We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Sunday, June 22, 2014

Let’s Talk About the American Deep State

Click here if you wish to access the transcript of a recent 58:43m audio recording of an interview with Peter Dale Scott. He is interviewed by the German financial journalist Lars Schall.
LS: Are Wall Street interests at the very heart of the deep state?
PDS: ...CIA is as powerful as it is because of its connections to Wall Street and – it used to be almost the same thing – its connections to big oil, because the big oil companies used to be based in New York and they were put together by, and they operated as a cartel that was defended successfully by Sullivan & Cromwell, which was a Wall Street law firm that — not accidentally — John Foster Dulles and Allen Dulles were senior members of.
Yes, the Wall Street is important; it was then, it is historically easy to show, in the 1950s and I do in my book. It is harder to show in the present but there are many indications I think … One thing is, the deep state, we should mention, is going more and more multinational as the corporations go multinational. Exxon is a multinational firm and there are some US firms, notably Blackwater, which is this kind of private army that turns up in various places. Germany I'm seeing, I believe in Germany your press has said that Blackwater or a subsidiary of Blackwater is operating in the Ukraine.
LS: Yes, that is true. 
PDS: What we call an American corporation has now technically its headquarters in Qatar, in the Persian Gulf.