High Weirdness back roads

I've been thinking a bit about some of the subjects and events which seem to stay low on the horizon within the Conspiracy Theory and High Weirdness communities these days. With the current state of events in America we certainly have our plates full and it seems the odd, kooky and more curious stories get shuffled out of the deck. The recent Drones photos and revelations are a prime example, so is the VaTech Black Op.

Listed below are three subjects that fit this description. The Gulf Breeze Six is an example of a story that simply gets overlooked because it predates the Internet and doesn't have the broad range of appeal that the JFK assassination or UFOlogy has. Maitiera seems to only interest the folks who are interested in cults or mind control and those who are interested in Theocratic Conspiracy Theories. The emergence of the Internet and it's effect on our community falls more in line with people who have an interest in the history of our communities or those who have been publishing their ideas for long before the Internet was known of by the average person.

There are many other subjects and stories that can be listed but these three seem to have more prominence in my mind these days. The Gulf Breeze Six have been in my head because of the recent drones photos and the major UFO sightings in England this week. Maitiera has been in my mind because I have been thinking more about the VaTech Black Op. Our history has been in my mind because I'm in a mood to assess where I want to take this blog and looking back is always a part of looking forward.

The Gulf Breeze Six – This was an extremely peculiar case when it played out in the summer of 1990. I had spent several years in the Pensacola area before this occurred and was in fact stationed in Pensacola during the Gulf Breeze sightings. I never had a sighting but there was indeed a “feeling” of strangeness around the area during the sightings time frame. The story itself was odd on far too many levels and I’m afraid that Vance Davis’ publication of Unbroken Promises has only added to the muddy waters of this story, in my eyes.

I’ve thought that this story would actually make a very good film. The story has it all; intrigue, mystery, a manhunt, the supernatural, all of this against the backdrop of the military Intelligence Community. There has been very little interest about these six individuals and I think it would be interesting if someone could get them together for an interview to talk about the history of their adventure and perspective since we are nearing the 20th anniversary of the event.

Maitiera – In early 2006 several local Atlanta television stations began airing Maitiera commercials in the early morning hours, usually around 4:00 AM. I often wondered how many people were first introduced to this figure because of the ads. I especially wondered how many trust fund babies in Atlanta saw the ads after a particularly bad and desperate night of drinking and drugging in the Buckhead nightclub district. In the right set of circumstances, with a head full of coke, a belly full of Grey Goose and a empty yearning in the heart, a young person perched in their lofty condo looking down on Peachtree could see a possible “meaning” to their life by seeing those ads.

Cults and cult leaders in general seem to garner very little attention these days. I do have a feeling that the renewed Pentecostal movement has tempered any desire of the corporate news outlets to expose and discuss the activities of cults. I’m not saying that the Pentecost is a cult but it is obvious that cults use the tactics of organized religion to recruit and keep members.

The emergence of the Internet – Before the web, the typical Conspiracy Theory or High Weirdness enthusiast had to rely on a loose and ethereal world of mail order and print magazines for information, new ideas and guidance. Those were the days of kitchen publishing and printed databases and mailing lists that you could get from sources as varied as Donna Kossy and Ivan Stang. What the web has done to this sub-culture is open it to a completely new audience but it has also removed a certain charm and work ethic that was inherent to the subject. It’s been years since I sent out a SASE and got that rush of excitement many weeks later when I saw my handwriting on the envelope, knowing there were pages of goodies inside.

I have never read or even seen an essay on the effects of the Internet on our community. I think this would be a marvelous subject for one of the better writers to tackle. I think we have some incredible historians in the community and their perspective on how things have changed, become more mainstream and more open for disinfo would be exciting to learn.

Low rumbles on the horizon

I’m trying to stay away from the purely political posts for at least a few days. The recent Libby commutation of sentence still has my blood boiling. I still need to spend some time digesting the CIA “Family Jewels” release and I haven’t even made the time to do that yet. So let’s go off in a different direction today.

Courtesy of Kent Steadman’s website we have some interesting information that has come to light regarding the Roswell incident. For those who have followed the players in the case, the name of Col. Walter Haut will ring a bell. Col. Haut’s “deathbed confession” has been released. He wrote an affidavit before he passed away which explains the things he saw and did surrounding the infamous incident.

The British media are reporting the details of this affidavit in surprising depth. The American media are, as par for the course, ignoring it. It’s quite interesting to read the Col.’s comments and it’s even more interesting to consider whether his affidavit is a real confession, disinfo or a prank.

The timing of this release is extremely curious considering some of the related and non-related events of the past two weeks. We first had the botched automobile-as-a-Molotov-cocktail “attacks” in the UK, followed by the detainment of a number of conspirators that include physicians and this was book ended by a new al-Quaeda video being released; an abnormally long video at that. The American political scene has given us the insulting Libby commutation, a potential physical threat on the life of Presidential hopeful Barrack Obama and a meeting in Kennebunkport between the Bush clan and Vladimir Putin. The UFOlogy field has also had two new stories to follow with the sudden emergence (and quiet follow-up) of the “Drones” photos and sightings which were accompanied by a release of documents purportedly by a former “insider”.

It’s quite obvious that some of these stories are plants and distractions. Which story is the real McCoy is a question up for debate. We are being distracted, intentionally, for a reason. The Libby story surprises me not in the least bit, but it still infuriates me. The hypocrisy of those in power knows no bounds and the overt in your face attitude is stunning. The Obama story, which I first learned of last night, troubles me the most.

I have feared since the VaTech massacre that we will soon be seeing a return to the days of assassins, where the leaders who appeal to the populace and those with a certain charismatic appeal to the masses, will be gunned down. The threats to all of us are lined up like rings, each one a barrier to keep us in line and under control. Assassination of our own leaders in America is a tactic we have not seen in a generation. Enough time has passed and it is of great concern to me.

The Drone photographs

The last few nights I have had some free time (for a change) to simply relax and do whatever the mood strikes me to do. This doesn’t happen as often as I’d like and probably not as often as should be. On Wednesday night I happened upon some recent reports coming from the UFOlogy world regarding a series of sightings of a new variety. If you don’t follow the UFOlogy world here is the scoop.

A series of photos have been released by what appears to be 3 different people, who took the photos at different locations and within a very, very short time frame of one another. The photos are quite sharp and appear quite convincingly real. The photos show objects that are being described by UFOlogists as “Drones”, and their appearance is appropriate given the name. The photos do not show the hallmarks of being PhotoShopped, at least on a casual glance and the objects in the photos appear to me, in my opinion, to have a certain physical “weight” that is lacking in PhotoShopped images.

What I mean by physical “weight” is a certain quality that seems amiss and unnatural in CGI or photo editing suites. When you look at a special effects laden movie, say Spiderman, doesn’t the action seem “off” because the computer created people don’t seem to have a physical presence in reality? Maybe it’s the speed in which the characters move or the quality of only being a series of points in a grid in a computer program. There is just a quality that feels more unreal than it looks real.

These photos do not have that feel about them. There isn’t a sensation of unnatural depth like we used to see when people would fake film-based photos. They just seem to have a quality of realism, depth and presence, which is quite natural in the “feel” of the images. There has been an anonymous explanation for these drones released on a web site that is purportedly written by an engineer who claims to have worked on advanced projects that are virtually identical to the drone images.

While I can’t say I am bowling over with excitement about this story I can say that my interest has been piqued. Something about the speed of this story developing, the information that has been released and the circumstances of the events seems both right and wrong to me. Not since the Phoenix Lights has a UFO story captured my thoughts as this one is.

This could, as so many high weirdness stories, turn out to be an elaborate hoax. So many hoaxes collapse simply because the inertia of the story brings too much info to the forefront too soon and the weak aspects of the story simply cause the whole story to collapse. The Aussie Bloke postings are a prime example of a story folding after the weight and inertia cause the weak foundation to give way.

I’m going to keep watching the story and see how it progresses. The story is either scripted or it’s not and scripted stories begin to show the veneer of fiction and creative writing quite soon. Until then…keep watching the skies.