One of their latest manipulation of the system is called the Franklin Center. It's financed largely with their money. It's really a phony wire service. Here is how it works. The center hires right wing wordsmiths -- these so called reporters -- are screened for their ideology at the time of hiring. The Franklin Center then has them cover political and government events that much of the corporate media has stopped covering because of staff cutbacks. Then the center offers the stories free to corporate newspapers in 43 states. The center does not mention that the stories come from a right wing news source and who the funders of the center are. Of course, the Charles and Ed Koch brothers are the Financial Godfathers of the Republican Party. They are John Birch Society revivalists who have a combined net worth over $40 billion and exceeding the wealth of Warren Buffett. A progressive organization in Wisconsin has done a story on the center and found the stories are being used by main stream papers without identifying their funders. To me that is nothing more than journalistic fraud. And it's no coincidence that it's being done in Wisconsin. Republican Gov. Scott Walker and a Republican Legislature enacted an anti collective bargaining law for public employees. Walker is a Koch brothers lackey. He is now in deep political trouble as the Democrats and their allies are circulating a recall petition against him. If -- as appears likely -- it gets the over half million signatures it needs, there will be a recall election early next year. We need to fight back against the Koch brothers and their Republican allies -- or should I say lackeys -- using the corporate media not covering these political manipulations. Please e-mail this information to as many friends, relatives, etc. as possible. Also please post on your social media sites. And write letters to the editor and complain to editors of your local, regional and statewide news media what is not being covered and demand coverage. If we want to prevent being enslaved by the one percent power base, we need to have the 99 percent of the population fight back. The sooner we start, the better. Ray A. Coh, retired political journalist.

Living in a country which jails whomever it deems a threat indefinitely without trial, I just can't get too worked up about relatively minor infringements of our own citizens' personal freedoms. Look at the treaties covering cluster bombs, (which kill and maim many times more children than combatants) or land mines. We have become a rogue nation, aligned more with North Korea than with the civilized nations of the world. Read President (and General) Eisenhower's retirement speech, warning against the military-industrial complex. We never heeded his warning, and they are firmly in control of the country of which I was once so proud. We are rushing to our eventual destruction. God help us all.

Anyone who doubts we are in a real class war for the heart, mind and soul of this nation need go no further. The fear-mongering psychopaths and sociopaths that make up the modern Republican party and the teabaggers, the Koch brothers and their running mates manipulating our finances will not be satisfied until every humane and caring individual in this country is behind private-prison bars or dead, or impoverished to the point of being ineffectual as a "threat." Thus the reason OWS exists and is growing.

@ Meech Lynn- Ever heard of Occams Razor? Go shave with it.

I don't know if Facebook was originally developed by the CIA, Joseph, but I would not be shocked if there is currently some real link there. Creating fake profiles to manipulate public opinion isn't anything new. Businesses have been doing this for years as many of the companies listed at http://www.buyfacebookfansreviews.com engage in this practice using low cost labor from India and other countries. What worries me most of all is that the warfare society is closing in on its peak when there's a public backlash brewing and these electronic tools that people rely on for recreation are going to be monitored and used against them by a corporate run government that helps scumbags make money through war. We are heading for a large backlash (see the popularity of Ron Paul's antiwar movement for example despite his numerous flaws) and people should be vigilant about their government's activities.

I'm as CT-aware as the next progressive, but put down the crack pipe Joseph.

Most progressive individuals and the thinking people probably have FBI files and are on some kind being watched lists. Who cares? Social/political change does not happen by secrete societies lurking in the dark. It happens because the system stops functioning like the mess we are in now... We are in the midst of major changes all over the world. The US cannot be an exception. The US SPRING seems to be on its way!

It is sufficient just to stick to the verifiable data. Commercial entities have a much more compelling need to know everything about everyone than does the CIA. The CIA didn't have to invent Facebook.

Conspiracy theories are not only unnecessary, they are counter-productive and, well, always wrong headed if not just wrong. Conspiracy theorists are like teen-aged boys who think they've just now invented wanking.

This is not surprising considering FaceBook was developed by the CIA, as a data mining counterintelligence program. Most people are aware of this, it is truly Orwellian. Mark Zuckerberg, was just one of the university students who was given access to this, but he did not create it. This is the great lie; it is a intelligence operative data mining, and now they are using the Social Network phenomena to track all people who use it to coordinate any possible future social unrest.