Cato caves on UFOs[Fires Adjunct Scholar]

Free-market economist and commentator Dom Armentano never considered his occasional reflections on America’s UFO conundrum to be particularly gutsy. After all, this stuff’s on "Larry King" now. But his Jan. 8 op-ed piece in the Vero Beach Press-Journal advocating government declassification was evidently too much for his bosses at the libertarian Cato Institute.

A few days after his column appeared, the Vero Beach resident got a letter informing him Cato was in the “process of overhauling” its adjunct scholars program. More to the point, it was canning Armentano as an adjunct scholar.

Incredulous, the man whose recent ruminations on UFOs neither appeared on Cato’s Web site nor implied its sanction zipped off an e-mail requesting clarification from Cato Executive Vice President David Boaz. In reply, Boaz wrote, “I won’t deny that this latest op-ed played a role in our decision. Some day we may look back and wish we’d listened to you. But for now this strikes us as not an issue that we want to have as part of Cato’s research agenda.”

Long espousing a political philosophy whose pillars include government transparency and free speech, Cato’s decision to sever Armentano’s tongue would seem a violation of its own principles. But Boaz’s squeamishness exposes the Washington think tank for what it is — just another garden-variety Beltway box turtle beholden to cash infusions of institutional thinking.

“You asked if I had been warned away from certain topics. Never,” Armentano wrote in his e-mail to De Void. “Indeed, when I did the PBS radio show ‘Byline’ many, many years ago, I recall doing a commentary on UFOs. No one said anything.”

Boaz did not respond to a request for an interview. The best that Boaz surrogate Jamie Dettmer could muster was this: “We never publicly comment on personnel matters.” The Cato rep also declined to comment on Cato's objections to UFOs as a policy issue. “That would be sliding back into personnel matters,” Dettmer said.

Here is the column in question:

Dom Armentano: Intelligent extraterrestrial life: The other inconvenient truth?

Unlikely as it seems, the UFO phenomenon has infiltrated presidential politics. During the recent presidential debates, Democratic candidates Dennis Kucinich and Bill Richardson were both asked publicly about their views on unidentified flying objects.

Gov. Richardson even went so far as to demand increased governmental disclosure on the UFO topic.

In addition, correspondence recently released under the Freedom of Information Act indicates that former President Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and their Office of Science and Technology were all involved in Laurance Rockefeller’s unsuccessful “disclosure initiative” (1993-1996) to open up secret government UFO files.

All of this demonstrates that despite the “giggle” factor, UFOs are a legitimate public policy concern.

The most astonishing news story of all time would be the confirmation of intelligent extraterrestrial life. Such a discovery would have multi-faceted social, religious, scientific and economic ramifications that can only be described as out-of-this-world. As an example, try to imagine the price of crude oil or the gyrations of the stock market just one day after such a revelation. The existence of off-the-planet intelligence could change what most people believe about almost everything.

Yet in some ways an even more significant story, perhaps even more significant than the discovery of extraterrestrial life itself, would be the revelation that certain elements of the U.S. government may have known about — and covered up — that discovery (even from elected officials without a “need to know”) for more than 50 years.

Now, that story, a deliberate half-century of deception to cover an inconvenient truth, likely would shake this nation to its very political foundations. That outrageous disclosure could change almost everything, too.

Yet outrageous as it may seem, many who have studied the UFO phenomenon now conclude that starting with Roswell in July 1947, elements of the U.S. government may have systematically lied to the American people (and to elected officials) concerning the actual nature of the UFO phenomenon. The evidence for that deception is substantial and is to be found in thoroughly documented books, dozens of declassified “top secret” documents, and many sworn testimonials from key military-intelligence community insiders.

If true, why the extreme secrecy and deception?

Those in control may have lied because they feared panic in the streets, the Orson Welles and “War of the Worlds” scenario. They may have lied because they could not understand or control the phenomenon, and governments can never admit such helplessness. They may have lied to study and exploit the technology for commercial or military purposes.

Ultimately, they may have lied because it was determined that UFOs may represent a serious threat, perhaps even a military threat, to the nation.

This last reason seems the most reasonable and the most ominous. Decades of reports from competent observers, many confirmed by radar, establish that some UFOs can fly soundlessly, stop on a dime, accelerate at breathtaking speeds and outdistance jets or missiles sent to intercept them. Moreover, there are disturbing reports of UFOs that may have interfered with the electronics of automobiles, airplanes, power stations, and even with the launch readiness of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

It would only be reasonable, then, for those in the military and intelligence community to treat UFOs as serious business and classify the information at the highest possible level.

Yet systemic public deception for decades poses a grave long-term threat for any constitutional republic. In the final analysis, the existence of legitimate government depends upon an intelligent, well-informed citizenry.

Heavily censored information, billion-dollar “black budgets” and super-secret “black projects “ (UFOs are likely a very black project) ultimately make open government and representative democracy a joke and a sham.

As foreign governments increasingly open their own UFO files and as the secret inevitably leaks out here, Americans deserve (and can handle) the truth about UFOs.

Armentano, who lives in Vero Beach, is professor emeritus in economics at the University of Hartford and an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute in Washington. He has followed the UFO controversy for more than 40 years.

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