Ross: The truth is out there between aliens, Chinese spy balloons

They had a good run. Who wouldn’t want to believe that the aliens were observing us?

Maybe it wasn’t here to destroy us but to help us – to share with us the fruits of an advanced civilization that had learned to control the excesses of ambition to which all sentient organisms are prey.

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But now we know these were not from another planet; it was balloons the whole time.

I’m expressing my own assessment here, but it’s based on what National Security spokesman John Kirby said during yesterday’s White House briefing when he was asked why NORAD wasn’t picking up these things before.

“As you heard General Van Hurt mentioned last night, they modified the filters in the gains, as we call it, of the radar capabilities to look more discreetly at high altitude, small radar cross sections, and low-speed objects,” Kirby said. “And so if you do that, and anybody that’s operated radar will know you can set the parameters, and if you set the parameters in such a way that to look for a certain something, it’s more likely that you’re going to find a certain something.”

Yes! You can’t see what you’re not looking at! Just like you can’t hear what you’re not listening to! It’s like tuning a radio. If all you have is an AM radio, you’re not going to hear KIRO-FM.

If your radar is tuned to pick up fast-moving missiles, it won’t pick up slow-moving balloons.

“Just by adapting the way the radar parameters are set, we have improved our ability to detect, and again I said that could be one reason why we’re seeing more,” Kirby said.

So that tells me the whole extraterrestrial meme was a self-induced illusion from the start. The NORAD system still uses 1970s technology that, until a few days ago, deliberately tuned out everything but missiles, thus setting up the flying saucer scenario: people could see these glowing objects from the ground, but military radar would see nothing! This must have meant these were alien craft because only a highly-advanced alien race could invent visible flying objects that radar couldn’t see.

But it was not advanced alien technology, it was outdated earthbound technology.

And now, after twisting a few dials – there they are, the balloons, an Octagon, and probably Dodecahedron will eventually show up.

The point is – the truth is out there – and the truth is we’re not being visited by aliens. Because the “aliens” have been right here the whole time. Which turns out to be even scarier.

Listen to Seattle’s Morning News with Dave Ross and Colleen O’Brien weekday mornings from 5 – 9 a.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.

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