OPINION:
A few friends of extraterrestrials got together the other day at the National Press Club, where there’s usually a couple of guys at the bar eager for a good story, to hold a Citizen Hearing on Disclosure, a “mock congressional hearing” on human encounters with extraterrestrials. The friends of the extraterrestrials are trying to pressure the U.S. government to release classified information about uninvited beings from space, but the government isn’t biting.
The sponsor of the “hearings” is something called Paradigm Research Group. It last tried to bring the subject of extraterrestrials to government attention in 2011, and failed. Paradigm intends to use video footage from the hearings to make a movie about what it calls a government cover-up of alien life.
Five former representatives and a former senator were paid $20,000 each to give the proceedings the appearance of a congressional hearing. Nothing looks more alien to most folks than a bunch of congressmen, and the public is always eager to hear stories about government cover-ups. Roscoe G. Bartlett, who once represented a Maryland district, said for the “record” that “it is very arrogant and presumptive to believe this is the only place where life exists in the universe.” Lynn Woolsey, another former lawmaker, said the idea was “to ask the questions the public wants to hear.” Richard French, a former Air Force lieutenant colonel who flew combat missions in Korea, described his direct contact with extraterrestrial beings. He told an interviewer for the Epoch Times that the alien skin was “slightly cool,” and they “did not talk” but seemed to communicate in some way. Alien or not, visitors like that are more desirable than in-laws who won’t go home.
Forty assorted international and military witnesses gave testimony about their encounters and the hurdles they’ve faced telling the public about it. Since all reports of extraterrestrial contact become classified at once, there’s no way to prove or disprove what the government knows, if anything. Conspiracy theories, like goblins and ghosts, thrive in the silence of dark attics and other mysterious places. The government does occasionally comment. Phil Larson, the White House spokesman on science, said after the 2011 “hearings” that the U.S. government has no evidence of extraterrestrial life, or of any contact. “In addition, there is no credible information to suggest that any evidence is being hidden from the public’s eye.”
The possibility of extraterrestrial life has captivated the public for years. Orson Welles famously terrorized some people with a fake broadcast, clearly labeled as fake, of landings by Martians in 1938. In 1947, when everybody was seeing flying saucers, a mysterious flying object crashed near the New Mexico town of Roswell. The government said the craft was debris from an experimental high-altitude surveillance balloon. A government denial was all the proof a lot of people needed.
Paradigm told the New York Daily News that it initially offered 55 former members of Congress $10,000 each to participate in the session at the press club. When Paradigm got no takers, the offer was doubled, and several formers took it.
UFO fans around the world were patched in via live video link, with booths of translators providing coverage in Spanish, Arabic, Hindi, Japanese and Mandarin. Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam, dropped by with a dozen or so of his security guards. An interesting time was had by all, but there were no takers from the guys at the bar.
The Washington Times
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