Ben Schreckinger

REALITY SHOCK: A beginner's guide to UFOs, Aliens and Disclosure Do you find the mass release of UFO files confusing? Have you noticed that the federal government seems to be on the fence about whether aliens are regularly flying around in the skies above the Earth? Are you curious why leaders in Congress keep expressing concerns that private military contractors may be hiding alien craft? After spending the last decade at POLITICO — reporting on the rise of Donald Trump, Hunter Biden's business dealings, and tech policy — I spent much of the past year digging into the UFO flap. The first result is Reality Shock, a deep-dive overview of a mystery that is enthralling growing cohorts across government, academia, business and culture. Below you can find a link to the full piece, where you can also subscribe to follow the investigation as it develops. But first, four initial takeaways: 1. The study of UFOs, and concern about them, have long been more serious than you’d think: Scientists, intelligence analysts and senior military figures in the U.S. and allied nations have repeatedly concluded that the highest-quality UFO reports stem from real objects whose behavior defies apparent explanation. Now, a new generation of UFO studies is starting to enter peer-reviewed academic journals. 2. While a case can be made for presuming that some UFOs really do represent one or more exotic phenomena, the available evidence that humans are retrieving and reverse-engineering alien craft is much weaker: These extraordinary claims, made before Congress, have not been matched with equally extraordinary evidence. At the same time, the serious concerns demonstrated by people with access to classified information about these claims signal a need for additional transparency and investigation. 3. The ongoing controversy presents a threat to the already-weakened legitimacy of many existing institutions: The risks are twofold: One is the excessive mobilization of government, scientific, and philanthropic resources to explore claims that turn out to be nonsense. The other is that alternative institutions discover, publicize and exploit the existence of non-human intelligence or other breakthroughs related to UFO anomalies while incumbents miss the boat. 4. The current UFO flap need not lead to proof of alien life to produce a major technological shock – or even a shock in our understanding of reality: All of this clamor about UFOs could end up being about something other than non-human intelligence. Persistent anomalies have often led to scientific paradigm shifts. And some longtime observers of UFO anomalies speculate that militaries have already exploited secret scientific breakthroughs to develop mind-bending technologies. Possible breakthroughs include new understandings of gravity or new aircraft propulsion systems far outside of known human capabilities. To understand why these possibilities are being discussed, read on...

NEW: Sean Kirkpatrick, who was the Pentagon's top UFO investigator as director of AARO, has shared new allegations about his investigations with PARADIGM. Kirkpatrick says he: *Worked with Lockheed Martin's chief technology officer to look into claims that the contractor possessed alien craft and traced the claims to "people who had both misled the company and were trying to make money on aerospace tech unconnected to aliens” *Looked into claims that former Lockheed exec Jim Ryder was involved in an alien technology program and in contact with the CIA *Received a call from a congressional staffer telling him to direct millions of dollars in funding to UFO-world figures FULL STORY: paradigm.news/p/ex-pentagon-…

Wow

This is not accurate. Much of the substance of the NYP stories has been substantiated e.g. Hunter eventually testified under oath that his father did meet Burisma's Vadim Pozharskyi at that Cafe Milano dinner The primary controversy around Hunter Biden's leaked emails had to do with his business dealings, not his drug addiction

Nothing you write here, Marcy, bears on the critique I leveled at the Atlantic's summary of this episode.

Very misleading description of the Hunter Biden laptop controversy from the Atlantic here. While many on the right reveled in the embarrassing personal details on the laptop, the files also contained details of Hunter Biden's business dealings, and their relationship to his father, that were politically damaging to Joe Biden. This amounts to revisionist history: "But the quick version is that MAGA became obsessed with the possibly stolen laptop, and the material it contained documenting Biden’s drug addiction, after the New York Post published an article about the laptop in the lead-up to the 2020 election" theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/1…

Obvious SOTU guest candidate

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