Misleading: Josh Hawley on UFO and David Grusch

Mick West

Mick West

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Article:
MATT LASLO JUN 13, 2023 7:00 AM
UFO Whistleblower, Meet a Conspiracy-Loving Congress
Fresh claims from a former US intelligence officer about an “intact” alien craft may get traction on Capitol Hill, where some lawmakers want to believe.

Lawmakers are still awaiting more answers on the spy balloons that dominated the news—and American air space—at the start of the year, especially in regard to the four objects the Air Force shot down within an eight-day period this February. In the wake of those military engagements, the Biden administration held closed-door classified briefings for members of Congress, but they were less than straightforward, at least initially, until lawmakers pushed officials on UAPs.

“They were talking about the balloons, and then several senators pointed out, ‘Now hold on: We’ve had a lot of unidentified anomalous phenomenon for years now,’ and that’s when the military briefer was like, ‘True. True,’” says Senator Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican. “The takeaway from that is, they had thousands of sightings of these things over the years, which was news to me. So I'm not surprised, necessarily, by these latest allegations, because it sounds pretty close to what they kind of grudgingly admitted to us in the briefing.”

While not necessarily surprised by Grusch’s claims, lawmakers of all stripes are disturbed by reports of UAPs hovering over US military sites.

“It’s not good. None of it’s good,” Hawley says. “I think we want to get to the bottom of this. I think it’s disturbing.”


The above is a clip from Wired, where it seems that Hawley is responding at the end to "reports of UAPs hovering over US military sites."

And the "begrudging admission" he references seems to be the "True. True." quoted, which was a response to "We’ve had a lot of unidentified anomalous phenomenon for years now"

However the story is being read differently by the UFO community, after this version from OutKick, a Fox News online news aggregator that repeats the Wired story

Article:

SENATOR SAYS UFO WHISTLEBLOWER CLAIMS ARE ‘PRETTY CLOSE’ TO BRIEFING HE RECEIVED: ‘NOT GOOD’​

June 18, 2023, 3:50 pm

Senator Josh Hawley appears ready to hear David Grusch out about UFOs.
While some in the media and in the country might want to dismiss Grusch’s claims entirely, Hawley definitely isn’t among them.

“The takeaway from that is, they had thousands of sightings of these things over the years, which was news to me. So I’m not surprised, necessarily, by these latest allegations, because it sounds pretty close to what they kind of grudgingly admitted to us in the briefing…It’s not good. None of it’s good. I think we want to get to the bottom of this. I think it’s disturbing,” Hawley said when reacting to Grusch’s claims, according to Wired.com.


Outkick strips away all the context, making it look like Hawley was talking only about Grusch's claims.

Similar with the Daily Star, with even more added paraphrasing
Article:
Jun 19, 2023

Now, Senator Josh Hawley has said that Grusch’s claims aren’t as far-fetched as others might think.

The influential senator, who sits on several major committees in the US senate, including the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said that he’s been briefed with information that seemingly confirms what Grusch has said.

He told Wired : “I’m not surprised, necessarily, by these latest allegations, because it sounds pretty close to what they kind of grudgingly admitted to us in the briefing…It’s not good. None of it’s good. I think we want to get to the bottom of this. I think it’s disturbing.”


Here they lead with their own interpretation, then add a short quote with no context.

This naturally gets picked up on UFO Twitter, with a variety of different takes:

Source: https://twitter.com/MartinNumbers6/status/1670835356718211072
 
And then the next phase of the motivated telephone game will be that Senator Josh Hawley has confirmed Grutsch's allegations.

"He flat out confirmed that everything Grusch said was true."
"Where did he say that?"
"I'm not your mom, do your own research!"
 
“They were talking about the balloons, and then several senators pointed out, ‘Now hold on: We’ve had a lot of unidentified anomalous phenomenon for years now,’ and that’s when the military briefer was like, ‘True. True,’” says Senator Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican. “The takeaway from that is, they had thousands of sightings of these things over the years, which was news to me. So I'm not surprised, necessarily, by these latest allegations, because it sounds pretty close to what they kind of grudgingly admitted to us in the briefing.”
Content from External Source
What do you think he meant with "these latest allegations"?
An allegation is "a claim or assertion that someone has done something illegal or wrong, typically one made without proof."
So I think he is referring to Grusch's allegations and stating he is not surprised by them "because it sounds pretty close to what they kind of grudgingly admitted to us in the briefing." (did he intend the pun, I wonder ;)
 
Itsme said:
What do you think he meant with "these latest allegations"?
An allegation is "a claim or assertion that someone has done something illegal or wrong, typically one made without proof."
Click to expand...
Sounds like he's willing to consider an allegation that the military could be withholding more information from Congress, since that's how he perceived the original UAP briefing. Other than that, Grusch's claims are manifestly unlike the simple acknowledgement that we've observed "a lot of unidentified anomalous phenomenon for years."
 
Some important context from the Wired article:

Article:
The sensational details of Grusch’s claims about so-called unidentified anomalous phenomena (or UAPs—NASA’s new name for UFOs) spread rapidly through the Capitol last week, along with much derision and mockery. Some congressional leaders laughed them off. "This is not a question I had on my bingo card,” House Democratic Caucus chair Pete Aguilar told the press corps. Or they slid these latest ET allegations right into their old talking points. "Obviously, we're concerned about Congress being kept in the dark from a lot of these agencies,” House majority leader Steve Scalise replied before even seeing the whistleblower’s claims.

The response was different among rank-and-file lawmakers, especially in the House, where the Grusch’s unvetted claims were seen as vindication by a small but vocal—and increasingly powerful—faction of far-right lawmakers who are heading up the inquiry ahead of a planned but still unscheduled hearing.
...
“I think it’s a little bit of madness and a whole lot of reality. I do believe we’ve recovered a craft at some point,” Representative Tim Burchett, a Tennessee Republican, told Steve Bannon on his podcast Wednesday. Burchett believes that the Pentagon’s budget is bloated, in part, because it’s funding secret UAP programs. His personal belief in UAPs stems from the 1947 incident in Roswell, New Mexico.
...
Burchett is joined by two Florida Republican representatives: Matt Gaetz—“I have seen evidence of craft that I am not familiar with any of our allies or adversaries or even our country possessing”—and Anna Paulina Luna, who believes the government has been lying to the public about UAP’s “for decades.”

While Luna and Burchett will likely head up the House inquiry and eventual hearing, it’s not just fringe-right members whose ears perked up over these allegations. This includes Representative Mike McCaul, a Texas Republican and chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “It’s a legitimate issue. On both sides, we just want to know if we've been seeing [UAPs] that are not man-made—is what the article said, but I don't know,” he says. “But that's a good question for the chairman” of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.


So the drift of the Wired article was, as the headline suggests, about how UFOs are being taken more seriously mostly by the conspiracy minded members of congress (Hawley strongly supports Trump's false claims that the election was stolen)

The later stories dropped this aspect, and framed it just as Hawley validating Grusch's claims.
 
ImagoDei said:
Sounds like he's willing to consider an allegation that the military could be withholding more information from Congress, since that's how he perceived the original UAP briefing. Other than that, Grusch's claims are manifestly unlike the simple acknowledgement that we've observed "a lot of unidentified anomalous phenomenon for years."
Click to expand...
He's talking about "what they grudgingly admitted to us" in
closed-door classified briefings
Content from External Source
So you can't be sure he was only referring to "a lot of unidentified anomalous phenomenon" as the stuff he heard there that 'sounded pretty close to Grusch's allegations'.

(I sincerely hope this topic is not politicized as well... although Wired seems to attempt it with their article.)
 
Itsme said:
(I sincerely hope this topic is not politicized as well... although Wired seems to attempt it with their article.)
Click to expand...

Exactly , very well said. Ans it's what I was just a bit beffudled at when reading the article, it immediately reminded me that during most of the last century the UFO subject was dismissed as a nonsense created by loons from the far left liberals. And today it seems there's again this weird trend to polarise the discussions involving this topic LOL...
 
Rick Robson said:
And today it seems there's again this weird trend to polarise the discussions involving this topic
Click to expand...
And every other topic as well, it would appear. It's become axiomatic among a good many conservatives that "if the government says it, we are against it/don't believe it", BEFORE (or instead of) any serious analysis of the facts of a question. Far too often a story is deemed true or false before the whole story is even narrated, or an individual is similarly adjudged guilty or innocent long before any testimony is given. We are not immune to that way of thinking at Metabunk, but I'd like to think that we try to get more information before we render judgment.
 
"Things aren't looking good for Mick West"

As if this were a bet where Mick, or any skeptic, would "lose" it whenever the "disclosure" happened.

I would bet a lot of money that no disclosure will happen because there is nothing to be disclosed. But I would love to lose that bet!
 
Gaspa said:
As if this were a bet where Mick, or any skeptic, would "lose" it whenever the "disclosure" happened.
Click to expand...
I'd gladly consider that bet lost on my part if there's an actual crashed UFO.
The problem is, it's not an actual bet, which is why UFOlogists can keep losing and just field the next new big thing (or touched-up old thing) without any consequences, while the debunkers' track record remains unblemished.
 
Rick Robson said:
during most of the last century the UFO subject was dismissed as a nonsense created by loons from the far left liberals.
Click to expand...
Really? I've been following both UFO claims (at first more credulously, I admit) and US politics (my father was an elected offcial and my first job out of college was in the office of a generalist political consultant, later worked briefly in a US Senator's in-state office) for approaching half a century and I can't recall that UFO/political ideology connection being made. Which may just mean that I missed it, or forgot it over the years -- but if you have a source, I'd be curious to see it.
 
JMartJr said:
Really? I've been following both UFO claims (at first more credulously, I admit) and US politics (my father was an elected offcial and my first job out of college was in the office of a generalist political consultant, later worked briefly in a US Senator's in-state office) for approaching half a century and I can't recall that UFO/political ideology connection being made. Which may just mean that I missed it, or forgot it over the years -- but if you have a source, I'd be curious to see it.
Click to expand...

No, I expressed my opinion based on what I heard and read, but will refrain from stepping further into that terrain lest this new thread is also misled, the spoiler alert was already given by @Itsme. If you want to further discuss it then please PM me.
 
For the longest time there's been minority of senators/congressmen believing in UFOs and/or inquiries into secret programs for personal or political reasons, as well as a bigger group laughing it off. What else is new? They were all privy to the classified portion of the UAP hearings so the argument of @Itsme doesn't really fly. Many considered the hearings entirely unremarkable. People hear what they want to hear.

I've said this before, but the real issue here is sociological. The vulnerability of certain representative democracies to lobby groups supported by money and an over-zealous constituency. Ufology is just one smaller symptom of this broader systemic failure.
 
Rick Robson said:
Exactly , very well said. Ans it's what I was just a bit beffudled at when reading the article, it immediately reminded me that during most of the last century the UFO subject was dismissed as a nonsense created by loons from the far left liberals. And today it seems there's again this weird trend to polarise the discussions involving this topic LOL...
Click to expand...

You don't want is polarised, yet you have specifically polarised it?

Your unwanted, even by yourself, injection looks like a claim that could be evaluated for truthiness in a different thread (several similar threads have historically sprung into existence, search for a match before starting a new one). I'm not sure how much is known about the history of those involved in UFO history, but if you're making a claim, then I presume you can provide some evidence to back it up. All I know is that the psychology literature nowadays would provide plenty of counter-evidence, but all parts of the sociological landscape have changed over time, constancy shouldn't be assumed.
 
Rick Robson said:
If you want to further discuss it then please PM me.
Click to expand...
Well, since this isn't an inherently personal topic, the Chitchat forum is well suited for topics that don't concern themselves with debunking.

Or, if you can muster enough evidence to support a claim, General would be suitable.
 
Hawley used the term "allegation" and he mentioned "not good". It's clear to me he's concerned about the "illegal program" side of this, not aliens. But, of course, ufotwitter assumes he's talking about the alien claims.

More of the same from ufotwitter.
 
At this point we need a full on, un-neutered investigation into what is going on.

We cant debunk anyof this if all we're doing is comparing old conpsiracy theories as reasons we can't believe the new ones.

It's not possible to find out the truth if the people who are in charge are just saying it's all true but hiding all the proof.
 
tobigtofool said:
It's not possible to find out the truth if the people who are in charge are just saying it's all true but hiding all the proof.
Click to expand...
Nobody "in charge" has said it's all true.
See https://www.metabunk.org/threads/da...-bodies-of-non-human-origin.12977/post-291848
tobigtofool said:
At this point we need a full on, un-neutered investigation into what is going on.
Click to expand...
If Grusch is exaggerating/lying, a full-on investigation helps nobody.

And Josh Hawley would be unlikely to be part of it, his committee assignments don't match afaik: no Intelligence and no Armed Services.
Article:
Senator Hawley currently serves on the Senate Committees on the Judiciary; Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs; Energy and Natural Resources; and Small Business and Entrepreneurship.
 
Last edited:
Mendel said:
Nobody "in charge" has said it's all true.
Click to expand...

David Gurshe is a member of the us military intelligence. The Howley is a congressman.

People flying planes with tactical nukes on them are saying they truly believe in aliens.

But we have no way to prove if anyone is telling any semblance of truth: It's just tinfoil hat people vs Atheist's

Unfortunately it's a simple fact all of the above folks (if you like them or believe them or not) are more reliable sources than any anonymous stranger on these boards.

If anything they've proven that the goverment is mismanaged, and there are sick, delusional people in high ranking positions of it.

It's time we had lawyers and doctors investigate it from the top to the bottom, instead of people online.
 
tobigtofool said:
At this point we need a full on, un-neutered investigation into what is going on.

We cant debunk anyof this if all we're doing is comparing old conpsiracy theories as reasons we can't believe the new ones.

It's not possible to find out the truth if the people who are in charge are just saying it's all true but hiding all the proof.
Click to expand...
Investigate what? "Going on" where? In the skies? In the organizations which require security clearances (that we don't have) to get any information? In the halls of congress?

Our investigations are, of necessity, limited to what is said publicly, what we can find out about the history of the subject, and what is published elsewhere that might shed light on a person's veracity or motivations. Nobody is going to turn over chunks of space debris or alien bodies to us.

Edit: Your later post says "If anything they've proven that the goverment is mismanaged". The (questionable) comments of a very small number of people in a very large organization "prove" nothing of the kind. I think you're reading your own bias into this whole thing. And your naïve assumption that "lawyers" would be the best people to investigate it is laughable.
 
Last edited:
tobigtofool said:
Unfortunately it's a simple fact all of the above folks (if you like them or believe them or not) are more reliable sources than any anonymous stranger on these boards.
Click to expand...
Article:
U.S. Rep. Mike Turner, R-Dayton, declined to comment to the Dayton Daily News on the subject. Turner is chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and has long advocated for NASIC and Wright-Patterson. He is a member of the “Gang of Eight,” the eight Congressional leaders who are briefed on the most sensitive classified intelligence questions by the executive branch.

On Tuesday evening, Turner told Bret Baier on Fox News that there’s nothing particularly new about these claims.

“Bret, this has been a story since the 1960s,” Turner said on Fox’s Special Report with Bret Baier. “Really every decade there have been individuals who have said that the United States has such pieces of unidentified flying objects that are from outer space. There is no evidence of this. And certainly, there (would) be quite a conspiracy for this to be maintained, especially at this level.”

Rep. Jim Himes, the ranking Democrat on the committee, agreed with Turner on the lack of evidence.

“We did have a hearing, in fact we have had two hearings in the last couple of years on this subject,” Himes told Baier. “And I asked a question in the second hearing, because of course we hear this kind of notion that has been out there forever that the United States government is hiding materials that we are hiding aliens or whatever. I asked a very specific question which is do we have any sort of matter, organic or inorganic or whatever, that we can’t explain as to its source. Now this was a year, maybe a year-and-a-half ago, and the answer was an unequivocal no.”
 
Ann K said:
Investigate what? "Going on" where? In the skies? In the organizations which require security clearances (that we don't have) to get any information? In the halls of congress?

Our investigations are, of necessity, limited to what is said publicly, what we can find out about the history of the subject, and what is published elsewhere that might shed light on a person's veracity or motivations. Nobody is going to turn over chunks of space debris or alien bodies to us.
Click to expand...

Just try to forget for a second that there are/are not aliens, and try to see it how I see it:

Our exceptionally large military industrial complex has people in it that believe there are and that terrifies me - not because I believe in aliens, but because I believe in a delusional individuals ability to do very damaging things, and if we're giving access to very powerful weapons apparently very delusional people, we need oversight.

Mendel said:
Neither Grusch or Hawley are "in charge" or in a position to have access to evidence.
They are not reliable sources at all.
Click to expand...

You dont believe members of our military intelligence are reliable sources, but you dont believe that we should have an oversight comity into our military intelligence?

You don't think a congressman's lie about being "briefed" about secret illegal agencies deserves to be proven false?
 
tobigtofool said:
Our exceptionally large military industrial complex has people in it that believe there are and that terrifies me - not because I believe in aliens, but because I believe in a delusional individuals ability to do very damaging things, and if we're giving access to very powerful weapons apparently very delusional people, we need oversight.
Click to expand...
David Grusch is no longer a member of the military or intelligence community.
tobigtofool said:
You dont believe members of our military intelligence are reliable sources, but you dont believe that we should have an oversight comity into our military intelligence?
Click to expand...
The US has congressional committees that exercise oversight. Turner and Himes are on them, Grusch and Hawley are not.
 
Mendel said:
That claim needs a source.
Click to expand...

You wont get one without an oversight comity or investigation - so as far as I am concerned his position makes him more reliable than you.

I should also point out you just said to prove it, we'd need proof it was true.

We agree!
 
Please consider that no congressional investigation can dispel the idea that "the government is lying". Hasn't worked with 9/11 or 1/6, hasn't worked with the 2020 election.
 
tobigtofool said:
You wont get one without an oversight commitie or investigation - so as far as I am concerned "he is more reliable than you"
Click to expand...
Please cite a quote where a congressman is lying.
i am asking you to source your claim.

Mick's point in the OP is that Hawley hasn't said what some people think he said, so if you're making vague claims, you're going to have to quote him (with a source) to be taken seriously.
 
Ann K said:
The only requirement to be a congressman is the ability to win an election. Some of them have been shown to be trustworthy; some not.
Click to expand...

Ok, so we're back to the first reason we need an oversight committee/investigation: You think people in our goverment are not trustworthy.

If they lie about illegal operations in our goverment and they can't be held accountable: then we can't believe anything about any of the operations in our goverment.

It's madness over reason.
 
tobigtofool said:
So I should listen to congressmen, sometimes? When it feels right?
Click to expand...
You can listen to anyone all you want, but to believe anything from anyone, you should have evidence. "Claims were close to a briefing I received" couldn't be more vague. It tells us nothing.

Lets do it this way - what do you get from that statement and why?
 
tobigtofool said:
So I should listen to congressmen, sometimes? When it feels right?
Click to expand...
We should not "listen" to anybody, without them having any proof. That is my opinion.. Too many grifters and attention seeking persons on the net. Just like I do not trust any MB member claiming anything without a substantial detailed analysis and corroborative data.
 
tobigtofool said:
If we cant listen to congressmen, or military intelligence, or pilots, enough to obtain the proof, then we need to completely audit the entire military industrial complex.
Click to expand...
We can listen to them when they say something that means something.
“The takeaway from that is, they had thousands of sightings of these things over the years, which was news to me. So I’m not surprised, necessarily, by these latest allegations, because it sounds pretty close to what they kind of grudgingly admitted to us in the briefing…It’s not good. None of it’s good. I think we want to get to the bottom of this. I think it’s disturbing,”
Content from External Source
Hawley says here he was surprised by the news of the sightings (only 122 in the UAPTF report, btw), and he was surprised by Grusch's allegations, which we all were.

Nothing of it is evidence. None of it claims that the government is hiding something. His stance re: Grusch's claims is, "we want to get to the bottom of this". There is nothing in this quote that Hawley could be said to be lying about, whether the government has UFOs or not.
 
tobigtofool said:
I don't feel safer with national security that believes in interdimensional beings.

All I care about is going to sleep at night knowing nobody in our military intelligence would ever assume that were true.
Click to expand...
That's not something you're ever going to be able to know, I'm afraid.
 
JMartJr said:
Or he is sincere but wrong. Or he's a liar who is also sane. Or...
Click to expand...
And whilst I agree, there was no simply binary choice, if you draw a matrix with all of the character traits and positions of knowledge that might be possible - *almost none* of the combinations would lead you to putting a tick mark in the final "happy with this guy in a position of power" column.

(Which brings back memories of the "I'll kill ya" monologue from /Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels/ - no linky, it's trivially searchable, but its contents may not be considered suitable for all audiences.)
 
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