Drones & The Toll of Official Lies

In 1938, on Halloween night, movie genius Orson Welles aired a radio program about a fictional invasion of aliens in Grovers Mill, NJ. He made the production sound like a newscast — news bulletins about the alien takeover interspersed with what the announcer called “our regular broadcasting.” The whole thing was a studio creation — including an orchestra of musicians to provide alternate programming.

Millions of Americans listened, and some fled their homes in panic. Triggered by fears of the coming war in Europe, in the era of Charles Lindbergh’s heroic flights, they clogged traffic in an effort to escape whatever was coming for them from the sky.

New Jersey has been in the news again lately, this time for drones flying in the skies. But this time, it’s no Halloween trick. Instead, some experts warn that the appearance of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) throughout the nation means the Biden team — in ceding drone technology to China — has lost control of US airspace.

“The FAA destroyed the U.S. drone industry by requiring pilot licenses for beyond-line-of-sight flights,” Marc Andreessen, software engineer and founder of the web browser Mosaic, recently told Joe Rogan. US manufacturers have their hands tied, while Chinese drones dominate the market. “Now, 90% of drones used by the U.S. military and police are Chinese-made—a massive security risk, as they could be used for surveillance or as weapons.” Biden? “Zero interest in fixing this issue.”

In a vaccum of leadership, with a leamduck White House where the “Big Guy” is alleged to have made millions of dollars from kickbacks from China to his son Hunter, conspiracy theories abound about these UAPs, said to be the size of SUV vehicles.

• The drones were sent from a mothership off the US East Coast to spy on military bases, perhaps an Iranian asset with plans to assassinate Donald Trump at his golf course in Bedminster.

• The drones were sent from biological terrorists (WHO? China?), and they are seeding our skies to make us sick and cause the next worldwide pandemic.

• The drones are from Vladimir Putin, payback for the West’s military support of Ukraine in its war against Russia.

• The drones belong to the US military, and they’re using them to find a loose nuke, which they can’t admit because then folks would clog the highways in escaping.

The one thing that everyone seems to agree on is that the US government is lying.

The Pentagon claims not to know what the drones are. Which makes me wonder what they are doing with their $825 billion budget. At the White House, John Kirby assures us they pose no imminent national security or personal security danger. How would you know they pose no risk if you don’t know what they are? Either officials know and don’t want to tell us, or they don’t know and seek to hide their incompetence.

Biden says he’s not sure if it would be safe to shoot them down over the ocean. Haven’t we done that with our spaceships for years? DHS Sec Alejandro Mayorkas ways the US doesn’t have authority to shoot them down. So, the same government autocrat who refuses to enforce our border is now worried about the law?

In that wonderful blunt way of his, President-elect Trump suggested officials just “SHOOT THEM DOWN!” to learn their derivation.

When the public no longer believes officials, it is a dangerous time. Arguably the drones are part of a culture of lying. Officials have been lying to us for a very long time, certainly since the pandemic gave authoritarian governors and mayors license to imprison us, censor us and close our churches. In the last four years:

Dr. Anthony Fauci lied to us, under oath, about the origin of the COVID-19 virus, and about the effectiveness of masks, vaccines and six-feet of distance to combat it. In clinical trials for the Pfizer vax, 21 patients taking the vaccine died. And some, like teenager Maddie de Garay, were severely injured. The company did not explore further to test for safety, nor did the FDA require them to before okaying the drug.

Big Pharma lied to us, in ads, about the efficacy of their vaccines, saying they were safe and effective when they were neither. Just look at all those who were injured. Hopefully, RFK Jr. will be confirmed as HHS sec, and bans pharmaceutical advertising.

President Biden lied to us, in fear-mongering speeches, saying vax mandates were critical to public health. The White House said 100 million people would be mandated to take them. How many health and military professionals lost their jobs by declining?

DHS Secretary Alejandra Mayorkis lied to us, in repeated congressional appearances, when he insisted that the US borders were secure. Tell it to the parents whose children were killed by illegal migrants.

Eager to demonize Trump and his supporters, Liz Cheney and Nancy Pelosi lied when they said Jan 6 was an insurrection. Turns out the FBI had 26 assets in the crowds, perhaps to foment violence among protestors, who were far less violent than the George Floyd rioters of 2020. Then the DOJ arrested, and judges ruled, on more than 1,500 Americans, subjecting them to harsh prison conditions and long sentences.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen lied when she said inflation was “transitory.” She had to know — this is basic economics. When you overspend, prices go up.

Of course the Biden administration is not the first to tell lies, or repeat untruths. The culture of lying, abetted by a media eager to curry power with sources in government, has a long history. I imagine you have your own favorites, but these two top my list.

• Barack Obama drew a “red line in the sand” in Syria, against the use of biological warfare, and never enforced it. He also said of Obamacare that you would be able to keep your doctor and your healthcare provider. Not true.

• George W. Bush had his sec of State Colin Powell tell the UN — based on faulty CIA reporting — that Iraq’s Saddam Hussein was using weapons of mass destruction. We went to war — and executed Saddam — on this flimsy foundation.

As for the media, braodcast ratings and print media subscriptions are plummeting. Americans voted for Trump in 2024 in large part because they see through the lies.

Trump, who just won a $15 million settlement from ABC’s George Stephanopoulis for saying Trump was “liable for rape,” is now suing the Washington Post, New York Times and the Pulitzer Prize Committee that awarded them Pulitzers for reporting as news the false claim that Russia had interfered in the 2016 election to help Trump. This accusation was always just a glint in a bitter Hillary Clinton’s eyes.

A friend of mine is a commercial pilot who tells me that his colleagues have seen unidentified objects over the Pacific Ocean over the last two months. The FBI says it has received 5,000 tips since the first mysterious drone was seen flying above NJ in November. Of those, an official said, fewer than 100 led to further investigation.

Whatever is going on, as top Democratic lawmaker Jim Hines told Fox News Sunday, the government’s reaction is “not good enough.”

In remarks at a DNC holiday party last night, President Biden said he ran “a scandal free campaign.” He also asked, “Have we left the country in better shape than we found it? The answer to that question is a resounding yes!”

As the RNC research team asks, who wants to tell him?