This started out as a comment to Timbuk 3’s fine post The Stalker, which deals with the officially encouraged, entirely media-proliferated paranoia amongst the general population.
In particular, (s)he wrote in a comment later on:
I have been meaning to post the story below for some days now, but that comment spurred me to do so today.
Read on for a first-hand account of the laxity of security at the logically most threatened point of our domestic society.
A big-time, Washington DC Army base.
Every word is true.
Bet on it.
Timbuk3…
It’s all hype.
ALL of it.
All of the “security” of that sort.
Check THIS out, for example.
I recently spent two days in and out of a VERY uptight Army base just outside of Washington DC.
Ft. Myer in Arlington, VA.
Why??
Don’t ask.
Totally non-military business, I assure you.
I walked onto the base both times, because I took a cab to the gate and did not want to sit in the cab (paying all the while) while the quarter mile-long line of vehicles were each individually searched by a so-called “security team” before they were allowed access to the hottest-thing-ever “We’re only a couple of miles from the Pentagon” military base.
So there I was. I’m in pretty good shape, could easily be mistaken for a retired or off-duty military guy. White, dressed down, baseball cap, jeans and sneakers, roomy old raincoat (buttoned), about 6’/200 lbs. On my back? A leather duffel bag…a big one…a good sized computer-holding backpack, and a musical instrument case that is almost exactly the size of an automatic rifle. All full of totally non-threatening things. Clothes,music, etc.
I walk through the gate, give the security person a big smile, show her my passport as ID, and she says “You’ll want to walk down that sidewalk across the street.” One that leads to the tent-like affair under which the security ops are progressing. Mirrors under trucks, opening sealed boxes…the works. “Don’t want none a’ them terrists gettin’ in an’ blowin’ shit all up, now DO we, Bubba!!!”
Riiiight…
I walk down said sidewalk expecting to have to unpack all of my stuff.
But…NOOOOOO!!!
The guards do not even LOOK at me!!! Not a glance. I mean…they have been told to search vehicles, and by all the Army gods in heaven and in hell, THAT IS WHAT THEY ARE GOING TO DO.
I could have been packing enough explosives to blow up half of that base.
Not once, but TWICE!!!
Two consecutive days.
In AND out.
I could have been a spy.
I could have been transporting stolen documents out of the base.
I could have been bringing in bio-weapons.
Or enough drugs to paralyze the whole base.
LOTS of things.
And now…get THIS.
In the middle of the second day, someone who has PX privileges…he’s married to a soldier… drove me to the PX supermarket to buy something that I needed. We were busy talking, and were being followed by another car because they wanted something too. We were deep in conversation, and pulled into the wrong driveway at the PX. Marked VERY badly by a little “Do not enter” sign. No traffic whatsoever. The other car followed.
Not one, but two MP vehicles immediately stopped us, told us to “Stay IN the vehicle!!!” in no uncertain terms…hands resting on the butts of their 9 MM, holstered sidearms…and ran a 15 minute security check on the two cars.
We were going to go buy some pot scrubbers, fer chrissake!!! Those little green ones. For the non-nefarious reason that we needed to take some corrosion off of the innards of some instruments.
And the walking-around soldiers on the base?
ESPECIALLY the white ones?
SO uptight.
All steroided-up in their camo fatigues with nobody to shoot. They all looked like they wanted to grow up to be Humvees.
The black and hispanic guys? Mostly fairly relaxed and on the goof. Looking pretty much like they were glad to have a gig. But the white ones?
HOO boy!!!
Lt. Calley redux.
Just LOOKING for an Abu Ghraib to call their very own.
So when people start talking about “Support our troops” versus “The military is broken”…remember.
The whole SOCIETY is fairly well broken.
The military is just one limb of that critter.
It is all broken. INCLUDING the military, the intel services, the federal government, Homeboy Security, the media, both goddamned political parties, the justice system, the educational system and the corporate/financial world in general.
We have got a LOT of work to do.
Yes, we need a military.
But folks…not THIS one.
Pork barrel generals and mostly losers on the ground.
Bet on it.
Sorry to have to report this. But there it was, right in my face.
Have fun.
Later…
AG