Do You Believe in Magic?

It's May Day folks, which means its also the first of the month. And that means, besides celebrating the Rites of Spring in your own peculiar way, you've also got a brand new, exclusive episode of The Farm to add to the festivities. That is if you're a subscriber, of course.  

This is an exclusive installment in The Farm's ongoing "The Secret History of Ufology" series. Joining me for this round is Erica Lukes of UFO Classified. Erica is a former member of MUFON, first working as a field investigator and later becoming a State Director for Utah. She's also been a guest on such TV shows as History's Ancient Aliens and The Travel Channel's UFOs: The Lost Evidence. 

Erica's background is especially apt for the topic of discussion: the Mutual UFO Network, more commonly known as MUFON. On the surface, MUFON may not seem like the sexiest topic, but that's probably because you haven't been paying attention. MUFON is undoubtedly one of the sleaziest and most corrupt organizations active today. The upper echelons have been deeply implicated in a host of outrages, including pedophilia, sexual entrapment, data mining, and right-wing extremism. And that's just MUFON's "Inner Circle."

Rank-and-file members are routinely exploited by the organization. Simply filing a report with MUFON can lead one to losing the copyright to their encounter account (seriously). Personal data turned over to MUFON has likely been sold to a host of shadowy companies. And if you expect anyone to be qualified who works with MUFON, forget it: Being anything from a field investigator to a member of the Inner Circle is determined by nothing other than how much cash you're willing to pony up. To cap it off, former members who have come forward have often been subjected to gang stalking and other forms of harassment. 

And those are just a few of the topics we touch upon. Also up for discussion are the Mormon mafia, nonlethal weapons, the dark uses of the real estate industry, personality profiling, and the real possibility of a QAnon-style operation breaking out in the UFO field. It's a fascinating talk chalk full of original research and first-hand accounts of the inner workings of MUFON. As always, I hope you guys enjoy. 

Erica is the latest in an ever-growing collection of exclusive shows for The Farm's subscribers. Prior guests include Diana Walsh-Pasulka, Richard B. Spence, Christopher Knowles, Douglas Valentine, Adam Gorightly, Walter Bosley, Greg Bishop, J. Michael "Doctor Future" Bennett, David Metcalfe, Neil Sanders, Edmund Berger, and Samuel Vandiver. Coming up soon will be my interview with Radix Verum of Patriot's Soapbox, in which she will provide an insider's account of the origins of Q. 

Plantation Intrigues

Many strange things have happened before, during, and after the inauguration of Joe Biden as the 46th president of these United States. Recently, a little more light had has been shed on one of the more notable curiosities surrounding Inauguration Day. It was then that an obscure company in South Florida suddenly announced to the world that it had taken over the management of an enormous chunk of idle space of Internet owned by he Department of Defense. 

In the following weeks, speculation has been rampant concerning this move. The Pentagon was finally forced to clarify matters recently. Reportedly, these moves were made to allow the military to "assess, evaluate and prevent unauthorized use of DoD IP address space" and to "identify potential vulnerabilities" so as to defend against cyberattacks. 

As to the former, the Pentagon has to routinely contend with unauthorized squatters setting up shop on it's Internet space. Chasing off these squatters is likely in play, but the military may also be planning on collecting "a massive amount of background internet traffic for threat intelligence.” The end game could be to set up some type of digital honeypot to draw in hackers, or even set up an infrastructure to scour traffic for suspect activity. 

What no one seems to grok is the company selected for these efforts --Global Resource Systems LLC. Red flags abound, starting with the outfit's name. A prior incarnation of Global Resource Systems operated in the same South Florida city during the first decade of the twenty-first century. The prior incarnation dealt in spam mail and shut down more than a decade ago. The new GRS is an LLC rather than a corporation, but appears to be using the same Internet routing identifier. Naturally, no explanation has been put forth as to why a Pentagon contractor would be taking on the persona of a spam mail outfit.  

GRS Mach II has no online presence as yet. The LLC was originally incorporated in Delaware by a Beverly Hills lawyer, and only seems to exist physically in a shared workspace above a bank. And yet, it reportedly controls more Internet space than China Telecom, AT&T, or Comcast. 

The Beverly Hills attorney is one Raymond Saulino. Previously, Saulino had ties to a company called Packet Forensics. This outfit specialized in selling forged security credentials to government agencies and law enforcement so to make it easier for them to spy on people's browsing history. The company was eventually able to parlay these skills into a DARPA contract. In theory, the capabilities Packet Forensics specializes in would be ideal for staging a cyberattack false flag --something that's been a growing concern in recent years. Of course, only the Russians, the Chinese, or other "rogue" regimes would ever dream of doing such a thing. The US's interest is surely only for "defensive" purposes. 

For me, the most interesting thing about Global Resource Systems LLC is it's location: Plantation, FL. Part of the Miami/Fort Lauderdale area, Plantation is not known for much. While somewhat more affluent than other, nearby areas, it's not an especially rich region by the standards of Miami. Nor is it especially economically viable. 

A Magical Place

GRS may have chosen Plantation for it's headquarters because it's such an unassuming location in one of the most economically significant areas of the US. However, there just happens to be another curious company based out Planation. It goes by then name of Magic Leap (ML). 

ML was founded in 2010 by a biomedical engineer named Rony Abovitz. For a time, much effort was put forward to hype up Abovitz as the next bro tech billionaire a la Elon Musk. Almost every profile I've read of him is quick to point out his love of sci-fi. We are also assured he has a unique way of viewing the world, that he builds "wealth through people" (just as every despot throughout human history has....), and that he he values diversity. 

Circa 2016, with the neo-liberal organ Wired leading the charge, it was proclaimed that Abovitz was engaged in a "Quest to Create a New King of Reality." Abovitz and ML were going to manage this through a "new" type of technology known as "augmented reality." In reality, AR is just a variation of the same type of virtual reality tech that's been available since the late 1980s. The major difference between AR and VR is that the latter attempts to immerse the player in an entirely digital world. In the case of AR, the real world and objects in it are "enhanced" by "computer-generated perceptual information." As with VR, headsets are a requirement of AR, along with other bulky equipment worn over the body so as to more completely immerse the player in the experience. 

Magic Leap's headset and related tech were said to be the best. Numerous accounts of it breathlessly likened it to the Oasis of Ready Player One or the Metaverse of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash. In fact, ML dug the Snow Crash comparison so much that the company even hired Stephenson as the company's "chief futurist." 

Nor was Stephenson the only hipster cred ML attempted to attract. Game designer Graeme Devine, creator of The 7th Guest and The 11th Hour, was brought in as the "Chief Creative Officer." The big catch, however, was surely effects designer Richard Taylor, the founder and head of Weta Workshops. Taylor and his company are best down for providing the bulk of the effects for Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies. The connection to Taylor and Weta provided ample opportunities for Jackson to drop by ML to observe the future of entertainment, especially when the company happened to be doing a certain type of entertaining involving journalists. 

Remarkably, it worked. During the middle of the past decade, a lot of companies were buying into the hype around ML --literally. During it's big coming out party in 2014, ML raised over $500 million in investment. Among the contributors were Google, Qualcomm, and venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins. The most remarkable part is that none of these companies reportedly knew exactly what they were investing in when they opened their wallets. All that mattered was that Abovitz was ready to revolutionize technology any day. 

Of course, it wasn't just the entertainment industry Magic Leap was trying to revolutionize. Amidst much less fanfare, the company also set it's sites (har har) on those plush, juicy defense contracts. Nor is this surprising in the least. Despite all the bold projections about how ML would change the ways stories were told, product roll out has been problematic, to put mildly. The truth is, no one really seems to know if AR has long term commercial viability. 

Military applications are a different story. They already exist and will likely only grow in the coming years. ML appears to have been a little late to recognize this. The only brought in a big shot defense director in 2018. It didn't take long for military interest to pick up after that. By 2019, the US Navy was using ML headsets. 

ML headsets being used by the US Navy for training exercises

It all appears to have been to little, to late, however. Towards the end of March 2021, rival Microsoft was awarded a sought after contract to deliver AR headsets to the Army. This was one in a string of setbacks ML experienced beginning in 2020. In the spring of that year, it laid off nearly a thousand of its employees and dropped its commercial business. The pandemic was blamed, but it wasn't enough to save founder Rony Abovitz. After several years of media hype, he was unceremonially forced out of the company. In 2019, Magic Leap was valued at $6.7 billion dollars. By September 2020, it had fallen to $450 million, a loss of 93% of its value. The Microsoft deal this year was probably the final nail in the coffin. 

Undoubtedly, we'll never know what exactly happened behind the scenes. No doubt, there were political considerations. The Microsoft deal being green lit months after Biden took office is likely not coincidental. Its also quite ominous. One of the major issues raised concerning the use of AR in the military is the ease with which the tech can be hacked. And of course, Microsoft's security appears to have been greatly compromised by a recent cyberattack. Kind of seems like a recipe for disaster --not that anyone asked me. 

Was Magic Leap simply not as incompetent or corrupt as their counterparts in Microsoft? Possibly, but perhaps their purpose has simply been fulfilled. One of the most interesting names linked to the company is the one of Sean Stewart. Stewart has worn many hats over the course of his media career, but he is principally known for his work in the alternate reality game (ARG) field, where he is considered a pioneer. Stewart was involved in setting up early ARGs such as The Beast and Ilovebees. Stewart co-founded two companies, 42 Entertainment and Fourth Wall Studios, that were among the first to specialize in the commercial applications of ARGs. 

Stewart

Thus, I found it most interesting that Stewart put in five years with Magic Leap, first as a consultant, and later as a "creative director." Stewart's tenure with the company ended in April 2020, just as the lay offs were kicking in. Certainly, it's interesting to see a guy with this kind of background working for a company based out of what was going to be a highly contested state during the 2020 election. Just saying. 

And what of this Global System Resources outfit springing up as a major force in Plantation just as ML appears to throwing in the towel?  Is it all a feign, with a new, militarized version of ML rising from the ashes after a lifeline or two from GSR? Only time will tell, but it's truly odd these highly secretive, defense-related tech companies ended up in the same obscure Florida city in recent years. These developments certainly warrant keeping an eye on. 

Non-lethals

Since we're speculating on tech with military applications, why not cover some non-lethal weapons? This is a subject once again making headlines, and in some remarkable ways. Most notably, how casually mainstream publications are acknowledging directed-energy weapons as a thing. 

It all started with a re-evaluation of "Havana syndrome." Remember that? It occurred several years ago, and involved American diplomats in Cuban and Russia experiencing unusual system. Initially, there were rumblings of some type of sonic weapon being used. Eventually, this explanation was brushed aside in favor of more "reasonable" culprits, such as the sounds of crickets causing the unusual injuries reported. 

Fear the cricket...

Now it turns out, the cricket explanation may not have been entirely accurate either. Reports are coming out that the initial investigation was botched, and that the possibility of non-lethals being used is so probable that the CIA felt the need to create a task force to study the matter. It's interesting to note that the reports of the CIA task force on this matter first began to emerge a little over a month after Biden took office. 

Then in April 2021, the Pentagon massively raised the stakes. It alleged that US forces were targeted with directed-energy weapons in Syria. In the same breath, they blamed the Russians for these attacks. Curiously, these reports started to come out after Congressional lawmakers were briefed on these attacks by "Pentagon officials." When these same lawmakers questioned General Frank McKenzie, the head of CenCom, about these reports, he informed them that he had seen "no evidence" of such attacks against US troops in the Middle East. 

In fairness to General McKenzie, it's probably the Special Operations Command (SOCOM) rather than CenCom that's directing the war in Syria. Thus, McKenzie is not in the chain of command for this one. And the chain of command is so important in the military, unless you happen to be a member of the Flynn family. 

Politico further hints at a SOCOM link when it noted that the Pentagon's Office of Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict (SO/LIC) initiated an investigation into directed-energy weapons being used against US troops in Syria during 2020. The Assistant Secretary of Defense who heads the SO/LIC is the principal civilian responsible for oversight of the SOCOM. 

This is interesting on a few levels. For one, it further reinforces the interest SOCOM has in non-lethals. But beyond this, there's who headed the SO/LIC during 2020: Eventual Secretary of Defense Christopher C. Miller; and Ezra Cohen-Watnick, a notorious lackey of Michael Flynn's. We've already explored some of the recent intrigues involving the Miller/ECW duo during the final week's of Trump's presidency. If either or both of these characters are the ones who initiated this investigation, it raises some interesting possibilities. 

Batman and the Boy Wonder: Miller (top) and ECW (bottom)

Effectively both the CIA and SOCOM, the two principal bodies responsible for covert operations in the national security state (and at times, intense rivals of one another), are actively investigating the use of non-lethals on US personnel by "foreign actors" (aka the Russians). This is all quite fascinating in light of the looming UFO Disclosure, which will be unfolding soon. Hype has apparently built to the point that Forbes had pondered whether 2021 will be the year of the UFO. 

Certainly, there have been a lot of interesting developments during the run up. Shortly before the COVID bill was signed, the bizarre monolith LARP broke out, first nationally, then internationally. But it started in the state of Utah, which is highly significant to modern Ufology due to the Mormon connection. Popular Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson has been flogging the UFO Disclosure narrative on a regular basis. John Ratcliffe, Trump's former Director of National Intelligence, has been hyping reports collected by the military. And of course, the military played in a role in the hype after it confirmed the authenticity of several dubious videos in the spring of 2020. 

In certain circles, there has been speculation that the UFO Disclosure narrative will be used as a means of rolling out the US Military's new, high tech toys --toys that may (this will surely never be confirmed) be based upon reverse engineered alien tech. I suspect these toys will be based upon concepts that have been researched in the non-lethal field (i.e. directed-energy weapons) for some time. 

In this context, it makes a lot of sense to have the CIA and SOCOM investigating the non-lethal tech of China and Russia. If I'm correct, then it can be claimed their weapons derive from a similar source, further bolstering the claims of the US intelligence community. And just imagine the kind of escalations that could occur with those types of weapons of massive destruction. 

Mind you, I really hope I'm way off base on this one. The temptation is always to chalk UFO Disclosure up as another round of confidence games. But there's just something about this one that seems ever so slightly off. And with recent develops in Ufology (see today's interview with Erica Lukes) that's led to increased fanaticism, a perfect storm-type scenario could be unfolding before our eyes. 

Again, I hope I'm way off base, but stay alert folks and don't buy into the hype during the coming weeks. And with that I shall sign off for now. Until next time, stay tuned.