The 9/11 attacks put the CIA on a dramatically different course. The agency went from an emphasis on traditional spy work — collecting intelligence and recruiting foreign spies — to a focus on paramilitary operations.

This quote is a huge lie. The CIA has been involved in paramilitary ops and coups in South America and other places since its inception. This article tries to pin all of the CIAs sins on the Bush administration which is a lie by omission and a hostile lie as it’s praising the agency on the Ukrainian Russian war. This puff piece was meant to make it seem like the CIA is in the moral right to be anti Russia but made a misstep on the war on terror. It’s propaganda and it is a terrible way to stay informed.

Yeah that puff piece was full of lies.

Independent journalist and smaller outlets. Unfortunately places like Vice and The Intercept started out pretty good but they have changed for the worse. But the one place I’d never recommend is any government funded news source and no I don’t care if it’s only a little bit. Also it’s better to follow journalist then to follow outlets. Plenty of journalist write on substack and other places to remain independent.

Much more than one. They are always on the side of the military industrial complex. So is the New York Times so it’s not just npr but acting like they are beyond reproach is dumb.

Lol it’s almost never critical of the US government. It will be critical of certain politicians and policies but rarely will they criticize the US foreign policy. Unless you consider puff pieces like this one for the CIA news you should seriously consider using other sources for foreign policy news.

Good way to only get the US government approved perspective.

I’ve met people from California who now live in Texas and are right leaning and typically they are very right wing. More so than your average Texan. Most older people in Texas don’t like change and are Christian conservatives. The right wingers from California feel different to me. I’ll use the term neo reactionary to describe them, but they are the no regulations, meritocracy, pro eugenics types. You can’t use the old school stuff like “what would Jesus do” which would occasionally work on getting the most stubborn conservative Texan on a neo reactionary as they typically don’t believe in God.

I’ll be honest I’ve heard some of their ideas and they frighten me. They imagine a antidemocratic world controlled by AI and tech executives. It’s very different from the conservative Texan ideas I’m used to seeing. The classic Texan conservative wants prayer in school and the freedom to not wear a seatbelt. They can be stubborn and annoying at times but I’m used to it and I think they mean well. I don’t feel the same way about neo reactionaries.

For better or worse California is a forward thinking place but also an exclusive one. It’s also very expensive to live there. The price to live in Austin has gotten crazy high and now there is a much larger homeless population. Austin’s solution to this now mimics San Francisco which is to pretend it’s not happening.

Also California loves regulations for some but not others. For every smart regulation they have some “futuristic” new thing that annoys people. Silicon Valley is basically exempt from regulation at all.

For a recent example the Waymo driverless taxis that break down in the road and cause traffic jams. They are only in 4 cities; LA and San Francisco of course, but now because of the influx of tech workers they are in Austin and Phoenix. Used to be that only San Francisco would be a guinea pig for tech and social experiments but now it’s spreading to where they moved to.