2013-10: The Rational Argument needs to be updated to include what was known, but is now confirmed through the leaks by Edward Snowden. See postings on this blog. Canadians have got to be crazy to stand by and do nothing about the involvement of Lockheed Martin Corporation in the data base on Canadians at StatsCan.
One of Lockheed Martin’s specialties is surveillance. The Snowden leaks tell the story of back-door access to data bases. Ladar Levison’s experience tells the extent to which the NSA will go to coerce the owners of data bases to provide access. There is no doubt about the connection between Lockheed and the NSA.
2013-04-15 Lockheed Martin, leading provider of cyber security technology and services to NSA
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Lockheed Martin was awarded census contracts by 2003 for the 2006 census. Thousands of people protested then; more protested in 2006 during the census.
Lockheed Martin was awarded contracts for the May 2011 census.
It is foolhardy to support the involvement of Lockheed Martin in the data base on Canadians at StatsCan through silence or inaction. There is an informative, short interview with William Hartung, author of “Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex” at http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/too-big-to-fail-lockheed-martins-got-their-fingers-everywhere-says-author-yftt_535769.html
I cannot explain Lockheed Martin better than William Hartung, except that in the short interview he can’t address
- the weapons they manufacture which are in contravention of International and Canadian laws,
- their role at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib,
- etc..
Other postings on this blog provide some of that elaboration.
Furthermore, it is important to understand the context within which the census contracts for Lockheed Martin Corp are set. Most people know these things but some do not integrate them into their understanding. There are implications for Canada. Think:
- the American southwest is running out of water. (addressed in earlier postings – – see the sub-category Resource depletion (water in the U.S.) under Peace or Violence).
The science is from the Scripps Institute of Oceanography at San Diego (2007). In the summer of 2009 I spoke with Tim Barnett, the lead scientist, to inquire if the situation has improved. He said (words to effect) no, the steps taken to reverse falling water levels are small and totally inadequate. The science stands: there is a 50/50 chance that the two largest water reservoirs in the U.S., on the Colorado River behind the Hoover and Glen Canyon Dams will be dry by 2021 and they will lose their hydro-electric capacity by 2017. 50/50 chance based on the unbroken line of falling water levels in the reservoirs since the 1990s.
It seems to me (Sandra) that our political institutions are incapable of dealing effectively with known and extremely serious situations that are a much greater threat to our security than the human enemies being created. We cannot rely on the Governments to find solutions; we had better think for ourselves.
So WHAT IS THE PLAN? Surely there is a plan somewhere, surely someone has some idea of where the water will come from? Surely there is a back-up plan when you know for certain that there will be pandemonium if (50/50 chance) the well runs dry.
- Is this the Plan? When the American corporations want access to resources that will be money-makers they typically drop bombs on people (Iraq – oil). Or set up puppet governments. Or assassinate the people’s leaders. They find quislings in a nation-state that has coveted resources.
Democracy fails, propaganda replaces journalism, the state must increasingly use coercion and violence to control the population.
That’s when data files on citizens become a tool for the now-police-state. Corporate interests run the show; they appropriate the resources one way or the other and they do not care about any outcome beyond corporate profits.
- It is possible to see danger lurking on the horizon. You can hope it won’t come, or you can rise up to prevent it from manifesting.
- You have to be dangerously naive to allow Lockheed Martin (the American military) anywhere near a large and growingly comprehensive data base on all Canadians. Click on 2008-12-06: The role of mechanized census data in Nazi Europe. Why we have a Charter Right to privacy of personal information. Edwin Black’s IBM and the Holocaust, the Strategic Alliance Between Nazi Germany and America’s Most Powerful Corporation. Black’s new book “The Plan” – the kicker is oil security for the U.S.. . Oil security, Homeland Security, Security and Prosperity Partnership with Canada.. security, security, ha! And then there’s the Patriot Act.
- Also, check out: 2011-05-28 Census: Elizabeth asks What is Lockheed Martin’s actual role?
I’m sorry – it’s late. I don’t get it why anyone would think it’s smart to involve Lockheed Martin in the data base on Canadians at StatsCan, in any way, shape or form. Unless you were going to receive a whole lot of money, maybe?
The other part of it that is incredibly dumb: we are aligning ourselves with the American military (Canada First Defence Strategy, June 2008). That means unmanned drones, courtesy of Lockheed Martin. Lockheed Martin who turns around and makes money by selling its products to “enemies” of the U.S. (witness its convictions for breach of arms export control laws. And see the SOFEX posting). In time, unmanned drones will be dropping bombs on North America. WHO are the brains behind our “defence” strategy? Get rid of them.
The next Canadian census is four months away. When you send in your form tell the Government: NO to Lockheed Martin in Canada.
Lockheed Martin is a company that exists only by war and for war.
How dangerous is the American military-industrial-complex? William Hartung offers us warning. And from the mouth of a war hero, an American General, the US President, Dwight Eisenhower:
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.
We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Lockheed Martin is a main player of this Complex (Lockheed Martin receives over $28 billion per year in Pentagon contracts — $36 billion of U.S. Government contracts in 2009.) The company has produced spy satellites; helped the Pentagon collect personal data on U.S. citizens; provided interrogators for employment at Guantanamo Bay; Lockheed Martin’s reach into all areas of US defense and American life is staggering, their horrific offensive (not defensive) products, having been selected for census work in the US (as in Canada with IBM as a sub-contractor) in order to better control; “international surveillance” is one of their operational branches.
Now they are expanding their role in Canada, StatsCan is just one example.
Eisenhower:
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.
I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.
I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.
With the U.S. faltering as it is, with water shortages happening and more to come, with the American government-corporate history of appropriating what does not belong to them, with the history of violent and corrupt means, Canadians are foolish to allow Lockheed Martin Corporation anywhere near the large data base on Canadians.
Statistics Canada, through its “surveys” is enlarging the data base every working day. Read the newspapers (posted on this blog): the Americans want access to the information on Canadians. And not just on the unruly ones, but on everyone. Ron Covais, “President of the Americas for Lockheed Martin” told Maclean’s magazine (Sept 2006) that they won’t get what they want through democratic means. They will get it through the “agencies of government” and the ministers have said “tell us what you want.” We’ll see that you get it.
If they don’t already have access to the data base, it will not be long in coming. Unless we are informed, talking with each other, not afraid, and willing to rise up to stop the indefensible.