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If anyone can read this and /not/ believe that the security state is very much active in a covert way on social media, reddit, and even specialized forums like this...

I realize that to suggest that, say, some proportion of the reddit mods are on the payroll of a .gov alphabet agency sounds like tinfoil hat territory, but it would have been dramatically crazier in the 50's to suggest that the CIA was funding socialist literary magazines, art galleries, and the like.

How is it tinfoil hat territory when we have been leaked information confirming what you said?

We really need to ditch the tinge of conspiracy "theory" when we talk about these issues, they're backed up by primary sourced evidence that wasn't tampered with and corroborated by insiders that are independent from each other. If this were science, this would be as much evidence as we would have for the primary working hypothesis to describe the phenomena.

We need to stop classifying whole swaths of ideas as junk because they sound too similar to 'conspiracy theories'. This dogma is unspeakably harmful to the truth and is easy to cultivate by those on the other end, by those who would be served better if the opposition were bearers of tinfoil, not bearers of bad news. Most of it is bullshit, sure, but most people are indeed 'sheep' (for lack of a better word), they don't do any sort of digging to figure out the truth for themselves. Whoever gets to them first earns the right to spread their own opinion, since the first opinion is the hardest to change.
Really? I'd have thought it was a pretty uncontroversial claim that government agencies were funding anti-communist media organizations in the middle of the Cold War (when, let's face it, they were doing it quite openly in many instances). I wouldn't be at all surprised to they are doing something similar with moderate Islamic organizations and interfaith dialogue groups (not to mention many anodyne business ventures with roots in the Middle East) today.

But suggesting that censoring the anti-authoritarian playground that is Reddit or persuading Hacker Newsers of the virtues of the TSA are sufficiently high on their list of current national security priorities to dedicate manpower to in our current environment just seems... rather more of a stretch.

If they are attempting to astroturf these particular corners of the internet it's something of an understatement to say they're not very good at it.

Edward Walker has a dissertation and book ("Grassroots for Hire") which includes data on modern-day commercial astroturfing, https://qualpolicomm.wordpress.com/2014/10/06/q-a-with-ed-wa...

"Walker examines the “back stage” work that public affairs professionals do to organize the “front stage” of public participation on behalf of various clients in part by incentivizing, coordinating, and orchestrating engagement ... the book does open up a new agenda .. on a variety of topics including public trust in advocacy groups (and its consequences) .. and also broader questions about the consequences of professionally-facilitated advocacy ... we also need to know more about how these campaigns affect corporate bottom lines, similar to how others have studied the effects of protests on stock prices."

Not just literary magazines and social media.

For instance, I went to an art exhibition in Berlin a couple of years back to see a retrospective of mid 20th century painting, and some of the info-cards claimed that the CIA sponsored a lot of the avant-garde US and European artists as a way to reject Soviet Social Realism movement. To show in a way that art in the West was freer in its imagination, execution, and scope. Quick Google, here's[1] a piece from the British newspaper, the Independent form 1995 :)

It is interesting that despotic regimes tend to persecute intellectuals and artists whereas the CIA, though far from lily-white, seems to have done the opposite. Though I'd say the dossier on Chomsky is a mile long!

[1] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-w...

For something a bit more concrete. Take a look at what IARPA is funding and has funded in the past.

http://www.iarpa.gov/index.php/research-programs

This may not go far in answering your questions regarding government funded sock puppets, but it gives an idea of what they're interested in. Basically they're interested in damn near everything, and they're willing to spend large sums of money investigating what works.

iirc there was a Powerpoint slide in one of Snowden's leaks that basically explicitly discussed manipulation of such fora. I post this in hopes someone who recalls better links to it.
"Through the CCF, as well as by more direct means, the CIA became a major player in intellectual life during the Cold War—the closest thing that the U.S. government had to a Ministry of Culture. This left a complex legacy. During the Cold War, it was commonplace to draw the distinction between “totalitarian” and “free” societies by noting that only in the free ones could groups self-organize independently of the state. But many of the groups that made that argument—including the magazines on this left—were often covertly-sponsored instruments of state power, at least in part. Whether or not art and artists would have been more “revolutionary” in the absence of the CIA’s cultural work is a vexed question; what is clear is that that possibility was not a risk they were willing to run. "

I wonder if the CIA really stopped being the Ministry of Culture?

The roots of cultural control go further back than the Cold War. Arguably it was Edward Bernays, father of public relations, who used his uncle Sigmund Freud's theories about humans being irrational economic actors motivated by primal instincts of fear, sex, and so on, to sell them products they didn't need.

The U.S. Government (and many around the world, including nazi Germany, whose head of propaganda admired Bernays) adapted these techniques as means to control people, or at least keep them from going out of control (Bolshevik Revolution, Naziism, etc). The popular image of the happy-go-lucky 1950s wasn't just how things "turned out to be," it was a concerted government effort to create the ideal and stable society that wouldn't overthrow the government.

You can see the same influence today in ideological news networks using compelling and vapid distractions instead of keeping focus on the "real" issues.

The BBC made a great documentary on this subject: "Century of the Self."

What culture? Fox News, Professional Sports, and reality TV? I miss the days when intellectuals were pandered to. Now they are just irrelevant.
I assume that's a rhetorical question...
Did anyone actually read why these magazines were "highly ranked"?

> the CIA actually thought that Levitas’s anti-Communism was too ferocious, unrelenting, and “conservative.” ... the CIA wanted a more moderate and “sophisticated” voice ... The New Leader remained progressive in the context of U.S. domestic politics; it was one of the first publications to publish Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail.

> Like other magazines affiliated with the Congress for Cultural Freedom, Mundo Nuevo published essays critical of U.S. policy in Latin America and Vietnam. Its usefulness, from the U.S. government’s point of view, consisted in its defense of the responsibility of the artist as an independent critic of power ...

I'm probably the only one in this thread, but I actually think some of these cases fall short of crimes against humanity.

I mean, of all the dirty secret squirrel things governments do, if I had to pick, then (1) funding the early publication of 'Letter from a Birmingham Jail' and (2) encouraging artists to challenge entrenched power (to include US policy) would be pretty high on my list.

> I'm probably the only one in this thread, but I actually think some of these cases fall short of crimes against humanity.

There's little evidence here of readers objecting to the CIA having funded literary journals during the Cold War. (They funded a lot of things, including great musicians [1]. It's surprising what good taste they had.) Mostly the thread consists of extrapolation to present affairs—maybe not the most substantive discussion because it's so speculative, but probably unavoidable.

1. http://www.openculture.com/2014/03/louis-armstrong-plays-his...

So it's not "when did the CIA become a rogue actor", but rather "which stuff did the CIA fund", right?

Also, is there anything like a "free market" in the US? It appears that some government agency or another is financing things, or feeding info to entities in just about every single market. This has been going on since WW2, at least. So when do I get to scoff at any mention of a "free market"?

Free markets are about freedom of choice in participation - freedom to create a business, take or leave a job, freedom to product or buy the products you want. It's about economic freedom.

That the CIA interfered with things doesn't change the fact that people are still free to do those things. You could argue about whether people really free to not buy a diamond ring to announce an engagement or not, in the same way the CIA has been influencing and financing operations. But the fact of the matter is there is no state actors forcing you to do such things.

In recent years I've started entertaining a bit of a heresy. I wouldn't say I believe this, but it's at least a question worth asking:

Is there actually any such thing as a "grassroots" movement?

Over the years I've seen so many unmasked as the product of someone or something with deep pockets: corporations, think tanks, governments. At the very least it's hard for me to think of any movement where major institutions didn't play some role.

Intelligence agencies seem to figure prominently too, and not necessarily in the areas you would think. The 60s counterculture was in part seeded by CIA LSD research, and Tor was funded by the US Department of Naval Intelligence (to provide two random examples).

Is it possible for a movement to spawn purely out of a cultural vacuum? Sure. I'm sure the people in the Tea Party think so.

Thing is, once the people notice opportunity, it isn't long until money and power follow suit. And even then it's hard to determine what was genuine feeling or subversive influence, or complex forces of history we can't even recognize. The dead are a presence among the living

You'd have to say that - yes, there is such a thing.

But gaining momentum and power requires money and leadership. Unless a grassroots movement can create those things themselves - which would be quite rare - inevitably a true grassroots movement is going to be co-opted by someone seeking to use their popularity. Thus the origins of the movement are always likely to be questioned by the opponents, because plenty of evidence of funding and leadership are going to appear. Placing them in a chronological order to determine the 'grassrootedness' of the movement is going to be tricky, unless someone kept very careful notes. Which is also very unlikely.

Occupy.

(Note that this is not necessarily a good thing -- Occupy's leaderless, grassroots-über-alles nature is a big part of why it eventually tore itself apart.)

GNU software? It's hard to imagine big coroporations pushed that.
I think that progressives (especially Chomsky) overstate the role of hard power/money in politics. Or perhaps they understate the role of soft power. E.g. the progressive movement in the West is driven by a relatively small group of academics and journalists. It is notable how many social sciences professors are self-professed Marxists. I don't see this in a conspiratorial way (as some do), of Marxists seeking to push an agenda. But rather, the core of the progressive movement are people who think that both the economic, and also the political and social realm, are characterized by power, domination and oppression. If you don't believe this about economics, it's much harder to believe this about the rest.
"Is there actually any such thing as a "grassroots" movement?"

I would hope that this would be an easy question to answer, simply by identifying some minor thing you have done that would qualify as - even as the germ of - grassroots action.

I can think of one or two things I have done myself that would fall into that category, and I would hope that would be the case for everyone. Even if it's minor (as mine have been) if it welled up from within you it is ipso facto the start of a grassroots movement.

Yes, there are plenty of people starting grassroots movements. However, once it gets big, it will start attracting attention and infiltrators.
How about movements that direct money towards smaller or local entities? It's hard for me to imagine the eat local / farmers market movement as being quietly backed by corporations.
Bitcoin, but like any of those could be hijacked by a group with an ulterior motive.

LSD and Tor were developed by the US government, but took on a life of their own, quite the opposite of what is described in the article.

By the way, one magazine like that still exists.

CIA, using Ford Foundation, co-founded the Brazillian publisher "Abril", their flagship magazine is called "Veja" (it translates to "See"), it is a sort of centrist magazine (its views resemble the US democratic party, in Brazil this is right of most parties, so the hardcore brazillian left consider "Veja" extreme right-wing, but actual right-wingers consider the magazine as left).

It is interesting that although they do spouse many positions that the brazillian right wing consider left, the magazine usually is supportive of US, the few times it said something against the US is when the US pulled some obviously evil stunt (ie: something that even a stupid and ignorant person can perceive as evil).

I had a hobby of buying "Veja" and "Carta Capital" (It translates to "Capital Letter"), the CC magazine is clearly leftist, usually supporting the obviously marxist and communist parties, also CC magazine is very critical of US, it is not uncommon to see Veja and CC make reports on the same thing, with completely different conclusions, or see Veja and CC taking stealth jabs at each other (example: insulting someone that has a position the other has, without naming the other directly).

"CIA, using Ford Foundation, co-founded the Brazillian publisher "Abril"

Source?

Czeslaw Milosz wrote that it was very clear that there was American government money behind the Congress for Cultural Freedom--one didn't need inside information to figure it out.
These are not the only magazines CIA funded. They where very active in the (radical) feminist movement and funded among other "Ms." and Gloria Steinem, who also was sent to Moscow for Socialist meet-ups, payed by the same.

Also this movement is rooted in socialism (to primarily break down the family union, as we can see today). No one can say feminism is not influential in the world today.

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloria_Steinem#CIA_ties ->

http://www.namebase.org/steinem.html http://www.namebase.org/foia/festival.html

And in an interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HRUEqyZ7p8

https://www.marxists.org/archive/kollonta/1920/communism-fam...

It's obviously not any news that CIA and similar agencies sponsor disruptive activities all over the world as long as they see fit to their own interest. So-called "democracy" and "freedom" etc. are just all convenient excuses, pretext of war. Maybe the only interesting thing here is the assertion that apparently leftists don't only fight capitalists, they also fight totalitarian regimes which have long abandoned their leftist roots. This might further clarifies things a bit.
Anyone read Eric Schmidt "The New Digital Age", Eric talks about cyberwar, Luddites, and geo politics as it relates to tech and data collection for the government, just replace the word the future with the present.
Communism uses suppression as a means to control the population.

I've never considered the converse, using 'promotion' to control the population.

It's done quite frequently in international geopolitics. Promote the group that is the most sympathetic to you, suppress the opposite.

Maybe if you're extra clever you promote two groups, one to be the clean "moderates" that you will ultimately back, and the other being the dirty "radicals" that you will use to brutally suppress your opponents. Wait til the job is done, then dispose of the radicals. I'm sure this has happened before.

Dictatorships use suppression. Communism is a style of collective government. The USSR was never communist, the government merely used the lexicon of communism to suit its needs.
Hm, wonder if samclemens reads Marxmail.... Louis sent this out a couple hours before you posted it here so thought it might be the case :)
So is it just socialist publications, then? No publications of other ideological bents deserving of similar scrutiny? Fantastic.
The Soviet Union was a dictatorship. Democratic socialists are natural foes of dictatorships the world over.
Subthread detached from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10118981 and marked off-topic.
Democratic socialists are quite capable of forming dictatorships themselves. See: Venezula under Hugo Chavez and Nicaragua under Daniel Ortega.
Quote from "Tempo presente", the Italian magazine in the list (first number, opening text):

> [...] sono incerti e problematici i confini del nostro mondo morale; incerte le norme del comportamento individuale; incerti il significato e i limiti dell'azione politica quale oggi la si pratica o la si propugna; incerto soprattutto il valore delle idee e delle ideologie correnti.

> [...] uncertain and problematic are the confines of our moral world; uncertain the norms of individual behavior; uncertain the meaning and limits of the political action practiced or defended today; uncertain most of all the value of current ideas and ideologies.

source: http://www.bibliotecaginobianco.it/flip/TEP/01/0100/#/3/zoom...

The US financed Bin Laden and the Afghani Mujaheddin to counterbalance the Soviets in Central Asia in the 80s despite the clear signs of Islamic terrorism gathering pace in the late 70s destabilizing the region and the middle east as well.

So all bets are off with these people.

George Orwell wrote in 1984 about how much effort was put into propagandizing to the professional-managerial class by the state. He should know, he was an informant against the left for the Foreign Office via Celia Kirwan.

Just go to the front page of the New York Review of Books ( http://www.nybooks.com ). I know I just had to scan the front page to find some article condemning Arab nationalism and of course one is there, "The Mystery of ISIS" by an anonymous author. It contains pictures of people about to be executed, and a picture of someone pointing a gun at the camera, so you can guess what the text is. What it doesn't talk about is how the US in the past supported religious fanatics in the Middle East against the real US enemy - secular, left-leaning pan-Arab nationalists. Just as the US does today. The US supports Saudi Arabia, where women can't drive, yet bombed Libya, just a few years after Qadaffi had given in to the US and UK after years of Nasserite posturing. Now Islamic fundamentalists sprout there. In Iraq, we had another Nasserite, pan-Arab secular nationalist in a party with socialist roots - Saddam Hussein was overthrown and now we have ISIS in Iraq. More recently the pan-Arab secular nationalist in a party with secular roots in Syria has the US and Europe working to undermine his power. This just happened. So now ISIS controls much of Syria, and just blew up an ancient pagan temple. It's quite clear with all its work to undermine Bashar al-Assad that this is what the US was working to have happen. We can go more into the distant past as well - the secular nationalist parliament of Mossadegh being replaced by a dictatorship initially backed by the mullahs by the US/UK in the 1950s, then the persecution and execution of the secular left - eventually the mullahs changed their mind and now Iran is run by them and devoid of the secular liberals that the CIA sent lists around to be executed.

I'm surprised the New York Review of Books doesn't have a nostalgic front-cover piece bashing the Warsaw Pact. Well there were just two on HN's front page the other day. It's great - while the US government is tapping its own citizens and the whole world, extraditing and torturing nationalists who oppose foreign intervention in their home countries, ringing the world with military bases - a US soldier just murdered a Filipino prostitute who he learned was a transvestite, spying on foreign corporations and stealing their industrial secrets, sending drones to willy-nilly bomb villages in Pakistan and Afghanistan and so on, everyone can focus on the errors Lenin commited a century ago, or how some ISIS militants blew up an ancient pagan temple in Syria (who the US helped back by undermining al-Assad's government - in fact investigative reporters have found the US has been actively backing jihadists in Iraq even in recent years).

This comment is completely wrong, infuriatingly so.

I'm a NYRB subscriber. No national publication was more critical of the U.S. Iraq adventure, or more critical of U.S. torture and detention policies. And all this long before it became received wisdom. (A sample, with examples all the way back to 2003: http://www.nybooks.com/contributors/mark-danner/).

Before the war, the editor of the magazine (Robert Silvers), and several of its most influential writers, went on a national speaking tour to expose the risks of the adventure. UCLA wouldn't even let them hold the event there. They had to go to a smaller venue at Occidental College nearby.

It is ignorant and delusional to accuse them of somehow ignoring secular or left-leaning Arabs, and rubber-stamping American projects there.

I suggest, by the way, you read the post on ISIS that you scoffed at (http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/aug/13/mystery...). You seem to have only skimmed the photos. The piece takes the ISIS phenomenon seriously as a political force, and tries to understand where it is headed and why it has been so successful. It ends with:

"I have often been tempted to argue that we simply need more and better information. But that is to underestimate the alien and bewildering nature of this phenomenon. To take only one example, five years ago not even the most austere Salafi theorists advocated the reintroduction of slavery; but ISIS has in fact imposed it. [...] It is not clear whether our culture can ever develop sufficient knowledge, rigor, imagination, and humility to grasp the phenomenon of ISIS. But for now, we should admit that we are not only horrified but baffled."

It is evident that this is not some kind of triumphalist perspective.

Your comment history consists of bashing the US and more bashing the US.