I keep reading about "TPTB". The Powers That Be are never named and appear to be faceless imaginery beaurocrats controlled by evil dark powers who are hell bent on secretly poisoning us and planting devices in our cranial cavities.

As TPTB is an acronymn that is not known by all except for perhaps a few here and also by Mel Gibson in 'Conspiracy Theory', could we all agree to use the better known term "BOOGEYMAN" from now on?

It will save time, be easier to understand and has a far more chilling feel to it. Think about it, doesn't it sound so much more realistic and cool to say "The Boogeyman is trying to kill us with his magic contrails", plus it would make far more sense to our kids if we used a universal phrase that they too could be afraid of.

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), September 21, 1999

Answers

C'mon Craig, GET REAL. You know what TPTB means. TPTB=government, industry, military, anyone with REAL power.

-- It's Obvious (itsobvious@openyoureyes.com), September 21, 1999.

Well that's what I thought but every time TPTB are mentioned, it seems that it is in a derogatory way........and I figured that no human agency could be THAT BAD ALL THE TIME.

So really, that only leaves us with the Boogeyman, hence my brilliant idea!!

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), September 21, 1999.

Try the "visible" PTB = Koskinen, for starters. (That's scary enough!)

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), September 21, 1999.

Koskinen huh.........so like would he be better than, or worse than Stalin and Hitler?

Tell me, is their ANYONE in a position of authority that you trust or are they all EVIL? If so, can we do the Boogeyman thing here because I kind of like it!

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), September 21, 1999.

I trust Ron Paul.

-- DaveW (dwood@southwind.net), September 21, 1999.

>> The Powers That Be (TPTB) are ... faceless imaginery beaurocrats controlled by evil dark powers... <<

So, does that make the evil dark powers: TPBTPTB (The Powers Behind The Powers That Be)???

When I use the acronym TPTB, I refer to those people in high positions of power. Such a position is distinguished by its proximity to the top of a heirarchical command and control structure.

For example, an Assistant Secretary of Defense may be below the CIC and the SoD in the command structure, but you can better believe that when someone in that position issues an order that just as much of the machinery of the DoD as is necessary to carry out that order starts to move to carry it out. The same is true of the CEO of any Fortune 500 company. Their desires carry weight far beyond the desires of us peons.

What is necessary to remember is that TPTB are not monolithic. They frequently disagree among themselves. Bill Gates and Larry Ellison spit at each other constantly.

But, at the same time, TPTB have a huge vested interest in maintaining the same general political and financial structure that rewarded them with power in the first place. Any sufficiently powerful outside threat to TPTB sees them pull together with remarkable unananimity, whether that threat is from another nation that may go to war with us, or from ordinary people, who may wake up and use their political power to upset the cozy status quo (class war). At those times, TPTB close ranks swiftly and the enemy finds out just what the meaning of "power" really is. It isn't pretty. Those who protested the Vietnam War found this out.

A community of interest is both broader and stronger than a conspiracy.

-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), September 21, 1999.

I suspect that much of what gets attributed to TPTB evil, is more like incompetence, however, I am also as equally convinced that there exists intent at bureaucratic level that is nothing more than self-serving evil. What's the old saying?: Just 'cos I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me.

In the end TPTB is just a nice shorthand that saves me a few keystrokes.

Question? Can a person reach the upper echelons of political/corporate/world financial organizations and still have real human integrity. I guess this is a tangential aside to the posted thread, but loose associations run in my family.

--Inquiring minds,...Must be time for my mellaril. :=)

-- Donna (moment@pacbell.net), September 21, 1999.

No - the Clintons are much more frightening.......and have fewer morals, less scruples, are are more dishonest.

They do have cleaner teeth, less B.O., and better haircuts - though I've never Hillary up close - the latter is subject to change upon receipt of better information.

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Marietta, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), September 21, 1999.

The Powers That Be = the one percent or so of the population that makes up the global financial elite, that controls (not necessarily "owns", but controls - big difference) the vast majority of resources on the planet, and controls the media that shapes public perception as part of that control. There are about 200 family dynasties that make up most of that one percent, (UK Royals, Rockefellers, Riadys, Rothschilds - you've heard 'em all before) and via various methods (fraction reserve banking, media conglomeration, IMF/World Bank, etc.) have shored up their control over the political systems of most of the countries of the world. (The rest are considered "rogue states.") These people think long-term. They are not boogey-men, but hu-man. Throughout history, people have worked to control societies. Nothing new here, other than the fact that these days there is this illusion of "freedom," whereas in the past, most people knew they were slaves or serfs.

Craig, is this so difficult to understand?

-- (dot@dot.dot), September 21, 1999.

Hi Craig,

Please call them TPTB, The Boogeyman or whatever floats your boat. Y2K doesn't care...

-- RUOK (RUOK@yesiam.com), September 21, 1999.

Dem powers dat bees is all aroun' an' dey ain't gwine away, no suh!

-- Jay Urban (jurban@berenyi.com), September 21, 1999.

Hey Robert - the Clinton's aren't IMmoral, they're Amoral. Ask Flint. :)

-- a (a@a.a), September 21, 1999.

TPTB did not get there without doing what was nessecary at any given time in history. Whether they know what the eventual outcome of Y2K will be or not, may not be the write question. The scaryier question may be, what would they be capable of doing if to there suprise they woke-up one morning and the division of labor was gone. Its best for the little people not to wake the sleeping giant. In this day and age when a guy goes wacky he takes bunch-out with him. Back in 29 you read the ticker and you just open a window...splat. Today the Big Boys have big toys...---...

-- Les (yoyo@tolate.com), September 21, 1999.

B-O-O-G-E-Y-M-A-N - 9 letters..... Hmmmm.....

T-P-T-B - 4 letters...... Hmmmmmmmmm.....

Nope it's easier to type TPTB....

Craig, don't get mad and go away, just go away... I have more trying problems than somebody's nomenclature issues...

scratchin'...

The Dog

-- Dog (Desert Dog@-sand.com), September 21, 1999.

""They" are who they have always been,throughout the ages"

"It's just business"

-- Sam (Gunmkr52@aol.com), September 21, 1999.

Well golly be.... I always thought that TPTB was short for

"The President, The Bit*h"

I guess I'll have to get with the program......

-- helium (heliumavid@yahoo.com), September 21, 1999.

Thinkning about this article - I'd rather have the bogeyman ...

Link: http://www.nypostonline.com/commentary/14277.htm

<

By STEVE DUNLEAVY

------------------------------------------------------------------------

IT WON'T be hard to find Bill Clinton in New York today - just follow the traffic jams that his visits always produce.

But don't look for his conscience. For the past 14 years, you wouldn't have been able to find it with AWAC radar and search parties.

I am not talking about the scandals of lying to judges and juries, or low-jinks in high places, or Whitewater or Travelgate or Filegate.

It has to do with a man called Wayne Dumond, over whose case I have agonized for long more than a decade.

Dumond, now 52, was given conditional parole yesterday in Arkansas after having being sentenced to 50 years in jail for the rape of Clinton's cousin.

That rape never happened.

Is that just me saying so?

No way.

Some others who say so are:

*The judge who sentenced Dumond under court guidelines to 50 years. In fact, the judge later quit the bench to become Dumond's lawyer to prove his innocence.

*Dr. Moses Schanfield, who headed the Genetic Testing Center in Denver and did sperm tests on the so-called victim's jeans. "No way, zip, nada. No way Dumond was the donor of that sperm. It couldn't have happened in a million years." Schanfield was one of the experts sent to Bosnia to identify mystery graves.

*Fred Odam, a retired Arkansas state police captain. He immersed himself in the case. He told me: "In all my time, this is the one case when I know a man is not guilty."

*Veteran journalist Gene Wirges, 72, who now publishes the "Common Sense American" and has battled this travesty from Day One: "Very few people thought Wayne was guilty, but a lot thought the Clinton kin and clan had to have revenge ... against anyone - and Bill went along with the program."

Despite the fact the Clinton cousin - whom I will not name, although The Associated Press has - failed to identify Dumond in two lineups, he was convicted.

Despite the fact that she identified two other suspects, one an ex-boyfriend, Dumond was convicted

Dumond will finally get out after nearly 14 years.

Before Dumond turned himself in for his 50-year sentence, while awaiting surrender, something terrible happened.

Two masked men burst into his house with a scalpel and surgical gloves and castrated him. You heard it right.

The former Vietnam veteran and father of six was found hog-tied from a rafter by two of his schoolboy sons. Miraculously, he survived.

A Clinton crony, Sheriff Coolidge Conlee, who also was a friend of the father of the Clinton cousin, had let the two animals out of jail to rob Dumond of his manhood.

Sheriff Coolidge Conlee would die in jail after the feds nailed him for 60 years on a RICO charge.

As Dumond was clinging to life in jail, the sheriff displayed his severed testicles in a jar on his desk.

"I saw him pick them up and I saw the display," state police Capt. Odam has told me.

As Dumond's testicles were on display on the sheriff's desk, something else happened. Dumond's house was torched to the ground.

The father of the so-called rape victim was one of Clinton's biggest donors in his race for the Arkansas Governor's Mansion.

When Dumond finally gets released next month, his wife, Dusty, will not be able to greet him. She died two years ago - after years of pleading with Clinton to review the case while he was governor. The man who, as president, would later grant clemency to FALN terrorists turned a deaf ear to her pleas.

Whenever a reporter would ask Gov. Clinton about the case, he'd invariably respond: "I don't comment on those things."

When pressed by other politicians, his response was: "The case [for a retrial or clemency] has no merit."

Sounds like Clinton knew a bit about executive privilege a long time ago.

I have in the past spoken to Wayne Dumond for hours in his cell, and, apart from never seeing his wife when he gets his freedom, he says: "No, I'm not bitter. I've learned a lot. I think I've become one of those computer nuts while in jail."

We will be able to find Clinton today in New York. But who can find his conscience? >>

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Marietta, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), September 22, 1999.

Craig... What's going on here, does Ralph Klein pay you to post or what?

Brian McLaughlin said "A community of interest is both broader and stronger than a conspiracy"

I believe that sums it up nicely, a much better response than your TPTB/Boogeyman blather deserves.

Surely you can see this can't you?

-- Will (sibola@hotmail.com), September 22, 1999.