07.02.13
‘States rights’ and Electromagnetic Pulse Crazies
Since Roscoe Bartlett was run out of Congress leaving the cause of electromagnetic pulse doom-stopping in the hands of legitimate rape caucus member Trent Franks of Arizona, the old Cult of EMP Crazy has been gravely damaged. But like the twin phenomena of zombie dramatic cable television and movies, it always staggers forward, always has an audience.
Franks is known now mostly for joining the GOP legitimate rape thing a couple weeks back. This marking as a barely sentient human being means there’s very little chance that anything he sponsors on electromagnetic pulse defense will go anywhere.
The old Cult of EMP Crazy knows this liability so they’ve taken their cause and their merchandising to “the states.”
From a recent edition of POWER, a trade magazine on the global power industry, comes an article on the now always looming (for 20 years) threat of electromagnetic pulse attack:
So [F. Michael Maloof, a columnist for the right-wing crank newsite WND.COM] says he’s been traveling to U.S. states to encourage state and local responses. “This is a new states’ rights issue,??? he says. “People can take action at the state level. I’m traveling around suggesting people get together with their local emergency response agencies and coordinators??? to plan for an EMP contingency.
Indeed, here is an example of taking the story of electromagnetic pulse doom to the states, in this instance a lecture for a South Carolina Tea Party meeting, archived on YouTube.
Caveat, it’s hard to watch, a real WhiteManistan sleeping pill. But in the first few minutes readers may note that it’s a road show including old Cult of EMP Crazy chieftain, Frank Gaffney, who has made a career during the last few years going around to Republican do’s in red states to warn about the contamination of the US justice system by shariah law. Gaffney, it’s fair to say, has had great success in this, being one of forces behind the appearance of ridiculous anti-shariah legislation in a few red states.
For his part, F. Michael Maloof has been involved in the selling and merchandising of his book on electromagnetic pulse doom.
From POWER:
In his book [A Nation Forsaken], Maloof describes a hypothetical attack on Washington, D.C., that completely disrupts the nation’s capital and surrounding areas, including communications at the Pentagon. The attackers, he writes, use “small, rifle-sized arms that shoot not bullets but radio frequencies, weapons that can be built for about $400 with easy-to-obtain parts. Think of one of those Super Soaker water guns.
Maloof also describes how a terrorist cell with a primitive EMP weapon in the back of a panel truck could easily bring down a passenger airplane landing at Washington’s Reagan National Airport. “At the cost of a few thousand dollars in material and know-how, this homegrown terror cell kills more than a thousand people—several hundred passengers on the planes, the rest in the buildings that take the full impact of the crashing planes.???
DD readers know the Cult of EMP Crazy is a primary part of right-wing rural kook demographic known as “preppers,” citizens of WhiteManistan assiduously preparing for the fall of America, aka The End of the World As We Know It (TEOTWAWKI).
Preppers have turned electromagnetic pulse doom into kitsch art and literature, the meme now having generated hundreds of unreadable novels on survival after electromagnetic pulse attack through the technological miracle of Amazon’s CreateSpace.
On the art side we now have prepper electromagnetic pulse doom song and video. It is brief.
And it’s been awhile since we checked in on one of the best known preppers, the Patriot Nurse.
It’s quite a grab bag.
I didn’t spend much time commenting on Maloof’s electromagnetic pulse terrorism scenarios. The reason being, they’re all moldy oldies, having been run up the flag pole numerous times, starting about two decades ago.
From the old Crypt Newsletter, a bit of satire from a feature called the Joseph K Guide to Tech Terminology, ca. 1997:
Victor von Doom: a.k.a Dr. Doom, an arch villain in the Marvel Comics universe often portrayed handcrafting a variety of directed energy weapons — ray guns — with which to smite enemies; now used by Crypt Newsletter as a catch-all designation for computer security snake-oil salesmen and assorted crackpots spreading freaky tales of non-existent electronic [pulse] rays.
Usage: Victor von Doom, a faculty member at the University of Gobble-Wallah in Brisbane, Australia, warned frightened businessmen that a raygun capable of surreptitiously smashing networked corporate computers from a distance of half a mile could be easily fashioned from parts including a cattle prod, two potato knishes, one TV antenna and four car batteries.
Another definition from the old Joseph K Guide is updated for your enjoyment:
Booz Allen Hamilton: Contractor for the Pentagon which most Americans have never heard of; or, a secret corporation that relies almost exclusively upon taxpayer dollars for profits.
Usage: “The ideal Booz Allen Hamilton business product always involves classification so that outside audits, fraud investigations, accusations of illegality and meddlesome oversight can be side-stepped,??? a company vice-president patiently explained to the new hire.
It used to be the definition for Science Applications International Corporation, which is still around, but not as much in the news as BAH.
George Smith said,
July 2, 2013 at 9:39 pm
An Escape from WhiteManistan No-Prize for any from the old crew who knows the true meaning of Gobble-Wallah. No Google for at least five minutes. Then notice how ol’ DD blog owns parts of the term in the top two pages of results.
Along with heevahava, a fine descriptive, so sadly neglected in the Culture of Lickspittle..