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A fiery meteor streaked across the Midwest sky early Monday morning, seen as far west as Nebraska and as far east as New York. Unfortunately for scientists who would like to study where it came from and how it got here (although perhaps fortunately for people living in the vicinity) all of the surviving bits of rock plopped into Lake Michigan. The American Meteor Society has received more than 350 reports from witnesses of the green fireball, which occurred around 1:25 a. m. local time. William B. Cook, a NASA meteor expert, reported in a email to NASA headquarters that the fireball originated about 60 miles above West Bend, Wis. moving about 38, 000 miles an hour toward the northeast before disintegrating about 21 miles above Lake Michigan. As the meteor fell apart, it emitted sounds that were recorded in the Canadian province of Manitoba, about 600 miles away. The blast released energy that was equal to at least 10 tons of TNT, Dr. Cook said, suggesting that the object that entered the atmosphere was at least 600 pounds and two feet in diameter. Most of the reports came from Wisconsin and Illinois. Michael Hankey of the American Meteor Society said such fireballs happen every day somewhere, but only rarely — perhaps four a year — do they occur over populated areas of the United States where the light show can be captured by dashboard cameras, security cameras and night owls carrying cellphones. “There were just a ton of videos,” Mr. Hankey said. “That was unique. ” Marc D. Fries, another NASA scientist, said that weather radar captured the shower of meteorites and that he was analyzing the data to estimate the masses of the meteorites and where they fell. From the multitude of reports, scientists should be able to calculate the trajectory of the object, which most likely originated in the asteroid belt. (An asteroid is a rock orbiting in the inner solar system, usually between Mars and Jupiter. A meteor is the streak of light as an asteroid enters the atmosphere. A meteorite is an asteroid remnant that makes it to the ground.) Philipp R. Heck, a scientist at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, said the fireball seemed comparable to one that fell over a southern suburb of Chicago in 2003. Meteorites as heavy as several pounds hit the ground, some damaging homes. With the asteroid remnants, scientists could study the mineralogy in detail, even estimating how many million years it took for the asteroid to cross paths with Earth. But it is unlikely that anyone will find pieces of Monday’s meteor. Mr. Hankey said the biggest meteorites were probably the size of baseballs, sunk in the sediments at the bottom of Lake Michigan. “Good luck finding that,” he said. | 1 |
Hvordan stemme nei til kjernefysiske våpen? av Manlio Dinucci USA har nettopp forkastet et forslag fra sine allierte i FNs Generalforsamlings første komite som arbeider for å fullstendig fjerne kjernefysiske våpen. Imidlertid kan de statene som huser USAs atombomber kreve at disse fjernes fra sitt territorium ved å vise til artikkel 2 i ikke-sprednings avtalen.
Voltaire Network | Roma (Italia) | 7 novembre 2016 français italiano English Español Türkçe «Mange takk, president Obama. Italia vil med stor besluttsomhet forfølge sin tilslutning til kjernefysisk sikkerhet», skrev statsminister Renzi i en historisk twitter. Seks måneder seinere, i FN, stemte Renzi JA til kjernefysiske våpen. Ved sin tilknytning til USA stilte den italienske regjeringen opp sammen med USA mot resolusjonen som ble støttet av det store flertallet i FNs generalforsamlings første komité. Den sa at det skulle innkalles til en FN-konferanse i 2017 for å «forhandle frem et lovlig bindende instrument for å forby kjernefysiske våpen og føre frem mot en fullstendig eliminering av disse.
Dermed gikk den italienske regjeringen tilbake på det den hadde lovet to år tidligere under Wien-konvensjonen, da den støttet anti-atomvåpen bevegelsen i og med at den forsikret at den var villig til å arbeide for kjernefysisk nedrustning ved å innta rollen som tålmodig mellommann og ved hjelp av diplomati». Dermed blir appellen hul og uten innhold: «Vi krever total kjernefysisk nedrustning», noe som krevet at regjeringen sørget for «en sammenhengende oppfølging av engasjementet og kampen for å fjerne kjernefysiske våpen», i en «humanitær og legal reise mot kjernefysisk nedrustning» hvor Italia kunne spille «en mer aktiv rolle, «muligens (til og med) en ledende rolle.»
Det parlamentariske forlaget med den samme hensikten faller også som en konsekvens. Det er enkelt nok å bruke generelle vendinger i kravet om kjernefysisk nedrustning: Vi trenger bare å forholde oss til det faktum at USAs president har satt i gang en kjernefysisk gjenopprustning til en prislapp på 1000 milliarder dollar til tross for at han har fått Nobels fredspris for «sin visjon om en verden fri for kjernefysisk våpen».
Den spesielle måten Italia kan bidra til å nå målet om kjernefysisk nedrustning, forkynt i en FN-resolusjon, er å fjerne USAs kjernefysiske våpen fra landet vårt. For å klare dette, trenger vi ikke å appellere til regjeringen, men ( ganske enkelt) å be om at Ikke-spredning-avtale (NPT) respekteres, undertegnet og ratifisert av Italia, hvor det i artikkel 2 heter følgende:
«Hver stat som militært er ikke-kjernefysisk og som deltar i denne avtalen, går med på å ikke motta fra noen kjernefysiske våpen og eksplosive anretninger, direkte eller indirekte.»
Vi må be om at Italia ikke overtrer NPT og må krevet at USA umiddelbart fjerner alle sine kjernefysiske våpen fra vårt territorium og ikke installerer de i de nye B61-12 bombene, som er et springrett for for USA/NATOs kjernefysiske eskalering overfor Russland, og heller ingen andre kjernefysiske våpen. Vi må kreve at treningen av italienske piloter i bruk av kjernefysiske våpen under USA-kommando, opphører.
Dette er målet til kampanjen som er satt ut i livet av Komiteen « Ikke krig - Nei til NATO » og andre organisasjoner. Kampanjen oppnådde sitt første viktige mål den 26. oktober i regional-rådet i Toskana, hvor det ble vedtatt en uttalelse som «ber regjeringen å respektere ikke-spredningsavtalen for kjernefysiske våpen og for å sørge for at USA øyeblikkelig fjerner alle kjernefysiske våpen fra Italias territorium og avstår fra å installere (på italiensk jord) de nye B61-12 bombene og andre kjernefysiske våpen.»
Gjennom dette og andre initiativ kan vi skape en omfattende front som med sterk mobilisering tvinger regjeringen til å respektere ikke-sprednings avtalen.
For seks måneder siden ble det gjort henvendelser på sidene til Il Manifesto , på basis av NPT, om noen i Parlamentet kunne reise forslag om at USAs kjernefysiske våpen øyeblikkelig måtte fjernes fra Italia. Vi venter fortsatt på en reaksjon.
Manlio Dinucci Oversettelse
Knut Lindtner
Kilde
Il Manifesto (Italia) | 0 |
BREMEN, Germany — Believing he was answering a holy call, Harry Sarfo left his home in the city of Bremen last year and drove for four straight days to reach the territory controlled by the Islamic State in Syria. He barely had time to settle in before members of the Islamic State’s secret service, wearing masks over their faces, came to inform him and his German friend that they no longer wanted Europeans to come to Syria. Where they were really needed was back home, to help carry out the group’s plan of waging terrorism across the globe. “He was speaking openly about the situation, saying that they have loads of people living in European countries and waiting for commands to attack the European people,” Mr. Sarfo recounted on Monday, in an interview with The New York Times conducted in English inside the prison near Bremen. “And that was before the Brussels attacks, before the Paris attacks. ” The masked man explained that, although the group was well set up in some European countries, it needed more attackers in Germany and Britain, in particular. “They said, ‘Would you mind to go back to Germany, because that’s what we need at the moment,’” Mr. Sarfo recalled. “And they always said they wanted to have something that is occurring in the same time: They want to have loads of attacks at the same time in England and Germany and France. ” The operatives belonged to an intelligence unit of the Islamic State known in Arabic as the Emni, which has become a combination of an internal police force and an external operations branch, dedicated to exporting terror abroad, according to thousands of pages of French, Belgian, German and Austrian intelligence and interrogation documents obtained by The Times. The Islamic State’s attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 brought global attention to the group’s external terrorism network, which began sending fighters abroad two years ago. Now, Mr. Sarfo’s account, along with those of other captured recruits, has further pulled back the curtain on the group’s machinery for projecting violence beyond its borders. What they describe is a multilevel secret service under the overall command of the Islamic State’s most senior Syrian operative, spokesman and propaganda chief, Abu Muhammad . Below him is a tier of lieutenants empowered to plan attacks in different regions of the world, including a “secret service for European affairs,” a “secret service for Asian affairs” and a “secret service for Arab affairs,” according to Mr. Sarfo. Reinforcing the idea that the Emni is a core part of the Islamic State’s operations, the interviews and documents indicate that the unit has carte blanche to recruit and reroute operatives from all parts of the organization — from new arrivals to seasoned battlefield fighters, and from the group’s special forces and its elite commando units. Taken together, the interrogation records show that operatives are selected by nationality and grouped by language into small, discrete units whose members sometimes only meet one another on the eve of their departure abroad. And through the coordinating role played by Mr. Adnani, terror planning has gone with the group’s extensive propaganda operations — including, Mr. Sarfo claimed, monthly meetings in which Mr. Adnani chose which grisly videos to promote based on battlefield events. Based on the accounts of operatives arrested so far, the Emni has become the crucial cog in the group’s terrorism machinery, and its trainees led the Paris attacks and built the suitcase bombs used in a Brussels airport terminal and subway station. Investigation records show that its foot soldiers have also been sent to Austria, Germany, Spain, Lebanon, Tunisia, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Malaysia. With European officials stretched by a string of assaults by seemingly unconnected attackers who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, Mr. Sarfo suggested that there may be more of a link than the authorities yet know. He said he was told that undercover operatives in Europe used new converts as or “clean men,” who help link up people interested in carrying out attacks with operatives who can pass on instructions on everything from how to make a suicide vest to how to credit their violence to the Islamic State. The group has sent “hundreds of operatives” back to the European Union, with “hundreds more in Turkey alone,” according to a senior United States intelligence official and a senior American defense official, both of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence. Mr. Sarfo, who was recently moved out of solitary confinement at his German prison because he is no longer considered violent, agrees with that assessment. “Many of them have returned,” he said. “Hundreds, definitely. ” The first port of call for new arrivals to the Islamic State is a network of dormitories in Syria, just across the border from Turkey. There, recruits are interviewed and inventoried. Mr. Sarfo was fingerprinted, and a doctor came to draw a blood sample and perform a physical examination. A man with a laptop conducted an intake interview. “He was asking normal questions like: ‘What’s your name? What’s your second name? Who’s your mom? Where’s your mom originally from? What did you study? What degree do you have? What’s your ambition? What do you want to become? ’” Mr. Sarfo said. His background was also of interest. He was a regular at a radical mosque in Bremen that had already sent about 20 members to Syria, at least four of whom were killed in battle, according to Daniel Heinke, the German Interior Ministry’s counterterrorism coordinator for the area. And he had served a prison sentence for breaking into a supermarket safe and stealing 23, 000 euros. Even though the punishment for theft in areas under Islamic State control is amputation, a criminal past can be a valued asset, Mr. Sarfo said, “especially if they know you have ties to organized crime and they know you can get fake IDs, or they know you have contact men in Europe who can smuggle you into the European Union. ” The bureaucratic nature of the intake procedure was recently confirmed by American officials after USB drives were recovered in the recently liberated Syrian city of Manbij, one of the hubs for processing foreign fighters. Mr. Sarfo checked all the necessary boxes, and on the third day after his arrival, the members of the Emni came to ask for him. He wanted to fight in Syria and Iraq, but the masked operatives explained that they had a vexing problem. “They told me that there aren’t many people in Germany who are willing to do the job,” Mr. Sarfo said soon after his arrest last year, according to the transcript of his interrogation by German officials, which runs more than 500 pages. “They said they had some in the beginning. But one after another, you could say, they chickened out, because they got scared — cold feet. Same in England. ” By contrast, the group had more than enough volunteers for France. “My friend asked them about France,” Mr. Sarfo said. “And they started laughing. But really serious laughing, with tears in their eyes. They said, ‘Don’t worry about France.’ ‘Mafi mushkilah’ — in Arabic, it means ‘no problem. ’” That conversation took place in April 2015, seven months before the coordinated killings in Paris in November, the worst terrorist attack in Europe in over a decade. While some details of Mr. Sarfo’s account cannot be verified, his statements track with what other recruits related in their interrogations. And both prison officials and the German intelligence agents who debriefed Mr. Sarfo after his arrest said they found him credible. Since the rise of the Islamic State over two years ago, intelligence agencies have been collecting nuggets on the Emni. Originally, the unit was tasked with policing the Islamic State’s members, including conducting interrogations and ferreting out spies, according to interrogation records and analysts. But French members arrested in 2014 and 2015 explained that the Emni had taken on a new portfolio: projecting terror abroad. “It’s the Emni that ensures the internal security inside Dawla” — the Arabic word for state — “and oversees external security by sending abroad people they recruited, or else sending individuals to carry out violent acts, like what happened in Tunisia inside the museum in Tunis, or else the aborted plot in Belgium,” said Nicolas Moreau, 32, a French citizen who was arrested last year after leaving the Islamic State in Syria, according to his statement to France’s domestic intelligence agency. Mr. Moreau explained that he had run a restaurant in Raqqa, Syria, the de facto capital of the group’s territory, where he had served meals to key members of the Emni — including Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the commander of the Paris attacks, who was killed in a standoff with the police days later. Other interrogations, as well as Mr. Sarfo’s account, have led investigators to conclude that the Emni also trained and dispatched the gunman who opened fire on a beach in Sousse, Tunisia, in June, and the man who prepared the Brussels airport bombs. Records from French, Austrian and Belgian intelligence agencies show that at least 28 operatives recruited by the Emni succeeded in deploying to countries outside of the Islamic State’s core territory, mounting both successful attacks and plots that were foiled. Officials say that dozens of other operatives have slipped through and formed sleeper cells. In his own interactions with the Emni, Mr. Sarfo realized that they were preparing a global portfolio of terrorists and looking to fill holes in their international network, he said. He described what he had been told about the group’s work to build an infrastructure in Bangladesh. There, a siege by a team of Islamic State gunmen left at least 20 hostages dead at a cafe last month, almost all of them foreigners. Mr. Sarfo said that for Asian recruits, the group was looking specifically for militants who had emerged from Al Qaeda’s network in the region. “People especially from Bangladesh, Malaysia and Indonesia — they have people who used to work for Al Qaeda, and once they joined the Islamic State, they are asking them questions about their experiences and if they have contacts,” he said. In his briefings with the German authorities, and again in the interview this week, Mr. Sarfo raised the possibility that some of the recent attackers in Europe who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State’s leader during their assaults might have a more direct link to the group than officials believe. Mr. Sarfo explained that the Emni keeps many of its operatives underground in Europe. They act as nodes that can remotely activate potential suicide attackers who have been drawn in by propaganda. Linking them are what Mr. Sarfo called “clean men,” new converts to Islam with no established ties to radical groups. “These people are not in direct contact with these guys who are doing the attacks, because they know if these people start talking, they will get caught,” he said of the underground operatives. “They mostly use people who are new Muslims, who are converts,” he said. Those “clean” converts “get in contact with the people, and they give them the message. ” And in the case of some videotaped pledges of allegiance, the can then send the video on to the handler in Europe, who uploads it for use by the Islamic State’s propaganda channels. The intelligence documents and Mr. Sarfo agree that the Islamic State has made the most of its recruits’ nationalities by sending them back to plot attacks at home. Yet one important region where the Emni is not thought to have succeeded in sending trained attackers is North America, Mr. Sarfo said, recalling what the members of the branch told him. Though dozens of Americans have become members of the Islamic State, and some have been recruited into the external operations wing, “they know it’s hard for them to get Americans into America” once they have traveled to Syria, he said. “For America and Canada, it’s much easier for them to get them over the social network, because they say the Americans are dumb — they have open gun policies,” he said. “They say we can radicalize them easily, and if they have no prior record, they can buy guns, so we don’t need to have no contact man who has to provide guns for them. ” Since late 2014, the Islamic State has instructed foreigners joining the group to make their trip look like a holiday in southern Turkey, including booking a return flight and paying for an vacation at a beach resort, from which smugglers arrange their transport into Syria, according to intelligence documents and Mr. Sarfo’s account. That cover story creates pressure to keep things moving quickly during the recruits’ training in Syria, and most get a bare minimum — just a few days of basic weapons practice, in some instances. “When they go back to France or in Germany, they can say, ‘I was only on holidays in Turkey,’” Mr. Sarfo said. “The longer they stay in the Islamic State, the more suspicious the secret service in the West gets, and that’s why they try to do the training as quickly as possible. ” Mr. Sarfo’s facility in both German and English — he studied construction at Newham College in East London — made him attractive as a potential attacker. Though the Emni approached him several times to ask him to return to Germany, he demurred, he said. Eventually, Mr. Sarfo, perhaps because of his burly build — and around 286 pounds when he arrived in Syria, though he has lost weight since then — was drafted into the Islamic State’s quwat khas, Arabic for special forces. The unit only admitted single men who agreed not to marry during the duration of their training. In addition to providing the offensive force to infiltrate cities during battles, it was one of several elite units that became recruiting pools for the external operations branch, Mr. Sarfo said. Along with his German friend, he was driven to the desert outside Raqqa. “They dropped us off in the middle of nowhere and told us, ‘We are here,’” he said, according to the transcript of one of his interrogation sessions. “So we’re standing in the desert and thought to ourselves, ‘What’s going on? ’” When the two Germans looked more closely, they realized there were cavelike dwellings around them. Everything above ground was painted with mud so as to be invisible to drones. “Showering was prohibited. Eating was prohibited, too, unless they gave it to you,” Mr. Sarfo said, adding that he had shared a cave with five or six others. Even drinking water was harshly rationed. “Each dwelling received two cups of water a day, put on the doorstep,” he said. “And the purpose of this was to test us, see who really wants it, who’s firm. ” The grueling training began: hours of running, jumping, parallel bars, crawling. The recruits began fainting. By the second week, they were each given a Kalashnikov assault rifle and told to sleep with it between their legs until it became “like a third arm,” he said, according to his interrogation transcript. The punishment for failing to keep up was harsh. “There was one boy who refused to get up, because he was just too exhausted,” Mr. Sarfo told the authorities. “So they tied him to a pole with his legs and his arms and left him there. ” He learned that the special forces program involved 10 levels of training. After he graduated to Level 2, he was moved to an island on a river in Tabqa, Syria. The recruits’ sleeping spots now consisted of holes in the ground, covered by sticks and twigs. They practiced swimming, scuba diving and navigating by the stars. Throughout his training, Mr. Sarfo rubbed shoulders with an international cadre of recruits. When he first arrived at the desert campus, he ran laps alongside Moroccans, Egyptians, at least one Indonesian, a Canadian and a Belgian. And out on the island, he learned of similar special units, including one called Jaysh or the Army of the Caliphate. A criminal complaint indicates that the Islamic State tried to recruit at least one American into that unit, but he declined to enroll. The man, Mohamad Jamal Khweis, a from Alexandria, Va. traveled to Syria in December, only to be captured by Kurdish troops in Iraq in March. In his debriefing with the F. B. I. he explained that early on, he was approached by members of the unit. “During his stay at this safe house, representatives from Jaysh Khalifa, a group described by the defendant as an ‘offensive group,’ visited the new ISIL recruits,” the complaint says. “The representatives explained that their group was responsible for accepting volunteers from foreign countries who would be trained and sent back to their countries to conduct operations and execute attacks on behalf of ISIL. The group’s requirements, among other things, were that recruits had to be single, would train in remote locations, must be free of any injuries and had to stay reclusive when returning to their home countries. ” As he progressed through the special forces training, Mr. Sarfo became closer with the emir of the camp, a Moroccan, who began to divulge details about how the Islamic State’s external operations effort was structured, he said. Mr. Sarfo learned that there was one outsize figure behind the group’s strategies and ambitions. “The big man behind everything is Abu Muhammad ” he said. “He is the head of the Emni, and he is the head of the special forces as well,” Mr. Sarfo added. “Everything goes back to him. ” Born in the town of Binnish in northern Syria, Mr. Adnani is said to be 39, and is the subject of a $5 million bounty from the State Department’s Rewards for Justice program. But details about his life remain a mystery. There are very few available photos of him, and the one used on the State Department’s website is years old. Mr. Sarfo explained that when recruits to the special forces finished all 10 levels of training, they were blindfolded and driven to meet Mr. Adnani, where they pledged allegiance to him directly. Mr. Sarfo was told that the blindfolds stayed on the whole time, so that even Mr. Adnani’s fighters never know what he looks like. To the world, Mr. Adnani is better known as the official spokesman of the Islamic State, and the man who put out a global call this year for Muslims to attack unbelievers wherever they were, however they could. “Adnani is much more than just the mouthpiece of this group,” said Thomas Joscelyn, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington who tracks the group’s leadership. “He is heavily involved in external operations. He is sort of the administrative ‘yea’ or ‘nay’ at the top of the pyramid,” who signs off on attack plans, the details of which are handled by his subordinates. During his time in Syria, Mr. Sarfo was contacted by other German fighters who wanted him to be an actor in a propaganda film aimed at German speakers. They drove to Palmyra, and Mr. Sarfo was told to hold the group’s black flag and to walk again and again in front of the camera as they filmed repeated takes. Syrian captives were forced to kneel, and the other German fighters shot them, showing an interest only in the cinematic effect. One turned to Mr. Sarfo immediately after killing a victim and asked: “How did I look like? Did I look good, the way I executed?” Mr. Sarfo said he had learned that videos like the one he acted in were vetted by Mr. Adnani himself in a monthly meeting of senior operatives. “There’s a vetting procedure,” he said. “Once a month they have a shura — which is a sitting, a meeting — where all the videos and everything that is important, they start speaking about it. And Abu Muhammad is the head of the shura. ” Mr. Sarfo said he had started doubting his allegiance to ISIS during his training, after seeing how cruelly they treated those who could not keep up. Making the propaganda video provided his final disillusionment when he saw how many times they recorded each scene in the film. Back in Germany, when he had been inspired by similar videos, he had always assumed they were real, not staged. He began plotting his escape, which took weeks and involved sprinting and crawling in a field of mud before crossing into Turkey. He was arrested at Bremen Airport, where he landed on July 20, 2015, and he voluntarily confessed. He is now serving a term on terrorism charges. Among the Islamic State’s innovations is the role of foreigners, especially Europeans, in the planning of attacks. Mr. Sarfo’s account agrees with investigation documents and the assessments of terrorism experts, who say that French and Belgian citizens like Mr. Abaaoud are more than just operatives and have been given managing roles. “It’s a creative and interesting operational road map, to be able to lean on someone like Abaaoud, who has his own network abroad,” said Brisard, chairman of the Center for the Analysis of Terrorism in Paris. “They gave him the autonomy regarding tactics and strategy, even if the operation as a whole still needs a green light from the Islamic State’s leadership. ” Looking at the current leaders of the Emni, investigators have homed in on two in particular. They go by the aliases Abu Souleymane, a French citizen, and Abu Ahmad, described as Syrian. Both are considered top lieutenants of Mr. Adnani, according to the senior American defense official and senior intelligence official. The two men play a direct role in identifying fighters to be sent overseas, in choosing targets and in organizing logistics for operatives, including paying for smugglers to get them to Europe and, in at least one case, sending Western Union transfers, according to European intelligence documents. A glimpse into the possible role of Abu Souleymane came from one of the hostages held by suicide bombers inside the Bataclan concert hall in Paris in November. After gunning down dozens of concertgoers, two of the suicide bombers retreated into a hallway with a group of hostages, forcing them to sit against the windows as human shields, said the hostage, David 24. In the standoff that ensued, Mr. Fritz heard one of the bombers ask the other, “Should we call Souleymane?” The second operative appeared annoyed that the first had asked the question in French, and ordered him to switch to Arabic. “I immediately understood that, yes, this was the individual, maybe not the individual who had organized the attack, but who held a place in the hierarchy above them,” Mr. Fritz said in a telephone interview. His testimony is also included in a detailed, report by France’s antiterrorism police. “They were absolutely, like soldiers,” awaiting orders, he said. Souleymane, whose full nom de guerre is Abu Souleymane or Abu Souleymane the Frenchman, is believed to be a French national in his 30s who is of either Moroccan or Tunisian ancestry, according to Ludovico Carlino, a senior analyst with IHS Conflict Monitor in London. Mr. Carlino says he believes that Souleymane was promoted to be the top terrorism planner for Europe after Mr. Abaaoud’s death. A snapshot of the other senior leader, Abu Ahmad, appears in the account of a man who investigators have concluded was supposed to be part of the team of Paris attackers: an Algerian named Adel Haddadi. Mr. Haddadi said he and another member of the team, a former member from Pakistan named Muhammad Usman, were separated from two other attackers after they reached Greece by boat. Mr. Haddadi, 28, and Mr. Usman, 22, were eventually arrested in a migrant camp in Salzburg, Austria. The two men sent alongside them became the first suicide bombers to detonate their vests outside the Stade de France during the November attacks. After arriving in Syria and being routed to the international dormitory there in February 2015, Mr. Haddadi worked as a cook in Raqqa for months before a member of the Emni came to see him, according to French and Austrian investigation documents. “One day, a Syrian came into the kitchen to see me and said that someone called Abu Ahmad wanted to see me,” Mr. Haddadi was quoted as saying in the Austrian record of his interrogation. He was driven to a building, where another Syrian holding a walkie talkie radioed Abu Ahmad. They waited for hours before the Syrian got orders to drive the recruit to the next location. In the street, a Saudi man wearing all white was waiting, and asked Mr. Haddadi to go on a walk. After 300 yards, they reached an empty apartment building and sat down. “I was scared, I wanted to leave, but he talked the whole time,” Mr. Haddadi told the authorities. “He said only positive things about me, that Daesh trusted me and that I now needed to prove myself worthy of that trust. He said that Daesh was going to send me to France,” Mr. Haddadi added, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. “The details, he said, I would get them once I arrived in France. ” Sometime after that, Abu Ahmad arrived. Mr. Haddadi described him as a Syrian man between 38 and 42 years old, slim with a long, black beard, and dressed all in black. He was, Mr. Haddadi said, “the giver of orders. ” Abu Ahmad brought Mr. Haddadi together with three other potential attackers, with the last man, Mr. Usman, being introduced just a day before they all set out for Europe. Mr. Haddadi and two of the other men were native Arabic speakers, and Mr. Usman spoke enough Arabic to communicate with them, the interrogation documents said. The day of their departure, Abu Ahmad came and gave them his Turkish cellphone number, instructing them to store it in their phone as “FF,” to avoid registering a name. He gave Mr. Haddadi $2, 000 in $100 bills, and they were driven to the Turkish border. A man met them in Turkey to take their photographs, and returned with Syrian passports. Another smuggler arranged their Oct. 3 boat trip to Leros, Greece. All of these logistical steps, as well as Western Union money transfers, were organized by Abu Ahmad, one of the senior lieutenants running the Islamic State’s efforts to export terror. Until his arrest in December, Mr. Haddadi remained in touch with Abu Ahmad through messages on Telegram and via text messages to his Turkish number, according to the investigation record. Abu Ahmad’s Turkish number was found somewhere else, too: written on a slip of paper in the pants pocket of the severed leg of one of the suicide bombers at the Stade de France. | 1 |
Same people all the time , i dont know how you can fix this corruption http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/10_09_01_krongard.html | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, privately expressed dismay on Wednesday over Mr. Trump’s increasingly aggressive attacks on the judiciary, calling the president’s criticism of independent judges “demoralizing” and “disheartening. ” The remarks by Judge Gorsuch, chosen by Mr. Trump last week to serve on the nation’s highest court, came as the president lashed out at the federal appellate judges who are considering a challenge to his executive order banning travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries. The president called their judicial proceedings “disgraceful” and described the courts as “so political. ” Those remarks followed Mr. Trump’s weekend Twitter outburst in which he derided a Seattle district court judge who blocked his travel ban as a “ judge” whose “ridiculous” ruling would be overturned. Judge Gorsuch expressed his disappointment with Mr. Trump’s comments about the judiciary in a private conversation with Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, as he paid courtesy calls on Capitol Hill to build support for his confirmation. An account of the discussion was confirmed by a White House adviser working to advance the Gorsuch confirmation, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment. The spectacle of a Supreme Court nominee breaking so starkly with the president who named him underscored the unusual nature of Mr. Trump’s public feud with the judiciary. Speaking to a group of sheriffs and police chiefs on Wednesday, the president said the appellate judges had failed to grasp concepts even “a bad high school student would understand. ” “This is highly unusual,” said Michael W. McConnell, a former federal judge who directs the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford University. “Mr. Trump is shredding longstanding norms of etiquette and interbranch comity. ” Presidents have traditionally tried to refrain from even appearing to intervene in court cases that concern them or their policies, or from impugning the motives and qualifications of jurists charged with deciding them, according to judges and legal experts from across the political spectrum. The tradition is important to preserving the separation of powers that is a pillar of American democracy, establishing an independent judiciary to serve as a check on the executive branch, they argued. Mr. Trump’s rhetorical battle with the judiciary may also end up harming his cause in a case that may end up before the Supreme Court, by potentially stiffening the resolve of judges who feel their independence is under attack. Mr. McConnell called Mr. Trump’s comments “extremely and ” because of their potential to sway judges to rule against Mr. Trump. “Judges who hear criticism of this sort are not going to be inclined to knuckle under it’s going to stiffen their spines to be even more independent,” said Mr. McConnell, who was nominated to his judgeship by President George W. Bush. Jeffrey Rosen, the president of the National Constitution Center, a nonprofit organization in Philadelphia devoted to explaining the Constitution, said there was a rich history of presidents strongly criticizing judges on matters of law. “But those criticisms were based on constitutional disagreements about the rulings, and it’s hard to think of a president who has challenged the motives of specific judges by name repeatedly, especially before a case is decided, or used the same kind of invective as Mr. Trump has toward the court,” Mr. Rosen said. “Judicial independence is a fragile and crucial achievement of American constitutionalism,” he added, “and it depends on the public seeing the judiciary as something more than politicians in robes. ” Yet Mr. Trump, who as president has the power to nominate members of the federal judiciary, appears bent instead on portraying independent judges who hold the fate of his travel ban in their hands as partisans who refuse to give him the power to which he is entitled to protect the nation. “I don’t ever want to call a court biased, so I won’t call it biased,” Mr. Trump said on Wednesday. “But courts seem to be so political, and it would be so great for our justice system if they would be able to read a statement and do what’s right. ” Mr. Trump, who opened his remarks to law enforcement officers reciting the passage of the United States code that gives the president the power to restrict immigration whenever he deems the influx of foreigners detrimental to the country, said he had watched “in amazement” Tuesday night as a federal appeals panel heard arguments on his executive order and the limits of presidential power in cases of national security. “I listened to a bunch of stuff last night on television that was disgraceful,” Mr. Trump said. “I think it’s sad. I think it’s a sad day. I think our security is at risk today. ” His comments came the morning after a lively, roughly hourlong hearing — the audio of which was carried live on national television — during which three judges on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit expressed skepticism about the arguments of a Justice Department lawyer defending Mr. Trump’s order. Judge James L. Robart of the Federal District Court in Seattle blocked the travel ban on Friday, and the appeals court is considering whether to uphold that action, with a ruling expected as early as Thursday. Mr. Trump took aim at one of the judges without specifying which, saying, “I will not comment on the statements made by, certainly one judge. ” The panel was made up of Judge William C. Canby Jr. appointed by President Jimmy Carter Judge Richard R. Clifton, named by Mr. Bush and Judge Michelle T. Friedland, nominated by President Barack Obama. “If these judges wanted to, in my opinion, help the court in terms of respect for the court, they’d do what they should be doing,” Mr. Trump said. “It’s so sad. ” By contrast, he lavished praise on Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton, a federal district judge in Boston who last week ruled that the travel ban could stay in place. “Right on — they were perfect,” Mr. Trump said of Judge Gorton’s comments. Mr. Trump is hardly the first president to criticize or seek to apply pressure to the courts Mr. Obama admonished Supreme Court justices as they sat before him in the House chamber during his 2010 State of the Union address for their ruling in the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission case that allowed corporations to spend freely to influence elections. John Yoo, a former counsel to Mr. Bush, argued that Mr. Trump was using a potent weapon that has been used throughout history — the presidential prerogative to provoke a constitutional crisis when a vital issue is at stake — on an insignificant matter. “I hate to see a president waste that kind of authority, which should only be deployed for our most important questions, on this immigration order, which the president could easily withdraw, fix and resubmit,” said Mr. Yoo, now a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley. “President Trump is pressing the accelerator down to 120 miles per hour on every single issue. He will exhaust himself and exhaust his presidency. ” Peter Wallison, a former White House counsel to Ronald Reagan, said the president often wished to weigh in on legal matters concerning personal friends or issues important to his administration, and Mr. Wallison always advised against it, both to protect the tradition of judicial independence and avoid undercutting the courts’ legitimacy. “It’s not illegal, it’s not a violation of the law to say these things, but it’s bad policy because it raises questions about the independence of the courts, and it raises questions about the judicial system as a whole when the president says this,” Mr. Wallison said. Mr. Reagan did not always take his advice, he added, and in those instances, “I always cringed. ” Mr. Trump defended the process that yielded the executive order, saying he had initially wanted to wait a week or even a month before issuing the travel ban. But he said he was told by law enforcement officials that doing so would prompt a flood of people, including some with “very evil intentions,” to rush into the United States before the restrictions took effect. That account appears to be at odds with the one given by several senior officials, who have said they were not fully briefed on the details of Mr. Trump’s order until the day the president signed it at the Pentagon. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump told the law enforcement officers that he was acting solely out of a concern about terrorism, a threat he said had deepened since he took office and gained access to information about the risks facing Americans. “Believe me, I’ve learned a lot in the last two weeks, and terrorism is a far greater threat than the people of our country understand,” Mr. Trump said. “But we’re going to take care of it. We’re going to win. ” | 1 |
Judge warns of dangers of appointed judiciary 'Unelected and unaccountable' ... rule on 'their empathetic feelings' Published: 5 mins ago Bob Unruh About | | Archive Bob Unruh joined WND in 2006 after nearly three decades with the Associated Press, as well as several Upper Midwest newspapers, where he covered everything from legislative battles and sports to tornadoes and homicidal survivalists. He is also a photographer whose scenic work has been used commercially. Print
A member of the increasingly divided and disputatious Alabama Supreme Court is warning that judges need to be elected and thus accountable to the voters or their decisions end up being based on “their empathetic feelings” instead of the law.
“Alabama’s judges are elected and accountable,” wrote Justice Tom Parker this week. “Federal judges, as recently noted by Chief Justice Roberts in his dissent in Obergefell v. Hodges … a case in which ‘five lawyers’ on the United States Supreme Court announced a fundamental right to same-sex marriage, are ‘unaccountable and unelected.’
He pointed out that three of the four dissenting U.S. Supreme Court justices in Obergefell “noted on eight different occasions that the ‘five lawyers’ who decided Obergefell were unelected. Chief Justice Roberts said on two occasions that those unelected ‘five lawyers’ were, consequently, unaccountable.”
Parker previously commented that the “five lawyers” failed to “base their decision ‘on legal reasoning, history, tradition, the court’s own rules, or the rule of law, but upon the[ir] empathetic feelings.'”
“Obergefell is the product of unelected and unaccountable judges,” he said.
He was arguing over a decision by the state court on its next move in a case brought by Chief Justice Roy Moore, who was suspended for his actions regarding a marriage-based case that the court was reviewing when the Obergefell case, which created same-sex “marriage” nationwide, was announced.
Moore, who is challenging the punishment, insisted that the state court justices who previously were involved in his case recuse themselves. They did, with the exception of the acting chief justice who was allowed to work with the governor to pick a panel of retired judges to hear Moore’s arguments.
Parker said active judges should have been included in the panel, because retired judges, too, are “unelected and unaccountable.”
“Unelected and unaccountable judges are empowered to impose their agenda, instead of faithfully applying the rule of law,” Parker warned. “Obergefell is not the first case concerning same-sex marriage to prove this principle true. Before the United States Supreme Court decided Obergefell, the constitutionality of state laws defining marriage as between one man and one woman had been litigated before numerous courts throughout the United States.
Don’t miss Phyllis Schlafly’s book, now available autographed at the WND Superstore: “Who Killed The American Family?”
“Before Obergefell, 40 states passed laws affirming traditional marriage. In 37 of those states, the traditional marriage laws were challenged in the courts as unconstitutional. Of the 37 state laws affirming traditional marriage that were challenged in the courts, 24 of those laws were struck down by the judiciary as unconstitutional. Each of the 24 courts that struck down the traditional marriage laws as unconstitutional was composed of judges who were unelected and thus unacountable.”
He explained what happens when activist judges are held to account, citing the situation that developed in Iowa.
“The Supreme Court of Iowa was one of the unelected courts that struck down Iowa’s traditional marriage law as unconstitutional. The judges of the Supreme Court of Iowa are appointed by the governor of Iowa. However, although the judges are initially appointed, they must stand for retention elections once their initial term expires.”
He explained that after the Iowa Legislature adopted one-man-one-woman marriage as law, in April 2009, in “a decision largely viewed as judicial activism, the Supreme Court of Iowa unanimously overruled the democratic will of the people of Iowa and held [the law] unconstitutional.”
“The very next year, three of the judges … who had concurred in Varnum had to stand for a retention election; all three were removed from office by vote of the people of Iowa. This was the first time since Iowa adopted its retention-election system that any judge had ever failed to be retained. The people of Iowa held accountable those judges who failed to uphold the rule of law.”
Mathew Staver, chairman of of Liberty Counsel, which is representing Moore, said huge questions remain of impropriety regarding the judicial system’s handling of Moore’s case.
“Chief Justice Moore is merely asking for the same thing any citizen is entitled to receive – equal justice under the law. He wants his case to be heard by an objective and fair panel of judges who will adhere to the rule of law,” he said.
“The people of Alabama have increasingly called upon their judges to be accountable. At every turn, this case presents new twists and turns that have never occurred in the history of Alabama. Never has there been a requirement that replacement judges all be retired. We hope this case moves quickly to a final and just resolution. The Court of the Judiciary violated the law when it suspended Chief Justice Moore for life even though it lacked the 9-0 vote. Never before under the unanimity requirement of COJ Rule 16 has any judge ever been suspended for the rest of the term. A sexting judge gets six months and a judge who writes a four-page order that is not unethical or unlawful gets suspended for life. This is not right.”
Supporters of Moore also have filed an ethics complaint against Lyn Stuart, who has been acting as Alabama’s chief justice.
She is accused of “violating multiple cannons of ethics in her mishandling of the cases surrounding Chief Justice Roy Moore.”
The complaint comes from the Sanctity of Marriage Alabama organization.
“If the Judicial Inquiry commission really cares about ethics, fairness and upholding the integrity and impartiality of the Alabama judiciary, they will no doubt take our complaint seriously, as will organizations which filed ethics complaints on Chief Justice Moore,” said Tom Ford, a spokesman for the group.
The complaints, the group said, outline “how acting Chief Justice Lyn Stuart has repeatedly failed to avoid impropriety or the appearance of impropriety, failed to perform the duties of her office impartially, failed to avoid conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice that brings the judicial office into disrepute, and failed to conduct herself at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary.”
Parker was not the first to cite the dangers of the judiciary.
Daniel Horowitz , senior editor at Conservative Review, told WND that the nation is going through a “social transformation without representation.”
“It is the unelected branches of government that are deciding our most important issues, whether it’s the bureaucrats, whether it’s the courts, and as it relates to even religious liberty, even property rights, immigration, our voting rights, who gets to vote,” he said.
Horowitz tackles the topic of “social transformation without representation” in his book “Stolen Sovereignty: How to Stop Unelected Judges From Transforming America.”
“How did we get here?” Horowitz asked rhetorically. “And the sad reality is nobody ever voted for this. This was all foisted upon the people by unelected judges, the legal profession, and unelected bureaucrats. That is social transformation without representation, which, as Scalia warned, is something much worse than even taxation without representation that served as the impetus for our first American Revolution.”
Same-sex marriage was mandated for the nation in 2015 by the bare 5-4 majority made up of Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and the late Antonin Scalia opposed it.
The majority found in the Constitution a right to same-sex marriage, overturning millennia of established legal precedent regarding marriage as well as the will of tens of millions of voters in dozens of states.
It elicited remarkably harsh criticism of the five justices in the U.S. Supreme Court majority.
For one, two of the justices in the majority, Kagan and Ginsburg, were asked to recuse themselves from the case because they had openly advocated for same-sex marriage, apparently violating standards to preserve judicial impartiality. Without their votes, the case would have gone the other way.
They refused.
Then there was the U.S. Supreme Court’s own opinion just two years earlier, in the Defense of Marriage Act case, in which the court said states have exclusive power over marriage.
And there also are those who point out that the Constitution doesn’t mention marriage but does dictate that everything not mentioned in the document is left to the states and the people.
As WND reported , Ginsburg, who voted in favor of same-sex marriage, has performed same-sex wedding ceremonies and made supportive public statements. Justice Elena Kagan also has performed same-sex weddings and promoted “gay” rights at Harvard’s law school while she was at its helm.
Critics contend the two justice appear to be violating judicial ethics rules that require recusal from a case in which there is even the appearance of a conflict of interest.
The Foundation for Moral Law asked the justices to excuse themselves from the case, but they refused to acknowledge the request. The Foundation explained that Canon 3A(6) of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges provides: “A judge should not make public comment on the merits of a matter pending or impending in any court.” 28 U.S.C. sec 455(a) mandates that a justice “shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
Rabbi Jonathan Cahn, author of the New York Times bestseller “The Harbinger” and the inspiration behind the “Isaiah 9:10 Judgment” movie, has criticized the Supreme Court’s assumption that it has the authority to redefine marriage.
At a prayer event in Washington, he said: “The justices of the Supreme Court took up their seats [in a hearing] on whether they should strike down the biblical and historic definition of marriage. That the event should even take place is a sign this is America of [George] Washington’s warning … a nation at war against its own foundation.”
Washington warned the smiles of heaven can never be expected on a nation “that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which heaven itself hath ordained.”
“Justices, can you judge the ways of God? There is another court and there is another judge, where all men and all judges will give account,” he warned.
“If a nation’s high court should pass judgment on the Almighty, should you then be surprised God will pass judgment on the court and that nation? We are doing that which Israel did on the altars of Baal,” he said.
See Jonathan’s Cahn’s message at Washington: Man of Prayer event at the Capitol.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is calling “same-sex marriage” an “intrinsic evil.”
And officials from several counties in Tennessee have adopted statements opposing the Supreme Court.
WND also reported when dozens of top legal scholars from the likes of Washington & Lee, Boston College, Kansas State, Notre Dame, University of Texas, Villanova, Vanderbilt, Hillsdale, University of Nebraska, Catholic University and Regent University issued a statement encouraging all state and federal officials to treat the Supreme Court’s recent creation of “same-sex marriage” as “anti-constitutional and illegitimate.”
“It cannot … be taken to have settled the law of the United States,” said the statement from the American Principles Project .
“We call on all federal and state officeholders: To refuse to accept Obergefell as binding precedent for all but the specific plaintiffs in that case. To recognize the authority of states to define marriage, and the right of federal and state officeholders to act in accordance with those definitions. To pledge full and mutual legal and political assistance to anyone who refuses to follow Obergefell for constitutionally protected reasons. To open forthwith a broad and honest conversation on the means by which Americans may constitutionally resist and overturn the judicial usurpations evidence in Obergefell.” | 0 |
Washington Free Beacon October 26, 2016
Hillary Clinton, Tim Kaine and every one of their Democratic surrogates have pivoted to attacking Russia’s role in the WikiLeaks release of John Podesta’s emails when asked about their subject matter.
So thorough is this particular talking point that both Howard Dean and Rep. Ben Ray Lujan (D., N.M.) blamed the Russians when asked about a totally separate matter involving quid pro quo accusations within the State Department.
So long as they’re asked about WikiLeaks, Team Clinton will just power through . This article was posted: Wednesday, October 26, 2016 at 7:33 am Share this article | 0 |
ALEXANDER MERCOURIS | THE DURAN R ussia’s use of its aircraft carrier in the Syrian conflict is principally intended to learn lessons for the design of more potent such warships in the future, rather than to change the situation in Syria itself. The Russian navy’s deployment of aircraft carrier to the eastern Mediterranean has provoked a very confused response in the Western media.
On the one hand it is described as a major escalation, as if was a US style super carrier. On the other hand there has been a great of deal of derision , with the ship called an obsolete rust bucket dangerous mainly to its crew. Where does the truth lie? The Admiral Kuznetsov is the first and only Russian aircraft carrier capable of launching fighter aircraft conventionally. The preceding Kiev class carriers were smaller ships, which could only launch a small number of aircraft vertically. Contrary to what reports say, Admiral Kuznetsov is by the standards of navy carriers a relatively new ship. She was launched in 1985, commissioned in the then Soviet navy in 1990, but only became operational after prolonged trials in 1995. The US navy currently operates 10 Nimitz class supercarriers. If the age of a ship is determined by its date of launch; then three of the US navy’s Nimitz class supercarriers are older than Kuznetsov; if by date of commission, then five are; if by entry into service then six are. The Russian navy had no previous experience of operating carriers, so the lengthy time scale of her sea trials between commission and entry into service is not surprising. In addition what undoubtedly extended this period before her full entry into service was the political and economic crisis Russia experienced during the 1990s. Given the severity of this crisis, it is a wonder a ship as large and complicated as Kuznetsov was brought into service at all. Either way talk of Kuznetsov as some sort of archaic ship from a bygone era is exaggerated, whilst jokes about Kuznetsov being “….practically old enough to have been deployed in the 1905 Russo-Japanese war….” are simply silly. The Admiral Kuznetsov is expected to deploy off Syria, carrying 15 warplanes, including new MiG-29K/KUB fighters and the Su-33a, shown here. Aircraft carriers as it happens tend to be long-lived ships. Coral Sea, a US Medway class carrier, served in the US Navy from 1947 to 1990. By the standards of aircraft carriers Kuznetsov is not an old ship. What is true about Kuznetsov is that because she was the first of a type of ship of which the Russians had no previous experience, and because of the fraught period during which she was commissioned and brought into service – which made it impossible to sort out her teething problems properly – Kuznetsov suffers by comparison with US navy carriers from design flaws and from engine problems. The ship’s engines are unreliable, because they are insufficiently powerful for a ship of this size. The Russians when they built Kuznetsov lacked suitable nuclear reactors for this type of ship (they were designed for the intended follow-on Ulyanovsk carrier, which because of the 1990s crisis was however never built). They also lacked conventional engines large enough for a ship of this size, which was roughly twice as heavy as the largest other ship the Russian or Soviet navy had commissioned before. The Russians accordingly came up with a complicated solution of using multiple steam turbines and turbo-pressurised boilers to make up for the lack of power of the individual engines. Like all complicated arrangements, this arrangement is unreliable and prone to breakdown, with the engines experiencing stress especially in heavy seas. To compound the trouble with the engines, they were built by a plant in what is now independent Ukraine. As political relations between Russia and Ukraine deteriorated, servicing of the engines by this plant became increasingly erratic, and has now stopped completely. It is these problems with the engines that account for the practice of accompanying Kuznetsov on long range deployments with a tug. The tug in question – the Nikolai Chiker – is the most powerful tug in the world. This same tug played a key role in successfully hauling Kuznetsov’s uncompleted sister ship Varyag from Ukraine to China in 2005, where she has now become the Chinese carrier Liaoning. The fact Kuznetsov is accompanied by a tug on long range deployments has provoked some derision. However it is common practice in any navy to accompany large surface warships with service ships, and accompanying Kuznetsov with a tug ensures in Kuznetsov’s case that the carrier will get to where the Russian naval staff are sending it. The engine problems will not affect Kuznetsov’s Mediterranean deployment when the carrier finally reaches its position. Kuznetsov suffers from other problems, which are unsurprising given that Kuznetsov is so much bigger and so different to any other ship the Russian navy has ever previously commissioned, and the unhappy times when it was launched. The arduous deployment of the Russian flotilla. Everything is harder for the Russians. (BBC) There are for example known to be problems with Kuznetsov’s water pipes, which have a history of breakdowns and of freezing up in Arctic weather. These problems too however will not affect Kuznetsov’s capabilities as a warship when the carrier finally reaches the eastern Mediterranean, and the close proximity of Russian bases in Sevastopol and Tartus means they can be dealt with quickly if they arise. Once this deployment is ended Kuznetsov will go through a lengthy refit, which unlike previous refits is intended to be practically a rebuild. With Russia developing a new range of much larger and more powerful engines, Kuznetsov’s current unsatisfactory engines will finally be replaced, and the other teething problems like the problem with the water pipes will finally be addressed. Ultimately this is a potent warship, bigger than any other carrier other than those operated by the US navy, and once the refit is done it will be a powerful asset. In the meantime the ship already provides the Russian fleet with a carrier capability matched by no other navy apart from that of the US.
The Russian carrier passing through the English Channel. In saying this it is important to stress however that the US navy carrier force – with its 10 nuclear powered supercarriers – dwarfs the capability of any other navy, including Russia’s, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Neither the Kuznetsov, nor any other carrier the Russians might build, nor any other navy, can match or rival it. A more pertinent criticism of Kuznetsov is that though Kuznetsov is a large ship (at 55,000 tonnes standard weight and with a 305 metre length Kuznetsov is midway between a US Medway class carrier and a US Forrestal class supercarrier) the air group it carries at 40-50 aircraft is relatively small (by comparison a smaller US Medway class carrier carried an air group of 75-80 aircraft in the 1980s). This suggests that Kuznetsov is inefficient in its use of its spaces, a fact which again reflects Russian inexperience designing this sort of ship when Kuznetsov was built. However it also partly reflects differences in Kuznetsov’s intended role. At the time Kuznetsov was built the Russians did not envisage using their carriers for the sort of long range carrier type operations carried out by the US navy. Unlike US navy supercarriers Kuznetsov prioritises air defence of the fleet rather than long range strikes. That explains why Kuznetsov’s fighter aircraft take off from the carrier using a ski jump rather than steam catapults. Ski jump takeoffs put less stress on the pilots and shorten takeoff times, enabling more aircraft to take off from the carrier more quickly, which can be important in an air defence situation. The penalty is that aircraft are limited in the loads they can carry by comparison with aircraft launched by steam catapults. For air defence – the purpose for which Kuznetsov was designed – this is unimportant since fighter aircraft carrying out air defence missions only carry light air to air missiles rather than heavy air to ground missiles and bombs. However it does significantly reduce the air group’s capability to carry out long range strikes. Combined with the relatively small size of the air group, this means that Kuznetsov’s ability to carry out long range ground strikes is fractional compared to that of a US navy supercarrier. If Kuznetsov is not really designed to carry out long range ground strikes, why are the Russians deploying Kuznetsov off the coast of Syria? The plan to deploy Kuznetsov to the eastern Mediterranean was made many months ago, long before the recent collapse in relations with the US over Syria. The decision therefore can have nothing to do with deterring the US from declaring a no fly zone over Syria, as some people are suggesting. Most likely the intention is to gain experience operating aircraft against ground targets from an offshore carrier. This is not something the Russians have ever done before. Even if Kuznetsov’s capability to do it by comparison with a US navy supercarrier is marginal, the fighting in Syria does at least give the Russians an opportunity to try it out to find out how it is done and what it involves. That way they can learn lessons that will help them with the design of the far more powerful ships that are to come (see here and here ). In other words the deployment of the Kuznetsov to the eastern Mediterranean is essentially a training exercise. It does not merit either the derision or the hype that has been created around it. | 0 |
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Your vote is statistically meaningless and will not sway the (s)election. Your vote is strategically meaningless and decides nothing about the future of the country. Your vote is useless, as the (s)election is rigged anyway. But as Larken Rose of LarkenRose.com reminds us, what really matters is that voting is immoral, legitimizing a system of authoritarian control and empowering the oligarchs who created the system and control its results.
Happy selection day! | 0 |
The political left and the mainstream media (but I repeat myself) still reeling from the results of the November election, found traction this weekend in the debate over crowd sizes with the new Trump administration. [For their purposes, it matters less what the Trump said, and even less what the crowd sizes were (or why) and more that they were able to create a common filter through which they will interpret subsequent events as they muster an opposition (pretentiously called “resistance”). First, the facts. The crowd on Inauguration Day was massive, and from the front sections — where this reporter was lucky enough to have seats — it looked like the entire mall was full. Trump — and anyone else seeing the event from that vantage point — could be forgiven for thinking the crowd was at least a million strong, or more. Taking him to task for speculating about that was simply petty. Press Secretary Sean Spicer was correct: the media were trying to undermine the new president. At the same time, the crowd did not feel overwhelming. And that was partly by design. The left did its best to scare Trump supporters away by threatening violence. Furthermore, the timing (on a Friday) and the high price of traveling to, and staying in, Washington over a weekend kept many Trump fans at home. A good portion of the protesters who came in from out of town had probably already booked their travel plans in anticipation of a Hillary Clinton win, driving prices up. The size of the crowds at the respective events was not an issue until the media made it one. In his combative statement to the press on Saturday, Spicer correctly noted that there were some media reports of crowd size that were clearly manipulative. The presence of additional security — again, required because of threats — did slow entry onto the Capitol lawn and the Mall. (How easy the left often has it: threaten Republicans, then mock them in the media for taking you seriously!) Most Trump fans were probably happy to see Spicer take the media to task — especially over the false report that President Trump had removed a bust of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. from the Oval Office. That bogus story was undoubtedly motivated by the media’s continued quest to find evidence of racism in the Trump camp. It was classic fake news, a clean bust (no pun intended). So, naturally, media critics focused on the more dubious claim that Trump’s crowds had rivaled Obama’s. To make his case, Spicer presented what Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway later called “alternative facts” — a harmless, and accurate, term in a legal setting, where each side of a dispute will lay out its own version of the facts for the court to decide. In the heated debate, however, the term quickly became a meme as a euphemism for “lying” — in much the way that a Bush aide inadvertently gave the mainstream media a badge of honor when he used the phrase “ community. ” Trump was not lying — nor were Spicer, or Conway. They were merely giving their version of events. But CNN and the New York Times explicitly said that Trump had made “false” claims, whether about crowd size or the media, even when his claims were clearly supportable opinion. It was not enough for journalists to find, and report, the facts independently, and let their readers or viewers decide. They decided to be argumentative — and laid down a marker, “Trump lied,” on Day One (or Two). In some ways, that was simply the media reverting to what they had done under the Bush administration, the last time they had to cover a Republican in power. We are likely to hear a lot more about “alternative facts” in the future, stripped of its original (benign) context and used as the foundation for an alternative reality. There is nothing even Trump can do to stop that. But the new administration could choose its battles more carefully, and perhaps learn to deliver rebukes with a smile. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. His new book, How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak. | 1 |
Home | World | Britain No Longer a Sovereign Democracy Britain No Longer a Sovereign Democracy By Anzu Legion 03/11/2016 13:41:13
LONDON – England – Britain is no longer a sovereign democratic nation when 17.5 million people who voted for Brexit can be swept aside with illegal injunctions.
When Britain is being ruled by those who wish harm upon these shores from foreign nations, and pander to other nations to invade, then there is no reason to believe that we are living in a democratic sovereign nation.
This is the case when 17.5 million people voted on June 23 to leave the European Union, only to be overstepped by a few treasonous vipers who misled the High Court possibly due to corruption at the highest levels of the system.
The EU referendum was a legally bound vote with promises from the political establishment that the result would be respected.
To have the wrath of 17.5 million people on you will not be a nice thing, it will not be pleasant because the people never forget, and the coming election will result in some major changes.
We are currently embroiled within a constitutional crisis, where the will of the people is being superseded by a few litigational scum bags who do not realise the enormity of their decision to thwart the will of the people.
Boycott
You have condemned all members of parliament who supported Remain to unemployment. You will never be voted in again, including Theresa May who shoehorned herself into the role of prime minister.
Guyanese Gina Miller, who was instrumental in this decision is not even British, she is some investment banker cunt with no mandate to thwart the EU referendum.
As for the judges involved, you have no right to undermine the will of the people. It is most certainly a question of corruption at the highest levels where these supposed upholders of law, are working against the law and undermining democracy and Britain’s sovereign rights.
17.5 million people voted for Brexit and 17.5 million people will have their say in 2020 when the right people will be put in charge.
The people never forget. | 0 |
A’u2009man was on a train in Japan, reading a novel set in Japan. The train slid past the mountains, bound for Kyoto, where the man, bearded, was headed. The year was 1989. The train was a bullet train. The man on the train was in a quandary, and the man in the novel he was reading was in a quandary and as he read the novel, it emerged that his quandary and the one in the novel were essentially the same. The man in the novel was Sebastian Rodrigues, a Portuguese Jesuit priest sent to Japan in the 17th century. He was there to minister to Japanese Catholics suffering under a brutal regime and also to find out what had happened to his mentor, a priest rumored to have renounced the faith under torture. The man on the train was Martin Scorsese. He was in Japan to play the part of Vincent van Gogh in a movie by Akira Kurosawa, another master filmmaker. He was also there to move past a brutal battle in America’s culture wars over a picture of his, “The Last Temptation of Christ. ” The film had been pilloried by conservative Christians for a dream sequence in which Christ has sex with Mary Magdalene. In depicting Christ’s life as a struggle between his human and divine natures, Scorsese had intended to make a film that was at once an act of doubt and an act of faith. In the novel he was reading, the priest was shown profaning an image of Christ, and yet the act was an act of faith. The train slid past the mountains. Scorsese turned the pages. This novel spoke to him. All at once he saw it as a picture he would like to make. The novel was “Silence,” by Shusaku Endo, a Japanese convert steeped in European literature and the history of Catholicism in Japan. Published in Japan in 1966, “Silence” sold 800, 000 copies, a huge number in that country. Endo was called “the Japanese Graham Greene” and was considered for the Nobel Prize. Greene referred to “Silence” as “one of the finest novels of our time. ” The Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier brought Catholicism to Japan in 1549. In the next century, it was suppressed through the torture of missionaries and their followers, who were forced to apostatize by stepping on the fumie — a piece of copper impressed with an image of Christ. In “Silence,” Endo took the missionaries’ point of view, casting much of the novel in the form of letters by Rodrigues reporting back to his superior. He goes to Japan with another young priest, Francisco Garrpe, vowing to seek the truth about their mentor, Father Cristóvão Ferreira, but they are captured and shown the reality of human suffering under torture. The shogunate invites the Japanese converts to avoid torture by stepping on the fumie. Many do some are tortured anyway. Rodrigues sees converts crucified, burned alive, drowned. A magistrate fluent in Christianity makes a grim proposal: Rodrigues can save the lives of the converts under torture if only he will step on the fumie and apostatize. When Scorsese returned from Japan, he procured the film rights to “Silence. ” As the years passed, hardly a day went by without his mentioning the project to the people around him: actors, friends and even his old parish priest, Father Principe. As he made “The Aviator” and “The Departed,” “Shutter Island” and “Hugo,” he insisted that “Silence” was the picture he really wanted to make. A Jesuit was elected pope Islamic terrorists began targeting Christians in the Middle East. In 2014, with “The Wolf of Wall Street” a hit, Scorsese declared that “Silence” would be his next picture: He wouldn’t commit to another until it was finished. years in, filming began. What led this great American artist to make a story of missionaries in Japan his ultimate passion project? He is known for his gangster pictures he is a grandmaster of the profane. From the beginning, he has revealed himself to be an artist of intensely Catholic preoccupations, and the poisoned arrow of religious conflict runs straight through his career. “Taxi Driver”: a Vietnam vet as a spiritual avenger, bent on cleansing the city of filth through violence. “Cape Fear”: a tattooed fundamentalist determined to exact God’s justice. “Kundun”: a young man raised to be a spiritual master, thrust up against communism. Even “Living in the Material World,” Scorsese’s documentary about George Harrison, takes as its theme the conflict between flesh and spirit, between Beatle and seeker. “Silence” is a novel for our time: It locates, in the missionary past, so many of the religious matters that vex us in the postsecular present — the claims to universal truths in diverse societies, the conflict between a profession of faith and the expression of it, and the seeming silence of God while believers are drawn into violence on his behalf. As material for Scorsese, then, “Silence” is apt, and yet Scorsese’s commitment to it has been extraordinary, even by his exacting standards. To understand that commitment, I spoke with the filmmaker, with members of the cast and the production team and with others who know the novel well — trying to grasp just what kind of an act of faith this film is. “I don’t know if there’s redemption, but there is such a thing as trying to get it right,” Scorsese said to me, in the ungentrified New York voice familiar from the cameos in his movies. “But how do you do it? The right way to live has to do with selflessness. I believe that. But how does one act that out? I don’t think you practice it consciously. It has to be something that develops in you — maybe through a lot of mistakes. ” He had invited me to his East Side townhouse at 9 p. m. having spent a full day editing “Silence” in Midtown. The living room, is decorated with a vintage movie camera, posters for Jean Renoir’s “The Grand Illusion” and photographs of his wife and daughter. He is 74, compact and gray, with tremendous life in his eyes and a youthful ardor that seems to have its source in reverence for his elders — like the Polish filmmaker Andrzej Wajda, who had signed a storyboard that Scorsese unhooked from the wall to show me. We took seats, and he began to talk. As the hours passed, the room, already dark, seemed to diminish around us, until it resembled a screening room, or a chapel, a place where questions of how to live are posed through stories and images. “It goes back to what Father Principe was telling me the last time I saw him, a couple of years ago,” he said. “Failing, doing something that is morally reprehensible, that is a great sin — well, many people will never come back from that. But the Christian way would be to get up and try again. Maybe not consciously, but you get yourself into a situation where you can make another choice. And that’s the situation Rodrigues is in” — he can choose to save the lives of others by renouncing his faith, the act he considers most reprehensible of all. “Silence,” no less than Scorsese’s informal New York trilogy — “Mean Streets,” “Taxi Driver,” “Raging Bull” — is rooted in his childhood. As a boy in Little Italy, he wanted to be a missionary. His parents were not religious, in part because their parents had felt the church’s heavy hand in Sicily, but for him the church — a malign force in so many stories — was a portal to the world beyond family and neighborhood. “I trusted the church, because it made sense, what they preached, what they taught,” he said. “I understood that there’s another way to think, outside the closed, hidden, frightened, tough world I grew up in. ” The movies, likewise, pointed to the wider world. His father, a presser in the garment district, didn’t make much but always had enough money to take him to the movies. A local TV station broadcast Italian films on Friday nights. He grew up watching the crucial works of Italian neorealism, many of them with a strong Catholic dimension — like Roberto Rossellini’s “Rome, Open City,” in which a priest is executed for cooperating with the Resistance. The Catholicism of the area was centered on street processions devoted to saints brought over from the old country: San Gandolfo for the Sicilians on Elizabeth Street, San Gennaro for the Neapolitans on Mulberry Street. “When I was there, it was already dying out,” Scorsese told me. It hooked him even so. The vast, vaulted interior of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral on Mott Street was a sharp contrast to the family’s small apartment, the Latin Mass a formal counterpoint to their mealtime banter. “I think fast, I move fast, and I think it has something to do with the medication I was given for asthma,” Scorsese said. “It affected the way I breathe, the way I think. I needed to pull back. Film did that for me, and so did the church. They slowed me down. They allowed me to meditate. They gave me a different sense of time. ” Francis Principe, a young priest assigned to the neighborhood, brought faith and film together. “He was the one who opened up things for us,” Scorsese recalled. “Who said: ‘You don’t have to live this way. You don’t have to follow in this cultural cycle. You don’t have to get married at 21. ’’u2009” Scorsese had become an altar boy, and each year Principe would take the altar boys to a movie uptown — “Around the World in 80 Days,” “The Bridge on the River Kwai” — and sit talking about it with them afterward on the steps of the rectory on Mulberry Street. They went to the Roxy near Times Square to see the Gospel drama “The Robe” and then heard him put it down. “Father Principe detested Christian sentimentality or religious aspects,” Scorsese said. “’u2009‘Oh, it’s so cliché,’ he said, meaning the thunder when Judas mentions his name — ‘My name is Judas,’ and there’s the thunder in stereophonic sound. To this day I haven’t heard thunder as good as that. ” And yet — at age 11 — he conceived of the wish to do it differently, “to take the biblical epic to another place. ” Faith and film offset the asthma that kept him out of sports and off the streets. Indoors, he drew movie storyboards, including some, a few years later, for a life of Christ. “I set it right in the neighborhood,” he told me, “with the crucifixion taking place on the West Side piers and the N. Y. P. D. involved. Can you see it?” Indoors, he had a seat for adult matters, especially his father’s dealings with a spendthrift uncle who seemed to take money from his father freely and with impunity to pay the loan shark. It was a pattern he knew from the Scripture passages read in church. “My brother’s keeper — it’s my brother’s keeper!” he said, chortling with recognition. “And it goes beyond your brother. Are we responsible for other people? What is our obligation, when somebody does something that is so upsetting? . .. Do you really have to do it because they’re a brother, or you’re related, or you made vows of marriage? What is the right thing to do for the other person, and for yourself? All of this carried through. I would see it acted out one way in reality, and I would hear it another way from Father Principe and a couple of priests at Cardinal Hayes. ” Cardinal Hayes is a high school in the Bronx, and after a year of minor seminary — a tryout for the priesthood once a regular stop for bright Catholic boys of limited means — Scorsese went there. (Don DeLillo, the novelist, was a few years ahead.) Rejected by Fordham University because of poor grades, Scorsese enrolled at N. Y. U. ’s Washington Square College and its film program. From there, he plunged into the ’60s: a concertgoer at the Fillmore East, an expatriate in England and Holland, an assistant director at Woodstock (he became an editor on the concert film) and then a maker of his own movies — “Who’s That Knocking at My Door,” about a young man in the suddenly liberated ’60s whose Catholic principles keep him out of bed with his girlfriend, and “Boxcar Bertha,” a film about a female “free’er than most. ” When he returned to Little Italy in 1972 to make “Mean Streets,” some of the young men in his generation were stepping into the underworld roles their fathers had occupied. Early in the picture, Charlie, an mobster played by Harvey Keitel, talks about going to confession in the old cathedral. He wishes he could choose his own penance instead of having one assigned by the priest. He gets his wish, in a way: It falls to him to look out for Johnny Boy, played by Robert De Niro — the lost boy of the neighborhood, a reckless gambler who puts them both in danger. Charlie becomes his brother’s keeper — and Charlie, eager to rise in the mob, lets his friend dangle without reaching out to the powerful uncle who could save him. Pauline Kael, in The New Yorker, struck a biblical note: “Charlie talks a lot to Johnny Boy about friendship and does nothing. He’s Judas the betrayer. ” It is striking to see the brother’ pattern show up at the other end of Scorsese’s career, in “Silence. ” As the two Jesuits set out for Japan, they find a translator named Kichijiro in a seedy neighborhood and drag him into their mission. He resists. He drinks himself sick. He lies. He bemoans his fate. A convert, he apostatized and was allowed to live, while the shogunate killed his brothers and sisters. Rodrigues decides that he is Kichijiro’s keeper and grimly bears up as Kichijiro apostatizes again and again and finally betrays him to the shogunate. But as Rodrigues is racked by doubts, the peasant becomes the priest’s keeper, a man whose faith is rooted in his recognition of his own weakness. Who is more Christlike: the person who is strong in faith or the one who is weak, who is humiliated? “Humiliation: That’s the key,” Scorsese told me. “As Kichijiro says in the movie: ‘Where is the place for a weak person in the world we’re in? Why wasn’t I born when there wasn’t any persecution? I would have been a great Christian. ’’u2009” For half a century, Scorsese has been a missionary for the cinema: making his own movies, promoting the work of great international directors, consolidating the history of the medium in a brilliant group of documentaries and advocating for the preservation of classics. Over time, this picture of his about a missionary adventure became a mission in its own right, and the act of getting it made became an act of faith. “I knew he had this script and was terribly disappointed that he couldn’t get it made,” Irwin Winkler, who produced “Raging Bull” and “Goodfellas,” told me. “And I thought, What a sad state Hollywood is in when Martin Scorsese, with all his success, with all the honors he’s gotten, can’t get a movie made. ” There began an intense collective effort guided by Emma Tillinger Koskoff, the film’s producer, to make the project materialize. Winkler worked through dozens of legal disputes attached to the project. Randall Emmett, a producer, secured new funding, and in 2013 Scorsese and some associates went to Cannes and returned with $21 million in distribution commitments. “I don’t think he’d ever done that before,” Koskoff told me, “but for this picture he has done a lot of things he hadn’t done before. ” He would direct the picture without a fee. All the principal actors — Andrew Garfield, Adam Driver, Liam Neeson — have pedigrees but would work for Screen Actors Guild “scale” or for greatly reduced fees (“a pittance,” Neeson called it, uncomplainingly). Paramount Pictures signed on as the U. S. distributor in 2014. Koskoff and the production designer Dante Ferretti scouted locations in Vancouver, Montreal, the Pacific Northwest and New Zealand. After four trips to Taiwan, they decided that Taiwan it would be — for eight months. In all, 750 people, cast and crew and production team, would put their faith in Scorsese’s act of faith. “Silence” is a novel about “the necessity of belief fighting the voice of experience,” as Scorsese has put it. To get the Jesuits’ beliefs right, he engaged the Rev. James Martin, an author and editor at large of the Jesuit weekly America. Filmmaker and priest had several colloquies at Scorsese’s home, and Martin worked intensively with Garfield and Driver. Just as De Niro learned to box for “Raging Bull,” they familiarized themselves with the rites and disciplines of the Jesuit priesthood to bring authenticity to their performances. Garfield, known for his role in two “ ” movies, prepared to play Father Rodrigues by entering fully into the process that Jesuits call “spiritual direction. ” Raised outside London, with a secular Jewish father, Garfield developed his character by undergoing the “Spiritual Exercises” of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order. The exercises, devised in the 1520s, invite the “exercitant” to use his imagination to place himself in the company of Jesus, at the foot of the cross, among tormented souls in hell. Garfield met with Martin for spiritual direction, and they swapped reflections via email and Skype. Then he set out for St. Beuno’s, a Jesuit house in Wales, to undertake a silent retreat. “If I’d had 10 years, it wouldn’t have been enough to prepare for this role,” Garfield told me. “I got totally swept up in all things Jesuit and very taken with Jesuit spirituality. The preparation went on for nearly a year, and by the time we got to Taiwan, it was bursting out of me. ” It’s not unusual for performers to allude vaguely to their spirituality. But Garfield describes the process with guileless specificity. “On retreat, you enter into your imagination to accompany Jesus through his life from his conception to his crucifixion and resurrection. You are walking, talking, praying with Jesus, suffering with him. And it’s devastating to see someone who has been your friend, whom you love, be so brutalized. ” Before Garfield left for Taiwan, Martin gave him a cross he had received as a gift while a Jesuit novice. “Andrew got to the point where he could a Jesuit,” Martin told me. “There were places in the script where he would stop and say, ‘A Jesuit wouldn’t say that,’ and we would come up with something else. ” “I don’t think I am called to be a priest,” Garfield said to me resolutely, as if making this film had spurred him to consider the prospect. “But I had the feeling that I was being called to something: called to work with one of the great directors, and called to this role as something I had to pursue for my spiritual development. ” Driver has played the unreliable boyfriend in “Girls” and the villainous Kylo Ren in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens. ” To play Francisco Garrupe (Garrpe in the novel) Rodrigues’s slightly more skeptical companion, Driver, who was raised a Baptist in Indiana, worked by analogy. “This movie is the story of a crisis of faith,” he said, and explained that he tried to apply the ideas of faith and doubt generally. “It could be faith in your work, in the project or in a marriage it could be doubts about the work or the project or the marriage. When you think about it that way, it’s very relatable. ” So he related to faith and doubt — and he lost nearly a third of his weight for the role. “ pounds,” he told me over black coffee. “It’s about control, and as an actor you want to have control. But it’s also about suffering: It gives you information you can use in the role. ” He lost the weight over four and a half months, supervised by a nutrition coach. Early on, he spent a week at St. Beuno’s. Garfield was already two days into his retreat when Driver arrived at the place, a Victorian Gothic pile where the Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins was once in residence. Pledged to silence, the two actors waved when they spied each other in the refectory. Liam Neeson, raised Catholic in Ireland, brought to “Silence” the insights he gained during “The Mission,” Roland Joffé’s 1986 film about Jesuit adventures in South America. Daniel Berrigan, the Jesuit poet and pacifist, was an adviser to that picture and celebrated Mass with the actors — Neeson, De Niro, Jeremy Irons — on location in Colombia. Neeson told me: “I remember Father Dan saying, ‘Do you know that Stanislavski based his “Exercises” for actors on the “Spiritual Exercises” of St. Ignatius?’ I’d come all this way to hear that! That had a real effect on me. ” This time, in Taiwan to play Father Ferreira — the older Jesuit who apostatized after being tortured — Neeson underwent a simulacrum of the torture, suspended upside down by ropes over a pit of excreta. The Japanese actor Yoshi Oida, determined to do his best to play a character crucified in the sea, hung on a cross as a wave machine pushed rising tides of water over him. Oida was 82. By the time Driver filmed his final scene — in which Garrupe, long unseen, staggers into view, starved by his captors — he was hallucinating from hunger. “I did the scene and hopped on a plane to New York to do a table reading for ‘Girls,’’u2009” he told me, and then began a regimen of triple breakfasts at a diner in Brooklyn. A. O. Scott, now a chief film critic for The New York Times, once wrote that Scorsese approaches filmmaking as “a priestly avocation, a set of spiritual exercises embedded in technical problems. ” So it was with “Silence. ” “Marty insists on having silence on the set,” Garfield told me. “The silence says: ‘Something is happening here. ’’u2009” Scorsese arranged the shooting script chronologically, so the cast could feel the characters’ emotions in sequence. Finally Garfield reached the scene in which Rodrigues steps on the fumie, profaning the God he believes in and renouncing the faith he has come halfway across the world to preach. Actor and director prepared the shot: a bare foot pressed to a piece of copper, the face of Christ worn smooth by the feet of countless apostates before him. “It’s something we had both waited for,” Garfield said, “but Marty had waited much longer — he had waited decades to film that scene. ” The director was ready the priest stepped — and then there was a technical difficulty. “I almost lost my mind, and I think Marty did, too,” Garfield recalled. “He wanted it to be done in one take. ” There was a second take, and the priest profaned the image of Christ once and for all. Step by step, “Silence” got made. The picture Scorsese saw in his head on the bullet train took 27 years and $46. 5 million to realize. “All in God’s good time,” he said to me philosophically as we sat together in his house in the near dark. It was one o’clock in the morning. “We don’t know why, but this is how this picture got made. It had to be this way. ” Scorsese could speak philosophically, because he had been through all this before. A passion project, religious in nature, based on a novel delays, funding difficulties and reluctance among studio executives: Such was “The Last Temptation of Christ,” his adaptation of the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis. When the novel was published in Athens in 1955, its conceit — that Jesus felt a temptation to climb down from the cross and live an earthly life with Mary Magdalene — was seen as a challenge to conservative Christianity, represented by the Greek Orthodox Church. By the time it reached the United States in English translation, the ’60s were on, and the novel was taken up by the counterculture as a template for religious illumination through carnal knowledge. Scorsese read the novel in the ’70s after it was given to him by Barbara Hershey and David Carradine, the two stars of “Boxcar Bertha. ” By the time he set to making a movie adaptation, it was the Reagan era, and the novel was again seen as a challenge to conservative Christianity, then at full volume. Scorsese’s stated aims for the picture were straightforward. He wanted to give the Gospel story a contemporary accent, the way great artists like Caravaggio had done. And he wanted to fulfill his childhood vision and take the biblical epic to a different place. But the project soon turned complicated beyond belief. After committing to the picture in 1983, Paramount Pictures began to have doubts. Scorsese shrank the shooting schedule (planned for Israel) and the budget, agreeing to forgo his fee. As fundamentalist Christian leaders got wind of the project, they organized a hostile campaign against Paramount’s parent company, Gulf and Western. Salah Hassanein, the head of United Artists, then the chain, declared that U. A. wouldn’t show the picture on its screens, citing trouble with “The Life of Brian” and other films, as well as with a film called “Mohammed: Messenger of God” that had prompted bomb threats. In an agonizing meeting with Scorsese and studio executives, Paramount’s chief, Barry Diller, canceled the picture. By now Scorsese’s intentions for it were a good deal more complicated. “I told him that God can’t be only in the hands of the churches,” he later said, recalling the meeting with Hassanein. “There are so many obstacles in between us and the spirit. In a sense, to make this film was to try to make God accessible to people in the audience who feel alienated from the churches. I said: ‘I have had three divorces. Does this mean I can’t speak to God because the church says I can’t? No, no! I can talk for myself because I’m me. ’’u2009” Angry and restive, he took on two projects initiated by others: “After Hours,” set in Lower Manhattan, and “The Color of Money,” a drama starring Paul Newman and Tom Cruise. “The Color of Money” grossed $52 million: the biggest hit he’d ever had. Emboldened, he switched agents — to Newman’s agent, Michael Ovitz, the head of Creative Artists Agency. “Mike said: ‘What is it you want to get done? What is the film you really want to get made?’ I said, ‘The Last Temptation of Christ.’ And he said, ‘O. K.’ And I said, ‘I’ve heard that before. ’’u2009” Ovitz swiftly got “Last Temptation” greenlighted at Universal. Scorsese filmed in Morocco with Willem Dafoe as Jesus, Harvey Keitel as Judas, David Bowie as Pontius Pilate and Barbara Hershey as Mary Magdalene. What happened next still stands as a central episode in the culture wars. As Scorsese worked round the clock to edit the picture, the religious right moved against it. Donald Wildmon, a instigator and head of the American Family Association, organized a picketing campaign at Universal Pictures in Los Angeles. The Rev. R. L. Hymers Jr. of the Baptist Tabernacle of Los Angeles did the same outside the home of Lew Wasserman, the chairman of MCA, which owned Universal. The leader of the Campus Crusade for Christ, Bill Bright, offered to buy the film from Universal in order to destroy it. Universal moved up the film’s release date and took out newspaper ads in its support. In an interview with reporters in Rome, the Italian director Franco Zeffirelli, who hadn’t seen the movie, called it “truly horrible and completely deranged. ” Reports attributed to him a remark that the movie was the product of Hollywood’s “Jewish scum. ” Zeffirelli denied this, but the notion took root that the movie was the sinister work of a cabal of Jewish movie executives conspiring against the Christian faith. The day the film had its premiere at the Ziegfeld — Aug. 12, 1988 — hundreds of picketers were there. So were several television news crews. “After the premiere,” Scorsese recalled to me, “a group of us went to dinner at the Regency hotel. ” The group included Universal executives the celebrated director Michael Powell Scorsese’s longtime editor and collaborator, Thelma Schoonmaker and prominent Christians who had supported the movie. Paul Moore, the Episcopal bishop of New York, had written a letter to The New York Times declaring that the movie dramatized the core church teaching that Jesus is both fully human and fully divine. At the Regency, Moore told Scorsese about a book he should read. The next day he had it sent over: “Silence,” by Shusaku Endo. In Egypt, Syria, Pakistan, China, and elsewhere, the persecution of Christians — often to the point of martyrdom — is real and continuing. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the word “martyr” has taken on awful new connotations. “Silence,” then, is inadvertently topical. Like the novel, the picture interrogates the very idea of Christian martyrdom, by proposing that there are instances when martyrdom — the believer holding fast to Christ to the bitter end — is not holy or even right. It makes in the way of art the arguments made in defense of “Last Temptation”: that an act can’t be fully understood if the intentions behind it aren’t taken into account, and that a seeming act of profanation can be an act of devotion if done out of an underlying faith. At a dramatic moment in the novel, Rodrigues hears the cries of Christians who are being tortured outside his cell. He has been told that he can save their lives if he will step on the fumie. He agonizes. He prays. He feels the offer as a temptation. Weary, hungry, surrounded by suffering and death, he hears a voice he takes to be Jesus: “Trample! It was to be trampled on by men that I was born into this world. ” “The novel poses a very profound theological question,” Peter C. Phan, a Catholic theologian at Georgetown who was born in Vietnam, told me. “The question is this: Are we allowed to do an essentially evil act to obtain a good result? If it is done to save himself, then the answer is no. But the novel is so complex because he does it for his followers, for the good end of saving his flock. He will go to hell — but he will go to hell for their sake. ” Rodrigues tramples on the fumie. Because his intention is right — to save the lives of others — the act seems right. And because it entails the sacrifice of his exalted sense of himself, it seems a Christian act, a loss of self for others’ sake. The novel doesn’t work through theological questions so scholastically. Rather, it enfolds them within other questions: whether missionary activity is ipso facto a form of imperialism, and whether the content of a religious faith is lost in translation when it is promulgated in a new language in a new land. Should the church adapt to particular cultures, or should it maintain an approach distinctively its own? In Christian theology, that is a question of “inculturation. ” Since the Council of Jerusalem — when the apostles, Jews by birth, clashed over whether new Christians should be held to Jewish law — the history of Christianity has turned on questions of inculturation. The brilliance of “Silence” is that it shows how these questions increase and multiply. The young Jesuits seem to favor inculturation, adopting peasant dress, taking the sacraments directly to the people and calling their hut “the monastery. ” A magistrate — a figure akin to Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor — tells Rodrigues that Christianity cannot take root in the “swamp” that is Japan. When Rodrigues finally meets him, Ferreira concurs. The converts? They are breakaway Buddhists, the apostate priest says they worship the “Sun of God,” not the Son of God. Those martyrs, dying upside down in the pit? They didn’t die for Christ, he tells Rodrigues, they died for you. For all that, “Silence” is itself a complex act of inculturation — a novel, featuring a European priest’s point of view, that could not have been written by anyone but a Japanese. The fumie, too, is an expression of inculturation, a point developed in a new book by the artist Makoto Fujimura. It is an image of God devised by the shogunate for the purpose of abuse, but over the course of the novel, it becomes an authentic image of Christ. Under threat, the converts abuse it. They renounce their faith. But that doesn’t mean they stop believing. They keep “hidden faith” in mysterious ways. Scorsese’s own body of work is a strong argument for inculturation, in that he instinctively finds religious patterns and images in modern, urban, vulgar, dispirited society. His “Silence” is an act of cultural adaptation (some would call it appropriation) to the third degree: Here an Catholic adapts a Japanese Catholic’s novel about Portuguese Catholics for a Hollywood movie — arguably American culture’s most distinctive art form. And yet Scorsese’s “Silence” suggests that inculturation of the usual kind is impossible. Instead, it makes vivid the idea that the act called apostasy can be a shrewd adaptation of religious faith to a hostile culture, and that faith maintained in spite of a believer’s outward acts of apostasy is faith nonetheless. The question the novel comes down to, then, is this: “Are you a Christian?” This question, posed by Garrpe to the peasant Kichijiro, is one that Rodrigues must answer for himself before he approaches the fumie, and long after he tramples on it. It is a question that cannot be answered for the believer by the church, or a mentor, or society. The novel is not about a missionary’s struggle with a hostile culture. When the magistrate says as much, Rodrigues denies it: “’u2009‘No, no . . . ’ Unconsciously the priest raised his voice as he spoke. ‘My struggle was with Christianity in my own heart. ’’u2009” Before it opens in New York and Los Angeles in December, “Silence” will be screened in Rome for several hundred Jesuits and for cinephiles at the Vatican. It’s no stretch to suppose that Pope Francis, a Jesuit himself, will find a way to be there. Scorsese assuredly will be there, and it’s striking to envision him sitting in the dark with the pope as his new picture plays. Their boyhoods were a lot alike: Six years older, Jorge Mario Bergoglio was brought up in Buenos Aires in a family of Italian immigrants who took him to the movies often, and he grew up cherishing Italian cinema, especially Fellini’s “La Strada” — “a film about the possibility of sainthood,” Scorsese calls it. I asked Scorsese how he would describe his work to Pope Francis. He paused, then replied, “I would say that I’ve tried, in my work, to find out how to live life — tried to explore what our existence really is and the meaning of it. ” One day not long ago, Scorsese stepped out of a black car in front of the old cathedral. He had on an overcoat, a scarf and a hat. He tightened the scarf, pulled the hat low and stood near the graveyard adjoining the cathedral. “We used to play right here,” he said. “You could hide behind the gravestones. You knew which ones were the right size for you. ” Little Italy today is largely symbolic territory, like the Vatican within Italy. The old Ravenite Social Club — a headquarters for the Gambino crime syndicate — is now a Cydwoq “ . ” Chinatown, once south of Canal Street, extends most of the way up Mott Street. At the Catholic churches, Mass is offered in Vietnamese and Cantonese. Scorsese looked up Mott Street toward Houston Street. “Where the Korean restaurant is, that used to be a house. Past it was a funeral home. The funeral procession would come out and bear the coffin along the sidewalk here and into the cathedral. I remember two kids from the neighborhood, 16 or 17 — they died of cancer, and the families had to be carried from the funeral home to the church, they were so devastated. It was terrible. I’ll never forget it. ” Inside the old cathedral, it became clear how literally Scorsese has never forgotten — not the splendor of the church, nor the presence of suffering and death, sin and redemption, nearby. The pastor pointed out the details of a renovation: the saints retouched in their original colors, the marble and brass altar fixtures restored to the way they were before a 1970 modernizing effort. Scorsese, who left the neighborhood in 1965, didn’t need a guide. He knew every inch of the place. “Picture an boy standing right here in a white cassock, reciting a prayer in Latin,” he mused aloud. “That’s me. ” The closing scenes of his “Silence” follow Rodrigues through the decades after he apostatizes. A priest no more, Rodrigues represents the shogunate in its dealings with traders from Europe. What is his inner life? What does he believe? Working from the imagination rather than from the text of the novel, Scorsese found a final image, subtle but not cryptic, for the character’s position — and it’s an image that suggests the nature of Scorsese’s own engagement with matters of faith. I asked him to draw a connection between “Silence” and what he was seeing in the old cathedral. He tapped his forehead with two fingers. “The connection is that it has never been interrupted. It’s continuous. I never left. In my mind, I am here every day. ” | 1 |
Edmondo Burr in News , US // 0 Comments Adam Schwartz, a senior lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). explains how the government spies on people using a powerful phone surveillance tool built by AT&T called Hemisphere.
Every day AT&T stores billions of call records and sells the information to Sheriff’s and police departments around the country who each pay upward of $1 million a year for the communications metadata.
In his article AT&T Requires Police to Hide Hemisphere Phone Spying Schwartz says law enforcement officials kept Hemisphere “ under the radar ” for many years—hidden from courts, legislators, and the general public—until the New York Times exposed the program in 2013.
Democracy Now interviews Adam Schwartz:
New details are emerging about how AT&T has been spying on Americans for profit with a secret plan called Project Hemisphere.
The Daily Beast reports AT&T is keeping private call records and selling the information to authorities investigating everything from the war on drugs to Medicaid fraud.
AT&T reportedly has been retaining every call, text message, Skype chat or other communication that has passed through its infrastructure. Some of the records date back to 1987.
Sheriff’s and police departments each pay upward of $1 million a year for access to the call records.
No warrants are needed, and AT&T requires governmental agencies to keep secret the source of the information.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ : Well, all of this comes as new details are emerging about how AT&T has been spying on Americans for profit. The secret plan is called Project Hemisphere. The Daily Beast reports AT&T is keeping private call records and selling the information to authorities investigating everything from the war on drugs to Medicaid fraud. AT&T reportedly has been retaining every call, text message, Skype chat or other communications that passed through its infrastructure. Some of the records date back to 1987. Sheriff and police departments across the country each pay upwards of a million dollars a year for access to the call records. No warrants are needed, and AT&T requires governmental agencies to keep secret the source of information.
AMY GOODMAN : A 2014 statement of work from AT&T to the city of Atlanta published by The Daily Beast outlines the secrecy AT&T demanded. It reads, quote, “[T]he Government agency agrees not to use the data as evidence in any judicial or administrative proceedings unless there is no other available and admissible probative evidence. The Government Agency shall make every effort to insure that information provided by the Contractor is non-attributable to AT&T if the data is provided to a third-party.”
Well, for more, we want to bring in Adam Schwartz to this conversation, senior lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. His latest article , “AT&T requires police to hide Hemisphere phone spying.”
So, explain. What is this Project Hemisphere?
ADAM SCHWARTZ : [inaudible] the largest known, possibly the biggest, database of telephone metadata that the government is using to spy on us. Every day, the database grows by literally 4 billion records. As you said, it has records going back to the 1980s. And police are using powerful algorithms to scrutinize this database of everyone that we are having telephone and other digital communications with, to discover our personal relationships, whether we’re talking to a psychiatrist or a criminal defense lawyer or a union organizer on the telephone. We view this as a menace to our privacy. And one of the most disturbing features of it is how it has been kept a secret, so that the public and the courts and Congress cannot scrutinize this program and decide whether we even want it.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ : Well, and how are they able to do this? Why are they not—why are the law enforcement agencies not required to have court-ordered subpoenas to obtain these records?
ADAM SCHWARTZ : Well, that’s a great question. Under federal statutes that protect our privacy, ordinarily, the police do have to go to a judge and get some kind of approval before they get this metadata of who we’re talking to. What AT&T has required the police to do, through the provision of the contract that you just read, is what the police call “parallel construction” and what the EFF calls “evidence laundering.” And what this means is, after the police find evidence against someone in the Hemisphere database, they “wall it off,” quote-unquote from their training manual, and then they use a traditional subpoena to recreate the exact same evidence trail. And when it comes time to put the person on trial, they present the second set of cleaner evidence, and no one is the wiser that they were using this massive, disturbing digital database to spy on all Americans, including the criminal suspect.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ : But wouldn’t there be a requirement for the company to at least notify their consumers that they’re participating in something like this?
ADAM SCHWARTZ : Yeah, unfortunately, there isn’t. You know, AT&T, in its public comments about Hemisphere, has suggested they are merely responding to government requests for information, the same way that all kinds of providers of consumer services have to respond. In fact, as we see through the contract that AT&T wrote, which came to light earlier this week in The Daily Beast, it is AT&T who was demanding of government that the program be kept a secret. We don’t know what AT&T’s motive is to demand the secrecy. Perhaps it’s because AT&T is literally making millions of dollars a year from government agencies in exchange for providing this unique database of telephone records to the police for their scrutiny.
AMY GOODMAN : So the police might pay up to—one police department somewhere might pay like a million dollars to get this information?
ADAM SCHWARTZ : Yeah, just to be clear, there is a task force of federal, state and local officials called the HIDTAs, the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas, and it is funded by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. And the HIDTAs have three regional centers across the country, where AT&T employees are posted along with DEA agents and other law enforcement. And that is the entry point for law enforcement to the AT&T Hemisphere database. And the funding is a little bit shadowy, but it is clear that at one of these three HIDTA centers, White House funds, to the tune of a million dollars a year, are going to the HIDTA, in turn, going to AT&T. So it’s not a million dollars from each agency, but it is millions of dollars in total.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ : And, Adam Schwartz, am I correct on this, that AT&T is not—does not only provide information on their own customers, but on other carriers who possibly may be going through the AT&T infrastructure, as well?
ADAM SCHWARTZ : That’s exactly correct. Any consumer, whether they are not—whether or not they are with AT&T, when a call goes through an AT&T switch, it goes into the Hemisphere database. So, for example, if you’re using roaming, away from your own carrier’s network, and you’re using AT&T’s network, then your call goes into the Hemisphere database—again, 4 billion records per day from American consumers and for international calls into the Hemisphere database.
AMY GOODMAN : And the significance of broadband internet providers having to ask permission if they want to sell customers’ private data to third parties, the ruling that was just adopted Thursday by the FCC?
ADAM SCHWARTZ : You know, I think that the critical principle here is that consumers should have control over their data, and corporations should not be diverting that data for their own profit reasons. We think that a program like—
AMY GOODMAN : That they could sell it to other companies, you’re saying. They could—not only to police agencies, but to corporations, they could sell your—you know, our texts to each other.
ADAM SCHWARTZ : Right. The ruling yesterday from the FCC, which the Electronic Frontier Foundation was strongly in support of and lobbied for, says that they have to get each individual consumer’s permission before they divert their private information to anything other than providing the standard broadband service. So there’s a parallel between that issue and the Hemisphere issue, which is that, you know, consumers have a right to privacy. And AT&T should not be undermining that privacy, in the case of Hemisphere, by creating the world’s biggest, if—or one of the world’s biggest databases to allow the government to scrutinize our private relationships based on who we are having digital correspondence with.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ : And, Craig Aaron of Free Press, your sense of how this information on the Hemisphere program—whether this is going to become now part of the overall discussions on AT&T’s increased market power if it has this merger?
CRAIG AARON : I think it has to be. You know, this is just yet another example of why we can’t trust AT&T and its promises. And, you know, I think it’s very concerning that AT&T is literally, you know, putting employees right alongside sitting law enforcement to willingly mine their data, to help them out and then sell it. So they’re taking their own customers’ private information, selling it back to the government for a hefty profit, while violating their privacy. So, this is the kind of company AT&T is. You know, EFF has exposed for years and years and years, through their legal work, everything AT&T has been up to supporting the DEA, the NSA, etc. I think this is something to be concerned about, when a company gets even bigger and when a company is about to take over a major news network. Who’s going to hold AT&T accountable when these kind of stories are out there? Are we going to even hear about them?
AMY GOODMAN : We want to thank you both for being with us, Craig Aaron, president and CEO of Free Press, and Adam Schwartz of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Of course, we’ll continue to follow this. The decision is not finally made. In fact, Craig Aaron, just what’s the timetable on this?
CRAIG AARON : I think this merger, we’re probably talking about a year, which means this is a decision that’s going to be made by the next presidential administration, by the Justice Department, which gives us time to organize, but it’s very, very important that we get started now, because this is going to be a fight that will be going well into next year.
AMY GOODMAN : Well, thanks so much to both of you. This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we head to North Dakota to the standoff at Standing Rock. Well over a hundred people were once again arrested yesterday, as Native Americans and their allies faced off against a heavy—a heavily militarized police department. Stay with us. | 0 |
LOS ANGELES — “Jason Bourne” easily won the latest box office race, but the posse in “Bad Moms” more than held its own. It was the first Bourne movie in nine years to star Matt Damon, and his return helped “Jason Bourne” collect a stout $60 million over the weekend at North American theaters — roughly 50 percent more than initial results for “The Bourne Legacy,” which was released in 2012 and starred Jeremy Renner. Nonetheless, turnout for “Jason Bourne” (Universal) was lighter than for Mr. Damon’s previous two outings in the lead role. “The Bourne Ultimatum” arrived to about $80 million in ticket sales in 2007, after accounting for inflation. “The Bourne Supremacy” had about $67 million in 2004. Overseas, “Jason Bourne,” which cost about $120 million to make, collected an additional $50. 1 million, a strong result. “Star Trek Beyond” (Paramount) was second at the domestic box office, taking in an estimated $24 million, for a total of $105. 7 million, according to comScore, which compiles ticketing data. The raunchy comedy “Bad Moms,” which cost STX Entertainment and its financing partners about $20 million to make, arrived to $23. 4 million in ticket sales. Starring Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell and Kathryn Hahn (in what many critics described as a breakout performance) “Bad Moms” received an A grade in CinemaScore exit polls, the first comedy to achieve that result since “The Hangover” in 2009. Coincidentally — or not — “Bad Moms” and “The Hangover” were both written by the screenwriting duo of Jon Lucas and Scott Moore. “Bad Moms” attracted an audience that was overwhelmingly female (82 percent) STX said on Sunday. If positive word of mouth can persuade men to attend in the coming weeks, as STX hopes, “Bad Moms” could well become a sleeper hit. | 1 |
ISIS applies chlorine in Aleppo 01.11.2016 One man died and more than forty got injured as a result of a shelling of the Aleppo's Western part by fighters. The Al-Mayadeen satellite TV channel reported, that extremists applied projectiles rigged with chemical agents. The region of Al-Hamdaniya was struck. A military academy which is under control of the government forces is situated there. Both civilians and military men got poisoned. Later, Zahir al-Hajw, head of the Aleppo province forensic medicine, noted that symptoms of those injured evidence the use of chlorine. '41 people were delivered to hospitals after the attack. Among the symptoms are watery eyes, frothing at the mouth, vomit, nausea. There are mild and moderate severity categories. For the moment no one has been discharged from the hospital,' he said. The UN Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura had already expressed his indignation at the acts of the so-called opposition. According to him, "credible reports... indicate that scores of civilians in west Aleppo have been killed, including several children, and hundreds wounded due to relentless and indiscriminate attacks from armed opposition groups". Pravda.Ru | 0 |
Illegitimate Stock Markets Back Hillary By Daily Bell Staff - November 01, 2016
The Stock Market Has a Favorite in the Election … On the evening of Sept. 26, two interesting things happened. First, Hillary Clinton won a decisive debate victory over Donald Trump in the first presidential debate, as judged by prediction markets (and later, by polls). Second, financial markets abruptly experienced large, abnormal swings. Economists Justin Wolfers and Eric Zitzewitz have documented this extraordinary convergence in a new paper, titled “What do financial markets think of the 2016 election?” – Bloomberg
This Bloomberg article actually questions conclusions regarding stock market support for Hillary, but adds: “So Wolfers and Zitzewitz make a strong case.”
Indeed the study has attracted a lot of attention, though one of the reasons is obviously because it is a pro-Hillary study and apt to be picked up by the mainstream media.
The larger question, of course, is why equity markets would find an anti-freedom, pro-war candidate attractive.
More:
The most likely explanation is that financial markets think a Clinton victory would be good for the economy ….
We saw some of the opposite happen when stock markets plunged on Friday, immediately after an announcement by FBI Director James Comey that the agency was reviewing new evidence in a probe related to its investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server while she was secretary of state.
Why would markets not like Trump? Well, it’s pretty obvious. Trump’s mercurial temperament, unconventional ideas and lack of governing experience would create large doubts about the direction of all sorts of government policy — just the sort of thing that makes investors uneasy.
This really doesn’t make much sense. On almost every front, Bill and Hillary Clinton’s actions over decades have been inimical to freedom. If investing and trade thrive in free-market environments, then markets should not reflect a pro-Clinton bias.
The reason that markets are pro-Clinton is probably because markets – especially stock markets – are not expressions of free markets. That sounds strange because stock markets, especially, are seen as expressions of capitalism.
Of course “capitalism” is not necessarily an appropriate nomenclature but that’s an article for another day.
The point is that corporations and the stocks that offer investment opportunities are not necessarily any more legitimate than central banks. Neither corporations nor central banks are “normal” expressions of a free-market system.
Central banks fix the price and value of “money” via interest rate manipulation. This price fixing has the force of law. If you don’t obey – or agree – you can end up in prison.
Corporations are artificial entities that the founders of the US greatly feared. (See here and here ). Before the Civil War corporations were almost non-existent.
Corporations are also the outcome of government force. They are in existence because of intellectual property laws, corporate personhood, monopoly central banking and regulations that prop them up.
Without significant government support, modern corporations would not exist and neither would their “stocks.”
The titanic nature of modern corporations is the outcome of government manipulation. The “investment” opportunities presented by such quasi-government monopolies would not be viable in a normal free-market environment.
People simply don’t realize how distorted modern economies are. They are entirely artificial creations, dependent on state-enforced central banking and industrial monopolies.
And this is why “stock markets” prefer the Clintons in this election cycle. It’s because large industries depend on government to sustain their artificial competitive advantages.
One can certainly speculate what a real free-market would look like within the context of stock markets. Probably such markets would be a good deal smaller and oriented toward a select clientele rather than a mass audience of “investors.”
Most people would make their living in the trades or in others ways that were directly in demand. Societies would probably be more agrarian-based – as they used to be. Savings would gradually appreciate in value as technology brought down the price of goods and services on a regular basis.
The stampeding of savers into stock markets is surely an unnatural occurrence. It has been promoted because those who control stock markets and their corporations want people to feel that their net worth is tied up in the current system.
Ironically, this system does not provide much wealth to the average individual. Most people in the West are relatively impoverished and times are growing more difficult not less so. Middle classes seem to be shrinking rather than expanding.
Conclusion: Many people in the West and certainly in the US would be glad to see real entrepreneurism flourish in the context of companies aligned with a fully competitive marketplace. Stocks and stock markets would still exist of course, but they would reflect a bias toward freedom rather than fascism. | 0 |
Brazil’s signature contribution to world culture is its popular music, and the characteristic mood of that music is the melancholy yearning called saudade. That is not the mood NBC wants you in while you’re watching its coverage of the 2016 Rio Olympics, however. In its broadcast of the Games’ opening ceremony on Friday night — meant to set the tone for more than 6, 500 hours of television and digital coverage over the next weeks — the network was intent on getting the party started. During NBC’s long introduction to the ceremony, the emphasis was on the physical beauty of the Brazilian landscape and its often scantily clad Brazilian bodies, and on the many styles of dancing abandon the country’s music inspires. Despite the controversies and fears that have dogged the Rio Games, the city was ready to throw “a massive party,” said Meredith Vieira, one of three “Today” hosts recruited to narrate the ceremony, along with Matt Lauer and Hoda Kotb. Ms. Kotb, the designated fun one, squealed, “Did somebody say party?” When the canned intro ended, more than an hour after the ceremony had actually started, a nearly subliminal string of words on screen painted the clichéd picture of (sanitized) hedonism that NBC wants as a background for its broadcast: music, color, flavor, passion, beaches, samba, carnival, futbol. The hosts did not ignore the scandals — economic, political, health and doping — that have dominated the to the Games, but their references were predictably few and faint. About the absence of the Brazilian president, Dilma Rousseff, who faces an impeachment trial, “It’s complicated” was as direct as it got. But NBC couldn’t airbrush out the parts of the ceremony itself that took on larger concerns. Less visually and choreographically impressive than Zhang Yimou’s spectacular show in Beijing in 2008, and less than London in 2012, the production Friday night had a winning earnestness. A long, powerful section represented Brazil’s history of slavery, and the culmination of the ceremony was a bald warning of the dangers of global warming to coastal cities like Rio de Janeiro. NBC’s decision to the broadcast of the ceremony by an hour — starting at 8 p. m. Eastern — probably had little or no effect on what we saw. There did not appear to be any significant disturbances or glitches at the stadium that needed to be smoothed over. What the network really gained by delaying the ceremony was more viewers for its nakedly promotional introductory . NBC featured the American athletes it is counting on for story lines, like the swimmer Michael Phelps and the sprinter Allyson Felix and an intrusive, embarrassing promo touted NBC’s most prominent announcers. The nadir of the evening was a segment, positioned just before the start of the opening ceremony, that was ostensibly about Olympic golf but was really a plug for the Golf Channel. The ceremony, when it arrived, was firmly in the approved international style that combines elements of Cirque du Soleil, “The Lion King,” American football halftime shows, political conventions, film (particularly the director Terrence Malick) and the fireworks of the artist Cai . An irregularly shaped section of the floor of the Maracanã stadium served as stage and screen. Watching theatrical effects that are scaled for a large stadium in the confines of a television screen is always problematic — you’re too close to the action and at the same time you’re missing the immersive effects of lights and sound. The opening act, a countdown to the ceremony involving lots of mylar, looked like hundreds of giant bags of Jiffy Pop popcorn getting ready to burst. During a tribute to the Brazilian aviation pioneer Alberto in which white boxes were tossed from hand to hand, the cameras were too close to capture the cascading effect. But other segments, like the sprouting of a rainforest from the stadium floor, and the slave march — for which dancers wore large blocks, like parking boots, on their feet — probably came across better on the screen, communicating some of the wonder that the stadium spectators must have felt. The ceremony’s most striking moment, however, involved a lone figure on a bare stage: the Brazilian model Gisele Bündchen, taking the longest catwalk ever, along the length of the Maracanã floor. Then there were the parts that were completely inexplicable without a program, like a wild number with masses of dancers in a multicolored, mosh pit. NBC thoughtfully cut in a prerecorded interview with Daniela Thomas, one of the ceremony’s creative directors, explaining that it was a representation of Brazil’s divides of class and race, as well as a celebration of diversity. Eventually, NBC’s cameras found and kept returning to Ms. Bundchen dancing in the stands, an image they clearly preferred. The strange fate of Olympic opening ceremonies is that they inevitably segue into the visually monotonous parade of nations, two hours of waves, hideous national costumes and rampant selfie taking. Rio tried to put its stamp on the parade by having the teams led into the stadium by bicycle carts of the kind that ferry supplies around big beach resorts. The parade requires more of the announcers, and the “Today” crew, unusually subdued during the ceremony, nimbly recited demographic and historical facts. These skewed toward American interests: “Roots” opens in Gambia. Alexander Hamilton was born in St. Kitts and Nevis. As long and featureless as the parade may be, it is also inspiring and heartwarming, the loud cheers for a new team representing refugees (and for the very well muscled and oiled Tongan flag bearer) balancing the occasional cuts to American team members chanting “U. S. A. !” Conveniently for NBC, the home nation danced in last, a samba line bouncing along to the best music any nation has offered. With her mind on those 6, 500 hours of actual athletics still to come, the rights to which cost NBC north of $1 billion, Ms. Vieira cautioned: “This is not the party. You haven’t seen anything yet. ” | 1 |
ISTANBUL — When the army cut off traffic in Istanbul on Friday night by shutting two bridges in the opening moments of a coup, the municipality ordered ferries to work overtime. City trucks blocked roads near army barracks. Buses and subways operated free of charge, and local officials and mosque preachers helped mobilize government supporters to the streets. And when President Recep Tayyip Erdogan finally emerged in public, after uncertain hours in which he narrowly missed being seized at a seaside hotel by soldiers trying to topple his government, he flew, not to the capital, Ankara, but to Istanbul, where he remained throughout the weekend and on Monday. Ankara may be the seat of Turkey’s government, but it was Mr. Erdogan’s grip on Istanbul, a city he once governed as mayor, that was crucial in putting down the coup. In the failed coup’s aftermath, it was in the streets, mosques and public squares in Istanbul that his Islamist supporters raucously celebrated, and where Mr. Erdogan consolidated his hold on power. The two cities, in many ways, represent Turkey’s deep divisions: Istanbul owns the hearts of the Islamists and is Turkey’s showcase to the world, while Ankara is a special place for secular Turks. “Istanbul’s becoming almost the second capital of the country has been very instrumental in preventing the coup,” said Yusuf Muftuoglu, who was an adviser to the former president, Abdullah Gul, and briefly for Mr. Erdogan. The drama of the failed coup mostly played out across two urban spaces and the skies overhead — Istanbul, the sprawling megacity that symbolizes the country’s past as the seat of Islamic empire, and Ankara, the utilitarian capital, a onetime Anatolian backwater built up by modern Turkey’s secular founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. Much of the violence occurred in Ankara, where different factions of the armed forces battled over government buildings. But the events in Istanbul proved crucial in fending off the coup. It was there that two private news channels broadcast coverage and gave a platform to elected leaders, including Mr. Erdogan. During his time in power, Mr. Erdogan has spent far more time in Istanbul than previous presidents and has overseen the construction of Turkey’s largest mosque in the city. He has also built up the police force, much of which is based in Istanbul. By stocking the force with loyalists and purging suspected enemies, he created a counterweight to the military, which has a history of carrying out coups against civilian governments. And it was largely the police special forces that defended the government over the weekend, confronting the renegade military factions. In the days before the attempted coup, a palpable sense of melancholy could be felt when walking through the city, whose singularity is measured in numbers: seven hills, two continents, the capital of three former empires. Turks call it “huzun,” a rich, word that means melancholy and a lot more: loss, sadness, spiritual anguish. Turkey’s most famous novelist, Orhan Pamuk, used it to describe Istanbul in the dreary years after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. The word is back in the city’s lexicon now, as years of optimism about Turkey’s growing power on the world stage give way to anxiety over terrorism and internal conflicts. After the coup was decisively put down, and Mr. Erdogan’s supporters flooded the streets and city squares over the weekend to celebrate, a sense of buoyancy returned to the streets, but the joy masked a deep unease that has enveloped the city. Istanbul, where ancient mosques and churches jostle with gleaming skyscrapers and shopping malls to define an evolving cityscape, was reshaped by Mr. Erdogan’s Islamist government, which created a glistening image of the city that is now threatened by instability. The government embraced Turkey’s Ottoman and Islamic past as a mythical time of harmony and reimagined Istanbul as Turkey’s true capital, investing heavily in public works projects, new shopping malls and office buildings. Ankara took a back seat. “I think the city was presented as this perfect dream without its problems,” said Kaya Genc, a novelist and essayist who wrote about “huzun” after the recent attack on Istanbul’s main airport, which left dozens of people dead. “Maybe it was a lie, but we miss it. ” Now, he said, “is the return of the real Istanbul. ” By that he meant a city whose mood is more in sync with its unstable past of military coups, political violence and economic crisis. In recent years, the government built an image of Istanbul as an urban wonderland of fascinating history and great architecture and cuisine, and tourism boomed. Mr. Genc said that like many other liberals and intellectuals he bought in to the vision. “A past was reinvented, and repackaged as this great, multicultural history where there are no conflicts,” he said. Even before the failed military coup, all that was clouded by spillover from the Syrian civil war — terrorism and a flood of refugees, hundreds of thousands in Istanbul alone — that set the city on edge. “Everything is being Arabized,” said Karaca Borar, who owns an antiques shop on one of the crooked, cobbled streets in European Istanbul, and supplied many of the items that fill a nearby museum owned by Mr. Pamuk that is based on his novel “Museum of Innocence. ” He said he was tired of hearing the Arabic greeting of “salaam aleikum” on the streets, and tired of so many Syrians in general. (It is a widely shared sentiment: When Mr. Erdogan recently said Turkey should offer citizenship to Syrians, a secular newspaper called Syrians “vermin” in a headline.) Asked about the mood of the city, which before the coup attempt had faced several devastating terrorist attacks for which the Islamic State was blamed, Mr. Borar said, “Terrible, terrible, terrible. ” “We’re not happy,” he said. “I’m not at ease. ” He continued: “We were the only secular, decent country in a bad region. Now, we are like one of those Arab states. ” With so many threats, even the weather can set off panic, a clap of thunder sending people scampering for cover. People walking the streets are scrutinized for what they are wearing and what they are carrying. A backpack could be a bomb. A sweater or jacket in summertime could conceal a vest of explosives. Nowadays, it seems, all of Turkey’s old conflicts — most prominently the divide between religious and secular Turks — and many new ones, are coming to the fore. The most dramatic was the long night of uncertainty as fighter jets buzzed the sky, gunfire echoed across the city, and protesters mobilized as the military tried to secure the city. But even before that, Turkey’s traumas were playing out across Istanbul, in bitter conversations about politics, in painful decisions to move away or in to gated communities, in smatterings of protests quickly put down by the police, and in new debates over the use of public spaces. Three years ago, protesters in Gezi Park, in Taksim Square in European Istanbul where Mr. Erdogan’s supporters rallied over the weekend, rose up to oppose plans to convert the park into a shopping mall. The protests became a widespread challenge to his rule, which is growing increasingly autocratic. It produced no lasting political changes, but it did save the park. But maybe not for long. In recent comments that seemed designed to provoke his enemies, Mr. Erdogan said he could revive the plan. On a recent afternoon, Ali Erdogan, a retired military man in his late 60s who is not related to the president, sat on a bench in Gezi Park, where the city has planted new trees, blossoming with pink flowers, and told how his life had improved since Mr. Erdogan came to power more than a decade ago. He pulled out his card for retirees for free rides on Istanbul’s subway, which has been modernized in recent years, as has Turkey’s health care system. “Everything is new and shiny,” he said. More important, he said, he can freely express his religion, something he was unable to do when Turkey’s secular elite ruled the country for decades. He said when he was in the military, the guardian of secularism, he had to conceal his religiosity. “I had to lie that I prayed five times a day,” he said. “I had to find a secret corner to pray. ” The city’s most conservative district is Fatih, in the old city, across the Golden Horn waterway that divides European Istanbul. There, Mr. Erdogan spoke at a funeral on Sunday, and rallied his supporters to keep gathering in the city’s public squares. It is also where three suicide attackers who carried out the airport bombings lived in an orange apartment building. But the area is far from homogeneous. In one gentrifying enclave of Fatih, in a neighborhood called Balat, cafes and quirky antique shops have sprouted on the narrow streets, raising tensions and testing the limits of social diversity. “Istanbul used to be like a village,” said Hikmet Bardok, 63, a longtime resident. “I don’t recognize it anymore. A lot of people who live here are poor. And these rich people are coming in an looking for places to park their Ferrari. ” Mr. Bardok said he quit drinking in 1994 when he turned to religion, and blamed secular Turks for the country’s polarization because they are “arrogant and disrespectful. ” Now that they are moving in to his neighborhood, he is worried that “in five to 10 years this place is going to turn into Amsterdam. ” Mr. Genc, meanwhile, has been thinking of writing a book on what he calls the “New Istanbul,” a chronicle of the “artificial, distant new neighborhoods” that have built up in the city’s outer reaches during Mr. Erdogan’s tenure. Mr. Erdogan once enjoyed the support of many of Istanbul’s intellectuals and elites, some of whom now call him a dictator, even though they opposed a coup. They once thought him capable of healing the country’s divides, and basked in the optimism that flowed through Istanbul. Now, in the aftermath of the coup attempt, they are left to wonder if Mr. Erdogan will turn more autocratic or, perhaps, seize the time to patch up relations with segments of the society he has alienated. That will become clearer in the days and weeks ahead. For now, Turks are simply trying to make sense of their dizzying weekend. The morning after the coup attempt, Mr. Genc woke early, and went for a walk along the Bosporus. “In the background was the waterway,” he wrote in an essay for The New York Times, “a burning sun and two bridges that span two continents, where just hours before tanks had been firing shots. ” | 1 |
November 11, 2016 Al Gore offers to work with Trump on climate change
Former vice president and longtime environmental activist Al Gore campaigned hard against Donald Trump, saying his election “would take us toward a climate catastrophe.”
But now that Trump will soon be occupying the Oval Office, Gore is extending an olive branch, saying in an online posting this week that he will do everything he can to work with the incoming administration to ensure that the United States remains a leader in combating the harmful effects of global warming.
“President-elect Trump said he wanted to be a president for all Americans,” Gore wrote on the website of the Climate Reality Project, the advocacy group he founded with a mission of helping accelerate the shift from dirty fossil fuels to renewable energy. “In that spirit, I hope that he will work with the overwhelming majority of us who believe that the climate crisis is the greatest threat we face as a nation.” | 0 |
The Senate will take up health care reform after a revised version of the American Health Care Act (AHCA) passed through the House last Thursday. [Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell ( ) said Saturday that the Senate does not expect help from Democrats as it works to repeal and replace Obamacare. “We don’t anticipate any Democratic help at all so that it will be a simple majority vote situation,” McConnell told the Associated Press. Several senators expressed concern over the House decision to vote without a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) score. Senator Roy Blunt ( ) a member of Senate leadership, said that the Senate will wait for a new CBO score before preceding to a vote. Senate Republicans already plan to change the House version of the AHCA. Mick Mulvaney, head of the Office of Management and Budget, said, “The bill that passed out of the House is most likely not going to be the bill that is put in front of the president. ” White House chief of staff Reince Priebus spoke with a dozen members of a Senate working to make “improvements” to the bill, necessary to win at least 50 votes to pass through the Senate. Members of the working group include Sens. Mitch McConnell, Bob Portman ( ) John Corynyn ( ) John Thune ( ) Mike Enzi ( ) Orrin Hatch ( ) Lamar Alexander ( ) Tom Cotton ( ) Cory Gardner ( ) Ted Cruz ( ) John Barrasso ( ) and Pat Toomey ( ). “Everyone is committed to getting this thing done and getting it done as soon as possible. I don’t think everyone is going to be beating down this group of 12 I think we’re going to want to let them do their work,” Priebus told Fox News. The Senate working group does not feature two of the bill’s biggest critics, Senators Susan Collins ( ) and Bill Cassidy ( ). The two senators joined a separate group of Republicans studying potential health care solutions including Sens. Shelley Moore Capito ( ) Johnny Isakson ( ) and Mike Rounds ( ). Senators Cassidy and Collins released a separate Obamacare repeal bill, The Patient Freedom Act. The bill would repeal the individual and employer mandate for health insurance, retain protections for conditions, and allow young adults to stay on their parents’ health plan until age 26. States have three options under the plan: Congressman Mark Meadows ( ) chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, told Breitbart News that he will work with Senate colleagues to push for a more conservative version. “I am having conversations with my colleagues in the Senate,” he explained, “where we can push for even more conservative solutions because it was more difficult to push amendments procedurally in the House. ” Senators Rand Paul ( ) Mike Lee ( ) and Ted Cruz ( ) were the strongest opponents of the American Health Care Act. Senator Paul crafted his own conservative plan for repealing Obamacare and worked with the Freedom Caucus to push for an even more conservative Obamacare repeal bill. The Freedom Caucus endorsed Sen. Paul’s plan. Senator Paul’s plan, The Obamacare Replacement Act: President Donald Trump recently tweeted that Republican Senators will not let the American people down on repealing Obamacare. Republican Senators will not let the American people down! ObamaCare premiums and deductibles are way up — it was a lie and it is dead! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 7, 2017, | 1 |
Hillary’s Criminal Plan for the Internet Hillary’s Criminal Plan for the Internet By 0 57
You’re probably appalled at the American media’s shameless whoring for Hillary Clinton, asking yourself why they would so thoroughly debase their much-touted journalistic ethics. President Obama has answered that question.
As reported by Agence France Presse, during a recent speech in Pittsburgh he postulated:
“We are going to have to rebuild within this wild-wild-west-of-information flow some sort of curating function that people agree to.
“There has to be, I think, some sort of way in which we can sort through information that passes some basic truthiness tests and those that we have to discard, because they just don’t have any basis in anything that’s actually happening in the world.”
Set aside the outrageous, un-American gall in proposing that any central authority should “curate” information put out to the public, and walk with me for a minute down a meandering path of speculation.
It is, or course, the World Wide Web in which Obama’s informational “wild-wild west” exists. This is the realm of Breitbart, Cybercast News Service, the Drudge Report , World Net Daily , American Thinker , and other non-establishment outlets that persist in making the president uncomfortable.
Current Prices on popular forms of Silver Bullion
And what has happened recently to affect the World Wide Web? The U.S. government has handed over control to ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), the nonprofit agency that assigns website domain names.
Is it in the president’s mind that ICANN might someday assume the “curating function” he sees as necessary to insure “truthiness” in web-based news reporting?
Well, according to ICANN Board Chair Stephen D. Crocker, diverse membership in the organization makes such a thing unthinkable. Quoted by the tech site C/NET, Crocker said:
“This community validated the multistakeholder model of internet governance. It has shown that a governance model defined by the inclusion of all voices, including business, academics, technical experts, civil society, governments and many others is the best way to assure that the internet of tomorrow remains as free, open and accessible as the internet of today.”
His confidence is echoed by the Internet Governance Coalition, a group of technology firms that includes Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Verizon, among others. They issued a statement that lauds ICANN’s “strong accountability measures” and upholds “the bottom-up approach that embodies the very nature of the open internet we experience today.…”
Pardon the skepticism to which I’ve become increasingly prone, but this sounds very much like the “collaborative” concept of governance that prevails in the academic world.
If you’ve ever applied for a position at a college or university, you know that what a search committee wants most urgently to know about you is whether you have a “collaborative style” of working.
What exactly is a “collaborative style,” as understood in today’s academic world? It means that you won’t do anything to contradict the orthodoxy in thought and procedure reigning on campus — in other words, that you are “politically correct” in your outlook. | 0 |
President Trump jokingly told White House staff Sunday that he wouldn’t tell the press what was in the letter former President Obama wrote to him, the Hill reported. [“I just went to the Oval Office and found this beautiful letter from President Obama,” Trump said Sunday when addressing senior staff members. “It was really very nice of him to do that and we will cherish that. We will keep that and we won’t even tell the press what’s in that letter. ” Obama left Trump a letter in the Oval Office, continuing a tradition that many outgoing presidents have done before him. In the letter former President Bush left former President Obama, Bush told Obama that he will face “trying moments” during his presidency. He also warned Obama that “critics will rage” and said your “‘friends’ will disappoint you. ” “But, you will have an Almighty God to comfort you, a family who loves you, and a country that is pulling for you, including me,” Bush wrote. “No matter what comes, you will be inspired by the character and compassion of the people you now lead. ” In the letter former President Clinton wrote to his successor Bush, Clinton wished Bush “success” and “happiness” and told him that being president is “the greatest honor that can come to an American citizen. ” “The burdens you now shoulder are great but often exaggerated. The sheer joy of doing what you believe is right is inexpressible,” Clinton wrote. “My prayers are with you and your family. Godspeed. ” | 1 |
Alec Baldwin says his days of playing a parody version of President Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live are numbered. [While he didn’t set a specific end date to hang up the wig and tie, the actor told Extra’s Mario Lopez that he wouldn’t be doing his most famous impersonation “much longer. ” “Trump just overwhelmingly lacks any sportsmanship, he remains, bitter, and angry, and you just want to look at him and go, ‘You won! ’” Baldwin told Extra, saying he’d hoped the president would change once in office. “His policies aside, which you can hate, I thought he would have just relaxed. ” “The maliciousness of this White House has people worried,” he added. “That’s why I’m not going to do it much longer, the impersonation, I don’t know how much more people can take it. ” Baldwin debuted as Trump during the NBC show’s 42nd season, before the presidential election, and continued to return to the role following Trump’s inauguration in January. The show’s skits have mocked Trump’s penchant for tweeting and skewered his confrontation with the 9th Circuit Court over the halt on his executive order on immigration last month. Offscreen, Baldwin has been a fierce critic of the president. He spoke at an rally outside Manhattan’s Trump Tower alongside Michael Moore and Mark Ruffalo before the inauguration, and has trolled the president on Twitter. While Saturday Night Live enjoyed some of its highest ratings in years this season, a recent survey found that viewers have grown weary of the show’s constant assaults on Trump. A Morning Consult poll released in February found that more viewers than not would like the show to focus its attention elsewhere. Though he may not play the president on SNL much longer, Baldwin is reportedly working on a satirical book about his time playing Trump. Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter: @dznussbaum | 1 |
WikiLeaks’ latest release from the Vault 7 leaks, titled “Marble,” claims that the CIA can use string obfuscating algorithms to attribute cyber attacks to other countries. [WikiLeaks released the “Marble Framework” leak today on their website, describing Marble as a tool used to “hamper forensic investigators and companies from attributing viruses, trojans and hacking attacks to the CIA. ” “Marble does this by hiding (‘obfuscating’) text fragments used in CIA malware from visual inspection,” WikiLeaks claims. “This is the digital equivalent of a specialized CIA tool to place covers over the english language text on U. S. produced weapons systems before giving them to insurgents secretly backed by the CIA. ” Marble is reportedly an obfuscation tool that is not used as a cyber attack itself but to hide and cover up previous attacks. WikiLeaks claims it is part of the CIA’s approach and the CIA’s core library of cyber attacks and viruses, “Designed to allow for flexible and obfuscation” as “string obfuscation algorithms (especially those that are unique) are often used to link malware to a specific developer or development shop. ” The source code also reportedly contains a deobfuscator used to reverse CIA text obfuscation. WikiLeaks believes that with the framework now made public, forensic investigators should be able to notice patterns and signatures which can be followed to attribute previous cyber attacks and viruses to the CIA. WikiLeaks also believes that Marble could be used to attribute cyber attacks to multiple countries due to evidence of Marble test examples in English, Chinese, Russian, Korean, Arabic, and Farsi. WikiLeaks states, “This would permit a forensic attribution double game, for example by pretending that the spoken language of the malware creator was not American English, but Chinese, but then showing attempts to conceal the use of Chinese, drawing forensic investigators even more strongly to the wrong conclusion, — but there are other possibilities, such as hiding fake error messages. ” Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan_ or email him at lnolan@breitbart. com | 1 |
I say send him and Hillary to Bengazi and let them live where Mr. Stephens was murdered and they did nothing to help. | 0 |
Teenager ‘enamored with ISIS’ in court over ‘viable device’ found on London... Teenager ‘enamored with ISIS’ in court over ‘viable device’ found on London Underground By 0 53
A poker-fixated teenager, who was “enamored with ISIS” and charged in connection with a “viable device” found on the London Underground, has appeared in court.
Damon Smith, 19, of South East London, has been accused of unlawfully and maliciously making or possessing an explosive substance with intent to endanger life or cause serious danger to property, the Metropolitan Police said. BREAKING – 19 year old Damon Smith charged with possessing or constructing explosives after device left on London tube train last Thursday pic.twitter.com/b0BekmI1aw
— Mark White (@skymarkwhite) October 26, 2016
He did not enter a plea in relation to the charge during his hearing at the Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Thursday.
Defence counsel Simon Eastwood, however, indicated that his client, who has a form of autism, would be pleading not guilty on the grounds it was a prank, according to Sky News.
The device was found last Thursday on a tube carriage on the Jubilee Line at North Greenwich station, near the O2 Arena. It had been left inside an abandoned black Adidas rucksack and was found by two members of the public.
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The station was evacuated for several hours, and counter-terrorism police destroyed the item in a controlled explosion.
The prosecution told the court that experts carried out a forensic examination of the package and deemed it to be a “viable improvised explosive device” which would have caused injury had it detonated.
The bomb was a “pressure” type device and contained grey powder, ball bearings, and a clock-type detonator, the court was told.
Four properties have been searched in connection with the investigation.
On Saturday, another device was discovered at an address in Newton Abbot by police investigating the North Greenwich incident. The item was later declared not viable.
Smith had just moved to London from Newton Abbot, Devon, to study IT at the London Metropolitan University.
He has been described as a “mummy’s boy” and a “loner,” with an interest in martial arts and online poker.
Friends of Smith have also claimed he was “enamored” with Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), Sky reports.
“He had a Koran and knew several phrases and he wore a black headscarf. Damon had replica guns and air rifles and even posted a video of himself shooting a replica Glock on YouTube,” a former friend told the Sun.
Smith has been remanded back into custody and will next appear at the Old Bailey on November 17.
Via RT . This piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News with permission or license. | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Supreme Court justices offered hope to both prosecutors and traders on Wednesday during arguments in the first insider trading case to come before the nation’s high court in two decades. A ruling by the court could clarify one of the most hotly debated issues on Wall Street: what prosecutors must prove to secure insider trading convictions based on confidential tips. In their questioning, the justices grappled with where to draw the line. Even as they appeared sympathetic to the government’s interpretation of the high court’s past insider trading decisions, the justices were wary of radically expanding the government’s power and affording prosecutors too much of a free hand in these cases. The case now before the court, Salman v. United States, No. comes from California and centers on the insider trading conviction of Bassam Salman in 2013. According to prosecutors, Mr. Salman placed profitable stock trades based on confidential information leaked by his future Maher Kara, who had advance knowledge of corporate mergers because of his job in Citigroup’s health care investment banking group. For decades, courts have held that it is not inherently illegal to trade stocks based on material, nonpublic information like a merger or acquisition. For an insider to be guilty of sharing inside information, his leak must breach a duty to keep the information confidential and he must receive a personal benefit in exchange for the leak. By extension, the person who receives the information must generally know of that breach and benefit. The Salman case presents a question that has vexed federal appeals courts and left prosecutors and traders alike seeking clarity: What exactly amounts to a “personal benefit”? Prosecutors hope the court will afford them leeway in defining the benefit, arguing that if an insider provides a gift of information, that should count as a benefit. In the Salman case, Maher Kara did not receive any financial benefit, but arguably leaked the information as a gift. Mr. Salman’s lawyer, Alexandra Shapiro, argued on Wednesday that the benefit must be more “tangible” — like cash or something that eventually can be monetized. Several of the justices, citing one of the court’s seminal insider trading decisions from three decades ago, seemed skeptical of her argument and poised to uphold Mr. Salman’s conviction. After all, as Justice Stephen Breyer noted, “to help a close family member is like helping yourself. ” Yet the court, often skeptical of prosecutors in crime cases, also questioned the government’s lawyer, Michael Dreeben, about where to draw the line. The justices seemed hesitant to afford prosecutors broad authority to apply the gift test to situations in which the insider and recipient are not family or close friends. The issue gained prominence after a 2014 decision from the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Manhattan, United States v. Newman, that upended the Justice Department’s sweeping crackdown on insider trading. Mr. Salman’s argument for overturning his conviction hinges on the Newman decision, which tightened the standard for what constitutes a personal benefit by requiring prosecutors to show a tangible benefit rather than mere friendship between the tipper and recipient. The Second Circuit, in that 2014 decision, overturned the insider trading convictions of the hedge fund managers Todd Newman and Anthony Chiasson, who were at the end of a long chain of information being passed along. In the aftermath, federal prosecutors in New York tossed out the convictions of nearly a dozen other traders and industry consultants. Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan, whose office secured insider trading convictions against dozens of people in the nearly $3 trillion hedge fund industry, has been an outspoken critic of the Second Circuit ruling. Mr. Bharara, who attended Wednesday’s argument, has argued that the Second Circuit’s decision could create “a potential bonanza for friends and family of rich people with material nonpublic information. ” The Supreme Court denied the Justice Department’s request that it review that ruling, though the justices could indirectly rebuke it in deciding Mr. Salman’s case. In Mr. Salman’s case, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco took a different approach. The Ninth Circuit upheld Mr. Salman’s conviction and adopted the view that giving inside information to a family member qualified as a benefit, creating what some legal observers saw as a split that only the Supreme Court could reconcile. Both the Newman and Salman appeals court decisions hinged on a Supreme Court case, Dirks v. Securities and Exchange Commission, that has long been the cornerstone of insider trading law. That decision directed courts to focus on “whether the insider receives a direct or indirect personal benefit from the disclosure, such as a pecuniary gain or a reputational benefit that will translate into future earnings. ” In overturning Mr. Newman’s conviction, the Second Circuit seized on that financial element. But when the Ninth Circuit upheld Mr. Salman’s conviction, it focused on another passage in the Dirks decision that allowed liability “when an insider makes a gift of confidential information to a trading relative or friend. ” That excerpt strikes at the heart of Mr. Salman’s case. Maher Kara passed the inside information, arguably as a gift, to his brother, Michael Kara, who in turn shared it with Mr. Salman. The two families were close Maher Kara was engaged to Mr. Salman’s sister. (While Maher Kara struck a plea deal and was sentenced to three months of home confinement, Mr. Salman was sentenced to three years in prison.) Some of the justices, appearing skeptical of Mr. Salman’s argument, highlighted the passage within the Dirks ruling that references gifts to family members. “You’re asking us to cut back significantly from something that we said several decades ago,” Justice Elena Kagan told Ms. Shapiro, adding that “the integrity of the markets are a very important thing for this country. And you’re asking us essentially to change the rules in a way that threatens that integrity. ” But a decision that just upholds Mr. Salman’s conviction — and reaffirms the Dirks decision with some clarity — would disappoint some prosecutors who argue that the current unsettled nature of the law has had a chilling effect on cases. The Justice Department’s ideal ruling would uphold the conviction of Mr. Salman and then take the Ninth Circuit’s ruling further so that the gift rule would not be limited to just family and close friends. Mr. Dreeben mentioned the case of a barber who could slip through the cracks. He also proposed an even looser standard that would allow charges whenever information is shared for a noncorporate purpose and the insider knows that the recipient will place trades based on the leak. The justices appeared to balk at that extension of prosecutorial power. “It doesn’t seem to me that your argument is much more consistent with Dirks than Ms. Shapiro’s,” Justice Samuel Alito told Mr. Dreeben. Justice Alito then proposed a hypothetical: “Now suppose someone, the insider is walking down the street and sees someone who has a really unhappy look on his face and says, I want to do something to make this person’s day. And so he provides the inside information” and allows the recipient to trade. Mr. Dreeben replied that such a case was indeed a violation. Later in the argument, however, as other justices expressed skepticism about the Justice Department’s position, Mr. Dreeben conceded that “if the court feels more comfortable given the facts of this case of reaffirming Dirks and saying that was the law in 1983, it remains the law today, that is completely fine with the government. ” Daniel Richman, a former federal prosecutor and now a professor at Columbia Law School, predicted that because insider trading law was almost entirely rather than set by Congress, the Supreme Court might be reluctant to radically revisit its Dirks ruling from three decades ago. It would be simpler to draw distinctions between cases involving family members and business associates. “If you were going to be a minimalist, this little bit of family relationship could be elaborated on without wholesale redevelopment,” he said. One of the most prominent critics of judges determining what constitutes insider trading was Justice Antonin Scalia, whose death earlier this year created the vacancy on the bench. Justice Scalia argued that only Congress — rather than agencies, prosecutors or judges — may define what conduct amounts to insider trading. Although Ms. Shapiro made a similar argument, the remaining eight justices seemed to be unswayed. They also seemed skeptical of her argument that Maher Kara turned over the information to Michael Kara for “the scant benefit of getting his brother off his back. ” Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, for whom Ms. Shapiro was once a law clerk, remarked: “He’s no longer being pestered. Isn’t that a benefit?” | 1 |
The French aerospace giant Airbus recently unveiled its secret flying-car project dubbed Vahana — a single-manned, autonomously piloted aircraft that can take off and land vertically. Cue the Jetsons references! The concept drawing of Vahana should look familiar to anyone who follows the tiny-but-passionate flying car movement. The aircraft has eight rotors on two sets of wings, both of which tilt depending on whether the car’s flying vertically or horizontally. There’s room for a single passenger under a canopy that retracts like a visor. The aircraft will be deployed like a taxi, making it the air-taxi version of Uber, according to CNN Money . The project launched in early 2016 as one of the first pursuits of A³ (pronounced A-cubed), the Silicon Valley arm of Airbus, according to the startup’s CEO Rodin Lyasoff. Vahana is a Sanskrit word that refers to the vehicle or mount of a god, but Lyasoff says his feet are firmly rooted in reality when it comes to the project.
“Beyond developing the vehicle itself,” Lyasoff wrote in a Medium post quietly published last month, “we’re seeking to move key technology categories forward, foster development of the regulatory regime for the certification and operation of automated aircraft, and to otherwise nurture an ecosystem that will help enable the vertical cities of the future.”
Airbus, which competes with the US-based Boeing, is best known for large jetliners like the double-decker A380. However, the flying car project shows that the French company is not above dabbling in some high-concept, and perhaps unrealistic, aviation ideas.
Lyasoff says his team of engineers, designers, and robotics experts are aiming to fly a full-size prototype before the end of 2017, and to have a “productizable demonstrator” by 2020.
Flying cars have lurked in collective imaginations for decades, but the idea of personal, roadable aircraft took on renewed emphasis this summer when it was revealed that Google co-founder Larry Page was funding a pair of flying car startups, Kitty Hawk and Zee.Aero. Dozens of other companies are working on their own prototypes, though some probably don’t qualify as flying cars. Some are just tiny personal aircrafts, while others look like drones on steroids.
There are many things about flying cars that make them impractical The fact that flying cars act as a stand-in for some distant, unattainable future isn’t a mistake. There are many things about flying cars that make them impractical, unworkable, and even wrongheaded. Airspace in North America and Europe is tightly regulated, making it extremely difficult for any company to gain permission for commercial flight, especially in dense urban environments. And the idea of autonomous aircraft would probably strike most passengers as a recipe for disaster.
Lyasoff insists that pilotless flying cars are an attainable dream, if only because the rules governing the skies are bound to change in the future. Plus robot aircraft are cheaper to produce. “Full automation also enables us to make our aircraft as small and light as possible, and will significantly reduce manufacturing costs,” Lyasoff says.
And if something goes wrong, the Vahana will come equipped with “a ballistic parachute that works even at low altitudes.” Because what commute is complete without a little unexpected sky-diving thrown in the mix?
Source: The Verge
Via: Earth Mystery News
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LONDON — Anjem Choudary, one of Britain’s best known Islamist activists, was sentenced on Tuesday to five years and six months in prison after having been convicted in July of encouraging support for the Islamic State. Mr. Choudary, 49, had been found guilty of promoting the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, in speeches and messages posted online, which is a crime under Britain’s antiterrorism laws. Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, 33, an associate of Mr. Choudary’s, received the same sentence. Along with Mr. Choudary, Mr. Rahman was convicted on July 28 of having violated British laws after a trial at the Old Bailey, London’s central criminal court. The verdict was not announced until for legal reasons. Mr. Choudary’s supporters shouted the Arabic phrase “Allahu akbar,” or “God is great,” as he was sent to jail in London. Long regarded as one of the country’s most prominent radical preachers, Mr. Choudary had praised those who attacked the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, and he refused to condemn the London subway and bus bombings of 2005. Mr. Choudary was arrested two years ago after his name appeared on an oath that circulated online declaring the legitimacy of the “proclaimed Islamic Caliphate State. ” Mr. Choudary denied encouraging his followers to support the Islamic State and said his name had appeared on the online oath without his knowledge. But evidence was presented during the trial that Mr. Choudary had posted speeches online that provided his rationale for recognizing Abu Bakr as the leader of the Islamic State. In a statement issued on Tuesday, the police said that, in the course of their investigation, they had considered material spanning two decades and had assessed evidence from more than 333 electronic devices. “These men have stayed just within the law for many years, and there has been frustration for both law enforcement agencies and communities as they spread hate,” said Cmdr. Dean Haydon, who leads the Metropolitan Police Service’s Counter Terrorism Command, in the statement. “We have watched Choudary developing a media career as spokesman for the extremists, saying the most distasteful of comments, but without crossing the criminal threshold. ” “Their recent speeches and the oath of allegiance,” he added, “were a turning point for the police — at last, we had the evidence that they had stepped over the line and we could prove they were actively encouraging support of ISIS. ” | 1 |
Former Breitbart Senior Editor MILO has announced the founding of his new $12 million dollar media company, MILO, Inc. [In a Facebook post, MILO outlined his new business plan and the $12 million investment funding that it has received from undisclosed investors. He has reportedly hired a seasoned media executive to lead the new team that will be based out of Miami, Florida. The new company will manage MILO‘s books, tours, merchandise and radio and TV opportunities. In a statement, MILO said, “This isn’t some vanity nameplate on a personal blog. This is a fully talent factory and management company dedicated to the destruction of political correctness and the progressive left. I will spend every waking moment of the rest of my life making the lives of journalists, professors, politicians, feminists, Black Lives Matter activists and other professional victims a living hell. Free speech is back — and it is fabulous. ” The statement also outlined MILO’s plans for free speech week at Berkeley, “MILO will release more details about Free Speech Week, his book, DANGEROUS, his new tour and the media company at a “Cinco de Milo” party in Florida on May 5, with occasional updates between now and then on how fans and enemies can see, hear, and read his work. ” MILO also clarified the current status of the Privilege Grant, “MILO‘s charity, the Yiannopoulos Privilege Grant, recently announced the 10 recipients of its pilot grant program. Each recipient will receive $2, 500 towards his higher education. A second grant will occur in the second half of 2017. Please visit privilegegrant. for more information. ” MILO said, “MILO, Inc. will bring laughter and war to every corner of America in dozens of different formats. I will fight harder and look hotter than anyone else on the political right. And I will do more damage to the political left than anyone else in American culture. ” Read the full Facebook post here. Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan_ or email him at lnolan@breitbart. com | 1 |
Here's something interesting from The Unz Review... Recipient Name Recipient Email =>
“Nation state as a fundamental unit of man’s organized life has ceased to be the principal creative force: International banks and multinational corporations are acting and planning in terms that are far in advance of the political concepts of the nation-state.”
— Zbigniew Brzezinski, “Between Two Ages: The Technetronic Era”, 1971
“I’m going to continue to push for a no-fly zone and safe havens within Syria….not only to help protect the Syrians and prevent the constant outflow of refugees, but to gain some leverage on both the Syrian government and the Russians.”
— Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Third Presidential Debate
Why is Hillary Clinton so eager to intensify US involvement in Syria when US interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya have all gone so terribly wrong?
The answer to this question is simple. It’s because Clinton doesn’t think that these interventions went wrong. And neither do any of the other members of the US foreign policy establishment. (aka–The Borg). In fact, in their eyes these wars have been a rousing success. Sure, a few have been critical of the public relations backlash from the nonexistent WMD in Iraq, (or the logistical errors, like disbanding the Iraqi Army) but–for the most part– the foreign policy establishment is satisfied with its efforts to destabilize the region and remove leaders that refuse to follow Washington’s diktats.
This is hard for ordinary people to understand. They can’t grasp why elite powerbrokers would want to transform functioning, stable countries into uninhabitable wastelands overrun by armed extremists, sectarian death squads and foreign-born terrorists. Nor can they understand what has been gained by Washington’s 15 year-long rampage across the Middle East and Central Asia that has turned a vast swathe of strategic territory into a terrorist breeding grounds? What is the purpose of all this?
First, we have to acknowledge that the decimation and de facto balkanization of these countries is part of a plan. If it wasn’t part of a plan, than the decision-makers would change the policy. But they haven’t changed the policy. The policy is the same. The fact that the US is using foreign-born jihadists to pursue regime change in Syria as opposed to US troops in Iraq, is not a fundamental change in the policy. The ultimate goal is still the decimation of the state and the elimination of the existing government. This same rule applies to Libya and Afghanistan both of which have been plunged into chaos by Washington’s actions.
But why? What is gained by destroying these countries and generating so much suffering and death?
Here’s what I think: I think Washington is involved in a grand project to remake the world in a way that better meets the needs of its elite constituents, the international banks and multinational corporations. Brzezinski not only refers to this in the opening quote, he also explains what is taking place: The nation-state is being jettisoned as the foundation upon which the global order rests. Instead, Washington is erasing borders, liquidating states, and removing strong, secular leaders that can mount resistance to its machinations in order to impose an entirely new model on the region, a new world order. The people who run these elite institutions want to create an interconnected-global free trade zone overseen by the proconsuls of Big Capital, in other words, a global Eurozone that precludes the required state institutions (like a centralized treasury, mutual debt, federal transfers) that would allow the borderless entity to function properly.
Deep state powerbrokers who set policy behind the smokescreen of our bought-and-paid-for congress think that one world government is an achievable goal provided they control the world’s energy supplies, the world’s reserve currency and become the dominant player in this century’s most populous and prosperous region, Asia. This is essentially what Hillary’s “pivot” to Asia is all about.
The basic problem with Washington’s NWO plan is that a growing number of powerful countries are still attached to the old world order and are now prepared to defend it. This is what’s really going on in Syria, the improbable alliance of Russia, Syria, Iran and Hezbollah have stopped the US military juggernaut dead in its tracks. The unstoppable force has hit the immovable object and the immovable object has prevailed…so far.
Naturally, the foreign policy establishment is upset about these new developments, and for good reason. The US has run the world for quite a while now, so the rolling back of US policy in Syria is as much a surprise as it is a threat. The Russian Airforce deployed to Syria a full year ago in September, but only recently has Washington shown that it’s prepared to respond by increasing its support of its jihadists agents on the ground and by mounting an attack on ISIS in the eastern part of the country, Raqqa. But the real escalation is expected to take place when Hillary Clinton becomes president in 2017. That’s when the US will directly engage Russia militarily, assuming that their tit-for-tat encounters will be contained within Syria’s borders. It’s a risky plan, but it’s the next logical step in this bloody fiasco. Neither party wants a nuclear war, but Washington believes that doing nothing is tantamount to backing down, therefore, Hillary and her neocon advisors can be counted on to up the ante. “No-fly zone”, anyone?
The assumption is that eventually, and with enough pressure, Putin will throw in the towel. But this is another miscalculation. Putin is not in Syria because he wants to be nor is he there because he values his friendship with Syrian President Bashar al Assad. That’s not it at all. Putin is in Syria because he has no choice. Russia’s national security is at stake. If Washington’s strategy of deploying terrorists to topple Assad succeeds, then the same ploy will be attempted in Iran and Russia. Putin knows this, just like he knows that the scourge of foreign-backed terrorism can decimate entire regions like Chechnya. He knows that it’s better for him to kill these extremists in Aleppo than it will be in Moscow. So he can’t back down, that’s not an option. ORDER IT NOW
But, by the same token, he can compromise, in other words, his goals and the goals of Assad do not perfectly coincide. For example, he could very well make territorial concessions to the US for the sake of peace that Assad might not support.
But why would he do that? Why wouldn’t he continue to fight until every inch of Syria’s sovereign territory is recovered?
Because it’s not in Russia’s national interest to do so, that’s why. Putin has never tried to conceal the fact that he’s in Syria to protect Russia’s national security. That’s his main objective. But he’s not an idealist, he’s a pragmatist who’ll do whatever he has to to end the war ASAP. That means compromise.
This doesn’t matter to the Washington warlords….yet. But it will eventually. Eventually there will be an accommodation of some sort. No one is going to get everything they want, that much is certain. For example, it’s impossible to imagine that Putin would launch a war on Turkey to recover the territory that Turkish troops now occupy in N Syria. In fact, Putin may have already conceded as much to Turkish president Tayyip Erdogan in their recent meetings. But that doesn’t mean that Putin doesn’t have his red lines. He does. Aleppo is a red line. Turkish troops will not be allowed to enter Aleppo.
The western corridor, the industrial and population centers are all red lines. On these, there will be no compromise. Putin will help Assad remain in power and keep the country largely intact. But will Turkey control sections in the north, and will the US control sections in the east?
Probably. This will have to be worked out in negotiations, but its unlikely that the country’s borders will be the same as they were before the war broke out. Putin will undoubtedly settle for a halfloaf provided the fighting ends and security is restored. In any event, he’s not going to hang around until the last dog is hung.
Unfortunately, we’re a long way from any settlement in Syria, mainly because Washington is nowhere near accepting the fact that its project to rule the world has been derailed. That’s the crux of the matter, isn’t it? The bigshots who run the country are still in denial. It hasn’t sunk in yet that the war is lost and that their nutty jihadist-militia plan has failed.
It’s going to take a long time before Washington gets the message that the world is no longer its oyster. The sooner they figure it out, the better it’ll be for everyone.
MIKE WHITNEY lives in Washington state. He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion (AK Press). Hopeless is also available in a Kindle edition . He can be reached at . (Reprinted from Counterpunch by permission of author or representative) | 0 |
RIO DE JANEIRO — The American swimmers Ryan Lochte, Jimmy Feigen, Jack Conger and Gunnar Bentz left a lavish Olympics party hosted by the French authorities early Sunday morning. They got into a taxi for the ride across Rio de Janeiro to their lodgings in the athletes’ village. What happened next has been the subject of intense police scrutiny, diplomatic debate and widespread criticism — first for Rio’s crime problems, and then for the behavior of the four American athletes. What’s the latest? Mr. Conger and Mr. Bentz were allowed to fly back to the United States on Thursday night. (The night before, they were pulled off their flight and detained for questioning.) Mr. Feigen agreed to donate $11, 000 to a Brazilian charity in an effort to receive permission to leave the country, according to news reports Friday morning. Mr. Lochte returned to the United States earlier in the week and apologized Friday for his role in the episode (see below). What happened? The taxi stopped at a gas station and the swimmers got out to use the restroom. The police say that after one or more of them vandalized the restroom, a security guard brandished a gun to keep them under control until the police arrived. The chief of police said Thursday that the swimmers paid for the damages — about $50 — and left before the police arrived. In his original account, Mr. Lochte said the car had been pulled over by armed men, one of whom put a gun against his head before taking the cash from his wallet. He subsequently altered his version of events. What aspects of the incident remain unclear? Many. There is little doubt that one or more of the American athletes damaged the gas station restroom. What happened after that is less clear: Who brandished a gun? Did any of the athletes grow combative? Did the athletes understand that they were being asked to pay for the restroom damages, or did they believe they were being extorted? How did United States officials respond when the reports first emerged? What are the possible legal consequences for the athletes? The judge who oversees the special court handling the case said the crime the athletes have been accused of — making false statements about a crime — “is not that serious. ” He said it would not result in any time in prison if they were found guilty. Why did the swimmers describe the incident inaccurately? We don’t know yet. The police chief speculated that the accounts were fabricated to disguise that the swimmers had remained at the party until almost sunrise. He said one of the first leads in the investigation had come from a taxi driver who gave a ride to two Brazilian women who had left the same party and discussed having romantic encounters with the swimmers. “At least one of the athletes may have had a motive for telling a story that wasn’t true,” he said. Have the swimmers apologized? On Friday, Mr. Lochte apologized, in a statement on Twitter, “for not being more careful and candid in how I described the events of that early morning and for my role in taking the focus away from the many athletes fulfilling their dreams of participating in the Olympics. ” Many Brazilians have said they wanted to see contrition from the swimmers because, they say, the false claims portrayed Rio grossly on an international stage. Mario Andrada, a spokesman for the Rio Olympics, had said an apology was not necessary. Nevertheless, on Friday, he said, “We accept and appreciate his apology,” according to The Associated Press. Scott Blackmun, the chief executive of the United States Olympic Committee, issued an apology in a statement Thursday night. “The behavior of these athletes is not acceptable, nor does it represent the values of Team USA or the conduct of the vast majority of its members,” the statement said. “On behalf of the United States Olympic Committee, we apologize to our hosts in Rio and the people of Brazil for this distracting ordeal in the midst of what should rightly be a celebration of excellence. ” | 1 |
Italians this week cheered the electoral defeat of a mayor who signed a deal with George Soros to turn the tiny island of Lampedusa into a gateway to Europe for migrants travelling from Africa. [“Thank you, you have eradicated the Lampedusa cancer,” read graffiti sprayed across walls on several streets of the small island with just 6, 000 residents after voters ousted Mayor Giusi Nicolini. The Lampedusa native was kicked into third place at local elections Sunday, locals electing businessman Salvatore “Totò” Martello, who said during the campaign that he “cannot stand seeing migrants swarming everywhere”. Since taking office in 2012 the outgoing mayor transformed the island into a gateway to Europe, streamlining migrant processing to enable Lampedusa’s reception centre to process and give shelter to 700 asylum seekers at a time, moving most of them on to Sicily or the Italian mainland. Nicolini, who has used her status as a public figure to repeatedly promote open borders and acceptance of mass migration to Europe, was two months ago awarded the UNESCO Peace Prize for her “boundless humanity and unwavering commitment to refugee crisis management and integration”. And in October last year, the decorated mayor attended dinner with Barack Obama at the White House, brought along by Italy’s Minister, the unelected technocrat Matteo Renzi, as one of the people who represented the best of Italy. Following Nicolini’s defeat, “conservative activists joyfully posted altered images representing the former mayor as an illegal immigrant expelled from the country and memes claiming she is an agent of George Soros,” according to the Washington Post, which described the Hungarian billionaire as “the liberal tycoon whom conspiracy theorists accuse of being behind the wave of African immigration to Europe. ” The outgoing mayor rushed to destroy and delete “files, documents, private correspondence and entire folders” from computers in her office upon her electoral defeat, telling the media: “No, I do not have time to respond to Martello, my priorities lie elsewhere. ” Questioning her haste in clearing the mayoral office, several Italian websites pointed to documents that emerged in 2014 which showed Nicolini signed a “memorandum of understanding” with Open Society Initiative for Europe (OSIFE) in which the agreed to let Soros’ international funding network “help strengthen Lampedusa’s capacity [to take migrants] and promote the island’s population and its guests. ” Noting how, with so many African migrants arriving on boats, Lampedusa “operates in a state of chronic emergency” the OSIFE document asserts the island “will require manpower and expertise to complement its current workforce. ” Under the terms of the agreement, the funding body sent personnel to Lampedusa who set up “humanitarian” and “cultural” projects on the island,. “The agreement does not provide direct financing,” the document states, explaining that “OSIFE will provide the service via a person on the island with skills suitable for the purpose, and adding that funds allocated to Lampedusa will be sent to “specific bank accounts” which must be used specifically for projects promoting mass migration. Last year, leaked OSIFE documents revealed Soros proclaimed that mass migration to Europe should be accepted as a “new normal” carrying with it “new opportunities” for the billionaire’s cash to influence immigration policies on a global scale. | 1 |
Police in New York are searching for six teenaged girls who allegedly beat up another train passenger for looking at them with disapproval, reports say. [Officials are on the lookout for six girls who witnesses say began to harass a female passenger on a L train on December 23. The teens were upset with the woman because she shook her head at them to “express her displeasure towards the group,” according to police. The teens began to punch and kick the woman and knocked her phone out of her hand. In addition, as the assailants left the train car they stole the assaulted woman’s phone, New York’s DNAInfo. com reported. The victim was punched in the face several times, police said, The girls jumped off the train at the Sutter Avenue stop at around 3:30 PM. The NYPD released surveillance video of the teens exiting the train. No one is currently in custody for the incident. Authorities are asking anyone with information to contact Crime Stoppers at (800) (8477). Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail. com. | 1 |
In our previous article The Secret Truth about Russia Exposed, we elaborated on how Russia is a convenient enemy for politicians and specifically the Democratic party, to create an enemy that really , well - doesn't exist to distract and confuse voters. But like with any 'enemy' if you bomb a village, you may have some pissed off villagers. As we explain in our best selling book Splitting Pennies - the world doesn't work the way you see on TV - in fact, it works more closely as seen on Zero Hedge.
Although Russia simply is just a country in the wrong place at the wrong time (which, throughout Russian history, seems to be a theme for them) - there really is a reason the Elite hate Russia. It's not because they're Xenophobic, although there's that too - it's because of several key factors that make Russia a unique power in the world, compared to similar countries.
1. Russia is an independent country. It's not possible to manipulate Russia via external remote control, like it is most countries. The Elite don't like that! Russia kicked out Soros "Open Society": Russia has banned a pro-democracy charity founded by hedge fund billionaire George Soros, saying the organization posed a threat to both state security and the Russian constitution. In a statement released Monday morning, Russia's General Prosecutor's Office said two branches of Soros' charity network — the Open Society Foundations (OSF) and the Open Society Institute (OSI) — would be placed on a "stop list" of foreign non-governmental organizations whose activities have been deemed "undesirable" by the Russian state.
2. Russia is not easy to cripple via clandestine means, whether it be CIA, MI6, or outright military conflict. Some other BRICs however, that's not the case. Say what you will about Russia's military - it's on par and in many cases, advanced, compared to the US military. And that's not AN opinion, that's in the opinion of top US military commanders: Late in September, we brought you “ US Readies Battle Plans For Baltic War With Russia ” in which we described a series of thought experiments undertaken by The Pentagon in an effort to determine what the likely outcome would be should something go horribly “wrong” on the way to landing the US in a shooting war with Russia in the Balkans.
The results of those thought experiments were not encouraging. As a reminder, here’s how Foreign Policy summed up the exercises:
3. Russian culture, and language, is too complex for the average "Elite" who pretends to be internationally well versed because they had a few semesters of French. For example, when the diplomat Clinton was Secretary of State, she presented a reset button translating the opposite meaning... ooops. "I would like to present you with a little gift that represents what President Obama and Vice President Biden and I have been saying and that is: 'We want to reset our relationship, and so we will do it together.' ...
"We worked hard to get the right Russian word. Do you think we got it?" she asked Lavrov, laughing. “You got it wrong," said Lavrov, as both diplomats laughed.
“It should be “perezagruzka” [the Russian word for reset]," said Lavrov."This says ‘peregruzka,’ which means ‘overcharged.’”
Yes, it's almost a certainty that if Clinton by some horrible fate is President there will be Nuclear war. Wars have been started over much more subtle mistakes. One would think, that Clinton would have had an advisor CHECK THIS before presenting it in a public ceremony, in front of reporters? How much more blatantly unprofessional can one be? If politicians worked in the private sector, they wouldn't last a day! How do these people advance so far in politics?
4. Plain and simple, the Elite do not control Russia. While there are backchannels of Russian oligarchs that work directly with Western Rothschild interests, for example, they simply don't have the same level of control as they do European countries, like Germany for instance. Or another good example is China, there's this fanatical talk that China can dump US Treasuries blah blah blah the fact is that China is completely dependent on USA and US Dollars, and will be for the rest of our lives. Maybe in 1000 years in the Dong Dynasty still to come they will rule the world but it's not going to happen anytime soon.
Russia is one of the most highly misunderstood cultures in the West. Which is strange, because Russia is more like America than any European country: Both Russia and America share huge landmasses with large undeveloped territory Both Russia and America are predominantly white christian majorities (although in last decades, America tries to be more of a melting pot whereas Russia favors ethnic cleansing) Both Russia and America fought against Hitler and the Nazis during World War 2, the defining event of the last 60 years
There have been numerous interesting situations where Russia helped America and America helped Russia on a number of levels, to learn more about it checkout the following books:
Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution . Armand Hammer: The Untold Story
Most interestingly, during the Nixon administration Kissinger was prodding Nixon to partner with Russia that would, in Kissinger's view would create an unstoppable alliance, that no one could compete with such a superpower axis. But, it didn't happen, as there were 'neo-cons' who were against it, mostly Polish Catholics who have some deep genetic fear of any culture using the Cyrillic alphabet.
Nixon instead chose China (what a mistake!) and created Forex. But the point being that, through a small slip of fate, "China" may have been in this alternative Kissinger reality the 'Great Evil Enemy' hacking our elections, as we drive across the Alaskan-Siberian highway without any speed limit, oil would be ten cents a gallon, and we wouldn't need to war with the Middle East. Did you enjoy this article? - Consider helping us! Russia Insider depends on your donations: the more you give, the more we can do. $1 $10 Other amount
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November 4, 2016 - Aris Petasis, Katehon - c.e. by J. Arnoldski
The Cyprus problem is a Russian problem as well. The current purblind negotiations, ostensibly between the two Cypriot communities (82% Greek and 18% Turkish), are strictly directed by NATO under the watchful eye of 40,000 Turkish occupation troops that hold 37% of Cyprus’s land and 54% of its shores. At every major juncture in Cyprus’ recent history, one finds an obsession with Russia by Britain and its successor in the Eastern Mediterranean (EM), America.
The Russia factor featured strongly in 1878 and, of course, before. In that year, the Ottomans ceded Cyprus to Britain in exchange for the United Kingdom's military support to the Ottomans (read: Turkish) should Russia attempt to take possession of Ottoman territories in Asia. Here we see the people of Cyprus treated as a commodity and Turkey and Britain acting as traders treating Russia as collateral.
With the start of WWI, Cyprus was put under British military occupation (1914-1925) and then became a colony of the British crown (1925-1960.) During WWI, when the Turks joined the losing side, Britain promised to cede Cyprus to Greece just as it did in 1864 with some Greek-populated islands. But Britain reneged on its promise perfidiously because of its obsession with keeping Russia in check in the EM. The Treaty of Lausanne of 1923 established the new Turkish state, which in turn formally recognized Britain's sovereignty over Cyprus (Article 20).
The British distrusted the Greeks because of favorable Greek sentiment towards Russia. Beyond the cultural links between Greeks and Russians, Russia deservedly earned the appreciation of the Greeks. In 1770, at Catherine the Great’s behest, the Orlov brothers attempted, although unsuccessfully, to free the Greeks from Turkish bondage. The Greek General Alexander Ypsilanti, who fought against Napoleon as an officer of the Russian Cavalry, led the Greek war of independence against the Turks. The Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ioannis Kapodistrias, was the first Governor of liberated Greece. The battle of Navarino of 1827, that saw the crushing of the Turkish navy, was initiated by Russia (with Rear-Admiral Lodewijk Heyden of the Imperial Russian Navy) and only then, so as not to be left out, did France and Britain (with philhellene Vice-Admiral Edward Codrington) joined the fray. This led to independence in 1829 for some Greek territory.
Just after WWII, when the issue of Cyprus was raised again, the British toyed with the idea of ceding Cyprus to Greece. The project was stopped when the British (and Americans) cunningly brought up the imaginary danger of Greece falling under communism and ultimately siding with the Soviet Union (read: Russia). Of course, the Yalta agreement prevented such an eventuality (Greece went to the West by 90%) whilst the massive military support the British and Americans gave the anti-communists (many of whom were shadowy characters and collaborators) sealed the communists’ fate.
Here again, the legitimate ambitions of the Greeks of Cyprus were thwarted largely on account of the West’s obsession with stopping Russia.
Years later, after Cyprus was given fettered independence by the British in 1960, NATO accused Cyprus’ president of close relations with Cypriot “communists.” In response, NATO started to work tirelessly towards the dissolution of the Republic of Cyprus (RofCy) out of fear that Russia would use the “communists” as a wedge to gain entry into Cyprus. All of this was, of course, nonsense.
So, the British set their sights on replacing the RofCy with a new amalgam to be run 50-50 by the 18% Turks and the 82% Greeks, thereby ushering in minority tyranny and government paralysis. This was meant to meet NATO’s two objectives in Cyprus: a.) to set up a regime that would be paralyzed by the Turkish minority’s vetoes so that the Greeks would never be able to side with fraternal Russia, and b.) to establish in Cyprus a second NATO (Turkish) presence in addition to Britain’s.
The Americans want - in this order - Cyprus, Crete, and Greece as military staging posts against anyone that dares to refuse to succumb to the American line. In the last twenty years, NATO and co. have used the British military bases in Cyprus regularly to bomb a multitude of countries. Now, NATO is just a step away from meeting both objectives. The first objective has already been met in that the Greek nomenklatura of the last 8 years accepted the dissolution of the RofCy and its replacement by a 50-50 “Frankenstein state.”
As regards the additional NATO military base on Cyprus, all guns are now trained on the already browbeaten Greek representatives. NATO remains optimistic. In this way, NATO hopes to seal Russia’s and Greece’s fate in Cyprus - but what has been agreed upon to date will still need to be put to referendum. If the plan goes through, the Greeks will be put on the path to emigration. Uncertainty will reign, conflict will rule, and violence and intimidation against the Greeks will probably be organized from Turkey. In the absence of a serious central government, mass colonization by Turkey will immediately follow, since any mechanisms of control will all but disappear.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova was right when she recently accused the West of persistent attempts to speed up negotiations and push for a solution at all costs. She warned of a repeat of the 2004 fiasco when the disastrous NATO-initiated Anan plan (masquerading as a UN plan) was massively rejected by the people of Cyprus and is blatantly supported by those in power now. The same sources continue to support the current NATO plan. Fortunately, there is a huge chasm separating some among the political elite of Cyprus and those who consider the people’s desire for a democratic rather than a NATO solution.
Incidentally, the current administration in Cyprus has repeatedly called on NATO to accept Cyprus in its ranks, forgetting that NATO’s primary objective is the encirclement of Russia.
Russia now needs to stand firm on the side of a democratic solution. Using its vast diplomatic weight, Russia can thwart the current NATO plan before it goes to referendum. A strong Russian position will give courage to the people of Cyprus. If the Greeks surrender, NATO will become the choreographer of Cyprus’ political life from now on. Since Greece is merely a sorry bystander, only Russia can save Cyprus. If the NATO plan for Cyprus succeeds, Russia will end up suffering geostrategic casualties and the Greeks of Cyprus will be left as collateral damage.
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Waking Times
No event in American history (if you ask me) has been more engineered, more anticipated and more built up than the upcoming November 8, 2016 presidential election. Face it. This presidential election season made the truth movement mainstream. Evil and corruption was brought into the light. We’ve observed what a George Soros-like engineered regime breakdown looks and feels like from the inside, our side this time. We had heard and read about all those foreign governments that the US overthrew with their “democracy” tactics using “special forces,” NGOs, paid-for revolutionaries, activists and in some cases flat-out murderous fighters (ISIS, moderate rebels). This time the engineered chaos was happening here in the US.
This 2016 election season has been packed with outright exposed corruption, lies, propaganda, murders, stolen primaries, fabricated accusations, distractions, staged debates and much more. We have seen a criminally accused presidential candidate get away with crimes in broad daylight while suspected of suffering from Parkinson’s disease, passing out, having seizures and even being followed around by a creepy doctor with a seizure medication injector. This is the stuff Hollywood films are made of. The list of the insanity goes on and on, right? We’ve witnessed plenty of lies, propaganda and Jerry Springer Show -like attacks by the candidates to create just the perfect smokescreen so that Americans are not looking into the events in Aleppo or Mosul much less the Hillary-DNC- mainstream media corruption scandals and revelations.
Instead of keeping a close eye on the doings of the US criminal empire, the elite relied on a very in-your-face and increasingly arrogant, defiant and now very busted and discredited mainstream media to push the desired paradigm and reinforce it every which way they can. Actually, this understates the situation. What really happened was that the mainstream media joined forces with the chosen candidate of the ruling oligarchs (Hillary) and together their campaign (the DNC-Hillary-Soros-Moveon.org-Michael Moore-Hollywood-mainstream media complex) has brought us to the ending that truth seekers are now looking ahead to with great anxiety and anticipation. Actually, I’m understating the situation again. All or most Americans (awakened or not) are anticipating and anxiously awaiting the end results of the US presidential elections.
The question we should all be asking then is, how did we get here? Oh, and perhaps more importantly, where are we going? To answer this, one must realize that the ruling elite have plans. They have a lot of money and they have players willing to go along with their plans. Not sure of this? Then please research Sandy Hook or Boston bombing events. Or research many of the crisis actor events of the past few years.
That’s right. While they were staging one event after another, too many Americans were too busy and too afraid to call these fake events for what they were. Too many Americans fell for the trick that we were supposed to believe mainstream media “stories” and narratives unless we could “prove” that the account didn’t happen the way mainstream media said it did. In other words, many Americans were tricked into believing that, unless proven otherwise, we should BELIEVE mainstream media. Well here we are in October of 2016 and finally (though it has been common knowledge to many of us for a long while) the illegitimacy of the mainstream media is carved in stone. No longer can it be considered a “conspiracy” by anyone, that mainstream media is corrupt and acts as a tool of psychological terrorism against the public on behalf of the ruling elite.
That said, now it is time to confront the fully engineered and long-planned ending of this 2016 US presidential election. Will staged “ political terrorism, ” a term just introduced a couple of weeks ago into the American psyche, be staged as Mike Adams at Natural News is writing about ? Will this “terrorism” or planned “event” mark the beginning of the end of America? If so, what will happen? How will it all go down? Many are now wondering how deep is this web of corruption and how far will the traitors identified before us be willing to go to destroy America?
The one thing everyone should accept is that this ending has been planned just like so many “events” of the past several years have been scripted and planned. So today I invite readers to acknowledge this very important singular factor in today’s events. The fact that they are planned. The notion of organic and spontaneous results is something the ruling elite hate. They hate anything that is organic, spontaneous, unpredictable, people-powered, natural and real. They need everything to be controlled, scripted, planned, orchestrated, engineered. Do you see a pattern here? One consciousness longs for freedom, naturalness and spontaneity, the other longs to control, orchestrate, engineer and dictate the ending, like a master would want to control his slave.
Understanding this fundamental contrast between the control-freak consciousness (think ruling elite) and the free-spirited consciousness, will allow you to see what’s coming this November 8th 2016. What’s coming is a long-awaited day for which the ruling elite have paid a lot of money and hired many people to manipulate and control the ending of. So the real question is, will their operation succeed? Looking at the election day ending from a bird’s-eye view and seeing how the ruling elite think and operate it is not difficult to see that they, too, are waiting for that day so that they can implement whatever plan they’ll need based on the materializing reality at that moment. In this (what I’ll call) wait-and-see plan whose execution will either be entirely controlled from the beginning or be an adjusting reaction-based plan to be determined by the emerging reality, we can be sure that at no point will the ruling elite accept an ending that ruins their plan. In other words, they will adjust their plan as often and as desperately as possible and necessary to engineer an ending to their liking.
This ultimately is all we need to know to plan our (truth seekers and freedom lovers) next move. And our next move should look something like this if you ask me:
1- Have a plan including options for self-sustaining yourself and your loved ones (food, water, shelter and other personal needs).
2- Expect corruption but continue fighting and exposing the perpetrators. Let’s not let one of these traitors (including crisis actors and operatives working for the State) get away with what they have done.
3- Don’t rely ONLY on the Internet to keep track of developing events. You might want to write down current event information, or better yet print out key articles and documents (proof). Also download important videos; don’t assume these videos will always be available on YouTube or the Internet. Remember we are entering a much more volatile and intense information war age. The main point is we need to archive the evidence against those criminals who have betrayed America and humanity.
4- Beware of layered psychological operations. Question everything you hear and don’t discount that some “news” is designed for you to hear it (get it?). Unfortunately the controllers have indeed upped the ante when it comes to the information war. In deceptive times like these, grabbing on to the principles you believe in become much more important than agreeing with someone on every little nuance about a particular event. Stay oriented and remember who the bad guys are, especially as we see the Hillary-mainstream media complex laughably blaming Russian president Vladimir Putin for all the now-revealed corruption and criminality of the Clintons, the mainstream media, the DNC and many others.
Now is the time to confront the very real and very relevant inherent concepts of truth versus lies, lightness versus darkness, freedom versus slavery and knowledge versus hidden knowledge (the occult); because this, my friends, is what we are dealing with. We (truth seekers) are all in this together. We didn’t ask to be put in this show, it sort of came to us. Perhaps we (awakened humanity) are fulfilling a role that we cannot fully understand. This species we call humans needs some members of its kind to save the rest of the species, and if you are reading this then you are probably a chosen vessel in this battle for humanity.
There is nothing to fear, for the ending has surely been scripted. We (like them) will also respond in real-time in the most effective way possible. What we need to do more than anything else is …. (pay attention) … think ahead just like they do.
And so today I’m thinking ahead. I have plans for both scenarios (Trump or Hillary declared victory). I have plans for no “political terrorism” and political terrorism, shock or no shock, chaos or no chaos. In my world the problem remains the same until we hold these corrupt ruling elite, their politicians and players all responsible for their criminality and corruption. Plain and simple, the ruling elite must be identified, stopped and held accountable for their crimes against humanity and the US Constitution. This is more important than any presidential election. Will a Trump victory make this accountability more possible? Many are hopeful of this, but ultimately we must find a way to impose our will on the future and not rely on a politician to do this for us.
Finally, I’m reminded of the very last line of the film The American Dream when the villain asks, “What do you think this is?” and the answer: “This is AMERICA!!” Likewise, let’s remember, this IS America, the politically hijacked land that guarantees each and every individual inherent rights which are clearly and indisputably outlined in the US Constitution. Will an opportunity present itself for the rule of law to be restored or will the ruling elite have their way? That question will very likely be answered at a time not necessarily coinciding with election night. This is a reminder to all that the battle we face for humanity and truth is continuous and very long term, not about one isolated moment or day. About the Author
Bernie is a revolutionary writer with a background in medicine, psychology, and information technology. He is the author of The Art of Overcoming the New World Order and has written numerous articles over the years about freedom, government corruption and conspiracies, and solutions. A former host of the 9/11 Freefall radio show, Bernie is also the creator of the Truth and Art TV project where he shares articles and videos about issues that raise our consciousness and offer solutions to our current problems. His efforts are designed to encourage others to joyfully stand for truth, to expose government tactics of propaganda, fear and deception, and to address the psychology of dealing with the rising new world order. He is also a former U.S. Marine who believes it is our duty to stand for and defend the U.S. Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. A peace activist, he believes information and awareness is the first step toward being free from enslavement from the globalist control system which now threatens humanity. He believes love conquers all fear and it is up to each and every one of us to manifest the solutions and the change that you want to see in this world, because doing this is the very thing that will ensure victory and restoration of the human race from the rising global enslavement system, and will offer hope to future generations.
This article ( Awakened Humanity Awaits Fully Scripted Ending to the Election ) was originally created and published by Bernie Suarez at Truth and Art TV and is re-posted here with permission.
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Cook these six vegetables for even greater health benefits
raw food , cooking , vegetables (NaturalNews) "To cook or not to cook?" has been a topic of heated debate among some health food advocates. Raw food junkies claim that eating foods in their most natural state is the answer to all our issues and diseases, cancer included. They believe that cooking destroys essential vitamins, live enzymes and antioxidants vital to our health.While nobody will dispute the fact that adding more raw, organic fruits and vegetables to our diet is essential for overall health and well-being, going raw all the way isn't always the best option either. A study published in the British Journal of Nutrition found that people who followed a strictly raw food diet had normal levels of vitamin A and beta-carotene, but low levels of the antioxidant lycopene. As reported by Scientific American , high lycopene levels have been associated with a lower risk of cancer and heart attacks. According to Rui Hai Liu, an associate professor of food science at Cornell University, lycopene may be an even more potent antioxidant than vitamin C .It seems that some vegetables need a little heat to release their plant goodness. Most plants have a tough cellular structure. Lightly cooking these food makes it easier for the body to break down the plant's thick cell walls, making nutrients more available for absorption .Read on to discover six foods that are healthier cooked. 1. Asparagus Lightly cooking asparagus spears makes it easier for the body to absorb cancer-fighting vitamins such as vitamin A, C and E, as well as folate. Furthermore, higher levels of antioxidants, ferulic acid in particular, have been reported when this vegetable is cooked. 2. Carrots Beta-carotene is the compound that gives carrots their vibrant orange color. The body converts beta-carotene to vitamin A, which is vital for vision, reproduction, bone growth and immune health.Carrots, however, are sturdy vegetables and don't give up their nutrients that quickly. To get the most out of your carrots, Researchers at the University of Arkansas advise that higher levels of beta-carotene are obtained when carrots are cooked. 3. Mushrooms According to Andrew Weil, M.D., mushrooms are indigestible when they are uncooked. He said that thoroughly heating them releases the nutrients they contain, including B vitamins, proteins and minerals, as well as compounds not found in other foods. 4. Pumpkin and other winter squash Not many people will eat raw pumpkin, unless it is put through a juicer , and that is just fine, since cooked pumpkin has been shown to be more nutritious. Just like carrots, pumpkins need a little heat to break down tougher cell walls and release their plant goodness. 5. Spinach Folate, vitamin C, niacin, riboflavin and potassium are more available in raw spinach. However, slightly cooking spinach increases the levels of vitamin A and E, fiber, zinc, thiamin, calcium, iron and protein – as well as essential carotenoids, such as beta-carotene, lutein and zeaxanthin. 6. Tomatoes While cooking tomatoes reduces vitamin C levels, it also makes lycopene more available to the body. As mentioned earlier, lycopene has been linked to a lower risk of cancer and heart attacks. Vitamin C is an abundant vitamin, so it is well worth the loss.As you can see, raw isn't necessarily always best. However, if you love tomato or spinach salads and can't stand them cooked, that doesn't mean you should stop eating them raw. Whether you enjoy your veggies raw or cooked, the most important thing is that you are eating them in the first place. | 0 |
By Lizzie Bennett Every winter we are bombarded by information about the cold and how to protect ourselves from it and from health issues associated with it. Wrap up warm, keep one room heated to a... | 0 |
Chelsea Clinton is not getting much support to run for office from American voters, according to a new poll. [Only 27 percent of registered voters say they would support Clinton if she ran for political office, while 48 percent said they would rather not see her run, according to a Morning poll. The remaining quarter of voters said they had no opinion or were unsure. Along party lines, Clinton, 37, did not have a lot of support from her own party, with only 48 percent of Democrats saying they would support her in a future run for office. An overwhelming 74 percent of Republicans said they would oppose her candidacy. Clinton performed poorly in the polls among independents as well, with only 20 percent of independents supporting her and 48 percent opposing her. Younger voters, women, and Democrats were more likely to support a possible Clinton run, while men, Republicans, and older voters were more likely not to support a potential Clinton candidacy. Clinton’s popularity is split, with 39 percent saying she is viewed favorably while 38 percent say she is not viewed in a favorable light. Clinton has stoked a lot of speculation about her entrance into the political arena, with many in Democratic circles saying she should run for a House or Senate seat. Clinton has denied that this speculation is true while leaving the door open for a future run. “I really am constantly surprised by the stories of me running for, fill in the blank — Congress, Senate, City Council, the presidency,” Clinton told Variety in an interview. “I really find this all rather hysterical, because I’ve been asked this question a lot throughout my life, and the answer has never changed. ” “I clearly do not support the president and certainly hope that he is defeated in the next election, but I don’t think I’m the best person for that job,” she added. | 1 |
The first eight convictions for driving while intoxicated didn’t stop Donald Middleton of Houston from sliding behind the wheel and getting his ninth conviction. This time, the judge had had enough. When Mr. Middleton, 56, faced Judge Kathleen Hamilton of the 359th District Court in Texas on Tuesday, she sentenced him to life in prison. He won’t be eligible for parole for 30 years. Such a harsh sentence is uncommon for convictions, which often lead to temporary license suspensions and prison stays that allow repeat offenders to return to the road. In Mr. Middleton’s case, he still had a valid driver’s license, despite the eight convictions. Mr. Middleton’s case raises the question: How many times does someone have to be caught driving drunk before he or she can no longer legally drive? He was arrested in May 2015 after he turned into the wrong lane and collided with a vehicle driven by a who was on the way home from work at a grocery store. Mr. Middleton ran into a nearby convenience store and repeatedly asked a clerk to hide him, prosecutors said. He had a level of 0. 184, more than twice the legal limit, 0. 08, according to Justin Fowles, a Montgomery County assistant district attorney. Mr. Middleton pleaded guilty to driving while intoxicated last May and has been in jail since. The teenager, Joshua Hayden, was not injured, but his father, Rowdy Hayden, said in a telephone interview that he appreciated the judge’s harsh sentence. “It angers me, as a father, that this individual skirted the justice system eight times and was still out here endangering our citizens on the roadway by drinking and driving,” said Mr. Hayden, who is a police constable in Montgomery County. “His proven track record showed he was going to continue to drink and drive. And who knows, the next time he may have killed someone. ” Mr. Middleton had four previous stints in prison for driving while intoxicated. His eighth conviction, in 2008, involved a car with several people inside they sustained minor injuries. Mr. Middleton fell out of the car and was unable to stand, Mr. Fowles said. The conviction from that episode led to a prison sentence, of which he served four years. After the most recent conviction, he was classified as a habitual offender, which enabled the longer sentence. “He had proven to us that he can’t be trusted with his own freedom, that he’s a danger to our community and that the best thing for everyone else’s safety on the roadways is for him to never be able to drive again,” Mr. Fowles said in a telephone interview. Rules for stopping habitual drunken drivers vary wildly by state, but repeat offenders tend to get multiple extra chances. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that one in three people arrested on charges are repeat offenders. In Minnesota, a man was released from prison last year after a stay for his 27th conviction related to drunken driving. In Pennsylvania, one man was arrested five times in less than a year, but never lost his driver’s license or served more than 10 days in jail. Punishments also vary by state. In New York, a third aggravated charge of driving while intoxicated can bring a $10, 000 fine and seven years in prison, although penalties can increase for multiple violations within 25 years. In Arkansas, drivers permanently lose their licenses on their fourth offense within five years, in addition to criminal penalties. J. T. Griffin, the chief government affairs officer for Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said the organization had focused on promoting ignition interlock devices, which require anyone convicted of drunken driving to pass a breathalyzer test before starting a car. states have laws requiring them, including New York, he said. Suspending licenses can be ineffective when many people continue to drive without a valid license, he said. “We believe in going after D. U. I. the first time, not waiting for the second or third or fourth offense,” Mr. Griffin said. “The first time is unacceptable. And nine times is just ridiculous. ” | 1 |
NEW BRUNSWICK, N. J. — Four years of increasing activism and growing political awareness recently brought Lacey Rzeszowski to Rutgers University here, to a packed room of nearly 280 women, each on the cusp of launching a bid for public office for the first time. Spurred by the 2012 shooting rampage in Newtown, Conn. she had pressured local and federal lawmakers on gun control legislation, first on the backs of postcards and then in live confrontations in town halls and congressional offices. Her advocacy led to calls for her to run for office, but Ms. Rzeszowsk had repeatedly declined. Now, seeking solace and inspiration following the 2016 presidential election and the Women’s March on Washington, Ms. Rzeszowski, 42, is squaring off in a tough race against a local Republican for a seat in the New Jersey Assembly. Political activism of all persuasions, ignited largely in response to President Trump, has swelled in the wake of the 2016 election. A monsoon of marchers swept through Washington following the inauguration, letters and phone calls flooded the White House and Congress, and protests erupted at congressional town hall meetings across the nation. But in the social media age, where protest movements often remain relegated to cable news screens and hashtags, some have wondered whether the fervor and energy would be reflected in local, state and federal ballots. The answer seems to be a resounding yes. A surge in demand for programs around the country like the one at Rutgers, along with a significant spike in small dollar for local races, suggests that the protest movement is producing a flood of led predominantly by new female candidates, on local ballots, from school boards to town councils to state legislatures. Emily’s List, the national organization dedicated to advancing Democratic women in politics, has been contacted by more than 10, 000 women saying they were going to run for local and state office in the four months since Election Day. In the two years leading up to the 2016 election, when the presidential election cycle was at its apex, the group said it had received fewer than 1, 000 contacts. Emily’s List has tripled the resources devoted to state and local races to help meet the demand. “What we’re seeing is not just in New Jersey but it’s happening all around the country,” said Debbie Walsh, the director at the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers. “Women are looking for a way to have a voice. They’re feeling that in ways that we haven’t seen the general public experience, the real understanding that elections have consequences. ” This is especially true in states like New Jersey that hold major local and statewide elections this year the deadline to file for primary elections in New Jersey is April 3. “It was the ride down on the New Jersey Turnpike, on a bus, watching all the buses heading to D. C.,” Ms. Rzeszowski said, describing the moment she decided to run as a Democrat, and try to unseat her former party, which she felt had moved too far to the right. She recalled her joy at seeing not just the streets of Washington, but the highways of her home state, flooded with protesters that finally pushed her into a declaration for office. Here at the “Ready to Run” program at Rutgers University — an annual event that features classes, conferences and training for women who want to run for office but are unsure of the next steps — attendance has climbed by nearly 300 percent compared with past averages, according to the event organizers. Since Ready to Run, a national, nonpartisan training program, was founded 18 years ago, sister programs have popped up around the country, from The Ohio State University to Oklahoma University to Chatham University in Pittsburgh. And at each event this year, attendance is soaring past previous records, often selling out for the first time in its history. New programs have popped up this year in Delaware, Mississippi and Connecticut. “I’ve had a few women email me and invite me just to come into their living rooms and say, ‘Teach us how to do this,’” said Gayle Ann Alberda, a former Republican strategist now teaching politics at Fairfield University in Connecticut and anchoring the effort to bring “Ready to Run” to the school. “They say ‘Hey, I’ll pay you, just come teach us how to run.’ And I’ve never seen this before. ” ActBlue, the Democratic software, has seen its users, who can be local or state or federal candidates and groups, raise $76 million in since the election. In the same time frame in 2015, its users took in $16 million. The interest, and the intent to actually take the big step and run for office, is so overwhelming that new groups are popping up across the country with the sole purpose of getting candidates ready. Run for Something, a national group started after the election to recruit and train Democratic candidates, initially expected 100 or so to show interest. More than 7, 500 have since put a hand up. The swell in interest certainly leans Democratic, and much of the protest and activism following the election of President Trump has come from those more aligned with liberal policies, but the surge is bipartisan in some states. In red Mississippi, a program similar to that at Rutgers is starting at the Stennis Center for Public Service Leadership, a federally funded center that promotes civic engagement. And in the small town of Starkville, Miss. more female candidates are running for municipal office than ever before, including six candidates for mayor. In Utah, another reliably Republican state, the Y. W. C. A.’s Real Women Run program saw more than 200 come out to one of the training sessions. “It’s only March, but it’s my interpretation that it’s more of a democratic surge in Utah because women don’t feel represented,” said Sheryl Allen, 73, a former Republican legislator from Bountiful, Utah, who helps run the Real Women Run program. She pointed to candidates like Kathryn Allen, a physician who is planning on challenging Representative Jason E. Chaffetz in the state’s 3rd Congressional District in 2018, as one of many examples. A lot of the women here at the Rutgers event seemed to share the energy of Ms. Rzeszowski, and pointed to the Women’s March as the inspiration for their planned runs. Lindsay Brown, a product manager who is lining up to challenge Representative Leonard Lance in New Jersey’s Seventh Congressional District, cited the march’s “big outpouring of anger, sadness and hope that really inspired me. ” Christine Chen, a businesswoman from Bridgewater, first felt the push to run the day after the election, when she looked up local legislators to support in the face of her disappointment at the election, only to find her local representatives just as to her as the new administration. “It was very visceral, like my way of life was under threat,” she recalled, describing the months since November. She has formed a ticket of candidates in Legislative District 23, with Isaac Hadzovic and Laura Shaw running for State Assembly seats, and Ms. Chen for the State Senate. Some have found inspiration from the election of Mr. Trump himself, though not because they agreed with the president. While she often found his comments during the campaign caustic and controversial, Lucille Lo Sapio, 65, said his irreverence was the liberating force she needed to push her own name onto the ballot. “The fact that he could get up there and literally say anything, most of it untrue, but say it in such an inflammatory way, told me now I’m free to do that,” said Ms. Sapio, a “irreverent to very irreverent” political blogger aiming to be the first Democratic freeholder elected in Monmouth County, N. J. since 2008. “That’s the way I am, I don’t pull punches,” she said, admitting that she might yet push the envelope further. “The hardest thing for me is going to be not using any profanity. ” | 1 |
HAVANA — At the Salon Rojo, one of Havana’s most popular nightspots, where the reggaeton usually blares into the early hours, the music stopped abruptly. An announcement was made: Fidel Castro had died. The police waved along young women in miniskirts and young men with gelled mohawks as they spilled into the streets. No one was weeping. No one was chanting. Some said the country would be better off, freer now, though they said it quietly, wary that someone might overhear such hopes. A hearse, repurposed as a taxi, happened to drive by. “Take him with you,” one of the young men shouted with a smile as a friend cheered him on. The young women with them looked embarrassed, but not angry. A few feet away from a crowd of partygoers, three neighbors, each in their 50s and consoling one another, stood in their apartment building’s doorway facing the iconic Hotel Nacional. Concepcion Garcia, 55, looked at the young people around her with disappointment. “What a rich experience we have had, to live the two periods of Cuba — capitalism and socialism,” she said. “Imagine how we Cubans feel. The most precious thing we have just died. ” With the departure of Cuba’s epic revolutionary in green fatigues, at the age of 90, the residents of Havana have not erupted so much as moved into their own emotional corners. All over this city on Saturday, indifference and relief stood side by side with sorrow and surprise as the conflicts that characterized Fidel Castro in life continued to reverberate after his death. “He was the only leader I ever knew,” Graciela Martinez, 51, said as she mopped the floors of a cafe near the American Embassy on Saturday morning. She paused, then began to weep, thinking of her father, who fought for the revolution — and of her relatives who had fled to the United States. “For those who loved him, he was the greatest,” she said of Mr. Castro. “For those who hated him, there was no one worse. ” Cuba, a verdant, struggling country of 11 million people that has been moving slowly toward changes, finds itself again at an international crossroads. Mr. Castro died as Venezuela has pulled back financial support, facing its own political and economic crisis, and the détente engineered under President Obama threatens to be rolled back by Donald J. Trump. While Mr. Obama issued condolences to the Castro family and offered “a hand of friendship to the Cuban people,” Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter, “Fidel Castro is dead!” and later issued a statement calling him a “brutal dictator. ” Cuban officials have long maintained that the island has diversified its international ties enough to withstand financial or political storms. But after decades of unfulfilled promises about economic growth, the passing of Mr. Castro may open rifts both inside and outside Cuba over how to proceed. Elaine Díaz, an independent blogger in Cuba, said she expected Mr. Castro’s death to lead to more diversity of opinion within the leadership. The Cuban government likes to portray itself as a monolith, even though some factions are more conservative than others, she said. “This is going to bring that out in public,” she said. Other divides may also become more visible, especially between generations. Mr. Castro molded the country and governed it for so long that many older Cubans can hardly think of the nation apart from his legacy. But he has also been out of the national spotlight for so long (after handing power to his brother Raúl Castro in stages, beginning in 2006) that many young Cubans have had little exposure to him and do not seem to identify with him. Theirs is a generation that has, in many ways, already become — seeing politics as useless and intractable, craving technology and, in many cases, much more eager to leave Cuba than to defend the Communist slogans that are as faded as the billboards still displaying them on the nation’s highways and roads. “In my parents’ generation, there is also still a lot of loyalty. In my generation, you’ll see more differences,” said Ms. Diaz, 31. “In a large portion of the young people, what you will see is apathy. ” On Friday night, for example, many young people did not respond with any visible emotion when they were told of Mr. Castro’s death. On Saturday, many went about their day as usual, arguing that little would change because of Mr. Castro’s demise. “The country will continue on the path that it’s on,” said Abraham Jimenez Enoa, 27, a of an independent blog called “el estornudo,” or “the sneeze. ” “I don’t really see changes in the near future. ” The response could not have been more different from that of the government or its strongest supporters. Their grief began with a brief televised speech by Raúl Castro announcing that “El Comandante” had died. He did not emphasize that the man was also his brother — his passing was a loss for the nation. By sunrise, flags all over Havana had been lowered to . Young and old gathered in small groups, and where there might have normally been laughter or yelling, whispers filled the void. Much of Havana seemed uncertain about exactly how to feel, or at least how to talk about it. “It is a very strange feeling,” said Francisco Rodríguez Cruz, a prominent blogger and gay activist who supports the revolution. He was one of many who said losing Mr. Castro was like losing a parent. “With this death, you feel that your own life is spread before you,” Mr. Cruz, 46, said. Many others looked back to what they had gained in Fidel’s Cuba. Ms. Garcia removed her glasses and pointed at her eyes. “I have the revolution and Fidel to thank for this cataract surgery,” she said, adding that she would not have been able to afford the procedure without Cuba’s socialized medical care. It did not cost her a cent, she said. “He put Cuba on the map,” Ms. Garcia added, “and the world has recognized that. ” Her neighbor Josue Carmon Arramo, 57, chimed in, “His life may be over, but his work will live on. ” “This story will not die, because we are followers of his ideas of nationalism and solidarity of the Cuban people,” he said. “That’s who we are. ” The official state apparatus seemed ready for the news. A night watchman working near the Malecon — the seaside boulevard where so many young people gather that Cubans often call it the city’s longest sofa — said he had seen busloads of soldiers pass by before Mr. Castro’s death was widely known. Cuban national television interrupted its regular schedule in favor of historic video clips of Mr. Castro and scenes of the reunion of Elián González with his family in Cuba after the boy was returned from Florida in 2000. Near the American Embassy on Saturday morning, the police circled in patrol cars while men in plain clothes who refused to answer questions about Mr. Castro seemed determined to keep an eye on those nearby. Long after the sun soared over Havana harbor, the Malecon, usually bustling at all hours, was devoid of all but jogging tourists and a few cars. But the news for Cuba’s memorial plans moved through the streets quickly. He was to be cremated Saturday. There would be a period of public mourning in Havana on Monday and Tuesday, and then a procession over the course of the week, with the revolutionary’s ashes moving across the country from Havana to the city known as the cradle of the revolution, Santiago de Cuba, where he would be put to rest on Sunday, Dec. 4. The details, at least, were easier to talk about in public than his legacy. They could not be argued about, or get you in trouble if overheard in conversation. In Miami, by contrast, celebratory crowds gathered at Versailles, a Cuban restaurant in the Little Havana neighborhood that has become a focal point of the Cuban exile community in the United States. Revelers posted videos on social media of popping champagne bottles. Still, in Havana, expectations were limited and often more narrowly focused, on economic survival, and on how little would really change when the mourning was done. “It closes one chapter and starts another,” Miguel Fernandez, 56, said as he walked his dog Saturday near the Malecon. “But it won’t bring about anything substantial. He’s been out of the picture for a while. ” | 1 |
MOSCOW — Saying relations with the United States have deteriorated in a “radically changed environment,” President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia withdrew Monday from a landmark nuclear security agreement, in a troubling sign that the countries’ cooperation in a range of nuclear areas could be threatened. The treaty, on the disposal of plutonium, the material used in some nuclear weapons, was concluded in 2000 as one of the framework disarmament deals of the early War period. It required Russia and the United States to destroy military stockpiles of plutonium, a deal that represented another encouraging step away from nuclear doomsday and an insurance policy against the materials falling into the hands of terrorists or rogue states. The deal has no bearing on the numbers of nuclear weapons deployed by Russia or the United States. Instead, it concerns 34 tons of plutonium in storage in each country that might go into a future arsenal, none of which has yet undergone verifiable disposal. Still, the abrogation signals that the nuclear agreements that accompanied the breakup of the Soviet Union and were to lead the world back from the brink of atomic conflict could be open to revision, as Russia’s relations with the West sour on a range of disputes today, including Syria and Ukraine and the Kremlin’s interference in the domestic politics of Western democracies. The Kremlin had signaled previously that it planned to cut back on mutual efforts with the United States to secure nuclear material on Russian territory. Times have changed, Mr. Putin wrote in the decree signed on Monday. “The threat to strategic stability posed by the hostile actions of the U. S. against Russia, and the inability of the U. S. to deliver on the obligation to dispose of excessive weapons plutonium under international treaties” forced Russia’s hand, he wrote. Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, said the administration was disappointed by the Russian decision since “both leaders in Russia and the United States have made nonproliferation a priority. ” “We’ve also been quite disappointed by a range of Russian decisions both in Syria and inside of Ukraine,” Mr. Earnest said, adding that the decision on the plutonium deal was part of a problematic pattern. Russia will withdraw from the original pact and subsequent amendments, the decree says, meaning that the country will no longer be to destroy its plutonium stockpiles. But the decree also offers an assurance, backed by no bilateral agreement, that the plutonium will not be used for military purposes. “These agreements were designed to limit and circumscribe the future chances of getting back into a competition over nuclear arms,” James Collins, an associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said in a telephone interview. “It was an important step in defusing the strategic nuclear arms race. ” Mr. Collins, who was the United States’ ambassador to Russia when the agreement was signed, called the abrogation a “strange move,” given the extraordinary danger, not least to Russians, should plutonium fall into terrorist hands. He added that it was “in my understanding the first time they have withdrawn from a specific nuclear agreement,” highlighting the slide in relations lately. Russia and the United States had reaffirmed the plutonium disposal agreement in 2009, as President Obama pursued the “reset” policy with Dmitri A. Medvedev, then the Russian president. Russia had viewed the agreement as rendering disarmament irreversible by destroying the fissile materials accumulated during the Cold War. In this light, the Russians had interpreted the treaty as requiring that the plutonium be irreversibly transformed into nonexplosive materials by using it in civilian nuclear power plants as a type of fuel, called mixed oxide fuel, or mox. Russia is pressing ahead with that. But glitches and cost overruns in the mox plant at Savannah River, S. C. delayed the American program. This year, Mr. Obama proposed canceling the program in the 2017 budget and instead sending the plutonium for storage at a nuclear waste site in Carlsbad, N. M. The State Department has said the move complies with the treaty, but the Russians have said it does not, as Mr. Putin reaffirmed on Monday. As ties with the West have frayed under Mr. Putin, analysts in Moscow have floated the prospect of a Russian pullback from an array of disarmament agreements dating from a period of greater friendliness. Two years ago, for example, the Obama administration accused Russia of violating another bedrock security agreement by testing a prohibited cruise missile. In Mr. Putin’s second term in office, Russia pulled out of a treaty governing conventional forces in Europe in retaliation for the Bush administration’s abrogation of the antiballistic missile treaty that prohibited missile defense systems. Russia and the United States last signed a nuclear disarmament accord in 2009, when both sides agreed to a new limit on delivery vehicles such as bombers or cruise missiles of 500 to 1, 100, and a limit on deployed warheads as low as 1, 500. In the chaos surrounding the end of the Cold War, the United States embarked on a sweeping program to secure the former Soviet Union’s nuclear arsenal and fissile materials by returning them to Russia from former Soviet states and upgrading security at storage areas. The Soviet nuclear program was so entwined with the economy and society that slowing the Cold War military machine took years and cost United States taxpayers billions of dollars. In several cities, specialized nuclear reactors, for example, continued to pump out plutonium because they were also used to heat water for residential use in showers and space heating in nearby towns. A 1993 agreement allowed Russia to sell uranium bomb cores to American utilities for use as fuel rods in civilian power plants, in a program called Megatons to Megawatts. This program generated about 10 percent of all electricity in the United States for 20 years, until 2013. The plutonium program, while smaller, held the potential to also yield energy for civilian electrical networks. It seems unlikely that the two countries will resume cooperation on plutonium soon. The Kremlin first wants the removal of all economic sanctions and compensation for the damage they have caused the repeal of the Magnitsky Act, which allows Americans to freeze the assets of Russian officials thought to have been involved with human rights violations and reductions in the American military presence in countries that joined NATO after Sept. 1, 2000. | 1 |
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Queen Elizabeth II is not like you and me.
Did you know she is immune from prosecution? That she has her own personal poet, paid in Sherry wine? Or that she holds dominion over British swans and can fire the entire Australian government?
It's true that her role as the British head of state is largely ceremonial, and the Monarch no longer holds any serious power from day to day. The historic "prerogative powers" of the Sovereign have been devolved largely to government ministers. But this still means that when the British government declares war, or regulates the civil service, or signs a treaty, it is doing so only on her authority.
And she still wields some of these prerogative powers herself — as well as numerous other unique powers, ranging from the surprising to the utterly bizarre.
Most famously, she owns all swans in the River Thames.
Technically, all unmarked swans in open water belong to the Queen, though the Crown "exercises her ownership" only "on certain stretches of the Thames and its surrounding tributaries," according to the official website of the Royal Family.
Today this tradition is observed during the annual "Swan Upping," in which swans in the River Thames are caught, ringed, and set free again as part of census of the swan population.
It's a highly ceremonial affair, taking place over five days. "Swan uppers" wear traditional uniforms and row upriver in six skiffs accompanied by the Queen's Swan Marker.
"The swans are also given a health check and ringed with individual identification numbers by The Queen's Swan Warden, a Professor of Ornithology at the University of Oxford's Department of Zoology," according to the Royal Family website.
"Rule, Britannia, Britannia rules the waves," goes a classic British song — and this rule extends beneath the waves, too. The sovereign has dominion over a variety of aquatic animals in British waters.
The Queen still technically owns all the sturgeons, whales, and dolphins in the waters around England and Wales, in a rule that dates back to a statute from 1324, during the reign of King Edward II, according to Time.
According to the article: "This statute is still valid today, and sturgeons, porpoises, whales, and dolphins are recognised as 'fishes royal': when they are captured within 3 miles (about 5 km) of UK shores or wash ashore, they may be claimed on behalf of the Crown. Generally, when brought into port, a sturgeon is sold in the usual way, and the purchaser, as a gesture of loyalty, requests the honour of its being accepted by Elizabeth."
The law is still observed: In 2004, a Welsh fisherman was investigated by the police after catching a 10-foot sturgeon, the BBC reported at the time. The Scottish government also issued guidance on the law in 2007, writing that "the right to claim Royal Fish in Scotland allows the Scottish Government (on behalf of the Crown) to claim stranded whales which are too large to be drawn to land by a 'wain pulled by six oxen.'"
The Queen can drive without a licence.
Driving licenses are issued in the Queen's name, yet she is the only person in the United Kingdom who doesn't legally need a license to drive or a number plate on her cars, according to Time.
Despite not being required to have a license, the Queen is comfortable behind the wheel, having learned to drive during World War II when she operated a first-aid truck for the Women's Auxillary Territorial Service. (As a result of the Queen's training, she can also change a spark plug, Time notes).
Queen Elizabeth II isn't afraid to show off her driving skills, either. In 1998, she surprised King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (then still a prince) by driving him around in her country seat of Balmoral.
Former British Ambassador Sherard Cowper-Coles recounted the meeting in the Sunday Times: "As instructed, the crown prince climbed into the front seat of the front Land Rover, with his interpreter in the seat behind. To his surprise, the Queen climbed into the driving seat, turned the ignition and drove off. Women are not — yet — allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia, and Abdullah was not used to being driven by a woman, let alone a queen."
Cowper-Coles continued: "His nervousness only increased as the Queen, an army driver in wartime, accelerated the Land Rover along the narrow Scottish estate roads, talking all the time. Through his interpreter, the crown prince implored the Queen to slow down and concentrate on the road ahead."
Unlike other members of the Royal family, the Queen does not require a passport, as they are issued in her name. Despite this lack of travel documents, she has been abroad many times.
She has two birthdays.
When you're the British head of state, one birthday just isn't enough. The Queen's official birthday is celebrated on a Saturday in June, though her actual birthday is on April 21.
"Official celebrations to mark a sovereign's birthday have often been held on a day other than the actual birthday, particularly when the actual birthday has not been in the summer," according to the Royal Mint.
Both birthdays are celebrated in suitable style, too. Her actual birthday "is marked publicly by gun salutes in central London at midday," according to the official website of the British Monarchy. This includes "a 41-gun salute in Hyde Park, a 21-gun salute in Windsor Great Park, and a 62-gun salute at the Tower of London. In 2006, Her Majesty celebrated her 80th Birthday in 2006 with a walkabout in the streets outside of Windsor Castle to meet well-wishers."
For her "official" birthday celebrations, meanwhile, she "is joined by other members of the Royal Family at the spectacular Trooping the Colour parade, which moves between Buckingham Palace, The Mall, and Horseguards' Parade."
She has her own private cash machine.
Less a "power" and more a perk of the job, a private cash machine for use by the royal family is installed in the basement of Buckingham Palace. It's provided by Coutts, one of Britain's most prestigious — and exclusive — banks.
The Queen has her own personal poet.
The poet laureate is an honorary position in British society appointed by the Monarch to a poet "whose work is of national significance," according to the official website of the British Monarchy. When first the role was introduced, the appointee was paid £200 per year plus a butt of canary wine. Today the poet laureate is given a barrel of Sherry.
Carol Ann Duffy will hold the position until 2019.
She has to sign laws.
The Queen's consent is necessary to turn any bill into an actual law. Once a proposed law has passed both houses of Parliament, it makes its way to the Palace for approval, which is called "Royal Assent." The most recent British Monarch to refuse to provide Royal Assent was Queen Anne, back in 1708.
Royal Assent is different than "Queen's consent," in which the Queen must consent to any law being debated in Parliament that affects the Monarchy's interests (such as reforming the prerogative or tax laws that might affect the Duchy of Cornwall, for example). Without consent, the bill cannot be debated in Parliament.
Queen's consent is exercised only on the advice of ministers, but its existence provides the government with a tool for blocking debate on certain subjects if bills are tabled by backbench rebels or the opposition.
It has been exercised at least 39 times, according to documents released under the Freedom of Information act, including "one instance [in which] the Queen completely vetoed the Military Actions Against Iraq Bill in 1999, a private member's bill that sought to transfer the power to authorise military strikes against Iraq from the monarch to parliament," The Guardian reported in 2013.
She can create Lords.
The Queen has the power to appoint Lords, who can then sit in Parliament, the upper house in Britain's legislative system. Like many other powers, this is exercised only "on the advice of" elected government ministers.
She doesn't have to pay tax (but she does anyway).
The Queen does not have to pay tax, but she has been voluntarily paying income tax and capital gains tax since 1992.
The Queen has the power to form governments.
Unlike the Queen, Prime Minister David Cameron doesn't literally sit on a throne. Rob Stothard/Getty Images/HBO/BI
The Queen previously wielded the power to dissolve Parliament and call a general election, but the Fixed-Term Parliaments Act put an end to that in 2011. Now a two-thirds vote in the commons is required to dissolve Parliament before a five-year fixed-term is up.
She does still play a part after an election, however, when she calls on the MP most able to form a government to do so.
This caused some worry ahead of this year's General Election. It once looked as if the Conservatives might not have a majority (but would be the largest party) and would try to form a government. Meanwhile, it was feasible that Labour could form a majority, despite having fewer seats, by entering into a coalition with multiple other parties.
In this situation, the Queen would have been stuck between a rock and a hard place. Every year, she opens Parliament with the Queen's speech, which lays out the government's plans. But to give David Cameron's speech would arguably be to tacitly endorse his government — while staying away would send the opposite message.
At one point, The Times was told by sources that she planned to "stay away" if Cameron failed to secure enough MPs, but the Palace later had an about-face. "Royal sources confirmed she would lead proceedings, even if there was a risk the speech would be overthrown the following week because the Tories had failed to muster enough backing from smaller parties," The Times subsequently reported.
She has knights.
Sure, they no longer ride around on horseback wooing maidens with their tales of valour, but Britain still retains knights. Like Lords, they are appointed by the Queen — and she knights them personally.
Knighthoods are typically given to figures who have made a particular contribution to British society — whether in business, the arts, the military, or elsewhere. After Terry Pratchett was knighted, the legendary fantasy author forged himself a special sword using pieces of a meteorite.
The individuals knighted are decided by ministers, the BBC reports, "who present her with a list of nominees each year for her approval."
She is exempt from Freedom Of Information requests.
All information about the royal family is exempt from Freedom of Information requests. The exemption was made after a legal battle between The Guardian and the government to have letters from Prince Charles sent to Whitehall ministers made public. The so-called black spider memos were recently released, but the change means the same can't happen in the future.
She can ignore or overrule ministerial advice in "grave constitutional crisis."
While the overwhelming majority of the Queen's prerogative powers are devolved to her ministers, there is one exception that allows her to wield power herself. Only "in grave constitutional crisis," the Sovereign can "act contrary to or without Ministerial advice." With no precedent in modern times, it's not clear what would actually constitute this, but the possibility remains.
The Queen holds the ability to fire the entire Australian government.
As the head of state in Australia, the Queen has certain powers over the government. In 1975, for example, the Queen's representative in the country at the time, Gov. Gen. Sir John Kerr, fired the prime minister in response to a government shutdown.
"[Kerr] appointed a replacement, who immediately passed the spending bill to fund the government, Max Fisher wrote in The Washington Post. "Three hours later, Kerr dismissed the rest of Parliament. Then Australia held elections to restart from scratch. And they haven't had another shutdown since."
In addition to the UK and Australia, the Queen is also the head of state in Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon Islands, and Tuvalu.
All the above are Commonwealth Realms, or former British colonies. The British sovereign retains the position she holds in the United Kingdom, that of head of state. As in Britain, this is largely a ceremonial role from day to day.
She's the head of a religion.
Queen Elizabeth II is the head of the Church of England, Britain's state religion first established after King Henry VIII split away from the Catholic Church in Rome in the 16th century.
Her formal title is defender of the faith and supreme governor of the Church of England, and she also has the power to appoint Bishops and Archbishops. As with many of her other powers, however, this is exercised only on the advice of the prime minister, who himself takes advice from a Church Commission.
An interesting side effect of this is that the Sovereign must be a confirmed member of Church of England. Catholics and those of other religions may not ascend to the British throne. If Prince Charles converted to Islam, for example, he would be unable to become king after Queen Elizabeth II dies.
She gets to give away special money to the elderly.
Maundy money is a special kind of silver coin the Queen gives away to pensioners every year at a UK cathedral every Easter in a special ceremony. The number of recipients corresponds with the Sovereign's age. This year, for example, she will be 89 when Easter rolls around, so she will give maundy money away to 89 pensioners.
The coins are technically legal tender, despite coming in unconventional 3-pence and 4-pence denominations. But given the coins' rare status, they tend not to enter general circulation.
She's also immune from prosecution.
All prosecutions are carried out in the name of the Sovereign, and she is both immune from prosecution and cannot be compelled to give evidence in court.
In theory, the Sovereign "is incapable of thinking or doing wrong," legal scholar John Kirkhope told Business Insider. However, barrister Baroness Helena Kennedy QC told the BBC in 2002 that "nowadays, that immunity is questionable."
"Although civil and criminal proceedings cannot be taken against the Sovereign as a person under UK law, the Queen is careful to ensure that all her activities in her personal capacity are carried out in strict accordance with the law," according to official site of the Monarchy.
If the monarch did commit a grievance offence, he or she would almost certainly be forced to abdicate. There is at least one precedent of the Courts' prosecuting the Sovereign. In the 17th Century, King Charles I was tried for treason following the English Civil War. He said "no earthly power can justly call me (who am your King) in question as a delinquent." The Court disagreed and had him executed.
The Queen has the right to be consulted, to encourage, and to warn her ministers.
Assuming no "grave constitutional crisis," the Queen's input into the legislative process is supposed to be limited in real terms to the right "to be consulted, to encourage, and to warn" her ministers — advice delivered via meetings with the prime minister.
The Queen also has certain historic rights and privileges. John Kirkhope, a lawyer who successfully campaigned to have details of "Queen's consent" made public, provided Business Insider with a list of some of the stranger rights the Queen still holds.
Hungerford has to present a red rose to the Sovereign in exchange for its fishing and grazing rights.The Duke of Atholl must pay by way of a rose whenever the Sovereign calls. This most recently happened during the reign of Queen Victoria, so it's unclear whether the rose has to be any particular colour.If the Sovereign passes near Kidwelly Castle in Wales, the tenant has to provide a bodyguard in full armour. This is complicated slightly by the fact the castle is a ruin.The Marquis of Ailesbury owns Savernake Forest and is required to produce a blast on a hunting horn should the Sovereign pass through the Forest. This last happened in 1943.Similarly, the owner of Dunlambert Castle in Northern Ireland has to produce a blast on an ancient bugle.And lastly, many landowners must also pay a "quit-rent" — a kind of tax on their property paid to the Monarch. Some are pretty unusual.
The owner of Sauchlemuir Castle must set out three glasses of port on New Year's Eve for the grandmother of James IV of Scotland. (For reference, James IV served from 1474 to 1513.)The owner of Fowlis must deliver — when required — a snowball in mid-summer.The City of Gloucester pays for its holdings of Crown Lands by providing an enormous eel pie.Great Yarmouth must provide a hundred herrings baked in 24 pasties to the Sheriff, who then sends them to the Lord of the Manor — who then sends them to the Sovereign.The Duke of Marlborough has to present a small satin flag with a Fleur de Lys on August 13, the anniversary of the Battle of Blenheim.The Duke of Wellington has to present a French Tricolour flag before noon on June 19 — the anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. | 0 |
KABUL, Afghanistan — The American University of Afghanistan in Kabul came under attack by bomb and gunfire on Wednesday night, in a siege that lasted for hours as pockets of people trapped on campus tried to escape. The Afghan Health Ministry said that a security guard was killed in the attack and that at least 26 people had been wounded. Sediq Sediqqi, a spokesman for the Ministry of Interior, said early Thursday that police operations at the university were completed about 10 hours after the attack began, though officers remained on campus. “Two terrorists who attacked the university are killed the operation ended almost after 10 hours as there were hundreds of students and all of them were evacuated,” Mr. Sediqqi said. He said that the police could not yet provide casualty figures. Later on Thursday, Fraidoon Obaidi, chief of the Kabul police Criminal Investigation Department, told Reuters that 12 people had been killed, including seven students, three police officers and two security guards, and another 44 people were wounded. Afghan security forces massed around the campus, a guarded compound in the western part of the capital, after initial reports of an explosion and gunfire. From within, trapped people began taking to social media to ask for help and report what was going on around them. The university opened for enrollment in 2006 to both men and women, and quickly became a prestigious education choice for some of Afghanistan’s elites, offering undergraduate and graduate degrees taught in English. It was praised by senior American officials as a sign of Afghanistan’s bright future, and as such was an obvious symbol of Western ambitions for the country — and exactly the kind of symbol the Taliban and other militants have come to pursue as targets. One after another, such places — hotels, restaurants frequented by foreigners, even cultural centers where young Afghans performed arts — have come under attack, limiting the movement of expatriates in Kabul and keeping the local population in constant fear of unpredictable violence. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which was the second directed at the university this month. On Aug. 7, two professors — an American and an Australian, both men — were abducted from a vehicle near the campus. Officials said they were investigating the case, but there was no public word on who was behind the kidnapping or the condition of the two professors. Officials say that most kidnappings in Kabul are conducted by criminal gangs. As the assault on Wednesday unfolded, several people who were able to escape, along with other witnesses, gave accounts of people being wounded by gunfire or being injured while trying to flee. One man who managed to escape the compound, a who would give only his first name, Fahim, said that the sound of gunfire sent many students running for emergency exits. Almost immediately, they heard a loud explosion. Fahim said two of his friends were hospitalized after getting free: One had broken a leg as he jumped from a window, and the other had been shot in the back. With electricity cut off by the security forces to restrict the movement of the attackers, dozens of family members anxiously awaited news of their loved ones outside the security cordon. Qudratullah Waziri said his brother, a student, was still unaccounted for. The last Mr. Waziri heard from him was a phone call in which he said he was surrounded by wounded people. “I saw the police just rescue 12 female students in the back of their truck,” Mr. Waziri said. An operator at the Kabul police emergency line said calls had come in from panicking people inside the university who said attackers had infiltrated after an initial explosion. But at checkpoints outside the campus, security officials insisted that the attackers had not infiltrated the perimeter of the university. Ahmad Jawad, a police officer at the site of the attack, said a car bomb had exploded in front of a school for the blind that is next to the American University. He said that the attackers had entered that school, and were firing at the university from there. | 1 |
WASHINGTON — Donald J. Trump has offered the post of national security adviser to Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, potentially putting a retired intelligence officer who believes Islamist militancy poses an existential threat in one of the most powerful roles in shaping military and foreign policy, according to a top official on Mr. Trump’s transition team. General Flynn, 57, a registered Democrat, was Mr. Trump’s main national security adviser during his campaign. If he accepts Mr. Trump’s offer, as expected, he will be a critical gatekeeper for a president with little experience in military or foreign policy issues. Mr. Trump and General Flynn both see themselves as brash outsiders who hustled their way to the big time. They both post on Twitter often about their own successes, and they have both at times crossed the line into outright Islamophobia. They also both exhibit a loose relationship with facts: General Flynn, for instance, has said that Shariah, or Islamic law, is spreading in the United States (it is not). His dubious assertions are so common that when he ran the Defense Intelligence Agency, subordinates came up with a name for the phenomenon: They called them “Flynn facts. ” As an adviser, General Flynn has already proved to be a powerful influence on Mr. Trump, convincing the that the United States is in a “world war” with Islamist militants and must work with any willing allies in the fight, including President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. During the transition, General Flynn has been present when Mr. Trump has received his daily intelligence briefing. As national security adviser, he would have the last word on how the president should respond to crises such as a showdown with China over the South China Sea or an international health crisis like the Ebola epidemic. But, like Mr. Trump, he would enter the White House with significant baggage. The Flynn Intel Group, a consulting firm he founded after he was fired by President Obama as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, has hazy business ties to Middle Eastern countries and has appeared to lobby for the Turkish government. General Flynn also took a paid speaking engagement last year with Russia Today, a television network funded by the Kremlin, and attended the network’s lavish anniversary party in Moscow, where he sat at Mr. Putin’s elbow. Those potential conflicts of interest had led Mr. Trump’s transition team to worry that General Flynn might have difficulty winning confirmation for any post that, unlike the national security adviser role, requires congressional approval, such as director of the C. I. A. But for Mr. Trump, he has one overriding virtue: He was an early and ardent supporter in a campaign during which most of the Washington national security establishment openly called Mr. Trump unfit to lead. General Flynn did not respond to repeated interview requests. Yet in numerous speeches and interviews before the election, and in a book published in August, he laid out a view of the world that sees the United States as facing a singular, overarching threat that can be described in only one way: “radical Islamic terrorism. ” All else is secondary for General Flynn, and any other description of the threat is “the worst kind of political correctness,” he said in an interview three weeks before the election. Islamist militancy poses an existential threat on a global scale, and the Muslim faith itself is the source of the problem, he said, describing it as a political ideology, not a religion. He has even at times gone so far as to call it a political ideology that has “metastasized” into a “malignant cancer. ” For General Flynn, the election of Mr. Trump represents an astounding career turnaround. Once counted among the most respected military officers of his generation, General Flynn was fired after serving only two years as chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency. He then as a vociferous critic of a Washington elite that he contended could not even properly identify the real enemy — radical Islam, that is — never mind figure out how to defeat it. In Mr. Trump, General Flynn found someone who was more than willing to listen. He readily signed on to the campaign, and quickly emerged as the angry voice of the national security establishment, leading chants of “lock her up” against Hillary Clinton at rallies and the Republican convention. And now, after months of the two men talking to each other, it can be hard to tell where Mr. Trump’s views end and General Flynn’s begin. They both believe that the United States needs to start working with Mr. Putin to defeat Islamist militants and stop worrying about his suppression of critics at home, his attempt to dismember Ukraine or the Russian military’s indiscriminate bombing of Syrian cities. The same goes for President Abdel Fattah of Egypt, who took power in a coup and who was the first world leader to speak with Mr. Trump after the election. Mr. Trump “looks at people and leaders of countries and says: ‘Can I work with this guy? Do we have a common threat that we can focus on? ’” Mr. Flynn said in the interview before the election. “He knows that when it comes to Russia or any other country, the common enemy that we all have is radical Islam. ” General Flynn and Mr. Trump also agree that the United States needs to sharply curtail immigration from predominantly Muslim countries, and possibly even force American Muslims to register with the government. The similarities run beyond political views. Like the boy from Queens who made it in Manhattan, General Flynn came into the military without a West Point pedigree — he graduated from the Army’s Reserve Officer Training Program at the University of Rhode Island — and earned a reputation as outspoken and unconventional as he climbed the ranks to the top of military intelligence. Yet General Flynn still nurses the grudge of an outsider, believing he never quite got the respect he deserves. For example, he has attributed his dismissal from the Defense Intelligence Agency to a pair of consummate insiders: James R. Clapper Jr. the director of national intelligence, and Michael Vickers, the undersecretary of defense intelligence. His response, like that of his new boss, has been to buck the establishment. In his view, both the Republican and the Democratic luminaries who have shaped American defense and foreign policy through two presidencies have “gotten us into mess after mess for the wrong reasons. ” “I would argue with that crowd all day long,” he said before the election. Among the Republicans who now dominate the party, General Flynn has become something of a cult figure for what they see as his brave stand against the Obama administration’s perfidy. General Flynn insists that he was fired from the intelligence agency because he refused to toe the administration’s line that Islamist militants were in retreat. (He was right, in all fairness.) “He’s an analyst who can get deep into the weeds on the issues and a lot of this stuff and then is very good at playing chess,” said Representative Devin Nunes, the California Republican who is chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a close confidant to Mr. Flynn. “He was the one who called out the administration for being wrong on Al Qaeda. ” But many of those who worked with General Flynn attribute his firing to management problems, saying his attempts to overhaul the sprawling agency had left it a chaotic, backbiting mess. They also question whether his tactical acumen — he was especially good at unraveling militant networks in Afghanistan and Iraq — can translate into the kind of strategic thinking needed at the White House. “He is a very talented information gatherer,” said Sarah Chayes of the Carnegie Endowment in Washington, who worked with General Flynn when he ran military intelligence in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2011. “But his thinking process is not sufficiently analytical to test some streams against others and make sense of it, or draw consistent conclusions,” she said. “If you listen to him, in 10 minutes you’ll hear him contradict himself two or three times. ” Take his views on Islam. In the interview before the election, he characterized Islam as intolerant. Then he said that he had many Muslim friends, and that the United States needed to do a better job of understanding Islamic culture and fostering its tolerant side. | 1 |
Outgoing President Barack Obama is using his power over U. S. immigration rules to help Cuba’s dictatorial government shut down emigration from the island’s backward economy. [Late Thursday, Obama cancelled the “ foot” migration policy, which allowed Cubans to get a U. S. Green Card once they were officially “paroled” into the United States. The policy, which was established by President Bill Clinton in 1995, also forced Cubans caught at sea back to the island dictatorship. Since 2009, roughly 100, 000 Cuban migrants have used the “dry foot” policy to migrate into the United States, although at enormous cost to taxpayers. Currently, thousands of Cubans are migrating through Central America, heading to the California and Texas borders in the expectation they’ll get asylum and Green Cards. Clinton’s wet policy narrowed a 1966 law which provided Green Cards to all escapees from Cuba’s regime. Many Cubans used the policy to migrate into Florida and other states during the 1960s and even in the 1980s, when Cuba’s leaders sent thousands of criminals to Florida, causing a huge drop in wages for unskilled Americans in Miami. A White House statement said Obama’s new ‘ ’ policy will treat migrating Cubans like it treats ordinary migrants from Mexico and many other countries, only a few of whom are allowed to file for asylum. “By taking this step, we are treating Cuban migrants the same way we treat migrants from other countries,” said a statement from the White House. “The Cuban government has agreed to accept the return of Cuban nationals who have been ordered removed, just as it has been accepting the return of migrants interdicted at sea. ” But Obama’s policy for Cuban migrants is sharply different from his policy towards the people of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. Since 2012, Obama has used his administrative power to permit at least 350, 000 people from these three countries to cross the U. S. border and then quickly file for file for asylum and work permits, even though they are mostly fleeing for economic reasons. The cost to taxpayers of Obama’s help for the unskilled Central American adults, youths, and children will exceed $200 billion over the next 75 years, unless most are sent home, according to multiple estimates. Obama’s statement sought to justify his shutdown of Cuban immigration as a policy, not as a policy intended to drive up Americans’ wages by reducing economic competition from unskilled migrants. The United States, a land of immigrants, has been enriched by the contributions of for more than a century. Since I took office, we have put the community at the center of our policies. With this change we will continue to welcome Cubans as we welcome immigrants from other nations, consistent with our laws. During my Administration, we worked to improve the lives of the Cuban people — inside of Cuba — by providing them with greater access to resources, information and connectivity to the wider world. Sustaining that approach is the best way to ensure that Cubans can enjoy prosperity, pursue reforms, and determine their own destiny. As I said in Havana, the future of Cuba should be in the hands of the Cuban people. In 2014, Obama declared the national socialist government of Cuba was a legitimate government, and promised to boost trade with companies in the tropical island prison. “I believe that we can do more to support the Cuban people and promote our values through engagement. After all, these 50 years have shown that isolation has not worked. It’s time for a new approach,” Obama said in December 2014. To the Cuban people, America extends a hand of friendship. Some of you have looked to us as a source of hope, and we will continue to shine a light of freedom. Others have seen us as a former colonizer intent on controlling your future. José Martí once said, “Liberty is the right of every man to be honest. ” Today, I am being honest with you. We can never erase the history between us, but we believe that you should be empowered to live with dignity and . Cubans have a saying about daily life: “No es facil” — it’s not easy. Today, the United States wants to be a partner in making the lives of ordinary Cubans a little bit easier, more free, more prosperous. Obama’s new decision does not kill off a 1995 agreement, under which the U. S. accepts 20, 000 emigrants each year. advocacy groups praised Obama’s new restrictions on Cubans seeking to escape the dictatorship. “The Obama Administration has taken a positive step toward a more sensible Cuban immigration policy, one that ends preferential treatment for Cubans compared with others who arrive without visas,” said a statement from program director Geoffrey Thale, at the Washington Office on Latin America. Up until now, U. S. policy has permitted Cubans who arrive at a U. S. border without a visa to be paroled into the country, and put on a path toward citizenship, an advantage that no other Latin Americans enjoy, and one that has seemed particularly unfair when children and families fleeing violence in Central America are subject to deportation. This change ‘normalizes’ our treatment of Cuban immigrants. Cubans have been seeking entry into the United States primarily because of economic stagnation at home. The U. S. embargo is one of many factors that has contributed to that stagnation, and so WOLA and many colleagues have recommended to the Administration that it should both end preferential treatment for Cubans and increase the number of visas available to Cubans who pursue regular immigration routes. The population of Cuba is 11. 2 million. | 1 |
By Hrafnkell Haraldsson 8:47 pm "We're not conceding we're behind. In our enthusiasm, we have closed the gap...dramatically over the last week."
Donald Trump’s deputy campaign manager, the Clinton-obsessed Republican operative, David Bossie, told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos this morning that “there’s an enthusiasm gap” and that this bit of math Republicans do is Trump’s path to victory on November 8.
This is how the conversation went, per CBS News’ Sopan Deb , as always highlighting the important bits:
Stephanopoulos was not about to let Bossie get away with the claim about Trump’s tax returns, and hammered him on the issue: "He's going to release [his tax return] when he is not under audit."– David Bossie, Trump Deputy Campaign Manager https://t.co/Y9xVg0rJIX
— Good Morning America (@GMA) November 1, 2016
Bossie deflected like a pro. You can see why Trump hired him.
As a corollary to Bossie’s claims, Trump suddenly found himself interested in polls again this morning, tweeting , Wow, now leading in @ABC / @washingtonpost Poll 46 to 45. Gone up 12 points in two weeks, mostly before the Crooked Hillary blow-up!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 1, 2016
The Trump campaign has always been about making much out of nothing; elections are not rigged if Trump gets his way, and neither are polls if Trump is leading. Otherwise, it’s all left-wing shenanigans.
However, even Newt Gingrich isn’t buying the new poll: Washington Post-ABC poll is an absurdity. Trump has not moved up 13 points in the last 8 days.he was NEVER 12 points behind. Ignore polls
— Newt Gingrich (@newtgingrich) November 1, 2016
And what Trump fails to mention is that his lead disappears if Johnson and Stein are taken out of the mix: then Clinton leads by +1 .
These latest claims are an absolute sham as Clinton leads overwhelmingly in early voting and Comey’s email gambit seems to have failed to sway voters to Trump’s camp.
Meanwhile, Trump’s own legal problems are beginning to overwhelm the narrative , and if there is any evidence of a Clinton enthusiasm gap it exists only in Bossie’s own head.
David Bossie is living proof that Clinton’s “vast right-wing conspiracy is real,” and all the hating on Hillary isn’t going to change the fact that it is Trump who is the crooked candidate, not Hillary Clinton. | 0 |
The “Anchorage” Incident is a well known UFO event involving a veteran Japanese airline pilot who saw three UFOs following his 747 aircraft carrier for over 400 miles. One of the objects was much larger than the 747, while the other two were smaller. The crewmen of JAL Flight 1628 reported seeing flashing lights trailing their jet to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). FAA officials confirmed the conclusions drawn from the controller who handled Flight 1628 on his radar. His conclusion was that the aircrafts were unidentified. Air Force officials at the Alaska Air Command also said their radar picked up something near the JAL plane. The United States Air Force scrambled a jet to get a closer look at the object. This incident occurred in 1986. It’s now 2013 and high ranking credible witness testimonies as well as officially released government documentation confirm that UFOs are a real phenomenon and should be taken very seriously by people in high power. Three letter agencies have also released previously highly classified documentation. The documents indicate that UFOs are constantly tracked on military radar and jets are often scrambled so pilots can take a closer look. You can see an example of these files by clicking on the number following this sentence -this one is from the National Security Agency (NSA) (1) . The FAA even has protocol for UFO sightings as they are now very common ( 2 ), they even have a data collection centre -Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies ( 3 ). You can browse through our web site, more specifically the science/tech/alternative news sections if you would like more information about the UFO/Extraterrestrial phenomenon. This is retired FA Senior Division Chief, John Callahan. Check out his testimony below given to Dr. Steven Greer. He was directly involved with this incident, it is amazing to hear his story and the events that transpired because of it. The UFO phenomenon is really nothing to fear. Humanity has been progressing in its understanding of other concepts of reality that do not fit the ‘accepted’ framework. We often see a lot of fear mongering when it comes to extraterrestrials and our perception about extraterrestrial life has been largely influenced by entertainment corporations. As we continue to wake up, transform and grow into our adulthood, new possibilities and discoveries are available to us. More people on planet Earth are aware that love, peace, cooperation and understanding is necessary if the human race would like to move forward. The same corporations and people that own the energy, health, money supply and other major industries that govern our every day lives, do not have humanities best interests in mind. They are also responsible for covering up the UFO phenomenon. Anything that has the potential to assist us in growing our understanding about reality, or allowing us to move past our archaic, harmful ways of operating on planet Earth will be concealed.
There are breakthroughs available to those who can remove one of truths protective layers – Neil Armstrong Sources: | 0 |
Donald J. Trump’s transition team is nearing picks for heavyweight posts such as the secretaries of state and of the Treasury, attorney general, and ambassador to the United Nations. They were accused by detractors of being bosom buddies, in cahoots over underhanded efforts to rig the American election — accusations candidate Trump denied. Now, Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia have spoken. The Kremlin released a readout Monday of the first call between Mr. Putin and the since he won the election, saying the men expressed mutual optimism about improving the dire state of relations between the two countries. According to the Kremlin, Mr. Putin said he hoped to work with Mr. Trump in an atmosphere of mutual respect without interfering in each other’s internal affairs. They also talked about fighting international terrorism and settling the crisis in Syria. The Trump transition team reported that “ Trump noted to President Putin that he is very much looking forward to having a strong and enduring relationship with Russia and the people of Russia. ” While Mr. Trump said he hoped to have a constructive relationship with Russia, he insisted during one of his debates with Hillary Clinton that he was “no puppet” of Mr. Putin. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who once called Mr. Trump a “faker” who “has no consistency about him,” said on Monday what she likely wanted to avoid: Mr. Trump will make the Supreme Court whole again. “Most immediately our vacancy will be filled,” she told a meeting of the Jewish Federations of North America at a Washington hotel. “President Trump will fill it. ” She urged the Senate to act promptly on the ’s nomination to fill the vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. “Eight is not a good number,” she said. At full strength, the court has nine members. At a news conference on Monday before an overseas trip, the president struck a diplomatic tone. • On Stephen K. Bannon’s appointment as chief White House strategist, which civil rights groups, Democrats and some Republicans have criticized, President Obama demurred, saying, “It would not be appropriate for me to comment on every appointment that the starts making. ” • Faced with repeated questions about Mr. Trump’s temperament, Mr. Obama expressed hope that the presidency would be a reality check. “His gifts that obviously allowed him to execute one of the biggest upsets in political history, hopefully he will put to good use,” Mr. Obama said. • On his Democratic Party, Mr. Obama said that a period of reflection was healthy, that new voices were necessary and that the stunning defeat should be a warning. “It takes a while for people to reconcile themselves with that new reality,” he said. “Hopefully it’s a reminder that elections matter. ” • On immigration, Mr. Obama urged Mr. Trump to “think long and hard” about endangering the status of young immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children. He described them as “American kids. ” The F. B. I. reported Monday that attacks against American Muslims rose last year, driving an increase of about 7 percent in hate crimes against all victims. The data, the most comprehensive look at threat crimes nationwide, expanded on previous findings by researchers and outside monitors, who have noted an alarming rise in some types of hate crimes tied to the intense vitriol of the presidential campaign and the aftermath of terror attacks at home and abroad since 2015. A wave of racially charged assaults, graffiti attacks and other episodes has swept the country since Election Day, prompting Mr. Trump to call for a halt to it during a “60 Minutes” interview broadcast on Sunday night. In its report Monday, the F. B. I. cataloged a total of 5, 818 hate crimes in 2015 — a rise of nearly 340 over the year before — including assaults, bombings, threats and property destruction against minorities, women, gays and others. Attacks against Muslim Americans saw the biggest surge: 257 reports of assaults, attacks on mosques and other types hate crimes against Muslims last year, a jump of about 67 percent over the year before. It was the highest total since 2001, when the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks saw more than 480 attacks. Attacks against transgender people also sharply increased, the data showed. Law enforcement officials acknowledge that the statistics give an incomplete picture because many local agencies still have a spotty record of reporting hate crimes, 26 years after Congress directed the Justice Department to begin collecting the data. “We need to do a better job of tracking and reporting hate crime to fully understand what is happening in our communities and how to stop it,” James B. Comey Jr. the F. B. I. director, said Monday. Mr. Trump has spoken with President Xi Jinping of China, the presidential transition team announced on Monday, and the world likely thought, “Interesting. ” According to the announcement, in a call that took place on Monday Beijing time, Mr. Xi congratulated Mr. Trump for “winning a historic election,” and the thanked the Chinese leader for his well wishes. “During the call, the leaders established a clear sense of mutual respect for one another, and Trump stated that he believes the two leaders will have one of the strongest relationships for both countries moving forward,” the statement said. No mention of whether Mr. Trump’s repeated campaign threats against Chinese trade practices came up, nor his statement that climate change was a hoax perpetuated by the Chinese, nor his promises on economic relations moving forward. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who mobilized a movement but not enough votes to win the Democratic presidential nomination, is stepping forward as an alternative to the party’s leadership and a stalwart against racial politics. Taking to his campaign Twitter handle on Monday, he decried the Democrats’ loss of white, voters to Trump. He added, “The Democratic Party has to stand with working people, feel their pain and take on the billionaire class, Wall Street and drug companies. But he also said that the new role of Mr. Bannon in the Trump White House as senior counselor and chief strategist should make the country “very nervous. ” The country has battled “discrimination and racism and sexism and homophobia” for hundreds of years, he said in an interview on ABC’s “The View” program on Monday, and the country could not afford to move backward. “We’re going to tell Mr. Bannon and any other advisers that we’re not going to be turning on each other,” Mr. Sanders said. “We’re going to be standing together. ” In concert, liberal activists staged a in the office of Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the incoming Democratic minority leader, to demand a leadership position in the next Senate for Mr. Sanders. Civil rights groups, Democrats and some Republicans on Monday denounced Trump’s decision to appoint Mr. Bannon to a top White House position, warning that he represents nationalist and racist views that should be rejected by the incoming president. Read the full story. Alex Jones, an online broadcast host who has accused the government of conspiracies, says that Trump personally called him to thank him for his support during the campaign. Mr. Jones made the revelation on a brief clip on his website. “He said, ‘Listen Alex, I just talked to the kings and the queens of the world,’” Mr. Jones recalled, saying that Mr. Trump added, “I want to thank you, your audience. ” He said the incoming president promised to come on his program again in the next few weeks. He celebrated that Mr. Trump had triumphed over “hoaxes” such as Obamacare. Mr. Jones was an early booster of Mr. Trump, who appeared on his program during the end of the primaries. Mr. Jones has charged, among other things, that the Sandy Hook school shooting in Connecticut in December 2012 was a hoax. | 1 |
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The political class has been hammering Donald Trump for saying ahead of the November election that the system is “rigged.”
Thanks to the Washington Free Beacon, we have video evidence of Democrats saying the term “rigged” over and over, except without the feigned media outrage to go along with it. | 0 |
Pieczenik: ‘There is a coup in the White House and we are going to stop it’ Full-scale counter coup launched November 1; the tyrants have been warned By Shepard Ambellas - November 2, 2016 ( INTELLIHUB ) —“The Clintons have been involved in corrupting our White House, our judiciary, our CIA, our Federal Bureau of Investigation, our Attorney General Loretta Lynch and our Diector of the FBI James Comey for some time now,” Steve Pieczenik said in his latest video released Tuesday
Pieczenik said that a coup had been formed in the White House through “political cronyism” and that “the Intelligence community and others formally involved have gotten together” and “initiated a counter coup through Julian Assange and Wikileaks.”
“We have your number,” Pieczenik said, talking about the corrupt Administration.
“We are going to stop you from making Hillary Clinton the President of the United States,” Pieczenik told the Establishment in a firm tone.
“[…] we will convict and indict the President of the United States, Loretta Lynch and many other who are involved in the cover-up of the massive corruption that occurred under the Clinton Foundation.”
“This is probably the first time in the history of any country where a coup was initiated through the Internet and a counter-coup was initiated through the Internet.”
‘This is bigger than me,’ Pieczenik said before pointing out that good people in “over 15 agencies” are working together to stop this criminal syndicate.
‘We have everything we need to undermine the Clintons’
“We do not have weapons, we do not have the intent to kill anybody and we do not intend to harm anybody.”
Pieczenik pointed out how the American public, along with good veterans and people in Intelligence agencies, will put a stop to the Clintons from once again “assuming power.”
‘History is occurring in front of us.’
Shepard Ambellas is an opinion journalist, filmmaker , radio talk show host and the founder and editor-in-chief of Intellihub News & Politics. Established in 2013, Intellihub.com is ranked in the upper 1% traffic tier on the World Wide Web. Read more from Shep’s World . Get the Podcast . Follow Shep on Facebook and Twitter . | 0 |
Glazebrooks, a family of three who last week moved into a semi-detached house in Coronation Street, say they have little interest in getting involved with the community in their new home in Weatherfield.
‘We like the quiet life,’ said 48-year-old Barry, an insurance underwriter. ‘We got the place at a knock-down price thanks to that recent thing we read in the local news about a tram crashing into a nightclub and killing four people. I only chose Weatherfield for the easy commute – which hopefully it will be, once the trams are up and running again.’
As a near-teetotaller, Barry added that he does not envisage spending much time in the local pub, the Rovers Return Inn. ‘Besides, what with the last four landlords packing it in in acrimonious circumstances, lorries crashing into it and it being burnt to the ground, an attempted murder in the cellar and arguments going on there most nights, it doesn’t sound like my sort of place,’ he added.
His 17-year-old son Philip, who has now settled in well at the local fee-paying academy Oakhill School, said that he had no plans for romantic entanglements. ‘Don’t get me wrong,’ he told reporters, ‘I’ve seen that Tracey Barlow from down the road and I definitely would, and I’ve heard there’s some lesbian action going on down at the Websters’, but I just have no time for that sort of thing with my A-levels coming up.’
Meanwhile, Mary Glazebrook, 45, who decided against seeking work at the local clothing factory because she doesn’t believe it’s healthy to spend all her time closeted in a single small street, is reluctant to mix with her neighbours.
‘I mean, take that Gail McIntyre,’ she said. ‘She seemed nice enough when she said hello to me, but it turns out she has a long history of feuding with her mother-in-laws, her first husband was murdered, her second one was a serial killer who tried to kill her whole family by driving her car into a canal, her daughter got pregnant at 13, her son is a borderline psychopath, her long-last father came back after 30 years and turned out to be gay, then to top it all she married the debt-ridden father of the son’s girlfriend and ended up in prison accused of his murder when he fell off a boat. Honestly, you couldn’t make it up.’
As of today, the Glazebrooks have no plans to have a housewarming. ‘To be honest,’ continued Mary, ‘I don’t think we could fit it in, what with hosting our swingers parties and sacrificing animals to Satan. Besides, I really need to have that conversation with Barry about how he’s not actually Philip’s dad – his brother is.’ Share this story...
Posted: Nov 19th, 2016 by Oxbridge Click for more article by Oxbridge .. More Stories about: From The Archives 0 | 0 |
Регион: США в мире В своей новой статье американский журналист Мартин Бергер указывает, что. хотя на днях издание The American Spectator и написало, что «в скором времени Обама и его команда будут выкинуты на свалку истории », тем не менее вопрос о будущем «хромой утки» занимает не только многие СМИ. Отдельные комментаторы, отрабатывая уже вложенные в них Белым домом капиталы, пытаются хоть как-то улучшить имидж уходящего президента США, сильно подпорченный его деятельностью последних лет , в том числе на ниве «борьбы» с расизмом в США, вооруженных интервенций США. Газета New York Times отметила: «В условиях, когда ему осталось пробыть на посту президента менее трех месяцев, Обама готовится к тому, что он будет делать после того, как покинет Белый дом. Весьма вероятно, что он будет тесно связан с Силиконовой долиной». Это направление возможной будущей деятельности Обамы в многочисленных последних комментариях американских СМИ просматривается как одно из основных, тем более учитывая тот «вклад», который он внес в успехи военно-промышленного комплекса США и продвижение его «продукции» в различные страны мира. Нередко в комментариях об Обаме в американских СМИ можно прочитать, что у него весьма широкие музыкальные пристрастия. Поэтому подчас от музыкантов, особенно американских, можно услышать их предложения Обаме с политики переключиться на музыкальную деятельность, вплоть до игры кантри на банджо. Весьма много комментариев в различных СМИ можно встретить о негласной связи Обамы и госпиталей «Врачей без границ», многие из которых поплатились своим существованием и жизнями сотен врачей и пациентов в результате санкционированных Обамой авианалетов в Афганистане, Йемене, Ираке, да и в других регионах мира. Поэтому вряд ли какой госпиталь «Врачей без границ» откажет завтра Обаме в его трудоустройстве туда, особенно если учесть, что опасность их гибели в определенной степени после января 2017 года все же может уменьшиться. Правда, если в Белый дом не придёт Хиллари Клинтон с ее непомерной любовью к войнам и массовым разрушениям. Но главное, считает автор, – это чтобы Барак Обама отошел от политической деятельности, которая увенчалась не только одновременным ведением США пяти войн , но и страданиями миллионов мирных жителей на Ближнем Востоке, в Африке, Азии, потерявших кров и своих близких, вынужденных из-за агрессивной политики Обамы страдать и искать приюта на чужбине. Поэтому выбор американцами более достойного его преемника должен стать превалирующим над активно разыгрываемой сейчас Белым домом поддержки Партии войны и ее кандидата – Хиллари Клинтон. С полным содержанием статьи вы можете ознакомиться здесь . Популярные статьи | 0 |
Desperate To ‘Preserve His Legacy’, Barack Obama Releases 527 Pages Of New Regulations In ONE Day! According to the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Obama administration has just shattered the old record for pages of regulations and rules published by the in-house journal, the Federal Register. At 81,640 total pages for 2016, it ranks first and 235 pages more than all of those published in 2010, the previous record. 17, 2016 President Obama has just set a new record for rules and regulations, his administration spitting out 527 pages worth in just one day, as he races to put his fingerprint on virtually every corner of American life and business.
According to the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the administration has just shattered the old record for pages of regulations and rules published by the in-house journal, the Federal Register . At 81,640 total pages for 2016, it ranks first and 235 pages more than all of those published in 2010, the previous record. The rules, politics of federal regulations under Obama:
As shocking as this video is , it was made 5 months ago and does not reflect the current race-to-regulate happening right now. What’s more, there are still about 26 working days left in the year.
“No one knows what the future holds, but at a pace of well over 1,000 pages weekly, the Federal Register could easily top 90,000 pages this year. The simple algebra says that at the current pace we’ll add 11,190 pages over the next 44 days, to end 2016 at around 92,830 pages,” said CEI’s Clyde Wayne Crews.
“This is astonishing and should be of great concern, and intolerable, to policymakers. It is remarkable enough that the all-time record has been passed before Thanksgiving,” he added. Obama has promised to regulate by executive authority, but the sheer number of pages of regulations being rushed through is astonishing.
Still, it’s not a big surprise to CEI and other regulation watchdogs.
The reason, said Crews, Obama owns seven of the 10 highest-ever Federal Register counts.
He called on President-elect Trump to make good on campaign promises and cut regulations.
“President-elect Donald Trump could take a page from President Reagan, who brought page counts down from Carter’s 73,258 to as low as 44,812. We don’t need a pen and phone, we need a meat axe,” said Crews. source
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The Non-Existent Trump Mandate November 14, 2016
Republicans are claiming a mandate to speak for the “silent majority,” but the actual numbers show that not only did Donald Trump fail to win a plurality, his vote total largely matched other recent GOP candidates, notes Nicolas J S Davies.
By Nicolas J S Davies
Within days of the U.S. general election, central elements of the result have already entered into American mythology: the revenge of the “white working class voter”; the unprecedented anti-establishment character of the President-elect; the populist revolution that led to Trump’s victory; and the years in the wilderness now facing Democrats and progressives in America.
But the endless repetition of these themes by the corporate media deserves a great deal more skepticism and scrutiny before they worm their way into all our heads to form the established and accepted narrative of this election. Let’s first review some basic facts about what happened on Nov. 8: Donald Trump at the 2016 Republican National Convention. (Photo credit: Grant Miller/RNC)
Who Voted Republican?
Though Donald Trump prevailed in the Electoral College, he failed to secure a plurality of the total ballots cast, getting a bit over 60 million votes to Hillary Clinton’s 61 million votes, according to The Associated Press tally . Meanwhile, only 55.6 percent of 219 million eligible voters, or 50.4 percent of the voting-age population , actually voted, placing the U.S. 33rd out of 35 advanced (OECD) countries in national voter turnout , above only Chile and Switzerland.
Only 27 percent of eligible voters or 24 percent of the voting-age population voted for Trump. Roughly the same number, about 60 million, voted for both John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012. The result was different because Barack Obama received 69 million votes in 2008 and 66 million in 2012, while Hillary Clinton could only muster only a shade more than Trump, Romney and McCain.
As Sen. Bernie Sanders repeated in every stump speech during the Democratic primaries, “Let us never forget, Democrats and progressives win when voter turnout is high. Republicans win when people are demoralized and voter turnout is low.”
So, Trump deserves credit for finding a few new Republican voters to replace those who have died in the past fou4 years, and for a successful strategy to gain votes in the right states to win the Electoral College. But the more decisive difference with 2008 and 2012 was the dramatic failure of the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, to turn out the vote. This was despite, or maybe even because of, unprecedented SuperPAC money and overwhelming support from political, business and media elites.
Democratic Hopes
If the Democrats hope to do better in future elections, they must confront this reality. Grassroots Democrats should insist that party leaders finally abandon the long obsolete Reagan/Thatcher-lite Democratic Leadership Council model of politics based on fund-raising, propaganda, corporate welfare and militarism, and welcome the kind of new, progressive leadership that inspired 47 percent of Democratic primary voters to vote for Senator Bernie Sanders. Sen. Bernie Sanders speaking to one of his large crowds of supporters. (Photo credit: Sanders campaign)
This was all the more significant and impressive in the context of party leaders’ monolithic support for Clinton and their shameful campaign to stage a coronation instead of organizing a free and fair primary election.
We will find out more about who actually voted for Trump, but the pollster Nate Silver already exposed “The Myth of Trump’s ‘Working Class’ Support” in a fivethirtyeight .com article on May 3. Silver’s article analyzed a survey of the average household income of people who voted in the 23 primaries up to that point. The average Clinton or Sanders primary voter had a household income of $61,000, while the average Trump voter earned $72,000, about the same as Cruz’s supporters but less than Kasich’s.
The 70 percent of eligible voters who did not vote in either primary had an average household income of $52,000. In broad terms, this tracks the traditional pattern of U.S. politics, with wealthier Americans leaning Republican, the middle-class favoring Democrats and few of the poor African-Americans and immigrants who make up much of the real U.S. working-class voting at all.
These figures were for primary voters, but they suggest that Trump’s supporters were, well, Republicans, like Romney’s, McCain’s, Bush’s and so on. The Republican Party has continually rebranded itself over the past 50 years, generating great fanfares from deferential or captive corporate media for the Silent Majority, the Reagan Revolution, the Moral Majority, the Christian Right, the Contract With America, the Tea Party and now Trump’s Deplorables, but behind these well-funded P.R. campaigns, Republican voters remain roughly the same people or class of people. Edward Bernays, the father of modern propaganda and advertising, would approve their ever-changing public message!
What is Trump’s agenda?
Despite contradictory pronouncements on many issues, Donald Trump’s published plan for his first 100 days in office contained more policy details than Hillary Clinton’s campaign web site, which followed the DLC model of appealing to principles most Americans believe in without pinning the candidate down to anything detailed enough for most voters to disagree with.
In Clinton’s case, this includes voluminous treatises on a wide array of subjects, but the blizzard of words was short on actual policy details, leaving the formerly presumptive president plenty of room to do whatever she and her corporate and military-industrial colleagues really planned to do after the coronation. As Wikileaks revealed, one of the few things Clinton’s staff and financiers were clear on was the necessarily wide gap between her public and private positions .
Warmed-Over GOP Fare
On the other hand, Donald Trump’s plan for his first 100 days in office includes more specifics and is, for the most part, a pretty standard wish-list of policies the Republican Party has backed for decades. That still leaves plenty of room for smoke and mirrors: President Obama in the Oval Office.
–On Trump’s first day in office, he plans to cancel every “unconstitutional” action, memorandum and order issued by President Obama; to cancel federal funding to cities that provide sanctuary to undocumented immigrants; to begin deporting 2 million undocumented immigrants “with criminal records” (somehow expanding that group from the 178,000 counted in a 2010 Congressional report before Obama’s mass deportations reduced it still further); to stop issuing U.S. visas to people in countries that won’t accept unlimited numbers of U.S. deportees; to suspend immigration from “terror-prone” regions; and to begin work on selecting a new Supreme Court justice.
–The legislative portion of Trump’s agenda starts with “massive tax reduction,” including an across-the-board 15 percent corporate tax rate, which drops to 10 percent for repatriated offshore earnings to reward the outsourcing he condemned on the campaign trail. This is balanced politically by a vague promise of unspecified new tariffs to penalize future outsourcing.
–“The American Energy and Infrastructure Act” will declare open season on the environment and the climate, stimulating “energy infrastructure” projects like the Keystone XL pipeline with tax cuts and corporate welfare, and ending U.S. payments to the U.N. climate fund.
–A national school voucher program will expand the privatization of public education, while Trump also pays lip service to local control, reducing college tuition and ending common core.
–Trump wants to repeal Obamacare and replace it with a new program based on health savings accounts, along with similar programs for childcare and elder care; states will be allowed to make unprecedented cuts in Medicaid; and he wants the Food and Drug Administration to speed up approvals for 4,000 new drugs.
–As well as funding Trump’s wall on the Mexican border, new draconian immigration laws will impose mandatory 2- and 5-year federal prison sentences on previously deported immigrants who try to reenter the U.S.
–New “national security” and “community safety” laws will blast military spending past Obama’s post-World War II record , and throw more money at local police to combat imaginary increases in “crime, drugs and violence” at home. Liberal state marijuana laws may be “trumped” by this new national “stop and frisk” program.
–Trump wants term limits in Congress to get rid of popular progressive legislators like John Conyers and Patrick Leahy. He also wants a federal civilian hiring freeze and sweeping deregulation under which any new federal regulation must be offset by canceling two existing regulations.
Controlling the Levers
The most critical factor in the Republicans’ new-found power is that they now control the White House and both houses of Congress, as they did from 2003 to 2006 and for a shorter spell in 1953-54. This does not usually end well for them. The last time the Republicans held full control of the U.S. government for more than 4 years was in the 1920s, and that ended even worse. President George W. Bush speaks on the phone in the Oval Office, Oct. 7, 2008, with Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the United Kingdom, discussing efforts to solve the spreading global financial crisis. (White House photo by Eric Draper)
If the Republicans exploit the support of 24 percent of Americans – not even a plurality of those who voted – to ram through their extreme right-wing agenda, they will deserve to be slung out on their ears in 2018 and 2020, as they were in 2006 and 2008.
If rank-and-file Democrats can force their party’s corrupt leaders to quickly hand over power to new progressive leadership who will represent the other 76 percent of Americans, this should not be a tall order.
In the meantime, progressives can contain the damage by countering every part of the Republicans’ (and corrupt Democrats’) agenda with clear, intelligent progressive proposals for real solutions to the serious problems facing our country and the world and building a popular movement around them.
This will all be a real test for the Democrats, but it is one they have brought on themselves, and the radical clean-up required is what progressives have been demanding of the Democratic Party for a long time.
Nicolas J S Davies is the author of Blood On Our Hands: the American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq . He also wrote the chapters on Obama at War in Grading the 44th President: a Report Card on Barack Obama’s First Term as a Progressive Leader . He has also served as a local chapter leader and national team leader on war and peace issues for Progressive Democrats of America (PDA) . | 0 |
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HILLARY THE SPY? - UPDATED INFO!
Let us start with an historical fact. Treason and betrayal by the highest levels is a common feature of history, whether it is Judas vs Jesus, Brutus vs Julius Caesar, Benedict Arnold, the Rosenbergs, Jonathan Pollard, Aldrich Ames, Robert Hanssen. It is just a fact of life. It does happen.
Back in 1996, when Bill Clinton was running for re-election, he authorized the transfer of highly sensitive technology to China. This technology had military applications and allowed China to close the gap in missile performance with the United States. The transfers were opposed and severely criticized by the Defense Department.
At the same time Bill Clinton was transferring this technology to China, huge donations began to pour into his re-election campaign from the US companies allowed to sell the technology to China, and from American citizens of Chinese descent. The fact that they were US citizens allowed them to donate to political campaigns, but it later emerged that they were acting as conduits for cash coming in from Asian sources, including Chinese Intelligence Agencies! The scandal eventually became known as China-gate!
John Huang
A close associate of Indonesian industrialist James Riady, Huang initially was appointed deputy secretary of commerce in 1993. By 1995, however, he moved to the Democratic National Committee where he generated hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal contributions from foreign sources. Huang later pleaded guilty to one felony count of campaign finance violations.
Charlie Trie
Like John Huang, Trie raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal contributions from foreign sources to Democratic campaign entities. He was a regular White House visitor and arranged meetings of foreign operators with Clinton, including one who was a Chinese arms dealer. His $450,000 contribution to Clinton's legal defense fund was returned after it was found to have been largely funded by Asian interests. Trie was convicted of violating campaign finance laws in 1998.
One of Trie's main sources of cash was Chinese billionaire Ng Lap Seng, according to a Senate Report. Ng Lap Seng had connections to the Chinese government. Seng was arrested in 2015 over an unrelated bribery case, but this gave investigators the opportunity to question Seng about the Chinagate scandal. Former United Nations General Assembly President John Ashe was also caught in the bribery case and was about to testify to the links between the Clintons and Seng when he was found dead that very morning. Initially reported as having died from a heart attack, John's throat had obviously been crushed. At that point the official story changed to him accidentally dropping a barbell on his own throat.
Ng Lap Seng with the Clintons.
Johnny Chung
Gave more than $366,000 to the Democratic National Committee prior to the 1996 campaign, but it was returned after officials learned it came from illegal foreign sources. Chung later told a special Senate committee investigating 1996 Clinton campaign fund-raising that $35,000 of his contributions came from individuals in Chinese intelligence. Chung pleaded guilty to bank fraud, tax evasion and campaign finance violations.
Chinagate, documented by Judicial Watch, was uncovered by Judicial Watch founder Larry Klayman. Technology companies allegedly made donations of millions of dollars to various Democratic Party entities, including President Bill Clinton's 1996 re-election campaign, in return for permission to sell high-tech secrets to China. Bernard Schwartz and his Loral Space & Communication Ltd. later allegedly "helped China to identify the cause of [a rocket failure], thereby advancing China's missile program and threatening U.S. national security, according to records.
This establishes a history of the Clintons treating US secrets as their own personal property, and selling them to raise money for campaigns!
Is history repeating itself? It appears so!
Let us consider a private email server with weak security, at least one known totally open access point, no encryption at all, and outside the control and monitoring systems of the US government, on which are parked many of the nation's most closely guarded secrets (as well as those of the United Nations and other foreign governments)! It is already established that Hillary's email was hacked. One hacker named Guccifer provided copies of emails to Russia Today, which published them. | 0 |
Clinton aide’s for-profit firm illegally raised $150 million for ‘nonprofit’ Clinton Foundation Commenting Policy
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Hillary Howls in Laughter About Radical Muslims Sodomizing, Killing Man
“Say, ‘Bill Clinton is a sexual predator,'” he said.
Kelly never did say those words, but she did shoot back at Gingrich by saying that the Kelly File has covered former President Bill Clinton’s accusations as well, but that he “wasn’t on the ticket.”
However Kelly never implied that Clinton was a sexual predator during those segments, something to which Gingrich took offense. Advertisement - story continues below
“I am sick and tired of people like you using that language. That is inflammatory, that is not true,” Gingrich angrily said after Kelly used the phrase “sexual predator” when talking about the women who have come forward to accuse Trump of sexual assault, but not about Clinton.
“You are fascinated with sex and you don’t care about public policy,” Gingrich said to Kelly at one point during the show.
Kelly insisted that she was not obsessed with sex, she was simply reporting on someone who could potentially be the next president of the United States.
The fiery exchange ended on an even lower note. Advertisement - story continues below | 0 |
US House Seeks Syria-War Escalation November 22, 2016
Moving to trap President-elect Trump into a war escalation in Syria, the House rushed through a resolution promoting a U.S.-imposed “no fly zone” that could spark World War III, reports Rick Sterling.
By Rick Sterling
Late in the day, on Nov. 15, one week after the U.S. elections, the lame-duck Congress convened in special session with normal rules suspended so the House could pass House Resolution 5732, the “Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act” calling for intensifying the already harsh sanctions on Syria, assessing the imposition of a “no fly zone” inside Syria (to prevent the Syrian government from flying) and escalating efforts to press criminal charges against Syrian officials.
HR5732 claims to promote a negotiated settlement in Syria but, as analyzed by Friends Committee for National Legislation, it imposes preconditions which would actually make a peace agreement more difficult. The West Front of the U.S. Capitol
There was 40 minutes of “debate” with six representatives (Ed Royce, R-California; Eliot Engel, D-New York; Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Florida; Dan Kildee, D-Michigan; Chris Smith, R-New Jersey; and Carlos Curbelo, R-Florida) all speaking in favor of the resolution. There were few other representatives present, but the House Foreign Affairs Committee stated that the resolution was passed “unanimously” without mentioning these special conditions.
According to Wikipedia, “ Suspension of the rules is a procedure generally used to quickly pass non-controversial bills in the United States House of Representatives … such as naming Post Offices…” In this case, however, the resolution could lead to a wider war in the Middle East and potentially World War III with nuclear-armed Russia.
Most strikingly, the resolution calls for evaluating and developing plans for the United States to impose a “no fly zone” inside Syria, a sovereign nation, an act of war that also would violate international law as an act of aggression. It also could put the U.S. military in the position of shooting down Russian aircraft.
To call this proposal “non-controversial” is absurd, although it may say a great deal about the “group think” of the U.S. Congress that an act of war would be so casually considered. Clearly, this resolution should have been debated under normal rules with a reasonable amount of Congressional presence and debate.
The motivation for bypassing normal rules and rushing the bill through without meaningful debate was articulated by the bill’s sponsor, Democrat Eliot Engel: “We cannot delay action on Syria any further. … If we don’t get this legislation across the finish line in the next few weeks, we are back to square one.”
The current urgency may be related to the election results since President-elect Donald Trump has spoken out against “regime change” foreign policy. As much as neoconservatives and their liberal-interventionist allies are critical of President Obama for not doing more in Syria, these Congressional hawks are even more concerned about the prospect of a President who might move toward peace and away from war.
The Caesar Fraud
HR5732 is titled the “Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act,” which House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Royce explained was named after “the brave Syrian defector known to the world as Caesar, who testified to us the shocking scale of torture being carried out within the prisons of Syria.” U.S.-backed Syrian “moderate” rebels smile as they prepare to behead a 12-year-old boy (left), whose severed head is held aloft triumphantly in a later part of the video. [Screenshot from the YouTube video] In reality, the Caesar story was a grand deception involving the CIA with funding from Qatar to sabotage the 2014 Geneva peace negotiations. The 55,000 photos which were said to show 11,000 torture victims have never been publicly revealed. Only a tiny number of photos have been publicized. However, in 2015, Human Rights Watch was granted access to view the entire set. They revealed that almost one half the photos show the opposite of what was claimed: instead of victims tortured by the Syrian government, they actually show dead Syrian soldiers and civilian victims of car bombs and other terror attacks. The “Caesar” story, replete with a masked “defector,” was one of the early propaganda hoaxes regarding Syria.
One of the other big lies regarding Syria is that the U.S. has been doing nothing. Royce said, “ The administration has decided not to decide. And that itself, unfortunately, has set a course where here we sit and watch and the violence only worsens. Mr. Speaker, America has been sitting back and watching these atrocities for far too long. Vital U.S. national security interests are at stake.”
Rep. Engel said, “Four years ago I thought we should have aided the Free Syrian Army. They came to us in Washington and begged us for help. … They were simply looking for weaponry. I really believe if we had given it to them, the situation in Syria would have been different today.”
That narrative is nonsense. By late 2011, the U.S. was actively coordinating, training and supplying armed opposition groups. When Muammar Gaddafi’s Libyan government was toppled in fall 2011, the CIA oversaw the diversion of Libyan weapons to the Syrian armed opposition, as documented in the Defense Intelligence Agency report of October 2012.
These weapons transfers were secret. For the public record, it was acknowledged that the U.S. was supplying communications equipment to the armed opposition while U.S. “allies” — Saudi Arabia and Qatar — were supplying the weaponry. This is one reason that Saudi purchases of weapons skyrocketed during this time period; they were buying weapons to replace those being shipped to the armed opposition in Syria. It was very profitable for U.S. arms manufacturers.
Huge weapons transfers to the armed opposition in Syria have continued to the present, with the U.S. government even more directly involved. This past spring, Janes Defense reported the details of a U.S. delivery of 2.2 million pounds of ammunition, rocket launchers and other weaponry to the armed opposition.
So, the political claims that the U.S. has been inactive are baseless. In reality, the U.S. has done everything short of a direct attack on Syria. And the U.S. military is starting to cross that line. On Sept. 17, the U.S. air coalition conducted a series of airstrikes on the Syrian Army in Deir Ezzor, killing 80 Syrian soldiers and enabling ISIS to launch an attack on the position. Claims that it was a “mistake” are highly dubious.
The assertions by Congressional hawks that the U.S. has been “inactive” in the Syrian conflict are part of the false narrative suggesting the U.S. must “do something” which leads to a “no fly zone” and full-scale war. Ironically, these calls for war are masked as “humanitarian” though even proponents, such as Hillary Clinton, privately have acknowledged that large numbers of Syrians, including civilians, would be killed in the U.S. attacks needed to establish the “no fly zone.”
And, never do the proponents bring up the case of Libya where the U.S. and NATO “did something”: destroyed the government and created chaos.
Fact-Free House of Propaganda
With only a handful of representatives present and no dissent, the six Congressional members engaged in unrestrained propaganda and misinformation. Samantha Power, Permanent Representative of the United States to the UN, addresses the Security Council meeting on Syria, Sept. 25, 2016. Power has been an advocate for escalating U.S. military involvement in Syria. (UN Photo)
Engel, said “We’re going into the New Year 2017, Assad still clings to power, at the expense of killing millions of his citizens.” Even if all the deaths, including Syrian soldiers and civilians killed by anti-government jihadists, were blamed on Assad, this number is way off anyone’s charts.
Rep. Kildee said “The world has witnessed this terrible tragedy unfold before our eyes. Nearly half a million Syrians killed. Not soldiers – men, women, children killed.”
The official text of the resolution says, “ It is the sense of Congress that– (1) Bashar al-Assad’s murderous actions against the people of Syria have caused the deaths of more than 400,000 civilians…”
The above accusations – from “millions of citizens” to “half a million” to “400,000 civilians” – are all preposterous lies. Credible estimates of casualties in the Syrian conflict range from 300,000 to 420,000. The opposition-supporting Syrian Observatory for Human Rights estimates the documented 2011-2016 death toll as follows: killed pro-Syrian forces – 108,000; killed anti-government forces – 105,000; killed civilians – 89,000
In contrast with Congressional and media claims, civilians comprise a minority of the total death count and the heaviest casualties are among those fighting in defense of the Syrian state. In the U.S. political world and the mainstream media, these facts are ignored and never mentioned because they point to the reality versus the propaganda narrative which has allowed the U.S. and its allies to continue funding terrorism and a war of aggression against Syria.
The Congressional speakers were in full self-righteous mode as they accused the Syrian government of “committing crimes against humanity and war crimes against civilians including murder, torture and rape. No one has been spared from this targeting, even children.” A naive listener would never know that the Syrian government is primarily fighting the Syrian branch of Al Qaeda including thousands of foreign fighters supplied and paid by foreign governments.
The speakers went on to accuse the Syrian military of “targeting” hospitals, schools and markets. A critical listener might ask why they would do that instead of targeting Al Qaeda terrorists and their allies who launch dozens and sometimes hundreds of hell-cannon missiles into the government-held sections of Aleppo every day.
The Congressional propaganda fest would not be complete without mention of the “White Helmets.” Royce said “We (previously) heard the testimony of Raed Saleh of the Syrian White Helmets. These are the doctors, nurses and volunteers who actually, when the bombs come, run towards the areas that have been hit in order to try to get the injured civilians medical treatment. … They have lost over 600 doctors and nurses.”
This is more Congressional nonsense. There are no nurses or doctors associated with the White Helmets. The organization was created by the U.S. and U.K. and heavily promoted by a “ shady PR firm .” The White Helmets operate solely in areas controlled by Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front (recently renamed Syria Conquest Front) and associated terrorist groups. The White Helmets do some rescue work in the conflict zone but their main role is in the information war manipulating public opinion.
The White Helmets actively promote U.S./NATO intervention through a “no fly zone.” Recently, the White Helmets became a major source of claims about innocent civilian victims in east Aleppo.
Given the clear propagandistic history of the White Helmets, these claims should be treated with skepticism. We need to ask exactly what is the evidence?
The same skepticism needs to be applied to video and other reports from the Aleppo Media Center. AMC is a creation of the Syrian Expatriates Organization whose address on K Street in Washington, D.C., indicates it is a U.S. marketing operation.
What’s Going On?
The campaign to overthrow the Syrian government is failing and there is possibility of a victory for the Syrian government and its allies. A heart-rending propaganda image designed to justify a major U.S. military operation inside Syria against the Syrian military.
The earlier flood of international jihadi recruits is drying up. The Syrian Army and allies are gaining ground militarily and negotiating settlements or re-locations with “rebels” who previously terrorized Homs, Darraya (outer Damascus) and elsewhere. In Aleppo, the Syrian army and allies are tightening the noose around the armed opposition in east Aleppo.
This has caused alarm among neoconservative lawmakers devoted to Israel, Saudi Arabia and U.S. empire. They are desperate to prevent the Syrian government from finally eliminating the terrorist groups which the West and its allies have promoted for the past five-plus years.
“Pro Israel” groups have been major campaigners for passage of HR5732. The name of Simon Wiesenthal is even invoked in the resolution. Rabbi Lee Bycel wrote, “Where is the Conscience of the World?” as he questioned why the “humanitarian” HR5732 was not passed earlier.
Israeli interests are one of the primary forces sustaining and promoting the conflict. Syria is officially at war with Israel which continues to occupy the Syrian Golan Heights; Syria has been a key ally of the Lebanese Hezbollah resistance; and Syria has maintained its alliance with Iran. In 2010, Secretary of State Clinton urged Syria to break relations with Hezbollah, reduce relations with Iran and come to settlement with Israel. The Syrian refusal to comply with these Washington demands was instrumental in solidifying Washington’s hostility .
Congressional proponents of HR5732 make clear the international dimension of the conflict. Royce explains, “It is Russia, it is Hezbollah, that are the primary movers of death and destruction. … It is the IRGC [Revolutionary Guard] fighters from Iran.”
Engel echoes the same message: “Yes, we want to go after Assad’s partners in violence … Iranian and Hezbollah forces.”
In words and deeds Israel has made its position on Syria crystal clear. Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren explained in an interview: “we always wanted [President] Bashar Assad to go, we always preferred the bad guys who weren’t backed by Iran to the bad guys who were backed by Iran … the greatest danger to Israel is by the strategic arc that extends from Tehran, to Damascus to Beirut. And we saw the Assad regime as the keystone in that arc.”
These statements have been fully backed up by Israeli actions bombing Syrian positions in southern Syria and providing medical treatment for Nusra/Al Qaeda and other armed opposition fighters.
What Will Happen Now?
If the Syrian government and its allies continue to advance in Aleppo, Deir Ezzor, outer Damascus and the south, the situation will come to a head. The enemies of Syria – predominately the U.S., Gulf Countries, NATO and Israel – will come to a decision point. Do they intervene directly or do they allow their “regime change” project to collapse? HR5732 is an effort to prepare for direct intervention and aggression.
One thing is clear from the experience of Libya: Neoconservatives do not care if they leave a country in chaos. The main objective is to destabilize and overthrow a government which is too independent. If the U.S. and its allies cannot dominate the country, then at least they can destroy the contrary authority and leave chaos.
What is at stake in Syria is whether the U.S. and allies, including Israel and Saudi Arabia, are able to destroy the last secular and independent Arab country in the region and whether the U.S. goal of being the sole superpower in the world prevails. The rushed passage of HR5732 without any meaningful debate is indicative of that.
Despite Trump’s election and his stated priority of taking on Islamic terrorism – not overthrowing Assad – the “regime change” proponents have not given up their war on Syria. They still seek to escalate U.S. aggression there and hope to box President Trump in.
It’s also clear that the U.S. Congress has become a venue where blatant lies can be stated with impunity and where violent actions are advanced behind a cynical and amoral veneer of “humanitarianism.”
Rick Sterling is an investigative journalist and member of Syria Solidarity Movement. | 0 |
What motivates you to live? What is the meaning of life?
For centuries, mankind has questioned everything. Mankind’s quest for the answer to what drives us, and what pushes us forward in times of darkness is not exempt from analysis. In fact, it’s been a consistent theme since the dawn of time. Stoicism , although not directly attributed to answering ‘what drives us’, skirts around the topic and creates a general set of principles to help us deal with negative externalities in life.
While many philosophers have pontificated on the subject of mankind’s driving force, and the ‘will to live’, there’s a problem inherent with such an analysis. In order to research such a basic, and instinctual topic, one needs to experience a visceral, cerebral experience that brings him or her to a basic, instinctual level, before having such an epiphany. One needs to examine our animalistic base, and then explore logically from there.
One such analysis is known as Logotherapy, from the Greek word logos(wise) . Logotherapy, developed by Viktor Frankl, is an influential school of psychotherapy, that is founded on the pillars of ‘what motivates mankind’. Before we delve into Logotherapy, however, it’s important that we discuss Viktor Frankl—who he was, and why his unique perspective provides for an incredibly powerful source of credibility and authority.
Viktor Frankl was born in 1905, in what was at that time known as Austria-Hungary. Frankl was a neurologist, and psychiatrist. His early life was relatively unspectacular, but from an early age he displayed an interest in philosophy, as well as psychotherapy. Initially interested in Freud and Adler’s work, he began to see their faults, and eventually diverged from their teachings—becoming particularly interested in depression, as well as suicide.
During 1933-1937, Frankl, in completing his residency in neurology, was responsible for setting up the Selbstmörderpavillon , translated in English to “the suicide pavilion”. It’s estimated that Frankl, along with his staff, treated upwards of 30,000 women who had suicidal tendencies.
In September of 1942, his life was shaken. Frankl, along with his wife and family, were deported to a Nazi concentration camp, known as Theresienstadt ghetto. Whilst there, and during his stay at Auschwitz, Frankl worked as a doctor in the psychiatric care unit, focusing on mental health, helping newcomers deal with shock and grief.
In 1946, after three years in a concentration camp, Frankl released his book entitled Man’s Search for Meaning , which details his experiences as a holocaust survivor, as well as his theory, which became known as Logotherapy. The book is divided into two parts—part one is a detailed account of his experiences, whereas part two discusses Logotherapy.
His time in the numerous concentration camps began to shape his philosophical, and psychiatric theory. While he had read books on the subject of ‘psychological healing’ prior to his imprisonment, he had never experienced it to the degree in which he had become accustomed to. Particularly intrigued as to why some prisoners lived longer than others, Frankl began to organize his thoughts and document how the average prisoner’s life in a concentration camp was reflected in their mind. As a doctor focusing on grief and shock-stricken inmates, he was in a very unique position.
Hundreds, and during some weeks thousands, of helpless inmates were carted in Auschwitz, the most-feared concentration camp, weekly. Between the inmates sleeping next to him, and those seeking treatment, Frankl noted that each prisoner, without exception faced three stages of psychological reactions once entering the concentration camp. These stages were; shock, apathy, and depersonalization.
While seemingly unimportant, the noted documentation of these stages was very important for Frankl. As he began to notice, while every inmate experienced these stages, some experienced them to a less cerebral degree. Some inmates seemed less depressive than others, and featured a happier disposition. These inmates—with some expected variability—outlived the other inmates.
Discovery As he began to poke and prod, Frankl noticed something that separated these individuals from others— hope. There is never not meaning in life. Every moment no matter how painful, dehumanizing or horrendous it is, has meaning. By extension, Frankl suggests, even suffering is meaningful. The inmates that survived the longest—the ones that outlived the rest, had hope. Frankl suggested that he could tell whether or not an inmate would live just by looking at their faces—the face of a dejected, depressed inmate was obvious and clear as day. Without hope, they were doomed.
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
The next question that Frankl sought to answer was an important one, and the foundational maxim of Logotherapy—why did some men have hope, and others not?
The answer, was love.
“The truth – that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which Man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of Man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved.”
Frankl, in his book Man’s Search for Meaning recounted several instances where he would be driven into brief stints of depression; after a beating, during a late-night march in bare feet, or watching his friend get treated inhumanely. He’d vacillate from depression by thinking, and longing for his wife. The men whom lasted the longest, invariably had a wife, or a job that they loved. It was this motivator, the unquantifiable love, that pushed men in inhuman circumstances to existentially escape the physical realm, and put mind above body.
What we can get from this To answer this, Frankl codified three ways that he discovered is how we can find meaning in life – A job, love, and how we react to suffering. It’s important to realize that while it’s easy to read this and assume that Frankl is saying we should all suffer in order to find meaning—he’s not. He IS suggesting, however, that should we not have a job/deed, or love that allow us to find meaning in life, we can still find meaning by choosing how to react in a negative situation—our mental freedom is one of the only things that can never be taken from us, theoretically speaking.
The average man will never be faced with such a dire circumstance such as the atrocities that Frankl and so many others dealt with. What we can do, however, is choose how we react to life’s adversities.
A fair assessment of Logotherapy is that it provides a simplistic solution to a complex question (life). Since life is such a complex series of events, Logotherapy offers a solution that may not be representative of life’s true hardships and intricacies. In saying this, my own personal evaluation is that, this criticism in itself may have flaws, by assuming that a complex question must have a complex solution. Even the assumption that life in complex can be debated. It’s a cliched saying that ‘life is hard’, or complex—and even if it is, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that a complex question has a simple solution – sometimes the answer we seek is right in front of us.
Viktor Frankl died in September 1997, and his works are still read today. Several Logotherapy institutes exist today named after him.
Read more: Does Life Have Inherent Meaning Without Belief In God?
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La influencia de Estados Unidos y la OTAN en las relaciones de la Unión Europea con China por Manlio Dinucci Al intervenir en un foro internacional, el geógrafo italiano Manlio Dinucci sintetiza su análisis sobre el arsenal que Estados Unidos ha venido acumulando para imponer su voluntad al mundo. Este trabajo reviste especial importancia ya que esa voluntad claramente asumida de dominación y esa organización unipolar del mundo son precisamente lo que Siria, Rusia y China cuestionan hoy por la vía de las armas.
Red Voltaire | Roma (Italia) | 27 de octubre de 2016 français Entro de inmediato en el quid de la cuestión. Pienso que no podemos hablar de las relaciones entre la Unión Europea y China sin abordar la influencia que Estados Unidos ejerce sobre la Unión Europea, tanto directamente como a través de la OTAN.
Hoy en día, 22 de los 28 países miembros de la Unión Europea (21 de los 27 después de la salida del Reino Unido) son miembros de la OTAN, reconocida por la Unión Europea como « base fundamental de la defensa colectiva ». Y la OTAN se halla bajo el mando de Estados Unidos: el Comandante Supremo de las fuerzas de la OTAN es siempre un general estadounidense nombrado directamente por el presidente de Estados Unidos y todos los demás mandos de la OTAN también están en manos de militares estadounidenses. La política exterior y militar de la Unión Europea se ve así fundamentalmente subordinada a la estrategia estadounidense, tras la cual se alinean las principales potencias europeas.
Esa estrategia, claramente enunciada en los documentos oficiales, es trazada en el momento histórico en que la situación mundial cambia como resultado de la desintegración de la URSS. En 1991, la Casa Blanca declara en la National Security Strategy of the United States :
«Estados Unidos queda como el único Estado que dispone de una fuerza, de un alcance y de una influencia en todos los aspectos –político, económico y militar– realmente globales. No existe sustituto del liderazgo estadounidense.»
En 1992, en su Defense Planning Guidance , el Pentágono subraya:
«Nuestro primer objetivo es impedir que cualquier otra potencia domine una región cuyos recursos sean suficientes como para engendrar un poderío mundial. Esas regiones incluyen Europa occidental, el Asia oriental, el territorio de la ex Unión Soviética y el Asia sudoccidental.»
En 2001, en el informe Quadrennial Defense Review –publicado una semana antes de la guerra de Estados Unidos y la OTAN contra Afganistán, área de primera importancia geoestratégica en relación con Rusia y China–, el Pentágono anuncia:
«Existe la posibilidad de que surja en la región un rival militar con una formidable base de recursos. Nuestras fuerzas armadas deben conservar la capacidad de imponer la voluntad de Estados Unidos a cualquier adversario, ya sean Estados o entidades no estatales, cambiando el régimen de un Estado adverso o ocupando un territorio extranjero hasta que se alcancen los objetivos estratégicos estadounidenses.»
En base a esa estrategia, la OTAN –bajo el mando de Estados Unidos– ha emprendido su ofensiva en el frente oriental: luego de haber destruido la Federación Yugoslava mediante la guerra, desde 1999 hasta este momento la OTAN ha abarcado todos los Estados del desaparecido Pacto de Varsovia, 3 Estados de la antigua Yugoslavia, 3 de la antigua URSS y dentro de poco abarcará otros (comenzando por Georgia y Ucrania, esta última ya está de hecho en la OTAN), moviendo bases y fuerzas, incluso nucleares, hacia zonas cada vez más cercanas a Rusia. Al mismo tiempo, en el frente sur, estrechamente vinculado al oriental, la OTAN bajo el mando estadounidense destruyó el Estado libio –también recurriendo a una guerra– y también trata de destruir el Estado en Siria.
Estados Unidos y la OTAN hicieron estallar la crisis ucraniana y, acusando a Rusia de « desestabilizar la seguridad europea », arrastraron Europa a una nueva guerra fría, principalmente por voluntad de Washington –y a expensas de las economías europeas, ampliamente afectadas por sanciones y contrasanciones– para destruir las relaciones económicas y politicas entre Rusia y la Unión Europea, [relaciones] nefastas para los intereses estadounidenses. En esa misma estrategia se inscribe el creciente traslado de fuerzas militares estadounidenses hacia la región Asia/Pacífico, con objetivos antichinos. La US Navy anunció que, en 2020, tendrá concentrado en esa región el 60% de sus fuerzas navales y aereas.
La estrategia estadounidense está enfocada hacia el Mar de China Meridional, cuya importancia subraya el almirante Harris, jefe del PaCom (el mando militar estadounidense para el Pacífico): por ahí transitan anualmente 5 000 millardos [ 1 ] de dólares en mercancías por vía marítima, incluyendo un 25% de las ventas mundiales de petróleo y un 50% de las ventas de gas natural.
Estados Unidos quiere controlar esa vía marítima en nombre de lo que el almirante Harris define como una « libertad de navegación fundamental para nuestro modo de vida aquí y en Estados Unidos » y atribuye a China « acciones agresivas en el Mar de China Meridional, similares a las de Rusia en Crimea ». Así que la US Navy « patrulla » el Mar de China Meridional.
Tras Estados Unidos llegan las principales potencias europeas: en julio pasado, Francia pidió a la Unión Europea « coordinar el patrullaje naval en el Mar de China Oriental para garantizar una presencia regular y visible en esas aguas ilegalmente reclamadas por China ». Y mientras Estados Unidos instala en Corea del Sur sistemas « antimisiles » –pero capaces de lanzar también misiles nucleares, como los instalados contra Rusia en Rumania y próximamente en Polonia, además de los que llevan los navíos de guerra desplegados en el Mediterráneo– el secretario general de la OTAN Jens Stoltenberg recibe el 6 de octubre, en Bruselas, al ministro de Exteriores sudcoreano Yun Byung-se para « fortalecer la asociación de la OTAN con Seúl ».
Esos hechos y muchos más demuestran que en Europa y en Asia se está aplicando la misma estrategia. Es el intento desesperado de Estados Unidos y las demás potencias occidentales por conservar la supremacía económica, política y militar en un mundo en plena transición, donde están surgiendo nuevos actores estatales y sociales.
La Organización de Cooperación de Shanghai (OCS), nacida del acercamiento estratégico entre China y Rusia, dispone de recursos y capacidades de trabajo que pueden convertirla en el área de integración económica más grande del mundo. La organización de Shanghai y los países del grupo BRICS (Brasil, Rusia, India, China, Sudáfrica) son capaces, con sus organismos financieros, de tomar en gran parte el lugar que actualmente ocupan el Banco Mundial y el Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI), dos instituciones que durante los últimos 70 años permitieron a Estados Unidos y las principales potencias occidentales dominar la economía mundial mediante préstamos dignos de usureros a los países endeudados y otros instrumentos financieros. Los nuevos organismos pueden concretar a la vez la desdolarización de los intercambios comerciales, con lo cual privarían a Estados Unidos de la posibilidad de transferir a otros países su propia deuda al imprimir el papel moneda utilizado como divisa internacional dominante.
Para mantener su cada vez más tambaleante supremacía, Estados Unidos no sólo utiliza la fuerza militar sino también otras armas a menudo más eficaces que las armas propriamente dichas.
Primera arma: los llamados « acuerdos de libre comercio », como la « Asociación Transatlántica de Comercio e Inversiones » (TTIP) con la Unión Europea y la « Asociación Transpacífica » (TPP) cuyo objetivo no es solamente económico sino también geopolítico y geoestratégico. Es por eso que Hillary Clinton califica la asociación Estados Unidos-Unión Europea como el « objetivo estratégico más grande de nuestra alianza transatlántica », proyectando una « OTAN económica » que integraría [la OTAN] política y militar.
El proyecto está claro: formar un bloque político, económico y militar Estados Unidos-Unión Europea, también bajo el mando de Estados Unidos, para oponerlo al área euroasiática en ascenso, que a su vez se basa en la cooperación entre China y Rusia; y oponerlo también a los BRICS, a Irán y a cualquier otro país que se sustraiga al control de Occidente.
Como las negociaciones sobre el TTIP encuentran dificultades para avanzar, a causa de las divergencias en materia de intereses y de una amplia oposición en Europa, actualmente tratan de recurrir al « Acuerdo Económico y Comercial Global » (CETA) entre Canadá y la Unión Europea, que no es otra cosa que un TTIP disimulado ya que Canadá es firmante del NAFTA [ 2 ] con Estados Unidos. El CETA será probable firmado por la Unión Europea el próximo 27 de octubre, en ocasión de la visita del primer ministro canadiense a Bruselas.
Segunda arma: la penetración en los países designados como blancos para desintegrarlos desde adentro.
Se recurre para ello a los puntos débiles que todo país puede presentar: la corrupción, el deseo de ganar dinero, el arribismo político, el secesionismo fomentado por grupos de poder locales, el fanatismo religioso, la vulnerabilidad de las masas ante la demagogia política. Apoyándose también, en ciertos casos, en un descontento popular justificado hacia la conducta del gobierno del país.
Los instrumentos de penetración son las llamadas « organizaciones no gubernamentales » (ONGs) que en realidad obedecen al largo brazo del Departamento de Estado y de la CIA, que con enormes medios financieros han organizado las « revoluciones de colores » en el este de Europa y que también trataron de realizar una operación similar en Hong Kong con la llamada « Revolución de los Paraguas » (« Umbrella Révolution »), tendiente a fomentar movimientos similares en otras zonas de China pobladas por minorías.
Esas mismas organizaciones operan en Latinoamérica, fundamentalmente tratando de subvertir las instituciones democráticas en Brasil [país miembro del grupo BRICS], saboteando así a los BRICS desde adentro.
Otro instrumento de la misma estrategia son los grupos terroristas, como los grupos armados e infiltrados en Libia y en Siria para sembrar el caos, contribuyendo a la destrucción de Estados enteros que son al mismo tiempo agredidos desde el exterior.
Tercera arma: las « PsyOps » (Operaciones psicológicas) que se realizan a través de los canales mediáticos mundiales, operaciones que el Pentágono define de la siguiente manera:
« Operaciones planificadas para influir a través de determinadads informaciones sobre las emociones y motivaciones, y por tanto en el comportamiento de la opinión pública, de organizaciones y gobiernos extranjeros, con el fin de inducir o fortalecer actitudes favorables a los objetivos predeterminados. »
Mediante esas operaciones, que acondicionan a la opinión pública para que acepte la escalada belicista, se presenta a Rusia como responsable de las tensiones en Europa y a China como responsable de las tensiones en Asia, acusándolas simultáneamente de « violaciones de los derechos humanos ».
Manlio Dinucci y su esposa, Carla, ante la casa natal de Mao Tse Tung, en 1965. Permítanme una última consideración. Por haber trabajado en Pekín en los años 1960, donde contribuimos juntos a la publicación de la primera revista china en italiano, puedo decir que viví una experiencia formativa fundamental en el momento en que China –liberada desde hacía apenas 15 años del control colonial, semicolonial y semifeudal– se hallaba completamente aislada y ni Occidente ni las Naciones Unidas la reconocían como Estado soberano.
De aquel periodo quedaron profundamente grabados en mi recuerdo la capacidad de resistencia y la conciencia de aquel pueblo –por entonces 600 millones de personas– inmerso, bajo la dirección del Partido Comunista, en la construcción de una sociedad con bases económicas y culturales totalmente nuevas. Pienso que aquella capacidad es también necesaria hoy en día para que la China de nuestros tiempos, que está desarrollando su enorme potencial, logre resistir ante los nuevos planes imperiales de dominación, contribuyendo con ello a la lucha decisiva por el porvenir de la Humanidad: la lucha por un mundo sin guerras, donde triunfe la paz indisolublemente vinculada a la justicia social.
Manlio Dinucci | 0 |
Natural Blaze reports:
After months of similar struggle to protect sacred burial grounds and the Missouri river, opposers of the DAPL were blessed today when a herd of buffalo appeared from nowhere. While mass arrests, macing, and beatings from batons took place, a stampede of bison appeared near the Standing Rock protest camp. Reportedly, a cry of joy erupted from the crowd, as protectors have been praying for help from the American bison (known as Tatanka Oyate) during their standoff with riot police and national guardsmen.
As UsUncut relays, the Native American culture honors the Tatanka Oyate as a symbol of sacrifice. Its appearance is reportedly being hailed as a gift from the Great Spirit.
Buffalo are revered as symbols of sacrifice in Native American culture. Indigenous people believe the American bison, which are also known as “Tatanka Oyate” or “Buffalo Nation,” sacrifice themselves in order to supply their meat and their hides for people. | 0 |
Close Transcript Transcript: Who Shouldn’t Eat Soy?
Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.
When the Women’s Health Initiative study found that menopausal women taking hormone replacement therapy suffered “higher rates of breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, and overall harm,” a call was made for safer alternatives. Yes, estrogen has positive effects, the Women’s Health Initiative found—such as reducing menopausal symptoms and improving bone health, reducing hip fracture risk; but also negative effects—increasing risk of blood clots in the heart, brain, and lungs, as well as breast cancer.
So, ideally, to get the best of both worlds, we’d need what’s called a selective estrogen receptor modulator, something that has pro-estrogenic effects in some tissues (like bone), but anti-estrogenic effects in other tissues (like the breast). Drug companies are trying to make them, but phytoestrogens—natural compounds in plants, like genistein in soybeans, that are structurally similar to estrogen—appear to function as natural selective estrogen receptor modulators. How could something that looks like estrogen act as an anti-estrogen?
The original theory for how soy phytoestrogens control breast cancer growth is that they compete with our own estrogens for binding to the estrogen receptor. As you drip more and more soy compounds on breast cancer cells in a petri dish, less and less actual estrogen is able to bind to them. So, the estrogen-blocking ability of phytoestrogens can help explain their anti -estrogenic effects. But, how do we then explain their pro -estrogenic effects on other tissues, like bone? How can soy have it both ways?
The mystery was solved when we discovered there are two types of estrogen receptors in the body. And, so, how a target cell responds depends on which type of estrogen receptors they have. This may be “the key to understanding the health-protective potential of soy phytoestrogens”—the existence of this newly discovered estrogen receptor, named estrogen receptor beta, to distinguish it from the classic estrogen receptor alpha. And, unlike our body’s own estrogen, soy phytoestrogens preferentially bind to the beta receptors.
If you have people eat about a cup of cooked whole soybeans, within about eight hours, genistein levels in the blood reach about 20 to 50 nanomoles—that’s how much is circulating throughout our body, bathing our cells. About half is bound up to proteins in the blood; so, the effective concentration is about half that. So, let’s see what that means for estrogen receptor activation.
This is the graph that explains the mysterious health benefits of soy foods. Down around the effective levels you’d get eating a cup of soybeans, there’s very little alpha activation—but, lots of beta activation. So, now let’s look at where each of these receptors are located in the human body.
The way estrogen pills increase the risk of fatal blood clots is by causing the liver to dump out all these extra clotting factors. But, guess what? The human liver only contains alpha estrogen receptors, not beta receptors. And so, maybe, if we ate like 30 cups of soybeans a day, that could be a problem. But, at the kinds of concentrations one would get with just normal soy consumption, no wonder this is a problem with drug estrogens—but not soy phytoestrogens.
The effects on the uterus appear also to be mediated solely by alpha receptors—which is, presumably, why no negative impact has been seen with soy. So, while estrogen-containing drugs may increase the risk of endometrial cancer up to ten-fold, phytoestrogen-containing foods are associated with significantly less endometrial cancer—in fact, protective effects for these types of gynecological cancers, in general. Women who ate the most soy had 30% less endometrial cancer, and appeared to cut their ovarian cancer risk nearly in half.
Soy phytoestrogens don’t appear to have any effect on the lining of the uterus, but still can dramatically improve menopausal symptoms. The Kupperman index is like a compilation of all 11 of the most common menopausal symptoms.
In terms of bone health, human bone cells carry beta estrogen receptors. So, we might expect soy phytoestrogens to be protective. And, indeed, they do seem to significantly increase bone mineral density—consistent with population data suggesting “High consumption of soy products is associated with increased bone mass.” But, can they prevent bone loss over time?
Soy milk was compared to a transdermal progesterone cream. The control group lost significant bone mineral density in their spine over the two-year study period. But, the progesterone group lost significantly less, and the two glasses of soy milk a day group ended up actually better than when they started. This is probably the most robust study to date, comparing the soy phytoestrogen genistein to a more traditional hormone replacement drug regimen. In the spine, over a year, the placebo group lost bone density, but gained in the phytoestrogen and estrogen groups, and the same with the hip bones.
The study clearly shows that the soy phytoestrogen prevents bone loss, and enhances new bone formation, in turn producing a net gain of bone mass. But, the only reason we care about bone mass is that we want to prevent fractures. Is soy food consumption associated with lower fracture risk? Yes. A significantly lower risk of bone fracture associated with just a single serving of soy a day—the equivalent of 5 to 7 grams of soy protein, or 20 to 30 milligrams of phytoestrogens. So, that’s just like one cup of soy milk—or, even better, a serving of a whole soy food, like tempeh or edamame, or the beans themselves.
We don’t have fracture data on soy supplements, though. So, if we seek the types of health benefits we presume Asian populations get from eating whole and traditional soy foods, maybe we should look to eating those, rather than taking unproven protein powders or pills.
Is there anyone who should avoid soy? Well, some people have soy allergies. A national survey found that only about 1 in 2,000 people report a soy allergy. That’s 40 times less than the most common allergen—dairy milk—and about ten times less than all the other common allergens—like fish, eggs, shellfish, nuts, wheat, or peanuts. Please consider volunteering to help out on the site. Close Sources Video Sources | 0 |
The politics of populism and mudslinging undermines democracy By Linda S. Heard Posted on November 8, 2016 by Linda S. Heard
Our world is on the cusp of a new era. Traditional taboos are being smashed. Respect has become an old-fashioned word. Nothing is too low or too dirty to be ignored, overlooked or even applauded by some.
The rise of antiestablishment popularism plays to the lowest common denominator and is potentially divisive and corrosive of values held dear for generations. We’ve witnessed how a populist candidate spouting what he imagines the struggling sectors want to hear has not only lowered the tone but has dragged many of his supporters and rivals down to the same level.
The American political sphere has turned into a swamp of muckraking, hatred of the other and threats of violence to the extent that white supremacist militias are preparing to attack African Americans if their candidate doesn’t make the White House.
It’s suddenly okay for the son of one to announce the former head of the Ku Klux Klan “desperately needs a bullet in the head.” What happened to judicial process? On the other hand Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton cynically attempted to woo African Americans by appearing on the stage with her new buddies, celebrity black rappers.
Robert de Niro’s video urging voters not to support Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, adding he would love to punch him in the face went viral. Trump supporters claim they are a ‘movement’ and threaten revolution if he fails to win an election they believe may be ‘rigged.’ Republicans anxious to keep their grip on Congress have threatened to block Clinton’s initiatives at every turn.
Even the feuding Justice Department and the FBI aren’t exempt from the ire. Both are being hit by accusations of interfering in the political process. The country that’s stood as the greatest example of democracy and the rule of law is gradually embracing the law of the jungle. I’m amazed that most Americans see nothing amiss about their president, his wife and his vice-president spending days stumping for their candidate. Isn’t a US president supposed to represent all Americans?
There are echoes within the UK where politicians still quarrel over the validity of a referendum over Britain’s exit from the EU. The High Court’s judgment to the effect that the prime minister doesn’t have the authority to take the country out without a parliamentary vote has resulted in media attacks on judges whose reputations were formerly unassailable. I may be wrong but I don’t recall such venom directed at the judiciary throughout my lifetime.
Tabloid headlines scream “Who do you think you are? “The judges versus the people” and the Daily Mail has gone as far as to post photographs of three judges referring to them as “Enemies of the People,” describing one as being “openly gay.” This is nothing short of an attack on democracy’s checks and balances.
The High Court has pronounced on a legal point, not on the pros and cons of Brexit. The government has the right to appeal in the Supreme Court but UK Prime Minister Theresa May has indicated she will proceed with triggering Article 50 come what may.
Charles Falconer writing in The Guardian was right to assert “the judiciary is a vital pillar of our constitution. The government must defend it from these unconscionable attacks—or put all our freedoms at risk.”
Gina Miller, an activist who lodged the legal challenge is now receiving online death threats! Britons posting on Facebook have called for her “to be shot or hung.”
Populist leaders tap in to people’s basest instincts. They are not reliant on knowledge of how the world works or of experience but rather on personal charisma and the power of persuasion. They inspire devoted followings blind to their transgressions which gives them a sense of power and infallibility.
We’ve seen the rise of rank outsiders in the Philippines and Indonesia whose rhetoric and policies defy all norms.
This ‘anything goes’ trend fuelled by fear and economic grievances is a slippery slope reminiscent of Germany in the early 1930s when Hitler wasn’t viewed as the monster he was but as a saviour from a brutal economic depression resulting in worthless currency and unemployment in the millions. He mesmerised crowds as he vowed to make Germany strong again. Perhaps it’s time that lessons were learnt before there’s no going back.
Linda S. Heard is an award-winning British specialist writer on Middle East affairs. She welcomes feedback and can be contacted by email at . | 0 |
October 26, 2016 Knesset Speaker asks Vatican to join battle against UNESCO’s denial of history
The resolution, the Speaker wrote, “is an assault on history and is deeply offensive to both Christianity and Judaism. The denial of the historicity of the two Jerusalem Temples and the Temple Mount as recounted in both the Old and New Testaments is a terrible indictment of the international community when repeatedly adopted by an important UN body.
“The outrageous repudiation of the millennia-old bond between Judaism and its holiest shrines in Jerusalem is a blatant attempt to rewrite history,” he added. “The annals of both our religions cannot be erased by raised hands and counted votes.”
Edelstein said the time has come for the international community to pass a resolution reaffirming Jerusalem as the holy city for the three major monotheistic religions, “a city where the two Temples stood and from which the Word of G-d was first promulgated to humanity by our prophets.”
Education Minister Naftali Bennett called UNESCO’s decision “a denial of history, and history will erase the embarrassing decision. | 0 |
During Sunday’s New York AM 970 “The Cats Roundtable” radio broadcast, former United Nations ambassador John Bolton called President Barack Obama “vindictive” for abstaining in a Security Council vote condemning Israeli settlements, and accused the president of trying to box in his successor, Donald Trump. “[P]resident Obama has very negative views on the state of Israel,” Bolton told host John Catsimatidis. “He thinks they’re the obstruction in the peace process in the Middle East, not the Palestinians or some of the more radical Arab states. In many respects, what he did in this resolution by the Security Council just before Christmas was try to define the boundaries of the state of Israel. It’s a rejection of 50 years of bipartisan American foreign policy that says that the parties in the dispute themselves have to work this out. ” “I just think it was a very bad idea. It was vindictive because everybody knows that Donald Trump has a different policy view. This was intended to box [Trump] in. I’m just worried that more is coming, as well,” he added. Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent | 1 |
Thomas DiLorenzo https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/hillarys-first-impulse-always-lie-lie-lie/
Imagine my shock upon learning that Hitlery lied through her teeth at her five-second “news conference” last night regarding the reopening of her Clinton Crime Family email case by the FBI. She declared that the FBI had notified only Republican members of Congress about this, implying a dark conspiracy between the Obama administration’s FBI and the Republican Party. Vast Right-Win Conspiracy, Act II
But, lo and behold, one of the talking head shows revealed that “ranking Democrats” in Congress were notified at the same time as the Republicans.
This was vintage Bill Clinton whose modus operandi was always: ” I wonder if I can get the suckers to believe this one?” 6:46 am on October 29, 2016 | 0 |
News, information and analysis from the black left. Black Agenda Report for Week of Oct 31, 2016 Submitted by Nellie Bailey a... on Mon, 10/31/2016 - 20:45 Venezuela The Missing Black Movement Ingredient: Self-Determination
The Black Is Back Coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations will hold a National Black Political Convention on Self-Determination, November 5 and 6, in Washington, DC. “If you go through history, the fundamental thing that we’ve confronted is the loss of our self-determination as a people,” said Black Is Back chairman Omali Yeshitela . The Coalition has put forward a 19-point position on the need to put self-determination at the center of Black struggles. The 19 points “give us the beginning of some kind of a plan,” said Yeshitela. “It says, specifically, here is our view on self-determination and the subject of reparations, Black women, the question of police invasion and brutality in our community,” and many other issues. The “Moment of Truth” for the Empire
“We are entering a new moment in American history,” said Dr. Anthony Monteiro , the Duboisian scholar and Black Radical Organizing Committee activist. “It is a moment of truth for the ruling class, for the ruling elite. What do they do when they are trumped at home -- forgive the pun -- and trumped internationally?” he asked. “Do they back off of empire, do they readjust, do they become peaceful, or do they up the stakes and attempt to resolve all problems with war abroad and oppression at home?” Dr. Monteiro is one of the planners of a Revolutionary Science for Radical Times conference, in Philadelphia, December 9 and 10. Hard Times in Venezuela
Despite what the corporate media are telling you, Venezuelans are not starving and the Socialist Party government will not be toppled any time soon. However, the rightwing opposition “is smelling blood” due to an economic crisis that “has made it very difficult for people to get access to imported goods, and many goods are very expensive,” said political science professor George Caccariello-Maher , of Drexel University, author of We Created Chavez: A People’s History of the Venezuelan Revolution . Corruption, smuggling and money speculation are serious problems, said Caccariello-Maher. However, the strength of the Left lies in the nation’s grassroots organizations and communes. “It would be very difficult for an opposition government to come in and attempt to throw them off their land” or return property to the private sector, he said. Happy Birthday, Rev. Pinkney!
Benton Harbor, Michigan, human rights leader Rev. Edward Pinkney, currently serving a 2 ½ to 10 year sentence on election tampering charges, turned 68 years old this month. Marcina Cole , a courtroom observer at Pinkney’s trial, teamed up with David Sole , of the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War and Injustice, to throw a birthday party for Pinkney, in absentia, in Detroit. “He’s definitely in support of other inmates, doing ministry work, and looking forward to being out very soon,” said Cole. She reported that Green Party vice presidential candidate Ajamu Baraka visited the political prisoner on October 19. “This was historical,” said Cole. “They know how powerful Rev. Pinkney is” -- and that he has allies on the outside. Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network is hosted by Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey. A new edition of the program airs every Monday at 11:00am ET on PRN. Length: one hour. | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Congress completed its overturning of the nation’s strongest internet privacy protections for individuals on Tuesday in a victory for telecommunications companies, which can track and sell a customer’s online information with greater ease. In a vote largely along party lines, House Republicans moved to dismantle rules created by the Federal Communications Commission in October. Those rules, which had been slated to go into effect later this year, had required broadband providers to receive permission before collecting data on a user’s online activities. The action, which follows a similar vote in the Senate last week, will next be brought to President Trump, who is expected to sign the bill into law. A swift repeal may be a prelude to further deregulation of the telecommunications industry. Republicans said President Barack Obama’s appointee to the F. C. C. Tom Wheeler, had created a slew of overbearing rules for broadband providers that would put them at a disadvantage relative to internet companies like Google and Netflix. Those internet companies are not regulated by the F. C. C. but are increasingly in competition with telecom companies for online streaming customers. Lawmakers and Republican regulators at the F. C. C. have said they plan to target the 2015 classification of broadband as a utilitylike service that is strapped with strong regulatory oversight. They are also set to seek the overturning of net neutrality rules that forbade broadband providers from blocking, slowing down or charging extra for downloads of websites and apps. “What we’ve created is confusion, and this is the way to rein in an agency that was overreaching,” said Marsha Blackburn, Republican of Tennessee, who introduced the House bill to overturn the privacy rules. She used the Congressional Review Act in a procedure that lets lawmakers scrap regulations recently created by government agencies. Ms. Blackburn said the Federal Trade Commission, which enforces privacy policies created by web companies such as Facebook and Google, was the best agency to oversee broadband privacy. The White House issued a statement just before the House vote expressing support for the overhaul of privacy rules. “The rule departs from the framework for online privacy administered by the Federal Trade Commission,” the Trump administration said. “This results in rules that apply very different regulatory regimes based on the identity of the online actor. ” Broadband companies immediately celebrated the House vote. They promised they would honor their voluntary privacy policies, noting that violations would be subject to lawsuits. “Today’s vote removing another set of unnecessary regulations is a for consumers and their privacy,” said Jonathan Spalter, the chief executive of the broadband lobbying group USTelecom. “Online users will continue to have the consistent and strong privacy protections they require and the promise of continued innovation they expect from the internet. ” Democratic lawmakers and regulators protested the vote, saying consumers had few options for internet service, which meant more government oversight of the companies was needed. Broadband providers have an expansive view into consumers’ online habits, including seeing what sites and apps are visited, which can expose sensitive information. The F. C. C. rules would have given consumers greater power to stop companies from making money off such information, the Democrats said. “The rules gave individuals control over their information when it comes to privacy,” Mignon Clyburn, the sole Democratic F. C. C. commissioner, said in an interview. “The proprietary information these companies have at their disposal should not only be treated with care, but consumers should have a voice. ” | 1 |
America’s Streets Will Run Red With Blood- Mike Adams
VIOLENCE IN AMERICA-AMERICA’S STREETS WILL RUN RED WITH BLOOD
Hillary is going down. But don’t make the mistake of thinking it is over! As Mike Adams says in the following video. It does not matter who wins, the streets will run red with blood.
Listen to what Mike Adams has to say in the following video. If this video does not convince you to prepare to be on your own, then nothing will. | 0 |
Vatican Makes Unprecedented Agreement With Chinese Gov’t 11/01/2016
DAILY CALLER
The Vatican and Beijing reached an agreement that will elevate the Chinese government above the Church, reports the Wall Street Journal.
The question of who has the authority to ordain bishops has been at the heart of a decades-old dispute between China and the Vatican.
The new agreement will give China the power to select bishops with only limited input from the Vatican. Furthermore, the Vatican will stop ordaining bishops for underground churches without the authorization of the Chinese government. While the pope will be acknowledged as the head of the Catholic Church in China, the Chinese government will have the last word on all appointments. The state will be able to pick individuals loyal to Beijing.
The new deal is likely to help repair ties between the Vatican and the Chinese government, but the full restoration of diplomatic relations is still a long way off.
The Chinese government and the Vatican have been estranged since the Communist Party of China (CPC) expelled Vatican envoy Antonio Riberi from the country in 1951, banned missionaries, and began oppressing organized religion. Pope Francis has been actively pursuing rapprochement with China.
China insists on appointing its own bishops, claiming that oversight by the Holy See, the judicial body within the Catholic Church, constitutes unnecessary foreign intervention in Chinese affairs. China also opposes attempts by the Vatican to appoint bishops for underground churches without state authorization.
In China, all Catholic organizations must register with the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association. The Vatican expressed frustration over the Chinese government’s 2010 appointment of a bishop without Pope Benedict XVI’s approval. The Vatican called the move, one of a number of such occurrences, a “ painful wound ” to the Church.
The new agreement could thaw relations between Beijing and the Vatican, giving the world’s largest religious organization access to the world’s most populous country. For China, normal interactions with the Vatican could improve its international image, potentially reducing criticisms of China’s human rights record.
Negotiations for the new agreement reportedly began in April. Having reached an accord, negotiators are waiting for papal approval and a formal decision from the Chinese government. Once the agreement passes, it will mark an unprecedented shift in the Vatican’s interactions with foreign governments. The Vatican would officially accept the appointment of eight bishops, three of which were previously excommunicated.
Some observers expect members of underground churches in China to protest the accord.
“If the Vatican should be perceived as abandoning them, it could be seen as a betrayal” and “cause serious divisions in the Chinese Catholic Church,” Richard Madsen, a professor of sociology at the University of California at San Diego, told the WSJ. “The government would probably actually like this. Its action over the years show that it would like to see the church weakened, and a deeper division in the church would help accomplish that,” he added, highlighting his suspicions of Beijing’s intentions.
China has a documented propensity for dominating and oppressing religion in order to better preserve state power. Christians played an important role in the shift from a dictatorship to a democracy in South Korea, and now there are an estimated 100 million Christians in China.
Having failed to eradicate religion, the Chinese government, which is officially atheist, set up state-run churches with pastors loyal to China. These churches advocate morality, not scripture, and that the state is superior to religion.
“We have to remember first of all we are a citizen of this country. We are a citizen of the Kingdom of God, but that comes second,” Pastor Wu Weiqing of the state-owned Haidian Church in Beijing told BBC. He further stated that if Jesus were alive today, he would probably be a member of the Communist Party. While the deal between the Vatican and Beijing could give the Catholic Church greater access to Chinese Christians, it could also give the Chinese government greater control over the Church and organized religion.
Pope Francis “would not accept any agreement that would harm the integrity of faith of the universal Church,” the Bishop of Hong Kong, Cardinal John Tong argued in July, according to the WSJ.
The future of the Catholic Church in China remains shrouded in uncertainty. The new agreement between Beijing and the Vatican could be a positive step forward or a dangerous surrender of religious power to political organizations like the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association and the State Administration for Religious Affairs. | 0 |
Videos Hillary Clinton Aide Advised: ‘Dump all those emails’ On Private Server “Not to sound like Lanny, but we are going to have to dump all those emails so better to do so sooner than later,” says the March 2015 message, labeled as from John Podesta to Cheryl Mills and apparently referencing longtime Clinton confidant Lanny Davis. | November 2, 2016 Be Sociable, Share!
Hillary Clinton ‘s campaign chairman advised a longtime aide that they were “going to have to dump all those emails” on the day that a report revealed Clinton’s exclusive use of a private email server while secretary of State, according to stolen emails released Tuesday by WikiLeaks.
“Not to sound like Lanny, but we are going to have to dump all those emails so better to do so sooner than later,” says the March 2015 message, labeled as from John Podesta to Cheryl Mills and apparently referencing longtime Clinton confidant Lanny Davis. “Think you just got your new nick name,” Mills replied.
Clinton campaign officials have refused to confirm the authenticity of the emails, which are believed to have been stolen from Podesta’s personal account by Russian government hackers. Previously released emails have revealed some advisers were frustrated that Clinton hadn’t made information about the server public sooner. “Why didn’t they get this stuff out like 18 months ago? So crazy,” policy adviser Neera Tanden wrote to Podesta that same evening, March 2, 2015. “Unbelievable,” Podesta replied. Other messages show the Clinton campaign caught unprepared for the New York Times story , published weeks before Clinton launched her bid for the White House. Also on March 2, Podesta asked future campaign manager Robby Mook if he had seen it coming . “Did you have any idea of the depth of this story?” Podesta asked Mook in an email late on the evening. “Nope,” Mook responded after 1 a.m. that night. “We brought up the existence of emails in reserach [sic] this summer but were told that everything was taken care of.” In other messages, Clinton’s aides spent hours debating language for Clinton to use defending and eventually apologizing for her actions. This article originally appeared on The Hill. Be Sociable, Share! | 0 |
Football Manager 2017 to include dicking about on Football Manager 2016 03-11-16
THE new Football Manager allows players to spend downtime fiddling about on a slightly older football management simulator.
Football Manager 2017, released yesterday, enables players to run a club’s first team, reserves, and youth team then waste time between matches with a game of Football Manager 2016.
Wayne Hayes said: “I can take a break from trying to win the Premier League with Huddersfield Town and just mess around trying to get MK Dons promoted on Football Manager 2016 instead.
“Though my manager on that is struggling to win the FA Cup with Hull on Football Manager 2015 , and in that game the manager’s trying to win Serie A with Torino on Football Manager 2014 , and it goes all the way down.
“34 levels deep, there’s a manager taking a break from his day job with Everton in Football Manager 2 on the Amiga by enjoying a cup run with Norwich on Kevin Toms’s Football Manager for the ZX Spectrum.
“I don’t know which one I am. I’m lost. I don’t know which way reality is any more.”
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Share on Facebook Share on Twitter At one time or another most of us have met someone for the first time and experienced a feeling about that person that’s beyond causal. Somehow, this particular new person generates a reaction within us that sparks our primal instincts beyond the usual associations registered when meeting a new person. One of the most baffling encounters occurs when meeting a person for the first time and so strongly sensing you’ve known this person before. It’s an uncanny feeling that too often is dismissed as a “past-life connection” or simply being reminded of another person whom you cannot for the life of you recall. It might be an instant dislike or an affinity, even those “love at first sight” moments. Whatever the case, there’s a short-term overwhelm happening while we’re taking their measure, a subconscious reading. Personally, I’ve always been taken aback by these moments, so much so that it can prevent me from being able to react in expected social dialogue. I’m preoccupied, trying to observe what is it that’s so charging me and why. There’s a kind of knowing, a recognition taking place that’s occurring down in the subconscious — or possibly through some astral dimension. Is this experience similar to déjà vu? Cognitive science explains this sensation as a chemical reaction in the brain which floods our senses with a feeling that we’ve lived the moment before. Perhaps something similar is happening upon meeting people who cause this effect? I’m not buying it, however, and here’s why. There have been several times in my life when this sensation occurred, and it was shared mutually with the person whom I had just met. In effect, we’re both having the same feeling that we’ve known each other before, somehow, somewhere. The most vivid example I will share is from a trip to China. I was in a small village in a remote area, walking along a canal with my Chinese hosts. Approaching us was another group, all Chinese, and upon passing each other, this one Chinese gentleman stops and turns; simultaneously, I was doing the exact thing. There we were, facing each other, both of us grinning like school children, with tears forming in our eyes. He spoke no English and I no Mandarin, yet we were both speaking softly to each other. My Chinese guide returned to my side, providing translation: “This man says he knows you. Ask where have you been?” my guide said. Evolve Your Inbox & Stay Conscious Daily Inspiration and all our best content, straight to your inbox. “I feel like I know him too, somehow,” I replied, “Has he ever been to California?” “No, he says he’s never been outside of China,” my guide continued, somewhat perplexed and embarrassed by our exchange. “But I know him,” I protested. “We, we were friends, good friends, but I cannot remember where or when?” “That’s what this fellow just said about you,” my guide lamented, feeling such talk inappropriate. “I know, you didn’t have to translate. I knew what he was saying,” I answered, trying to control my emotions. “This strange person, he says, he says he misses you,” the guide stated, now officially embarrassed. “I miss you too, my old friend,” I said, staring into the man’s eyes. We exchanged business cards, and he bowed to me, and I to him. We shook hands, and then, much to the horror of my guide, this total stranger and I embraced. Somewhere in a cluttered cubbyhole I still have his card, my long lost friend who has slipped back into the ethers. Yet, what I actually want to speak to is something quite different from my warm Chinese anecdote. This is a vastly more unsettling subject — encountering someone who does not read as a human being. By that, I mean there’s something so otherly about the person that, at the visceral level, you can’t ignore your reaction. This might not be a common experience for most people, but among my spiritual colleagues, we’ve spoken of this kind of encounter, so it’s not just me. There are myriad theories as to what’s going on here, the prime one being that these are alien beings from various star systems composed as hybrids of animal, fairy, cyborg, or other essences who live within a human form and have agendas that may be beneficial for or malevolent toward the human race. There’s a plethora of literature on such things readily found in metaphysical bookstores, not to mention online. And the subject matter can range from angels and spirit guides to a complex ontological philosophy that incorporates quantum physics. Yet, the common thread to all of this is the perception that we, meaning us humans, are not alone. And this of course opens the question: What is the agenda of these others — why are they here? This is where the speculation ramps up and the wormholes open. While it can be amusing to think of certain individuals fitting such a description, it’s a serious matter for those who monitor this subject. Movies and books have employed this concept to create various storylines for their plots. I, too, in my books have used this sense that other beings, non-humans, are among us. In Call of the Forbidden Way , an alien threat to colonize our planet is at the core of the drama. But I didn’t come to this idea casually. No, I have always felt an awareness of other beings active on our planet. And I have had my share of encounters with an assortment of folk who, to me, simply didn’t register as authentically human — some far from it. So, while prevailing logic requires me to present such ideas as fiction, I write with much more than a casual what-if attitude on the subject. Perception, be it accurate or not, is how we experience the world. My own perception seems to register that we’re not alone.
The Sacred Science follows eight people from around the world, with varying physical and psychological illnesses, as they embark on a one-month healing journey into the heart of the Amazon jungle.
You can watch this documentary film FREE for 10 days by clicking here.
"If “Survivor” was actually real and had stakes worth caring about, it would be what happens here, and “The Sacred Science” hopefully is merely one in a long line of exciting endeavors from this group." - Billy Okeefe, McClatchy Tribune | 0 |
On Breitbart News Saturday, broadcast live on SiriusXM Patriot Channel 125 from 10 AM to 1 PM Eastern, Breitbart lead investigative reporter Lee Stranahan will be discussing school choice and homeschooling, healthcare reform, fake news about Russian hacking, and the strange story of Pakistani brothers arrested for looking at GOP emails and more. [Guests include Breitbart’s Washington Political Editor, Matt Boyle, and Breitbart’s brilliant investigative reporter Dr. Susan Berry. Also appearing on the show will be the Daily Caller’s Luke Rosiak and Tennessee Star Managing Editor Christina Botteri. Breitbart’s conservative radio enterprise airs seven days a week. SiriusXM Vice President for news and talk Dave Gorab called the show “the conservative news show of record. ” As always, the premier guest on the show is YOU. So make sure you call in to talk to Lee. Follow Breitbart News on Twitter for live updates during the show. Listeners may call into the show at . | 1 |
Caitlyn Jenner fired a verbal shot at liberals this weekend, while calling into question their ability to fire actual shots. [Jenner spoke at the College Republican National Committee recently, during which time the speech turned to the shooting at the Republican congressional baseball game. While referencing the shooter, a man who had supported Bernie Sanders, Jenner said, “Fortunately, the guy was a really bad shot — liberals can’t even shoot straight. ” The video can be seen on the College Republican Federation of Virginia Facebook page. Jenner, speaking out for the victims of the shooting, also said, “First of all, nobody deserves what happened out there. There’s no justification. There are crazy people in the world. We have to minimize that type of stuff. ” Follow Dylan Gwinn on Twitter:@themightygwinn | 1 |
Russia: No jets have flown over Aleppo for past 9 days By Press TV on October 27, 2016 Russian servicemen prepare a Sukhoi Su-30SM fighter jet before departure on a mission at the Hmeimin military base in Latakia province, western Syria on Dec. 16, 2015. (Photo by AFP)
Moscow says Russian and Syrian aircraft have not carried out any sorties over Aleppo for nine days in line with their “humanitarian pause.”
The Russian Defense Ministry responded on Thursday a day after a monitoring group sympathetic to militants claimed that airstrikes had killed at least 26 people in a village in Idlib.
Russia’s Ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin challenged the UN and the West to provide evidence of continuing airstrikes in Aleppo.
Churkin said no aircraft has approached the city at a distance of less than 10 km since a unilateral moratorium was announced by Russia and Syria on October 18 “in response to the UN call, and as a goodwill gesture.”
“If you have any information that there were any missile and bomb strikes, please provide this information,” Churkin said, adding he expected an “objective analysis” of the current situation.
Churkin also criticized the UN for failing “to thrash out in a proper way the operation on evacuation of the sick and injured people.”
“The UN staff members have failed to exert required pressure on patrons of the illegal armed units so that the militants could cooperate with humanitarian workers.”
The Russian ambassador also hit out at UN aid envoy Stephen O’Brien for bias and arrogance after claiming that Aleppo had become a “kill zone” under Russian and Syrian bombs.
The US, Britain and France rushed to his defense in one of the stormiest council sessions in weeks after Churkin accused O’Brien of failing to recognize that Russia and Syria had declared a humanitarian pause.
Churkin criticized the UN official for failing to present the facts objectively while foreign-backed rebels and al-Qaeda-linked terrorists are hampering a UN plan to evacuate the wounded from Aleppo.
“Please leave this kind of report to a novel that you might write one day,” the Russian ambassador told the UN official.
In Moscow, Russian Foreign Ministry said Takfiri militants continue to indiscriminately target residential neighborhoods of Aleppo, using makeshift rocket launchers, and preventing civilians from leaving the city’s militant-held east.
“Aircraft of the Russian aerospace forces and the Syrian air force have not been carrying out any flight closer than the 10-kilometer zone around the city of Aleppo for nine days,” ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said. Fighters from the so-called Free Syrian Army fire an anti-aircraft machine gun mounted near the northern Syrian village of Beraan north of Aleppo, Oct. 24, 2016. (Photo by AFP)
Warships won’t join Aleppo campaign
The Foreign Ministry also dismissed as absurd suggestions from NATO that a new Russian battle group heading to the Mediterranean would join the campaign against terrorists in Aleppo.
The rebuttal came after NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg warned on Tuesday that the ships could be used to launch more airstrikes.
Andrei Kelin, a senior Russian Foreign Ministry official, told the RIA news agency that Stoltenberg’s statement was unhelpful.
“The concerns are not based on anything as our planes have not come near Aleppo for nine days. Our battle group is in the Mediterranean. Our ships have always had a presence there,” said Kelin.
‘Double standards’
Meanwhile, Syria’s Ambassador to the United Nations Bashar al-Ja’afari denounced double standards towards the ongoing conflict in his country.
Ja’afari lashed out at the US for supporting the so-called moderate militants in eastern Aleppo. He said Takfiri terrorists are now in possession of US-built rockets. Syria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Bashar al-Ja’afari
He also slammed Turkey’s aggressive policies toward Syria amid US support, saying it violated the basics of international law.
Ja’afari said Saudi Arabia – another key ally of the West – is supporting terrorism while Wahhabi muftis are fanning the flames of bloodshed in Syria, Iraq and Yemen through their decrees.
The entire Syrian population, he said, is suffering from the militancy being sponsored by Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar and Israel.
Ja’afari called on all members of the UN Security Council to exercise their responsibilities concerning the establishment of security and peace across the globe.
‘No Russian, Syrian role in fatal Idlib raids’
In another development on Thursday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, rejected as “a lie” claims that Russian and Syrian warplanes had conducted fatal air raids in the northwestern province of Idlib.
She was reacting to reports that 22 children and six teachers were killed in airstrikes that hit a school and nearby areas in Idlib.
The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group linked to foreign-backed militants in Syria, later claimed “warplanes — either Russian or Syrian — carried out six strikes” in the Idlib village of Hass, where the school is located.
Zakharova further stressed “the Russian Federation has nothing to do with this terrible tragedy, with this attack,” adding that Moscow has called for an immediate investigation into the incident.
Commenting on the reports on Idlib airstrikes earlier in the day, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said “it’s horrible, horrible. I hope we were not involved.”
“It’s easy for me to say ‘no’ but I’m a responsible person. I need to see what our Defense Ministry is going to say,” he added. | 0 |
Few really believe former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has changed her mind about the virtues of free trade or the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Part of the reason is because, despite Clinton’s rhetoric, some of her closest allies say she is firmly in the corporate camp and a true free trader who supports NAFTA and TPP.
In 2012, Clinton called TPP “ the gold standard in trade agreements to open free, transparent, fair trade, the kind of environment that has the rule of law and a level playing field.”
On October 8, 2015, Clinton reversed her position and said she no longer supported TPP.
Clinton and her staff pushed back on claims that her reversal was political, but a recently released email from Wikileaks shows Clinton Campaign Manager Robby Mook uncertain about Clinton’s position as recently as March 1, 2015, not even a year before the reversal.
When informed on February 28 by White House Director of the Office of Political Strategy and Outreach David Simas that a bipartisan letter was being drafted by former cabinet officials in support of free trade, Mook responded:
I can’t recall where we landed exactly on trade. Is she going to say she supports it? Regardless of her position, signing a letter feels like poking the bear with labor to me.
Even Clinton’s staff didn’t now what her position was on trade in 2015? How could someone who had been in public life so long not know their own views?
The answer, of course, is that Clinton was likely waiting to see where the polling came out on TPP—a deal that largely resembles the one she helped negotiate as secretary of state. TPP does not poll well, especially among progressive Democrats, whom she was going to have to deal with in the then-future presidential primaries.
The problem for those opposing TPP is not Clinton’s current position, it is whether, as her friends say, she is going to reverse herself again if she becomes president and sign TPP into law.
The post TPP: Leaked Emails Show Clinton Staff Unsure of Trade Positions In 2015 appeared first on Shadowproof .
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Poor gut health and food allergies: More research is linking gut health to hormone regulation . Obesity Inflammation as a result of poor diet and a sedentary lifestyle Genetic susceptibility Toxicity in the form of exposure to pesticides, toxins, viruses, cigarettes, excessive alcohol, and harmful chemicals Excessive amounts of stress, as well as a lack of rest Natural Treatments For Hormonal Imbalances 1. Consume Healthy Fats Your body requires different types of fats — including saturated fat and cholesterol — to create hormones that help keep inflammation levels low, boost metabolism, and promote weight loss. Coconut oil and avocado are great sources. 2. Incorporate Healing Herbs Adaptogen herbs are a class of healing plants that work to promote hormone balance and fight off various diseases. Research has found that various adapotogens can improve thyroid function , reduce anxiety and depression , support adrenal gland functions , and more. Keep Evolving Your Consciousness Inspiration and all our best content, straight to your inbox. 3. Improve Your Gut Health Taking care of the gut is becoming of increasing concern, especially since it’s been found to cause autoimmune reactions, including arthritis and thyroid disorders . Many things contribute to an unhealthy gut, including: Antibiotics and medications like birth control Diets high in refined carbohydrates, sugar, and processed foods Diets low in fermentable fibers Dietary toxins such as industrial seed oils Chronic stress Chronic infections 4. Avoid Conventional Body Care Products Many commercial products are laden with potentially-harmful chemicals including: DEA, parabens, propylene glycol, and sodium lauryl sulfate. Instead, do your research and find natural products made with essential oils, coconut oil, shea butter, and castor oil. 5. Exercise Regularly (Especially Interval Training) High intensity interval training (HIIT) has been popularized in recent years for its ability to quickly and efficiently get and keep the body in shape, but the University of Notre Dame Medical School in Sydney also discovered that : “HIT is associated with increased patient compliance and improved cardiovascular and metabolic outcomes and is suitable for implementation in both healthy and ‘at risk’ populations.” 6 . Sleep More, Stress Less Seems easier said than done, right? But not getting enough sleep can mess with your hormone schedule. Cortisol, for example, is the primary stress hormone, and is regulated at midnight. If people go to bed late, they never find relief from their sympathetic flight/fight stress response. One report published in the Indian Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism found that : “Stress can lead to changes in the serum level of many hormones including glucocorticoids, catecholamines, growth hormone and prolactin.” 7. Limit Your Caffeine And Alcohol Consumption Caffeine can stay in your system for up to six hours, and the chemical can affect the central nervous system, raising your heart rate, increasing alertness, and altering the way your brain produces hormones. We’ve come to accept synthetic treatments as our first step toward bettering our health, but what’s even more important is understanding your condition, what causes it, and taking holistic approaches before succumbing to anything else.
The Sacred Science follows eight people from around the world, with varying physical and psychological illnesses, as they embark on a one-month healing journey into the heart of the Amazon jungle.
You can watch this documentary film FREE for 10 days by clicking here.
"If “Survivor” was actually real and had stakes worth caring about, it would be what happens here, and “The Sacred Science” hopefully is merely one in a long line of exciting endeavors from this group." - Billy Okeefe, McClatchy Tribune | 0 |
WASHINGTON — Former President George Bush, the 41st president, was in stable condition at a Houston hospital on Wednesday after doctors performed a procedure to clear his airway, his spokesman said. His wife, Barbara Bush, was also admitted to the medical center, Houston Methodist Hospital, on Wednesday morning “as a precaution after experiencing fatigue and coughing,” the spokesman, Jim McGrath, said in a statement. Mr. Bush, 92, was suffering from an acute respiratory problem stemming from pneumonia when he was admitted to the intensive care unit at the hospital. After initial reports of Mr. Bush’s hospitalization, his office said he was expected to return home by the weekend. Mr. Bush, who served as vice president from and president from refused to support Donald J. Trump for president in last year’s election and had already declined to attend Friday’s inauguration, citing health concerns. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, daughter of Robert F. Kennedy, said last fall that the former president had told her that he planned to vote for Hillary Clinton. His son, former President George W. Bush, and his wife, Laura, have announced that they plan to attend the inauguration, although former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida, who lost the Republican nomination to Mr. Trump, does not intend to be there. Also scheduled to be on hand are Mrs. Clinton and former President Bill Clinton, as well as former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn. | 1 |
BATON ROUGE, La. — He joined the Marines, served in Iraq and earned a Good Conduct Medal. He was an entrepreneur, a author, a nutrition and fitness counselor, a proponent of the American gospel of . He considered himself a lifestyle coach, even though he had failed in marriage, neglected to pay his taxes and was, at one point, living on $500 per month. He had also embarked on a spiritual quest to find his roots as a black man, traveling around Africa for two years. But Gavin Long’s life also became a web of paranoid ideas, a professed allegiance to an antigovernment “sovereign citizen” group and a belief that bloodshed was a better tool than peaceful protest in the fight against oppression. On Sunday, Mr. Long died in a parking lot just off a commercial street here in a shootout with the police. It was his 29th birthday. He killed three law enforcement officers and wounded three others. On Monday, law enforcement officials said Mr. Long had targeted officers, though his motives otherwise remained murky. Mr. Long had been a resident of Kansas City, Mo. and it is unclear what he was doing in Baton Rouge, though a video that appears to have been posted by him shows him in the Louisiana capital discussing the July 5 fatal police shooting of a fellow man, Alton B. Sterling, here. Though the police here have released little information about Mr. Long, a deeper portrait is beginning to emerge, based on a large trail left online. Many of these digital bread crumbs — web posts, YouTube videos and podcasts — are tied to Mr. Long’s given name, or some version of a new name, Cosmo Ausar Setepenra, which he filed court documents in Missouri to adopt in May 2015. (He never petitioned the court, so the name change was not legally binding, officials said.) Some of these posts and videos included biographical and personal information that aligned with the information released by the authorities. In an interview with a podcast host in March, Mr. Long identified himself as a member of the online community of targeted individuals, people who believe they are being harassed with weapons and by armies of stalkers. And in one YouTube video, he discusses the killings of men at the hands of police officers, including the death of Mr. Sterling, and advocates a bloody response instead of the protests that followed the deaths. “One hundred percent of revolutions, of victims fighting their oppressors,” Mr. Long said, “have been successful through fighting back, through bloodshed. Zero have been successful just over simply protesting. ” “You’ve got to stand on your rights, just like George Washington did, just like the other white rebels they celebrate and salute did,” he added. “That’s what Nat Turner did. That’s what Malcolm did. ” In Baton Rouge on Monday, the crime scene along Airline Highway was returning to normal. Bullet holes could be seen in a wall of the Hair Crown Beauty Supply store, where the shooting took place. The city had begun the process of mourning the police officers Mr. Long gunned down — including Montrell Jackson, 32, an and veteran of the Baton Rouge Police Department, who left behind a wife and son. On a podcast posted on iTunes and dated April, the speaker, who gives his name as Cosmo, gives a sketch of his life story. He says he grew up in Kansas City, and was a student until about middle school, when he became fat and started getting C’s. As a child, he was something of a hustler who made extra money by making loans and charging interest. “Say if I loaned out money to my family, even to my mother, I would make her pay me back, with interest,” he says. “If I loaned $20, I would make you pay me back $5 on Friday. ” He says he lost significant weight in high school, bought his first car at age 16 and joined the Marines. Mr. Long’s military records show he served from 2005 to 2010, including a deployment in Iraq. He was a sergeant and a data network specialist who earned several awards, including one for good conduct. He was also assigned to Okinawa, Japan, and several locations in Southern California. He attended Central Texas College at its Marine Corps Air Station Miramar site in San Diego and via distance education, earning an associate of arts degree. In 2011, court records show, he had an uncontested divorce from a woman named Aireyona Osha Hill. They listed that they had no children or assets and that Mr. Long earned $500 a month. Around this time, Mr. Long befriended a Kansas City schoolteacher who wished to remain anonymous because of the heinous nature of the shootings. The teacher said Mr. Long had taken interest in the Occupy Wall Street movement and culture, and sympathized with the views of the villain Bane, from the 2012 Batman film “The Dark Knight Rises” — particularly Bane’s vigilantism against corruption. But the man the teacher knew never spoke about violent solutions to the real world’s problems. “I’m surprised he took it as far as he did,” the teacher said Monday. “It doesn’t surprise me so much as he had an agenda against the government. He’d always talk about how the government was corrupt. ” By 2012, Mr. Long had moved — briefly, apparently — to Tuscaloosa, Ala. where he spent one semester at the University of Alabama. He majored in business. He made the dean’s list. The University of Alabama police had no interactions with him during his time there. Mike Mansur, a spokesman for the Jackson County prosecutor’s office, which covers most of Kansas City, said his office also had no record of contact with Mr. Long. He also attended Clark Atlanta University during the school year, and was in good academic standing, a university spokeswoman said. Although he claimed to be on the dean’s list there, he said he had dropped out, sold his two cars, gave away his possessions and traveled to Africa. Mr. Long appeared to be obsessed with the idea of for himself and for others, and he embraced more esoteric means of achieving those goals. While traveling to Burkina Faso, Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda, he said, he wrote three books, covering topics like “holistic detoxification for health, and success” the “ancient esoteric secrets of the Pineal Gland” and the “124 Universal Laws and their use in the Laws of the Cosmos. ” In 2015, Mr. Long filed the petition to change his name. In his statement of intent, he said he was a member of an “indigenous society” called the United Washitaw De Dugdahmoundyah Mu’ur nation. It was apparently a reference to the Empire Washitaw De Dugdahmoundyah. On its website, the group says it is “a multicultural, highly spiritual nation of aboriginal, indigenous Americans. ” The group is largely and subscribes to a “sovereign citizen” ideology holding that members are “no longer beholden to any form of government,” said Ryan Lenz, a senior writer for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups. On Monday morning, a man who answered a phone number on the website and said he was a leader of the group, Fredrix Joe Washington, said he had never heard of Mr. Long. “We are about peace — and especially not about going out and killing some police officers,” said Mr. Washington, 71. This year, court records show, a case was filed against Mr. Long for not paying his local earnings tax. Papers in that case were served on his address last month, and his mother accepted them, according to court records. Six days later, the tax case was dismissed. In many of his podcasts, Mr. Long expounds at length on dating and tips for men, arguing that they must display the characteristics of an “alpha” male. But a number of his other online offerings discuss the historical oppression of minorities, and America’s current racial problems. In a recent email he sent out to those interested in his ideas, he listed numerous instances of massacres of people. On July 8, Lance Scurvin, a podcast host in Orlando, Fla. posted a note from Mr. Long on his Facebook page that seemed to suggest that Mr. Long was feeling paranoid about his safety. Mr. Scurvin, who is known for lending a sympathetic ear to guests, had interviewed Mr. Long in the past. “I just want everyone to know that if anything may happen to me or with me, I am NOT affiliated with anybody, any group, nationality, association, religion, corporation, business, etc. ” the note said. Mr. Long traveled to Dallas after the killing of five police officers at a demonstration there on July 7. Chanattra Long, who is not related to Mr. Long, said he had come into her shop, the His and Hers Barber Shop, two days after that shooting and passed out copies of his book. “He pulled out a wad of money and said: ‘You think this is something? This is nothing,’” she recalled. She said he had spoken of being in Africa and of being able to speak five languages. She was startled at his boldness and assertiveness. She had never seen him before and had no idea why he entered her shop that day. “I could tell he wasn’t right, his demeanor, his aggressiveness,” she said. Still, Mr. Long made no mention of attacking police, she said. One of Mr. Long’s last videos, posted to YouTube but taken down as of Monday, shows him driving around Baton Rouge. He approaches a number of strangers apparently, and doles out stray nuggets of advice and wisdom, deploying the salty language of the street. He refers to himself as a life coach, a freedom strategist, a real estate entrepreneur, an author, a teacher and a motivational speaker. And he tells them about his book. “I want my people to succeed,” he says at one point. Later, he refers to “Arabs” and “Indians” who do not care about people, ostensibly except when the latter give them their money. At one point he uses the word “cracker,” apparently in reference to whites. He also makes a passing reference to the shooting of Mr. Sterling. “It’s two parts to freedom, bruh,” he says. “Knowing your rights and standing on your rights. They know we know our rights. ” But how many black people, he asked, stand on their rights? “And if you not standing on your rights then you have no rights. ” | 1 |
ST. PAUL — Demonstrators angered by the fatal police shooting of a black man during a suburban traffic stop kept vigil outside the governor’s mansion here Friday as officials urged calm and more details emerged about the officer who fired the shots. Officer Jeronimo Yanez, who was placed on administrative leave after the killing on Wednesday night of the driver, Philando Castile, was a member of the St. Anthony police for four years. He had earned a bachelor’s degree in law enforcement in 2010 and was honored by his college as a top student. In the years since graduating, he had posted online about a wedding and the birth of a child and settled into a suburban neighborhood. “He always wanted to dig deeper — what if this happened, or that happened,” said Christian Dobratz, one of Officer Yanez’s professors at Minnesota State University, Mankato. “I knew he was very big on wanting to work with others and serving a community,” he added. But even as Officer Yanez’s background became clearer, the specifics of the shooting that left Mr. Castile dead remained murky. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, which is investigating, has said little about why Officer Yanez and a colleague pulled Mr. Castile over on a stretch of suburban road near the state fairgrounds, or what led to the shooting. Much of what is known comes from a Facebook Live video by Mr. Castile’s girlfriend showing the emotional, gruesome aftermath. As that footage went viral online, protests have continued almost nonstop in St. Paul and the surrounding area, with activists calling for charges against Officer Yanez and a separate, federal investigation. In Falcon Heights, the suburb where Mr. Castile was shot, a group of university students and employees marched to the shooting scene to pay tribute Friday afternoon. And at the governor’s residence in a residential area of St. Paul, demonstrators continued to mingle outside the gates. The protests have been large, spirited and almost entirely peaceful, though one person was arrested and a police car was damaged early Friday near Gov. Mark Dayton’s home when demonstrations turned tense. So far, Justice Department officials have said they were monitoring the state investigation, but have not announced their own inquiry. John J. Choi, the prosecutor in Ramsey County, said he had urged the state agency investigating to be prompt and thorough, but did not offer a timeline on when a charging decision might be made. Mr. Choi, whose office will decide whether to bring charges, said he was unsure whether he would present the evidence to a grand jury or make the charging decision himself. Mr. Choi historically has used grand juries in police shooting cases and said he saw benefits in doing so, but that he would consider whether that was the right approach for Mr. Castile’s case. “I just need a little time and thought put into it,” Mr. Choi said at a news conference at his downtown office. “I think this is a very extraordinary case. ” If Mr. Choi opts to decide on charges himself, rather than presenting the case to grand jurors, he would be following his colleague in neighboring Hennepin County, which includes Minneapolis. The prosecutor there, who also had long used grand juries for police shootings, changed his policy and decided himself to not charge the Minneapolis officers involved in last year’s fatal shooting of Jamar Clark, another case that prompted widespread protests in this area. Governor Dayton, a Democrat, who angered some in law enforcement Thursday by saying he thought Mr. Castile probably would not have been shot if he were white, said Friday that he was standing by those comments. Mr. Dayton, who has at times mingled with the protesters outside his home, said he appreciated the demonstrators’ peaceful tone. On Friday, he said he planned to meet with pastors and civic leaders in the coming days, and called for people to “react nonviolently. ” “I make an appeal to everyone in Minnesota for calm, for understanding of this difficult time and the need for calm and nonviolence,” said Mr. Dayton, who also spoke of a shooting in Minneapolis on Friday that left a toddler dead. “We’ll get through this terrible time here in Minnesota if we can all recognize that and not take any actions that are going to exacerbate a very difficult situation. ” | 1 |
Erdoğan: Ben Türkiye'nin tamamını kontrol eden başmuhtarım © REUTERS/ Cumhurbaşkanlığı Cumhurbaşkanı Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, "Ben Türkiye'nin tamamını kontrol eden başmuhtarım" dedi.
Cumhurbaşkanı Tayyip Erdoğan 29. Muhtarlar Toplantısı'na "Ben Türkiye'nin tamamını kontrol eden başmuhtarım" sözleriyle başladı.
‘ARTIK İŞ KAPIYA GELDİKTEN SONRA MÜDAHALE DÖNEMİ BİTTİ'
Erdoğan, ‘terörle mücadele' konusuna değinerek savunmadan taarruza geçtiklerini belirterek "Artık tehditlerin kapımıza dayanmasını beklemeyeceğimiz. Yeni güvenlik anlayışı Türkiye'nin Suriye ve Irak'ta neden olduğunun en açık ifadesidir. Artık iş kapıya geldikten sonra müdahale dönemi bitti" dedi. © 2016 Sputnik. Tüm hakları saklıdır Kayıt Kayıt'a tıklayarak Gizlilik Politikası'nı kabul ettiğinizi ve kişisel verilerinizin Gizlilik Politikası'na uygun bir şekilde kullanılmasına onay verdiğinizi teyit edersiniz. Kayıt Kapat Topluluk kuralları Sputnik’teki kullanıcı hesapları veya sosyal ağ hesaplarıyla kullanıcıların tescil edilmesi ve yetkilendirilmesi aşağıdaki kuralların kullanıcılar tarafından bilindiğini ve kabul edildiğini gösterir: Kullanıcılar ulusal ve uluslararası kurallara riayet etmek, görüşmelerdeki diğer katılımcı ve gönderilerde adı geçen kişilere karşı saygılı davranmak zorundadır. Site yönetimi, sitenin genel kullanımı dışındaki herhangi bir dilde yapılan her türlü yorumu silme hakkına sahiptir. sputniknews.com’un bütün dillerdeki yayınlarına gönderilen her türlü yorum üzerinde oynama yapılabilir. Kullanıcı yorumları aşağıdaki durumlar halinde silinecektir; Mevcut gönderiyle alakalı değilse. Herhangi bir ırkçı, etnik, cinsiyetçi, dini veya içtimai esasa dayalı nefret söylemi ve ayrımcılık içeriyor ise veya azınlık hakları ihlal ediliyorsa. Ruhsal veya başka bir yönden zarar vererek, çocuk hakları ihlal ediliyorsa, Herhangi bir aşırı düşünce içeriyor veya yasa dışı eylemlere teşvik ediyorsa. Başka kullanıcılara, kişilere veya özel kuruluşa yönelik tehdit, itibara zarar verme veya ticari şöhret zedelemeye yönelik bir söylem içeriyorsa. Sputnik’e yönelik saygısızca bir söylem veya aşağılama içeriyorsa. Özel hayatın gizliliği ihlal ediliyor, üçüncü kişilerin onayı olmaksızın kişisel bilgiler yayınlanıyor veya haberleşme gizliliği ihlal ediliyorsa. Hayvanlara yönelik şiddet, işkenceden bahsediliyor veya bu tarz görüntüleri barındırıyorsa. İntihar yöntemlerine ilişkin söylemler veya buna yönelik bir teşvik içeriyorsa. Ticari amaç güdüyor, yasadışı siyasi kuruluş reklamı veya uygunsuz bir reklam içeriyor, ya da bu çeşit bilgi barındıran başka bir çevrimiçi kaynağa bağlantı gösteriliyorsa. Yetkilendirilmeksizin üçüncü kişilerin hizmetleri veya ürünlerin tanıtımı yapılıyorsa. Küfür, saldırı veya türevlerini içeren veya bu tanımlamaya uyan herhangi bir sözcüğe yönelik ipuçları içeriyorsa. Spam içeriyor, spam barındıran toplu mail hizmetlerinin ve çabuk zengin olma planı bulunduran içeriklerin reklamı yapılıyorsa. Uyuşturucu madde kullanımına teşvik ediliyor, bu maddelerin kullanımı ve üretimine yönelik bilgi içeriyorsa. Virüs veya kötü amaçlı yazılım içeriyorsa. Aynı temalı birçok yorumun gönderildiği örgütlü bir hareket planının parçasıysa (flash mob). Birçok tutarsız ve ilgisiz iletiyle tartışma sekmesi altında yığılma yaratıyorsa (flood yapma). Görgü kurallarına aykırı, her türlü saldırgan, küçük düşürücü ve kötüye kullanım bulunduran bir söylem barındırıyorsa (trolleme). Dilin standart kurallarına uygunsuz bir şekilde yazılmışsa (Çoğunlukla veya tamamen büyük harfle ya da cümle cümle ayırmamak gibi). Kullanıcı bu kurallardan herhangi birini ihlal eder veya sözü geçenlere yönelik ihlal belirtisi gösteren davranışta bulunursa, site yönetimi kullanıcının sayfaya erişimini engelleyebilir veya hiçbir bilgilendirme yapmaksızın kullanıcının hesabını silebilir. Kullanıcılar site moderatörleriyle adresinden iletişime geçerek hesaplarının erişime açılmasını talep edebilir. Moderatöre gönderilen e-postalar şunları içermelidir: Konu: Hesap geri alma/ erişime açılması yazdıkları, kullanıcı adı, hesaplarının silinmesi veya erişiminin engellenmesine yol açan davranışlarına yönelik bir açıklama. Site moderatörleri, iade etmeye veya erişime açılmaya uygun görmeleri halinde kullanıcı hesabını açacaktır. Kullanıcı hesabı yukarıdaki kuralların ihlalinin tekrarlanması halinde erişimi engellendiğinde yeniden alınamaz. Daha fazlası için: | 0 |
Thursday in preview clips of an interview with “‘Fox Friends,” White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Attorney General Jeff Sessions should not recuse himself over allegations that he met with Russian officials from a Washington Post story published late Wednesday night. He added Democrats were “continuing to push a false narrative for political purposes. ” Spicer said, “I think Senator Sessions did his job. He was asked very pointedly if there had been any contact with the Trump campaign in the capacity of him being a surrogate. There was not. He was 100 percent straight with the committee. He did he acknowledge that he met in his capacity as a United States senator on the Armed Services committee with the ambassador on a couple occasions, one being after he had given a speech and someone approached him. As you have seen, senators like Ted Cruz have come out and said this is a perfectly normal course of business. I think this is Democrats continuing to push a false narrative for political purposes. ” He added, “There is nothing to recuse himself. He was 100 percent straight with the committee. And I think that people who are choosing to play partisan politics with this should be ashamed of themselves. ” Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN | 1 |
Friday in a portion of an interview that aired ABC, Chelsea Manning, a transgender former U. S. Army soldier that served seven years at the U. S. Disciplinary Barracks at Ft. Leavenworth after being convicted by a military tribunal for violating the Espionage Act, thanked former President Barack Obama. Obama, shortly before leaving office, commuted Manning’s sentence sentence to seven years. “Thank you,” Manning said to Obama in the interview ABC’s Juju Chang. “I’ve been given a chance,” Manning added. “That’s all I asked for was a chance. That’s it, and now this is my chance. ” Follow Breitbart. tv on Twitter @BreitbartVideo | 1 |
Daily Mail October 27, 2016 Republicans say they’ll keep the heat on Hillary Clinton if she wins the Oval Office with new investigations into her family charity and quid pro quo allegations. Judicial Watch, a conservative group that’s been at the forefront of Clinton’s email scandal, is already talking impeachment for the not-yet president. ‘I know this generation of Republican leaders is loath to exercise these tools, but impeachment is something that’s relevant,’ the organization’s president, Tom Fitton, told NBC News. Fitton noted, however, that congressional Republicans were unlikely to follow his advice. ‘They see [the oversight process] as an opportunity in some measure to keep their opponents off-kilter, but they don’t want to do the substantive and principled work to truly hold corrupt politicians, or the administration, or anyone accountable,’ he charged. Republicans on Capitol Hill are gearing up for a bevy of new investigations involving Clinton in the next Congress. 8:32 | 0 |
Motorola is Dead but Donbass lives on ‹ › Dr. Kevin Barrett, a Ph.D. Arabist-Islamologist, is one of America’s best-known critics of the War on Terror. He is Host of TRUTH JIHAD RADIO ; a hard driving weekly LIVE call in radio show. He also has appeared many times on Fox, CNN, PBS and other broadcast outlets, and has inspired feature stories and op-eds in the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, the Chicago Tribune, and other leading publications. Dr. Barrett has taught at colleges and universities in San Francisco, Paris, and Wisconsin, where he ran for Congress in 2008. He currently works as a nonprofit organizer, author, and talk radio host. I beat the ban in Berkeley – still censored in Sacramento By Kevin Barrett on October 26, 2016
by Kevin Barrett , Veterans Today Editor
Thanks to members of the Social Justice Committee of the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists, a large and enthusiastic crowd turned out for my talk on “Recent False Flags” yesterday. It was a triumph of free speech in the city that gave the world the Free Speech Movement.
But unlike last year’s talk (watch it here ) this one wasn’t held at BFUU.
Why not? One member of the BFUU Social Justice Community, a certain Holly Harwood, demanded that my scheduled event be canceled because (she libelously claimed) I am a “Jew hater” and “homophobe.”
Not one member of the Social Justice Committee supported her.
So Holly Harwood started inundating the BFUU Board with lies and distortions about me and my books. The Board, which apparently includes some “stealth Zionists” who got themselves elected by concealing their pro-Israel loyalties, went along with her.
Harwood’s vicious vilification campaign only succeeded in increasing the turnout for my talk, which was held at Redwood Gardens instead of BFUU. But Harwood didn’t get the message. Now she has managed to censor another Berkeley free speech institution: Bonnie Faulkner’s legendary Guns and Butter radio show.
Today’s broadcast, which goes out on KPFA Berkeley and other Pacifica stations, features most of an interview Bonnie recorded with me last week. Unfortunately, after more mendacious complaints from Holly Harwood, Bonnie was apparently forced to cut the final six minutes of the interview, which features me explaining how and why I was banned at BFUU. Here is the censored “Guns and Butter” segment (please spread it far and wide so the censorship backfires):
The last place on earth I would ever expect ANY censorship of ANYTHING is Berkeley, California. And the last two places in Berkeley I would EVER expect to be censored are the Unitarian Church and the Guns and Butter radio show!
Did I fall into a black hole and emerge into a Bizarro World counter-universe where Berkeley Unitarians are authoritarians and censors, and it’s the Bible-thumping Baptists of Alabama who are at the cutting edge of free speech, free thought, and unfettered intellectual inquiry? Memo to the Association of Alabama Baptists: Please invite this “radical Muslim conspiracy theorist” to speak at your freedom-loving church!
And it gets worse. I will be speaking in Sacramento tonight, and guess who’s blocking the news? The main local leader of the 9/11 truth movement!
David Kimball, who runs Sacramento 9/11 Truth, has sponsored and/or helped publicize all of my previous talks in the area. Yet this time he wouldn’t return my repeated phone calls. Finally, weeks after I had started calling him, I got this email:
From: David Kimball <…> Sent: Friday, October 21, 2016 11:42 PM Subject: Re: Sacramento event October 26th
Hi Kevin.
I’ve received your phone messages and email, and my apologies for this late response.
In recent years I’ve continued to research 9/11 more thoroughly, and although you and I are still in agreement that the “official narrative” of 9/11 cannot be true and that the media perpetuates the Big Lie, my views about 9/11 are no longer in agreement with yours.
Therefore, I cannot in good conscience promote your upcoming speaking event.
Sincerely, | 0 |
POTUS has treated our friends like enemies and our enemies like friends. I guess that's what hopeless chains is supposed to be though. The condition of urban schools has gotten much worse while 4 billion in cash goes to our mortal enemy, Iran. Yet urban blacks will still vote for Hillary. This I blame on the 3rd political party, Pravda, FKA the American media. | 0 |
The MIT Technology Review recently published an article demonstrating that Google’s new comment detection system, Perspective, seems to have difficulty differentiating offensive words or controversial subjects from actual hate speech. [Breitbart previously reported on the “hate speech” detection software, designed to help online publications clear their article comment sections of any offensive content that could potentially be applied to other Internet platforms. The MIT Technology Review decided to test the accuracy of the software, which analyzes comments on a scale of for “toxicity. ” Toxic comments are defined by the program as “a rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable comment that is likely to make you leave a discussion. ” “Trump sucks” scored a colossal 96 percent, yet codeword “ ” only scored 5 percent. “Few Muslims are a terrorist threat” was 79 percent toxic, while “race war now” scored 24 percent. “Hitler was an ” scored 70 percent, but “Hitler was not an ” scored only 53% and “The Holocaust never happened” scored only 21%. And while “gas the joos” scored 29 percent, rephrasing it to “Please gas the joos. Thank you. ” lowered the score to a mere 7 percent. (“Jews are human,” however, scores 72 percent. “Jews are not human”? 64 percent.) The MIT Technology Review believes the system is designed to detect particular words and phrases in a sentence that may be deemed offensive but does not account for the meaning behind these words. In an example, the word “rape” scored a toxicity rating as high as 77 percent when detected by the program, but a statement such as “rape is a horrible crime” actually rated higher at 81 percent. Curse words receive similar treatment: “I fucking love this” was rated at a 94 percent on the toxicity scale, which is supposed to indicate if a comment is “rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable. ” We may say “Trolls are stupid” (toxicity score 96 percent) but the language of toxicity and harassment is often rich in ways that systems can’t handle. The comment “You should be made into a lamp,” an allusion to claims that skin from concentration camp victims was used for lampshades, has been thrown at a number of journalists and other public figures in recent months. It scores just 4 percent on Perspective. But best not reply by saying “You are a Nazi,” because that’s an 87 percent. Read the full article by MIT Technology Review here. Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan_ or email him at lnolan@breitbart. com | 1 |
Saudi Arabia Deliberately Targeting Impoverished Yemens Farms
Increasing evidence suggests Kingdom is not merely bombing civilians in neighbouring country, but systematically targeting infrastructure survivors will need to avoid starvation when the war is over
By Robert Fisk " The Independent " - The Yemen war uniquely combines tragedy, hypocrisy and farce. First come the casualties: around 10,000, almost 4,000 of them civilians. Then come those anonymous British and American advisers who seem quite content to go on helping the Saudi onslaughts on funerals, markets and other obviously (to the Brits, I suppose) military targets.
Then come the Saudi costs: more than $250m (Ł200m) a month, according to Standard Chartered Bank and this for a country that cannot pay its debts to construction companies. But now comes the dark comedy bit: the Saudis have included in their bombing targets cows, farms and sorghum which can be used for bread or animal fodder as well as numerous agricultural facilities.
In fact, there is substantial evidence emerging that the Saudis and their coalition allies and, I suppose, those horrid British advisers are deliberately targeting Yemens tiny agricultural sector in a campaign which, if successful, would lead a post-war Yemeni nation not just into starvation but total reliance on food imports for survival. Much of this would no doubt come from the Gulf states which are currently bombing the poor country to bits.
Mundy points out that a conservative report from the ministry of agriculture and irrigation in the Yemeni capital Sanaa, gathered from its officers across the country , details 357 bombing targets in the countrys 20 provinces, including farms, animals, water infrastructure, food stores, agricultural banks, markets and food trucks.
These include the destruction of farms in Yasnim, the Baqim district of Saadah province and in Marran. Mundy has compared these attacks with figures in the Yemen Data Project, which was published some weeks ago. Her verdict is a most unhappy one.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, 2.8 per cent of Yemens land is cultivated, Mundy says. To hit that small amount of agricultural land, you have to target it. Saudi Arabia has already been accused of war crimes, but striking at the agriculture fields and food products of Yemen in so crude a way adds merely another grim broken promise by the Saudis.
The kingdom signed up to the additional protocol of the August 1949 Geneva Conventions which specifically states that it is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, such as foodstuffs, agricultural areas for the production of foodstuffs, crops, livestock for the specific purpose of denying them for their sustenance value to the civilian population whatever the motive
The fact that Yemen has long been part of Saudi Arabias proxy war against Shiites and especially Iran which has been accused, without evidence, of furnishing weapons to the Shia Houthi in Yemen is now meekly accepted as part of the Middle Easts current sectarian narrative (like the good rebels in eastern Aleppo and the very bad rebels in Mosul). So, alas, have the outrageous bombings of civilians. But agricultural targets are something altogether different.
Academics have been amassing data from Yemen which strongly suggests that the Saudis Yemen campaign contains a programme for the destruction of rural livelihood.
Martha Mundy, emeritus professor at the London School of Economics, who is currently working in Lebanon with her colleague Cynthia Gharios, has been researching through Yemeni agriculture ministry statistics and says that the data is beginning to show that in some regions, the Saudis are deliberately striking at agricultural infrastructure in order to destroy the civil society.
In a lecture in Beirut, Mundy has outlined the grievous consequences of earlier economic policies in Yemen cheap American wheat from the 1970s and the influx of food from other countries which discouraged farmers from maintaining rural life (terracing of farms, for example, or water husbandry) and the effect of Saudi Arabias war on the land. The armies and above all air forces of the oil-dollar, she said, have come to destroy physically those products of Yemeni labour working with land and animals that survived the earlier economic devastation.
There are photographs aplenty of destroyed farms, factories and dead animals lying in fields strewn with munitions effectively preventing farmers returning to work for many months or years. Poultry and beehive farms have been destroyed.
Even today, more than half the population of Yemen relies in part or wholly on agriculture and rural husbandry. Mundys research through the files of other ministries suggests that technical support administration buildings for agriculture were also attacked. The major Tihama Development Authority on the Red Sea coastal plain, which was established in the 1970s and houses, as Mundy says, the written memory of years of development interventions is responsible for a series of irrigation structures. It has been heavily bombed twice.
But I guess that one war or two in the Middle East is as much as the world can take right now. Or as much as the media are prepared to advertise. Aleppo and Mosul are quite enough. Yemen is too much. And Libya. And Palestine
A picture and its story: Severe malnutrition in Yemen
By Abduljabbar Zeyad | HODAIDA, Yemen
" Reuters " - The emaciated frame of 18-year-old Saida Ahmad Baghili lies on a hospital bed in the red sea port city of Hodaida, her suffering stark evidence of the malnutrition spread by Yemen's 19-month civil war.
Baghili arrived at the Al Thawra hospital on Saturday. She is bed-ridden and unable to eat, surviving on a diet of juice, milk and tea, medical staff and a relative said.
"The problem is malnutrition due to (her) financial situation and the current (war) situation at this time," Asma Al Bhaiji, a nurse at the hospital, told Reuters on Tuesday.
The 18-year-old is one of more than 14 million people, over half of Yemens population, who are short of food, with much of the country on the brink of famine, according to the United Nations.
Her picture is a reminder of the humanitarian crisis in the Arabian Peninsula's poorest country where at least 10,000 people have been killed in fighting between Saudi-led Arab coalition and the Iran-allied Houthi movement.
Baghili is from the small village of Shajn, about 100 km (60 miles) southwest of the city of Hodaida, and used to work with sheep before developing signs of malnutrition five years ago, according to her aunt, Saida Ali Baghili.
"She was fine. She was in good health. There was nothing wrong with her. And then she got sick," Ali Baghili told Reuters.
"She has been sick for five years. She cant eat. She says her throat hurts."
After the war began, Baghili's condition deteriorated with her family lacking the money for treatment.
She lost more weight and in the last two months developed diarrhoea.
"Her father couldnt (afford to) send her anywhere (for treatment) but some charitable people helped out, Ali Baghili said, without elaborating who the donors were.
(Writing by Patrick Johnston in LONDON Editing by Alison Williams) | 0 |
0 comments It is meant to be fun, but this video actually reveals quite a bit about 50 BMG ballistics. Surprisingly, the Internet is blowing up about our hero’s political hat, as well. Happy Halloween! The .50 Browning Machine Gun, or 50 BMG, is simply terrifying. The 12/7 X 99 MM NATO cartridge was developed in the late 1910’s, and has been manufactured in a number of variants: regular ball, armor piercing, tracer, incendiary, or even saboted sub-caliber rounds. Some rifles, like the one in this video, use magazines, while machine guns often use metallic links. The round is based on a scaled-up .30-06 cartridge and the ballistics are completely insane! Snipers can fire at long ranges, more than a mile away, and avoid contact with the enemy by changing positions on retreating before they are discovered. Modern 50 BMG rounds can produce between 10,000 and 15,000 foot pounds of energy while suffering from less drift from cross-winds than smaller, lighter projectiles. Originally, John Browning intended for this round to be used in World War I anti-aircraft weapons. Armor-piercing incendiary variants were proven to be effective not only against aircraft, but also structures, concrete bunkers, and some armored vehicles. There are a number of military and law enforcement applications for the 50 BMG round. The US Coast Guard uses it to disable boat engines, often firing from a helicopter. Similarly, police departments use the round to disable vehicles by firing it into the engine block. As mentioned earlier, military snipers have used the round for some time, with Marine Carlos Hathcock recording a successful shot at 2,286 yards! The longest confirmed kill with a 50 BMG has been credited to Canadian Army Corporal Rob Furlong, who shot a combatant in Afghanistan at 2,657 yards in 2002. So, the 50 BMG is effective in a number of ways. Many consider it to be effective at creating massive amounts of fun. No doubt, firing this awesome round through a big pile of pumpkins qualifies. Enjoy, and Happy Halloween! | 0 |
WARSAW — The Polish Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a government request to extradite Roman Polanski, the filmmaker, to the United States over a conviction for having sex with a girl. The decision almost certainly ends the legal battle in Poland over how to deal with Mr. Polanski, although as a practical matter, even a ruling in favor of the government would have had little effect. Mr. Polanski, a dual citizen of France and Poland, lives in France, which does not extradite its citizens. Judge Michal Laskowski ruled that a lower court’s verdict was not a “flagrant violation of the law,” as the request for an appeal had claimed. “The regional court of Krakow considered and verified all evidence exceptionally carefully,” Judge Laskowski said. The legal effort reflects a broader push by the conservative Law and Justice government, which since coming to power a year ago has been calling for a return to Roman Catholic values in Poland, to try to reinforce its reputation as a party. The ruling on Tuesday came six months after the chief prosecutor and justice minister, Zbigniew Ziobro, asked the court to overrule the earlier verdict as the government sought to extradite Mr. Polanski, whom authorities in the United States have wanted for decades. A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice said that Mr. Ziobro “accepts and respects” the Supreme Court’s decision, although he still “takes the position that proceedings concerning sexual abuse of minors should be enforced consistently” regardless of who committed the crime, or when it occurred. Mr. Polanski was arrested in 1977 on charges that included the rape of the teenager at the Los Angeles home of Jack Nicholson, the actor. In 1978, Mr. Polanski left the United States on the eve of sentencing under an agreement by which he was to plead guilty to a count of statutory rape. In October 2015, a judge in Krakow, Poland, ruled that turning over Mr. Polanski would be an “obviously unlawful” deprivation of liberty, saying that the State of California, where he was convicted, was unlikely to conduct a fair trial and provide humane conditions of confinement for the director, who was 82 at the time. The Krakow prosecutor’s office, which had sought Mr. Polanski’s extradition on behalf of Los Angeles County, said a month later that it would abide by the judge’s ruling. But Mr. Ziobro appealed the decision to the Supreme Court at the end of May, calling the trial judge’s ruling “incomprehensible” and a “serious breach” of the extradition agreement between Poland and the United States. Mr. Ziobro said in an interview with Polish state radio in May that Mr. Polanski had received preferential treatment because of his fame. “If he was just a regular guy, a teacher, doctor, plumber, decorator, then I’m confident that he’d have been deported from any country to the U. S. a long time ago,” he said. In his opening statement on Tuesday, Jan Olszewski, a lawyer for Mr. Polanski, recalled how the Swiss authorities had declined in 2010 to extradite Mr. Polanski, who directed “Chinatown,” because of doubts over the conduct of the judge in his original trial. Jerzy Stachowicz, another lawyer for Mr. Polanski, argued in court that his client had not technically fled the United States because he had never been prohibited from leaving. “Mr. Polanski didn’t flee, as it is believed,” Mr. Stachowicz said. “He simply bought a plane ticket, checked in his luggage and boarded a plane. It was not fleeing. ” Referring to Mr. Ziobro’s argument, Mr. Stachowicz said, “If Mr. Polanski were not a celebrity, a famous filmmaker, but he was an average Joe, this case would have been over long ago, and nobody would have ever heard of it. ” The Supreme Court ruling means that Mr. Polanski, now 83, would be free to work in Poland. He has been planning to make a film about Alfred Dreyfus, a French Jew who was wrongly accused of spying and whose case raised a debate in the late 19th century about prosecutorial misconduct. The film, “An Officer and a Spy,” was to be shot in Poland, but it was announced in June that Mr. Polanski had decided to make it in France. That prompted speculation that his legal problems had led him to move production of the film, but Robert Benmussa, the film’s producer, attributed the decision to French tax incentives, according to The Los Angeles Times. Mr. Polanski, who lives with his wife in France, was not in court on Tuesday. “This is just too emotional for him,” Mr. Stachowicz said by telephone on Monday, before the ruling. “This has been going on for such a long time. A ruling against overruling the first verdict would be a great relief for him. ” After the ruling, Mr. Olszewski, the lawyer, said that he had spoken with Mr. Polanski on the phone. “He is currently in France, where he is shooting his new film,” Mr. Olszewski said. “He is beyond happy that this is finally over. At least in Poland. ” | 1 |
It Was the Rise of the Davos Class That Sealed Americas Fate
Hillary Clintons embrace of neoliberalism was disastrous. The only answer now is to take on the billionaires
By Naomi Klein
November 10, 2016 " Information Clearing House " - " The Guardian " - They will blame James Comey and the FBI. They will blame voter suppression and racism. They will blame Bernie or bust and misogyny. They will blame third parties and independent candidates. They will blame the corporate media for giving him the platform, social media for being a bullhorn, and WikiLeaks for airing the laundry.
But this leaves out the force most responsible for creating the nightmare in which we now find ourselves wide awake: neoliberalism. That worldview fully embodied by Hillary Clinton and her machine is no match for Trump-style extremism. The decision to run one against the other is what sealed our fate. If we learn nothing else, can we please learn from that mistake?
Here is what we need to understand: a hell of a lot of people are in pain. Under neoliberal policies of deregulation, privatisation, austerity and corporate trade, their living standards have declined precipitously. They have lost jobs. They have lost pensions. They have lost much of the safety net that used to make these losses less frightening. They see a future for their kids even worse than their precarious present.
At the same time, they have witnessed the rise of the Davos class, a hyper-connected network of banking and tech billionaires, elected leaders who are awfully cosy with those interests, and Hollywood celebrities who make the whole thing seem unbearably glamorous. Success is a party to which they were not invited, and they know in their hearts that this rising wealth and power is somehow directly connected to their growing debts and powerlessness.
For the people who saw security and status as their birthright and that means white men most of all these losses are unbearable.
Donald Trump speaks directly to that pain. The Brexit campaign spoke to that pain. So do all of the rising far-right parties in Europe. They answer it with nostalgic nationalism and anger at remote economic bureaucracies whether Washington, the North American free trade agreement the World Trade Organisation or the EU. And of course, they answer it by bashing immigrants and people of colour, vilifying Muslims, and degrading women. Elite neoliberalism has nothing to offer that pain, because neoliberalism unleashed the Davos class. People such as Hillary and Bill Clinton are the toast of the Davos party. In truth, they threw the party.
Trumps message was: All is hell. Clinton answered: All is well. But its not well far from it.
Neo-fascist responses to rampant insecurity and inequality are not going to go away. But what we know from the 1930s is that what it takes to do battle with fascism is a real left. A good chunk of Trumps support could be peeled away if there were a genuine redistributive agenda on the table. An agenda to take on the billionaire class with more than rhetoric, and use the money for a green new deal. Such a plan could create a tidal wave of well-paying unionised jobs, bring badly needed resources and opportunities to communities of colour, and insist that polluters should pay for workers to be retrained and fully included in this future. It could fashion policies that fight institutionalised racism, economic inequality and climate change at the same time. It could take on bad trade deals and police violence, and honour indigenous people as the original protectors of the land, water and air.
People have a right to be angry, and a powerful, intersectional left agenda can direct that anger where it belongs, while fighting for holistic solutions that will bring a frayed society together.
Such a coalition is possible. In Canada, we have begun to cobble it together under the banner of a peoples agenda called The Leap Manifesto , endorsed by more than 220 organisations from Greenpeace Canada to Black Lives Matter Toronto, and some of our largest trade unions.
Bernie Sanders amazing campaign went a long way towards building this sort of coalition, and demonstrated that the appetite for democratic socialism is out there. But early on, there was a failure in the campaign to connect with older black and Latino voters who are the demographic most abused by our current economic model. That failure prevented the campaign from reaching its full potential. Those mistakes can be corrected and a bold, transformative coalition is there to be built on.
That is the task ahead. The Democratic party needs to be either decisively wrested from pro-corporate neoliberals, or it needs to be abandoned. From Elizabeth Warren to Nina Turner, to the Occupy alumni who took the Bernie campaign supernova, there is a stronger field of coalition-inspiring progressive leaders out there than at any point in my lifetime. We are leaderful, as many in the Movement for Black Lives say.
So lets get out of shock as fast as we can and build the kind of radical movement that has a genuine answer to the hate and fear represented by the Trumps of this world. Lets set aside whatever is keeping us apart and start right now.
Naomi Klein is the author of This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs the Climate . She tweets @NaomiAKlein | 0 |
Over its existence, the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank and its founder, Masayoshi Son, have been known for ambitious and sometimes moves. Now, SoftBank is nearing its most unusual move yet: It is buying Fortress Investment Group, an American private equity giant that oversees around $70 billion in assets. That business is a radical departure from the technology and telecommunications holdings for which the Japanese company is known. But the acquisition is intended to energize SoftBank’s other enormous new endeavor: a $100 billion technology investment fund that threatens to roil the private equity world. The move highlights the immense ambitions of SoftBank’s brash founder, Mr. Son. The mogul, who is one of Japan’s richest men, has sought to shake up the American telecommunications industry and recently sought to win over President Trump by announcing intentions to create jobs in the United States. “Fortress’s excellent track record speaks for itself, and we look forward to benefiting from its leadership, expertise and investment platform,” Mr. Son said in a statement late Tuesday. “For SoftBank, this opportunity will immediately help expand our group capabilities, and, alongside our SoftBank Vision Fund platform, will accelerate our SoftBank 2. 0 transformation strategy of bold, disciplined investment and world class execution to drive sustainable growth. ” Over the past three decades, SoftBank has become one of Japan’s most formidable technology companies. It is perhaps best known for its telecommunications empire, which stretches from Japan to Sprint in the United States. SoftBank also has portfolio of investments that includes stakes in the Alibaba Group of China, the Japanese affiliate of Yahoo and like the online lender SoFi. At its helm, the entire time, has been Mr. Son. An businessman, Mr. Son began the business as a software distributor, but eventually moved into cellphone service and became the first Japanese carrier to embrace the iPhone. He has never been known for his modesty, repeatedly boasting about outsize ambitions like dethroning Verizon and ATT atop the American wireless industry with Sprint. SoftBank will be paying $3. 3 billion for Fortress, a premium to the company’s stock market value of $2. 3 billion. As part of the agreement, SoftBank has the option of bringing in partners to help cover the cost of the deal and who may want to become investors in Fortress funds, too, thus increasing assets under management. The deal frees up Peter L. Briger Jr. and Wesley R. Edens of Fortress to focus on their strengths as fund managers — several of their private equity funds have produced returns over time — without having to deal with the headaches of running a public company. As leaders of a public company, they struggled mightily to bolster their stock, more so than their competitors. Recently, the firm shut down its flagship hedge fund. The purchase of Fortress, a prominent private equity firm with a specialty in investing in distressed assets, was driven by Rajeev Misra, a former top derivatives expert at Deutsche Bank who has taken a leading role in setting investment strategy for the SoftBank Vision Fund. After leaving Deutsche Bank in 2008, where he had worked closely with Anshu Jain, who headed the bank’s global markets operations, Mr. Misra went to UBS and then spent several months at Fortress, where he came to know the firm’s chairmen, Mr. Briger and Mr. Edens, well. Now, Mr. Misra will be helping steer an enormous new fund that is intended to invest in technology companies worldwide, often by taking huge stakes. SoftBank is expected to contribute at least $25 billion to the fund, while partners in the fund include Saudi Arabia and Apple. All told, SoftBank will now oversee assets under management of $170 billion, making it one of the largest private investors in the world after the Blackstone Group, which manages about $330 billion. While private equity firms have performed poorly as publicly traded stocks, they are attractive in part because of their ability to lock up money for multiple years and charge high fees. As an entity that is regulated — if relatively lightly compared with, say, a bank — Fortress will have to operate at arm’s length from the $100 billion Vision Fund when it comes to making investments. And the team of investors under Mr. Misra and Mr. Son will also remain unchanged. Still, it expected that there will be ample opportunity for the Vision Fund to benefit from shared intelligence between the two entities. That could mean Fortress seeing a deal in a telecommunications company that does not fit its mandate and passing it along to the Vision Fund. The transaction also widens the Vision Fund’s capacity to source new investments, given Fortress’s global network. For Fortress, the motivation was to join with one of the world’s most innovative investors and to enter global markets, like the Middle East, where they have trailed some of their peers. Fortress went public on the New York Stock Exchange in 2007, before the financial crisis. But shares of Fortress, like shares of other publicly traded private equity firms, have performed poorly in recent years. Fortress’s stock price is down 80 percent since it began trading, and its executives have made no secret that the joy of being a public company has largely evaporated. The firm’s struggles trace to the financial crisis, when it was slow to exit the subprime loan business, forcing heavy losses. The stock dipped below $1, and the firm did not consistently return to profitability until 2012. At the same time, Mr. Edens positioned the firm to capitalize on the economic recovery, piling back into the subprime business through its purchase of the mortgage servicer Nationstar and consumer lender Springleaf, now known as OneMain Financial. Mr. Edens, a former Lehman Brothers partner who Fortress, has turned the firm’s $124 million Springleaf investment into a stake valued at roughly $2 billion. Those investments underscore Fortress’s breadth across the American economy. As detailed in a New York Times investigation last year, Fortress is one of several private equity firms that have assumed a pervasive and influential role in daily American life, stepping in for banks that pulled back in the aftermath of the financial crisis. Under the terms of the deal, Fortress will become an independent subsidiary of SoftBank. Fortress’s principals, who control roughly a third of the firm’s voting shares, have agreed to vote in favor of the sale, which is expected to close by year’s end. On Tuesday, before the deal was announced, shares of Fortress rose 6. 5 percent on unusually heavy trading volume. | 1 |
Times Insider delivers insights into life at The New York Times. In a large newsroom, the collaboration between a reporter and a photographer often depends on the whims of their respective assigning editors, who calculate strengths, weaknesses, and, most of all, availability. Who’s up to cover that fire? Who’s up to shoot it? The resulting slapdash teamwork between writer and photographer can end as quickly as it began they may work together the next day, or never again. But for many years now, I have been fortunate to work with exceptional New York Times photographers for extended periods of time while writing a national column called “This Land. ” Lately, I have been collaborating with Todd Heisler, a stunningly gifted photographer and a great companion. Before Todd, I traveled for several years beside the recently retired Nicole Bengiveno, whose profound empathy comes through in her camera’s every click, and who deserves some formal commendation for having put up with a certain hack — me — for so long. And before Nicole, there was Ángel Franco, who retired last month to end a storied Times career — and who began the “This Land” column with me 10 years ago this month. The template for our relationship — indeed, for “This Land” — was established in early 2007, as we headed out to do our inaugural column, one on Logan, a small West Virginia city struggling with a fatal mine disaster and the decline of King Coal. Mr. Franco and I began by walking the streets, noticing: the coal train running through the city’s core the dust settling on buildings along the tracks and the Jesus Christ carved from anthracite, prominent in a store’s window display. Noticing — that was the word for it. At one point we went to a small diner, and engaged in a brief exchange with the waitress. After she had taken our order, I asked, “Did you hear what she said?” And Mr. Franco repeated her words exactly: “‘Are we ready yet, children? ’” There it was. As with Todd and Nicole, as with so many other photographers — and may God forgive any reporter who uses the term “my photographer” — Mr. Franco is an attentive observer, witnessing and listening always. In that diner, I knew that my Times colleague embraced the storytelling worth of the small and quiet moment. This is going to be fun, I thought. For the next two years, Mr. Franco and I produced a column a week, just about, and wound up filing dispatches from each of the 50 states. This, of course, was madness. Our weeks would often begin on Monday at Newark Liberty International Airport, and end on Friday, or Saturday, even Sunday, with frantic efforts to figure out where to go to next. Louisiana? Montana? Maine? (The only way we were able to maintain some semblance of sanity, by the way, was by having the great Cate Doty help us with possible story ideas, travel logistics and dinner recommendations she was a full partner in this misbegotten venture. I also owe a debt of gratitude to then National desk editor, Suzanne Daley, and then deputy national editor, David Firestone, both of whom were integral in allowing “This Land” to begin.) You can look it up. We went to a retirement home in Penney Farms, Fla. to visit the coroner in “The Wizard of Oz. ” To Havana, Ill. to report on the Asian carp infesting the Illinois River. To Kalaupapa, Hawaii, to meet the last residents of a colony to which those with leprosy, also known as Hansen’s disease, were once relegated. To Nashville to witness an execution by electric chair. To Bethel, Alaska, to explore the games of bootleggers. To Bill, Wyo. — population five, maybe — to stay in a new hotel catering to railway workers. To Cottage Grove, Wis. to meet the pastor who baptized Jeffrey Dahmer in a prison whirlpool. To Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, to uncover the intrigue at a county fair’s . To Denver, to cover the annual convention of the Sovereign Grand Lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows (where we felt perfectly at home). Kalispell, Mont. Lake Mead, Nev. Ainsworth, Neb. Newport, Ind. Pascagoula, Miss. Greensburg, Kan. Hollywood, Md. Sylva, N. C. The datelines blur into one American story, captured in all its breadth by Mr. Franco and his camera. I often had no idea what to do for the next column. One Saturday morning, while scanning online newspapers for ideas, I noticed a news brief about a farewell breakfast in a V. F. W. hall in Mohave Valley, Ariz. for a high school graduate named Resha Kane. After the meal, she was to be taken by motorcycle escort to Las Vegas, to catch a flight to Fort Hood, where she would begin her Army career in exchange for college tuition. I called my good friend Mr. Franco — who, of course, got it immediately. We flew out the next day, and were present when Ms. Kane, who looked much younger than her 18 years, said her goodbyes. Mr. Franco’s memorable photograph of this young woman in fatigues, saying goodbye to her father — the fear of her unknown, of our unknown, conveyed in her eyes — hangs in the newsroom. Once again he had noticed, and captured, that small and quiet moment. Working closely with Mr. Franco for two years, I could not help but be blown away by his fierce dedication to his art, by his determination to capture a moment’s essence — and by his unflagging reportorial curiosity, which led to my favorite moments on assignment: the evening debriefing. Sitting in a booth at a Chili’s or Texas Roadhouse hard against some interstate, Mr. Franco and I would pore over what we had just seen and heard, comparing notes, dissecting motives, framing The Story to come. One modest testament to Mr. Franco’s art is in how I remember our travels. It’s not my opening paragraphs or closing kickers that I recall, but rather Mr. Franco’s photographs, which return me so completely to the Mississippi despair of a FEMA trailer, to the joy of a small Maine amusement park, to the expansive wonder of a remote South Dakota spot known as the Center of the Nation. It is a rare privilege to see this great country, in all its heartbreaking, wonder, on the dime of your employer. A rarer privilege, still, to have also seen it through the eyes of Ángel Franco. | 1 |
Words are battling in my head and I cannot truly form a sentence empty of frustration.
The phone is barely ringing to Aleppo. And, when they finally pick up, no word is discernible. The internet connection is cut. There’s no actual way of reaching anyone, to make sure your loved ones are safe.
This is West Aleppo.
A few days ago, a school was targeted, A SCHOOL Six children, six innocent lives, only there to getaway from the atrocity that is war, to learn, to reach a future, taken away, leaving torn families behind.
This is West Aleppo.
Yesterday, as the situation was getting worse and worse, my aunts and their families found themselves forced to seek what’s left of safety and refuge, at my grandmother’s house.
This is West Aleppo.
My friend wondering if he will survive one more month in this bloodshed because everyone around is dying.
This is West Aleppo.
Aleppo, where East and West have been battlefields for years now. Yet, as always we hardly hear of those paying the price. Forgotten, probably deliberately. After all, all that has mattered since day one was the « winner » of this horror story.
Shame. Shame on this world. Shame on the mainstream media, playing a game with us, trying to convince us of the care they feel for the Syrian people dying but only talking about some parts of it.
Where are the mediatized pictures of Aleppo these last few days… Where are those people always acting like Syria has become their number one worry while six years ago, they didn’t even know how to place it on a map of the Middle East…? Or is it just that some lives aren’t really worth remembering…?
You don’t chose where you are born, where your house is. I have loved ones in both parts of Aleppo and I worry about them as much and I cannot bear the fact that a side is more worthy of empathy than the other just because there’s apparently a « good » and a « bad » while all I’m seeing is my people suffering wherever they are. | 0 |
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