It’s kinda like “The artist formerly known as Prince”…whose name was Prince.  Hey!  This guys name is Prince too!  Are they brothers?  Could be…

Erik Prince is a piece of work.  Dominionist extraordinaire.  He has taken playing army to a frightening level.  Here is a blurb about this war-mongering racist ‘c’hristian:

“America’s Holy Warriors”

Erik Prince^[36] is “the secretive, mega-millionaire, right-wing Christian founder of Blackwater, the private security firm that has built a formidable mercenary force in Iraq,” Chris Hedges wrote December 31, 2006, in Truthdig.^[37]

Prince “champions his company as a patriotic extension of the U.S. military. His employees, in an act as cynical as it is deceitful, take an oath of loyalty to the Constitution.^[38] These mercenary units in Iraq, including Blackwater, contain some 20,000 fighters. They unleash indiscriminate and wanton violence against unarmed Iraqis, have no accountability and are beyond the reach of legitimate authority. The appearance of these paramilitary fighters, heavily armed and wearing their trademark black uniforms, patrolling the streets of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, gave us a grim taste of the future. It was a stark reminder that the tyranny we impose on others we will one day impose on ourselves,” Hedges wrote.^[37]

Vigilantism is dangerous no matter who initiates it.  And Prince is one of our favorite Dominionists who believes he is called in the Great Commission to take up where the proselytizers fail.  In other words, if you don’t convert and “accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour”, learn “speaking in tongues” as a second language and claim rebirth – well – Prince and Pals will be happy to remove you from the landscape…pretty much that simple.

Jeremy Scahill is the expert on Prince and Xe and this video is Scahill being interviewed by Keith Olberman on August 4th, 2009:

This next video is Mike Papantonio of Air America describing the frightening power of this mercenary military that is immune from oversight…you really have to watch this!

And the third, an excellent introduction as to exactly WHO and WHAT Blackwater/Xe is and how the Bush Administration used them as their own personal militia to engage in activities that would never be sanctioned under the rule of law.  In their minds they are truly the “hit men” for God with a mission to “cleanse” the world of what their definition of evil is.

No special meaning indeed. The same can be said for the identity, which is a bizarre cross between theold Xeroxbrandmark and the logo for Xena: Warrior Princess.As a result, the only X this rebrand deserves is for a new identity that has gone terribly, terribly wrong.In 2007, Blackwater Worldwide, the world’s largest private security company, made the wrong kind of headlines when Blackwater contractors allegedly shot and killed 17 Iraqis in a crowded square in Baghdad. This resulted in protests, congressional inquiries and the Iraqi government refusing to allow the organization to operate in the country. And now, in an effort to improve public perception, Blackwater has changed its name to Xe (pronounced ZEE).

Organizations that change their name usually do so to “better define” what they do, or to “clarify” a shift in services, and this is often in tandem with a repositioning of services or a shift in core competencies. Anne Tyrrell, a spokeswoman for Blackwater, explained that the company was changing its name because “the idea is to define the company as what it is today and not what it used to be.”

The Blackwater name has being expunged from all of its business units: Blackwater Airships (which offers surveillance services for intelligence gathering) has become Guardian Flight Systems. Blackwater Target Systems (the unit that develops and builds targets) is now being called GSD Manufacturing, and Blackwater Lodge and Training Center has been named the U.S. Training Center.

Not everyone agrees with Tyrrell. RJ Hillhouse, a national security expert and author of the blog called The Spy Who Billed Me, said the company is “obviously trying to distance itself from their image as reckless cowboys that’s etched into the world’s mind from the…shooting.” With a new name, “there are a lot of people who probably won’t connect the dots,” she said. “In a year or two, people won’t remember that’s Blackwater.”

When asked about the name change, Robert Passikoff, president of the New York marketing research firm Brand Keys, Inc. offered this: “There’s an old saying about brands: ‘When you can’t change the product, you change the packaging,’” he said. “It’s common for companies to rename in an effort to distance themselves from bad publicity, but in Blackwater’s case, things have gotten so bad that the company had little choice but dump the brand.”

Tyrrell disagrees. She countered that Blackwater’s past was only one of several factors involved in the decision. “The company leaders came up with and considered several new names,” she said. “Xe had the best potential for brand identity but has no special meaning,” she added.

No special meaning indeed. The same can be said for the identity, which is a bizarre cross between the old Xerox brandmark and the logo for Xena: Warrior Princess. As a result, the only X this rebrand deserves is for a new identity that has gone terribly, terribly wrong.

This is another article that gives you more information about this group of “brown shirts”, as I see them and yet another ‘incident’…  http://aftermathnews.wordpress.com/2009/03/23/xe-blackwater-sued-for-drunken-killing-of-iraqi-vps-guard-and-cover-up/

And here is the web site to their actual site…http://www.xecompany.com/

The Blackwater name has being expunged from all of its business units: Blackwater Airships (which offers surveillance services for intelligence gathering) has become Guardian Flight Systems. Blackwater Target Systems (the unit that develops and builds targets) is now being called GSD Manufacturing, and Blackwater Lodge and Training Center has been named the U.S. Training Center.

Not everyone agrees with Tyrrell. RJ Hillhouse, a national security expert and author of the blog called The Spy Who Billed Me, said the company is “obviously trying to distance itself from their image as reckless cowboys that’s etched into the world’s mind from the…shooting.” With a new name, “there are a lot of people who probably won’t connect the dots,” she said. “In a year or two, people won’t remember that’s Blackwater.”

And they aren’t kidding!  They truly rely on us being that stupid, that we really won’t remember…

Verb “Xe“

1. To block – (To fill (something) so that it is not possible to pass) or (To prevent (something or someone) from passing).
2. To catch – (act of catching a ball).
3. To fill – (to make full).
4. To seal – To prevent people or vehicles from crossing (something) or (To close securely to prevent leakage).

I will close this post with that…and please tell me what your interpretation of “Xe” is.  I know I have my own thoughts.  This was certainly a thoroughly thought out choice, and I am not comfortable with the meaning.

Tags: Bible, Christian, Dominionists, God, political dominionists, religious right, Republican Party, theocracy, United States

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