I didn't feel any of those three options. What I felt (putting myself in the context of the time) was reassured. I trusted what he was saying. I didn't immediately jump to the conclusion that he was lying. The whole speech seems honest - "I can tell you these things, I cannot tell you these other things." I can't think of a single politician right now that I trust not to lie, except maybe Bernie and Mark Kelly.
I had hoped Mark Kelly would have been the Democratic party's nominee last round and WILL be in 2028. He has an "Eisenhower-like" cred and background and a wife who would be a role model in the White House for the many living and trying to cope with disabilities. Linda Spiegler
Stay tuned to the readout and then the truth that will emerge several days after The Great Orange Turd leaves China. I have absolutely no doubt that Demento will give China a signal that the U.S. will not defend Taiwan.
Not surprising in the least. Authoritative biographies and similar sources show that Demento grew up in a household where falsehood, denial, and image‑management were routine survival strategies, not moral questions. Enter mentor Roy Cohn. He treated shameless lying again, not as a moral failure, but as a core strategic weapon --- a tool for domination, narrative control, and psychological intimidation. His view was that truth was irrelevant, perception was everything, and the person willing to lie boldly, repeatedly, and without shame would almost always overpower the person constrained by honesty. This was a technique Cohn used during the McCarthy era and taught Demento to adopt, to our continuing peril.
Sad, because such "gentlemanly" words would never issue from this despicable human's mouth.
We have a children's book designed to help kids control their emotions called, "Don't Rant and Rave on Wednesdays."
It reads, "If we see a small child having a temper tantrum, we might think his behavior is cute or even funny. But we wouldn't think it was funny if we saw the President of the United States on national television, and he was jumping up and down, yelling and screaming, and beating his fists against a podium. We would probably say: 'Even if the president is angry, he should be able to control his behavior better than that!'"
The Corona/Keyhole imaging satellite program was already underway by the time the U-2 was shot down. The U-2, and later the SR-71, were used to get images quickly of areas the satellites weren't passing over. And the KH satellites used film (until the KH-11 in the mid-70s) so even if they did go over something we wanted data on we had to wait until the film was used up and dropped to the ground.
The U-2 is still in service, it just doesn't cross into denied airspace.
Still one of the best explanations of actual the need for spycraft, imho. It isn't easy to make that balance work between maintaining honor and the necessity to understand what evil people are doing, and so much of the authoritarian world is what I call evil. Which means there need to be laws, rules, oversight for us or we stumble away from our morals so quickly. This concern was utmost to what I feared back in 2015, and that lack of moral guidance has only deteriorated, which certainly must be part of Gene's intention in highlighting this event now, of course.
I'm not sure that "spying" can be considered immoral. Or recent. It seems to me that wanting to discern the plans of one's enemy are the universal objective of both sides in any time of serious conflict. This didn't begin with the advent of spy planes.
"Oh, what a tangled web we weave / When first we practice to deceive!"
--- Sir Walter Scott
Interesting the U-2 business and the then Soviet Union and it's similarity to today, at least the USSR side. Bannon, Demento's former chief strategist, explicitly described the communications approach as “flood the zone with shit” — a tactic aligned with the “firehose of falsehood” propaganda model --- a modern propaganda model defined by high‑volume, rapid, repetitive, multichannel messaging that disregards truth or consistency. It was first described by the RAND Corporation in 2016 based on observations of Russian state propaganda.
I remember very clearly. What stunned folks where I lived--small town Republican Indiana--was his honesty. Fear of war & distrust of & distaste for the military ubiquitous. That a president would speak as Ike, especially given his often awkward circumlocutions, was totally unexpected. His presidency is the only thing in 1950s I'm nostalgic for.
In 1990, doing my internship for my library degree, I worked in what I think we still called a junior college. Directed a history student to the area where the materials reserved for their unit on the U2 incident were stored. In a few minutes he came back and said, "I couldn't find them. There was just some stuff on a spy plane." He'd thought he was supposed to be boning up on the rock band. Then a few years ago, I was talking to some young girl, can't remember the topic or the context, and she had never heard of either the band or the spy plane. Then I started feeling old.
I didn't feel any of those three options. What I felt (putting myself in the context of the time) was reassured. I trusted what he was saying. I didn't immediately jump to the conclusion that he was lying. The whole speech seems honest - "I can tell you these things, I cannot tell you these other things." I can't think of a single politician right now that I trust not to lie, except maybe Bernie and Mark Kelly.
The current GOP would run from Ike.
Ike would run from them.
I had hoped Mark Kelly would have been the Democratic party's nominee last round and WILL be in 2028. He has an "Eisenhower-like" cred and background and a wife who would be a role model in the White House for the many living and trying to cope with disabilities. Linda Spiegler
Also, every time I say, "you, too" to my dad (a notorious punster), he replies, "Francis Gary Powers."
We have sunk so far in such a short period of time. Will the county ever be able to breathe fresh air again
Not in our lifetimes. Nor, probably, in the lifetimes of our children.
As the Xi summit approaches I wonder what personal enrichment Trump is about to trade for Taiwan.
Stay tuned to the readout and then the truth that will emerge several days after The Great Orange Turd leaves China. I have absolutely no doubt that Demento will give China a signal that the U.S. will not defend Taiwan.
Not surprising in the least. Authoritative biographies and similar sources show that Demento grew up in a household where falsehood, denial, and image‑management were routine survival strategies, not moral questions. Enter mentor Roy Cohn. He treated shameless lying again, not as a moral failure, but as a core strategic weapon --- a tool for domination, narrative control, and psychological intimidation. His view was that truth was irrelevant, perception was everything, and the person willing to lie boldly, repeatedly, and without shame would almost always overpower the person constrained by honesty. This was a technique Cohn used during the McCarthy era and taught Demento to adopt, to our continuing peril.
"I have in my pocket a list..."
Sad, because such "gentlemanly" words would never issue from this despicable human's mouth.
We have a children's book designed to help kids control their emotions called, "Don't Rant and Rave on Wednesdays."
It reads, "If we see a small child having a temper tantrum, we might think his behavior is cute or even funny. But we wouldn't think it was funny if we saw the President of the United States on national television, and he was jumping up and down, yelling and screaming, and beating his fists against a podium. We would probably say: 'Even if the president is angry, he should be able to control his behavior better than that!'"
Sadly, this was written before the *47 era...
I chose sad, as even when reading Ike's words I was thinking of our present occupant of the office.
I was 11, and living in the NYC media market was totally tuned into this story - reading it again today it feels as real as it did 66 years ago.
Me, too. I was nine. Remember it all.
The Corona/Keyhole imaging satellite program was already underway by the time the U-2 was shot down. The U-2, and later the SR-71, were used to get images quickly of areas the satellites weren't passing over. And the KH satellites used film (until the KH-11 in the mid-70s) so even if they did go over something we wanted data on we had to wait until the film was used up and dropped to the ground.
The U-2 is still in service, it just doesn't cross into denied airspace.
And there is an actual NASA U2 which is used for scientific flights.
Still one of the best explanations of actual the need for spycraft, imho. It isn't easy to make that balance work between maintaining honor and the necessity to understand what evil people are doing, and so much of the authoritarian world is what I call evil. Which means there need to be laws, rules, oversight for us or we stumble away from our morals so quickly. This concern was utmost to what I feared back in 2015, and that lack of moral guidance has only deteriorated, which certainly must be part of Gene's intention in highlighting this event now, of course.
I'm not sure that "spying" can be considered immoral. Or recent. It seems to me that wanting to discern the plans of one's enemy are the universal objective of both sides in any time of serious conflict. This didn't begin with the advent of spy planes.
I didn’t say it was immoral or recent.
"Oh, what a tangled web we weave / When first we practice to deceive!"
--- Sir Walter Scott
Interesting the U-2 business and the then Soviet Union and it's similarity to today, at least the USSR side. Bannon, Demento's former chief strategist, explicitly described the communications approach as “flood the zone with shit” — a tactic aligned with the “firehose of falsehood” propaganda model --- a modern propaganda model defined by high‑volume, rapid, repetitive, multichannel messaging that disregards truth or consistency. It was first described by the RAND Corporation in 2016 based on observations of Russian state propaganda.
I remember very clearly. What stunned folks where I lived--small town Republican Indiana--was his honesty. Fear of war & distrust of & distaste for the military ubiquitous. That a president would speak as Ike, especially given his often awkward circumlocutions, was totally unexpected. His presidency is the only thing in 1950s I'm nostalgic for.
Decency (even gentlemanly!) seems to elude these repubs and of course, the fish rots from the ............
In 1990, doing my internship for my library degree, I worked in what I think we still called a junior college. Directed a history student to the area where the materials reserved for their unit on the U2 incident were stored. In a few minutes he came back and said, "I couldn't find them. There was just some stuff on a spy plane." He'd thought he was supposed to be boning up on the rock band. Then a few years ago, I was talking to some young girl, can't remember the topic or the context, and she had never heard of either the band or the spy plane. Then I started feeling old.