THE TRUTH ABOUT FLYING SAUCERS: Part 2

The midterm elections are 18 days away.  From Fox News:

88%

The top issue of concern for voters heading into the midterms is government corruption, according to a Fox News poll. Eighty-eight percent of respondents said they were extremely or very concerned about the issue, ahead of inflation and high prices at 85%.

Otherwise, from the White House, after serving 5 days, Katie Zacharia was fired.

• She broke the 11-day record held by Anthony Sacaramucci during Trump's first term.
• Social media users have joked in recent days about whether Zacharia would last “one Scaramucci” after her first press briefing Tuesday was heavily scrutinized. Bets were also being taken on the prediction market site Kalshiover when she would depart the role.
• Said Scaramucci:  Records are made to be broken.

Iran War?

• ATTACKS on commercial shipping around the Strait of Hormuz have already reached a record monthly high just halfway through October, reinforcing evidence that Iran’s strategy is increasingly aimed at making the waterway unsafe for any vessel attempting passage without Tehran’s consent.  At least 26 attacks or other security incidents involving commercial vessels have been recorded in the first 15 days of October, surpassing every previous monthly total since the US-Iran war began on February 28.

Many find flying saucers to be intriguing.  Of course, all of them are not roundish, or plate shape.  

A larger question has to do with life in the universe and possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence.  Here is a video about the history of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence.

IMBd has a top 22 best alien movies of all time:

1.

Arrival

1. Arrival

• 2016
• 1h 56m
• PG-13
81Metascore

7.9 (883K)

Linguist Louise Banks leads a team of investigators when gigantic spaceships touch down around the world. As nations teeter on the verge of global war, Banks and her crew must find a way to communicate with the extraterrestrial visitors.

DirectorDenis VilleneuveStarsAmy AdamsJeremy RennerForest Whitaker

2. Alien

• 1979
• 1h 57m
• R
89Metascore

8.4 (1.1M)

After investigating a mysterious transmission of unknown origin, the crew of a commercial spacecraft encounters a deadly lifeform.

DirectorRidley ScottStarsSigourney WeaverTom SkerrittJohn Hurt

3. The Thing

• 1982
• 1h 49m
• R
57Metascore

8.2 (539K)

A research team in Antarctica is hunted by a shape-shifting alien that assumes the appearance of its victims.

DirectorJohn CarpenterStarsKurt RussellWilford BrimleyKeith David

4. Aliens

• 1986
• 2h 17m
• R
84Metascore

8.4 (851K)

Decades after surviving the Nostromo incident, Ellen Ripley is sent out to re-establish contact with a terraforming colony but finds herself battling the Alien Queen and her offspring.

DirectorJames CameronStarsSigourney WeaverMichael BiehnCarrie Henn

5. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial

• 1982
• 1h 55m
• PG
92Metascore

7.9 (478K)

A troubled child summons the courage to help a friendly alien escape from Earth and return to his home planet.

DirectorSteven SpielbergStarsHenry ThomasDrew BarrymorePeter Coyote

10. Invasion of the Body Snatchers

• 1956
• 1h 20m
• Approved
92Metascore

7.7 (61K)

A small-town doctor slowly comes to realize that the population of his community is being perfectly duplicated and replaced by an alien entity.

DirectorDon SiegelStarsKevin McCarthyDana WynterLarry Gates

11. Close Encounters of the Third Kind

• 1977
• 2h 18m
• PG
90Metascore

7.6 (239K)

An Indiana electric lineman finds his quiet and ordinary daily life turned upside down after a close encounter with a UFO, spurring him to an obsessed cross-country quest for answers as a momentous event approaches.

DirectorSteven SpielbergStarsRichard DreyfussFrançois TruffautTeri Garr

12. Contact

• 1997
• 2h 30m
• PG
62Metascore

7.5 (318K)

Dr. Ellie Arroway, after years of searching, finds conclusive radio proof of extraterrestrial intelligence, sending plans for a mysterious machine.

DirectorRobert ZemeckisStarsJodie FosterMatthew McConaugheyTom Skerritt

22. Mars Attacks!

• 1996
• 1h 46m
• PG-13
52Metascore

6.4 (262K)

Earth is invaded by Martians with unbeatable weapons and a cruel sense of humor.

DirectorTim BurtonStarsJack NicholsonPierce BrosnanSarah Jessica Parker

Rotten Tomatoes ranks the Alien franchise.

• #1    Alien: Earth: Season 1 (8 episodes) (2025)  94/65
• #2    Aliens (1986)  93
• #3    Alien (1979)  93
• #4    Alien:  Romolus (2024) 80
• #5    Prometheus (2012)  73
• #10  Aliens vs Predator:  Requiem (2007) 12

Steven Spielberg, in particular, has had plenty of these alien type movies.  Here are his best, only some being related to the subject matter of the day.

• #1    Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
• #2    ET the Extra-terrestrial (1982)
• #3    A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
• #4    Jurassic Park (1993)
• #5    Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
• #6    Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)
• #8  Disclosure Day (2026)  I will below review this movie.
• #10  War of the Worlds (2005)

I can go on and on, but instead will segue to a book that was just released this week, Out of the Shadows.

• Before he retired from a long career in the military and government, Jay Stratton led the Pentagon’s UAP task force and spent nearly two decades looking into reports of alien life
• 
  Now, in a new memoir and an interview with PEOPLE, he speaks out — describing an 80-year-long “disinformation campaign”

• He joined the Army while still in high school, thought he would become an infantryman, and eventually got promoted to become chief of air and space warfare for the Defense Intelligence Agency.
• He said that in 2005 he viewed a video of a black triangular craft with orange, white and yellow lights glowing on each corner. It moved silently before seeming to defy the laws of physics by accelerating faster than the eye could follow — and was gone.

• 
  Changed his life.
• Was the first director of the Pentagon's Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force, created in 2020 to interact with Congress and service members pushing for transparency of the Federal government's attitude about UAP.
• Retired in 2022 at the age of 54.
• Says Stratton:

“We’re not the only intelligent life in the universe,” says Stratton, whose book — which is already slated to become a scripted TV series — was vetted by 21 agencies and departments before being cleared for release, according to a rep.

Stratton’s account of what he learned from classified files and from insiders willing to speak to him about the programs — which, he writes, involved sending covert special operations teams to recover and transport crashed UAP and non-human bodies — is startling. 

Elsewhere in his book, Stratton writes that military contractors hold at least a dozen recovered craft in secure facilities around the nation.

And, yes, according to what Stratton says he learned in the course of his work, citing another insider, the much-discussed, much-mocked stories of a UAP crash in Roswell, N.M. — complete with dead extraterrestrials — are true.

Since 2022, Congress has held six hearings on UAPs that included two Navy pilots testifying about their own unexplained encounters. 

Last year, Stratton appeared in the documentary The Age of Disclosure along with 33 other senior members of the U.S. government, military and intelligence community. Director Dan Farah worked on the project in secret for two and a half years.

In February, a presidential directive instructed federal agencies to identify, declassify and release evidence involving UAPs and non-human life to the public. 

This documentary got 27/90 scores from Rotten Tomatoes.  Can be rented from Amazon Prime.

There does not seem to have been any sort of collaboration between Stratton and Steven Spielberg about both their efforts being released relatively close to each other, but the story Spielberg tells in Disclosure Day is eerily similar to the above quotations reflecting Stratton's work.  And the use of DISCLOSURE in both productions certain links the two.

Clearly, Stratton is a believer of aliens on Earth.  Speilberg?  I asked Google AI:

Yes, Steven Spielberg believes that extraterrestrials have visited and are currently on Earth. [1, 2]

While promoting his sci-fi thriller Disclosure Day, Spielberg shared that his perspective has evolved over the decades: [1, 2, 3]

• Accumulated Evidence: He stated he is convinced aliens are here based on decades of circumstantial evidence, visual documentation, smartphone footage, U.S. Navy FLIR footage, and testimonies presented during congressional hearings on UAPs (Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena).

• 
  No Personal Sightings: Despite his firm belief, Spielberg admitted he has never personally seen a UFO or experienced a close encounter himself.
• Shift from Speculation: When he made Close Encounters of the Third Kind in 1977, he viewed the concept mostly as science speculation, but he now says he is ready to "believe the believers" due to the overwhelming volume of reports and data. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]

If you want to watch this film without knowing the ending, stop reading HERE!  Spielberg's Disclosure Day creates a situation where all those hidden government documents about aliens suddenly appear on the world wide web.

• Only got Rotten Tomatoes scores of 79/69.
• Can be streamed on Peacock.
• For the record, this movie takes the position that there is real evidence of alien presence, and the reason why the government has not released this information is that the public will panic about this truth.
• Watch the ending of this film.

Tomorrow, Part 3:  Why there are no Aliens on Planet Earth.

The hurricane/typhoon season has a month and a half left.  In the West Pacific, what will tomorrow become a typhoon certainly looks formidable.  At this time Champi is headed straight for Taiwan.

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