CIA, NSA, PNAC, Star NeoCons, Goldman VP, PsyOp Specialists: Meet Ted Cruz' leadership team.

[denem]

Last edited Sun Feb 7, 2016, 04:52 AM - Edit history (8)

What sort of guy advocate an indefensible war crime, carpet bombing ISIL areas in Syria and Iraq. Perhaps a guy who has collected together a team headed by Chad Sweet, Ex-Goldman VP, operations director CIA National Clandestine Service, ex-Chief of Staff at Homeland Security who went on to co-found company which advocates aggressive NSA metadata collection.

'THE MEN BEHIND TED CRUZ: NEOCONS AND THE CIA'

....
His campaign manager, Chad C. Sweet, co-founded the Chertoff Group with former Bush and Obama administration Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff. Sweet, as a leader of the Chertoff Group, “advocated for expanding NSA metadata collection,” according to his bio on the risk-management and security consulting company’s webpage.

“Mr. Sweet formerly served as the Chief of Staff of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Prior to becoming Chief of Staff of DHS, Mr. Sweet worked as an investment banker at the firms of Morgan Stanley and [VP of] Goldman Sachs well as served in the CIA’s National Clandestine Service,” the bio continues.

Cruz’s foreign policy advisor is the notorious neocon James Woolsey, the former director of the CIA during the Clinton administration. Woolsey is connected to the now largely defunct Project for the New American Century (PNAC), a think tank with an agenda formulated by top neocons William Kristol and Robert Kagan. PNAC was at the forefront of the Bush administration push to invade Iraq. He is a former vice president of the defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton and an advocate of the neocon hardline on Iran.

Ted’s foreign policy team includes Elliot Abrams, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and the son-in-law of Norman Podhoretz, a trailblazing neoconservative ideologue. Abrams was a key adviser on Mideast policy at the National Security Council (NSC) during the George W. Bush presidency and also a staunch advocate of the Iraq invasion, the hardline on Iran and military strikes against the government of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

Finally, a volunteer working in public relations for the Cruz campaign, Dan P. Gabriel, is a former CIA covert action officer and a founding partner of Applied Memetics, a company “focused solely on developing engineered influence for clients seeking to alter their tactical or strategic operational environments,”according to its webpage The company specializes in propagating memes that ”can move through the cultural sociosphere in a manner similar to the contagious behavior of a virus,” in other words Applied Memetics specializes in propaganda.

http://www.infowars.com/the-men-behind-ted-cruz-neocons-and-a-cia-propagandist/

Really I could have put the whole thing in bold. This operation looks more like a coup, than a bunch of grifters ideologues backing an unprincipled, kinda sorta Dominionist with a particular fetish for the death penalty.

Finally married to Goldman Sachs - how could I leave them out? Ted's wife is not a senior investment advisor with Goldman, Heidi Cruz is a Goldman Sachs Managing Director on leave.

Most of the statements here are based on official bios. Ron Paul's statement that Goldman owns Cruz is not.

[Betty Karlson]

1. Goldman Sachs? That bank is becoming too evil to exist, never mind too big. eom

[denem]

2. Does anyone know who are Chad C. Sweet connections

within the GOP over the years? Hell of a CV. Has he just been keeping a snake low profile?

[starroute]

5. There's a lot on the Chertoff Group in this Nation article

http://www.thenation.com/article/how-private-contractors-have-created-shadow-nsa/#

What we have now is a national-security class that simultaneously bridges the gap between private and public, merging government careers with jobs as corporate executives and consultants. By retaining their security clearances, many of its members have access to the most highly guarded intelligence, which they use to the benefit of their corporate and government clients. The power they wield is exponentially greater than that of their Cold War predecessors.

To see the difference, let’s take a closer look at the Chertoff Group and its best-known executive, Michael Hayden. Chertoff founded his consultancy in March 2009, barely two months after President Obama’s inauguration. The group’s cofounder was Chad Sweet, who had served as Chertoff’s chief of staff at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and had earlier worked in the CIA’s National Clandestine Service. In effect, the pair re-created the national-security team that had provided much of the intelligence advice to Bush and Cheney, and they said as much in their literature. According to the firm’s website, the Chertoff Group provides “business and government leaders with the same kind of high-level, strategic thinking and diligent execution that have kept the American homeland and its people safe since 9/11.”

When Hayden came on board in April 2009, he emphasized continuity. “After serving for decades at the highest levels of the U.S. military and the U.S. intelligence services, I grew accustomed to working alongside remarkably talented and dedicated professionals,” the former NSA director wrote. “I wanted an opportunity to re-create the experience in the private sector.” And he did just that. One of the firm’s early recruits was Charles E. Allen, a legendary intelligence official who had recently served as director of intelligence for Chertoff’s DHS. Another principal with extensive NSA experience is Paul Schneider, Chertoff’s deputy secretary at DHS; from 2002 to 2003, he was Hayden’s senior acquisition executive at the NSA. That would have put him in charge of all of the NSA’s hugely expensive contracting, which exploded during Hayden’s reign from 1999 to 2005.

[denem]

6. OK NSA Director, DHS Chief. DHS Intelligence Chief, + Woolsey, CIA Director

and his wife is a Goldman Manging Director

[starroute]

8. Woolsey did more than anyone to promote the Iraq War

His stint as CIA director was nothing compared to his unofficial activities since. Among other things, he was very active trying to tie Saddam to 9/11. As I posted here a few months ago:

He was one of the PNAC signers calling for war against Iraq in 1998 and was working for the Iraqi National Congress by 2000, but he really went into high gear after September 11. On October 14, 2001, The Guardian reported (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/terrorism.afghanistan6):

"It was confirmed yesterday that Jim Woolsey, CIA director from 1993 to 1996, recently visited London on behalf of the hawkish Defence Department to 'firm up' other evidence of Iraqi involvement in 11 September.

"Some observers fear linking Saddam to the terrorist attacks is part of an agenda being driven by US hawks eager to broaden the war to include Iraq, a move being resisted by the British government."

During that same London visit, he was looking for evidence to tie Saddam Hussein to the anthrax attacks. And a couple of months later, he was already pushing the Curveball/mobile labs claims.

That man has more blood on his hands than almost anyone else except Dick Cheney.

[polly7]

3. God, as if he wasn't scary enough on his own. nt.

[Octafish]

4. CIA moonlights in corporate world

Wonder how long "compartmentalized information" holds when the "price is right" is on the table?

CIA moonlights in corporate world

In the midst of two wars and the fight against Al Qaeda, the CIA is offering operatives a chance to peddle their expertise to private companies on the side — a policy that gives financial firms and hedge funds access to the nation’s top-level intelligence talent, POLITICO has learned.

In one case, these active-duty officers moonlighted at a hedge-fund consulting firm that wanted to tap their expertise in “deception detection,” the highly specialized art of telling when executives may be lying based on clues in a conversation.

The never-before-revealed policy comes to light as the CIA and other intelligence agencies are once again under fire for failing to “connect the dots,” this time in the Christmas Day bombing plot on Northwest Flight 253.

SNIP...

But the close ties between active-duty and retired CIA officers at one consulting company show the degree to which CIA-style intelligence gathering techniques have been employed by hedge funds and financial institutions in the global economy.

The firm is called Business Intelligence Advisors, and it is based in Boston. BIA was founded and is staffed by a number of retired CIA officers, and it specializes in the arcane field of “deception detection.” BIA’s clients have included Goldman Sachs and the enormous hedge fund SAC Capital Advisors, according to spokesmen for both firms.

CONTINUED...

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0110/32290.html#ixzz0eIFPhHBh

That was 2010. Now they've got the likes of Ted Princeton Whore Cruz to carry their MIC flag.

Thank you for the heads-up, denem. Yours is a most enlightening OP.

[bobthedrummer]

7. Thanks for being another member of the real DU reality-based community denem. GWB was a coup.

Chapter 37 of Michael Hastings book "The Operators"...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016130893

[denem]

9. No, - thank you! This is starting to look like a nightmare scenario

Last edited Sun Feb 7, 2016, 06:12 AM - Edit history (1)

Cruz campaign credits psychological data and analytics for its rising success
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/cruz-campaign-credits-psychological-data-and-analytics-for-its-rising-success/2015/12/13/4cb0baf8-9dc5-11e5-bce4-708fe33e3288_story.html

The only question is, why would they even be even be talking about it?

[Blue_Tires]

10. Can you at least dig up a non-infowars link, please?

[denem]

12. OK, lets start with Chad Sweet, campaign manager

Chad C. Sweet
Certoff Group

Previous Government and Private Sector Service:
Chief of Staff, Department of Homeland Security (2007 – 2009)
Vice President, Goldman Sachs (1996 – 2006)
Investment Banker, Morgan Stanley (1994 – 1996)
Directorate of Operations, Central Intelligence Agency (1990, 1991 – 1993)

http://www.chertoffgroup.com/bios/chad-sweet.php

A Director of CIA Operations
DHS Chief of Staff 2 years
Goldman VP for 10 years

[Blue_Tires]

22. But the original link is still in your OP...

so noted.

[hifiguy]

11. Kick, kick, kick.

Goldman is a genuine axis of evil. It should be wiped from the face of the earth with extreme prejudice.

[denem]

13. Campaign Manager, Goldman VP for 10 years

as per official bio http://www.chertoffgroup.com/bios/chad-sweet.php

[dmr]

14. From an opportunistic teabagger to an opportunistic neocon.

It's like magic!

He scares the hell out of me.

[denem]

15. Cruz principal backer: "THE MAN WHO OUT KOCHED THE KOCHES"

Principal Backer
Robert Mercer
Rentech Hedge Fund
"The man who Out Kotched the Koches"
(Bloomberg Politics)
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2014-10-23/the-man-who-outkoched-the-kochs

Mercer has given $11m to Ted Cruz Super PAC
(Slate)
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/01/21/ted_cruz_donor_robert_mercer_profiled.html

[Hortensis]

16. How about a theocratic neocon? Most

"American exceptionalists" believe God has chosen American to be ascendant to do "His" work.

[denem]

17. PsyOps: If you have pacify people

(gosh I can't believe I'm quoting this) Religion is a good sedative .

Then you wake them up. Nice security then the big event -

" Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is TELL THEM THEY ARE BEING ATTACKED, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY COUNTRY." Goering Nuremberg, 1946

But why not deeply customise the message to individual groups, rather than mere mass propaganda?

Cruz' campaign said they had over 50,000 data points to target pitches. Think Google/FaceBook selling Propaganda.

Cruz campaign credits psychological data and analytics for its rising success
(Washington Post)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/cruz-campaign-credits-psychological-data-and-analytics-for-its-rising-success/2015/12/13/4cb0baf8-9dc5-11e5-bce4-708fe33e3288_story.html

[dmr]

18. That is a frightening article.

This should be posted in a thread of its own.

This gives me one more reason to fear this man.

A man who everyone seems to hate yet has a dedicated & powerful backing funding & working toward him being elected.

[denem]

19. Yes, but why were they boasting about it?

They have a NSA director aboard. I thought immediately about virtually direct access to Facebook / Google.

But yeah ... Cruz aint no Nixon, he's ... ? Chills.

Still why talk about it at all? Hubris?

[librechik]

20. don't kid yourself--the same cabal worms its way into EVERY campaign team.

they are the secret government that never goes away, no matter who wins.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/10/18/vote-all-you-want-the-secret-government-won-change/jVSkXrENQlu8vNcBfMn9sL/story.html

[denem]

21. Yes, but with respect,

there are differences between the likes of Geithner and Wolfowicz

The hidden government is no more monolithic, than it's public manifestations. There are temporary, and long standing alliances, and new developments in oppression.

[bobthedrummer]

23. Yep. The United States of America is no exception to whatever you want to call the forces allied in

the shadows, the powers that be, how about Daddy War Bucks?

Control wise it's been really easy with just a two major party facade and a perception-managed belief system that denied class in the USA and fanatically supported "free market capitalism" as the expression of democracy.

Well, those days are over, it's time for an accounting to we, the people.