Gentle Readers, In view of the controversy regarding the unmasking of American names caught up in “incidental collection” and the parallel accusation that some Americans were inappropriately in contact with agents of the Kremlin, I thought it might be fun to take a look a the way the national security state came to be, masks […]

Scientists now have arrived at the 97% consensus: temperatures in Culpeper, VA, were once warm enough to support the growing of grapes for wine. To demonstrate, our team of expert scientists sampled an experimental personal analysis of the local product at lunch today, courtesy of Quentin, our server at the Copper Fish on historic East […]

See? Isn’t that one of the problems? I have been a useful idiot for Apple products for several years- I think since I was working for IBM and discovered that Big Bluw was going to sell the ThinkPad lap-top line to the Chinese. I always hated Microsoft products because the Government made us use them, […]

(ADM Thomas Moorer in 1964. Photo USN). It was April Fool’s Day, 2010. The town of Topeka, Kansas had decided to re-name itself “Google” for some reason best known to the Mayor and the city council. Mac Showers was feeling a little housebound and was available to chat, and on a splendid day in the […]

(An RVAH-12 RA-5C beginning its reconnaissance run over Vietnam, 1967. Photo USN). Mac was waiting patiently at Willow, half way down the bar that Old Jim anchored at the Amen Corner. I was a little flustered. A subcontractor to us on a counterintelligence contract down at the Russel Knox Building at Quantico had some people […]

Editor’s Note: We are still marching through the remarkable career of RADM Donald “Mac” Showers, which spanned the rise to zenith of The American Century. I will get us to Vietnam one of these days. But trust me, we are going to wrap this up in a month or two. – Vic (GRAB reconnaissance satellite, […]

I got through most of the long list things to do in the blue notebook on my desk yesterday. I was fairly pleased with that- even found out that I could get a booster shot for TDAP- tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis- so I can meet the new Granddaughter without exposing her to any additional risk. […]

24 March 2017 The Big Four-Oh Screen Shot 2017-03-24 at 1.20.58 PM.png Gentle Readers, I would be remiss if I did not correct a tiny mistake in the story yesterday, the one about Marlow’s 68th anniversary on the planet. Marlow is a real human being- and by that I mean an author whose musings (along […]

Editor’s note: We know, we know, the Staff of the Daily Socotra has not gone into summer re-runs, though it did turn out this way with the Medium series. I had to go back and put it all back together as the single story that it really is. I also wanted to get Karen a […]

I ran across my old Navy finance jacket the other day as I start the painful process of preparing to move. Again. Where did all this crap come from? I wondered if I needed to shred the old paystubs that I kept in chronological order with the two metal tangs inserted through the two holes […]