of people that had any motive at all to blow the pipeline up. We do not need evidence or a trail to know with scientific certainity that the US did it. Oh did I forget that the Ukrainian leadership had a movtive to blow the pipeline up as well. Yes I forgot. That changes everything doesn`t it.
Curt Kastens
OOps I meant trial not trail, in the comment above. Maybe that can be corrected and this post dealeted.
What else did I forget?
Willy
People playing power games use the art and science of “plausible deniability” because it works so well on the rubes. And there are always a lot of rubes. I really don’t think that any of the power players in this latest episode of “Russia, Russia, Nato!” are innocent. The only good guys are the actual innocent. But there’ll always be folks who needs good guys and bad guys to be clearly defined. Cognitive closure and all.
I’d sure hope that “leftism” could be a science about elevating the innocent. But like the rubes, so many leftists often fall for traps which power players routinely set for them.
Curt Kastens
If I had been head of the German Government when the pipeline was blown up I would have declared war on the US and then ordered the capture of all US military personnel first in Germany and then in Europe. These personnel would have been planced in POW camps. These camps would have been more humain than the one in Guantanamo. I would have also ordered the deportation of all US government workers in Germany. I would have also called for a vote in NATO to expell the US from the organization.
But alas the number of opportunists with no integrity in this world vastly outnumbers the idealists with integrity. So I probably would have been placed in a straight jacket and sent of to a sanitorium minutes after I decided to no longer do what I was expected to do. Say isn`t there a US senator by the name of Sanitorium?
elkern
I find Hersh’s piece very credible. Biggest surprise to me is the allegation of deep involvement of Norwegian Government; and that’s now the key to confirming this account.
Perhaps I have a rosy view of Norway, but I expect the Storting to seriously investigate what amounts to an Act of War – against both Russia *and* Germany.
I can imagine that there are some in Norway who would support this (those who stand to gain by higher price of gas exported to Europe?), but I can’t believe that the entire population approves of risking war for this.
Anybody here who can provide more perspective on Norwegian politics?
bruce wilder
It may be worth remembering amidst the emphatic denials from the White House and the CIA and everyone involved that they have an effective alternative to empty denials if they really want to “prove” they didn’t do it.
There will develop increasing political pressure to make the denials stick. The Germans will ask what kind of ally is this? The Congress may grow uncomfortable with being by-passed. The search for the informant will lumber about.
There may be an alternative to emphatic denial, as I say: say who did it. So, who did blow the pipelines if not the U.S.? And when Biden & Co. deny it, ask them who did?
Curt Kastens
The Germans are not going to ask, what kind of an ally is this. They are a defeatd nation.
They queitly accept that they have no alternative.
Art
Characterize me as you will but I think you are wrong.
The revelations are simply too weak to prove anything. An unnamed guy … please.
I’m sticking fact that we really don’t know. Of course the speculators are going to produce a work product which will be a Rorschach test for their own biases.
My bias is that the Russians blew it up while attempting to do maintenance and/or clear the lines after methane hydrates blocked the flow, These blockages are particularly likely to happen when you frequently alter the flow. And are almost inevitable if the people managing the pipeline don’t follow procedure.
Was it accidental or purposeful? I don’t know. With the politics as they are Russia seems unlikely to sell much gas to the area serves even if the lines were intact, Which makes the structures worthless.
Not an argument but Seymour Hersh hasn’t been reliable for a couple of decades. His unnamed-source is pretty unimpressive. Wake me when someone has real evidence.
My bias and yet to be factually supported, by anything other than circumstantial evidence, belief is that Russian incompetence and mismanagement blew up the pipelines.
Yes lots of people could have blown it up in an act of sabotage, I’m well aware of who and how, and why they might. But, ironically, the hints: mysterious ships in the area with ID turned off and sightings of individuals all serve to tell me no professionals did it. They would have left less of a trail.
My official stance remains: We do not know.
Willy
But alas the number of opportunists with no integrity in this world vastly outnumbers the idealists with integrity.
I dont think so. I think the opportunists with no integrity leverage the power they have to dominate narratives to try and keep idealists with integrity quiet.
I think of the latest attacks on “woke” anything. Suddenly a fair number of folks are mad-as-hell-not-gonna-take-it-anymore because of what, exactly? You’d think if light-skinned folks are pissed about corporations bringing in replacements who’re often brown-skinned, then why not just say so? Why attack “woke” instead of corporate power policy?
Ché Pasa
The US and its beholden satrapies — miss-named “allies” — have been using this war as a means to cause significant if not irreparable harm to the Russian Federation with the aim of eventual destruction and conquest.
The sinking of the Moskva, the truck bombing of the Kerch Bridge, numerous acts of sabotage within Russia, possibly some of the assassinations that seem to plague the upper levels of Russian intelligence, defense, and government agencies all have the flavor of hardcore US anti-Russian factional involvement. With an interesting Israeli spice.
We know, because it’s been repeatedly announced, where it’s headed: “Rossiya delenda est.” The Russians know it, too.
But the odd thing to me is that the Kremlin (not just Putin) appears to be playing along. None of the large and small actions against Russia have been countered tit for tat, none of the actions have apparently slowed or halted the war over Ukraine, none have apparently harmed the apparatus of government, the ability to wage war or the foundations of the Russian economy. Russia doesn’t respond except rhetorically.
Reminds me somewhat of the situation in 1905 only without the defeat of Russia on the seas, nor the revolution. Russia is not “winning”, nor are their tormentors. Apparently the Kremlin believes that so long as the State survives, whatever happens is… OK. Well, maybe not OK, but not something that requires response.
It’s interesting, odd and dangerous. If the torments don’t work to destabilize and bring down the Russian Federation, what’s to stop the West from tapping its nuclear arsenal? Does Russia want to provoke something like that? We’ve certainly been prepped from the beginning to expect a nuclear exchange in due time. Not too unlike the prepping during the Cold War when nuclear brinkmanship was pretty much constant. Don’t think they wouldn’t do it. Of course they would.
Blowing up the Nordstream pipeline did not harm Russia that much, but it very much harmed Europe. The predicted catastrophic freeze and collapse of the European economy did not happen however. Not even close. Be prepared to see much more of this sort of thing. Actions by the West that harm the West more than Russia, but not harm it that much, no comparable response from Russia to acts of war against it except in Ukraine, continued loss of Russian materiel and personnel with little more than a shrug from the Kremlin, continued “help” to Ukraine and to potential breakaway Russian Federation republics from the West, “help” that has the effect of ensuring more destruction but no perceptible outcome.
Bizarre.
NR
Joe Galvin at the Outlaw Ocean project has a thread up about this story by Hersh:
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1623459664334659585.html
In short, publicly available data contradicts Hersh’s version of events.
StewartM
Hersh’s article seems entirely credible to me. For any doubters, he is the one who did break the My Lai story, and also posted what to me sounds like the most credible account of the death of Bin Laden (no, it wasn’t a uber-competent raid by Navy seals, but an raid by incompetents after we had *paid off* the Pakistani military to be absent that night, and even then, with no resistance, they crashed a helicopter).
Compared to Hersh’s story, the “Russia did it story” has no legs and no credibility.
Ian Welsh
Back in late 2008 I had a source who said that Obama was going to ramp up drone assassinations massively. My publisher insisted they give their name, and the story wasn’t published, since putting a name to it would mean going to prison.
Z
Art,
As I’ve mentioned to you before, not that you’re ever interested in listening to anything that contrasts with your “official stance” (and I would add “initial” to that), the pipelines were blown at separate times so what your theory leads to is that they blew one out accidentally, learned nothing from this catastrophe, and went ahead and did the same damn thing on the other and blew that out too.
Yeah, I can’t imagine why Hersh’s source wouldn’t want to put his name behind these accusations. I’m sure it would all be forgiven and he’d probably get a medal of honor and book deal and everything …
–
I’ve been expecting some resistance from the Deep State to the producers of Weekend at Biden’s plans to add some suspense to Season 3 (can you believe that their heroic pharma team still have the Lead Stiff standing up straight on his strings!) by placing the world on the brink of nuclear annihilation. Even those shady figures in the Deep State are still human and enjoy a good meal and ballgame and maybe would like to see their children and grandchildren grow up and are not all willing to have it all end so that the Lead Stiff can tell his ego-nourishing tough guy stories … well, son of a bitch, wouldn’t you know, they fired him … to the adoring, lapdog stenographers in the statestream media.
This is the first serious public sign of resistance and that’s a big positive in my opinion.
–
One of the things I liked least about Hersh’s story is that it ends up with somebody complementing the Lead Stiff for having the “balls” for doing it when the Lead Stiff will pay zero personal price for what he did. That’s not “balls”, or whatever you might want to call it, that’s just a selfish, narcissistic assh*le, one of the very worst U.S. politicians in the last fifty years who has either backed or directly had his fingerprints on the policies that have done the most damage to this country and, especially, the rest of the world being the same selfish, psychotic assh*le he’s always been. There’s nothing brave about that or any admirable virtue involved in it.
Z
NR
Anonymous sources have been right in the past, sure. But anonymous sources have also been wrong in the past. And the fact that Hersh’s entire story is based on a single anonymous source means it should be viewed with more skepticism, not less.
And the fact that Hersh published it directly to Substack also means that there wasn’t even an editor to double-check that single anonymous source.
Now of course this does not automatically mean the source is wrong, and I’m not saying the article should be dismissed out of hand, but those facts, combined with the fact that the source’s version of events is contradicted by publicly available data, means the article should be viewed with quite a healthy dose of skepticism unless and until corroborating information is found.
bruce wilder
In 2008? While Obama was President-elect?
different clue
If the RussiaGov is playing a multi-years long game here, it would be to their advantage to let this bombing fester along for years without making any specific response to Hersh’s fingering of DC FedRegime and Norwegian action. If the long game is to encourage NATO to fester and weaken and maybe break up, then just quietly letting this fester in the Western countries and letting bitterness and suspicion levels rise to politically uncontainable leves would advance the goal of helping NATO break itself up.
In the long run, all the gas they would have sold to EUrope through the Nordstreams will end up being sold to various Asian countries. The Russians won’t run out of gas customers or gas money.
different clue
Here is an article by John Helmer of Dances With Bears titles: ” What’s Wrong With The Hersh Report On The Nord Stream Attacks.”
The second and third paragraphs read like this . . .
” From the full text of the Hersh report, it appears that neither the source nor Hersh has “direct knowledge” of the history of US-led operations to sabotage and destroy the pipelines which became public more than a year before; they directly involved the Polish government and the Danish government. In fact, by error of omission Hersh and his man are ignorant of those operations and of that history.
Also, the two of them are ignorant of the British government’s role in this history, and in the final destruction, which was revealed publicly by then-Prime Minister Elizabeth Truss to Secretary of State Antony Blinken sixty seconds after the detonation; and by the Russian government when it announced its knowledge of the British involvement.”
If John Helmer is correct, then what is the point and purpose of the Hersh article? People who try to be reality-based would like to know who actually diddit, and who actually was involved. I suspect the RussiaGov would like to know who actually diddit and who actually was involved, so that they know best how and where to direct their patient grinding countermeasures over the next few years.
Anyway, here is the link.
http://johnhelmer.net/whats-wrong-with-the-hersh-report-on-the-nord-stream-attacks/
Trinity
Another stance is: why do we care? We would all probably provide differing reasons why.
It’s not as if anyone will be held accountable anytime soon. Sixty years after JFKs assassination and now we know, but no one is or will be held accountable. Nothing has changed with that knowledge.
The lack of accountability is the main problem for us, but I’m again stating the obvious. Meanwhile, I expect American-Euro relations will continue to become more strained as they begin to realize just how messed up in the head the US power elite already are. Especially when their power elite realize their cut is probably going to be wafer thin. These people definitely don’t keep their promises, their rhetoric is almost always meaningless, and they lie, lie, lie.
Sorry, Ian, I don’t mean to diss your post and it’s importance. And reading it and the comments I always learn something new, there’s value in everything you write. I’m just carrying this out to the bigger picture perspective.
And this announcement by Hersh could be just another magician’s distraction, the usual modus operandi. One wonders what they are up to right now, or why/if they needed the distraction/sound bite/”positive” optics.
carborundum
Given that the major increases in strike tempo were over the six months before Obama took office and 12 months into his first term (after CIA had their in-country team, including the chief of station, misted by a suicide bomber), probably a good thing that your publisher was gun-shy. He definitely presided over a significant ramp-up, but the notion that he decided to escalate prior to assuming office sounds like yet another iteration of the tried and true “accuse the opposition of what we’re doing” play.
Mark Level
Hi, Ian. Thank you for the personal anecdote about reporting. Yes, this is what the system calls “checks & balances”, isn’t it? Of course it only runs one way as well, in favor of TPTB. When we almost had World War 3 in August because Ukraine shot a missile North into Poland, reportedly killing 2, then claimed it was the nasty Russkie “Orcs” and Article 5 had to be invoked and full on war (eventually possibly escalating to nuclear level) started . . . well, even the Biden White House admitted the Ukranians shot the missile (but it was a “Russian missile” from the 1980s! So there!) . . . anyway, the chump at Reuters (or the Guardian?) who quoted but did not reveal the NatSec ghoul’s identity who leaked the lie either resigned or was fired within a week or so . . . the liar who wanted to ignite WW3 is still presumably working for the MIC, no accountability there! So one standard for journalists (& see what they’ve done to Assange) & no standards for gov’t. insiders. I’d bet those defecating all over Seymour Hersh’s reputation (incl. on this site)– I mean he “only” broke the My Lai massacre, the Bush torture at Abu Ghraib etc., anyway they hold him to impossible standards but not those with actual governmental power whose impunity is required for a good (war-generating & propagandizing) state. Oh, also I agree with Curt, the German public will go along with having their own pipeline bombed by their “ally” & paying 200% or more higher energy bills. The State and good Order (I believe the German word for noun form is Ordnung) are honored by Germans now as in the 30s & 40s. They haven’t had many radicals or critical thinkers since the days of Karl Kraus, & before that Goethe, Schiller (poetic Romantic hippy types). Good obedient types like most Americans.
Ian Welsh
Bruce, yes, while Obama was President-elect. To the best of my memory it was very late December, but I could mis-recall. It was, in any event, before the official hand-over.
Unnamed sources are often reliable, it’s really a judgment call. Seymour has gotten way more right over the years than wrong, and his story is entirely plausible. Could he be wrong? Sure.
Ordinary claims (dog bites man) require a lot less proof than extraordinary claims. That the US was behind the Nord Stream bombings is extremely plausible: they’ve always opposed it, had a great deal to gain and have a long record of underhanded actions. That Russia did it is extremely inplausible–certainly they have the means, but their interests run in the exact opposite direction. As for Norway, they also had a great deal to gain and plenty of opportunity.
If someone has means, motive, opportunity and a rap sheet that fills entire books, they probably did it.
(Back to Obama) Later I was told to believe denials from the White House and that I should check with them before publishing articles related to them: I wrote an article saying that firing Dean would mean the end of the 50 state strategy (it did) and got scolded for that and for not checking with the WH first. (Also the commenters were almost universally hostile, they wanted to believe in Obama at that point.)
If something is obviously the case, at least nine times out of ten, it’s true.
Anyway, the publisher and I disagreed on editorial policy so I left soon after. In general they wanted a unified voice: I wanted both pro and anti-Obama coverage. Later when FDL went anti-Obama it was all anti–I wouldn’t have done that either, but given writers more freedom even though I was hostile to Obama. You can see that here occasionally, I sometimes have guest writers who disagree with me. Mandos almost always disagrees but was here for years (and is welcome to write again.)
I also think that it led to better traffic. FDL’s traffic increased about 60% during the time I was in charge, and that’s after the post-election traffic die-off. (I don’t optimize for traffic here, but there it was part of the job and without enough traffic and ads the place couldn’t survive and eventually didn’t.)
As for Obama, he was always a sociopath who truly cared for no one but himself and whose first concern was to get into the charmed circle. He enjoyed killing, despised the left and knew he was the smartest slickest guy around. He got off on getting the left to vote for him even as he told them he despised them.
different clue
One reason the left and even the middle voted for Obama was to spare themselves from the threat of 4 or 8 years of President Caribou Barbie after 4 or 8 years of President Bomb Bomb Iran.
Those who also expected something left, leftish or even moderate liberal were indeed fooled ( or maybe self-fooled). Those who only wanted to assure McCain/Palin wouldn’t be President did get that.
Which was I? Some of both. To the extent that McCain/Palin were kept out of that office, I got what I voted for. I did not expect Obama to be the Deep Cover ClintoReaganite he actually was. Since he did give abundant clues, I fooled myself about that.
Astrid
Look at how they took out John Edwards, who was probably looking too Kennedyesque (idealistic sounding, charismatic and good looking, independently wealthy and smart) to coronate Obama. I’m sure that if he didn’t have a mistress, he would have been Wellstoned. Look at how they scared they are of Tulsi Gabbard, who is also pretty and smart and maybe just crazy enough (given her cultist upbringing) to bring them all down.
We all knew a lot less about the Jakarta Method in 2008, or Obama’a spooktacular rise in national politics should have been all too obvious for anyone with eyes. Once he made his key cabinet appointments, I lost any hope I had for him not to be terrible and lost my respect for my PMC cohort.
different clue
Speaking of Senator Wellstone . . .
Hear is a Rigorous Intuition post about the Wellstoning of Wellstone himself.
http://rigorousintuition.blogspot.com/2004/11/very-special-agents.html
This event exposes yet again to those with eyes to see the fallacy of accusing the American public of getting what we vote for because we voted for what we got. When the Nazi Paperclipper Deep State assassinates every Kennedy, King, X, Kennedy, Wellstone, etc. . . . and image-assassinates every Edwards, Hart, etc. . . . that dares to emerge, Americans are left without such persons to even be able to vote for.
Tulsi might escape that paradigm of “candidate selection management” because she may know something about security, and she may have a following of armed and talented people ready to hunt down and exterminate every likely perpetrator and perpetrator-adjacent bad actor who “could be” involved in a Tulsi assassination.