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4/3/18: 2001: SPACE AUDACITY

Ron Patton | April 3, 2018

2001: SPACE AUDACITY

MONOLOGUE WRITTEN BY CLYDE LEWIS

On April Fool’s Day, Ground Zero secretly observed its 23rd anniversary. In 1995, I was working two news reporting jobs for a national company that beamed news to regional radio stations.

I freelanced a couple of regional reports for CNN Radio. We answered to CNN and I would have all of the contacts of a full CNN reporter. I was producing talk shows and even pulling a shift as a Rock and Roll disc jockey.

It was a living.

One day, a colleague of mine said he was giving up his weekend talk show and asked me if I was willing to fill the slot – I said sure not even knowing what I wanted to talk about. Eventually, I settled for apocalyptic stories because of my religious background and rather than sounding like a preacher, I figured I would sound like a deranged cult leader – from apocalyptic stories came stories of alien invasions and the cover ups of the government.

Many times throughout my career, I have been called a conspiracy theorist. Even when I was a news reporter and string reporter for CNN I was called a conspiracy theorist.

I have always corrected people by saying I am a reporter who is conspiracy theory analyst. I see it as a consequence of my background in history and analysis of Science fiction and pop culture.

Not being comfortable with the title of conspiracy theorist I have often quipped “I really don’t have a conspiracy theory attributed to me and if anyone could find one I would be open to hearing about it.”

Well, on my 23rd anniversary, someone actually called my bluff and told me that yes, there is indeed a conspiracy theory which is attributed to me and what is most interesting is that the timing couldn’t have been better.

A listener turned me on to as story that was published in 2014 on the Truthseekers website that actually mentions me and wonders if I am the “conspiracy theorist” that launched a theory long ago that Stanley Kubrick the director of 2001: A Space Odyssey was actually the director of the alleged faked moon landings.

StanleyKubrickFakingTheMoonLanding.ParanoiaMagazine.2015

According to the Truth Seekers website, which doesn’t seem to be updated all that much, I am cited as a possible source for the Kubrick Moon landing conspiracy theory. I am also assumed to be the author of the infamous “Stanley Kubrick and the Moon Hoax” conspiracy. To be honest I remember talking about this back in 1999 and chances are I may have been inspired to speculate on this theory from other information that I had heard first hand from Vladimir Terziski, a Bulgarian Physicist who claimed to be a former KGB agent. He was actually the first guy that turned me on to Bill Kaysing who was one of the oldest moon hoax conspiracy writers.

To quote the site Trutheseekers website, it reads:

“Wikipedia has a page dedicated to debunking “conspiracy theories about the Moon landing”, with a section highlighting the Kubrick connection. The page cites the “Stanley Kubrick and the Moon Hoax” article as the probable origin of the Kubrick connection. The page also notes that the article has since “been quoted as in earnest by Clyde Lewis.”

ClydeLewis.KXL.YouTube.2013

Furthermore the website says that:

“It is odd that Wikipedia cites this individual alone and nobody else. Why? Clyde Lewis is a peculiar character. He has championed his self-styled “conspiracy theorist” personae with all the grace and solemnity of a game show host. He has also had a long-standing connection with a number of individuals in the mainstream media / entertainment industry. To my mind, he raises some of the serious concerns that I have about other similarly high-profile figures in the alternative knowledge arena (such as Alex Jones), leading me to suspect that Lewis may be an agenda-steered purveyor of disinformation. “

With regard to the Stanley Kubrick 2001 a Space Odyssey the website says:

“Lewis appears to have been one of the first individuals to publicly state that Kubrick was involved in the Apollo 11 cover-up. He was also one of the earliest people to use direct quotes from the “Stanley Kubrick and the Moon Hoax” article. This has prompted some people to suggest that Lewis himself may have authored the original article. If this is the case, then it is possible (emphasis on that word!) that Lewis is the original source of the “Kubrick faked the Apollo footage” hypothesis – a disturbing thought!”

The uncanny coincidence is that today April 3rd, 2018 marks the 50th anniversary of the release of 2001: a Space Odyssey.

What is most confusing is that I had always thought that most conspiracy theorists knew of the alleged connections between Stanley Kubrick, the film and the moon landing.

After all film makers like Jay Weidner have made the connections, also Jay Dyer and Olav Phillips have spoken about the connections.

Jay Weidner even made a film called “Kubrick’s Odyssey: Secrets Hidden in the Films of Stanley Kubrick; Part One: Kubrick and Apollo.”


KubricksOdyssey.JayWeidner.YouTube.2011

There was also a film called “Room 237” where these theories about Kubrick have been explored.

My first article and show where I proposed that the moon landing in 1969 was faked was in 1999. The show was called “Good luck Mr. Gorsky and Other Lies About the Moon and featured Bill Kaysing who in 1976 wrote the book, We Never Went to the Moon: America’s Thirty Billion Dollar Swindle.”


TheMoonLandingConspiracy.BillKaysing.YouTube.2017

I remember him speaking to me about Kubrick directing the Moon landings for NASA because they were impressed with his work on 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Kaysing also said that the reason why Star Trek was abruptly cancelled by NBC was because NASA knew that it would be hard to sell the American people that man had landed on the moon when in a studio they can have a starship realistically pass over a fake planet.

It makes you wonder since Star Trek was one of the highest rated TV shows in NBC’s history.

The very first episode of Star Trek received 19.8 percent and 40.6 percent on the Trendex 26-city rating. This means that it was watched by 19.8 percent of all potential television viewers, and an incredible 40.6 percent of all of those watching television at the time.

This was before Nielsen ratings and back then there wasn’t the vast volume of channels to whittle away the ratings as there is today, but NBC agreed for a full season within three months and it was renewed for a second season during the following March.

Star Trek was cancelled June 3rd 1969. The Apollo launch happened a month later.

A year before that, we were watching astronauts in space on the movie screen with 2001 A Space Odyssey.

The story goes that in early 1968, Kubrick was secretly approached by NASA officials who presented him with a lucrative offer to “direct” the first three moon landings.

Initially Kubrick declined, as “2001: A Space Odyssey” was in post-production at the time, but NASA threatened to publicly reveal the heavy involvement of Stanley’s younger brother, Raul, with the American Communist Party.

This would have been an intolerable embarrassment to Mr. Kubrick, especially since the release of “Dr. Strangelove”. Kubrick finally relented, and for sixteen months he and a special effects team — led by Douglas Trumbull worked in a specially built sound stage in Huntsville, Alabama, “creating” the first and second moon landings. This effort resulted in hundreds of hours of 35mm and video “footage” of the Apollo 11 and 12 moon missions.

The bogus Apollo 11 mission was masterfully staged in July of 1969. A Saturn V rocket with astronauts Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins was launched into low Earth orbit, remaining there while NASA carefully released Kubrick’s studio footage to the press. After the spectacular “lunar landing” and “return to Earth,” the astronauts reentered Earth’s atmosphere and made a perfect splash down in the Pacific, right on schedule. Several months later, the Apollo 12 mission was successfully staged in a similar manner.

Mr. Kubrick refused to direct the Apollo 13 mission, however, because NASA officials rejected his screenplay in which the Apollo 13 mission fails. Kubrick insisted that a dramatic failed mission from which the astronauts were safely returned to Earth would ultimately prove to be NASA’s “finest hour.”

NASA maintained that a failed mission would unnecessarily jeopardize the agency’s image, so Kubrick quit the project. Ironically, NASA later decided to use the failed mission scenario, for which Randall Cunningham — a little known but highly respected British director was recruited to direct.

The conspiracy theory concludes that Kubrick was meticulous in his directing of the Moon landing.

Kubrick’s relentless perfectionism is evident throughout the Apollo production, from the chilling “1201 alarm” during the final seconds of the Eagle’s descent to the lunar surface, right down to the lunar dust covering the astronaut’s EVA suits.

Now I want to stop for a moment and remind everyone that this is hypothetical as there is absolutely no proof the Kubrick directed the moon landings – however there are some interesting coincidental evidence that perhaps there was work that was done for NASA PR – that maybe Kubrick had a hand in.

It is believed that Kubrick had sets constructed at the Mercury base center in Nevada.

The set was built in an underground cavern. There were provisions for lighting, camera tracks and special effects equipment.

All moonwalk scenes were filmed on the set. The “missions” were controlled by complexes of IBM 370 computers. There were radio links to major tracking stations in Australia, Spain, and California, and a satellite broadcasting a copy of the voice channel.

Some people claim that you can even catch a few rare NASA Photos where you see astronauts posing in front of blue screens.

People argue that there were no film technologies available in 1969 to fake such a mission. Simulating one-sixth the gravity of Earth would be easy using movie magic. Hydraulics, wires, and some scenes shot in underwater aquariums. No one knows for sure. Technologies allegedly are developed 20 years before they are commercial which would lend credence to the possibility that in 1969, battleground simulations and planetary terrain programs could have been used with the aid of something as simple as a blue screen.

The crude versions were seen in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.

It is also documented that Kubrick hired spacecraft consultants Frederick Ordway and Harry Lange, who had assisted some of the major contractors in the aerospace industry and NASA with developing advanced space vehicle concepts, as technical advisors on the film.

Ordway was able to convince dozens of aerospace giants such as IBM, Honeywell, Boeing, General Dynamics, Grumman, Bell Telephone, and General Electric that participating in the production of “2001” would generate good publicity for them. Many companies provided copious amounts of documentation and hardware prototypes free of charge in return for “product placements” in the completed film. They believed that the film would serve as a big-screen advertisement for space technology and were more than willing to help out Kubrick’s crew in any way possible.

In an interview that I read concerning the re-mastering of the movie, it was reported that Senior NASA Apollo administrator George Mueller and astronaut Deke Slayton nicknamed “2001’s” Borehamwood, England production facilities “NASA East” after seeing all of the hardware and documentation lying around the studio. That was an interesting nickname. Would this insinuate that perhaps special effects models and sets were at NASA also? It’s a valid question.

Even today, most audiences and critics still find “2001’s” props and spaceships more convincing than those in many more recent science fiction movies. Con Pederson, one of the special effects artists, even knew Wernher Von Braun.

One of the most remarkable things that I recall is that big companies paid for the sets. One set that had a big bill was the Discovery Ship.

A 30-ton rotating “Ferris wheel” built by Vickers-Armstrong Engineering Group. Vickers-Armstrong was a British aircraft company that shelled out $750,000 dollars for this effect. It rotated at 3 miles per hour and was big enough to create a lasting impression.

It is certainly a compelling coincidence and it is a very applicable conspiracy theory. If you were planning a hoax like the moon landing, wouldn’t you want the greatest technical director of his generation on your side, making things go smooth?

I guess you can believe what you want to believe. The government has the power to create or fake anything. With the right kind of influence and they can make dragons and slay them, they can create bogey men and then debunk them, and they can land men on the moon to give us reason to dream and then limit our reach by keeping us in orbit around the Earth.

The new generations are now making rockets for the moon and mars – the only thing that bugs me us that we already had rockets that could go to the moon – the technology as primitive as it was back then was said to be able to put men on the moon and bring them back safely—surely scientists could pick up from where we left off.

The question is why haven’t they? Why didn’t they?

Hollywood has conducted more missions into space where humans come in contact with aliens. This includes the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey — a film that convincingly put us into space long before NASA did. Phase two of manned missions into space have not happened yet.

Probably because Stanley Kubrick died in 1999 – funny how the whole moon hoax speculations under his direction began right after he died.

If you can believe we went to the moon in 1969, it isn’t that far of stretch to realize that it could have been faked and directed by a Hollywood genius.

Today I believe we should hurry up and get back to the moon. We should give man a new reason to look up.

Because right now it seems that most people have their heads in the sand.

Written by Ron Patton




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