While
looking through an interesting tangent to the Ed Snowden spy case - spy,
leaker, terrorist thing, I was struck how easy it is to get clearance in the US
these days. I recalled the case of bad FBI spy Robert Hanssen
who
before he was arrested was rubbing elbows with the powerful in the Opus Dei
Parish of Scalia, Freeh, LaPierre and Santorum in a Latin Mass. Of course,
Hanssen was not a regular parish member of St Catherine of Sienna in Great
Falls Virginia. It was however with all the rich right wing Catholics in the
suburbs a convenient place to hang out and to have cover so to speak to drop important secret Government documents in the
woods nearby.
Hanssen
probably had to bust his butt at the FBI for twenty years before he got the
clearances he had to even be able to begin to sell out U.S. Government secrets to the Russkies.
These
days, any high school, army, dropout can get the kind of clearance Robert
Hanssen probably is still dreaming about in his lifetime prison cell.
Of
course these days, spies don’t have to muck about the woods in Virginia to sell
Government secrets (small “s’), they just have to send an e-mail on the
Internet. But then again, Snowden is not a spy? Did not do what he did for
money? Etc.
At least he has no discernible religion or designated Virginia parish. TG lol
I
read a brief story somewhere on the Internet about how the last great American
Spy Robert Hanssen was pinching pennies on his mean stingy FBI salary and
supplemental spy payments, how he was about to retire and looking for a
security consultant job no doubt in the Rich Virginia burbs run-a-muck with
Security Consultants who no longer these days put a shingle out on the street
but merely have a web page.
Which
brings us briefly to Senator Claire McCaskill getting hot and bothered about
some fly by night security consulting firm in Virginia that gave Ed Snowden top
secret security clearance mainly because he had the right references from the
right people in the Beltway?
Whatever.
I
got lost on the internet trying to look up Falls Church Virginia and Great
Falls Virginia. I always get those two places mixed up. I would not have made a good Hanssen classic era spy. And forget about me trying to get around all the pipes that connect the Internet thingy.
Whatever
again.
On
a possible tangent, a dated but Interesting Rick Santorum Article:
The church claims 3,400 parishioners. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia and his wife attend Mass there; at one time or another,so have Redskinsquarterbacks , the head of the National Rifle Association *, and former FBI director Louis Freeh. (Members of the Branch Davidians once blocked the parking lot with a protest targeted at Freeh after the Waco raid, someone familiar with St. Catherine told me.) The church also suffered brief notoriety eleven years ago when FBI agent Robert Hanssen—then a member of the congregation—was arrested for selling intelligence to Russia. Mostly, the church is home to families with school-aged children—“big families, seven-, eight- or nine-children families,” as one parishioner told me. (None of the half-a-dozen parishioners I interviewed would agree to be quoted by name, and the parish office declined interview requests.) Bishop Anton Justs of Jelgava, Latvia, who oversaw the creation of St. Catherine in 1981 as a reverend in Arlington, wrote in an email that its wealthy congregants are known for generosity. “The Catholic Church Community in Great Falls is very dedicated, intellectual and keeps strongly to Christian values … The people of the parish have been very generous in terms of contributions to the church and humanitarian aid abroad. It has been over 20 years since I left St. Catherine, but people write to me, and at Christmas time enclose a check.”
Before the GOP race began, members of the church say, Santorum attended Mass with his family nearly every day. Even with his wife, Karen, now joining him on the campaign trail, several parishioners told me that the Santorums ensure that their children attend Mass almost daily by having other congregants drive them to St. Catherine.
The day I attended, about 100 parishioners, among them many parents with small children, were gathered for a subdued, half-hour Mass without a homily. An additional group of about 30 young, red sweater-clad children, from the Catholic Montessori school on the grounds, were ushered in by teachers and a nun. Most of the parishioners who were there, many explained to me after, can be seen at Mass every day. The new Mass translation implemented at the end of last November, which most Catholics are still getting acclimated to, was already second-nature to them.
* "head of the National Rifle Association" – (Wayne LaPierre?)
Wheels within Wheels.
Suburban Bubbles within Surburan Bubbles?
.
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