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Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

antipolygraph.org

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Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#71

Post by anonymousiam »

Been there, done that. It's a good account, but I'm pretty surprised that the author felt that he could get away with "butt clinching", which is a form of deception, even when you're using it because you know the polygraph process is flawed. So he had to have lied to the investigator about whether or not he was being deceptive, and he never should have been cleared in the first place.

My last few polygraphs (I've had well over a dozen of them) were abusive. Before one of the later tests, the investigator tried to establish rapport, and told me that he had interrogated terrorists in the middle east, who had threatened to kill him. Before the test, I sympathized with him on this and thought that those terrorists must have been really bad people. After the test, I completely understood why those subjects had threatened to kill him.

The polygraph is basically a mind fuck. They try to guilt you into admitting some wrong that you've done by pretending that they already know about it. People with a conscience will break down and admit something, but different personality types react differently.

A senior security officer that I knew always passed his polygraphs on the first sitting, and never had any trouble. The reason was because he was a pathological liar. One of the requirements for his job was to come up with "cover stories", which are lies that you must convincingly tell others, to protect the security of a program.

Two co-worker engineers I know failed, because they refused to go back for more abuse. They were not bad or deceptive people -- They were "Type A" personalities, and it was just too stressful for them.

Refusing to take (or re-take) a polygraph is a red flag, and gets a lot of high level attention. The government will assume that you are refusing because you've done something wrong, and may go after you, and could ruin you life, even if you are innocent.

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#72

Post by b00ty4breakfast »

XorNot wrote: post #56
b00ty4breakfast wrote: post #48

I'm always surprised to hear that a government agency administers polygraph tests in something as serious as hiring but then I remember the CIA also spent millions of dollars trying to develop telekinetic assassins and train clairvoyants to spy on the Kremlin.

That research was oriented towards making sure it wasn't possible though. You're saying "of course it isn't" - but how do you know that? At the time the Soviets had the same sort of projects. So until you're sure it's not possible, the potential capability is an enormous threat if it is. How they went about that research is where the waste creeps in.

Plenty of things we could be wasting money on if the only criteria is "how do you know it's not real?", why stop at killing goats with mind bullets? We could be looking for yetis or Atlantis or lunar nazi spaceships.

It was a giant waste of time and money and, this being the CIA, it likely harmed many people.

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#73

Post by the_af »

Paracompact wrote: post #44
stego-tech wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not bad, just as misinformed as most folks out there about the process and requirements. National Security is a PITA, full of cutthroat sociopaths who would eat the SV VC-types for breakfast. That is a compliment , because the work they do is broadly dark and grimly necessary, at least at the levels of global geopolitics a lot of them are expected to operate at. I washed out in contracting for much the same reason th…

It would seem there's a spectrum of beliefs regarding the people in the CIA, the FBI, in politics, etc. ranging from "They're just like us!" to "They're lizard people (for better or for worse)." In other words, is it the situation or is it the person/self-selection? I self-identify as uninformed about the bigger picture, but my experience working in a federally adjacent sector where all my colleagues are perfectly no…

Your experience of "lizard people" vs "bureaucracy of normal people doing the legwork" seems to match Arendt's banality of evil, right?

Though Arendt seemed to imply those normal people were not very smart or imaginative. Just blindly doing evil stuff simply because they were told to.

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#74

Post by BlobberSnobber »

ifh-hn wrote: post #9

I've no idea why I read to the end of that, seems like a long ramble, I kept expecting something to happen and it never did.

It made me cringe at how boot-licking the author, and apparently a lot of people at the CIA, are (like defending the “petty thief” not getting the job).

People will work for one of the most evil organizations in the world and expect pity for being interrogated, while that same organization has torture sites.

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#75

Post by stefantalpalaru »

Arainach wrote: post #59

I applied for an internship with the NSA. My understanding of the process (years ago, pre-Snowden) was that they did a pass on your resume (I can't recall if there was even a phone screen), then they started background checks and if there were N internships the first N people to pass the security clearance were selected. They went through the standard stuff, interviewing my neighbors, etc. Then they flew me to Fort M…

[dead]

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#76

Post by stefantalpalaru »

tptacek wrote: post #42
marxisttemp wrote: post #25

The guy trying to work for the psychological torture club got psychologically tortured a little? My heart bleeds for him

What do the people writing these kinds of comments think the CIA is? There are mustache-twirling villains there, in greater proportion than in other government organizations, but the median CIA employee sits at a desk and translates cables from Farsi to English and back again, or keeps track of the rainfall in Azerbaijan. A very small fraction of the agency does anything more "interesting" than that, and the majority…

[dead]

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#77

Post by Hikikomori »

XorNot wrote: post #56
b00ty4breakfast wrote: post #48

I'm always surprised to hear that a government agency administers polygraph tests in something as serious as hiring but then I remember the CIA also spent millions of dollars trying to develop telekinetic assassins and train clairvoyants to spy on the Kremlin.

That research was oriented towards making sure it wasn't possible though. You're saying "of course it isn't" - but how do you know that? At the time the Soviets had the same sort of projects. So until you're sure it's not possible, the potential capability is an enormous threat if it is. How they went about that research is where the waste creeps in.

Was drugging random Americans with LSD also a valid experiment? Parts of the CIA was just insane back then, maybe still is.

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#78

Post by rapnie »

XorNot wrote: post #56
b00ty4breakfast wrote: post #48

I'm always surprised to hear that a government agency administers polygraph tests in something as serious as hiring but then I remember the CIA also spent millions of dollars trying to develop telekinetic assassins and train clairvoyants to spy on the Kremlin.

That research was oriented towards making sure it wasn't possible though. You're saying "of course it isn't" - but how do you know that? At the time the Soviets had the same sort of projects. So until you're sure it's not possible, the potential capability is an enormous threat if it is. How they went about that research is where the waste creeps in.

I always wonder when I see one of those hypnosis shows, where someone from the audience makes themselves a docile fool in front of a large crowd, whether they are stooges or it is the real deal. But I wouldn't volunteer to get hypnotised to figure that out, in fear of being the next person who stands imitating a dog in heat on such a stage.

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#79

Post by Aeolun »

unsnap_biceps wrote: post #66
delichon wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Knowing someone had committed petty theft is at least a red flag. I can't blame an employer for considering it disqualifying when they have many equally qualified candidates without it. Even for a burger flipper, let alone a secret agent.

We know nothing about the situation. It's entirely possible that the person took $50 from their parent's purse as a child. My parents used to love to tease me about the time I stole candy from the grocery store as a child. Is that a red flag?

If you don’t at least mention that damning fact on your polygraph, of course it is!

Re: Personal Statement of a CIA Analyst

#80

Post by spatley »

influx wrote: post #50
sonofhans wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do work. Their purpose is intimidation. They’re not truth machines, they’re pressure cookers.

Exactly, the whole point is to put someone into an interrogation scenario for hours or days, where you control whether nor not they "passed". Unfortunately, it probably has zero effect on psychopaths.

Unfortunately psychopathy may be the most desirable trait.
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