Ahh, after a heavier week than planned, we finally get to the potpourri promised on Monday. And the scent of today's wood chips is ... well ... a bit strange.
Maybe the producers put them up to it, for entertainment value. Or maybe people who research activities at top secret military bases really are frightened to learn that those bases have security guards, and the guards do watch them. If it's the former, I get it. If it's the latter ... c'mon guys, what did you expect?
More below the fold....
Security ... at a Classified Military Base? Whoodathunkit? (Non-Cynical Saturday)
Last night I relaxed with an episode of Mystery Quest, a new documentary series on the History Channel. The episode focused on activities at the Air Force development and testing site near Groom Lake, Nevada, commonly known as "Area 51." Yes, the place where Bob Lazar claims the government was reverse engineering alien technology, a story popularized in the Roland Emmerich film Independence Day.
Spoiler Alert: They didn't find any aliens.
Color me not surprised.
Indeed, when it comes to UFOs as visitors from another planet, color me "extremely dubious." (I'd say "skeptical," but some skeptics give that word a bad name.) The universe is a big place, and a lot of things are possible, but I need more than "I saw something I can't explain" as evidence. I believe people see things they can't explain. That doesn't mean I believe they're seeing alien spacecraft.
In fact, as we discussed last April in a Morning Feature series on conspiracy theories, even most serious UFO researchers now believe the UFO craze grew out of a disinformation campaign to cover up the testing of classified military aircraft. Seed a few stories of alien visitors. Fertilize with pseudo-skeptics (the ones who give "skeptical" a bad name) claiming it's only swamp gas. Watch them go at each other, and everyone forgets the original and more important question: What really flew over my house last night? While disinformation may be useful for those in government who don't want to issue "We can't talk about that" denials, it's toxic in terms of building or keeping public trust.
Regardless, an increasing amount of "looking for UFOs" is actually "looking for classified military activities." And that's fine with me. Some of the researchers document what they see in meticulous enough detail that popular aeronautics writers talk to them as sources. Some are also plane spotters, a worldwide hobby that helped uncover the CIA's extraordinary rendition program.
I think nosy citizens are usually a good thing for a democratic society.
But please ... don't be shocked if security guards watch while you're walking around the perimeter of a classified military testing center. Don't pretend to be alarmed by signs that warn you to keep off and notify you that the security guards may use deadly force if you start climbing over the fence.
And if you're climbing the 8000-foot Tikaboo Peak, 26 miles from Area 51, so you can look way over down there at the base ... don't be surprised if military aircraft fly over to check up on you. Turns out it's a steep, arduous climb over broken, rocky terrain. So if your group includes an older-middle-aged guy leaning on a cane - and you're hauling a huge, heavy, super-high-magnification and super-high-resolution camera - please don't say "I have a really bad feeling about this" and talk about how the pilot of that unarmed Black Hawk helicopter is there to threaten you during the last hour or two of that grueling climb.
It's more likely he's hanging around in case you need someone to haul you back down the mountain after you've had a heart attack or fallen and broken a leg.
I realize that inference doesn't fit the Secret Military Base Experimenting With Alien Bodies And Technology For The Evil Overlords narrative.
But it fits pretty well with the Real Human Military Commander Thinking "Oh Geez These Guys Are Gonna Get Hurt And Sue The Government" narrative.
Like I said, maybe the producers asked the guys on the show to say those things. One of the guys in the group was a aeronautics journalist, so I hope at least he would expect security at a classified military testing center. So maybe they just said it for "entertainment value." Maybe some people find displays of absurd paranoia entertaining.
But I'm not one of them.
I'd be more worried if people could walk around the perimeter of a classified military base, and haul a huge case up the side of a mountain that overlooks the base, and there were no security. That would make me suspicious.
+++++
Happy Saturday!