INSIDE THE
SHADOW
GOVERNMENT
Inside
the Shadow Government
by
Harry Helms
Feral House / 2003 / $12.95
One
would think that a book titled Inside the Shadow Government,
especially one coming from a publisher like Feral
House, would be filled with black helicopters, UN takeovers
of the United States' government, and references to alien autopsies
in Area 54. Feral House (and, more specifically, its agent provocateur/guiding
light Adam Parfrey) is known for its taste for the outré,
putting up on stage the carnival sideshow that lies behind the façade
of everyday reality—books that corporate publishing houses are
too timid, or too concerned with making multi-million-dollar profits
off the next Da Vinci Code, to bring to press. However, Feral
House's catalogue, which Parfrey has admitted on more than one occasion
is largely reflective of his own taste and interests, is Socrates
in a carnie's clothing. For every necrophiliac and serial killer on
display, there is a work that is shocking in a quieter, yet even more
disturbing way.
So it
is with Inside the Shadow Government. Harry Helms, an electronics
expert who has published widely on both civilian and covert radio,
comes across neither as a conspiracy theorist nor as a militia member
holed up inside a Montana bunker, but as a serious thinker who has
done his homework. This is a work of history, not wild speculation,
for facts, after all, are more shocking, and frightening, than fiction.
Helms carefully traces the history of the U.S. government's emergency
backup plans: Their World War II inception, their growth during
the Cold War, their procedures and facilities, and how they changed
after September 11. Of the most concern is the government's plans
for declaring martial law in case of widespread civil disturbance,
taking over the media (more so, at least, than the corporations
have already done), and arresting, or even killing, American civilians
without due process (which has precedent with FDR's interment of
Japanese-Americans during World War II, and which the recent protests
in Miami have shown are all
too likely to happen again). There are black helicopters
and Area 54 references, all right—but Area 54 only serves to
illustrate how the government can seize and control land at a whim,
and the black helicopters' mission is to literally fly over the
Fourth Amendment as they search for drugs.
All of
this is publicly available information and reasonable reading between
the lines—no Deep Throats here—but it is clearly laid
out and organized into a coherent narrative, with both the possibilities
and the balanced truths laid out. (For instance, military handbooks
consider declaring martial law a very serious matter, and even during
the L.A. Riots, when such a measure might have been justified, authororities
were not swift to bring in the National Guard.) On the downside,
though, Helms could have included a more comprehensive bibliography
and list of sources—though the reprinting of key documents
is a valuable addition.
It would
have been easy to paint the concealed workings of power in our nation
as some sinister, omnipotent force, but Helms avoids this trap.
Rather, he shows it as the bumbling giant it is, with military patrols
mistakenly shooting innocent civilians in their drug-interdiction
sweeps and military units frightening inner-city neighborhoods,
swooping in, guns blazing, in nighttime training exercises, the
only forewarning the roar of low-flying helicopters. The questions
Helms raises are as old as politics: Who will guard the guardians?
And, in this age of with-us-or-against-us moral absolutes, how can
we preserve our civil liberties?
In the
end, Helms points out, the cloak-and-dagger methods of the Shadow
Government were already in place on September 11, where they failed
miserably. It was only the passengers of United Flight 93, who,
informed of what their situation was, discussed matters amongst
themselves and then decided to take action, who had any effect on
the terrorists' plans. In a true democracy, the surest guarantee
of security is an informed, activist population.
Click
here
to order Inside the Shadow Government from the Feral House
Web site.
Informants
write editor@corporatemofo.com
Posted
December 14, 2003 4:59 PM