I’d say ‘conspiracy’ but here they all are, in plain sight, plotting ways in which they can take over the world.

Some days, I feel like I’m in a really bad version of Pinky and the Brain.

Behind the scenes, the Brains that want to take over the world have been at it again.

A story in WIRED Magazine exposed the situation last week (non-paywall version here).

More than 200 of the world’s elites registered for a retreat whose agenda runs from panels on cult-building and sex to prepping for World War III. An associated app offers matchmaking.

The group, called Dialog, is a private, invitation-only organization cofounded in 2006 by the billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel. It convenes US officials, foreign government figures, and Silicon Valley executives at off-the-record annual retreats. Dialog has spent two decades declining to disclose its members.

Notice the irony? A data breach with the company and group that offers security and tracking programs to governments around the world?

The sooner Canada backs away from this mess, the better. France and other countries have already taken steps to remove Palantir and related organizations from their roster of companies that they use for security purposes.

More Links:

The Full List (to date):

/… partial list of people who will be participating in the 2013 Dialog Retreat (all are references): /

• ??? Founding Partner, Pacific Investments. Chm, Portal de Documentos. Boards: Allied Advanced
  Technologies, Wow! Nutrition, Mercado Libre, ‘Smart Foundation.”
• ??? Athey•-• Professor of Economics, Harvard University. Chief Economist, Microsoft. 2007 Winner of John Bates.
  Clark Medal.
• *Byron **Auguste.– Director and Head of Social Sector Office, McKinsey & Co. Chm, Hope Street Group.Boards: William
  and Flora Hewlett Foundation; Pacific Council on International Policy; Center for American Progress.
• *David Barron. — Professor, Harvard Law School. Fmr Acting Asst U.S. Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel.
• *Kirsten Bartok.– CEO, AirFinance. Fmr CFO of XOJet. Fmr GP at Alpine Investors.
• *Evan Bayh*— Sr Advisor, Apollo Management. Partner, McGuireWoods. Fmr U.S. Senator (D-IN) (1999-2011). Fmr
  Governor of Indiana (1989-1997). Author, /From Father to Son/.
• *Tom Bedecarre*— CEO, AKQA.
• *Nick Beim.— GP, Matrix. Boards: Gilt Groupe, TheLadders, Care.com, Conductor, Intent Media, BuyWithMe.
• *Nicolas *’Berggruen•– President, Berggruen Holdings.
• *Charles Bests—CEO, DononrsChoose.
• *Elizabeth Blackburn.— Prof of Biology and Physiology, UCSF. 2009 Winner of Nobel Prize in Medicine. President,
  American Association of Cancer Research.
• *David Bonderman. — Founding Partner, Texas Pacific Group (TPG). Founding Partner, Newbridge Capital. Boards:
  Continental Airlines, Bowe Bell & Howell, Ducati Motorcycles, Credicom Asia, National Education Corp, Beringer Wine,
  Carr Reality, Virgin Cinemas, CoStar Group, GemAlto, RyanAir Holdings, Wilderness Society, World Wildlife Fund.
• *Jason Bordoff.— Senior Advisor for Energy and Environmental Policy to U.S. President Obama.
• *Erik Brynjolfsson*— Prof of Economics, MIT Sloan School of Management.
  Director, MIT Center for Digital Business. Chair, /MIT Sloan Management Review. / Author, /Race Against the Machine/.
• *John Burbank*—CEO, Passport Capital.
• *John Burbank. — President, Nielsen Strategic Initiatives. Fmr CEO of Online, Nielsen. Fmr CMO, Nielsen. Fmr CMO, AOL.
• *Leah Busque*— Founder, TaskRabbit.
• *Marc Cenedella*— CEO, TheLadders.
• *Stephen Cohen.— cofounder, Palantir.
• *Gio Colella *— CEO, Castlight Health. Fmr CEO, RelayHealth.
• *Mark Colodny.— Managing Director, Warburg Pincus. Boards: CAMP Systems, GlobalSpec, MLM Information, i Paradigms, Multi View, A Place for Mom, EVIDON, eCert, Spigit, OnTargetJobs.
• *Boykin Curry. — Managing Director, Eagle Capital. Creator of Playa Grande. Cofndr, Girls Prep. Boards: Alliance for
  School Choice, Democrats for Education Reform.
• *Adam D’Angelo*— CEO, Quora. Fmr CTO, Facebook.
• *Mitch Daniels “— President, Purdue University. Governor, State of Indiana (2005-2013). Fmr Director, Office of
  Management and Budget (2001-2003). *
• *Lanny Davis.– FmrSpecial Counsel to the President (under Clinton).Author of Scandal and The Emerging Democratic
  Majority.
• *Ken Denman.— CEO, Machine Perception Technologies. Fmr CEO of Openwave.
  Fmr CEO of iPass (IPAS). Fmr CEO, AuraSery Communications. Fmr SVP MediaOne. National Markets.
• *Marc Ecko*—Chief Creative Officer, Marc Ecko Enterprises. Award-winning artist.
• *RP Eddy CEO, Ergo. Fmr Director, White House National Security Council. Fmr Chief of Staff to U.N. Ambassador
  Richard Holbrooke. Sr Fellow, Manhattan Institute.
• *Juan Enriquez.— CEO, Biotechonomy. Founding Director of the Life Sciences Project, Harvard Business School. Boards:
  Cabot Corp, Craig Venter Institute. Fmr CEO, Mexico City ‘s Urban Development Corporation.
• *Jeff Epstein. — fmr CFO, Oracle. Fmr CFO, DoubleClick. Fmr CFO, King World Productions. Boards: Priceline.com,
  Stanford University Hospital.
• *Niall Ferguson.— Prof History, Harvard. Author of /The World’s Banker: The History of the House of Rothschild/,/The Cash Nexus/,/Empire, Colossus/,/The War of the World, The Ascent of Money/, and others.
• *Brad Garlinghouse.— CEO, YouSendlt.
• *Julius Genachowski*— Chairman, Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
• *Jared Genser. — MD, Persesus Strategies. Founder, Freedom Now. International lawyer for Aung San Suu Kyi.
• *Jeff George— Global Head, Sandoz. Member of Exec Committee, Novartis.
• *Dave Goldberg. — CEO, SurveyMonkey.
• *Tom Goldstein.– Partner, Goldstein & Howe. Fmr Partner and head of Supreme Court practice, Akin Gump. Has argued
  over 20 cases before Supreme Court. CEO, SCOTUSbIog.
• *Fabrice **Grinda*– CEO, OLX. Fmr fndrand CEO, Zingy. Fmr CEO, Aucland.
• *Ash Gupta’— Chief Risk Officer, American Express.
• *Richard Haass.— President, Council on Foreign Relations. Fmr Director of Policy Planning, U.S. State Department. Fmr U.S. Special Envoy to Northern Ireland.
• *Victor Halberstadt’— Prof of Economics, Leiden University (Netherlands). Fmr President, International Institute of Public Finance. Mbr, Investment Committee, ABP Pension Fund. Boards: RHJ Internationall.
• *Janet Hanson’— CEO, 8SBroads. ‘Hollie Moore Haynes.— MD, Silver Lake Partners.
• *Bob Hertzberg. — Chairman, G24 Innovations. Partner, Mayer Brown Rowe & Maw. Fmr Speaker, California State Assembly (200O-2002). Fmr Regent, University of California. Fmr Chm, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa transition team.
  Board: Solar Integrated Technologies (Chm), California Historical Society, MALDEF, Town Hall Los Angeles, Century
  Housing.
• *Jim Nimes’— U.S. Congressman (D-CT).
• ‘Auren Hoffman’– CEO of LiveRamp. Chm, Rapleaf. Curator, Dialog Retreat. Board: Retargeter. Reid Hoffman’— Chairman and founder, Linkedln. Partner, Greylock. Boards: DoSomething, Kiva, Endeavor Global, Mozilla. Zynga.
• *Jacob Hsu.— CEO, Symbio.
• ‘Daisuke Iwase’— cofounder and COO, Lifenet Insurance (top life insurance company in Japan).
• *Christian Johansson’— Secretary of Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED), State of Maryland. Fmr CEO, Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore.
• *David Kamenetzky.— Group Head, Mars & Co.
• PV ••Kannan*— CEO, 24/7 Customer.
• Andy • •Karsner•— CEO, Manifest Energy. Fmr U.S. Asst Sec of Energy for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy
  (2005.2009). Fmr Managing Director, Enercorp. Boards: Applied Materials, Conservation International.
• Garry Kasporovs— Fmr World Chess Champion. Chm, United Civil Front of Russia.
• Neal ••Katyal•— Partner, Hogan Lovells. Fmr Acting Solicitor General for the United States (2010-2011). Professor of
  Law, Georgetown U. Lead counsel for the plaintiff in Supreme Court case Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld.
• Terry Kawaja CEO, Luma Partners.
• Juliette Kayyem•— Foreign Affairs Columnist, Boston Globe. Lecturer in Public Policy, Harvard. Asst Sec. for Intergovernmental Affairs, U.S.
  Dept. of Homeland Security.
• Jeff Kearl.— Chm, SkullCandy.
• Peter Kellner•– MD, Richmond Management. Cofounder, Endeavor. Fmr partner, VectisGroup.
• Chris Kelly•– Fmr Chief Privacy Officer and Head of Global Public Policy at Facebook . Fmr Chief Privacy Office, Excite@Home.
• Pradeep ••Khosla•— Chancellor, UC San Diego. Fmr Dean of College of Engineering, Carnegie Mellon.Boards: Quantpoint, BioMatricore, BitArmor, Children’s Institute, IIT Foundation, Mellon-Pitt Corp.
• Charlie Kim*— CEO, NextJump.
• David Kirkpatrick•— Author, /The Facebook Effect/. Fmr head technology writer, FORTUNE.
• Henry Kravis•— Co-CEO of KKR. Chm, First Data. Boards: Claremont McKenna College, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Mount Sinai Medical Center, Council on Foreign Relations, Columbia Business School, Rockefeller University, others. Fmr Chair, Partnership for New York City.
• Marie-Josee Kravis•— Boards: Publicis, LVMH. Boards: Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Robin Hood Foundation, Council on Foreign Relations, Qatar Museum Authority. President, Museum of Modern Art board of directors. Fmr Board: Ford, IAC, CIBC.
• Will Lansing•— CEO, FICO (NYSE: FICO). Fmr CEO, InfoSpace. Fmr CEO, NBC Internet. Fmr COO, Prodigy Communications.
• Renaud Laplanche•— CEO, Lending Club.
• Laura and Gary Lauder•– General Partners, Lauder Partners. Cofndrs, Socrates Society.
• Jenna Lee. — Anchor, Fox News. Host, /Happening Now/ on Fox News.
• Jorge Lemann•— Fmr Owner, Am Bev (largest brewery in Latin America) and now one of the largest shareholders in Anheuser-Busch InBev. Boards: Lojas Americanas, Gillette, Swiss Re, Burger King.
• *Max Leychin. — fmr CEO, Slide. Fmr co-founder, PayPal.
• *Jonathan Levin. — Prof and Chair of Dept of Economics, Stanford. 2011 Winner of the John Bates Clark Medal.
• *Ann Lewis *— President, NoLimits. Fmr Director of Communications to the U.S. President (1997-2000).
• *Rob LoCasio.— CEO, LivePerson (NASDAQ: LSPN).
• *Jeremy Liew.— GP, LightSpeed Venture Partners. Investor in: Bonobos, CarDomain, Flixster, Focus, Kixeye, Kongregate, LivingSocial, Playdom, RockYou, ShoeDazzle, and others.
• *Joe Lonsdale*— CEO, Adepar. cofounder, Palantir.
• “Doreen Lorenzo *— President, Frog Design.
• *Bob •*Luskin*– Partner and Co-Chair of Litigation Dept, Patton Boggs.Attorney to Karl Rove and Lance Armstrong. Fmr Chief Counsel to the Organized Crime & Racketeering Section of DOJ
• *torn Lyseggen.— CEO of Meltwater.
• *John Maeda•— President, Rhode Island School of Design. Author, /Laws of Simplicity./
• Divesh Makan.— CEO, Iconiq Capital.
• *Meyer •*Malka**— co-CEO, Lemon.’
• *Andy McAfee•— Principal Research Scientist at the Center for Digital Business, MIT. Author of /Race Against the Machine. /
• *General Stan •*McChrystal*.— Ret. 4-star U.S. General. Led all U.S. forces in Afghanistan. *Fmr Commander, Joint Special Operations Command.*Current Principal, *McChrystal*Group. Sr. Fellow, Yale’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs.*
• *Andrew McLaughlin’ s— Fmr VP, Tumblr. Fmr Deputy CTO of the United States, White House. Fmr Dir of Public Policy, Google. Boards: Public Knowledge, Code for America.
• *Dmitri Mehlhorn**— COO, *StudentsFirst..*
• *Lenny ••Mendonca•– Director, McKinsey. Head of McKinsey’s strategy practice. Chm, McKinsey Global Institute. Chm, Bay Area Council. Board:
  McKinsey & Co, Economic Institute of the Bay Area, Bay Area Science and Innovation Consortium, The New America Foundation, Common Cause, Committee for Economic Development, ChildrenNow, and DonorsChoose.
• *Eugene Meyer.— President, Federalist Society.
• *Chris Michel•’— GP, Nautilus Ventures. Award-winning photographer.
• *Fmr*CEO, Affinity Labs. •Fmr*CEO, Military.com. Boards: International Data Group, Dale Carnegie, *Kixeye*,
• *Castlight’Health, USO, •Marine*Corps University Foundation.
• *Katie Mitic **— Fmr Head of Platform Marketing, Facebook. Fmr SVP, Palm. Fmr VP Product Strategy, Yahoo! Fmr Fndr and CEO, Fourll. Boards:
  eBay, Special Olympics International. *
• ‘Wes Moore’– Author, “The Other Wes Moore”. Fmr. Special Assistant to Secretary of State Rice. Fmr Director of Information Operations, 82nd Airborne Division, US Army, Afghanistan 2005-2006.
• *Nader Mousavizadeh*— CEO of Oxford Analytica.
• *Luke Muehlhauser’— Exec Director, Singularity University.
• ‘Matt Mullenweg *— Founder, WordPress.
• *Roger Myerson’– Prof of Economics, U of Chicago. 2007 winner of Nobel Prize in Economics.
• ‘Scott Nathan’— Partner, Baupost Group.
• *Meghan O’Sullivan’– Professor, Harvard Kennedy School of Govt. Fmr Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and
  Afghanistan, President George W. Bush. Mbr, Trilateral Commission.
• ‘Chamath “Palihapitiya’— CEO, Social+Capital. fmr VP Growth, Mobile, and International at Facebook. Fmr GM of AIM at AOL. Boards:
  SecondMarket, FixYa, Lemon, Integrated Plasmonics. Co-Owner, Golden State Warriors.
• ‘Eli **Pariser**—*Fmr President, MoveOn.Cofndr, Avaaz.org. Boards: MoveOn, Avaaz, New Organizing Institute and Simon’s Rock College.
• ‘Mark Penn’— Corp VP of Strategic Projects (reports to the CEO), Microsoft. Fmr CEO, Burson-Marsteller. President, of polling firm Penn, Schoen and BerlandAssociates. Fmr Chief Strategist, Hillary Clinton for President 2008. Author, Microtrends. Fmr pollster to President Clinton. Fmr pollster to Prime Minister Tony Blair.
• *Lois Quam’— Executive Director, Global Health Initiative — part of the State Department and she reports directly to Secretary Clinton. Fmr CEO of Public and Senior Markets, UnitedHealth Group ($30 billion division).
• ‘Dan Rosensweig ‘— CEO, Chegg. Fmr CEO, Guitar Hero. Fmr COO, Yahoo.
• ‘Robert Rubin’—Co-Chairman, Council on Foreign Relations. Fmr U.S. Secretary of the Treasury (1995.1999). Fmr Director, National Economic Council (1993.1995). Chm, Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC). Fmr Co-Chairman, Goldman Sachs.
• ‘Sal Russo’— Founder, Tea Party Express. Partner, Russo Marsh.
• ‘Tod Sacerdoti*— CEO, BrightRoll. Board: ReTargeter.
• ‘Amy Salzhauer *— CEO, Ignition.
• ‘Cami Samuels’— General Partner, Versant Ventures. Boards: Achaogen, APT Pharmaceuticals, Kythera Biopharmaceuticals, Semprae Laboratories.
• ‘Ken Sawyer’– CEO, Saints Ventures (manages over $1 billion in capital). Selected to Forbes Midas List. Boards: Continuous Computing, HK Systems, Cleargauge, Travel Intelligence, Envivio, Alliance Consulting, Acsis and Laureate EVP BD and Strategic Planning, Universal Pictures. Fmr SVP Digital Strategy and Business Development, NBC Universal. Board: World Wide Biggies.
• *Barry Silbert ‘1— CEO of SecondMarket.
• *Josh Silverman’— President of US Consumer Services, American Express. Fmr CEO, Skype. Fmr CEO, Shopping.com. Fmr CEO and Fndr, eVite.
• *Sukhinder Singh Cassidy*— Chm, JOYUS. Fmr CEO, Polyvore. Fmr President of Asia Pacific and Latin America, Google. Boards: TripAdvisor (TRIP) and Formspring.
• *Megan Smith*— VP Business Development, Google. Fmr CEO, PlanetOut.
• *Charles **Songhurst*– GM and Head of Strategy and M&A, Microsoft. MD, Katana Capital.
• *Angelo Sotiras— CEO, DeviantArt.
• *Bret Stephens’– Member of Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal. Main Foreign Affairs Columnist, Wall Street Journal. Fmr Editor-in-Chief, Jerusalem Post.
• *Simon Stevens*— EVP, UnitedHealth Group. Fmr CEO, Ovations (revenues of $31 billion). Fmr Health Policy Director to British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
• *Henry Sweica’— CEO, Talpion Fund Management. Fmr co-founder, Highbridge Capital Management.
• *Alexander Tamas*- Partner, DST. Boards: Forticom, mail.ru
• *Peter Thiel.– CEO of Thiel Capital. Managing Director, Founders Fund. Fmr founder and CEO of PayPal. Boards: Facebook and Palantir.
• *Steve Wayne’— CEO, Jensen Group.
• *Will Wechsler*— Deputy Asst. Sec of Defense for Counternarcotics and Global Threats.
• *Adam Weiss”—co-CEO, Scout Capital. *
• *Katharine Weymouth”— Publisher, Washington Post.*
• *Michael Wolf’—CEO, Activate. fmr President and COO, MN Networks. Fmr Prtnr, McKinsey. Former Senior Partner, Booz Allen & Hamilton.
• *Paul Wolpes— Director, Center of Ethics. Prof of Bioethics, Emory. Sr Bioethicist, NASA. Co-Editor, American Journal of Bioethics.
• *Jed York’— CEO of San Francisco 49ers.
• *Lauren Zalaznick’— Chairman, Entertainment & Digital Networks and Integrated Media, NBCUniversal. She oversees Bravo, Oxygen Media, Style, PBS Sprout, Telemundo, iVillage, Swirl, Daily Candy, and Fandango.
• *Eric Zinterhofer — *co-CEO, Searchlight Capital. Chm, Charter Communications. Fmr Sr Partner, Apollo Management. Boards: Central European Media Enterprises, Dish TV India
• ‘Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg’— fmr Minister of Defense, Germany. Fmr Minister of Economics and Technology,
  Germany.