BS: The Goat Whisperers

Subject: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: freda underhill
Date: 02 Oct 05 - 11:34 PM

where is our military money being spent? oh well, i guess this is less toxic than chemical warfare..

read on and bleat..................................................

Farm animals, psychics and the US military. This is a true story, writes Marian Wilkinson.

CAN I say frankly I am deeply envious of Jon Ronson? In all my probing of the US military during my time in America I never discovered the Special Forces' clandestine goat lab. Had I stumbled on this soundproof bunker at Fort Meade, Maryland, I might have been the first with the scoop on the military's secret experiments to use psychic power to kill a goat, a dream that began with General Albert Stubblebine III.

But when probing the weird side of the American military, Ronson, a British writer and documentary maker, is peerless. No one else could persuade Stubblebine, the former US Army intelligence guru, to talk about psyching out animals or his overwhelming belief that one day he would master the art of walking through his office wall, like Captain Kirk in Star Trek. "I really thought they were great ideas," he told Ronson. "I just haven't figured out how my space can fit through that space. I simply kept bumping my nose."

Stubblebine no doubt regrets talking to Ronson. The writer doesn't have a threatening question in his notebook, but he seduced the general into talking about the Pentagon's fascination with psychic powers, revealing another dimension to the US military that is simultaneously wacky and terrifying. Ronson got a lot of help from Stubblebine's proteges, some of whom had cashed in on their secrets with books and radio appearances. "The damn psychic spies should be keeping their damn mouths shut," Stubblebline says, "instead of chit-chatting all over town about what they did".

But what began as Ronson's obsession with finding a psychic goat assassin ended up with a bizarre discovery that US military "PsyOps" in the war on terrorism, includes using popular music as a form of torture. Such songs as I Love You from Barney and Friends and covers of Fleetwood Mac hits were blasted out to prisoners in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay apparently with the aim of breaking their spirit, if not their eardrums. Ronson's often hilarious, and at times horrifying, tales are captured in his book, The Men Who Stare at Goats. It has sold 100,000 copies in the US and Britain.

"I didn't intend to go from slapstick to chilling," Ronson told me from London. "but it's good the structure ended up that way." Although Ronson opens his book with the line, "This is a true story," every turn of the page makes you doubt that anyone, not even the US military, could come up with this stuff. OK, I am prepared to believe Special Forces had a goat lab because your average Special Forces warrior could not handle a dog lab. Apparently, the idea of experimenting on dogs, shooting them, setting their legs in plaster, and perhaps, in the future, stopping their hearts with psychic mind waves was too much. On the other hand, goats, as Ronson explains, have historically made up an unusually large percentage of the estimated 1 million animals on the receiving end of covert experiments in the US Army.

Ronson does finally admit that the only hard evidence of an animal being dropped by psychic power comes in a videotape showing a hamster falling over. This feat was performed by a civilian, Guy Sevelli, who runs a martial arts and dance studio in Cleveland when he's not demonstrating psychic powers to the US military. But Ronson's aim is not proving the facts but finding out what makes people tick, including some of the stranger members of the armed forces. And his deadpan style is at times pure genius.

He describes Sevelli going down to Fort Meade where he is urged by members of the Special Forces to use his psychic powers to kill a goat. After they manage to round up 30 healthy animals, Sevelli picks out No. 16. But, he moans, with the soldiers chanting "kill the goat" in his ear, he loses concentration and No. 17 dropped dead instead.

"Collateral damage?" Ronson asks him flatly.

"Right," says Sevelli.

Ronson is slightly taken aback when I asked him to describe his work. "I call myself a journalist and an author," he says. No, he is not a satirist. He is not a John Safran even though the Brisbane writers festival last weekend understandably paired the two. Neither is he Michael Moore even though he turns his books into very successful documentaries. Ronson's touch is far lighter and a lot funnier. He shot to fame in Britain, where he writes a column for The Guardian, with his first book, Them: Adventures with Extremists. He spent many hours following the conspiracy theorists of the Ku Klux Klan and 3.7-metre lizard men, among others, looking for, "the secret room from which a tiny elite secretly rule the world".

Having dissected the "fringe dwellers", Ronson thought it was only fair to turn his eye on the military. "I see irrationality on my own street and in my own life and I thought, isn't it interesting that these bubbles of irrationality are everywhere. I bet they're there in politics and the military as well." Much to his delight, Them has now been bought by Hollywood and will be made into a movie by the director of Shaun of the Dead, Edgar Wright.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 12:06 AM

Well, I don't know anything about that psychic power stuff, but it's damned well time we had a new thread about goats. The secret mangelwurzel pipeline is all abuzz with "What's going on at the Mudcat? There hasn't been a thread about goats or sheep in months." There've even been calls for high level investigations. Maybe this thread will calm things down. We can only hope so.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: freda underhill
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 12:23 AM

You're so right, Bee Dubya. I knew (intuited, even) that it was time for a goat thread.

best wishes

freda

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: wilbyhillbilly
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 12:28 AM

We have just acquired seven Pygmy Goats, 2 nannies, 2 billys, and 3 kids. They think its a great idea to have a goat thread and have promised to keep me up to date with what is going on in goat world.

By the way, they say that Sevelli is a fraud cos the goat in question actually died laughing, just couldn't believe what was happening.

They told me not to get sheep as these are known to be able to teach humans some bad habits, specially those living in lonely places, don't know what they mean at the moment but I'm working on it.

Glad we got them now, they are brilliant to talk to and surprisingly intelligent.....................................finally found someone to talk to on my level, I knew I would if I waited long enough.


whb

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 10:32 AM

I should get some goats so one of my dogs will stop herding the people around here. Give her something to do. The other dog has gotten tired of it and has resorted to grabbing her by the scruff of the neck and dragging her around like a puppy. In dog, she's saying "Get Over it! How do you like being hauled all over the place?" [dragging motion resumes]

Goats would also save me a lot of work clearing the brush between the back fence and the creek.I bet they could clear in one hour what it will take me a couple of weekends to accomplish.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 11:00 AM

You must have one heckuva backyard to want goats....

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Peace
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 11:12 AM

We see lots of them here, Rapaire.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 11:47 AM

Yup. Here too.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 12:23 PM

I've seen a lot of them in other places. And between some of those other places and here I've also seen Dalls Sheep, which are sometimes confused (by viewers, not by critters) with mountain goats.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 12:52 PM

We got them, too. So does Peace, I betcha.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Peace
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 01:57 PM

Yeppers.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Peace
Date: 03 Oct 05 - 02:13 PM

I have seen Dall's sheep in the Northwest Territories. We have other kinds in Alberta. Never seen a Dall's sheep here however.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: LadyJean
Date: 04 Oct 05 - 12:16 AM

I had a boyfriend who said goats were grounds for divorce. His family tried to raise them. Goats are independent thinkers. He was working at Jamestown, when they got a pair. They spent the morning untying one of the intepreter's aprons.
Terry, my ex boyfriend, used to say goats were grounds for divorce. When he found out I was going to France, he asked for a French post card and I was only too happy to oblige. I got him a cute, funny card with a family of goats on it. Those goats were naked, and one of them was female. Her udder was clearly visible. I don't know why he compalined   
I suspect the lady he married threw it out. Just as well. Who'd want a husband with a French postcard with naked goats on it.

Subject: RE: BS: The Goat Whisperers
From: Ebbie
Date: 04 Oct 05 - 01:22 AM

Years ago, I bought a couple of rural hillside acres that were badly overgrown with scrub trees of all kinds, including many with long thorns. (Try stepping on one of those- each thorn was about an inch and a half long.) I bought a browser goat, an Angora, and for the next few months in the course of clearing the small stuff he followed me all over the place, knowing he was in for some delectations. Sometimes when I was busy I simply turned down some branches so he could reach the leaves. I have seen him balancing on his hind feet as elegantly as a gazelle.

He was a wether so he smelled fine. (When one calls a man 'an old goat' it's usually not a compliment!)