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( Jul 10, 2017 , www.msn.com )
Jul 16, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com
likbez , July 16, 2017 at 6:17 pm
Matt,You are all over the place, but let's return to Soros. Soros is a neoliberal, a staunch proponent of globalization. BTW Karl Popper was the member of Mont Perelin Society ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mont_Pelerin_Society ). You can't get more neoliberal than that.
Neoliberalism as "Trotskyism for rich" is determined to install neoliberal regimes in all countries, if necessary by force, or subversion ("color revolutions" model. )
The accusation of totalitarianism is a standard neoliberal practice for governments they do not like, especially those who are not very friendly to multinationals.
Soros was instrumental in the collapse of the USSR due to the incompetence of Gorbachov and his clique of neoliberal reformers some of which later became part of Yeltsin entourage (Alexander Yakovlev, Yegor Gaidar, later the architect of the "shock therapy" reforms, Eduard Shevardnadze, etc). Their attempt to establish the second NEP ( which created a caste of "Komsomol bankers", like Khodorkovsky) went out of control and buried the already weakened USSR along with the splash of nationalism (by-and-large induced by the West) in all Soviet republics.
BTW he established the presence in all major Soviet Republics and promoted nationalism like there is no tomorrow, spending tens million of dollars on bribing key intellectuals and policy makers and working in close cooperation with USAID (and even just one million dollars was substantial money during this period and can get you a huge leverage) . Often working in close cooperation with emigrant organizations from the USA and Canada.
Now he complains about rising of ethno nationalism and cultural-nationalism in Europe ;-)
https://www.georgesoros.com/essays/remarks-delivered-at-the-brussels-economic-forum/
Jan 19, 2019 | www.moonofalabama.org
On March 4 2018 the British/Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were found incapacitated on a bench in Salisbury. The British government asserts that they were affected by a chemical poison of the so called Novichok group. The case led to a diplomatic conflict as Britain accused Russia of an attempt to kill the Skripals. No evidence was provided by the British government to support those accusations. The Skripals have since been vanished.
Today an intriguing new detail of the case came to light. Spire FM , a local radio station in Salisbury, reports of a young woman, Abigail McCourt, who was given a 'Lifesaver Award' for her involvement in the Skripal case:
The 16 year old, from Larkhill, was the first to spot two people collapsed on a bench in the Maltings on March 4th and didn't hesitate to help. Abigail quickly alerted her mum, a qualified nurse, who was nearby and together they gave first aid to the victims until paramedics arrived.It soon became clear this was no ordinary medical incident, but the poisoning of a former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, and his daughter Yulia, with Novichok.
...
Immediately following the incident and with the world's media focused on Salisbury, the pair didn't want any want press attention and kept their involvement quiet.
But Abby's mum now feels the time is right for her daughter to be recognised for the "incredible" way she dealt with the scenario. Alison nominated her for the Lifesaver Award at Spire FM's Local Hero Awards, and the judges were unanimous in their decision that Abigail was a very worthy winner.
Earlier reports mentioned that a 'military nurse' had attended to the Skripals. Following the above report Elena Evdokimova checked the name of the young women's mothers and found a curiosity:
Elena Evdokimova @elenaevdokimov7 - 10:50 utc - 19 Jan 2019We were right, it was Alison McCourt who was that"unknown military nurse" who, absolutely randomly, happened to be near the bench where #Skripals collapsed . Spire FM alleges that it was her daughter Abigail alerted her, but no one mentioned her before ...
Here is the thing. Alison McCourt is not just one random 'military nurse'. She is the Chief Nursing Officer for the British Army in the rank of Colonel:
Colonel A L McCourt OBE ARRC QHN - Assistant Head Health Strategy / Chief Nursing Officer (Army) - Senior Health Advisor (Army) Department.Colonel McCourt was appointed Chief Nursing Officer on February 1 2018, just one month before the Skripal incident happened. Colonel McCourt lives in Larkhill, a garrison town some 11 miles from Salisbury. She is known to visit elsewhere.
Petri Krohn , Jan 19, 2019 3:12:45 PM | link
Dig deep enough and you will find that Alison McCourt is married to Pablo Miller
c1ue , Jan 19, 2019 3:16:12 PM | link
Lark Hill - as in "V for Vendetta" Lark Hill? Hrmph.Zachary Smith , Jan 19, 2019 3:17:00 PM | linkAs I read this I had two thoughts. The first one is that the Brits have lost the competence they once had with this stuff. "Operation Mincemeat" was, according to all accounts, a marvel in planning, execution, and getting the desired reactions from the German High Command. The "Double-Cross System" turned the extremely risky invasion at Normandy into a success. The recent stuff is a comedy by comparison.Jetpack , Jan 19, 2019 3:39:34 PM | link... ... ...
Here's one way she could have made it on time:snake , Jan 19, 2019 3:39:49 PM | link
https://mobile.twitter.com/RoyalNavy/status/1086623282831523840?s=09
excellent reporting.. still we have little written collaborative evidence.. just as in 9/11 just top dogs saying improbable things.uncle tungsten , Jan 19, 2019 3:44:37 PM | linkWhat seems to me important now is to develop as you have done a set of hypotheses. and to hack at them until we hit the ones which all evidence cannot dispute. Using your summary I rewrite in hypothesis form,
- hypothesis 1: Steele's dirty dossier is not related to the Skripal case.
- hypothesis 2: Steele's dossier is not the result of an integrity initiative.
- hypothesis 3: Downing street personnel were not involved in integrity initiative
- hypothesis 4: media reported only supportable facts.
- hypothesis 5: Neither the USA or any of its agencies were involved
- hypothesis 6: Neither Israel or any of its agencies were involved
- hypothesis 7: Neither Saudi Arabia or any of its Arab partners were involved
- hypothesis 6: Neither Republicans or Democrats in America were involved.
- hypothesis 8: the FBI had no part in this.
- hypothesis 9: Developing sufficient misinformation to justify attacking Nord 2 pipeline was not one of the objectives of the integrity initiative.
- hypothesis 10: No private interest supported organizing a false flag op against Russia
Too good. That is such a great article b. I have had a great wry chuckle at the folly of human hubris. Fancy setting up your own daughter for an award. Certainly looks less and less like novichok and more like novifraud with every passing day.annie , Jan 19, 2019 4:06:54 PM | linkfrom the Daily Mail:brook trout , Jan 19, 2019 4:10:57 PM | linkNot only is the military mother Britain's most senior soldier on the virulent battlefield against ebola , she is also the last line of defence for the Army medics and other healthcare workers fighting the deadly disease.what a stroke of luck Britain's most senior soldier on the virulent battlefield against ebola was there, arguably the most qualified person in all of Britain to attend to the Skripals.
Coincidence? Probably like most here, I think not. But isn't this something of an own goal? If indeed things are as we suspect, why would you put the daughter up for an award? Wouldn't you want the can of worms this presents to remain unopened? Can they be this incompetent? Well, looking at the Brexit process, I guess we know the answer to that last by now rhetorical question.Jen , Jan 19, 2019 4:22:07 PM | linkThe story of the heroic Abigail McCourt in helping to save the Skripals must be too good for the likes of The Fraudian and other so-called "progressive" MSM outlets to resist. Strange that such a narrative was not brought up until now, coming close to the anniversary of the poisoning and the deadline for Britain's exit from the EU.Bobby Peru , Jan 19, 2019 4:29:53 PM | linkCurious that Abigail McCourt received basic first aid training at school (in which she would have been taught CPR) yet when Spire FM hosts spoke to her, she says that her training was not needed. In almost the same sentence, she says Julia Skripal was not breathing.
https://www.spirefm.co.uk/news/local-news/2782928/exclusive-teenage-girl-describes-moment-she-found-collapsed-skripals/Off-Guardian on Twitter wonders if Alison McCourt had been involved in Exercise Toxic Dagger (chemical weapons training exercise) staged by The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory and the Royal Marines in February 2018:
https://twitter.com/OffGuardian0
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/exercise-toxic-dagger-the-sharp-end-of-chemical-warfareSay cheese https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MGsqbRXuRcBobby Peru , Jan 19, 2019 4:40:30 PM | linkMy dog barks some https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9SrbPkpQHARobert Snefjella , Jan 19, 2019 5:10:41 PM | linkb, you are too suspicious. Nothing to see here. Clearly way beyond a serious matter, this dastardly attack on Skripals by the Soviets, er, the Russians, er, Putin.Robert Snefjella , Jan 19, 2019 5:11:39 PM | linkIn Canada our eloquent foreign Minister, in a barrage of outraged talking the talk that was accompanied by making four Russian diplomats walk the walk home, said in words that will surely take their high place in the history of inspired speeches, along with Churchill's 'Never have so many done so much for so few', and MLK's 'I have a nightmare':
And her words re the March 4 nerve agent attack on a close ally and partner of Canada "a despicable, heinous and reckless act" that potentially endangered the lives of hundreds"Ghost Ship , Jan 19, 2019 5:26:11 PM | linkStrange - no military hospital in Salisbury but then there aren't military hospitals in Britain anymore. Instead the military use civilian hospitals with a Ministry of Defence Hospital Unit attached but none near Salisbury. The Ministry of Defence Hospital Units do not treat operational casualties who are treated at the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine at Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) in Birmingham. You'd think the Chief Nursing Officer for the British Army, Colonel McCourt would work out off the most important site for defence medicine in the UK (QEH in Birmingham) but instead she's based at Larkhill which from memory is where the Royal Artillery is located.Hal Duell , Jan 19, 2019 5:39:14 PM | linkNot so strange - The area inhabited by the British Army north of Salisbury (more specifically north of the A303 road was classified as deprived because of the lack of shopping facilities, so most residents of this area do their shopping in Salisbury which has the best shopping in the area. There are now a Tesco superstore and a branch of Lidl in Tidworth so perhaps it's not so deprived anymore.
The main area for shoppers to park in Salisbury is just north of the Maltings (site of the alleged attack) so it's not surprising that someone shopping in Salisbury would pass the bench the Skripals were found on. What is surprising it that none of the family seems to have suffered any effects from the Novichok.
The Skirpal case, the Maidan coup and the related MH17 downing, the various gas attacks in Syria, the most recent bombing incident also in Syria, the Mueller investigation in its entirety - the sheer incompetence shown by the US and British deep states is simply staggering, and in sharp contrast to the investigative ability of this and other sites.exiled off mainstreet , Jan 19, 2019 6:05:32 PM | linkThe US is fracturing, the EU is fracturing, and therein lies the greatest danger. With the overplayed sanctions only making the sanctioned effect work arounds to the point that the primacy of the US dollar is threatened, with the contain China train having left the station and recently pulling into a station purpose built on the dark side of the moon, their only options look to be to either go nuclear or go away.
2019 looks to be a most interesting year!
It all adds up to stasi state bullshit. They are so arrogant and cocksure of the controlled media that they can even draw attention to the provocation by seeking an award for a family member despite the prominence of the mother and her role in the power structure. Knowledge, of course, will remain limited to those who are canny enough not to believe the received propaganda wisdom of the five eyes spy state.Yeah, Right , Jan 19, 2019 6:12:12 PM | linkSo in all the police press briefings and all of the political posturing it was not deemed to be important to mention that the Skripals-on-the-park-bench were attended to by the Chief Nurse Of the British Army?somebody , Jan 19, 2019 6:17:21 PM | linkEven though this could have gone a long, long way to explaining the biggest discrepancy in the government narrative (i.e. Novicock is way, way deadly only, err, umm, they didn't die). How odd. How very, very odd. You'd almost think that the government considered that acknowledging that fact would open up more questions than it would answer. Hard to see why.....
Posted by: Ghost Ship | Jan 19, 2019 5:26:11 PM | 20somebody , Jan 19, 2019 6:37:39 PM | linkShe lives in Aldershot like Sergeant Bailey. There is a field hospital based there, she is the chief officer
Posted by: somebody | Jan 19, 2019 6:17:21 PM | 26Tom Welsh , Jan 19, 2019 6:38:44 PM | linkBailey lives in Alderholt. Aldershot is an hour by car from Salisbury.
I am beginning to wonder if Sir Humphrey Appleby and some of his colleagues are conducting a deliberate hoax, piling impossibility upon impossibility and contradiction upon contradiction, just to see how long it takes the unbelievably gullible British public to get the joke and start throwing cabbages and rotten fruit. Not so funny for the poor woman who died - but then, as Sir Humphrey has often been heard to remark, one cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs.karlof1 , Jan 19, 2019 6:57:19 PM | linkRecall that it was recently established and published that the Steele Dossier was compiled to act as an Insurance Policy in the event Trump won the election. See here . I posted this news as a comment and b picked up on it too, but that aspect of the Dossier is omitted from his essay above. We can see that the Dossier--like Blair's Dodgy Dossier to sell the illegal war on Iraq--has had a massive impact on Trump's presidency, which, whether you like Trump or not, is a matter of grave concern for the institutions of governance of the USA, and IMO is very close to treason.Krollchem , Jan 19, 2019 7:03:58 PM | linkSure, the nurse revelation is curious to say the least, but I'm far more interested in the entire disinformation network built by the British along with previous and current versions operated by CIA here in USA. Think back to what Bill Casey said, "We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false," then Rove's boast: "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors...and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."
Add those to all the 100% evidence free accusations made against Russia, China, Venezuela, Syria, other nations and private individuals--the "universal sports doping" by Russian athletes was a massive smear proven to be 100% false--and you can understand why I call it BigLie Media. Clearly, the Skripal story's utter fantasy. But the Brits will kill their own to insure the story isn't compromised--Dr. David Kelly, Dawn Sturgess, and quite likely Sergei Skripal, and likely others from incidents in the further past.
So, while it seems comical, this is all deadly serious.
The Integrity Initiative was also heavily involved in promoting an anti-Russian agenda such as the Skripal affair.james , Jan 19, 2019 7:51:44 PM | linkEither Chris Donnelly of the Institute for Statecraft (IoS), (formally of the British Army's Soviet Studies Research Centre at Sandhurst), or UK General Sir Richard Barrons reportedly stated that "if no catastrophe happens to wake people up and demand a response, then we need to find a way to get the core of government to realise the problem and take it out of the political space."
UK: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/01/07/inte-j07.html
great coverage b.. thank you... it's either a coincidence theory, or a conspiracy theory... no other choices, until the uk gets down to doing an open investigation on integrity initiative...the investigators investigating the investigators.. ain't going to happen... similar deal in the usa now.. basically this will be when hell freezes over - a very long time if ever.. meanwhile the skripals are persona non grata... it would be very interesting to find out where they are kept... it looks like their is no chance for any type of normal life for them here on out... even if the novihoax didn't kill them, the uk has done the equivalent.. it is hard not to tie operation toxic dagger into all of this... the coincidences are just too great..psychohistorian , Jan 19, 2019 7:58:50 PM | link@ petri.. thanks for the that.. how did you manage to figure that one out? does that mean that allison mccourt is the daughter of pablo miller, or was allison from another relationship/marriage? of course m16 and some folks know the answer to this amazing coincidences and probably are unable to openly say..
@ Glen Brown and bevin with their correction to my comment.....thankspretzelattack , Jan 19, 2019 8:02:08 PM | linkI was not in my best of mind and along with misspelling his name I projected my desire for more movement by the UK opposition in light of having the government paying folks to work against them.....my bad idealism........
If it is true that Alison McCourt is married to Pablo Miller as Petri Kohn asserts in comment #1 then it looks like the daughter is being groomed for big things in the UK government.....16 years old and already an award for criminal complicity.
reminds me of the kuwaiti ambassador's daughter in the runup to the first gulf war.PavewayIV , Jan 19, 2019 8:10:51 PM | linkPetri Krohn@1 - ? Only thing I could find is a reference to her husband Hugh - a prison officer - and her two kids, Abagail (now 16) and Cameron (now 14). That was from a DailyMail article (I know...) from Dec. 20, 2014. She was spending time away from them during Christmas when she was sent to Sierra Leone for the Ebola outbreak. The article also mentions time away from Hugh and Abagail in 2003 when she was deployed to Iraq. Couldn't find anything about Pablo Miller being married or having kids, but many mentions of his home in Salisbury.karlof1 , Jan 19, 2019 8:11:20 PM | linkbevin @32--Bart Hansen , Jan 19, 2019 8:30:25 PM | linkNice conjecture, except that those who devised the Dossier specifically said it was to be used as insurance in case Trump won. Please see article I linked to in my comment.
The daughter is what's know as a "cutout". You can't have the "nurse of all nurses" be the first on the scene. But, they didn't even bother with the daughter having to call mama at home. She was luckily "nearby", presumably lurking behind a tree.Ghost Ship , Jan 19, 2019 8:43:51 PM | link>>>>: somebody | Jan 19, 2019 6:17:21 PM | 26james , Jan 19, 2019 8:57:41 PM | linkShe might have been the commanding officer of 22 Field Hospital but now she's moved on.
From the QARANC website:
Following promotion to Lieutenant Colonel in 2011, Alison attended the Advanced Command and Staff Course. Her initial SO1 appointment was as Chief of Staff, Headquarters 2nd Medical Brigade in York in Aug 2012. Alison assumed Command of 22 Field Hospital in July 2013 and deployed the Unit to Sierra Leone on Op GRITROCK in Oct 14. She was awarded an OBE for her leadership of 22 Field during Op GRITROCK.On promotion to Colonel in Dec 2015 she assumed an appointment in the newly established Senior Health Advisors department and has been the lead for Assurance and now Health Strategy in that area.
Alison assumed the appointment of Chief Nursing Officer for the Army on 1 Feb 18.
@1 petri... unless they hooked up after 2014, your theory doesn't look very likely...ADKC , Jan 19, 2019 8:58:24 PM | linkfurther to @36 paveways comment from the daily mail dec 20 2014 article - Even though Lieut Col McCourt is a veteran of campaigns in Iraq and the Balkans, she admits this tour of duty has taken a toll, and that she has depended on the support of her husband Hugh, a prison officer, to help her through it. While this is her first Christmas apart from her children, she is accustomed to leaving them and her husband behind. In 2003, she left Abigail, then aged just eight months, in Hugh's arms while she went to Iraq to treat British soldiers wounded in the Gulf War. She returned there in 2008 for a second tour of duty.
Lieut Col McCourt said: 'I have a very supportive husband. On both occasions I went to Iraq he took sabbaticals from his job to ensure that our family life was maintained. Yes, it was hard to say goodbye so soon after having my first child but you immerse yourself in your work, and on an operational tour everyone is missing someone. This Christmas he'll be with the children and my mum will join them at the family home in Aldershot. Of course I miss them all but our focus has to be saving lives here.'
brook trout @11Suppose you were Russian and believed that the west would not attack because of the checks and controls that exist in western democracy. Suppose a deadly incident occurred and Russia was blamed and an attack became more likely. Suppose that (as a Russian) you knew Russia wasn't involved and that the evidence was very sketchy and didn't make sense. Suppose this was was all in the public domain but instead of the incident being questioned it was just accepted and Russia was sanctioned and other western and allied countries (despite knowing it was nonsense) joined in.
You might as a Russian come to believe that evidence didn't matter, that the west could manipulate their populations at will and the idea that there was some "restraint" on western attacks would be shown to be fanciful. You might, as a Russian, become very concerned that you might be attacked and there was a lack of restraint on the west.
The west are blaming Russia for something they didn't do but, also, showing that they know that Russia didn't do it and, more, letting Russia know they framed them, and showing Russia that the evidence doesn't matter. Perhaps, not UK incompetence, maybe, it's all psyops.
Ric G , Jan 19, 2019 9:23:12 PM | link...
Mr Moon, you have excelled yourself! A brilliant article, worthy of a standing ovation!Tom , Jan 19, 2019 9:50:14 PM | link'So in all the police press briefings and all of the political posturing it was not deemed to be important to mention that the Skripals-on-the-park-bench were attended to by the Chief Nurse Of the British Army?' And how embarrassing for our 'fearless' journalists and tabloid truth seekers! Let the crowd cry out 'shame'!
John Helmer raises an important question, why does the roof of Sergei's house need to be removed? Tongue firmly planted in cheek. The air leakage through the front door of Sergei's house must be through the roof! How else does the fumes from novichok get from the front door handle to the roof? Sure hope they do a proper energy efficient rebuild. Can't go wasting that soon to be arriving at Perfidious Albion's shores horror of horrors, Russian gas. North Sea gas wont last much longer.Roy G , Jan 19, 2019 10:53:35 PM | linkSo, where are the Skirpals these days? Inquiring minds want to know!
May 05, 2017 | nationalinterest.org
One of the best summary observations in this regard is from Washington Post columnist Steven Pearlstein , who writes on business and financial matters but whose conclusions could apply as well to Trump's handling of a wide range of foreign and domestic matters: " What we know, first and foremost, is that it hardly matters what Trump says because what he says is as likely as not to have no relationship to the truth, no relationship to what he said last year during the campaign or even what he said last week. What he says bears no relationship to any consistent political or policy ideology or world-view. What he says is also likely to bear no relationship to what his top advisers or appointees have said or believe, making them unreliable interlocutors even if they agreed among themselves, which they don't. This lack of clear policy is compounded by the fact that the president, despite his boasts to the contrary, knows very little about the topics at hand and isn't particularly interested in learning. In other words, he's still making it up as he goes along."Many elements of dismay can follow from the fact of having this kind of president. We are apt to get a better idea of which specific things are most worthy of dismay as the rest of this presidency unfolds. I suggest, however, that a prime, overarching reason to worry is Trump's utter disregard for the truth. Not just a disregard, actually, but a determination to crush the truth and to instill falsehood in the minds of as many people as possible. The Post 's fact checker, Glenn Kessler , summarizes the situation by noting that "the pace and volume of the president's misstatements" are so great that he and other fact checkers "cannot possibly keep up."
Kessler also observes how Trump's handling of falsehoods is qualitatively as well as quantitatively different from the garden variety of lying in which many politicians indulge: "Many will drop a false claim after it has been deemed false. But Trump just repeats the claim over and over." It is a technique reminiscent of the Big Lie that totalitarian regimes have used, in which the repetition and brazenness of a lie help lead to its acceptance.
The problem is fundamental, and relates to a broad spectrum of policy issues both foreign and domestic, because truth-factual reality -- is a necessary foundation to consider and evaluate and debate policy on any subject. Crushing the truth means not just our having to endure any one misdirected policy; it means losing the ability even to address policy intelligently. To the extent that falsehood is successfully instilled in the minds of enough people, the political system loses what would otherwise be its ability to provide a check on policy that is bad policy because it is inconsistent with factual reality.
Dec 30, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org
Yesterday and today saw some small protests in Iran. They are probably the first stage of a large "regime change" operation run by the U.S. and Israel with the help of Iranian terrorist group.
Earlier this month the White House and the Zionist prepared for a new assault on Iran:
A delegation led by Israel's National Security Adviser met with senior American officials in the White House earlier this month for a joint discussion on strategy to counter Iran's aggression in the Middle East, a senior U.S. official confirmed to Haaretz.Another report about the meeting quotes Israeli officials on the result:
"[T]he U.S. and Israel see eye to eye the different developments in the region and especially those that are connected to Iran. We reached at understandings regarding the strategy and the policy needed to counter Iran. Our understandings deal with the overall strategy but also with concrete goals, way of action and the means which need to be used to get obtain those goals. "This is probably a result of the above meeting:
Hundreds took to the streets of Iran's second largest city of Mashad on Thursday to protest over high prices, shouting slogans against the government.Videos posted on social media showed demonstrators in Mashad in northwest Iran, one of the holiest places in Shia Islam, chanting "death to (President Hassan) Rouhani" and "death to the dictator".
The semi-official ILNA news agency and social media reported demonstrations in other cities in Razavi Khorasan Province, including Neyshabour and Kashmar.
A video of that protest in Mashad showed some 50 people chanting slogans with more bystander just milling around.
Protests against the (neo-)liberal economic policies of the Rohani government in Iran are justified. Official unemployment in Iran is above 12% and there is hardly any economic growth. The people in the streets are not the only ones who are dissatisfied with this:
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has repeatedly criticized the government's economic record, said on Wednesday that the nation was struggling with "high prices, inflation and recession", and asked officials to resolve the problems with determination.On Thursday and today the slogans of some protesters turned the call for economic relief into a call for regime change.
My hunch is that the usual suspects are behind these protests. Note that these started in several cities at the same time. This was not some spontaneous local uproar in one city but had some form of coordination.
Then there is this:
Carl Bildt @carlbildt - 9:38 PM - 28 Dec 2017 from Rome, LazioReports of signals of international satellite TV networks jammed in large cities of Iran. Would be sign of regime fear of today's protests spreading.
A search in various languages finds exactly zero such "reports". Carl Bildt is a former Swedish prime minister. He was recruited in 1973 as a CIA informant and has since grown into a full blown U.S. asset. He was involved in the Ukraine coup and tried to personally profit from it.
The only response to Bildt's tweet was from one Riyad Swed - @SwedRiyad who posted several videos of protests with one of them showing burning police cars.
I am not sure the video is genuine. The account has some unusual attributes (active since September 2016, 655 tweets but only 32 followers?).
Just yesterday one lecture at the CCC "hacker" congress was about the British GHCQ Secret Service and its sock-puppet accounts on Twitter and Facebook. These are used for acquiring human intelligence and for running "regime change" operations. Page 14-18 of the slides (11:20 min) cite from obtained GCHQ papers which lists Iran as one of the targets. The speaker specifically notes a GCHQ account "@2009Iranfree" which was used in generating the protests in Iran after the reelection of then President Ahmedinejad.
Today, Friday and the weekly day off in Iran, several more protest took place in other cities. A Reuters report from today:
About 300 demonstrators gathered in Kermanshah after what Fars called a "call by the anti-revolution" and shouted "Political prisoners should be freed" and "Freedom or death", while destroying some public property. Fars did not name any opposition groups.
...
Footage, which could not be verified, showed protests in other cities including Sari and Rasht in the north, Qom south of Tehran, and Hamadan in the west.Mohsen Nasj Hamadani, deputy security chief in Tehran province, said about 50 people had rallied in a Tehran square and most left after being asked by police, but a few who refused were "temporarily detained", the ILNA news agency reported.
Some of these protests have genuine economic reasons but get hijacked by other interests:
In the central city of Isfahan, a resident said protesters joined a rally held by factory workers demanding back wages."The slogans quickly changed from the economy to those against (President Hassan) Rouhani and the Supreme Leader (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei)," the resident said by telephone.
...
Purely political protests are rare in Iran [...] but demonstrations are often held by workers over layoffs or non-payment of salaries and people who hold deposits in non-regulated, bankrupt financial institutions.
...
Alamolhoda, the representative of Ayatollah Khamenei in northeastern Mashhad, said a few people had taken advantage of Thursday's protests against rising prices to chant slogans against Iran's role in regional conflicts.
...
"Some people had came to express their demands, but suddenly, in a crowd of hundreds, a small group that did not exceed 50 shouted deviant and horrendous slogans such as 'Let go of Palestine', 'Not Gaza, not Lebanon, I'd give my life (only) for Iran'," Alamolhoda said.Two videos posted by BBC Persian and others I have seen show only small active protest groups with a dozen or so people while many more are just standing by or film the people who are chanting slogans.
Videos published by the terrorist group Mujahedin-e Khalq [MEK], 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , also show mostly small protests despite the MEK's claim of Tens of thousands of people chant "death to dictator" . The MEK, or its "civilian" organization National Council of Resistance of Iran , seem to be most involved in the current protests. Its website is currently filled with the protest issue with a total of ten reports and its head figure issued a supportive statement:
Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the Iranian Resistance, saluted the heroic people of Kermanshah and other cities who rose up today chanting "death or freedom", "death to Rouhani", "death to the dictator", and "political prisoners must be freed", and protested against high prices, poverty and corruption.She said, "Yesterday Mashhad, today Kermanshah, and tomorrow throughout Iran; this uprising has tolled the death knell for the overthrow of the totally corrupt dictatorship of the mullahs, and is the rise of democracy, justice and popular sovereignty.
This very early engagement of the MEK -its first report was published yesterday at 10:26 am- is extremely suspicious. In 2012 it was reported that Israel had used the MEK terrorist organization to assassinate nuclear scientists in Iran:
psychohistorian , Dec 29, 2017 2:56:15 PM | 1
Thanks for the Iran analysis bjames , Dec 29, 2017 3:19:45 PM | 2I saw the reports of unrest in Iran and know that the pot is being stirred externally.
Trump needs his war to be a real US president, Netanyahoo needs cover for his crimes and SA needs cover for its war crimes.
The carousel keeps spinning faster and faster. How many will die when it crashes? Sad.....and hard to watch
thanks for this b... i agree with your 3rd to last paragraph and the line in the 2nd to last one "Mossad and the MEK are not shy of killing random people." it seems these paid stooges - carl bildt and etc, are quite happy to try another regime change/ green revolution on iran.. everything has been headed in this direction for some time.. usa/israel saber rattling towards iran 24/7, financial sanctions and etc. etc. it never stops.. these neo-con regime change artists get extremely tiring and predictable..
Nov 27, 2016 | www.amazon.com
Alan Dale on November 27, 20165.0 out of 5 stars An Essential Addition to an Essential Body of Work
Of the extraordinarily valuable and informative works for which Mr. Valentine is responsible, his latest, CIA As Organized Crime, may prove to be the best choice as an introduction to the dark realm of America's hidden corruptions and their consequences at home and around the world. This new volume begins with the unlikely but irrevocable framework by which Mr. Valentine's path led to unprecedented access to key Agency personnel whose witting participation is summarized by the chapter title: "How William Colby Gave Me the Keys to the CIA Kingdom."
By illuminating CIA programs and systems of surveillance, control, and assassination utilized against the civilian population of South Vietnam, we are presented with parallels with operations and practices at work today in America's seemingly perpetual war against terror.
Through the policies of covert infiltration and manipulations, illegal alliances, and "brute force" interventions that wreak havoc on designated enemy states, destroy progress and infrastructure under the claim of liberation, degrade the standards of living for people in the perceived hostile nations, "...America's ruling elite empowers itself while claiming it has ensured the safety and prestige of the American people. Sometimes it is even able to convince the public that its criminal actions are 'humanitarian' and designed to liberate the people in nations it destroys."
Mr. Valentine has presented us with a major body of work which includes: The Strength of the Wolf; The Strength of the Pack; The Pheonix Program, to which we may now add The CIA as Organized Crime, and for which we are profoundly indebted.
felixnola on December 6, 2016
5.0 out of 5 stars The Truth About the CIA and What is Instore For You
If you want the inside scoop on the CIA and it's criminal past; this is the book. Additionally, why the Phoenix Program is pertinent for our own times. This book connects the dots.
If you have been wondering why Homeland Security has fusion centers; why the USA Anti-Patriot Act, NDAA and Rex 84 have been passed by Congress; you will get your answer here.
A book every intelligent American needs to read and place in a prominent place in their library. Oh, and don't forget after you read it; spread the word !!! (this book is based upon actual face to face interviews and documents)
Jay Trout on January 2, 2017
5.0 out of 5 stars A crucial tool to understanding present reality. An absolute must read.
Run, don't walk, and get yourself a copy of this book. The author has been warning us for decades about the clear and present danger that is the CIA I was unaware of Valentine's work for most of those years, perhaps because our media outlets (even the "anti-establishment" ones like Democracy Now and The Intercept) have been compromised. Valentine's work has been suppressed since his ground-breaking book on the Phoenix Program.
Not that I didn't know anything about the sordid history. I knew about MK-Ultra, some of the agency's drug running and empire-building exploits. This work goes much deeper and paints a much bigger picture. The extent of the agency's influence is much greater than I had imagined.
This is not another history book about dirty tricks. It is not just about our insane foreign policy and empire building. The cancer of corruption, of outright crime, has metastasized into every agency of the government right here in the US itself. Those dirty tricks and crimes have become domestic policy- in fusion centers and Homeland Security, in the militarization of local police and in Congress, from Wall Street to Main Street. Border Patrol, the DEA, Justice and State have all been compromised.
Want to know why the DEA is losing the war on drugs, how torture has become policy? Want to know why the government no longer represents your interests? Look no further.
The problem is now. We are the new targets.
Read it and weep, but for God's sake, please read it.
A highly informative and comprehensive book, and a scathing, fearless indictment of government corruption.
I cannot overstate it's importance.Andrew E. Belshaw on December 6, 2016
Disguising Obama's Dirty War Chapter 22
I just picked up this book and have not read it yet--but I am writing this to CORRECT THE RECORD regarding very basic information. There are 446 PAGES (not 286, as listed above). 160 Pages is a big difference--obviously, QUALITY is more important than quantity--but I do feel the listing needs be corrected.
The "Inside Look" feature is also cutting off the last 9 chapters of the book, which are as follows:
- Chapter 16: Major General Bruce Lawlor: From CIA Officer in Vietnam to Homeland Security Honcho
- Chapter 17: Homeland Security: The Phoenix Comes Home to Roost
PART IV: MANUFACTURING COMPLICITY: SHAPING THE AMERICAN WORLDVIEW
- Chapter 18: Fragging Bob Kerrey: The CIA and the Need for a War Crimes Tribunal
- Chapter 19: Top Secret America Shadow Reward System
- Chapter 20: How Government Tries to Mess with Your Mind
- Chapter 21: Disguising Obama's Dirty War
- Chapter 22: Parallels of Conquest, Past and Present
- Chapter 23: Propaganda as Terrorism
- Chapter 24: The War on Terror as the Greatest Covert Op Ever
John C. Landon on January 2, 2017
This is a devastating and must-read study of the social and political calamity created by the CIA over the last sixty years. The portrait shows the criminal character of the agency and finally of the government it is said to serve. The portrait is a double shock because it shows not just a sordid corruption but a malevolent 'dark side' mafia-style corruption of american civilization and government. That the CIA controls the drug trade is not the least of the stunning revelations of this history.
Jan 20, 2017 | www.informationclearinghouse.info
The norms of US capitalist democracy include the election of presidential candidates through competitive elections, unimpeded by force and violence by the permanent institutions of the state. Voter manipulation has occurred during the recent elections, as in the case of the John F. Kennedy victory in 1960 and the George W. Bush victory over 'Al' Gore in 2000. But despite the dubious electoral outcomes in these cases, the 'defeated' candidate conceded and sought via legislation, judicial rulings, lobbying and peaceful protests to register their opposition.
These norms are no longer operative. During the election process, and in the run-up to the inauguration of US President-Elect Donald Trump, fundamental electoral institutions were challenged and coercive institutions were activated to disqualify the elected president and desperate overt public pronouncements threatened the entire electoral order.
We will proceed by outlining the process that is used to undermine the constitutional order, including the electoral process and the transition to the inauguration of the elected president.
Regime Change in AmericaIn recent times, elected officials in the US and their state security organizations have often intervened against independent foreign governments, which challenged Washington 's quest for global domination. This was especially true during the eight years of President Barack Obama's administration where the violent ousting of presidents and prime ministers through US-engineered coups were routine – under an unofficial doctrine of 'regime change'.
The violation of constitutional order and electoral norms of other countries has become enshrined in US policy. All US political, administrative and security structures are involved in this process. The policymakers would insist that there was a clear distinction between operating within constitutional norms at home and pursuing violent, illegal regime change operations abroad.
Today the distinction between overseas and domestic norms has been obliterated by the state and quasi-official mass media. The US security apparatus is now active in manipulating the domestic democratic process of electing leaders and transitioning administrations.
The decisive shift to 'regime change' at home has been a continual process organized, orchestrated and implemented by elected and appointed officials within the Obama regime and by a multiplicity of political action organizations, which cross traditional ideological boundaries.
Regime change has several components leading to the final solution: First and foremost, the political parties seek to delegitimize the election process and undermine the President-elect. The mass media play a major role demonizing President-Elect Trump with personal gossip, decades-old sex scandals and fabricated interviews and incidents.
Alongside the media blitz, leftist and rightist politicians have come together to question the legitimacy of the November 2016 election results. Even after a recount confirmed Trump's victory, a massive propaganda campaign was launched to impeach the president-elect even before he takes office – by claiming Trump was an 'enemy agent'.
The Democratic Party and the motley collection of right-left anti-Trump militants sought to blackmail members of the Electoral College to change their vote in violation of their own mandate as state electors. This was unsuccessful, but unprecedented.
Their overt attack on US electoral norms then turned into a bizarre and virulent anti-Russia campaign designed to paint the elected president (a billionaire New York real estate developer and US celebrity icon) as a 'tool of Moscow .' The mass media and powerful elements within the CIA, Congress and Obama Administration insisted that Trump's overtures toward peaceful, diplomatic relations with Russia were acts of treason.
The outgoing President Obama mobilized the entire leadership of the security state to fabricate 'dodgy dossiers' linking Donald Trump to the Russian President Vladimir Putin, insisting that Trump was a stooge or 'vulnerable to KGB blackmail'. The CIA's phony documents (arriving via a former British intelligence operative-now free lance 'security' contractor) were passed around among the major corporate media who declined to publish the leaked gossip. Months of attempts to get the US media to 'take the bite' on the 'smelly' dossier were unsuccessful. The semi-senile US Senator John McCain ('war-hero' and hysterical Trump opponent) then volunteered to plop the reeking gossip back onto the lap of the CIA Director Brennan and demand the government 'act on these vital revelations'!
Under scrutiny by serious researchers, the 'CIA dossier' was proven to be a total fabrication by way of a former 'British official – now – in – hiding !' Undaunted, despite being totally discredited, the CIA leadership continued to attack the President-Elect. Trump likened the CIA's 'dirty pictures hatchet job' to the thuggish behavior of the Nazis and clearly understood how the CIA leadership was involved in a domestic coup d'état.
CIA Director John Brennan, architect of numerous 'regime changes' overseas had brought his skills home – against the President-elect. For the first time in US history, a CIA director openly charged a President or President-elect with betraying the country and threatened the incoming Chief Executive. He coldly warned Trump to ' just make sure he understands that the implications and impacts (of Trump's policies) on the United States could be profound "
Clearly CIA Director Brennan has not only turned the CIA into a sinister, unaccountable power dictating policy to an elected US president, by taking on the tone of a Mafia Capo, he threatens the physical security of the incoming leader.
From a Scratch to GangreneThe worst catastrophe that could fall on the United States would be a conspiracy of leftist and rightist politicos, the corporate mass media and the 'progressive' websites and pundits providing ideological cover for a CIA-orchestrated 'regime change'.
Whatever the limitations of our electoral norms- and there are many – they are now being degraded and discarded in a march toward an elite coup, involving elements of the militarist empire and 'in`telligence' hierarchy.
Mass propaganda, a 'red-brown alliance, salacious gossip and accusations of treason ('Trump, the Stooge of Moscow') resemble the atmosphere leading to the rise of the Nazi state in Germany . A broad 'coalition' has joined hands with a most violent and murderous organization (the CIA) and imperial political leadership, which views overtures to peace to be high treason because it limits their drive for world power and a US dominated global political order.
James Petras is a Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York. http://petras.lahaine.org/
Dec 27, 2017 | www.politico.com
Former Trump chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon milled his former Oval Office colleague Jared Kushner into a bloody chunk of battle sausage this week and smeared him across the shiny pages of Vanity Fair . You've got to read Bannon's quote three or four times to fully savor the tang of its malice and cruelty. After scorning the Russia collusion theories as fiction, Bannon acknowledged the grisly reality that the Russia investigation poses for his former boss. And he blamed it all on Kushner, for having created the appearance that Putin had helped Trump. Dropping Kushner head first into the grinder, Bannon turned the crank.
"[Kushner was] taking meetings with Russians to get additional stuff. This tells you everything about Jared," Bannon told the magazine's Gabriel Sherman. "They were looking for the picture of Hillary Clinton taking the bag of cash from Putin. That's his maturity level."
Informing Vanity Fair that Kushner's hunt for political smut led him to over-fraternize with the Russians might not be the best way for Bannon to throw special counsel Robert S. Mueller III off the collusion scent. So what was the big man in the Barbour coat up to?
That Bannon and Kushner skirmished during their time together in the White House has been long established. Kushner advocated the sacking FBI Director James B. Comey, for example, and Bannon opposed it. He later told 60 Minutes that the firing was maybe the worst mistake in "modern political history" because it precipitated the hiring of the special counsel and had thereby expanded the investigation.
Sherman's piece reveals the cognitive split that evolved between Bannon and others, specifically Trump, on how to handle the mess that had been created. "Goldman Sachs teaches one thing: don't invent shit. Take something that works and make it better," Bannon told Sherman. He said he consulted with Bill Clinton's former lawyer Lanny Davis about how the Clintons responded to Ken Starr's probe. "We were so disciplined. You guys don't have that," Bannon recalls Davis advising him. "That always haunted me when he said that," Bannon told Sherman. Bannon said the investigation was an attempt by the establishment to undo the election, but he took it seriously and warned Trump he was in danger of being impeached.
Bannon's gripe against Kushner in Vanity Fair continues: He claims that Donald Trump's disparaging tweets about Attorney General Jeff Sessions were designed to provide "cover" for Kushner by steering negative media attention toward Sessions and away from Kushner as he was scheduled to testify before a Senate committee.
There's even more hot Bannon on Kushner action. Bannon tells of an Oval Office meeting he attended with Trump, Kushner and Kushner's wife Ivanka Trump in which he called Ivanka "the queen of leaks." "You're a fucking liar!" Ivanka allegedly responded. Hard to know how to score this round, but shattering the public image of Ivanka as poised princess must have been satisfying for a guy who called Javanka "the Democrats."
Getting mauled by Steve Bannon might not be the worst thing to happen to the president's son-in-law this week. He and Ivanka were sued by a private attorney for failing to disclose assets from 30 investment funds on their federal financial disclosure forms. Perhaps more ominous for Kushner, and according to the New York Times , federal prosecutors in Brooklyn have subpoenaed Deutsche Bank records about Kushner's family's real estate business. "There is no indication that the subpoena is related to the investigation being conducted by Robert S. Mueller III," the Times allowed. Yeah, but wouldn't you want to be there when Mueller's team invites Bannon in to talk to him about the Vanity Fair article, and they ask him, "What did you mean about Jared taking meetings with Russians to get additional stuff? Like, what stuff?"
Although "people close to Kushner, who decline to be named" told the Times they don't think the Mueller investigation exposes him to legal jeopardy, the young prince isn't taking chances. The Washington Post reports that his lawyer, Abbe Lowell, has been shopping for a "crisis public relations firm" over the past two weeks. (Senator Robert Menendez, the recent beneficiary of a deadlocked corruption trial, is another Lowell client.)
Why hire super flacks now? Does Kushner sense disaster? Another Bannon offensive? The Flynn plea bargain exposed him -- according to the press -- as the "very senior member" of the Trump transition team described in court documents who told former national security adviser Michael Flynn to lobby the Russian ambassador about a U.N. resolution on Israeli settlements. Maybe he's just buying reputation insurance. Or maybe he's taken to heart Chris Christie's scathing comments. Christie was squeezed out of the Trump transition early on, some say by Kushner who is said to hold a grudge against Christie who, when he was federal prosecutor, put Kushner's father in jail . This week Christie said that Kushner "deserves the scrutiny" he's been getting. It was almost as if Christie and Bannon were operating a twin-handled grinder, cranking out an extra helping of Kushner's tainted reputation.
President Putin and President Trump occupied the same page about the scandal this week in what was either a matter of collusion or of great minds thinking alike. Speaking at a four-hour media event in Moscow, Putin blamed the scandal on the U.S. "deep state" and said, "This is all made up by people who oppose Trump to make his work look illegitimate." According to CNN , Trump took the opportunity this week to call the Russia investigation "bullshit" in private. In public, he told reporters, "There's absolutely no collusion. I didn't make a phone call to Russia. I have nothing to do with Russia. Everybody knows it."
Everybody, perhaps, except former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Appearing on CNN , Clapper used direct language to bind former KGB officer Putin to Trump tighter than a girdle to a paunch. "[Putin] knows how to handle an asset, and that's what he's doing with the president," Clapper said. "I think some of that experience and instincts of Putin has come into play here in his managing of a pretty important account for him, if I could use that term, with our president."
Writing in Newsweek , Jeff Stein collected other tell-tale signs of Trump's cooptation: He refused to take Russian meddling in the election seriously. He responds favorably to Putin's praise and seems to crave more. He dismisses worries about his circle's connections to Kremlin agents before the election and during the transition -- and he tried to call off the Flynn investigation.
It's enough to make you wonder why Bannon thinks Kushner is the enemy, not Trump.
******
If you've read this far, you're probably disappointed that more didn't happen in the Trump Tower scandal this week. Sue me in small claims court via email to [email protected] . My email alerts never believed in collusion, my Twitter feed is set to cut a plea deal with Mueller, and my RSS feed has several crisis PR firms on retainer.
Dec 27, 2017 | www.washingtonpost.com
Opinion A column or article in the Opinions section (in print, this is known as the Editorial Pages). December 26 at 6:54 PM
VLADIMIR PUTIN boasts of popularity ratings that Western leaders, Donald Trump included, can only dream of -- 85 percent and above since Russia's invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014.
Yet Mr. Putin remains unwilling to test those numbers against real competition. On Monday, the state election commission banned his most popular opponent, Alexei Navalny, from running in the presidential election scheduled for March 18 -- meaning that Mr. Putin will face no serious opposition to obtaining another six-year term.
Mr. Navalny, who has attracted a broad following across Russia by campaigning against corruption, was proscribed on the basis of trumped-up fraud charges that the European Court of Human Rights ruled invalid . His real offenses were helping to lead opposition to Mr. Putin's last reelection, in 2012; producing videos documenting Kremlin criminality, such as the more than $1 billion in property amassed by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev; and bringing out tens of thousands of followers in cities across Russia this year to denounce the regime.
Mr. Navalny was credited with 27 percent of the vote when he ran for mayor of Moscow in 2013, and his presentation of his case against Mr. Medvedev had been viewed 25.7 million times on YouTube as of Tuesday. Still, the conventional political wisdom in Moscow holds that Mr. Putin could easily best Mr. Navalny in the presidential election, bolstering both his international and domestic credibility.
He nevertheless prefers to stage a Potemkin vote in which his only challengers will be two perennial candidates, one Communist and one ultra-nationalist, and Ksenia Sobchak , a 36-year-old celebrity who has called the election "a high-budget show." Mr. Navalny has now called for a boycott, which means that the Kremlin's reported goal of a 70 percent turnout may be impossible to reach, barring fraud. In one recent poll, only 58 percent said they would vote.
... ... ...
Dec 27, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org
Rhett , Dec 26, 2017 2:18:30 PM | 20
I have great respect for the reporting on this site regarding Syria and the Middle East. I regret that for some reason there is this dogmatic approach to the issue of Russian attempts to influence the US election. Why wouldn't the Russians try to sway the election? Allowing Hillary to win would have put a dangerous adversary in the White House, one with even more aggressive neocon tendencies than Obama. Trump has been owned by Russian mobsters since the the 1990s, and his ties to Russian criminals like Felix Sater are well known.Sid2 , Dec 26, 2017 3:17:40 PM | 27Putin thought that getting Trump in office would allow the US to go down a more restrained foreign policy path and lift sanctions against Russia, completely understandable goals. Using Facebook/Twitter bots and groups like Cambridge Analytica, an effort was made to sway public opinion toward Trump. That is just politics. And does anyone really doubt there are incriminating sexual videos of Trump out there? Trump (like Bill Clinton) was buddies with billionaire pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Of course there are videos of Trump that can be used for blackmail purposes, and of course they would be used to get him on board with the Russian plan.
The problem is that everything Trump touches dies. He's a fraud and an incompetent idiot. Always has been. To make matters worse, Trump is controlled by the Zionists through his Orthodox Jewish daughter and Israeli spy son-in-law. This gave power to the most openly extreme Zionist elements who will keep pushing for more war in the Middle East. And Trump is so vile that he's hated by the majority of Americans and doesn't have the political power to end sanctions against Russia.
Personally, I think this is all for the best. Despite his Zionist handlers, Trump will unintentionally unwind the American Empire through incompetence and lack of strategy, which allows Syria and the rest of the world to breathe and rebuild. So Russia may have made a bad bet on this guy being a useful ally, but his own stupidity will end up working out to the world's favor in the long run.
@20Oriental Voice , Dec 26, 2017 3:56:16 PM | 35there is considerable irony in use of "dogmatic" here: the dogma actually occurs in the rigid authoritarian propaganda that the Russians Putin specifically interfered with the election itself, which now smugly blankets any discussion. "The Russians interfered" is now dogma, when that statement is not factually shown, and should read, "allegedly interfered."
The dogma does not come from questioning this conclusion. Because Putin, during the campaign, complimented Trump, does not support the conclusion with its insinuation that those who voted for Trump needed to be influenced by anything other than being fed up with the usual in American politics. Same with Brexit. That dissatisfaction continues, and it doesn't need Russian influence to feed it. This is infantile oversimplification to say so.
To suggest "possibly" in any argument does not provide evidence. There is no evidence. Take a look at b's link to the following for a clear, sane assessment of what's going on. As with:
"The centrepiece of the faith, based on the hacking charge, is the belief that Vladimir Putin orchestrated an attack on American democracy by ordering his minions to interfere in the election on behalf of Trump. The story became gospel with breathtaking suddenness and completeness. Doubters are perceived as heretics and as apologists for Trump and Putin, the evil twins and co-conspirators behind this attack on American democracy. Responsibility for the absence of debate lies in large part with the major media outlets. Their uncritical embrace and endless repetition of the Russian hack story have made it seem a fait accompli in the public mind. It is hard to estimate popular belief in this new orthodoxy, but it does not seem to be merely a creed of Washington insiders. If you question the received narrative in casual conversations, you run the risk of provoking blank stares or overt hostility – even from old friends. This has all been baffling and troubling to me; there have been moments when pop-culture fantasies (body snatchers, Kool-Aid) have come to mind."
this is b's link in URL form here:
@20:I echo you opinion that this site gives great reports on issues pertaining to Syria and the ME. Credit to b.
On your surmise that Putin prefers Trump to Hillary and would thus have incentive to influence the election, I beg to differ. Putin is one smart statesman; he knows very well it makes no difference which candidates gets elected in US elections. Any candidate that WOULD make a difference would NEVER see the daylight of nomination, especially at the presidential level. I myself believe all the talk of Russia interfering the 2016 Election is no more than a witch hunt.
But I do believe Putin, and for that matter Xi Jinping of China too, should make efforts to infiltrate the USA election processes. It's an eye for an eye. USA has been exercising its free hands in manipulating elections and stirring up color revolutions all around the world, including the 2012 presidential election in Russia. They should be given a taste of their own medicine. In fact, I believe it is for this reason that the US MSM is playing up this hocus pocus Russian-gate matter, as a preemptive measure to justify imposing electioneering controls in the future.
USA may not be vulnerable as yet to this kind of external nuisances, as the masses have not yet reached the stage of being easily stirred. But that time will come.
May 26, 2015 | Strategic Culture Foundation
A recent release of Edward Snowden-provided classified PowerPoint presentation from the National Security Agency (NSA) provides a rather detailed description of how the FIVE EYES signals intelligence alliance of the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand has conspired with the promoters of social media-based revolutions, such as the "Arab Spring", to bring about the collapse of democratically-elected or otherwise stable governments. However, the PowerPoint slides were partially redacted in key areas by the dubious censors of First Look Media, financed by e-Bay founder and multi-billionaire Pierre Omidyar.The PowerPoint slides illustrate how, in November 2011, the NSA; Canada's Communications Security Establishment (CSE), now Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC), the Defense Signals Directorate (DSD) of Australia, now the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD); New Zealand's Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB); and Britain's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) developed a method for not only monitoring but taking control of cell phone and social media networks used for socio-political uprisings.
The program, known as "Synergizing Network Analysis Tradecraft", was developed by the FIVE EYES's Network Tradecraft Advancement Team or "NTAT".
... ... ...
The slides show that among the countries where mobile application servers were targeted by the FIVE EYES were France, Cuba, Senegal, Morocco, Switzerland, Bahamas, and Russia. The information targeted by the Western signals intelligence partners included "geolocation and network ownership information for each IP address" that consisted of "network owner name, carrier name, ASN (advanced service network), continent, country, region, city, latitude and longitude, and any other related details". Not of interest to FIVE EYES were such applications as Google, mobile banking, and iTunes.
Apr 11, 2016 | www.amazon.com
Harvard University Press ISBN 9780674737266, Publication: April 2016 304 pages 5-1/2 x 8-1/4 inches Coup d'État astonished readers when it first appeared in 1968 because it showed, step by step, how governments could be overthrown. Translated into sixteen languages, it has inspired anti-coup precautions by regimes around the world.In addition to these detailed instructions, Edward Luttwak 's revised handbook offers an altogether new way of looking at political power-one that considers, for example, the vulnerability to coups of even the most stable democracies in the event of prolonged economic distress.
The world has changed dramatically in the past half century, but not the essence of the coup d'état. It still requires the secret recruitment of military officers who command the loyalty of units well placed to seize important headquarters and key hubs in the capital city. The support of the armed forces as a whole is needed only in the aftermath, to avoid countercoups. And mass support is largely irrelevant, although passive acceptance is essential. To ensure it, violence must be kept to a minimum. The ideal coup is swift and bloodless. Very violent coups rarely succeed, and if they trigger a bloody civil war they fail utterly.
Luttwak identifies conditions that make countries vulnerable to a coup, and he outlines the necessary stages of planning, from recruitment of coconspirators to postcoup promises of progress and stability. But much more broadly, his investigation of coups-updated for the twenty-first century-uncovers important truths about the nature of political power.
Related Links5.0 out of 5 stars
- In Foreign Policy , read Edward Luttwak's analysis of the July 2016 attempted coup against Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan-why it was inevitable, and why it failed
- Read a Guardian profile of Luttwak, the "Machiavelli of Maryland"
Phoenix Without Ashes on December 14, 2016
Takeovers for Smart DummiesRobert Mosher on April 9, 2011This is a new version of an earlier 1968 edition of the same book, with updated examples. I had always imagined that coups were confined to 3rd world banana republics, but was surprised to find that Lutwak's definition of a coup, successful or not, included both France and Italy, and that coups, as opposed to revolutions, were the more common method of seizing power.
I found the book fascinating in its presentation of analytic tools for assessing the potential for successful a coup based on the concentration of power in ethnic groups and in the organization of a country's security agencies. In many cases these agencies are structured more to deal with internal threats to the regime from each other rather than external enemies!
Most of the book was very well written, but Chapter 7, "The Execution of the Coup D'Etat" which painted a hypothetical scenario of how a coup could take place seemed fictional and didn't play well with the actual case studies covered in the rest of the book. Appendix C was a useful list of 20th century coups organized by region and country.
Previously I'd read Luttwak's "Strategy" and "Strategy of the Byzantine Empire." Both were immensely enjoyable. The author's style and depth is always both interesting and engaging. It was a good read that I think that other political junkies might enjoy.
A Tour de Force EffortCoup d'etat, A Practical Handbook, Edward Luttwak, The Penguin Press, London, ©1968 Edward Luttwak
I first read this work at university shortly after it was published and have kept it near ever since. Edward Luttwak has in fact written a "handbook" that in five chapters offers clear and concise insights into the theory and the mechanics of the transfer of political power via the use or threatened use of armed force. In this surprisingly compact volume, he discusses what is a coup d'etat, when is it possible, and how to plan and execute a coup d'etat. Furthermore, he links this analysis to the historical record, repeatedly citing real world examples that were the basis for his work. Finally, he provides some 20 pages of appendices that provide much of the historical record and analytical background to the book's main theses. I had an opportunity to test Mr. Luttwak's work in December 1979.
I was then on duty as an intelligence watch officer at the Department of State in Washington as Soviet forces invaded Afghanistan.
Although the Soviet Union claimed that its forces had been invited in by the regime in Kabul, the arrival and movement of those forces in Kabul made it soon evident that their actions, which meticulously followed Luttwak's script, were intended to give them full and unimpeded sole control of Kabul and Afghanistan.
This small volume represents a valuable contribution to the political scientist's understanding of how armed political changes work and to the historian's understanding of how such changes have taken place over the years - this book is highly recommended and may be one of the most valuable single volumes in your library.
Dec 26, 2017 | colorrevolutionsandgeopolitics.blogspot.com
Color revolutions are, without a doubt, one of the main features of global political developments today. Should the casual reader immediately wonder what a "color revolution" is, keep reading, our view here is unique, but we most certainly have some answers.
Let us first begin with the Wikipedia definition. That website introduces the concept by stating the following:
" Color revolution(s) is a term used by the media to describe related [political] movements that developed in several societies in the CIS (former USSR) and Balkan states during the early 2000s. Some observers have called the events a revolutionary wave .
"Participants in the color revolutions have mostly used nonviolent resistance , also called civil resistance . Such methods as demonstrations, strikes and interventions havebeen [used to] protest against governments seen as corrupt and/or authoritarian, and to advocate democracy; and they have also created strong pressure for change. These movements all adopted a specific color or flower as their symbol. The color revolutions are notable for the important role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and particularly student activists in organizing creative non-violent resistance.
"These movements have been successful in Serbia (especially the Bulldozer Revolution of 2000), in Georgia's Rose Revolution (2003), in Ukraine's Orange Revolution (2004), in Lebanon's Cedar Revolution and (though more violent than the previous ones) in Kyrgyzstan's Tulip Revolution (2005), in Kuwait's Blue Revolution (2005), in Iraq's Purple Revolution (2005), and in Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution (1989), but failed in Iran's Green Revolution (2009–2010) . Each time massive street protests followed disputed elections or request of fair elections and led to the resignation or overthrow of leaders considered by their opponents to be authoritarian ."
What the Wikipedia article fails to mention is the massive foreign funding, and at least any notion that color revolutions are psychosocial operations of deception.
It's a fact that Western governments (especially the US government) and various non-governmental organizations (NGOs) spend millions of dollars to co-opt and "channel" local populations of targeted countries against their own political leadership.
Empty democracy slogans and flashy colors aside, we argue that color revolutions are good old-fashioned regime change operations: destabilization without the tanks.
The secret ingredient is a sophisticated science used to manipulate emotions and circumvent critical thinking. History shows that, to much of the power elite, humanity is seen as a collection of nerve endings to be pushed and pulled one way or the other, sometimes made to tremble in fear, sometimes made to salivate like Pavlov's dogs. These days the manipulation is so pervasive, so subtle, so effective, that even critical individuals at times must necessarily fail to recognize how often -- or in what context -- they have fallen prey.
Of course fear is the most obvious emotion played upon to effect massive social change. One need only to reflect upon the last ten years, since 9/11, to know that fear is a primary instrument used to initiate and justify dangerous shifts in public policy.
But as humanity has been physiologically equipped with a range of emotions, and is not merely arrested and controlled by fear alone, a strata of behavioral and political science also found it useful to master the flip-side of the emotional spectrum, and by that we mean desire, and all that drives groups of individuals to act, even in the face of fear, in pursuit of something worthwhile.
Many are the professions that utilize this type of understanding, including (but not limited to) marketing, advertising, public relations, politics and law-making, radio, television, journalism and news, film, music, general business and salesmanship; each of them selling, branding, promoting, entertaining, sloganeering, framing, explaining, creating friends and enemies, arguing likes and dislikes, setting the boundaries of good and evil: in many cases using their talents to circumvent their audiences' intellect, the real target being emotional, oftentimes even subconscious.
(Legs for educational purposes only)
Looking beneath the facade of the color revolutionary movement we also find a desire-based behavioral structure, in particular one that has been built upon historical lessons offered by social movements and periods of political upheaval.
It then makes sense that the personnel of such operations include perception managers, PR firms, pollsters and opinion-makers in the social media. Through the operational infrastructure, these entities work in close coordination with intelligence agents, local and foreign activists, strategists and tacticians, tax-exempt foundations, governmental agencies, and a host of non- governmental organizations.
Collectively, their job is to make a palace coup (of their sponsorship) seem like a social revolution; to help fill the streets with fearless demonstrators advocating on behalf of a government of their choosing, which then legitimizes the sham governments with the authenticity of popular democracy and revolutionary fervor.
Because the operatives perform much of their craft in the open, their effectiveness is heavily predicated upon their ability to veil the influence backing them, and the long-term intentions guiding their work.
Their effectiveness is predicated on their ability to deceive, targeting both local populations and foreign audiences with highly-misleading interpretations of the underlying causes provoking these events.
And this is where we come in: to help deconstruct the deception .
But we will not just cover color revolutions here, as color revolutions are bound up in the larger geopolitical universe. A color revolution is only an instrument of foreign policy--only a tool -- the ultimate object being the geopolitical advantages gained by powerful financiers and the brain trust they employ . It follows that understanding geopolitical context (and motive) is necessary to understanding the purpose of the color revolution.
Toward that end, we will discuss and analyze relationships of global power in great detail. We will highlight specific institutions of power; identify what their power rests upon; draw attention to the individuals that finance and direct their activities; speculate upon some of their motives; and get to know the broad range of tools they use to achieve them, tools which include the color revolution.
As in-depth studies into the color revolution are far too rare, and as the issue itself is far too obscure, we hope to draw more attention to it; to spark discussion and even debate.
It is an issue that takes time and patience. And it is for those that are willing to provide this time and patience that we offer this site.
"Never utter these words: 'I do not know this, therefore it is false.' One must study to know; know to understand; understand to judge." --Apothegm of Narada
Jan 28, 2017 | thesaker.is
The forces which are currently trying to impeach, overthrow or murder President Trump are a clear and present danger to the United States as a country and to the US Federal Republic. They are, to use a Russian word, a type of "non-system" opposition which does not want to accept the outcome of the elections and which by rejecting this outcome essentially oppose the entire political system.
... ... ...
It amazes me to see that the US pseudo-elites have as much hatred, contempt and fear of the American masses as the Russian pseudo-elites have hatred, contempt and fear of the Russian masses (the Russian equivalent or Hillary's "deplorables" would be a hard to pronounce for English speakers word "быдло", roughly "cattle", "lumpen" or "rabble").
It amazes me to see that the very same people which have demonized Putin for years are now demonizing Trump using exactly the same methods.
And if their own country has to go down in their struggle against the common people – so be it! These self-declared elites will have no compunction whatsoever to destroy the nation their have been parasitizing and exploiting for their own class interest. They did just that to Russia exactly 100 years ago, in 1917. I sure hope that they will not get away with that again in 2017.
J on January 28, 2017 · at 5:40 am UTC
blue on January 28, 2017 · at 6:26 am UTCTrump is part of neocon. If anything, trump is part of color revolution, not against it. I do not see his administration turn out well with his action so far. Trump is also a idiot. Any one pitch a fight with a neighbor like he is doing is not suit to deal with relation.
Talk about relation, check out internet video clips and see how much respect he give to his wife.
J on January 28, 2017 · at 7:07 am UTCMy current opinion is that he is not neocon or part of color revolution, but he is not a champion of the people either. He is one of the competitors among the elite. (An anti-hero as Crosstalk recently characterized him?)
So who is there to champion the people and oppose the monstrous elite? Us -- just us. Each and all of us, and we need to get our acts together. If there is no 'great leader' then we have to lead ourselves: distributed leadership with collective intelligence and power.
J.L.Seagull on January 28, 2017 · at 8:26 am UTCHe is pandering to neocons. He is result of people who fed up with the establishment. So he is result of revolution, maybe the first one of many to purge the system.
We need to make sure we take out garbage in every election, we will win in the end.
we can not only see things in one perspective. But it seems not something come naturally out side of east Asia.
J on January 29, 2017 · at 4:52 am UTCI don't understand why everything has to be either controlled opposition or controlled support.
Of course there is a color revolution in the US right now -- because all the sources of neoliberal fake-revolutionary ideology are right here. It's a poisonous ideology which really is popular with smug media elites, boosted by "nudges" from the deep state. It's just a lot of very corrupt, bad people. The ultimate, long-term objective of the deep state may not be readily apparent, but at a fairly serious medium-term level, their interests are precisely the same as what people like Michael Weiss, Dick Cheney, and Van Jones are making clear to us with their own words.
Similarly, Trump found his support base from Wall Street/Masters of the Universe as outlined by Pepe Escobar. Of course he doesn't represent "the people" because "the people," whether left or right, are no longer interested in grassroots political organization for their own interests. Wall Street can do that, because they have a source of money independent from the gov't. The only question now is who gets more slices of a shrinking pie, and how radical either side is willing to go in overriding America's broken democratic process to make it happen.
The readers of this website should cheer Trump's willingness to trample on the neoliberal narrative, but their own livelihoods will not be guaranteed by Trump or anyone else in power.
Sir Humphrey Appleby on January 28, 2017 · at 10:26 am UTCJ.L.S
Had Clinton won, she could done much worse than Trump, and get away with public opinion. Neoliberal infrastructure would be live and well. So I am fully for get rid of her, and do not let Trump getting away with anything. So far, trump's actions are pity, until he cause some real war somewhere. I love to see MSM got taken down.
Anonymous on January 28, 2017 · at 1:32 pm UTCKhrushchev says to Zhou Enlai, "The difference between the Soviet Union and China is that I rose to power from the peasant class, whereas you came from the privileged Mandarin class." Zhou replies, "True. But there is this similarity. Each of us is a traitor to his class."
I don't know if this is a true story, but Trump may end up obliged to betray his class like others have done in the past if we assume all rich people belong to the same class with homogeneous interests.
A curious aspect of Trump and which "class" he belongs to: As a "kid from Queens" Donald Trump has always been an outsider to the Manhattan social elites. Even after he became far wealthier than they, even after his buildings transformed the New York City skyline he was never admitted into the club. He was only ever allowed in as a guest.
He isn't a member of "the elite" – other than the one of his own making. It's an odd thing but true.
Apr 28, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
XXX, April 28, 2017 at 06:29 PMSanjait,"Hillary Clinton, following a long tradition of mainstream Democrats, had a grab bag of proposals that, if enacted, would collectively make a huge difference in the lives of working people. "
I think you are wrong here.
Hillary was/is a neoliberal, and as such is hostile to the interests of working people and middle class in general. Like most neoliberals she is a Machiavellian elitist. Her election promises are pure demagogy, much like Trump or Obama election promised (immortalized in the slogan "change we can believe in" which now became the synonym of election fraud)
Also she was/is hell-bent of preserving/expanding the US neoliberal empire and the wars for neoliberal dominance (in ME mainly for the benefit of Israel and Saudis). War are pretty costly ventures and they are financed at the expense of working class and lower middle class, never at the expense of "fat cats" from Wall Street.
All-in-all I think the role of POTUS is greatly "misunderestimated" in your line of thinking. As we can see differences between Trump and Hillary in foreign policy are marginal. Why are you assuming that the differences in domestic economic policies would be greater ?
In reality there are other powerful factors in play that diminish the importance of POTUS:
- The US Presidential Elections are no longer an instrument for change. They are completely corrupted and are mostly of "bread and circuses" type of events, where two gladiators preselected by financial elite fight for the coveted position, using all kind of dirty tricks for US public entertainment.
- While the appearance of democracy remains, in reality the current system represents that rule of "deep state". In the classic form of "National security state". In the National Security State, the US people no longer have the any chances to change the policies.
- Political emasculation of US voters has led to frustration, depression and rage. It feeds radical right movement including neo-fascists, which embrace more extreme remedies to the current problems because they correctly feel that the traditional parties no longer represent the will of the people.
- Insulated and partially degenerated US elite have grown more obtuse and is essentially a hostage for neocons. They chose to ignore the seething anger that lies just below the surface of brainwashed Us electorate.
- The "American Dream" is officially dead. People at a and below lower middle class level see little hope for themselves, their children or the country. The chasm between top 1% (or let's say top 20%) and the rest continues to fuel populist anger.
- While Trump proved to be "yet another turncoat" like Barak Obama (who just got his first silver coin in the form of the $400K one hour speech) Trump's election signify a broad rejection of the country's neoliberal elite, including neoliberal MSM, neocon foreign policy as well as neoliberal economic system (and first of all neoliberal globalization).
- The country foreign policy remains hijacked by neocons (this time in the form of fiends of Paul Wolfowitz among the military brass appointed by Trump to top positions in his administration) and that might spell major conflict or even WWIII.
The level of subservience to neocon agenda in Trump administration might well be higher then in previous administration. And "make America first" was already transformed into "full spectrum dominance" == "America uber alles". http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/deutschland-uber-alles-and-america-first-in-song
8. We can now talk about the USA as "neocon occupied country" (NOC), because the neocons policies contradict the USA national interests and put heavy burden of taxpayers, especially in lower income categories. Due to neglect in maintaining infrastructure, in some areas the USA already looks like third word country. Still we finance Israel and several other countries to the tune of $40 billion dollars in military aid alone (that that's in case of Israel just the tip of the iceberg; real figure is probably double of that) https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf
Since Bill Clinton POTUS is more or less a marionette of financial oligarchy (which Obama -- as a person without the past (or with a very fuzzy past) - symbolizes all too well).
Dec 25, 2017 | consortiumnews.com
The Israel-gate Side of Russia-gate December 23, 2017
While unproven claims of Russian meddling in U.S. politics have whipped Official Washington into a frenzy, much less attention has been paid to real evidence of Israeli interference in U.S. politics, as Dennis J Bernstein describes.
By Dennis J Bernstein
In investigating Russia's alleged meddling in U.S. politics, special prosecutor Robert Mueller uncovered evidence that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pressured the Trump transition team to undermine President Obama's plans to permit the United Nations to censure Israel over its illegal settlement building on the Palestinian West Bank, a discovery referenced in the plea deal with President Trump's first National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.
President Donald J. Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel at the United Nations General Assembly (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)
At Netanyahu's behest, Flynn and President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner reportedly took the lead in the lobbying to derail the U.N. resolution, which Flynn discussed in a phone call with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak (in which the Russian diplomat rebuffed Flynn's appeal to block the resolution).
I spoke on Dec, 18 with independent journalist and blogger Richard Silverstein, who writes on national security and other issues for a number of blogs at Tikun Olam .
Dennis Bernstein: A part of Michael Flynn's plea had to do with some actions he took before coming to power regarding Israel and the United Nations. Please explain.
Richard Silverstein:
The Obama administration was negotiating in the [UN] Security Council just before he left office about a resolution that would condemn Israeli settlements. Obviously, the Israeli government did not want this resolution to be passed. Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead. They approached Michael Flynn and Jared Kushner became involved in this. While they were in the transition and before having any official capacity, they negotiated with various members of the Security Council to try to quash the settlement resolution.
One of the issues here which is little known is the Logan Act, which was passed at the foundation of our republic and was designed to prevent private citizens from usurping the foreign policy prerogatives of the executive. It criminalized any private citizen who attempted to negotiate with an enemy country over any foreign policy issue.
In this case, what Flynn and Kushner were doing was going directly against US foreign policy, because Obama wanted the resolution to pass; He just didn't want to vote for it because that would cross the Israel lobby in the United States. The US finally ended up abstaining on the resolution and it passed 14-0.
But before that happened, Flynn went to the Russians and to Egypt, both members of the Security Council, and tried to get the resolution delayed. But all of Israel's machinations to derail this resolution failed and that is what Mueller was investigating, the intervention and disruption of American foreign policy by private citizens who had no official role.
This speaks to the power of the Israel lobby and of Israel itself to disrupt our foreign policy. Very few people have ever been charged with committing an illegal act by advocating on behalf of Israel. That is one of the reasons why this is such an important development. Until now, the lobby has really ruled supreme on the issue of Israel and Palestine in US foreign policy. Now it is possible that a private citizen will actually be made to pay a price for that.
This is an important development because the lobby till now has run roughshod over our foreign policy in this area and this may act as a restraining order against blatant disruption of US foreign policy by people like this.
Bernstein: So this information is a part of Michael Flynn's plea. Anyone studying this would learn something about Michael Flynn and it would be part of the prosecution's investigation.
Silverstein:
That's absolutely right. One thing to note here is that it is reporters who have raised the issue of the Logan Act, not Mueller or Flynn's people or anyone in the Trump administration. But I do think that Logan is a very important part of this plea deal, even if it is not mentioned explicitly.
Bernstein: If the special prosecutor had smoking-gun information that the Trump administration colluded with Russia, in the way they colluded with Israel before coming to power, this would be a huge revelation. But it is definitely collusion when it comes to Israel.
Silverstein: Absolutely. If this were Russia, it would be on the front page of every major newspaper in the United States and the leading story on the TV news. Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby and they have so much influence on US policy concerning Israel, it has managed to stay on the back burner. Only two or three media outlets besides mine have raised this issue of Logan and collusion. Kushner and Flynn may be the first American citizens charged under the Logan Act for interfering on behalf of Israel in our foreign policy. This is a huge issue and it has hardly been raised at all.
Bernstein: As you know, Rachel Maddow of MSNBC has made a career out of investigating the Russia-gate charges. She says that she has read all this material carefully, so she must have read about Flynn and Israel, but I haven't heard her on this issue at all.
Silverstein:
Even progressive journalists, who you'd think would be going after this with a vengeance, are frightened off by the fact the lobby really bites back. So, aside from outlets like the Intercept and the Electronic Intifada, there is a lot of hesitation about going after the Israel lobby. People are afraid because they know that there is a high price to be paid. It goes from being purely journalism to being a personal and political vendetta when they get you in their sights. In fact, one of the reasons I feel my blog is so important is that what I do is challenge Israeli policy and Israeli intervention in places where it doesn't belong.
Bernstein: Jared Kushner is the point man for the Trump administration on Israel. He has talked about having a "vision for peace." Do you think it is a problem that this is someone with a long, close relationship with the prime minister of Israel and, in fact, runs a foundation that invests in the building of illegal Israeli settlements? Might this be problematic?
Silverstein:
It is quite nefarious, actually. When Jared Kushner was a teenager, Netanyahu used to stay at the Kushner family home when he visited the United States. This relationship with one of the most extreme right political figures in Israel goes back decades. And it is not just Kushner himself, but all the administration personnel dealing with these so-called peace negotiations, including Jason Greenblatt and David Friedman, the ambassador. These are all orthodox Jews who tend to have very nationalist views when it comes to Israel. They all support settlements financially through foundations. These are not honest brokers.
We could talk at length about the history of US personnel who have been negotiators for Middle East peace. All of them have been favorable to Israel and answerable to the Israel lobby, including Dennis Ross and Makovsky, who served in the last administration. These people are dyed-in-the-wool ultra-nationalist supporters of [Israeli] settlements. They have no business playing any role in negotiating a peace deal.
My prediction all along has been that these peace negotiations will come to naught, even though they seem to have bought the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, which is something new in the process. The Palestinians can never accept a deal that has been negotiated by Kushner and company because it will be far too favorable to Israel and it will totally neglect the interests of the Palestinians.
Bernstein: It has been revealed that Kushner supports the building of settlements in the West Bank. Most people don't understand the politics of what is going on there, but it appears to be part of an ethnic cleansing.
Silverstein:
The settlements have always been a violation of international law, ever since Israel conquered the West Bank in 1967. The Geneva Conventions direct an occupying power to withdraw from territory that was not its own. In 1967 Israel invaded Arab states and conquered the West Bank and Gaza but this has never been recognized or accepted by any nation until now.
The fact that Kushner and his family are intimately involved in supporting settlements–as are David Friedman and Jason Greenblatt–is completely outrageous. No member of any previous US administration would have been allowed to participate with these kinds of financial investments in support of settlements. Of course, Trump doesn't understand the concept of conflict of interest because he is heavily involved in such conflicts himself. But no party in the Middle East except Israel is going to consider the US an honest broker and acceptable as a mediator.
When they announce this deal next January, no one in the Arab World is going to accept it, with the possible exception of Saudi Arabia because they have other fish to fry in terms of Iran. The next three years are going to be interesting, supposing Trump lasts out his term. My prediction is that the peace plan will fail and that it will lead to greater violence in the Middle East. It will not simply lead to a vacuum, it will lead to a deterioration in conditions there.
Bernstein: The Trump transition team was actually approached directly by the Israeli government to try to intercede at the United Nations.
Silverstein:
I'm assuming it was Netanyahu who went directly to Kushner and Trump. Now, we haven't yet found out that Trump directly knew about this but it is very hard to believe that Trump didn't endorse this. Now that we know that Mueller has access to all of the emails of the transition team, there is little doubt that they have been able to find their smoking gun. Flynn's plea meant that they basically had him dead to rights. It remains to be seen what will happen with Kushner but I would think that this would play some role in either the prosecution of Kushner or some plea deal.
Bernstein: The other big story, of course, is the decision by the Trump administration to move the US embassy from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem. Was there any pre-election collusion in that regard and what are the implications?
Silverstein:
Well, it's a terrible decision which goes against forty to fifty years of US foreign policy. It also breaches all international understanding. All of our allies in the European Union and elsewhere are aghast at this development. There is now a campaign in the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution condemning the announcement, which we will veto, but the next step will be to go to the General Assembly, where such a resolution will pass easily.
The question is how much anger, violence and disruption this is going to cause around the world, especially in the Arab and Muslim world. This is a slow-burning fuse. It is not going to explode right now. The issue of Jerusalem is so vital that this is not something that is simply going to go away. This is going to be a festering sore in the Muslim world and among Palestinians. We have already seen attacks on Israeli soldiers and citizens and there will be many more.
As to collusion in all of this, since Trump always said during the campaign that this was what he was going to do, it might be difficult to treat this in the same way as the UN resolution. The UN resolution was never on anybody's radar and nobody knew the role that Trump was playing behind the scenes with that–as opposed to Trump saying right from the get-go that Jerusalem was going to be recognized as the capital of Jerusalem.
By doing that, they have completely abrogated any Palestinian interest in Jerusalem. This is a catastrophic decision that really excludes the United States from being an honest broker here and shows our true colors in terms of how pro-Israel we are.
Dennis J Bernstein is a host of "Flashpoints" on the Pacifica radio network and the author of Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom . You can access the audio archives at www.flashpoints.net .
Drew Hunkins , December 23, 2017 at 5:37 pm
Annie , December 23, 2017 at 5:47 pmAs most regular readers of CN already know, some dynamite books on the inordinate amount of influence pro-Israel zealots have on Washington:
1.) 'The Host and the Parasite' by Greg Felton
2.) 'Power of Israel in the United States' by James Petras
3.) 'They Dare to Speak Out' by Paul Findley
4.) 'The Israel Lobby' by Mearsheimer and Walt
5.) 'Zionism, Militarism and the Decline of U.S. Power' by James PetrasI suggest that anyone relatively knew to this neglected topic peruse a few of the aforementioned titles. An inevitable backlash by the citizens of the United States is eventually forthcoming against the Zionist Power Configuration. It's crucial that this impending backlash remain democratic, non-violent, eschews anti-Semitism, and travels in a progressive in direction.
Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:38 pmWhich one would you suggest? I already read "The Israel Lobby."
Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:38 pmFindley and Mearsheimer are certainly worthwhile. I will look for Petras.
SocraticGadfly , December 23, 2017 at 6:10 pmIf you haven't already read them, the end/footnotes in "The Israel Lobby" are more illuminating.
SocraticGadfly , December 23, 2017 at 6:05 pmThat influence is also shown, of course, by the fact that Obama waited until the midnight hours of his tenure and after the 2016 election to even start working on this resolution.
Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:41 pmWhile I think Bibi is an idiot, I also think the Logan Act is overinvoked, overstated, probably of dubious legal value and also of dubious constitutional value.
In short, especially because Trump had been elected, though not yet inaugurated, I think he is not at all guilty of a Logan Act violation. This is nothing close to Spiro Agnew calling Anna Chenault from the airplane in August 1968.
JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:32 amProbably true, although evidence of extreme collusion with Israel eliminates any case against Russia, with whom we have far more reasons for amity. Bringing out the Israel collusion greatly improves public understanding of political corruption. Perhaps it will awaken some to the Agnew-Chennault betrayal of the people of the US.
Annie , December 23, 2017 at 10:48 pmIt's ironic that Russia-gate is turning out to be Israel's effort to distract attention from its complete control over the Democratic party in 2016. From Israeli billionaires behind the scenes to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz at the helm.
The leaked emails showed the corruption plainly, and based on the ACTUAL evidence (recorded download time), most likely came from a highly disgruntled insider. The picture was starting to spill into public view. I'd estimate the real huge worry was that if this stuff came out, it could bring out other Israeli secrets, like their involvement in 9/11. That would mean actual jail time. Might be hard to buy your way out of that no matter how much money you have.
Annie , December 23, 2017 at 6:59 pmThe Logan act states that anyone who negotiates with an enemy of the US, and Israel is not defined as an enemy.
Al Pinto , December 24, 2017 at 9:16 amThe Logan act would not apply here, although I wish it would. I don't think anyone has been convicted based on this act, and they were part of a transition team not to mention the Logan act clearly states a private citizen who attempts to negotiate with an enemy state, and that certainly doesn't apply to Israel. In this administration their bias is so blatant that they can install Kushner as an honest broker in the Israeli-Palestine peace process while his family has a close relationship with Netanyahu, and he runs a foundation that invests in the building of illegal settlements which goes against the Geneva conventions. Hopefully Trump's blatant siding with Israel will receive a lot of backlash as did his plan to make Jerusalem the capital of Israel.
I also found that so called progressive internet sites don't cover this the way they should.
Herman , December 24, 2017 at 10:54 am@Annie
"The Logan act would not apply here, although I wish it would."
You and me both .
From the point of starting to read this article, it has been in my mind that the Logan act would not apply here. After reading most of the comments, it became clear that not many people viewed this as such. Yes, Joe Tedesky did as well
The UN is the "clearing house" for international politics, where countries freely contact each other's for getting support for their cause behind the scene. The support sought after could be voting for or against the resolution on hand. At times, as Israel did, countries reach out to perceived enemies as well, if they could not secure sufficient support for their cause. This is the normal activity of the UN diplomacy.
Knowing that the outgoing administration would not support its cause, Israel reached out to the incoming administration to delay the vote on the UN resolution. I fail to see anything wrong with Israel's action even in this case; Israel is not an enemy state to the US. As such, there has been no violation of any acts by the incoming administration, even if they tried to secure veto vote for Israel. I do not like it, but no action by Mueller in this case is correct.
People, just like the article in itself, implying that the Logan Act applies in this case are just plain wrong. Not just wrong, but their anti-Israel bias is in plain view.
Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state. Even then, Russia contacting the incoming administration is not a violation of the Logan Act. That is just normal diplomacy in the background between countries. What would be a violation is that the contacted official acted on the behalf of Russia and tried to influence the outgoing administration's decision. That is what the Mueller investigation tries to prove hopelessly
Annie , December 24, 2017 at 1:55 pm"Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state." So that is how it works, the White House says it is an enemy state and therefore it is. The so called declaration is the hammer used for trying to make contact with Russia a criminal offense. We are not at war with Russia although we see our leaders doing their best to provoke Russia into one.
Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:41 pmThanks for your reply. When I read the article and it referenced the Logan Act, which I am familiar with in that I've read about it before, I was surprised that Bernstein and Silverstein even brought it up because it so obviously does not apply in this case, since Israel is not considered an enemy state. Many have even referenced it as flimsy when it comes to convictions against those in Trump's transition team who had contacts with Russia. No one has ever been convicted under the Logan Act.
mrtmbrnmn , December 23, 2017 at 7:36 pmThe Logan Act either should apply equally, or not apply at all. This "Russia-gate" hype seems to apply it selectively.
alley cat , December 23, 2017 at 7:45 pmYou guys are blinded by the light. The Israel connection disclosed by the malpracticer hack Mueller in the recent Flynn-flam just made Trump bullet-proof (so to speak).
There is no doubt that Trump is Bibi's and the Saudi's ventriloquist dummy and Jared has been an Israel agent of influence since he was 12.
But half the Dementedcrat Sore Loser Brigade will withdraw from the field of battle (not to mention most of the GOP living dead too) if publically and noisily tying Israel to Trump's tail becomes the only route to his removal. Which it would have to be, as there is no there there regarding the yearlong trumped-up PutinPutinPutin waterboarding of Trump.
Immediately (if not sooner) the mighty (pro-Israel) Donor Bank of Singer (Paul), Saban (Haim), Sachs (Goldman) & Adelson (Sheldon), would change their passwords and leave these politicians/beggars with empty begging bowls. End of $ordid $tory.
Leslie F. , December 23, 2017 at 8:28 pmSo Mueller caught Kushner and Flynn red-handed, sabotaging the Obama administration? What of it? He can't use that evidence, because it would inculpate the Zionist neocons that are orchestrating his farcical, Stalinist witchhunt. And Mueller, being an efficient terminator bot, knows that his target is Russia, not Israel.
Mueller can use that evidence of sabotage and/or obstruction of justice to try to coerce false confessions from Kushner and Flynn. But what are the chances of that, barring short stayovers for them at some CIA black site?
So Mueller will just have to continue swamp-fishing for potential perjurers ahem witnesses, for the upcoming show trials (to further inflame public opinion against Russia and Russia sympathizers). And continue he will, because (as we all know from Schwarzenegger's flicks), the only way to stop the terminator is to terminate him/it first.
JWalters , December 23, 2017 at 8:40 pmHe used it, along with other info, to turn flip Flynn and possibly can use it the same way again Kusher. Not all evidence has end up in court to be useful.
mike k , December 23, 2017 at 8:44 pmThis is an extremely important story, excellently reported. All the main "facts" Americans think they know about Israel are, amazingly, flat-out lies.
1. Israel was NOT victimized by powerful Arab armies. Israel overpowered and victimized a defenseless, civilian Arab population. Military analysts knew the Arab armies were in poor shape and would not be able to resist the zionist army.
2. Muslim "citizens" of Israel do NOT have all the same rights as Jews.
3. Israelis are NOT under threat from the indigineous Palestinians, but Palestinians are under constant threats of theft and death from the Israelis.
4. Israel does NOT share America's most fundamental values, which rest on the principle of equal human rights for all.
Maintaining such a blanket of major lies for decades requires immense power. And this power would have to be exercised "under the radar" to be effective. That requires even more power. Both Congress and the press have to be controlled. How much power does it take to turn "Progressive Rachel" into "Tel Aviv Rachel"? To turn "It Takes a Village" Hillary into "Slaughter a Village" Hillary? It takes immense power AND ruthlessness.
War profiteers have exactly this combination of immense war profits and the ruthlessness to victimize millions of people.
"War Profiteers and the Roots of the War on Terror"
http://warprofiteerstory.blogspot.comVast war profits easily afford to buy the mainstream media. And controlling campaign contributions for members of Congress is amazingly cheap in the big picture. Such a squalid sale of souls.
And when simple bribery is not enough, they ruin a person's life through blackmail or false character assassination. And if those don't work they use death threats, including to family members, and finally murder. Their ruthlessness is unrestrained. John Perkins has described these tactics in "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man".
For readers who haven't seen it, here is an excellent riff on the absurdly overwhelming evidence for Israel's influence compared to that of Russia, at a highly professional news and analysis website run by Jewish anti-Zionists.
"Let's talk about Russian influence"
http://mondoweiss.net/2016/08/about-russian-influence/mike k , December 23, 2017 at 8:49 pmHitler and Mussolini, Trump and Netanyahoo – matches made in Hell. These characters are so obviously, blatantly evil that it is deeply disturbing that people fail to see that, and instead go to great lengths to find some complicated flaws in these monsters.
Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 9:00 pmKeep it simple folks. No need for complex analyses. Just remember that these characters as simply as evil as it gets, and proceed from there. These asinine shows that portray mobsters as complex human beings are dangerously deluding. If you want to be victimized by these types, this kind of overthinking is just the way to go.
Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:54 pmThere is a modern theory of fiction that insists upon the portrayal of inconsistency in characters, both among the good guys and the bad guys. It is useful to show how those who do wrongs have made specific kinds of errors that make them abnormal, and that those who do right are not perfect but nonetheless did the right thing. Instead it is used by commercial writers to argue that the good are really bad, and the bad are really good, which is of course the philosophy of oligarchy-controlled mass publishers.
backwardsevolution , December 23, 2017 at 9:18 pmA very important article by Dennis Bernstein, and it is very appropriate that non-zionist Jews are active against the extreme zionist corruption of our federal government. I am sure that they are reviled by the zionists for interfering with the false denunciations of racism against the opponents of zionism. Indeed critics face a very nearly totalitarian power of zionism, which in league with MIC/WallSt opportunism has displaced democracy altogether in the US.
Joe Tedesky , December 23, 2017 at 10:33 pmA nice little set-up by the Obama administration. Perhaps it was entrapment? Who set it up? Flynn and Kushner should have known better to fall for it. So at the end of his Presidency, Obama suddenly gets balls and wants to slap down Israel? Yeah, right.
Nice to have leverage over people, though, isn't it? If you're lucky and play your cards right, you might even be lucky enough to land an impeachment.
Of course, I'm just being cynical. No one would want to overturn democracy, would they?
Certainly people like Comey, Brenner, Clinton, Clapper, Mueller, Rosenstein wouldn't want that, would they?
JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:33 amI just can't see any special prosecutor investigating Israel-Gate. Between what the Zionist donors donate to these creepy politicians, too what goods they have on these same mischievous politicians, I just can't see any investigation into Israel's collusion with the Trump Administration going anywhere. Netanyahu isn't Putin, and Russia isn't Israel. Plus, Israel is considered a U.S. ally, while Russia is being marked as a Washington rival. Sorry, this news regarding Israel isn't going to be ranted on about for the next 18 months, like the MSM has done with Russia, because our dear old Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, or so they tell us. So, don't get your hopes up.
Joe Tedesky , December 24, 2017 at 11:12 amIt's true the Israelis have America's politicians by the ears and the balls. But as this story gets better known, politicians will start getting questions at their town meetings. Increasingly the politicians will gag on what Israel is force-feeding them, until finally they reach a critical mass of vomit in Congress.
Jeff Blankfort , December 24, 2017 at 12:18 amI hope you are right JWalters. Although relying on a Zionist controlled MSM doesn't give hope for the news getting out properly. Again I hope you are right JWalters. Joe
Abe , December 24, 2017 at 12:39 amActually, Netanyahu was so desperate to have the resolution pulled and not voted on that he reached out to any country that might help him after the foreign minister of New Zealand, one of its co-sponsors refused to pull the plug after a testy phone exchange with the Israeli PM ending up threatening an Israeli boycott oturnef the KIwis.
He then turned to his buddy, Vladimir Putin, who owed him a favor for having Israel's UN delegate absent himself for the UNGA vote on sanctioning Russia after its annexation of Crimea.
Putin then called Russia's UN Ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, since deceased, and asked him to get the other UNSC ambassadors to postpone the vote until Trump took over the White House but the other ambassadors weren't buying it. Given Russia's historic public position regarding the settlements, Churkin had no choice to vote Yes with the others.
This story was reported in detail in the Israeli press but blacked out in the US which, due to Zionist influence on the media, does not want the American public to know about the close ties between Putin and Netanyahu which has led to the Israeli PM making five state visits there in the last year and a half.
Had Clinton won the White House we can assume that there would have been no US veto. That Netanyahu apparently knew in advance that the US planned to veto the resolution was, I suspect, leaked to the Israelis by US delegate Samantha Power, who was clearly unhappy at having to abstain.
argos , December 24, 2017 at 7:00 amThe Israeli Prime Minister made five state visits to Russia in the last year and a half to make sure the Russians don't accidentally on purpose blast Israeli warplanes from the sky over Syria (like they oughtta). Putin tries not to snicker when Netanyahu bloviates ad nauseum about the purported "threat" posed by Iran.
JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:34 amHe thinks Putin is a RATS ASS like the yankee government
alley cat , December 24, 2017 at 4:49 am"This story was reported in detail in the Israeli press but blacked out in the US"
We've just had a whole cluster of big stories involving Israel that have all been essentially blacked out in the US press. e.g.
"Dionne and Shields ignore the Adelson in the room"
http://mondoweiss.net/2017/12/jerusalem-israels-capitalThis is not due to chance. There is no doubt that the US mainstream media is wholly controlled by the Israelis.
Brendan , December 24, 2017 at 6:18 am"He [Netanyahu] then turned to his buddy, Vladimir Putin "
Jeff, that characterization of Putin and Netanyahu's relationship makes no sense, since the Russians have consistently opposed Zionism and Putin has been no exception, having spoiled Zionist plans for the destruction of Syria.
"Had Clinton won the White House we can assume that there would have been no US veto."
Not sure where you're going with that, since the US vote was up to Obama, who wanted to get some payback for all of Bibi's efforts to sabotage Obama's treaty with Iran.
For the record, Zionism has had no more rabid supporter than the Dragon Lady. If we're going to make assumptions, we could start by assuming that if she had won the White House we'd all be dead by now, thanks to her obsession (at the instigation of her Zionist/neocon sponsors) with declaring no-fly zones in Syria.
Skip Scott , December 24, 2017 at 7:59 amTrump and Kushner have nothing to worry about, even if a smoking gun is found that proves their collusion with Israel. That's because the entire political and media establishment will simply ignore the Israeli connection.
Journalists and politicians will even continue to present Mike Flynn's contacts as evidence of collusion with Russia. They'll keep on repeating that "Flynn lied about his phone call to the Russian ambassador". But there will be no mention of the fact that the purpose of this contact was to support Israel and not any alleged Russian interference.
argos , December 24, 2017 at 6:57 amI think you have it right Brendan. The MSM, Intelligence Community, and Mueller would never go down any path that popularized undue Israeli influence on US foreign policy. "Nothing to see here folks, move along."
Herman , December 24, 2017 at 10:47 amThe zionist will stop at nothing to control the middle east with American taxpayers money/military equiptment its a win win for the zionist they control America lock stock and barrel a pity though it is a great country to be led by a jewish entity.
Zachary Smith , December 24, 2017 at 1:34 pmWhat will Israel-Palestine look like twenty years from now? Will it remain an apartheid regime, a regime without any Palestinians, or something different. The Trump decision, which the world rejects, brings the issue of "final" settlement to the fore. In a way we can go back to the thirties and the British Mandate. Jewish were fleeing Europe, many coming to Palestine. The British, on behalf of the Zionists, were delaying declaring Palestine a state with control of its own affairs. Seeing the mass immigration and chafing at British foot dragging, the Arabs rebelled, What happened then was that the British, responding to numerous pressures notably war with Germany, acted by granting independence and granting Palestine control of its borders.
With American pressure and the mass exodus of Jews from Europe, Jews defied the British resulting in Jewish resistance. What followed then was a UN plan to divide the land with a Jerusalem an international city administered by the UN. The Arabs rebelled and lost much of what the UN plan provided and Jerusalem as an international city was scrapped.
Will there be a second serious attempt to settle the issue of the land and the status of Jerusalem? Will there be a serious move toward a single state? How will the matter of Jerusalem be resolved. The two state solution has always been a fantasy and acquiescence of Palestinians to engage in this charade exposes their leaders to charges of posturing for perks. Imagined options could go on and on but will there be serious options placed before the world community or will the boots on the ground Israeli policies continue?
As I have commented before, it will most probably be the Jewish community in Israel and the world that shapes the future and if the matter is to be resolved that is fair to both parties, it will be they that starts the ball rolling.
Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 5:56 pmAs I have commented before, it will most probably be the Jewish community in Israel and the world that shapes the future and if the matter is to be resolved that is fair to both parties, it will be they that starts the ball rolling.
The Nice Zionists responsible for the thefts and murders for the past 69 years along with the "Jewish Community" in the rest of the world will resolve the matter so as to be fair to both parties. This is mind-boggling fantasy.
Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 5:48 pmTruly mind-boggling. Ahistorical, and as you say, fantasy.
Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:11 pmFFS, Netanyahu aired a political commercial in Florida for Romney saying vote for this guy (against Obama)! I mean, it doesn't get any more overtly manipulative than that. Period. End of story.
$50K of Facebook ads about puppies pales in comparison to that blatant, prima facia, public manipulation. God, I hate to go all "Israel controls the media" but there it is. Not even a discussion. Just a fact.
Taras 77 , December 24, 2017 at 6:35 pmJust for the record, Richard Silverstein blocked me on Twitter because I pointed out that he slammed someone who was suggesting that the Assad government was fighting for its (Syria's) life by fighting terrorists. Actually, more specifically, because of that he read my "Free Palestine" bio on Twitter and called me a Hamas supporter (no Hamas mentioned) and a "moron" for some seeming contradiction.
I also have to point out that he "fist pumped" Hillary Clinton at Mohammed Ali's eulogy. If he's as astute as he purports to be, he has to know that Hillary would have invaded Syria and killed a few hundred thousand more Syrians for the simple act of defiantly preserving their country. By almost any read of Ali's history, he would have been adamantly ("killing brown people") against that. But there was Silverstein using the platform to promote, arguably, perpetual war.
Silverstein is probably not a good (ie. consistent) arbiter of Israeli impact on US politics. Just sayin'.
I wish it were otherwise.
This may be a tad ot but it relates to the alleged hacking of the DNC, the role debbie wasserman schultz plays in the spy ring (awan bros) in house of rep servers: I have long suspected that mossad has their fingers in this entire mess. FWIW
Good site, BTW.
Zachary Smith , December 24, 2017 at 7:35 pm
Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 8:51 pmI can't recall why I removed the Tikun Olam site from my bookmarks – it happened quite a while back. Generally I do that when I feel the blogger crossed some kind of personal red line. Something Mr. Silverstein wrote put him over that line with me.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/06/us/06leak.html?hp
In the course of a search I found that at the neocon NYT. Mr. Silverstein claims several things I find unbelievable, and from that alone I wonder about his ultimate motives. I may be excessively touchy about this, but that's how it is.
P. Michael Garber , December 24, 2017 at 11:54 pmYeah Zachary, "wondering about ultimate motives" is probably a good way to put it/his views. He's obviously conflicted, if not deferential in some aspects of Israeli policy. He really was a hero of mine, but now I just don't get whether what he says is masking something or a true belief. He says some good stuff, but, but, but .
Yeah I found a couple of Silverstein's statements to be closer to neocon propaganda than reality: "Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby . . ." "Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead." My impression was that the whole "terrible relationship between Obama and Netanyahu" was manufactured by the Israel lobby to bully Obama. However these are small blips within an otherwise solid critique of the Israel lobby's influence.
Apr 28, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
XXX, April 28, 2017 at 06:29 PMSanjait,"Hillary Clinton, following a long tradition of mainstream Democrats, had a grab bag of proposals that, if enacted, would collectively make a huge difference in the lives of working people. "
I think you are wrong here.
Hillary was/is a neoliberal, and as such is hostile to the interests of working people and middle class in general. Like most neoliberals she is a Machiavellian elitist. Her election promises are pure demagogy, much like Trump or Obama election promised (immortalized in the slogan "change we can believe in" which now became the synonym of election fraud)
Also she was/is hell-bent of preserving/expanding the US neoliberal empire and the wars for neoliberal dominance (in ME mainly for the benefit of Israel and Saudis). War are pretty costly ventures and they are financed at the expense of working class and lower middle class, never at the expense of "fat cats" from Wall Street.
All-in-all I think the role of POTUS is greatly "misunderestimated" in your line of thinking. As we can see differences between Trump and Hillary in foreign policy are marginal. Why are you assuming that the differences in domestic economic policies would be greater ?
In reality there are other powerful factors in play that diminish the importance of POTUS:
- The US Presidential Elections are no longer an instrument for change. They are completely corrupted and are mostly of "bread and circuses" type of events, where two gladiators preselected by financial elite fight for the coveted position, using all kind of dirty tricks for US public entertainment.
- While the appearance of democracy remains, in reality the current system represents that rule of "deep state". In the classic form of "National security state". In the National Security State, the US people no longer have the any chances to change the policies.
- Political emasculation of US voters has led to frustration, depression and rage. It feeds radical right movement including neo-fascists, which embrace more extreme remedies to the current problems because they correctly feel that the traditional parties no longer represent the will of the people.
- Insulated and partially degenerated US elite have grown more obtuse and is essentially a hostage for neocons. They chose to ignore the seething anger that lies just below the surface of brainwashed Us electorate.
- The "American Dream" is officially dead. People at a and below lower middle class level see little hope for themselves, their children or the country. The chasm between top 1% (or let's say top 20%) and the rest continues to fuel populist anger.
- While Trump proved to be "yet another turncoat" like Barak Obama (who just got his first silver coin in the form of the $400K one hour speech) Trump's election signify a broad rejection of the country's neoliberal elite, including neoliberal MSM, neocon foreign policy as well as neoliberal economic system (and first of all neoliberal globalization).
- The country foreign policy remains hijacked by neocons (this time in the form of fiends of Paul Wolfowitz among the military brass appointed by Trump to top positions in his administration) and that might spell major conflict or even WWIII.
The level of subservience to neocon agenda in Trump administration might well be higher then in previous administration. And "make America first" was already transformed into "full spectrum dominance" == "America uber alles". http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/deutschland-uber-alles-and-america-first-in-song
8. We can now talk about the USA as "neocon occupied country" (NOC), because the neocons policies contradict the USA national interests and put heavy burden of taxpayers, especially in lower income categories. Due to neglect in maintaining infrastructure, in some areas the USA already looks like third word country. Still we finance Israel and several other countries to the tune of $40 billion dollars in military aid alone (that that's in case of Israel just the tip of the iceberg; real figure is probably double of that) https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf
Since Bill Clinton POTUS is more or less a marionette of financial oligarchy (which Obama -- as a person without the past (or with a very fuzzy past) - symbolizes all too well).
Dec 24, 2017 | www.breitbart.com
The House Intelligence Committee has asked the former CEO of President Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, Stephen K. Bannon, to appear before them for an interview as part of their ongoing investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Bannon received a letter this week from the committee. In the letter, the committee requests that he appear in early January, according to Bloomberg:"The invitation, which didn't come in the form of a subpoena compelling them to testify, was for a "voluntary interview" in the committee's offices, which means it would be held behind closed doors, the official said."
Former Trump presidential campaign manager Corey Lewandowski also received a letter requesting he speak with the committee in January.
The report further reveals that the letters to Bannon and Lewandowski don't specify reasons for the interview beyond relation to the committee's ongoing investigation into any Russian meddling in the 2016 election. At the time of the report, the committee had not received responses from either Bannon or Lewandowski.
Dec 23, 2017 | www.counterpunch.org
Masha Gessen's Warning Ignored as Dreams of Trumpeachment Dance in Our Heads
Gessen felt that the Russiagate gambit would flop, given a lack of smoking-gun evidence and sufficient public interest, particularly among Republicans.Gessen also worried that the Russia obsession was a deadly diversion from issues that ought to matter more to those claiming to oppose Trump in the name of democracy and the common good : racism, voter suppression (which may well have elected Trump , by the way), health care, plutocracy, police- and prison-state-ism, immigrant rights, economic exploitation and inequality, sexism and environmental ruination -- you know, stuff like that.
Some of the politically engaged populace noticed the problem early on. According to the Washington political journal The Hill , last summer ,
Frustrated Democrats hoping to elevate their election fortunes have a resounding message for party leaders: Stop talking so much about Russia. Rank-and-file Democrats say the Russia-Trump narrative is simply a non-issue with district voters, who are much more worried about bread-and-butter economic concerns like jobs, wages and the cost of education and healthcare.
Here we are now, half a year later, careening into a dystopian holiday season. With his epically low approval rating of 32 percent , the orange-tinted bad grandpa in the Oval Office has won a viciously regressive tax bill that is widely rejected by the populace. The bill was passed by a Republican-controlled Congress whose current approval rating stands at 13 percent. It is a major legislative victory for the Republicans, a party whose approval rating fell to an all-time low of 29 percent at the end of September -- a party that tried to send a child molester to the U.S. Senate.
Nov 10, 2008 | www.washingtonsblog.com
Obama might very well be classified as a "neoliberal". He appears to be appointing leading neoliberals to key positions in his administration .
If you're a liberal, you might think this is great. Instead of the Neoconservatives who have been in power for the last 8 years, we'll now have neoliberals. You may assume that "neoliberals" are new, smarter liberals -- with liberal social policies, but with a stronger, more realistic outlook.
Nope.
In reality, neoliberalism is as dissimilar to true progressive liberal politics as neo-conservatism is to true conservative politics (if you don't know it, most leading neoconservatives are former followers of Trotsky communism -- not very conservative, huh?)
For example, did you know that Ronald Reagan was a leading neoliberal ? In the U.S., of course, he is described as the quintessential conservative. But internationally, people understand that he really pushed neoliberal economic policies.
As former CIA counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer Philip Giraldi writes :
Neoconservatives and neoliberals are really quite similar, so it doesn't matter who gets elected in 2008. The American public, weary of preemptive attacks, democracy-promotion, and nation-building, will still get war either way.
And leading neo-conservative strategist Robert Kagan recently said :
Until now the liberal West's strategy has been to try to integrate these two powers into the international liberal order, to tame them and make them safe for liberalism."
So neoconservatives are not really conservative and neoliberals are not really liberal. But neocons and neoliberals are very similar to each other . Neocons are a lot more similar to neoliberals than to true conservatives; neoliberass are more similar to neocons than to real liberals.
Do you get it? Both the Republican and Democratic party are now run by people with identical agendas: make the big corporations richer and expand the American empire.
There is only one party, which simply puts on different faces depending on which "branch" of the party is in power. If its the Democratic branch, there is a slightly liberal social veneer to the mask: a little more funding for social programs, a little more nice guy talk, a little more of a laissez faire attitude towards gays and minorities, and a little more patient push towards military conquest and empire.
If its the Republican branch, there's a little more tough guy talk, quicker moves towards military empire, a little more mention of religion, and a tad more centralization of power in the president.
But there is only a single face behind both masks: the face of raw corporatism, greed and yearning for power and empire.
Until Americans stop getting distracted by the Republican versus Democratic melodrama, America will move steadily forward towards war, empire and -- inevitably as with any country which extends too far -- collapse.
Neoliberalism is neither "new" or liberal. Neoconservativism is neither new or conservative. They are just new labels for a very old agenda: serving the powers-that-be, consolidating power, controlling resources. Whether the iron fist has a velvet glove on it or not, it is still an iron fist.
A true opposition party is needed to counter the never-changing American agenda for military and corporate empire.
J R Thompson , September 19, 2012 10:33 PM
Guest J R Thompson , June 18, 2014 8:12 PMThis article does much to confuse and disinform. NeoCons are essential modern day Fascists. If you don't recall your politics, Fascists are to the right of Conservatives on the political spectrum. They have nothing to do with Communists who are far to the left. During the 1930s Nazis were the NeoCons. They were Fascists, and they also had the overwhelming support of Muslims, who are also Fascists. Today's NeoLiberals are basically Right Wing and hardly middle of the fence. There is virtually no politics to the left of centre and this is the catalyst for massive economic stagnation, economic collapse, rapidly growing global instability, indemic poverty, and an ongoing threat of pandemic disease and general global conflict. Until we have some form of political balance, we're on the brink of catastrophe, and will probably end up with an enormous mess to clean up.
Grey Winters J R Thompson , June 23, 2014 4:28 PMThe Wiki page disagrees with you.
It says that Neo-Conservatives descend from Trotskeyism.
Malcolm Scott J R Thompson , November 4, 2016 9:18 PMFascism is statism and nothing represents the ultimate power of the state then the liberal. No liberal supports our constitution or a smaller government . But it's innately typical of a liberal to project their agenda onto others.
MisterReason J R Thompson , November 8, 2015 6:27 AMFascism, Communism are just different faces of Totalitarianism or Statism. Fascism gives "private" owners (oligarchs) the illusion of freedom.
Adnihilo , November 11, 2008 7:16 PMYour communist professor lied to you.
Communism and Fascism are one degree apart. In Fascism, instead of the elite being part of the government, they are part of the private sector. That is the only difference. They are both mainly concerned with consolidation of power and shaping the culture though control of information. Internationally they operate the same as well, expanding their influence through wars of occupation.
Alejandro Moreno Adnihilo , July 21, 2016 2:07 PMThank you for this article! As an author you always seem to be one step ahead of me in articles I've been planning to write! I too have been asserting [in comments mostly at OpedNews] that the economic right political 'values' found in NeoLibs, [short for both NeoLibertarians and Neoliberals] NeoCons, and TheoCons are predominantly the same for months now ever since these corporate bailouts started. This author has a firm grasp on political ideologies as evidenced in his other articles correctly identifying the now $2 trillion in US corporate bailouts as the economic policy of Fascism.
The TheoCons-NeoCons-NeoLibs have taken the country so far to the economic right and up in to an authoritarian level since 2000 that most all in the democratic party, excluding a few like Kucinich and Sanders, have moved from a 'centrist' political ideology to an authoritarian right and moderate conservative political ideology.
Like Anna here more fully displays, the overwhelming majority of Americans just do not have a realistic grasp on global political ideologies, much less their own personal political values. Political party indoctrination and mud slinging has the population wrongly convinced democratic politicians are for the most part 'liberals' when they're economic right NeoLiberals and moderate conservatives while republicans calling themselves 'conservative' are instead radically authoritarian and economic right TheoCons and NeoCons.
When Americans don't understand their own political values, much less those of the candidate they vote for, they will continue to make the wrong choices. This would seem to be exactly what the '1' party corporatist system wants so Americans will only continue making the wrong choices from choosing between 'moderate conservative' Democrats like Obama-Biden, and NeoCon/TheoCon republicans like McCain-Palin. Who better to assert this 1 party economic right NeoLiberal reality than one of the most renown liberal authors and intellectuals than Chomsky in his recent article the Anti-Democratic Nature of US Capitalism is Being Exposed.
Chomsky cites America as a "one-party system, the business party, with two factions, Republicans and Democrats" while putting the blame on this economic crisis where it belongs on the very people who created it, America's NeoLiberals. Anna, if you need more proof I suggest you take a trip to the non partisan web site created by a group of doctorate degreed political ideology professors, political experts and sociologists called Political Compass. I guarantee you these experts are far more learned than you are about political ideologies and political values not just in the US, but around the globe. It will surely shock you to learn based on speeches, public statements and most crucially voting records that Obama is firmly in the authoritarian right quadrant as a moderate conservative.
There you'll see their reasons for this based on his voting record and speeches briefly cited in "While Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader are depicted on the extreme left in an American context, they would simply be mainstream social democrats within the wider political landscape of Europe.
Similarly, Obama is popularly perceived as a leftist in the United States while elsewhere in the west his record is that of a moderate conservative. For example, in the case of the death penalty he is not an uncompromising abolitionist, while mainstream conservatives in all other western democracies are deeply opposed to capital punishment. The Democratic party's presidential candidate also reneged on his commitment to oppose the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He sided with the ultra conservative bloc in the Supreme Court against the Washington DC handgun ban and for capital punishment in child rape cases. He supports President Bush's faith-based initiatives and is reported in Fortune to have said that NAFTA isn't so bad."A way to realistically determine if the candidate you vote for actually represents your own political values is to take the political values test found at political compass here and afterward learn about the inadequacies inherent in the limited age-old traditional left-right economic view of political ideologies.
Then you Anna, along with a host of others, may actually start voting in support of candidates that factually represent your own political values. Or you may find you really aren't this liberal you think you are after all. Regardless, only by learning more about ones' own political values and those of the candidates Americans support will they get the political leaders, type of leadership, and government they actually want....
Dave , December 8, 2012 11:06 AMWritten 8 years ago and yet STILL true, Sanders and Kucinich are still of, by and for the people.
SuperTech86 Dave , November 11, 2015 3:20 AMLibertarian Party. http://www.lp.org
Ian SuperTech86 , September 5, 2016 6:28 PMDoesn't do anything to stop the advance of corporatism which ultimately leads to tyranny and fascism.
bosunj , November 10, 2008 5:59 PMIts debatable. Corporations won't be near as interested in a small government that is less willing to do favors for them. What do you suggest as a solution to stop the advancement of corporatism? If your answer is to tax the rich more and grow the government you would just get tyranny. Currently with big government we have both tyranny and fascism.
anon bosunj , November 17, 2013 9:43 PMIndeed. One Party. The Corporate party. GOP-DEM are little different than Sunni and Shia! GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!!
Mike , November 10, 2008 6:31 PMThis is just ignorance -- the Republicans and Democrats are the same, but Sunni and Shia Islam are not just arbitrary branches of some terrorist collective called Islam. I suggest you read more about Islam, it's extraordinarily misunderstood AND--I might add--misinforming people about Islam is an integral part of the agenda of the corporate GOP-DEM elite. I'm not a Muslim, for the record.
You are confusing the issue. The work neoliberal applies to an economic philosophy which is also sometimes called the Chicago School or the Washington Consensus. It is related to what we often call globalization, and it has to to with "liberalization" of economies, in other words privatization of publicly held industries etc. Liberal in the American political sense it totally unrelated to neoliberal. Neoconservatism is a political philosophy that espouses vanguardism and militant foreign policy. They are related in that their goals dove tail, kind of like apples and oranges are similar in that they are both edible.
Nov 10, 2008 | www.washingtonsblog.com
Obama might very well be classified as a "neoliberal". He appears to be appointing leading neoliberals to key positions in his administration .
If you're a liberal, you might think this is great. Instead of the Neoconservatives who have been in power for the last 8 years, we'll now have neoliberals. You may assume that "neoliberals" are new, smarter liberals -- with liberal social policies, but with a stronger, more realistic outlook.
Nope.
In reality, neoliberalism is as dissimilar to true progressive liberal politics as neo-conservatism is to true conservative politics (if you don't know it, most leading neoconservatives are former followers of Trotsky communism -- not very conservative, huh?)
For example, did you know that Ronald Reagan was a leading neoliberal ? In the U.S., of course, he is described as the quintessential conservative. But internationally, people understand that he really pushed neoliberal economic policies.
As former CIA counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer Philip Giraldi writes :
Neoconservatives and neoliberals are really quite similar, so it doesn't matter who gets elected in 2008. The American public, weary of preemptive attacks, democracy-promotion, and nation-building, will still get war either way.
And leading neo-conservative strategist Robert Kagan recently said :
Until now the liberal West's strategy has been to try to integrate these two powers into the international liberal order, to tame them and make them safe for liberalism."
So neoconservatives are not really conservative and neoliberals are not really liberal. But neocons and neoliberals are very similar to each other . Neocons are a lot more similar to neoliberals than to true conservatives; neoliberass are more similar to neocons than to real liberals.
Do you get it? Both the Republican and Democratic party are now run by people with identical agendas: make the big corporations richer and expand the American empire.
There is only one party, which simply puts on different faces depending on which "branch" of the party is in power. If its the Democratic branch, there is a slightly liberal social veneer to the mask: a little more funding for social programs, a little more nice guy talk, a little more of a laissez faire attitude towards gays and minorities, and a little more patient push towards military conquest and empire.
If its the Republican branch, there's a little more tough guy talk, quicker moves towards military empire, a little more mention of religion, and a tad more centralization of power in the president.
But there is only a single face behind both masks: the face of raw corporatism, greed and yearning for power and empire.
Until Americans stop getting distracted by the Republican versus Democratic melodrama, America will move steadily forward towards war, empire and -- inevitably as with any country which extends too far -- collapse.
Neoliberalism is neither "new" or liberal. Neoconservativism is neither new or conservative. They are just new labels for a very old agenda: serving the powers-that-be, consolidating power, controlling resources. Whether the iron fist has a velvet glove on it or not, it is still an iron fist.
A true opposition party is needed to counter the never-changing American agenda for military and corporate empire.
J R Thompson , September 19, 2012 10:33 PM
Guest J R Thompson , June 18, 2014 8:12 PMThis article does much to confuse and disinform. NeoCons are essential modern day Fascists. If you don't recall your politics, Fascists are to the right of Conservatives on the political spectrum. They have nothing to do with Communists who are far to the left. During the 1930s Nazis were the NeoCons. They were Fascists, and they also had the overwhelming support of Muslims, who are also Fascists. Today's NeoLiberals are basically Right Wing and hardly middle of the fence. There is virtually no politics to the left of centre and this is the catalyst for massive economic stagnation, economic collapse, rapidly growing global instability, indemic poverty, and an ongoing threat of pandemic disease and general global conflict. Until we have some form of political balance, we're on the brink of catastrophe, and will probably end up with an enormous mess to clean up.
Grey Winters J R Thompson , June 23, 2014 4:28 PMThe Wiki page disagrees with you.
It says that Neo-Conservatives descend from Trotskeyism.
Malcolm Scott J R Thompson , November 4, 2016 9:18 PMFascism is statism and nothing represents the ultimate power of the state then the liberal. No liberal supports our constitution or a smaller government . But it's innately typical of a liberal to project their agenda onto others.
MisterReason J R Thompson , November 8, 2015 6:27 AMFascism, Communism are just different faces of Totalitarianism or Statism. Fascism gives "private" owners (oligarchs) the illusion of freedom.
Adnihilo , November 11, 2008 7:16 PMYour communist professor lied to you.
Communism and Fascism are one degree apart. In Fascism, instead of the elite being part of the government, they are part of the private sector. That is the only difference. They are both mainly concerned with consolidation of power and shaping the culture though control of information. Internationally they operate the same as well, expanding their influence through wars of occupation.
Alejandro Moreno Adnihilo , July 21, 2016 2:07 PMThank you for this article! As an author you always seem to be one step ahead of me in articles I've been planning to write! I too have been asserting [in comments mostly at OpedNews] that the economic right political 'values' found in NeoLibs, [short for both NeoLibertarians and Neoliberals] NeoCons, and TheoCons are predominantly the same for months now ever since these corporate bailouts started. This author has a firm grasp on political ideologies as evidenced in his other articles correctly identifying the now $2 trillion in US corporate bailouts as the economic policy of Fascism.
The TheoCons-NeoCons-NeoLibs have taken the country so far to the economic right and up in to an authoritarian level since 2000 that most all in the democratic party, excluding a few like Kucinich and Sanders, have moved from a 'centrist' political ideology to an authoritarian right and moderate conservative political ideology.
Like Anna here more fully displays, the overwhelming majority of Americans just do not have a realistic grasp on global political ideologies, much less their own personal political values. Political party indoctrination and mud slinging has the population wrongly convinced democratic politicians are for the most part 'liberals' when they're economic right NeoLiberals and moderate conservatives while republicans calling themselves 'conservative' are instead radically authoritarian and economic right TheoCons and NeoCons.
When Americans don't understand their own political values, much less those of the candidate they vote for, they will continue to make the wrong choices. This would seem to be exactly what the '1' party corporatist system wants so Americans will only continue making the wrong choices from choosing between 'moderate conservative' Democrats like Obama-Biden, and NeoCon/TheoCon republicans like McCain-Palin. Who better to assert this 1 party economic right NeoLiberal reality than one of the most renown liberal authors and intellectuals than Chomsky in his recent article the Anti-Democratic Nature of US Capitalism is Being Exposed.
Chomsky cites America as a "one-party system, the business party, with two factions, Republicans and Democrats" while putting the blame on this economic crisis where it belongs on the very people who created it, America's NeoLiberals. Anna, if you need more proof I suggest you take a trip to the non partisan web site created by a group of doctorate degreed political ideology professors, political experts and sociologists called Political Compass. I guarantee you these experts are far more learned than you are about political ideologies and political values not just in the US, but around the globe. It will surely shock you to learn based on speeches, public statements and most crucially voting records that Obama is firmly in the authoritarian right quadrant as a moderate conservative.
There you'll see their reasons for this based on his voting record and speeches briefly cited in "While Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader are depicted on the extreme left in an American context, they would simply be mainstream social democrats within the wider political landscape of Europe.
Similarly, Obama is popularly perceived as a leftist in the United States while elsewhere in the west his record is that of a moderate conservative. For example, in the case of the death penalty he is not an uncompromising abolitionist, while mainstream conservatives in all other western democracies are deeply opposed to capital punishment. The Democratic party's presidential candidate also reneged on his commitment to oppose the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He sided with the ultra conservative bloc in the Supreme Court against the Washington DC handgun ban and for capital punishment in child rape cases. He supports President Bush's faith-based initiatives and is reported in Fortune to have said that NAFTA isn't so bad."A way to realistically determine if the candidate you vote for actually represents your own political values is to take the political values test found at political compass here and afterward learn about the inadequacies inherent in the limited age-old traditional left-right economic view of political ideologies.
Then you Anna, along with a host of others, may actually start voting in support of candidates that factually represent your own political values. Or you may find you really aren't this liberal you think you are after all. Regardless, only by learning more about ones' own political values and those of the candidates Americans support will they get the political leaders, type of leadership, and government they actually want....
Dave , December 8, 2012 11:06 AMWritten 8 years ago and yet STILL true, Sanders and Kucinich are still of, by and for the people.
SuperTech86 Dave , November 11, 2015 3:20 AMLibertarian Party. http://www.lp.org
Ian SuperTech86 , September 5, 2016 6:28 PMDoesn't do anything to stop the advance of corporatism which ultimately leads to tyranny and fascism.
bosunj , November 10, 2008 5:59 PMIts debatable. Corporations won't be near as interested in a small government that is less willing to do favors for them. What do you suggest as a solution to stop the advancement of corporatism? If your answer is to tax the rich more and grow the government you would just get tyranny. Currently with big government we have both tyranny and fascism.
anon bosunj , November 17, 2013 9:43 PMIndeed. One Party. The Corporate party. GOP-DEM are little different than Sunni and Shia! GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!!
Mike , November 10, 2008 6:31 PMThis is just ignorance -- the Republicans and Democrats are the same, but Sunni and Shia Islam are not just arbitrary branches of some terrorist collective called Islam. I suggest you read more about Islam, it's extraordinarily misunderstood AND--I might add--misinforming people about Islam is an integral part of the agenda of the corporate GOP-DEM elite. I'm not a Muslim, for the record.
You are confusing the issue. The work neoliberal applies to an economic philosophy which is also sometimes called the Chicago School or the Washington Consensus. It is related to what we often call globalization, and it has to to with "liberalization" of economies, in other words privatization of publicly held industries etc. Liberal in the American political sense it totally unrelated to neoliberal. Neoconservatism is a political philosophy that espouses vanguardism and militant foreign policy. They are related in that their goals dove tail, kind of like apples and oranges are similar in that they are both edible.
May 23, 2017 | www.npr.org
Former CIA Director John Brennan told the House Intelligence Committee Tuesday that Russia "brazenly interfered in the 2016 election process," despite U.S. efforts to warn it off. Brennan testified in an open session of the committee, one of a handful of congressional committees now investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
Brennan said he told his Russian counterpart, the head of Russia's FSB, last August that if Russia pursued its efforts to interfere, "it would destroy any near-term prospect for improvement in relations" between the two countries. He said Russia denied any attempts to interfere.
In his opening statement, Brennan also recounted how he had briefed congressional leaders in August of last year, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and the chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees about the "full details" of what he knew of Russia's interference in the 2016 election. Brennan said he became convinced last summer that Russia was trying to interfere in the campaign, saying "they were very aggressive."
Brennan said he is "aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign." Brennan said that concerned him, "because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals," and that it raised questions about whether or not the Russians "were able to gain the cooperation of those individuals." Brennan added he didn't know if "collusion existed" between the Russians and those he identified as involved in the Trump campaign.
While Brennan would not specifically identify any individuals associated with the Trump campaign who had contacts with Russian officials and would not opine as to whether there was any collusion or collaboration, he did tell lawmakers why he was concerned about the contacts occurring against the general background of Russian efforts to meddle in the election. Brennan said he's studied Russian intelligence activities over the years, and how Russian intelligence services have been able to get people to betray their country. "Frequently, individuals on a treasonous path do not even realize they're on that path until it gets to be too late," he said.
Brennan said Russia was motivated to back Donald Trump in the presidential election because of a "traditional animus" between Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and Russian President Vladimir Putin. He told committee members there had not been a good relationship between Putin and the Clintons over the years. What's more, Brennan said Putin blamed Hillary Clinton's actions as secretary of state during the Obama administration for domestic disturbances inside Russia. He said Putin was concerned Clinton would be more "rigid" on issues such as human rights if elected president.
But Brennan told the committee he believed that Russia anticipated that Clinton would be the likely winner of the presidential race, and that Russia tried to "damage and bloody" her before Election Day. Had she won, Brennan said, Russia would have continued to attempt to "denigrate her and hurt her" during her presidency. If Russia had collected more information about Clinton that they did not use against her during the campaign, Brennan said they were likely "husbanding it for another day."
On another question, Brennan criticized President Trump's reported sharing of classified intelligence with Russia officials. Brennan said if reports were accurate, Trump violated "protocols" by sharing the information with Russia's foreign minister and ambassador to the U.S.
Brennan also said he was "very concerned" by the release of what he said appears to be classified information from the Trump administration. He said there appear to be "very, very damaging leaks, and I find them appalling and they need to be tracked down."
Reacting to Brennan's testimony, a White House spokesman said "This morning's hearings back up what we've been saying all along: that despite a year of investigation, there is still no evidence of any Russia-Trump campaign collusion, that the President never jeopardized intelligence sources or sharing, and that even Obama's CIA Director believes the leaks of classified information are 'appalling' and the culprits must be 'tracked down.'"
Under questioning from Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., Brennan said the Russians have been trying to disrupt Western elections since the 1960s, and that they've quickly adapted to the times. Brennan pointed to the ease with which Russia was able to hack Democratic operatives' emails, which were then published on WikiLeaks.
"The cyber-environment now really provides so much more opportunity for troublemaking and the Russians take advantage of it," he said. Brennan said the use of spear phishing, and "whatever else so that they can then gain access to people's emails, computer systems networks," is something that the Russians are adept at.
He said Russia used WikiLeaks as a "cut-out," or go-between, and that protests by WikiLeaks that it is not working with Russia and Russia's claims it is not working with WikiLeaks are "disingenuous."
May 30, 2017 | www.unz.com
Speaking to a Russian becomes treasonous
The Washington Post and a number of other mainstream media outlets are sensing blood in the water in the wake of former CIA Director John Brennan's public testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. The Post headlined a front page featured article with Brennan's explosive testimony just made it harder for the GOP to protect Trump . The article states that Brennan during the 2016 campaign "reviewed intelligence that showed 'contacts and interaction' between Russian actors and people associated with the Trump campaign." Politico was also in on the chase in an article entitled Brennan: Russia may have successfully recruited Trump campaign aides .The precise money quote by Brennan that the two articles chiefly rely on is "I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and US persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals."
Now first of all, the CIA is not supposed to keep tabs on American citizens and tracking the activities of known associates of a presidential candidate should have sent warning bells off, yet Brennan clearly persisted in following the trail. What Brennan did not describe, because it was "classified," was how he came upon the information in the first place. We know from the New York Times and other sources that it came from foreign intelligence services, including the British, Dutch and Estonians, and there has to be a strong suspicion that the forwarding of at least some of that information might have been sought or possibly inspired by Brennan unofficially in the first place. But whatever the provenance of the intelligence, it is clear that Brennan then used that information to request an FBI investigation into a possible Russian operation directed against potential key advisers if Trump were to somehow get nominated and elected, which admittedly was a longshot at the time. That is how Russiagate began.
But where the information ultimately came from as well as its reliability is just speculation as the source documents have not been made public. What is not speculative is what Brennan actually said in his testimony. He said that Americans associated with Trump and his campaign had met with Russians. He was "concerned" because of known Russian efforts to "suborn such individuals." Note that Brennan, presumably deliberately, did not say "suborn those individuals." Sure, Russian intelligence (and CIA, MI-6, and Mossad as well as a host of others) seek to recruit people with access to politically useful information. That is what they do for a living, but Brennan is not saying that he has or saw any evidence that that was the case with the Trump associates. He is speaking generically of "such individuals" because he knows that spies, inter alia , recruit politicians and the Russians presumably, like the Americans and British, do so aggressively.
At a later point in his testimony Brennan also said that "I had unresolved questions in my mind about whether or not the Russians had been successful in getting US persons, involved in the campaign or not, to work on their behalf, again, either in a witting or unwitting fashion," clearly meant to imply that some friends of Trump might have become Russian agents voluntarily but others might have cooperated without knowing it.
It is a line that has surfaced elsewhere previously, most notably in the demented meanderings of former acting Director of Central Intelligence Michael Morell. As the purpose of recruiting an intelligence agent is to have a resource that can be directed to do things for you, the statement is an absurdity and Brennan and Morell, as a former Director and acting Director of the CIA, should know better. That they don't explains a lot of things about today's CIA
Brennan confirms his lack of any hard evidence when he also poses the question "whether or not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals." He doesn't know whether the Americans were approached and asked to cooperate by Russian intelligence officers and, even if they were, he does not know whether they agreed to do so. That means that the Americans in question were guilty only of meeting and talking to Russians, which was presumably enough to open an FBI investigation. One might well consider that at the time and even to this day Russia was not and is not a declared enemy of the United States and meeting Russians is not a criminal offense.
In his testimony, Brennan also hit the main theme that appears to be accepted by nearly everyone inside the beltway, namely that Russian sought to influence and even pervert the outcome of the 2016 election. Interpreting his testimony, the Post article asserts that "Russia was engaged in an 'aggressive' and 'multifaceted 'effort to interfere in our election." As has been noted frequently before, even though this assertion has apparently been endorsed by nearly everyone in the power structure AKA (also known as) "those who matter," it is singularly lacking in any actual evidence.
Nor has any evidence been produced to support the claim that it was Russia that hacked the Democratic National Committee (DNC) server, which now is accepted as Gospel, but that is just one side to the story being promoted. Last Wednesday, the New York Times led off its front page with a piece entitled Top Russian Officials Discussed How to Influence Trump Aides Last Summer . Based, as always, on anonymous sources citing "highly classified" intelligence, the article claimed that "American spies collected information last summer revealing that senior Russian intelligence and political officials were discussing how to exert influence over Donald J. Trump through his advisers " The "discussions," which are presumably NSA intercepts of phone calls, reportedly focused on two aides in particular, Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, both of whom had established relationships with Russian businessmen and government officials.
The article goes on to concede that "It is unclear, however, whether Russian officials actually tried to directly influence Mr. Manafort and Mr. Flynn ," and that's about all there is to the tale, though the Times wanders on for another three pages, recapping Brennan and the Flynn saga lest anyone has forgotten. So what do we have? Russians were talking on the phone about the possibility of influencing an American's presidential candidate's advisers, an observation alluded to by Brennan and also revealed in somewhat more detail by anonymous sources. Pretty thin gruel, isn't it? Isn't that what diplomats and intelligence officers do?
It would appear that the New York Times ' editors are unaware that the United States routinely interferes in elections worldwide and that the action taken in various places including Ukraine goes far beyond phone conversations. In some other places like Libya, Syria, Iraq, Somalia and Afghanistan the interference is particularly robust taking place at the point of a bayonet, but the Times and Washington Post don't appear to have any problem when the regime change is being accomplished ostensibly to make the world more democratic, even if it almost never has that result.
How one regards all of the dreck coming out of the Fourth Estate and poseurs like John Brennan pretty much depends on the extent one is willing to trust that what the government, its highly-politicized bureaucrats and the media tell the public is true. For me, that would be not a lot. The desire to bring down the buffoonish Donald Trump is understandable, but buying into government and media lies will only lead to more lies that have real consequences, up to and including the impending wars against North Korea and Iran. It is imperative that every American should question everything he or she reads in a newspaper, sees on television "news" or hears coming out of the mouths of former and current government employees.
RobinG , May 30, 2017 at 5:20 am GMT
animalogic , May 30, 2017 at 5:32 am GMTThanks for the reassurance, Phil. It's lonely standing against the tide, and many are trying to fabricate excuses for the lack of evidence.
Take Melvin Goodman, author of Whistleblower at the CIA, for instance. (I realize CIA is a big place, but did you know him?) I've met Mr. Goodman, and he struck me as thoughtful, rational and capable of objective discussion. However, in his talk at the Gaithersburg Book Festival, he seemed a rather different person. At the end of Q&A, he said that he was trying to figure out how the Russians had laundered the "hacked" DNC emails to make it look like they were leaked by an insider. He's sure the Russians did it. With such creative speculation, who needs facts?
The book, though, is probably pretty good. Which makes it that much stranger that he's taking the political line on the DNC emails!
https://www.c-span.org/video/?427995-3/whistleblower-cia
Melvin A. Goodman talked about his book, Whistleblower at the CIA: An Insider's Account of the Politics of Intelligence.
Anon , May 30, 2017 at 5:51 am GMTAh, another day, another disgraceful display by the media. Incidentally: "The "discussions," which are presumably NSA intercepts of phone calls, reportedly ."
"Presumably" here is quite generous: I'd be tempted to presume a whole string of lies .
The Alarmist , May 30, 2017 at 5:54 am GMTUS is now like USSR? https://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2017/05/29/forget-russian-collusion-we-are-russia/
exiled off mainstreet , May 30, 2017 at 6:15 am GMTIt's like climate change: The MSM tells us that 17 intelligence agencies agree that the Russians hacked the election and thereby influenced it, but when you dig a little you find that NSA, for example, did not express a high degree of confidence that this might have actually been the case. Nevertheless, the case is settled. Pravda and Izvestia should have been so convinced in their day.
jilles dykstra , May 30, 2017 at 8:00 am GMTThe end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war, since he seems to consider even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both fascist and nihilist and treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our survival.
Russ , May 30, 2017 at 8:39 am GMTIt all seems quite simple to me. After WWI the USA people decided that their sons should not die ever more for imperialism. Isolation, neutrality laws. In 1932 Roosevelt was brought into politics to make the USA great, great as the country controlling the world. Trump and his rich friends understand that this policy is not just ruining the USA, but is ruining them personally. If I'm right in this, it is the greatest change in USA foreign policy since 1932.
Of course those, their mouth pieces Washpost, CNN and NYT, who still want USA control of the world, have aligned their careers on this policy, do anything to get rid of Trump. As Russia is seen by them as the next country to be subjugated, any talk with this 'enemy' to them is high treason.
LauraMR , May 30, 2017 at 9:32 am GMTLisa Frank has recently (5/18/2017) written beautifully on the topic of Comey in the FBI: http://stateofthenation2012.com/?p=72788
Just as Ms. Frank dissects Comey's background and motivations, so a similar dissection is now in order for Mr. Brennan.
Renoman , May 30, 2017 at 10:08 am GMT@exiled off mainstreet The end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war, since he seems to consider even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both fascist and nihilist and treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our survival.
Is he an Anglo-Zionist? I kind of missed a reference to the true puppet-masters in the article
mp , May 30, 2017 at 10:30 am GMTI'll say it again "what has Russia ever done to the USA"? The answer is Nothing!
Tom Welsh , May 30, 2017 at 10:52 am GMTIs someone going to look in to how the Izzys influence our politicians and elections? No. Why? Because Russia is the "enemy" and Israel is our "ally." Can someone explain in simple terms why Russia is the enemy? Yes. Because Jews don't like them very much. Can someone explain in simple terms why Israel is our ally? Because of New York City, Hollywood, CNN, Fox, MSNBC, CBS and NBC, the major newspapers, Wall Street, porn, military subsidies, dual citizenship, etc. And because every president just can't wait to wear the beanie and genuflect at some wall. Any other questions?
Tom Welsh , May 30, 2017 at 10:53 am GMT" One might well consider that at the time and even to this day Russia was not and is not a declared enemy of the United States and meeting Russians is not a criminal offense".
Although in point of fact the USA has committed, and continues to commit, acts of war against Russia.
RealAmerican , May 30, 2017 at 11:23 am GMT@Renoman "[W]hat has Russia ever done to the USA"?
Er, supported the US government during the American Civil War? Given it Alaska for a token payment? Won WW2 for it?
DanCT , May 30, 2017 at 11:33 am GMTHow many congressmen and other politicians in Washington are already suborned by AIPAC? Is that not AIPAC's raison d'etre ?
Wizard of Oz , May 30, 2017 at 12:30 pm GMT"Because of New York City, Hollywood, CNN, Fox, MSNBC, CBS and NBC, the major newspapers, Wall Street, porn, military subsidies, dual citizenship, etc. "
Let's not forget 911 and it's ongoing coverup, the State Dept's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs exemplifying our bestest ally's parallel command and control apparatus in every federal agency such as the FBI, etc
alexander , May 30, 2017 at 12:31 pm GMTThe only problem I have with the article is understanding the vehemence with which Brennan and Morell are denounced for, as I read it, blathering about unwitting agents who might have co-operated without knowing it. I construed the objection to be based on a foreign intelligence service necessarily seeking to "direct" its agents. It would indeed follow that the agents could not help knowing what they were doing. However .
Is there not a category of people who Brennan and Morell might be referring to who could be aptly described as useful idiots. You meet them at a writer's festival, invite them to accept your country's generous and admiring hospitality and soon have them spouting the memes you have made sure they are fed as well inadvertently feeding you useful titbits of information, especially about people.
Andrei Martyanov , Website May 30, 2017 at 12:50 pm GMTI think something fascinating is going on, Tom. Our leaders made a choice to defraud us into the Iraq war. Russia didn't. This is a very serious crime for which there has been zero accountability. It seems that all the various people who should be in federal prison for having done this, are the one's "braying the loudest" about the Russian threat.
The real crisis in our country is the absence of accountability for the heinous crimes THEY committed, not anything the Russians did. If we allow acts of "war fraud" to go unprosecuted, then War Fraud becomes acceptable behavior. I do not know of one American, anywhere, who feels this is okay.
Do you ?
Agent76 , May 30, 2017 at 1:19 pm GMTNor has any evidence been produced to support the claim that it was Russia that hacked the Democratic National Committee (DNC) server
It doesn't matter. Mr. Clapper finally found the answer to this 1 billion dollar question why US is suffering in his NBC interview -- it is because Russians are untermensch. Russian genetics is wrong and we all were so sweating and suffering over this whole mess., while the answer was so close, on the surface.
"If you put that in context with everything else we knew the Russians were doing to interfere with the election, and just the historical practices of the Russians, who typically, almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique. So we were concerned."
Tom Welsh , May 30, 2017 at 1:53 pm GMTI know some others actually know you cannot believe spies. Some on the other hand so not.
Mar 22, 2017 How the CIA Plants News Stories in the Media. It is no longer disputed that the CIA has maintained an extensive and ongoing relationship with news organizations and journalists, and multiple, specific acts of media manipulation have now been documented.
August 30, 2015 THE CIA AND THE MEDIA: 50 FACTS THE WORLD NEEDS TO KNOW By Prof. James F. Tracy
Since the end of World War Two the Central Intelligence Agency has been a major force in US and foreign news media, exerting considerable influence over what the public sees, hears and reads on a regular basis.
https://www.intellihub.com/the-cia-and-the-media-50-facts-the-world-needs-to-know-2/
jilles dykstra , May 30, 2017 at 2:23 pm GMT@alexander Alexander, I definitely don't think it's OK, but I am not American – I am British (Scottish, to be exact). Although we have exactly the same problem over here – in miniature – with our local pocket Hitlers strutting around in their jackboots just salivating for the blood of foreigners.
I think the people who are braying about Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, etc. are doing so largely to distract attention from their own crimes. The following celebrated dialogue explains very clearly how it works.
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We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and destruction."Why, of course, the people don't want war," Goering shrugged. "Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship."
"There is one difference," I pointed out. "In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars."
"Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."
- Conversation with Hermann Goering in prison, reported by Gustave Gilbert
jilles dykstra , May 30, 2017 at 2:29 pm GMT@Tom Welsh I suppose the story is meant to show that Goering wanted war. The opposite is true, he sent the Swedish negotiator Dahlerus several times to London in his plane, taking himself care, telephoning with the Dutch authorities, that the Junckers could fly safely over the Netherlands. What Goering did not know was that Britain had been preparing for war at least since 1936. The march 1939 guarantee to Poland was meant to provoke Hitler to attack Poland. The trap worked.
Agent76 , May 30, 2017 at 2:32 pm GMT@Agent76 That even Senator Moynihan, of the CIA Oversight Committee, was lied to by the CIA director, about laying mines in Havana harbour, says enough. The CIA is not a secret service, it is a secret army. This secret army began drugs production in Afghanistan, mainly for the USA market, when funds for the CIA's war in Afghanistan were insufficient.
jilles dykstra , May 30, 2017 at 2:34 pm GMTThis CIA director? May 19, 2010 Obama advisor John Brennan speaks about the beauty of Islam
Agent76 , May 30, 2017 at 2:43 pm GMT@alexander It is.
After an investigation of some seven years the lies of Tony Blair were exposed, in a report of considerable size. What happened ? Nothing. Instead of being in jail, the man flies aroud in a private jet, with an enormous income, paid by whom for what, I do not have a clue.annamaria , May 30, 2017 at 2:50 pm GMTDec 12, 2016 Georgia Official Says Homeland Security Tried To Hack Their State's Voter Database
While most of the country frets over Russia's role in the 2016 election, the state of Georgia has come forward saying that they've traced an IP from a hack of their voter database right back to the offices of the Department of Homeland Security. Apparently we need to focus on protecting our vote from our own government.
alexander , May 30, 2017 at 2:58 pm GMTThe end result of Brennan's fulminations likely is nuclear war, since he seems to consider even contact with the Russians treasonous. His view is both fascist and nihilist and treasonous to civilization itself and a threat to our survival. Brennan is just a regular profiteering opportunist. Someone needs to remind the scoundrel that the civil war in Ukraine (initiated by an illegal Kievan junta sponsored and installed by the US), had started immediately upon Brennan's arrival to Kiev in 2014. He tried to make the visit secret but this did not work and Brennan's presence in Ukraine became widely known: https://sputniknews.com/world/20140415189240842-ANALYSIS-CIA-Director-Brennans-Trip-to-Ukraine-Initiates-Use-Of/
"CIA Director John Brennan visited Ukraine over the weekend, information that was confirmed by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on Monday, after being reported by media on Sunday.
Over the same weekend, Kiev authorities cracked down on pro-federalization protests in eastern Ukraine. Regime troops advanced toward a number of cities in eastern Ukraine Tuesday to attack the protesters. "Brennan's appearance in Kiev just before the announcement of a violent crackdown in eastern Ukraine is just too timely to assume that it is a coincidence," Turbeville [an American international affairs expert] said.
"Brennan, who has been actively involved in arming insurgents in Libya, Syria and Venezuela, has a reputation for using thuggish tactics in pursuit of CIA goals," Wayne Madsen, an American investigative journalist told RIA Novosti."
This is a fact showing the US' direct meddling in the affairs of another state and in creating a war on a border with Russian federation. Brennan has been so much immersed in lies and politicking and war crimes that it is impossible to expect any decent reasoning from this miserable opportunist.
Agent76 , May 30, 2017 at 3:08 pm GMT@Tom Welsh Excellent quote, Tom.
.And so true.
Tom Welsh , May 30, 2017 at 3:29 pm GMTUnfortunately for you and myself there are literally millions of people in America who do not think or challenge what they read or view as we do apparently. Thanks, *government schooling* .
Mar 6, 2017 Drug Boss Escobar Worked for the CIA
The notorious cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar worked closely with the CIA, according to his son. In this episode of The Geopolitical Report, we look at the long history of CIA involvement in the international narcotics trade, beginning with its collaboration with the French Mafia to using drug money to illegally fund the Contras and overthrow the Sandinista government in Nicaragua.
Tom Welsh , May 30, 2017 at 3:31 pm GMTI suppose the story is meant to show that Goering wanted war. The opposite is true, he sent the Swedish negotiator Dahlerus several times to London in his plane, taking himself care, telephoning with the Dutch authorities, that the Junckers could fly safely over the Netherlands. What Goering did not know was that Britain had been preparing for war at least since 1936. The march 1939 guarantee to Poland was meant to provoke Hitler to attack Poland. The trap worked.
What Goering did say – cogently and precisely – is that, regardless of the form of government, the people can always be quite easily stirred up to want war. The key sentence is this: "All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger". That is exactly what the US, UK and European governments have been doing for years to justify their terrorist scares and their wars of aggression. And Goering was absolutely right to point out that it works just the same in democracies (or "democracies") as under dictatorships.
As for your point about Britain having deliberately fomented the war, I don't think that holds water. Britain was grossly – almost grotesquely – underarmed in 1939, and came very close indeed to being conquered in 1940. In my view, it was FDR and his friends who assiduously wound up the Nazis and the Poles to fight one another, and then persuaded the British and French to give Poland guarantees. Everyone believed that, if war came, the USA would immediately join Britain and France in fighting Germany. Alas, they were very much mistaken.
Agent76 , May 30, 2017 at 3:57 pm GMT@Agent76 "
"Apparently we need to focus on protecting our vote from our own government". I very much doubt if the Deep State needs to resort to such small-scale and easily-detected trickery to retain control. As Philip Berrigan pointed out long ago, "If voting made any difference, it would be illegal".
Rurik , Website May 30, 2017 at 4:06 pm GMT@Tom Welsh Well, another ruler also stated this, "Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed." Joseph Stalin
Brennan is just a regular profiteering opportunist. Someone needs to remind the scoundrel that the civil war in Ukraine (initiated by an illegal Kievan junta sponsored and installed by the US), had started immediately upon Brennan's arrival to Kiev in 2014. He tried to make the visit secret but this did not work and Brennan's presence in Ukraine became widely known: https://sputniknews.com/world/20140415189240842-ANALYSIS-CIA-Director-Brennans-Trip-to-Ukraine-Initiates-Use-Of/
"CIA Director John Brennan visited Ukraine over the weekend, information that was confirmed by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on Monday, after being reported by media on Sunday.
Over the same weekend, Kiev authorities cracked down on pro-federalization protests in eastern Ukraine. Regime troops advanced toward a number of cities in eastern Ukraine Tuesday to attack the protesters. "Brennan's appearance in Kiev just before the announcement of a violent crackdown in eastern Ukraine is just too timely to assume that it is a coincidence," Turbeville [an American international affairs expert] said.
"Brennan, who has been actively involved in arming insurgents in Libya, Syria and Venezuela, has a reputation for using thuggish tactics in pursuit of CIA goals," Wayne Madsen, an American investigative journalist told RIA Novosti."
This is a fact showing the US' direct meddling in the affairs of another state and in creating a war on a border with Russian federation. Brennan has been so much immersed in lies and politicking and war crimes that it is impossible to expect any decent reasoning from this miserable opportunist.the civil war in Ukraine (initiated by an illegal Kievan junta sponsored and installed by the US), had started immediately upon Brennan's arrival to Kiev in 2014
I wouldn't so much call it a civil war, as a ZUSA imposed putsch, installing a Zio-bankster-quisling.
PG:
the United States routinely interferes in elections worldwide and that the action taken in various places including Ukraine goes far beyond phone conversations.
getting to the crux of the matter
when Russia released the phone conversation where ZUS State Dept. – Kagan klan / Zio-bitch Nuland was overheard deciding who was going to be the next president of Ukraine (some democracy), it was this breach of global oligarch protocol that has riled the deepstate Zio-war-scum ever since. Hence all the screeching and hysterics about "Russian hacking".
The thug Brennan, (as you correctly call him [imagine this mug coming into the room as you're about to be 'enhanced interrogated'])
http://www.frontpagemag.com/sites/default/files/uploads/2015/03/John_Brennan.jpg
has his fingerprints not just all over the war crimes and atrocities in Ukraine, but Syria and elsewhere too.
All these war criminals are all scrambling to undermine Trump in the fear that he'll eventually hold some of them accountable for their serial crimes, treasons, and treachery. Which brings us to this curious comment..
The desire to bring down the buffoonish Donald Trump is understandable,
what the hell does Mr. G think will replace him?!
So far the "buffoonish Donald Trump" has not declared a no-fly zone in Syria, as we know the war sow would have by now. He's not materially harmed the Assad regime, but only made symbolic attempts to presumably mollify the war pigs like McBloodstain and co in the zio-media/AIPAC/etc..
His rhetoric notwithstanding, he seems to be making nice with the Russians, to the apoplectic hysteria of people like Brennan and the Stain.
In fact the more people like Brennan and Bloodstain and the zio-media and others seem on the brink of madness, the better Trump seems to me every day.
And if it puts a smelly sock in the mouths of the neocons and war pigs to saber rattle at Iran, with no possibility to actually do them any harm, because of the treaty and Europe's need to respect it, then what's the harm of Trump sounding a little buffoonish if it gets them off his back so that he can circle himself with a Pretorian guard of loyalists and get to the bottom of all of this. I suspect that is what terrifies people like Brennan more than anything else.
Dec 23, 2017 | www.unz.com
Liverpool , December 22, 2017 at 9:16 pm GMT
I was raised by Democrats, and used to vote for them. But these days, I think heck would freeze over before I'd vote Democrat again. From my point of view, Bernie tried to pull them back to sanity. But the hard core Clinton-corporate-corrupt Democrats have declared war on any movement for reform within the Democratic Party. And there is no way that I'm voting for any of these corrupt-corporate Democrats ever again.Of course, the notion of 'reform' within the Democratic Party is an oxymoron. Its been around since Nader, when the corrupt-corporate Democrats tried to tell us that the way forward was to work within the corrupt-corporate Democratic Party and change things that way. We saw the way the corrupt-corporate Democrats colluded and rigged the last Presidential Primaries so that Corrupt-Corporate-Clinton was guaranteed the corrupt-corporate Democrat nomination. That's a loud and clear message to anyone who thinks they can achieve change within the corrupt-corporate-colluding-rigged Democratic Party.
Since I've always been anti-war, I've been forced to follow what anti-war movement there is over to the Republicans. And I see Steve Bannon trying to wage the fight within the Republican party that the fake-reformers in the Democrats never even tried . ie, numerous primary challenges to corrupt-corporate Democrats. That never happened, and by 2012 I was convinced that even the fake-reformers within the corrupt-corporate Democrats were fakes who only wanted fund-raising but didn't really fight for reform.
Neither party represents any but the richest of the rich these days. Both parties lie to voters and try to pretend that they might actually give a damn about the rest of us. But the only sign of life that I see of anyone trying to fight back against this Bannon inside the Republicans. I'm not thrilled with Bannon, although he's not nearly as bad as the loony-lefties in the corrupt-corporate Democratic Party and their many satellites call him. But he's the only one putting up a fight. I just hope that maybe someone will run in primaries against the corrupt-corporate-Republicans who fake-represent the part of the map where I live.
Neither party is on our side. The establishment in both parties is crooked and corrupt. Someone needs to fight them. And I sure as heck won't vote for the corrupt and the crooked. Since the Democrats are doubling down on corrupt and crooked and telling such big lies that even Goebbels would blush, it doesn't look like I'll ever vote Dem0crat again.
Dec 23, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
Pavlos December 20, 2017 at 11:08 pm
Trump won't get dragged into war, although his conniving nature may try to make it look like that if it serves some ulterior motive of his. Trump will race on his own volition (not get dragged by others) to war because he's already been chomping at the bit for war as evident in how he's been baiting Iran and N. Korea alike, just as Bush baited Saddam Huessein, then bait and switched Osama Bin Laden for Saddam. So if not war with one (Iran), then with the other (N. Korea), or with both.Fran Macadam , says: December 20, 2017 at 11:22 pmWhy? Because like all Republican politicians, Trump's a businessman and proud of it, (Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.) And because war is good for American business, a lesson that was learned from WWII from which was created the military-industrial-complex and the Permanent War Economy under which we've lived ever since.
That bit's key to understanding the whole unwavering GOP attack on social services and desire to deregulate and privatize everything, not because of evil "socialism" as the Republican constituency is hypnotized with propaganda into believing, but because there's no money to be made in government expenditures otherwise. The whole GOP agenda has been and is about public expense for private gain. All the blather about shrinking the government is smokescreen. The real agenda is about directing all government spending towards private contractors with none wasted on things like social services, medicare, or Social Security.
Economic aspects of politics can't be ignored and separated from social aspects of politics which is how conservatism in America has helped create the current political mess, by turning a blind eye and dittohead to economic matters in order to push the chosen, preferred social agenda.
As Coolidge said, "The business of America is business." So since the US is ruled by money of markets, there can be no getting one's moral back up and all Jesus over social immorality, only to ignore the immorality of the marketplace and thereby fail to push for a moral economy along with a moral society. Such misidentification of the problem will only result in missing the mark, in inappropriate rather than on the mark effective solutions to problems.
Trump is simply a braggart who likes to exaggerate by talking in superlatives, so it's fitting that Trump ran on the GOP ticket, because he's but another child of the Father of Lies, who superlatively lies about his wealth being billions instead of millions to swell his pride in being a mammon worshipper, and going to war is and will be as it certainly has been part and parcel of such hubris.
To be fair, the Saudi dictators have always been best friends with America's elites – think Bandar Bush, the grounding of all air traffic in the United States after 9/11, except the Saudi evacuation planes spiriting Saudi royals out of the country so they could not be questioned. And there is the locus of the Likud Israeli party friendship with the Saudis, and Trump is certainly nothing if not onside with his good friend, the Israeli PM.Fran Macadam , says: December 20, 2017 at 11:40 pmI'd like to believe either the Repubs or Dems were the answer, except both are near unanimous in their support for the military industrial complex and its expanding wars. Note the 98-2 vote to make Russia a permanent enemy. I believe the resistors were bipartisan, lonely as they are in either party, in reality separate branches of an imperial War Party.mohammad , says: December 20, 2017 at 11:50 pmMake no mistake: if there is going to be an attack on Iran by Americans, it is not because MbS wants it, it is because the Americans love war.leonard , says: December 21, 2017 at 12:38 amI am convinced that most (some 90%) Americans are open or closeted Neo-cons/liberal-interventionists/war-hawks. Some are shamelessly and openly so (John Bolton), but many are so without showing it or even being aware of it. The hawk in them is restlessly waiting for an opening, an excuse, to come out and proclaim what they have ever been
Don't worry, w Captain Marmalade at the helm, the US will mess this all up by itself just like it has again and again and again.Kronsteen1963 , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:04 amBush 41 dragged us into a coalition war over Kuwait. Clinton dragged us into a coalition war in the Balkans. Bush 43 dragged us into a war in Iraq. Obama dragged us into a secret war when he destabilized Syria and Lybia, which unleashed ISIS. All for the right reasons, of course (sarcasm).charles cosimano , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:42 amYou might be right, but I fail to see how that would be different than the last 30 years.
Finally.Kronsteen1963 , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:47 amIt should have been done 37 years ago.
BTW, Politico has a story about how the Obama Administration shot down DEA drug trafficking investigations of Hezbollah to support the Iran nuclear deal. I would like to read your comments about it, particularly in light of the comments you made above about Trump.Pro ivic , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:57 amhttps://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/obama-hezbollah-drug-trafficking-investigation/
Parents always tell kids to choose their friends carefully. With pals like Netanyahu and the Saudi bogus "crown prince", Trump clearly didn't follow that advice.Nelson , says: December 21, 2017 at 3:12 amThat looked like a promotional video made by defense contractors. Anyway it's crazy. If they go to war I hope we stay out of it.ludo , says: December 21, 2017 at 3:49 amThat video looks like a Nazi's wet dream, I mean the undiluted fascistic element is overwhelming, it's like getting a peek at an alternate dimension, not even a society, of pure militaristic "hathos" festooned by a limitless cloud of lies.Adamant , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:03 amThe worst of humanity is engrafted in that video, by which, I mean the unalloyed lying stupidity of war: imperialist expansionism, nationalist revanchism, and plutocratic supremacism, haloed by the grey mist–the dehumanzing pixelated mist–of the most dehumanizing endeavor man can undertake, for the most dehumanizing of modern causes: fascistic capitalism, the kind that fueled WWII (In this latter case, under the guise of religious supremacism or religious survivalism, but, in any case, only an obvious guise as far as the grotesque House of Saud is characteristically concerned).
Echoing Noah above, this doesn't appear to be a production of the Saudi government, but having a contingent of the Saudi population gung-ho for a Sunni/Shi'a Ragnarok is concerning in itself. Both KSA and Iran will fight each other to the last Yemeni before any direct conflict arises.Floridan , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:04 amThis is the scenario that should be keeping us all up at night:
The greatest myth of warfare -- "Once our forces invade the people will rise up against their government and welcome us a liberators."AB , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:42 amFran Macadam: To be fair, the Saudi dictators have always been best friends with America's elites – think Bandar Bush, the grounding of all air traffic in the United States after 9/11, except the Saudi evacuation planes spiriting Saudi royals out of the country so they could not be questioned.muad'dib , says: December 21, 2017 at 7:17 amIt wasn't the royals -- it was the bin Laden family itself. The people who knew Osama best. I never understood why we didn't insists that, with all airplanes grounded, they had to have a US Air Force pilot -- who then would have flown them to Gitmo for a sit-down on their newly famous relative. Instead the highest levels of government -- how high did you have to go to get permission to fly? -- broke into their busy schedules to be briefed and let them go.
The whole thing still stinks. We really need to have an investigation into the role of Saudi Arabia in American foreign policy; especially the Iraq Wars.
In the meantime, Frack Baby Frack! The less oil we have to import from there, Venezuela, or anyplace crazy the better.
Michelle , says: December 21, 2017 at 8:05 amPresident Trump's new best friend, MBS, is going to get us dragged into a new war in the region. Watch.
But her E-mails Good Thing the witch from Chappaqua isn't in the White House
ROTFLMAO!!!
If the Saudis are foolish enough to try that they will get their ass so thoroughly kicked that "who were the Al Saud?" will a trivial pursuit question on par with "Who were the Romanov's?" 10 years from now, and if the US is foolish enough to let them do that, watch the Global Economy collapse as the Strait of Hormuz gets closed for a few years.
Dr Talon,
The best military in the Middle East is Hezbollah (Trained & equipped by the Iranian, blooded and forged by the Israelis) the only thing they don't have is an air force. Let them have a half way decent air wing, and they would be on par or better than the USMC.Duke Leto,
All that beautiful hardware has to be put to good use, after all if you don't use it you can't replace it. Think of all that beautiful money to be made in hardware replacementNoah,
Trump also declined to support Kurdish independence, which the Israeli right supports and would have undermined Iran (which has a restive Kurdish minority) and Iran ally Iraq.
Supporting the Kurds would have pissed off his best buddy Erdogan, in that Turkey has the largest Kurdish minority population of all the Middle Eastern countries (about 20% of population) and the largest military in the Middle East. Not a good idea, especially if you don't want them to become buddy buddy with their eastern neighbor.
Oh, did I mention that Saudi Arabia has a substantial Shiite minority (10 to 15% of the population) who isn't exactly thrilled to live under Wahhabi rule.
Watching the Saudis (a country that has to import plumbers from South Asia because it's below the dignity of the locals to be plumbers) getting their asses handed to them, watching the Dumpster's poll rating jump up to the 80% mark before cratering down to 15%, watching the Trump recession that would follow would almost be worth it if I didn't have to suffer the consequences of "Real American's(TM)" idiocy. It would be almost as much fun as watching Brexit.
And President Ted Cruz or Clinton would be different how?Siarlys Jenkins , says: December 21, 2017 at 9:02 amIt's a pretty safe assumption that a President Clinton would work to uphold the treaty her predecessor signed with Iran. Cruz, like the rest of the GOP hawks, would probably (like Trump) be actively working to undermine it and provoke Iran. She'd want more money for social and infrastrucure spending, less for military.
Pavlos has it right. The GOP (and a lot of Democrats) think war is good for business and are happy to funnel obscene amounts of money to the military-industrial complex under the guise of "national security."
Underestimating Iran would be a mistake. Trying this in real life would make Iran, very roughly, into "Saudi Arabia's Vietnam."Alex (the one that likes Ike) , says: December 21, 2017 at 9:44 am"What is the national anthem of Saudi Arabia?"
"Onward, Christian Soldiers."Reminds me of 1975, when I said that the Cuban army marching band was going to adopt a new theme song, "We Are Marching to Pretoria."
It depends on what you imply when saying that it has lit up Arab social media, Rod. "Damn those Saudis are strong!" type of reaction means that social media are lit up. "LOL, what sorry comedian a-holes those Saudis are!" type of reaction also means that social media are lit up.Ark712 , says: December 21, 2017 at 9:49 amSo we are going to give North Korea a "Bloody nose" and invade Iran where they will welcome us as liberators with flower petals?collin , says: December 21, 2017 at 10:09 amIs this what it will finally take Trump supporters to realize they made a mistake, or will they once again move the goal posts?
I am sure they will say "hurr-durr Clinton voted for the war", as if Republicans were not calling anyone against it a traitor.
I can't decide if this truly 'government' backed or some Saudia wackos let their freak loose. At least the wackos are going after Iran and not the US. It is probably really nothing than an expensive Youtube comment but it does indicate that Saudia Arabia population really desires War somewhere and somehow.SDS , says: December 21, 2017 at 11:15 amAlthough this is probably forgotten in 1 month, the Middle East appears to be following similar paths as Europe in the 1900 – 1914. We have lots of secret Allies and treaties with enormous tensions that is hungry for a battle.
"And President Ted Cruz or Clinton would be different how?" Probably not at all .. Which is what's so tragic, really .Gunner , says: December 21, 2017 at 12:05 pmThe Saudis couldn't invade a Dunkin Doughnuts without the West helping them.TR , says: December 21, 2017 at 12:11 pmPaul: Keep your jokes to yourself. They're too painful.EngineerScotty , says: December 21, 2017 at 12:58 pmNoah172: Astute analysis and advice.
The foreign policy of a President Hillary Clinton would probably be too hawkish for my tastes–and certainly she wouldn't enjoy strong relations with Russia (given evidence, in this hypothetical, that Putin was actively interfering in the election to support her opponent)–but it wouldn't be the amateur hour that we've gotten so far with Trump. Clinton would still have a functioning diplomatic corps, instead of sacking half the State Department. She wouldn't be trading insults with foreign heads of state on Twitter. She'd likely be not trying to undermine the Iran deal. And she'd not be performing fellatio on the likes of Netanyaho, Ergodan, and MbS, as Trump has been eagerly doing.Hound of Ulster , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:24 pmReally. At what point does the "as bad as Trump's foreign policy has been, Clinton wudda been worse" refrain stop? Trump is already the worst foreign policy president since LBJ–he only needs a Vietnam War to his name to blow past him. And he has none of Johnson's domestic achievements.
The last time an Arab dictator tried to attack the Iranians he could only get a draw that bankrupted him and lead, by a series of second-order consequences, to his downfall.George , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:03 pmThe Iranians had just, when they were attacked by Iraq, had thier revolution and had liquidated thier officer corps. Think about that. Iranians as polity may, for the most part, dislike the rule of the clerics, but they are intensely patriotic and will fight to the last man/woman to defend the Persian homeland. Underestimate them at your peril.
When Iran's proxies in Yemen -- the Houthis -- are launching missiles at airports and the Royal Palace, I don't think this type video is very surprising and as propaganda goes really a big deal. It is pretty low level saber rattling if it is a Saudi Government produc, or what you would see a million times over among Americans if it is the work of just a bunch of young Saudi yahoos. Oh, and MSAGA -- Make Saudi Arabia Great Again!leonard , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:09 pmSo Charles Cosimano. I'm assuming you'll be the first to sign up?TTT , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:17 pmNoah172 , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:23 pmIsrael has never fought side-by-side with the US in any of the wars it has sent the us to fight [and die for and pay for] at the instigation of the settlers/occupiers.Since the U.S. has never fought any wars for Israel, that makes the score 0:0 then.
muad'dib wrote:Elijah , says: December 21, 2017 at 4:23 pmBut her E-mails Good Thing the witch from Chappaqua isn't in the White House
What ignorant drivel. Clinton is plenty hawkish (she cheered on Trump's April missile strike on Assad, and urged him to go much further). Moreover, as I wrote above, this video seems to be youthful fan fiction, not carrying any Saudi government imprimatur (let alone endorsement from Trump). Rod is speculating that the US will eventually join Saudi Arabia in a war against Iran, but Rod is no seer, whatever his other attributes.
Supporting the Kurds would have pissed off his best buddy Erdogan
Poppycock. Trump is hardly Erdogan's poodle. Trump gave heavy armaments to the Syrian Kurds (O had limited their support to small arms) and wants to move our embassy to Jerusalem, both decisions angering Erdogan. Erdogan would also liked to have seen Assad deposed.
I'm not going to offer an opinion on the efficacy of Saudi Arabia's army, and neither should you. Remember how everyone warned us about Iraq's Republican Guard?) Few of us know what we're talking about. On the larger point: are you all taking drugs? Some video "lights up" Arab social media and therefore Trump is taking us to war against Iran?? What?!FoolMeOnce , says: December 21, 2017 at 4:48 pmLet me be the dink who reminds you: Peak Oil
Merry Christmas!
We should warn the Saudis not to choose vain, arrogant, bloodthirsty plutocrats as leaders. Oh .grumpy realist , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:09 pmMuad'dib:james , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:31 pm+1000
(especially the Straits of Hormuz aspect. The Iranians just have to mine it so that one or more cargo ships get holed and got to the bottom at strategic bends and nobody ain't shipping no Saudi Oil nowhere. Have fun with $300/bbl oil economies, guys China will make out like a bandit, considering it's now the world leader in solar power.
As a clever newspaper writer said about Jesse Ventura: Jesse is a lot smarter than most folks think he is, but not nearly as smart as he thinks he is. Like Jesse, Trump is smart enough to avoid unnecessary war. However, war may just become "necessary" when the heat of his Russia investigation becomes unbearable, and Trump needs the ultimate distraction. When (not if) that happens, either North Korea or Iran will be in trouble -- perhaps both. Millions will most likely die, billions of dollars will be spent, and the US will create an entirely new generation of terrorists. This will not end well.Noah172 , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:58 pmEngineerScotty wrote: "The foreign policy of a President Hillary Clinton wouldn't be the amateur hour that we've gotten so far with Trump" No, it would be the ruthlessly effective professionalism of the reset with Russia and the ouster of Qaddafi. /sarc She wanted and wants Assad deposed. How well would that have gone?Fran Macadam , says: December 21, 2017 at 10:46 pmShe wouldn't be trading insults with foreign heads of state on Twitter
Clinton has insulted Putin any number of times on social media and in interviews. On the Colbert program just last September, she claimed that he worked against her election because of sexism, and claimed that he "manspread" during a meeting with her.
And she'd not be performing fellatio on the likes of Netanyaho, Ergodan, and MbS
Netanyahu and Erdogan do not get along, so it's pretty hard to please both of them simultaneously. Like muad'dib, Scotty has it in his head that Trump is a poodle of Erdogan, but the latter would disagree. Heavy weapons to Syrian Kurds, Jerusalem -- Erdogan is not fully pleased with Trump.
If Scotty thinks the Clintons are hostile to Saudi Arabia, he hasn't been paying attention (does he ever?).
Trump is already the worst foreign policy president since LBJ -- he only needs a Vietnam War to his name to blow past him
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?
"In the meantime, Frack Baby Frack! The less oil we have to import from there, Venezuela, or anyplace crazy the better." That would be sane. But the elites have decided to export it at a cut rate, to undermine Russia as the supplier in Europe, in order to foment regime change by crashing the Russian economy. Why did you think we had such low fuel prices all of a sudden?Alex (the one that likes Ike) , says: December 22, 2017 at 6:22 amNo, the fuel extracted from American soil does not accrue to the benefit of the American people, but to the profits and plans of elites.
Elijah , says: December 22, 2017 at 7:47 amAs a clever newspaper writer said about Jesse Ventura: Jesse is a lot smarter than most folks think he is, but not nearly as smart as he thinks he is. Like Jesse, Trump is smart enough to avoid unnecessary war. However, war may just become "necessary" when the heat of his Russia investigation becomes unbearable, and Trump needs the ultimate distraction. When (not if) that happens, either North Korea or Iran will be in trouble -- perhaps both. Millions will most likely die, billions of dollars will be spent, and the US will create an entirely new generation of terrorists. This will not end well.
Except that "heat" of his investigation is almost extinguished already.
"Except that "heat" of his investigation is almost extinguished already."Donald ( the left leaning one) , says: December 22, 2017 at 12:48 pmExactly.
Noah and Engineer Scotty -- There is a reasonable compromise. Both of you are right. Trump is a disaster and we know Clinton was terrible. There is no point in arguing about whether she would be worse. I happen to think In some ways she wouldn't be as bad. She wouldn't be engaged in stupid twitter fights with dictators. But she might be better at leading us into some stupid war in Syria. Trump will stumble into some war with no support. Clinton would have had lots of support for whatever mindlessly stupid bloodbath she wanted to start.EngineerScotty , says: December 22, 2017 at 3:44 pmThat would be sane. But the elites have decided to export it at a cut rate, to undermine Russia as the supplier in Europe, in order to foment regime change by crashing the Russian economy. Why did you think we had such low fuel prices all of a sudden?EngineerScotty , says: December 22, 2017 at 3:57 pmNo, the fuel extracted from American soil does not accrue to the benefit of the American people, but to the profits and plans of elites.
Unless the "elites" you are talking about are the Saudis–who are well-known for flooding the market with cheap crude periodically to undercut the competition (they can still produce oil for far less than anywhere else), and have many reasons to be suspicious of Russia–this makes no sense.
Oil obtained by fracking is far more expensive to produce than oil obtained by simply drilling a well in the Arabian Desert and quickly finding a gusher. The US can meet its domestic needs, but isn't that great of a net exporter -- prices have to be sufficiently high before high-volume production becomes cost-effective.
And if you don't think that either the Saudis or the American oil industry have the ear of Trump, you're smokin' something.
The "elites" that oppose Trump have rather little political power at the present moment. Don't confuse cultural elites (who don't like the Donald one bit) with the gazillionaires who actual control the petroleum industry, and are more than happy to do business with whoever is in charge in Washington.
Trump–ignorant and fatuous and unworldly as he may be–is an "elite" by virtue of the office he holds. Do not forget that.
Noah and Engineer Scotty -- There is a reasonable compromise. Both of you are right. Trump is a disaster and we know Clinton was terrible. There is no point in arguing about whether she would be worse. I happen to think In some ways she wouldn't be as bad. She wouldn't be engaged in stupid twitter fights with dictators. But she might be better at leading us into some stupid war in Syria. Trump will stumble into some war with no support. Clinton would have had lots of support for whatever mindlessly stupid bloodbath she wanted to start.
Fair enough–though I think that Hillary's foreign policy would likely be similar to that of her husband. Far from ideal, but not disastrous. Of course, Bill got to hold office in a time when the Soviet Union (and its constituent parts) was in shambles, China was still a third-world country, North Korea was no threat to anyone but South Korea, Islamic extremism was far less of a problem, and even the Israelis and Palestinians were talking, and on roughly equal terms. Now is a much more dangerous time.
One of my biggest concerns about Trump's foreign policy–and a major difference from how Hillary would have governed–is his utter disdain for diplomacy. As noted, he (and Tillerson) have been busy setting the State Department ablaze, and many, many, many seasoned diplomats (career civil servants, not political appointees) have left Foggy Bottom, some of their own accord, some not. Some Trump defenders claim this is part of "draining the swamp", and many critics claim this is a purge of anyone not loyal to Trump personally–and these two claims may be opposite sides of the same coin.
But there is something else. Trump seems to think that international diplomacy ought to be conducted like real-estate deals: Two high-rollers (CEOs or heads of state) meet on the golf course, hash out a deal, and the lawyers work out the details; and that having a large staff of people trained in understanding a potentially-hostile foreign country is simply unnecessary. In short, he acts as though he believes the entire system of international diplomatic protocol, is a racket. Perhaps he has a point here; and perhaps he does not–as the old saying goes, don't knock down a wall unless you know what loads it is bearing.
But you'll notice that neither Russia, nor China, nor Israel, nor Iran, or Germany, nor any other player on the world stage, have been engaging in similar purges of their diplomatic services.
Dec 23, 2017 | www.washingtonpost.com
what is interesting is that whuile answering "yes" about Russian interference in election is safe answer, the real quesion is whehther Russian intergfernce exceed in scope British (Stele dossier), Israel (via Kushner) and Saudi interference to name a few. If no this is a witch hunt. Russia is just another neoliberal state, so why it can be a threat to the US neoliberalm and empire is unlear. It does has its own interests in former USSR space. How would the US react if Russia halped to depose legitimate goverment in Mexico and started to supply arms in order to get back California, Texas and Florida which new government would consider were occupied by the the USA illegally? the fact that Russia does not want ot be Washington vassal is not illegal. And there is nothing criminal in attempts to resist the spread of the US neoliberal empire on xUSSR space.
May 11, 2016
SEN. MARK WARNER, D-VA.: Intelligence community assessment accurately characterized the extent of Russian activities in the 2016 election and its conclusion that Russian intelligence agencies were responsible for the hacking and leaking of information and using misinformation to influence our elections? Simple yes or no would suffice.ROBERT CARDILLO, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL GEOSPATIAL-INTELLIGENCE AGENCY: I do. Yes, sir.
STEWART: Yes, Senator.
ROGERS: Yes I do.
DAN COATS, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE : Yes I do.
MIKE POMPEO, DIRECTOR, CIA: Yes.
MCCABE: Yes.
WARNER: And I guess the presumption there -- or the next presumption, I won't even ask this question is consequently that committee assess -- or that community assessment was unanimous and is not a piece of fake news or evidence of some other individual or nation state other than Russia. So I appreciate that again for the record.
I warned you Mr. McCabe I was going to have to get you on the record as well on this. Mr. McCabe for as long as you are Acting FBI Director do you commit to informing this committee of any effort to interfere with the FBI's ongoing investigation into links between Russia and the Trump campaign?
MCCABE: I absolutely do.
WARNER: Thank you so much for that. I think in light of what's happened in the last 48 hours it's critically important that we have that assurance and I hope you'll relay, at least from me to the extraordinary people that work at the FBI that this committee supports them, supports their efforts, support their professionalism and supports their independence.
MCCABE: I will sir, thank you.
WARNER: In light of the fact that we just saw French elections where it felt like deja vu all over again in terms of the release of a series of e-mails against Mr. Macron days before the election and the fact that this committee continues to investigate the type of tactics that Russia has used.
Where do we stand, as a country, of preparation to make sure this doesn't happen again in 2018 and 2020 -- where have we moved in terms of collaboration with state voting -- voter files, in terms of working more with the tech community, particularly the platform -- platform entities in terms of how we can better assure real news versus fake news, is there some general sense -- Director Coats I know you've only been in the job for a short period of time -- of how we're going to have a strategic effort? Because while it was Russia in 2016 other nation states could -- you know -- launch similar type assaults.
COATS: Well, we are -- we will continue to use all the assets that we have in terms of collection and analysis relative to what the influence has been and potentially could be in future. Russians have spread this across the globe -- interestingly enough I met with the Prime Minister of Montenegro the latest nation to join NATO, the number 29 nation, what was the main topic?
Russian interference in their political system. And so it does -- it sweeps across Europe and other places. It's clear though, the Russians have upped their game using social media and other opportunities that we -- in ways that we haven't seen before. So it's a great threat to our -- our democratic process and our job here is to provide the best intelligence we can to the policy makers to -- as they develop a strategy in terms of how to best reflect a response to this.
WARNER: Well one of the things I'm concerned about is, we've all expressed this concern but since this doesn't fall neatly into any particular agency's jurisdiction you know, who's -- who's taking the point on interacting with the platform companies like the Google, Facebook and Twitter, who's taking the point in terms of interacting DHS image in terms of state boards of election? How are we trying to ensure that our systems more secure, and if we can get a brief answer on that because I got one last question for Admiral Rogers.
COATS: Well, I think the -- the obviously, our office tasks and takes the point, but there's contribution from agencies across the I.C. We will -- I've asked Director Pompeo to address that and others that might want to address that also. But each of us -- each of the agencies to the extent that they can and have the capacity whether its NSA though SIGINT, whether it's NSA through human or other sources will provide information to us that we want to use as a basis to provide to our -- to our policymakers.
Relative to a grand strategy, I am not aware right now of any -- I think we're still assessing the impact. We have not put a grand strategy together, which would not be our purview, we would provide the basis of intelligence that would then be the foundation for what that strategy would be.
WARNER: My hope -- my hope would be that we need to be proactive in this. We don't want to be sitting here kind of looking back at it after 2018 election cycle. Last question, very briefly, Admiral Rogers do you have any doubt that the Russians were behind the intervention in the French elections?
ROGERS: I -- let me phrase it this way, we are aware of some Russian activity directed against the Russian -- excuse me, directed against the French election process. As I previously said before Congress earlier this week, we in fact reached out to our French counterparts to say, we have become aware of this activity, we want to make you aware, what are you seeing?
I'm not in a position to have looked at the breadth of the French infrastructure. So I'm -- I'm not really in a position to make a whole simple declaratory statement.
WARNER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
BURR: Senator Rubio?
RUBIO: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. McCabe, can you without going into the specific of any individual investigation, I think the American people want to know, has the dismissal of Mr. Comey in any way impeded, interrupted, stopped or negatively impacted any of the work, any investigation, or any ongoing projects at the Federal Bureau of Investigations?
MCCABE: As you know, Senator, the work of the men and women of the FBI continues despite any changes in circumstance, any decisions. So there has been no effort to impede our investigation today. Quite simply put sir, you cannot stop the men and women of the FBI from doing the right thing, protecting the American people, and upholding the Constitution.
RUBIO: And this is for all the members of the committee, as has been widely reported, and people know this, Kaspersky Lab software is used by not hundreds of thousands, millions of Americans. To each of our witnesses I would just ask, would any of you be comfortable with the Kaspersky Lab software on your computers?
COATS: A resounding no, from me.
POMPEO: No.
MCCABE: No, Senator.
ROGERS: No, sir.
STEWART: No, Senator.
CARDILLO: No, sir.
... ... ...
POMPEO: I'll -- I'll let Mr. McCabe make a comment as well, but yes, of course. Frankly, this is consistent with what -- right, this is the -- the -- the attempt to interfere in United States is not limited to Russia. The Cubans have deep ties, it is in their deepest tradition to take American visitors and do their best influence of the way that is in adverse to U.S. interests.
MCCABE: Yes, sir. Fully agree, we share your concerns about that issue.
RUBIO: And my final question is on -- all this focus on Russia and what's happened in the past is that the opinion of all of you -- or those of -- you certainly all have insight on this. That even as we focus on 2016 and the efforts leading up to that election, efforts to influence policy making here in the United States vis-a-vis the Russian interests are ongoing that the Russians continue to use active measures; even at this moment, even on this day.
To try, through the use of multiple different ways, to influence the political debate and the decisions made in American politics; particularly as they pertain to Russia's interests around the world. In essence, these active measures is an ongoing threat, not simply something that happened in the past.
MCCABE: Yes, sir, that's right.
POMPEO: Senator, it's right. In some sense, though, we've got to put it in context, this has been going on for a long time. There's -- there's nothing new. Only the cost has been lessened, the cost of doing it.
COATS: I -- I would just add that the use of cyber and social media has significantly increased the impact and the capabilities that -- obviously this has been done for years and years. Even decades. But the ability they have to -- to use the interconnectedness and -- and all the -- all that that provides, that didn't provide before I -- they literally upped their game to the point where it's having a significant impact.
ROGERS: From my perspective I would just highlight cyber is enabling them to access information in massive quantities that weren't quite obtainable to the same level previously and that's just another tool in their attempt to acquire information, misuse of that information, manipulation, outright lies, inaccuracies at time.
But other times, actually dumping raw data which is -- as we also saw during this last presidential election cycle for us.
... ... ...
COATS: I can't speak to how many agents of -- of the U.S. government are as cognizant as perhaps we should be but I certainly think that, given China's aggressive approach relative to information gathering and -- and all the things that you mentioned merits a -- a review of CFIUS in terms of whether or not it is -- needs to have some changes or innovations to -- to address the aggressive -- aggressive Chinese actions not just against or companies, but across the world.
They -- they clearly have a strategy through their investments, they've started a major investment bank -- you name a park of the world Chinese probably are -- are there looking to put investments in. We've seen the situation in Djibouti where they're also adding military capability to their investment, strategic area for -- on the Horn of Africa there that -- that you wouldn't necessarily expect. But they're active in Africa, Northern Africa, they're active across the world.
Their one belt, one road process opens -- opens their trade and -- and what other interest they have to the Indian Ocean in -- and a different way to address nations that they've had difficulty connecting with. So it's a -- it's clearly an issue that we ought to take a look at.
... ... ...
WYDEN: Thank you very much Mr. Chairman.
Gentlemen, it's fair to say I disagreed with Director Comey as much as anyone in this room but the timing of this firing is wrong to anyone with a semblance of ethics. Director Comey should be here this morning testifying to the American people about where the investigation he's been running stands.
At our public hearing in January where he refused to discuss his investigation into connections between Russia and Trump associates I stated my fear that if the information didn't come out before inauguration day it might never come out. With all the recent talk in recent weeks about whether there is evidence of collusion, I fear some colleagues have forgotten that Donald Trump urged the Russians to hack his opponents. He also said repeatedly that he loved WikiLeaks.
So the question is not whether Donald Trump actively encouraged the Russians and WikiLeaks to attack our democracy, he did; that is an established fact. The only question is whether he or someone associated with him coordinated with the Russians.
Now, Mr. McCabe, the president's letter to Director Comey asserted that on three separate occasions the director informed him that he was not under investigations. Would it have been wrong for the director to inform him he was not under investigations? Yes or no?
MCCABE: Sir, I'm not going to comment on any conversations that the director may have had with the president...
(CROSSTALK)
WYDEN: I didn't ask that. Would it have been wrong for the director to inform him he was not under investigation? That's not about conversations, that's yes or no answer.
MCCABE: As you know, Senator. We typically do not answer that question. I will not comment on whether or not the director and the president of the United States had that conversation.
WYDEN: Will you refrain from these kinds of alleged updates to the president or anyone else in the White House on the status of the investigation?
MCCABE: I will.
WYDEN: Thank you.
Director Pompeo, one of the few key unanswered questions is why the president didn't fire Michael Flynn after Acting Attorney General Yates warned the White House that he could be blackmailed by the Russians. Director Pompeo, did you know about the acting attorney general's warnings to the White House or were you aware of the concerns behind the warning?
POMPEO: I -- I don't have any comment on that.
WYDEN: Well, were you aware of the concerns behind the warning? I mean, this is a global threat. This is a global threat question, this is a global threat hearing. Were you...
(CROSSTALK)
POMPEO: Tell me...
(CROSSTALK)
WYDEN: Were you aware?
POMPEO: Senator, tell me what global threat it is you're concerned with, please. I'm not sure I understand the question.
WYDEN: Well, the possibility of blackmail. I mean, blackmail by a influential military official, that has real ramifications for the global threat. So this is not about a policy implication, this is about the national security advisor being vulnerable to blackmail by the Russians. And the American people deserve to know whether in these extraordinary circumstances the CIA kept them safe.
POMPEO: Yes, sir, the CIA's kept America safe. And...
WYDEN: So...
POMPEO: And the people at the Central Intelligence Agency are committed to that and will remain committed to that. And we will...
(CROSSTALK)
POMPEO: ... do that in the face of...
WYDEN: You won't answer the question...
POMPEO: We will do that in the face of political challenges that come from any direction, Senator.
WYDEN: But, you will not answer the question of whether or not you were aware of the concerns behind the Yates warning.
POMPEO: Sir, I don't know exactly what you're referring to with the Yates warning, I -- I -- I wasn't part of any of those conversations. I -- I... (CROSSTALK)
WYDEN: The Yates warning was...
(CROSSTALK)
POMPEO: ... I have no first hand information with respect to the warning that was given.
WYDEN: OK.
POMPEO: She didn't make that warning to me. I -- I can't -- I can't answer that question, Senator...
WYDEN: OK.
POMPEO: ... as much as I would like to.
WYDEN: OK.
Director Coats, how concerned are you that a Russian government oil company, run by a Putin crony could end up owning a significant percentage of U.S. oil refining capacity and what are you advising the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States about this?
COATS: I don't have specific information relative to that. I think that's something that potentially, we could provide intelligence on in terms of what this -- what situation might be, but...
WYDEN: I'd like you to furnace that in writing. Let me see if I can get one other question in, there have been mountains of press stories with allegations about financial connections between Russia and Trump and his associates. The matters are directly relevant to the FBI and my question is, when it comes to illicit Russian money and in particular, it's potential to be laundered on its way to the United States, what should the committee be most concerned about?
We hear stories about Deutsche Bank, Bank of Cypress, Shell companies in Moldova, the British Virgin Islands. I'd like to get your sense because I'm over my time. Director McCabe, what you we most -- be most concerned about with respect to illicit Russian money and its potential to be laundered on its way the United States?
MCCABE: Certainly sir. So as you know, I am not in the position to be able to speak about specific investigations and certainly not in this setting. However, I will confirm for you that those are issues that concern us greatly.
They have traditionally and they do even more so today, as it becomes easier to conceal the origin and the -- and the track and the destination of purpose of illicit money flows, as the exchange of information becomes more clouded in encryption and then more obtuse, it becomes harder and harder to get to the bottom of those investigations. That would shed light on those issues.
WYDEN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. BURR: Senator Risch?
RISCH: Thank you very much. Gentlemen, I -- the purpose of this hearing as the chairman expressed is to give the American people some insight into what we all do, which they don't see pretty much at all. And so I think what I want to do is I want to make an observation and then I want to get your take on it, anybody who wants to volunteer. And I'm going to start with you Director Coats, to volunteer.
My -- I have been -- I've been on this committee all the time I've been here in the Senate and all through the last administration. And I have been greatly impressed by the current administrations hitting the ground running during the first hundred days, as far as their engagement on intelligence matters and their engagement with foreign countries. The national media here is focused on domestic issues which is of great interest to the American people be it healthcare, be it personnel issues in the government.
And they don't -- the -- the media isn't as focused on this administrations fast, and in my judgment, robust engagement with the intelligence communities around the world and with other governments. And my impression is that it's good and it is aggressive. And I want -- I'd like you're -- I'd like your impression of where we're going. Almost all of you had real engagement in the last administration and all the administrations are different. So Director Coats, you want to take that on to start with?
COATS: I'd be happy to start with that, I think most presidents that come into office come with an agenda in mind in terms of what issues they'd like to pursue, many of them issues that effect -- domestic issues that affect infrastructure and education and a number of things only to find that this is dangerous world, that the United States -- that the threats that exist out there need to be -- be given attention to.
This president, who I think the perception was not interested in that, I think Director Pompeo and I can certify the fact that we have spent far more hours in the Oval Office than we anticipated. The president is a voracious consumer of information and asking questions and asking us to provide intelligence. I -- we are both part of a process run through the national security council, General McMaster, all through the deputy's committees and the principal's committees consuming hours and hours of time looking at the threats, how do we address those threats, what is the intelligence that tells us -- that informs the policy makers in terms of how they put a strategy in place.
And so what I initially thought would be a one or two time a week, 10 to 15 minute quick brief, has turned into an everyday, sometimes exceeding 45 minutes to an hour or more just in briefing the president. We have -- I have brought along several of our directors to come and show the president what their agencies do and how important it is the info -- that the information they provide how that -- for the basis of making policy decisions.
I'd like to turn to my CIA colleague to get -- let him give you, and others, to give you their impression.
RISCH: I appreciate that. We're almost out of time but I did -- Director Pompeo you kind of sit in the same spot we all sit in through the last several years and I kind of like your observations along the line of Director Coats, what you feel about the matter?
POMPEO: Yeah, I think Director Coats had it right. He and I spend time with the president everyday, briefing him with the most urgent intelligence matters that are presented to us as -- in our roles. He asks good, hard questions. Make us go make sure we're doing our work in the right way.
Second, you asked about engagement in the world. This administration has reentered the battle space in places the administration -- the previous administration was completely absent. You all travel some too...
RISCH: Yes.
POMPEO: ... you will hear that when you go travel. I've now taken two trips to places and they welcome American leadership. They're not looking for American soldiers, they're not looking for American boots on the ground, they're looking for American leadership around the globe and this president has reentered that space in a way that I think will serve America's interest very well.
RISCH: Yeah I -- I couldn't agree more and we -- we deal with them not only overseas but they come here, as you know, regularly.
POMPEO: Yes sir.
RISCH: And the fact that the president has pulled the trigger twice as he has in -- in the first 100 days and -- and done it in a fashion that didn't start a world war and -- and was watched by both our friends and our enemies has made a significant and a huge difference as far as our standing in the world. My time's up. Thank you very much Mr. Chair.
WARNER: Thank you Senator.
Senator Heinrich.
HEINRICH: Director McCabe you -- you obviously have several decades of law enforcement experience, is it -- is it your experience that people who are innocent of wrong doing typically need to be reassured that they're not the subject of an investigation?
MCCABE: No sir.
HEINRICH: And I ask that because I'm still trying to make heads or tails of the dismissal letter from -- earlier this week from the president where he writes, "While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation." And I'm still trying to figure out why that would even make it into a dismissal letter. But let me go to something a little more direct.
Director, has anyone in the White House spoken to you directly about the Russia investigation?
MCCABE: No, sir.
HEINRICH: Let me -- when -- when did you last meet with the president, Director McCabe?
MCCABE: I don't think I -- I'm in...
HEINRICH: Was it earlier this week?
MCCABE: ... the position to comment on that. I have met with the president this week, but I really don't want to go into the details of that.
HEINRICH: OK. But Russia did not come up?
MCCABE: That's correct, it did not.
HEINRICH: OK, thank you. We've heard in the news that -- that -- claims that Director Comey had -- had lost the confidence of rank and file FBI employees. You've been there for 21 years, in your opinion is it accurate that the rank and file no longer supported Director Comey?
MCCABE: No, sir, that is not accurate. I can tell you, sir, that I worked very, very closely with Director Comey. From the moment he started at the FBI I was his executive assistant director of national security at that time and I worked for him running the Washington field office. And of course I've served as deputy for the last year.
MCCABE: I can tell you that I hold Director Comey in the absolute highest regard. I have the highest respect for his considerable abilities and his integrity and it has been the greatest privilege and honor in my professional life to work with him. I can tell you also that Director Comey enjoyed broad support within the FBI and still does until this day.
We are a large organization, we are 36,500 people across this country, across this globe. We have a diversity of opinions about many things, but I can confidently tell you that the majority -- the vast majority of FBI employees enjoyed a deep and positive connection to Director Comey.
HEINRICH: Thank you for your candor. Do you feel like you have the adequate resources for the existing investigations that the -- that the bureau is invested in right now to -- to follow them wherever they may lead?
MCCABE: Sir, if you're referring to the Russia investigation, I do. I believe we have the adequate resources to do it and I know that we have resourced that investigation adequately. If you're referring to the many constantly multiplying counter-intelligence threats that we face across the spectrum, they get bigger and more challenging every day and resources become an issue over time.
HEINRICH: Sure.
MCCABE: But in terms of that investigation, sir, I can -- I can assure you we are covered.
HEINRICH: Thank you.
Director Coats, welcome back. Would you agree that it is a national security risk to provide classified information to an individual who has been compromised by a foreign government as a broad matter.
COATS: As a broad matter, yes.
HEINRICH: If the attorney general came to you and said one of your employees was compromised what -- what sort of action would you take?
COATS: I would take the action as prescribed in our procedures relative to how we report this ad how it's -- how it is processed. I mean, it's a serious -- serious issue Our -- our -- I would be consulting with our legal counsel and consulting with our inspector general and others as to how -- how best to proceed with this, but obviously we will take action.
HEINRICH: Would -- would one of the options be dismissal, obviously?
COATS: Very potentially could be dismissal, yes.
HEINRICH: OK, thank you Director.
BURR: Senator Collins?
COLLINS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Vice Chairman.
Mr. McCabe, is the agent who is in charge of this very important investigation into Russian attempts to influence our election last fall still in charge?
MCCABE: I mean we have many agents involved in the investigation at many levels so I'm not who you're referring to.
COLLINS: The lead agent overseeing the investigation.
MCCABE: Certainly, almost all of the agents involved in the investigation are still in their positions.
COLLINS: So has there been any curtailment of the FBI's activities in this important investigation since Director Comey was fired?
MCCABE: Ma'am, we don't curtail our activities. As you know, has the -- are people experiencing questions and are reacting to the developments this week? Absolutely.
COLLINS: Does that get in the way of our ability to pursue this or any other investigation?
MCCABE: No ma'am, we continue to focus on our mission and get that job done.
COLLINS: I want to follow up on a question of resources that Senator Heinrich asked your opinion on. Press reports yesterday indicated that Director Comey requested additional resources from the Justice Department for the bureau's ongoing investigation into Russian active measures. Are you aware that request? Can you confirm that that request was in fact made?
MCCABE: I cannot confirm that request was made. As you know ma'am, when we need resources, we make those requests here. So I -- I don't -- I'm not aware of that request and it's not consistent with my understanding of how we request additional resources.
That said, we don't typically request resources for an individual case. And as I mentioned, I strongly believe that the Russian investigation is adequately resourced. COLLINS: You've also been asked a question about target letters. Now, it's my understanding that when an individual is the target of an investigation, at some point, a letter is sent out notifying a individual that he is a target, is that correct?
MCCABE: No ma'am, I -- I don't believe that's correct.
COLLINS: OK. So before there is going to be an indictment, there is not a target letter sent out by the Justice Department?
MCCABE: Not that I'm aware of.
COLLINS: OK that's contrary to my -- my understanding, but let me ask you the reverse.
MCCABE: Again, I'm looking at it from the perspective of the investigators. So that's not part of our normal case investigative practice.
COLLINS: That would be the Justice Department, though. The Justice Department...
MCCABE: I see, I see...
COLLINS: I'm -- I'm asking you, isn't it standard practice when someone is the target of an investigation and is perhaps on the verge of being indicted that the Justice Department sends that individual what is known as a target letter?
MCCABE: Yes, ma'am I'm going have to defer that question to the Department of Justice.
COLLINS: Well, let me ask you the -- the flip side of that and perhaps you don't know the answer to this question but is it standard practice for the FBI to inform someone that they are not a target of an investigation?
MCCABE: It is not.
COLLINS: So it would be unusual and not standard practice for there -- it -- for there to have been a notification from the FBI director to President Trump or anyone else involved in this investigation, informing him or her that that individual I not a target, is that correct?
MCCABE: Again ma'am, I'm not going to comment on what Director Comey may or may not have done.
COLLINS: I -- I'm not asking you to comment on the facts of the case, I'm just trying to figure out what's standard practice and what's not.
MCCABE: Yes ma'am. I'm not aware of that being a standard practice.
COLLINS: Admiral Rogers, I want to follow up on Senator Warner's question to you about the attempted interference in the French...
ROGERS: French.
COLLINS: ... election. Some researchers, including the cyber intelligence firm Flashpoint claim that APT28 is the group that was behind the stealing of the -- and the leaking of the information about the president elect of France, the FBI and DHS have publicly tied APT28 to Russian intelligence services in the joint analysis report last year after the group's involvement in stealing data that was leaked in the run up to the U.S. elections in November.
Is the I.C. in a position to attribute the stealing and the leaking that took place prior to the French election to be the result of activities by this group, which is linked to Russian cyber activity?
ROGERS: Again ma'am, right now I don't think I have a complete picture of all the activity associated with France but as I have said publicly, both today and previously, we are aware of specific Russian activity directed against the French election cycle in the course -- particularly in the last few weeks.
To the point where we felt it was important enough we actually reached out to our French counterparts to inform them and make sure they awareness of what we were aware of and also to ask them, is there something we are missing that you are seeing?
COLLINS: Thank you.
BURR: Senator King.
KING: Mr. McCabe, thank you for being here today under somewhat difficult circumstances, we appreciate your candor in your testimony.
On March 20th, Director Comey -- then Director Comey testified to the House of Representative, "I have been authorized by the Department of Justice to confirm that the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government's efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election and that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russian efforts.
As with any counter intelligence investigation this will also include an assessment of whether any crimes were committed." Is that statement still accurate?
MCCABE: Yes sir, it is.
KING: And how many agents are assigned to this project? How many -- or personnel generally with the FBI, roughly?
MCCABE: Yeah, sorry I can't really answer those sorts of questions in this forum.
KING: Well, yesterday a White House press spokesman said that this is one of the smallest things on the plate of the FBI, is that an accurate statement?
MCCABE: It is...
KING: Is this a small investigation in relation to all -- to all the other work that you're doing?
MCCABE: Sir, we consider it to be a highly significant investigation.
KING: So you would not characterize it as one of the smallest things you're engaged in?
MCCABE: I would not.
KING: Thank you.
Let me change the subject briefly. We're -- we've been talking about Russia and -- and their involvement in this election. One of the issues of concern to me, and perhaps I can direct this to -- well, I'll direct it to anybody in the panel. The allegation of Russian involvement in our electoral systems, is that an issue that is of concern and what do we know about that? And is that being up followed up on by this investigation.
Mr. McCabe, is that part of your investigation? No I'm -- I'm not talking about the presidential election, I'm talking about state level election infrastructure.
MCCABE: Yes, sir. So obviously not discussing any specific investigation in detail. The -- the issue of Russian interference in the U.S. democratic process is one that causes us great concern. And quite frankly, it's something we've spent a lot of time working on over the past several months. And to reflect comments that were made in response to an earlier question that Director Coats handled, I think part of that process is to understand the inclinations of our foreign adversaries to interfere in those areas.
So we've seen this once, we are better positioned to see it the next time. We're able to improve not only our coordination with -- primarily through the Department of Homeland -- through DHS, their -- their expansive network and to the state and local election infrastructure. But to interact with those folks to defend against ; whether it's cyber attacks or any sort of influence driven interactions.
KING: Thank you, I think that's a very important part of this issue.
Admiral Rogers, yesterday a camera crew from TAS (ph) was allowed into the Oval Office. There was not any American press allowed, was there any consultation with you with regard to that action in terms of the risk of some kind of cyber penetration or communications in that incident?
ROGERS: No.
KING: Were you -- you were -- your agency wasn't consulted in any way?
ROGERS: Not that I'm aware of. I wouldn't expect that to automatically be the case; but no, not that I'm aware of.
KING: Did it raise any concerns when you saw those pictures that those cameramen and crew were in the Oval Office without....
ROGERS: I'll be honest, I wasn't aware of where the imaged came from.
KING: All right, thank you.
Mr. Coats -- Director Coats, you're -- you're -- you lead the intelligence community. Were you consulted at all with regard to the firing of Director Comey?
COATS: I was not.
KING: So you had no -- there were no discussions with you even though the FBI's an important part of the intelligence community?
COATS: There were no discussions.
KING: Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, thank you.
BURR: Thank you Senator King.
Senator Lankford.
LANKFORD: Thank you, let me just run through some quick questions on this. Director McCabe, thanks for being here as well.
Let me hit some high points of some of the things I've heard already, just to be able to confirm. You have the resources you need for the Russia investigation, is that correct?
MCCABE: Sir, we believe it's adequately resourced...
LANKFORD: OK, so there's not limitations on resources, you have what you need? The -- the actions about Jim Comey and his release has not curtailed the investigation from the FBI, it's still moving forward?
MCCABE: The investigation will move forward, absolutely.
LANKFORD: No agents have been removed that are the ongoing career folks that are doing the investigation?
MCCABE: No, sir.
LANKFORD: Is it your impression at this point that the FBI is unable to complete the investigation in a fair and expeditious way because of the removal of Jim Comey?
MCCABE: It is my opinion and belief that the FBI will continue to pursue this investigation vigorously and completely.
LANKFORD: Do you need somebody to take this away from you and somebody else to do?
MCCABE: No sir.
L.. ... ...
MANCHIN: Thank you Mr. Chairman.
Thank all of you for being here, I really appreciate it and I know that, Mr. McCabe, you seem to be of great interest of being here. And we're going to look forward to really from hearing from all of you all in a closed hearing this afternoon which I think that we'll able to get into more detail. So I appreciate that.
I just one question for Mr. McCabe it's basically the morale of the agency, the FBI agency and the morale basically starting back from July 5th to July 7th, October 28th, November 6th and election day -- did you all ever think you'd be embroiled in an election such as this and did -- what did it do to the morale?
MCCABE: Well, I -- I don't know that anyone envisioned exactly the way these things would develop. You know, as I said earlier Senator, we are a -- a large organization. We are -- we have a lot of diversity of opinions and -- and viewpoints on things. We are also a fiercely independent group.
MANCHIN: I'm just saying that basically, before July 5th, before the first testimony that basically Director Comey got involved in, prior to that, did you see a change in the morale? Just yes or no -- yes a change or more anxious, more concern?
MCCABE: I think morale has always been good, however we had -- there were folks within our agency who were frustrated with the outcome of the Hillary Clinton case and some of those folks were very vocal about that -- those concerns.
MANCHIN: I'm sure we'll have more questions in the closed hearing, sir but let me say to the rest of you all, we talked about Kaspersky, the lab, KL Lab. Do you all have -- has it risen to your level being the head of all of our intelligence agencies and people that mostly concerned about the security of our country of having a Russian connection in a lab as far outreaching as KL Labs?
Has it come with your IT people coming to you or have you gone directly to them making sure that you have no interaction with KL or any of the contractors you do business with? Just down the line there, Mr. Cardillo?
CARDILLO: Well, we count on the expertise of Admiral Rogers and the FBI to protect our systems and so I value...
MANCHIN: ...But you have I -- you have IT people, right?
CARDILLO: Absolutely.
MANCHIN: Have you talked to the IT people? Has it come to your concern that there might be a problem?
CARDILLO: I'm aware of the Kaspersky Lab challenge and/or threat.
MANCHIN: Let me tell you, it's more of a challenge -- more than a challenge, sir and I would hope that -- I'll go down the line but I hope that all of you -- we are very much concerned about this, very much concerned about security of our country watching (ph) their involvement.
CARDILLO: We share that.
MANCHIN: General?
STEWART: We are tracking Kaspersky and their software. There is as well as I know, and I've checked this recently, no Kaspersky software on our networks.
MANCHIN: Any contractors? STEWART: Now, the contractor piece might be a little bit harder to define but at this point we see no connection to Kaspersky and contractors supporting (ph)...
MANCHIN: ...Admiral Rogers?
ROGERS: I'm personally aware and involved with the director on the national security issues and the Kaspersky Lab issue, yes sir.
COATS: It wasn't that long ago I was sitting up there talking -- raising issues about Kaspersky and its position here. And that continues in this new job.
POMPEO: It has risen to the director of the CIA as well, Senator Manchin.
MANCHIN: Great.
(UNKNOWN): He's very concerned about it, sir, and we are focused on it closely.
MANCHIN: Only thing I would ask all of you, if you can give us a report back if you've swept all of your contractors to make sure they understand the certainty you have, concern that you have about this and making sure that they can verify to you all that they're not involved whatsoever with any Kaspersky's hardware. I'm going to switch to a couple different things because of national security.
But you know, the bottom gangs that we have in the United States, and I know -- we don't talk about them much. And when you talk about you have MS-13, the Crips, you've got Hells Angels, Aryan Brotherhood, it goes on and on and on, it's quite a few. What is -- what are we doing and what is it to your level -- has it been brought to your level the concern we have with these gangs within our country, really every part of our country?
Anybody on the gangland?
MCCABE: Yes sir. So we spend a lot of time talking about that at the FBI. It's one of our highest priorities...
MANCHIN: Did the resources go out to each one of these because they're interspersed over the country?
MCCABE: We do, sir. We have been focused on the gang threat for many years. It -- like -- much like the online pharmacy threat. It continues to change and develop harried we think it's likely a -- having an impact on elevated violent crime rates across the country, so we're spending a lot of time focused on that.
... ... ..
COTTON: Inmates are running the asylum.
(LAUGHTER)
COTTON: So, I think everyone in this room and most Americans have come to appreciate the aggressiveness with which would Russia uses active measures or covert influence operations, propaganda, call them what you will, as your agencies assess they did in 2016 and in hacking into those e-mails and releasing them as news reports suggest they did. In the French election last week -- that's one reason why I sought to revive the Russian active measures working group in the FY'17 Intelligence Authorization Act.
These activities that will go far beyond elections, I think, as most of our witnesses know. former director of the CIA, Bob Gates, in his memoir "From the Shadows," detailed soviet covert influence campaigns designed to slow or thwart the U.S. development of nuclear delivery systems and warheads, missile-defense systems and employment of intermediate nuclear range systems to Europe.
Specifically on page 260 of his memoir, he writes "during the period, the soviets mounted a massive covert action operation, aimed at thwarting INF deployments by NATO. We at CIA devoted tremendous resources to an effort at the time to uncovering the soviet covert campaign. Director Casey summarized this extraordinary effort in a paper he sent to Bush, Schultz, Weinberger and Clark on January 18, 1983. We later published it and circulated it widely within the government and to the allies, and finally, provided an unclassified version of the public to use," end quote.
I'd like to thank the CIA for digging up this unclassified version of the document and providing it to the committee, Soviet Strategy to derail U.S. INF deployment. Specifically, undermining NATO's solidarity in those deployments. I have asked unanimous consent that it be included in the hearing transcript and since the inmates are running the asylum, hearing no objection, we'll include it in the transcript.
(LAUGHTER)
Director Pompeo, earlier this year, Dr. Roy Godson testified that he believed that Russia was using active measures and covert influence efforts to undermine our nuclear modernization efforts, our missile defense deployments, and the INF Treaty, in keeping with these past practices.
To the best of your ability in this setting, would you agree with the assessment that Russia is likely using such active measures to undermine U.S. nuclear modernization efforts and missile defenses?
POMPEO: Yes.
COTTON: Thank you.
As I mentioned earlier, the F.Y. '17 Intelligence Authorization Act included two unclassified provisions that I authored. One would be re-starting that old (inaudible) Measures Working Group. A second would require additional scrutiny of Russian embassy officials who travel more than the prescribed distance from their duty station, whether it's their embassy or a consulate around the United States.
In late 2016, when that bill was on the verge of passing, I personally received calls from high-ranking Obama administration officials asking me to withdraw them from the bill. I declined. The bill did not pass. It passed last week as part of the F.Y. '17 spending bill.
I did not receive any objection from Trump administration officials to include from our intelligence community.
Director Coats, are you aware of any objection that the Trump administration had to my two provisions?
COATS: No, I'm not aware of any objection.
COTTON: Director Pompeo?
POMPEO: None.
COTTON: Do you know why the Obama administration objected to those two provisions in late 2016? I would add after the 2016 presidential election.
COATS: Well, it would be pure speculation. I don't -- I couldn't read -- I wasn't able to read the president's mind then and I don't think I can read it now.
COTTON: Thank you.
I'd like to turn my attention to a very important provision of law. I know that you've discussed earlier section 702.
Director Rogers, it's my understanding that your agency is undertaking an effort to try to release some kind of unclassified estimate of the number of U.S. persons who might have been incidentally collected using 702 techniques. Is that correct?
ROGERS: Sir, we're looking to see if we can quantify something that's of value to people outside the organization.
COTTON: Would -- would that require you going in and conducting searches of incidental collection that have been previously unexamined?
ROGERS: That's part of the challenge. How do I generate insight that doesn't in the process of generating the insight violate the actual tenets that...
(CROSSTALK)
COTTON: So -- so we're -- you're trying to produce an estimate that is designed to protect privacy rights, but to produce that estimate, you're going to have to violate privacy rights?
ROGERS: That is a potential part of all of this.
COTTON: It seems hard to do.
ROGERS: Yes, sir. That's why it has taken us a period of time and that's why we're in the midst of a dialogue.
COTTON: Is it going to be possible to produce that kind of estimate without some degree of inaccuracy or misleading information, or infringing upon the privacy rights of Americans?
ROGERS: Probably not.
COTTON: If anyone in your agency, or for that matter, Director McCabe, in yours, believes that there is misconduct or privacy rights are not being protected, they could, I believe under current law, come to your inspector general; come to your general counsel. I assume you have open door policies.
ROGERS: Whistleblower protections in addition, yes, sir, and they can come to you.
COTTON: They can come to this committee.
So four -- at least four different avenues. I'm probably missing some, if they believe there are any abuses in the section 702 (inaudible).
MCCABE (?): And anyone in their chain of command.
COTTON: I would ask that we proceed with caution before producing a report that might infringe on Americans' privacy rights needlessly, and that might make it even that much harder to reauthorize a critical program, something that, Director McCabe, your predecessor last week just characterized, if I can paraphrase, as a must-have program, not a nice-to-have program.
Thank you.
BURR: Thank you, Senator Cotton.
Senator Harris?
HARRIS: Thank you.
Acting Director McCabe, welcome. I know you've been in this position for only about 48 hours, and I appreciate your candor with this committee during the course of this open hearing.
MCCABE: Yes, ma'am.
HARRIS: Until this point, what was your role in the FBI's investigation into the Russian hacking of the 2016 election?
MCCABE: I've been the deputy director since February of 2016. So I've had an oversight role over all of our FBI operational activity, including that investigation.
HARRIS: And now that you're acting director, what will your role be in the investigation?
MCCABE: Very similar, senior oversight role to understand what our folks are doing and to make sure they have the resources they need and are getting the direction and the guidance they need to go forward.
HARRIS: Do you support the idea of a special prosecutor taking over the investigation in terms of oversight of the investigation, in addition to your role?
MCCABE: Ma'am, that is a question for the Department of Justice and it wouldn't be proper for me to comment on that.
HARRIS: From your understanding, who at the Department of Justice is in charge of the investigation?
MCCABE: The deputy attorney general, who serves as acting attorney general for that investigation. He is in charge.
HARRIS: And have you had conversations with him about the investigation since you've been in this role?
MCCABE: I have. Yes, ma'am.
HARRIS: And when Director Comey was fired, my understanding is he was not present in his office. He was actually in California. So my question is: Who was in charge of securing his files and devices when that -- when that information came down that he had been fired?
MCCABE: That's our responsibility, ma'am.
HARRIS: And are you confident that his files and his devices have been secured in a way that we can maintain whatever information or evidence he has in connection with the investigation?
MCCABE: Yes, ma'am. I am.
HARRIS: It's been widely reported, and you've mentioned this, that Director Comey asked Rosenstein for additional resources. And I understand that you're saying that you don't believe that you need any additional resources?
MCCABE: For the Russia investigation, ma'am, I think we are adequately resourced.
HARRIS: And will you commit to this committee that if you do need resources, that you will come to us, understanding that we would make every effort to get you what you need?
MCCABE: I absolutely will.
HARRIS: Has -- I understand that you've said that the White House, that you have not talked with the White House about the Russia investigation. Is that correct?
MCCABE: That's correct.
HARRIS: Have you talked with Jeff Sessions about the investigation?
MCCABE: No, ma'am.
HARRIS: Have you talked with anyone other than Rod Rosenstein at the Department of Justice about the investigation?
MCCABE: I don't believe I have -- you know, not recently; obviously, not in that -- not in this position.
HARRIS: Not in the last 48 hours?
MCCABE: No, ma'am.
HARRIS: OK. What protections have been put in place to assure that the good men and women of the FBI understand that they will not be fired if they aggressively pursue this investigation?
MCCABE: Yes, ma'am. So we have very active lines of communication with the team that's -- that's working on this issue. They are -- they have some exemplary and incredibly effective leaders that they work directly for. And I am confident that those -- that they understand and are confident in their position moving forward on this investigation, as my investigators, analysts and professionals staff are in everything we do every day.
HARRIS: And I agree with you. I have no question about the commitment that the men and women of the FBI have to pursue their mission. But will you commit to me that you will directly communicate in some way now that these occurrences have happened and Director Comey has been fired? Will you commit to me that given this changed circumstance, that you will find a way to directly communicate with those men and women to assure them that they will not be fired simply for aggressively pursuing this investigation?
MCCABE: Yes, ma'am.
HARRIS: Thank you.
And how do you believe we need to handle, to the extent that it exists, any crisis of confidence in the leadership of the FBI, given the firing of Director Comey?
MCCABE: I don't believe there is a crisis of confidence in the leadership of the FBI. That's somewhat self-serving, and I apologize for that.
(LAUGHTER)
You know, it was completely within the president's authority to take the steps that he did. We all understand that. We expect that he and the Justice Department will work to find a suitable replacement and a permanent director, and we look forward to supporting whoever that person is, whether they begin as an interim director or a permanently selected director.
This -- organization in its entirety will be completely committed to helping that person get off to a great start and do what they need to do.
HARRIS: And do you believe that there will be any pause in the investigation during this interim period, where we have a number of people who are in acting positions of authority?
MCCABE: No, ma'am. That is my job right now to ensure that the men and women who work for the FBI stay focused on the threats; stay focused on the issues that are of so much importance to this country; continue to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution. And I will ensure that that happens.
HARRIS: I appreciate that. Thank you.
MCCABE: Yes, ma'am.
BURR: Thank you.
Senator King?
Second round, five minutes each.
Senator Wyden?
WYDEN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to go back to the question I asked you, Director Pompeo. And I went out and reviewed the response that you gave to me. And of course, what I'm concerned about is the Sally Yates warning to the White House that Michael Flynn could be blackmailed by the Russians.
And you said you didn't have any first-hand indication of it. Did you have any indication -- second-hand, any sense at all that the national security adviser might be vulnerable to blackmail by the Russians? That is a yes or no question.
POMPEO: It's actually not a yes-or-no question, Senator. I can't answer yes or no. I regret that I'm unable to do so. You have to remember this is a counterintelligence investigation that was largely being conducted by the FBI and not by the CIA. We're a foreign intelligence organization.
And I'll add only this, I was not intending to be clever by using the term "first-hand." I had no second-hand or third-hand knowledge of that conversation either.
WYDEN: So with respect to the CIA, were there any discussion with General Flynn at all?
POMPEO: With respect to what sir? He was for a period of time the national security advisor.
WYDEN: Topics that could have put at risk the security and the well being of the American people. I mean I'm just finding it very hard to swallow that you all had no discussions with the national security advisor.
POMPEO: I spoke with the national security advisor. He was the national security advisor. He was present for the daily brief on many occasions and we talked about all the topics we spoke to the President about.
WYDEN: But nothing relating to matters that could have compromised the security of the United States? POMPEO: Sir I can't recall every conversation with General Flynn during that time period.
WYDEN: We're going to ask some more about it in closed session this afternoon. Admiral Rogers, let me ask you about a technical question that I think is particularly troubling and that is the S.S. 7 question in the technology threat. Last week the Department of Homeland Security published a lengthy study about the impact on the U.S. government of mobile phone security flaws. The report confirmed what I have been warning about for quite some time, which is the significance of cyber security vulnerabilities associated with a signaling system seven report says the department believes, and I quote, that all U.S. carriers are vulnerable to these exploits, resulting in risks to national security, the economy and the federal governments ability to reliably execute national security functions. These vulnerabilities can be exploited by criminals, terrorists and nation state actors and foreign intelligence organizations.
Do you all share the concerns of the Department of Human -- the Homeland Security Department about the severity of these vulnerabilities and what ought to be done right now to get the government and the private sector to be working together more clearly and in a coherent plan to deal with these monumental risks. These are risks that we're going to face with terrorists and hackers and threats. And I think the federal communications commission has been treading water on this and I'd like to see what you want to do to really take charge of this to deal what is an enormous vulnerability to the security of this country?
ROGERS: Sure. I hear the concern. It's a widely deployed technology in the mobile segment. I share the concern the Department of Homeland security in their role kind of as the lead federal agency associated with cyber and support from the federal government to the private sector as overall responsibility here.
We are trying to provide at the national security agency our expertise to help generate insights about the nature of the vulnerability, the nature of the problem. Partnering with DHS, talking to the private sector. There's a couple of specific things from a technology stand point that we're looking at in multiple forms that the government has created partnering with the private sector.
I'm not smart, I apologize about all of the specifics of the DHS effort. I can take that for the record if you'd like.
WYDEN: All right. I just want to respond before we break to Senator Cotton's comments with respect to section 702. Mr. Director, glad to see my tax reform partner back in this role. You know Mr. Director that I think it's critical the American people know how many innocent law abiding Americans are being swept up in the program. The argument that producing an estimate of the number is in itself a violation of privacy, is I think a far fetched argue has been made for years. I and others who believe that we can have security and liberty, that they're not mutually exclusive have always believed that this argument that you're going to be invading peoples privacy doesn't add up. We have to have that number. Are we going to get it? Are we going to get it in time so we can have a debate that shows that those of us who understand there are threats coming from overseas, and we support the effort to deal with those threats as part of 702. That we are not going to have American's privacy rights indiscriminately swept up.
We need that number. When will we get it?
COATS: Senator as you recall, during my confirmation hearing, we had this discussion. I promised to you that I would -- if confirmed and I was, talk (ph) to NSA indeed with Admiral Rogers, try to understand -- better understand why it was so difficult to come to a specific number. I -- I did go out to NSA. I was hosted by Admiral Rogers. We spent significant time talking about that. And I learned of the complexity of reaching that number. I think the -- the statements that had been made by Senator Cotton are very relevant statements as to that.
Clearly, what I have learned is that a breach of privacy has to be made against American people have to be made in order to determine whether or not they breached privacy. So, it -- it -- there is a anomaly there. They're -- they're -- they're issues of duplication.
I know that a -- we're underway in terms of setting up a time with this committee I believe in June -- as early as June to address -- get into that issue and to address that, and talk through the complexity of why it's so difficult to say...
WYDEN: I'm...
COATS: ...this is specifically when we can get you the -- the number and what the number is. So, I -- I believe -- I believe -- we are committed -- we are committed to a special meeting with the committee to try to go through this -- this particular issue.
But I cannot give you a date because I -- I -- and -- and a number because the -- I understand the complexity of it now and why it's so difficult for Admiral Rogers to say this specific number is the number.
WYDEN: I'm -- I'm well over my time. The point really is privacy advocates and technologists say that it's possible to get the number. If they say it, and the government is not saying it, something is really out of synch.
You've got people who want to work with you. We must get on with this and to have a real debate about 702 that ensures that security and liberty are not mutually exclusive. We have to have that number.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
... ... ...
Dec 12, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
On America's 'long emergency' of recession, globalization, and identity politics.
Can a people recover from an excursion into unreality? The USA's sojourn into an alternative universe of the mind accelerated sharply after Wall Street nearly detonated the global financial system in 2008. That debacle was only one manifestation of an array of accumulating threats to the postmodern order, which include the burdens of empire, onerous debt, population overshoot, fracturing globalism, worries about energy, disruptive technologies, ecological havoc, and the specter of climate change.
A sense of gathering crisis, which I call the long emergency , persists. It is systemic and existential. It calls into question our ability to carry on "normal" life much farther into this century, and all the anxiety that attends it is hard for the public to process. It manifested itself first in finance because that was the most abstract and fragile of all the major activities we depend on for daily life, and therefore the one most easily tampered with and shoved into criticality by a cadre of irresponsible opportunists on Wall Street. Indeed, a lot of households were permanently wrecked after the so-called Great Financial Crisis of 2008, despite official trumpet blasts heralding "recovery" and the dishonestly engineered pump-up of capital markets since then.
With the election of 2016, symptoms of the long emergency seeped into the political system. Disinformation rules. There is no coherent consensus about what is happening and no coherent proposals to do anything about it. The two parties are mired in paralysis and dysfunction and the public's trust in them is at epic lows. Donald Trump is viewed as a sort of pirate president, a freebooting freak elected by accident, "a disrupter" of the status quo at best and at worst a dangerous incompetent playing with nuclear fire. A state of war exists between the White House, the permanent D.C. bureaucracy, and the traditional news media. Authentic leadership is otherwise AWOL. Institutions falter. The FBI and the CIA behave like enemies of the people.
Bad ideas flourish in this nutrient medium of unresolved crisis. Lately, they actually dominate the scene on every side. A species of wishful thinking that resembles a primitive cargo cult grips the technocratic class, awaiting magical rescue remedies that promise to extend the regime of Happy Motoring, consumerism, and suburbia that makes up the armature of "normal" life in the USA. They chatter about electric driverless car fleets, home delivery drone services, and as-yet-undeveloped modes of energy production to replace problematic fossil fuels, while ignoring the self-evident resource and capital constraints now upon us and even the laws of physics -- especially entropy , the second law of thermodynamics. Their main mental block is their belief in infinite industrial growth on a finite planet, an idea so powerfully foolish that it obviates their standing as technocrats.
The non-technocratic cohort of the thinking class squanders its waking hours on a quixotic campaign to destroy the remnant of an American common culture and, by extension, a reviled Western civilization they blame for the failure in our time to establish a utopia on earth. By the logic of the day, "inclusion" and "diversity" are achieved by forbidding the transmission of ideas, shutting down debate, and creating new racially segregated college dorms. Sexuality is declared to not be biologically determined, yet so-called cis-gendered persons (whose gender identity corresponds with their sex as detected at birth) are vilified by dint of not being "other-gendered" -- thereby thwarting the pursuit of happiness of persons self-identified as other-gendered. Casuistry anyone?
The universities beget a class of what Nassim Taleb prankishly called "intellectuals-yet-idiots," hierophants trafficking in fads and falsehoods, conveyed in esoteric jargon larded with psychobabble in support of a therapeutic crypto-gnostic crusade bent on transforming human nature to fit the wished-for utopian template of a world where anything goes. In fact, they have only produced a new intellectual despotism worthy of Stalin, Mao Zedong, and Pol Pot.
In case you haven't been paying attention to the hijinks on campus -- the attacks on reason, fairness, and common decency, the kangaroo courts, diversity tribunals, assaults on public speech and speakers themselves -- here is the key take-away: it's not about ideas or ideologies anymore; it's purely about the pleasures of coercion, of pushing other people around. Coercion is fun and exciting! In fact, it's intoxicating, and rewarded with brownie points and career advancement. It's rather perverse that this passion for tyranny is suddenly so popular on the liberal left.
Until fairly recently, the Democratic Party did not roll that way. It was right-wing Republicans who tried to ban books, censor pop music, and stifle free expression. If anything, Democrats strenuously defended the First Amendment, including the principle that unpopular and discomforting ideas had to be tolerated in order to protect all speech. Back in in 1977 the ACLU defended the right of neo-Nazis to march for their cause (National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie, 432 U.S. 43).
The new and false idea that something labeled "hate speech" -- labeled by whom? -- is equivalent to violence floated out of the graduate schools on a toxic cloud of intellectual hysteria concocted in the laboratory of so-called "post-structuralist" philosophy, where sundry body parts of Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, Judith Butler, and Gilles Deleuze were sewn onto a brain comprised of one-third each Thomas Hobbes, Saul Alinsky, and Tupac Shakur to create a perfect Frankenstein monster of thought. It all boiled down to the proposition that the will to power negated all other human drives and values, in particular the search for truth. Under this scheme, all human relations were reduced to a dramatis personae of the oppressed and their oppressors, the former generally "people of color" and women, all subjugated by whites, mostly males. Tactical moves in politics among these self-described "oppressed" and "marginalized" are based on the credo that the ends justify the means (the Alinsky model).
This is the recipe for what we call identity politics, the main thrust of which these days, the quest for "social justice," is to present a suit against white male privilege and, shall we say, the horse it rode in on: western civ. A peculiar feature of the social justice agenda is the wish to erect strict boundaries around racial identities while erasing behavioral boundaries, sexual boundaries, and ethical boundaries. Since so much of this thought-monster is actually promulgated by white college professors and administrators, and white political activists, against people like themselves, the motives in this concerted campaign might appear puzzling to the casual observer.
I would account for it as the psychological displacement among this political cohort of their shame, disappointment, and despair over the outcome of the civil rights campaign that started in the 1960s and formed the core of progressive ideology. It did not bring about the hoped-for utopia. The racial divide in America is starker now than ever, even after two terms of a black president. Today, there is more grievance and resentment, and less hope for a better future, than when Martin Luther King made the case for progress on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1963. The recent flash points of racial conflict -- Ferguson, the Dallas police ambush, the Charleston church massacre, et cetera -- don't have to be rehearsed in detail here to make the point that there is a great deal of ill feeling throughout the land, and quite a bit of acting out on both sides.
The black underclass is larger, more dysfunctional, and more alienated than it was in the 1960s. My theory, for what it's worth, is that the civil rights legislation of 1964 and '65, which removed legal barriers to full participation in national life, induced considerable anxiety among black citizens over the new disposition of things, for one reason or another. And that is exactly why a black separatism movement arose as an alternative at the time, led initially by such charismatic figures as Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael. Some of that was arguably a product of the same youthful energy that drove the rest of the Sixties counterculture: adolescent rebellion. But the residue of the "Black Power" movement is still present in the widespread ambivalence about making covenant with a common culture, and it has only been exacerbated by a now long-running "multiculturalism and diversity" crusade that effectively nullifies the concept of a national common culture.
What follows from these dynamics is the deflection of all ideas that don't feed a narrative of power relations between oppressors and victims, with the self-identified victims ever more eager to exercise their power to coerce, punish, and humiliate their self-identified oppressors, the "privileged," who condescend to be abused to a shockingly masochistic degree. Nobody stands up to this organized ceremonial nonsense. The punishments are too severe, including the loss of livelihood, status, and reputation, especially in the university. Once branded a "racist," you're done. And venturing to join the oft-called-for "honest conversation about race" is certain to invite that fate.
Globalization has acted, meanwhile, as a great leveler. It destroyed what was left of the working class -- the lower-middle class -- which included a great many white Americans who used to be able to support a family with simple labor. Hung out to dry economically, this class of whites fell into many of the same behaviors as the poor blacks before them: absent fathers, out-of-wedlock births, drug abuse. Then the Great Financial Crisis of 2008 wiped up the floor with the middle-middle class above them, foreclosing on their homes and futures, and in their desperation many of these people became Trump voters -- though I doubt that Trump himself truly understood how this all worked exactly. However, he did see that the white middle class had come to identify as yet another victim group, allowing him to pose as their champion.
The evolving matrix of rackets that prompted the 2008 debacle has only grown more elaborate and craven as the old economy of stuff dies and is replaced by a financialized economy of swindles and frauds . Almost nothing in America's financial life is on the level anymore, from the mendacious "guidance" statements of the Federal Reserve, to the official economic statistics of the federal agencies, to the manipulation of all markets, to the shenanigans on the fiscal side, to the pervasive accounting fraud that underlies it all. Ironically, the systematic chiseling of the foundering middle class is most visible in the rackets that medicine and education have become -- two activities that were formerly dedicated to doing no harm and seeking the truth !
Life in this milieu of immersive dishonesty drives citizens beyond cynicism to an even more desperate state of mind. The suffering public ends up having no idea what is really going on, what is actually happening. The toolkit of the Enlightenment -- reason, empiricism -- doesn't work very well in this socioeconomic hall of mirrors, so all that baggage is discarded for the idea that reality is just a social construct, just whatever story you feel like telling about it. On the right, Karl Rove expressed this point of view some years ago when he bragged, of the Bush II White House, that "we make our own reality." The left says nearly the same thing in the post-structuralist malarkey of academia: "you make your own reality." In the end, both sides are left with a lot of bad feelings and the belief that only raw power has meaning.
Erasing psychological boundaries is a dangerous thing. When the rackets finally come to grief -- as they must because their operations don't add up -- and the reckoning with true price discovery commences at the macro scale, the American people will find themselves in even more distress than they've endured so far. This will be the moment when either nobody has any money, or there is plenty of worthless money for everyone. Either way, the functional bankruptcy of the nation will be complete, and nothing will work anymore, including getting enough to eat. That is exactly the moment when Americans on all sides will beg someone to step up and push them around to get their world working again. And even that may not avail.
James Howard Kunstler's many books include The Geography of Nowhere, The Long Emergency, Too Much Magic: Wishful Thinking, Technology, and the Fate of the Nation , and the World Made by Hand novel series. He blogs on Mondays and Fridays at Kunstler.com .
Whine Merchant December 20, 2017 at 10:49 pm
Wow – is there ever negative!Celery , says: December 20, 2017 at 11:33 pmI think I need to go listen to an old-fashioned Christmas song now.Fran Macadam , says: December 20, 2017 at 11:55 pmThe ability to be financially, or at least resource, sustaining is the goal of many I know since we share a lack of confidence in any of our institutions. We can only hope that God might look down with compassion on us, but He's not in the practical plan of how to feed and sustain ourselves when things play out to their inevitable end. Having come from a better time, we joke about our dystopian preparations, self-conscious about our "overreaction," but preparing all the same.
Merry Christmas!
Look at it this way: Germany had to be leveled and its citizens reduced to abject penury, before Volkswagen could become the world's biggest car company, and autobahns built throughout the world. It will be darkest before the dawn, and hopefully, that light that comes after, won't be the miniature sunrise of a nuclear conflagration.KD , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:02 amEat, Drink, and be Merry, you can charge it on your credit card!Rock Stehdy , says: December 21, 2017 at 6:38 amHard words, but true. Kunstler is always worth reading for his common-sense wisdom.Helmut , says: December 21, 2017 at 7:04 amAn excellent summary and bleak reminder of what our so-called civilization has become. How do we extricate ourselves from this strange death spiral?Liam , says: December 21, 2017 at 7:38 am
I have long suspected that we humans are creatures of our own personal/group/tribal/national/global fables and mythologies. We are compelled by our genes, marrow, and blood to tell ourselves stories of our purpose and who we are. It is time for new mythologies and stories of "who we are". This bizarre hyper-techno all-for-profit world needs a new story.Peter , says: December 21, 2017 at 8:34 am"The black underclass is larger, more dysfunctional, and more alienated than it was in the 1960s. My theory, for what it's worth, is that the civil rights legislation of 1964 and '65, which removed legal barriers to full participation in national life, induced considerable anxiety among black citizens over the new disposition of things, for one reason or another."Um, forgotten by Kunstler is the fact that 1965 was also the year when the USA reopened its doors to low-skilled immigrants from the Third World – who very quickly became competitors with black Americans. And then the Boom ended, and corporate American, influenced by thinking such as that displayed in Lewis Powell's (in)famous 1971 memorandum, decided to claw back the gains made by the working and middle classes in the previous 3 decades.
I have some faith that the American people can recover from an excursion into unreality. I base it on my own survival to the end of this silly rant.SteveM , says: December 21, 2017 at 9:08 amRe: Whine Merchant, "Wow – is there ever negative!"Dave Wright , says: December 21, 2017 at 9:22 amCan't argue with the facts
P.S. Merry Christmas.
Hey Jim, I know you love to blame Wall Street and the Republicans for the GFC. I remember back in '08 you were urging Democrats to blame it all on Republicans to help Obama win. But I have news for you. It wasn't Wall Street that caused the GFC. The crisis actually had its roots in the Clinton Administration's use of the Community Reinvestment Act to pressure banks to relax mortgage underwriting standards. This was done at the behest of left wing activists who claimed (without evidence, of course) that the standards discriminated against minorities. The result was an effective repeal of all underwriting standards and an explosion of real estate speculation with borrowed money. Speculation with borrowed money never ends well.NoahK , says: December 21, 2017 at 10:15 amI have to laugh, too, when you say that it's perverse that the passion for tyranny is popular on the left. Have you ever heard of the French Revolution? How about the USSR? Communist China? North Korea? Et cetera.
Leftism is leftism. Call it Marxism, Communism, socialism, liberalism, progressivism, or what have you. The ideology is the same. Only the tactics and methods change. Destroy the evil institutions of marriage, family, and religion, and Man's innate goodness will shine forth, and the glorious Godless utopia will naturally result.
Of course, the father of lies is ultimately behind it all. "He was a liar and a murderer from the beginning."
When man turns his back on God, nothing good happens. That's the most fundamental problem in Western society today. Not to say that there aren't other issues, but until we return to God, there's not much hope for improvement.
It's like somebody just got a bunch of right-wing talking points and mashed them together into one incohesive whole. This is just lazy.Andrew Imlay , says: December 21, 2017 at 10:36 amHmm. I just wandered over here by accident. Being a construction contractor, I don't know enough about globalization, academia, or finance to evaluate your assertions about those realms. But being in a biracial family, and having lived, worked, and worshiped equally in white and black communities, I can evaluate your statements about social justice, race, and civil rights. Long story short, you pick out fringe liberal ideas, misrepresent them as mainstream among liberals, and shoot them down. Casuistry, anyone?peter in boston , says: December 21, 2017 at 10:48 amYou also misrepresent reality to your readers. No, the black underclass is not larger, more dysfunctional, and more alienated now than in the 1960's, when cities across the country burned and machine guns were stationed on the Capitol steps. The "racial divide" is not "starker now than ever"; that's just preposterous to anyone who was alive then. And nobody I've ever known felt "shame" over the "outcome of the civil rights campaign". I know nobody who seeks to "punish and humiliate" the 'privileged'.
I get that this column is a quick toss-off before the holiday, and that your strength is supposed to be in your presentation, not your ideas. For me, it's a helpful way to rehearse debunking common tropes that I'll encounter elsewhere.
But, really, your readers deserve better, and so do the people you misrepresent. We need bad liberal ideas to be critiqued while they're still on the fringe. But by calling fringe ideas mainstream, you discredit yourself, misinform your readers, and contribute to stereotypes both of liberals and of conservatives. I'm looking for serious conservative critiques that help me take a second look at familiar ideas. I won't be back.
Love Kunstler -- and love reading him here -- but he needs a strong editor to get him to turn a formless harangue into clear essay.Someone in the crowd , says: December 21, 2017 at 11:07 amI disagree, NoahK, that the whole is incohesive, and I also disagree that these are right-wing talking points.Jon , says: December 21, 2017 at 11:10 amThe theme of this piece is the long crisis in the US, its nature and causes. At no point does this essay, despite it stream of consciousness style, veer away from that theme. Hence it is cohesive.
As for the right wing charge, though it is true, to be sure, that Kunstler's position is in many respects classically conservative -- he believes for example that there should be a national consensus on certain fundamentals, such as whether or not there are two sexes (for the most part), or, instead, an infinite variety of sexes chosen day by day at whim -- you must have noticed that he condemned both the voluntarism of Karl Rove AND the voluntarism of the post-structuralist crowd.
My impression is that what Kunstler is doing here is diagnosing the long crisis of a decadent liberal post-modernity, and his stance is not that of either of the warring sides within our divorced-from-reality political establishment, neither that of the 'right' or 'left.' Which is why, logically, he published it here. National Review would never have accepted this piece. QED.
This malaise is rooted in human consciousness that when reflecting on itself celebrating its capacity for apperception suffers from the tension that such an inquiry, such an inward glance produces. In a word, the capacity for the human being to be aware of his or herself as an intelligent being capable of reflecting on aspects of reality through the artful manipulation of symbols engenders this tension, this angst.Joe the Plutocrat , says: December 21, 2017 at 11:27 amSome will attempt to extinguish this inner tension through intoxication while others through the thrill of war, and it has been played out since the dawn of man and well documented when the written word emerged.
The malaise which Mr. Kunstler addresses as the problem of our times is rooted in our existence from time immemorial. But the problem is not only existential but ontological. It is rooted in our being as self-aware creatures. Thus no solution avails itself as humanity in and of itself is the problem. Each side (both right and left) seeks its own anodyne whether through profligacy or intolerance, and each side mans the barricades to clash experiencing the adrenaline rush that arises from the perpetual call to arms.
The scientist 880 , says: December 21, 2017 at 11:48 am"Globalization has acted, meanwhile, as a great leveler. It destroyed what was left of the working class -- the lower-middle class -- which included a great many white Americans who used to be able to support a family with simple labor."And to whom do we hand the tab for this? Globalization is a word. It is a concept, a talking point. Globalization is oligarchy by another name. Unfortunately, under-educated, deplorable, Americans; regardless of party affiliation/ideology have embraced. And the most ironic part?
Russia and China (the eventual surviving oligarchies) will eventually have to duke it out to decide which superpower gets to make the USA it's b*tch (excuse prison reference, but that's where we're headed folks).
And one more irony. Only in American, could Christianity, which was grew from concepts like compassion, generosity, humility, and benevolence; be re-branded and 'weaponized' to further greed, bigotry, misogyny, intolerance, and violence/war. Americans fiddled (over same sex marriage, abortion, who has to bake wedding cakes, and who gets to use which public restroom), while the oligarchs burned the last resources (natural, financial, and even legal).
Adam , says: December 21, 2017 at 11:57 am"Today, there is more grievance and resentment, and less hope for a better future, than when Martin Luther King made the case for progress on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1963."Spoken like a white guy who has zero contact with black people. I mean, even a little bit of research and familiarity would give lie to the idea that blacks are more pessimistic about life today than in the 1960's.
Black millenials are the most optimistic group of Americans about the future. Anyone who has spent any significant time around older black people will notice that you don't hear the rose colored memories of the past. Black people don't miss the 1980's, much less the 1950's. Young black people are told by their elders how lucky they are to grow up today because things are much better than when grandpa was our age and we all know this history.\
It's clear that this part of the article was written from absolute ignorance of the actual black experience with no interest in even looking up some facts. Hell, Obama even gave a speech at Howard telling graduates how lucky they were to be young and black Today compared to even when he was their age in the 80's!
Here is the direct quote;
"In my inaugural address, I remarked that just 60 years earlier, my father might not have been served in a D.C. restaurant -- at least not certain of them. There were no black CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. Very few black judges. Shoot, as Larry Wilmore pointed out last week, a lot of folks didn't even think blacks had the tools to be a quarterback. Today, former Bull Michael Jordan isn't just the greatest basketball player of all time -- he owns the team. (Laughter.) When I was graduating, the main black hero on TV was Mr. T. (Laughter.) Rap and hip hop were counterculture, underground. Now, Shonda Rhimes owns Thursday night, and Beyoncé runs the world. (Laughter.) We're no longer only entertainers, we're producers, studio executives. No longer small business owners -- we're CEOs, we're mayors, representatives, Presidents of the United States. (Applause.)
I am not saying gaps do not persist. Obviously, they do. Racism persists. Inequality persists. Don't worry -- I'm going to get to that. But I wanted to start, Class of 2016, by opening your eyes to the moment that you are in. If you had to choose one moment in history in which you could be born, and you didn't know ahead of time who you were going to be -- what nationality, what gender, what race, whether you'd be rich or poor, gay or straight, what faith you'd be born into -- you wouldn't choose 100 years ago. You wouldn't choose the fifties, or the sixties, or the seventies. You'd choose right now. If you had to choose a time to be, in the words of Lorraine Hansberry, "young, gifted, and black" in America, you would choose right now. (Applause.)"
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/obamas-howard-commencement-transcript-222931
https://www.google.com/amp/s/m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_58cf1d9ae4b0ec9d29dcf283/amp
I love reading about how the Community Reinvestment Act was the catalyst of all that is wrong in the world. As someone in the industry the issue was actually twofold. The Commodities Futures Modernization Act turned the mortgage securities market into a casino with the underlying actual debt instruments multiplied through the use of additional debt instruments tied to the performance but with no actual underlying value. These securities were then sold around the world essentially infecting the entire market. In order that feed the beast, these NON GOVERNMENT loans had their underwriting standards lowered to rediculous levels. If you run out of qualified customers, just lower the qualifications. Government loans such as FHA, VA, and USDA were avoided because it was easier to qualify people with the new stuff. And get paid. The short version is all of the incentives that were in place at the time, starting with the Futures Act, directly led to the actions that culminated in the Crash. So yes, it was the government, just a different piece of legislation.SteveM , says: December 21, 2017 at 12:29 pmKunstler itemizing the social and economic pathologies in the United States is not enough. Because there are other models that demonstrate it didn't have to be this way.One Guy , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:10 pmE.g. Germany. Germany is anything but perfect and its recent government has screwed up with its immigration policies. But Germany has a high standard of living, an educated work force (including unions and skilled crafts-people), a more rational distribution of wealth and high quality universal health care that costs 47% less per capita than in the U.S. and with no intrinsic need to maraud around the planet wasting gobs of taxpayer money playing Global Cop.
The larger subtext is that the U.S. house of cards was planned out and constructed as deliberately as the German model was. Only the objective was not to maximize the health and happiness of the citizenry, but to line the pockets of the parasitic Elites. (E.g., note that Mitch McConnell has been a government employee for 50 years but somehow acquired a net worth of over $10 Million.)
P.S. About the notionally high U.S. GDP. Factor out the TRILLIONS inexplicably hoovered up by the pathological health care system, the metastasized and sanctified National Security State (with its Global Cop shenanigans) and the cronied-up Ponzi scheme of electron-churn financialization ginned up by Goldman Sachs and the rest of the Banksters, and then see how much GDP that reflects the actual wealth of the middle class is left over.
Right-Wing Dittoheads and Fox Watchers love to blame the Community Reinvestment Act. It allows them to blame both poor black people AND the government. The truth is that many parties were to blame.LouB , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:14 pmOne of the things I love about this rag is that almost all of the comments are included. You may be sure that similar commenting privilege doesn't exist most anywhere else.tzx4 , says: December 21, 2017 at 1:57 pmAny disfavor regarding the supposed bleakness with the weak hearted souls aside, Mr K's broadside seems pretty spot on to me.
I think the author overlooks the fact that government over the past 30 to 40 years has been tilting the playing field ever more towards the uppermost classes and against the middle class. The evisceration of the middle class is plain to see.Jeeves , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:09 pmIf the the common man had more money and security, lots of our current intrasocial conflicts would be far less intense.
Andrew Imlay: You provide a thoughtful corrective to one of Kunstler's more hyperbolic claims. And you should know that his jeremiad doesn't represent usual fare at TAC. So do come back.Wezz , says: December 21, 2017 at 2:44 pmWhether or not every one of Kunstler's assertions can withstand a rigorous fact-check, he is a formidable rhetorician. A generous serving of Weltschmerz is just what the season calls for.
America is stupefied from propaganda on steroids for, largely from the right wing, 25? years of Limbaugh, Fox, etc etc etc Clinton hate x 10, "weapons of mass destruction", "they hate us because we are free", birtherism, death panels, Jade Helm, pedophile pizza, and more Clinton hate porn.John Blade Wiederspan , says: December 21, 2017 at 4:26 pmAmericans have been taught to worship the wealthy regardless of how they got there. Americans have been taught they are "Exceptional" (better, smarter, more godly than every one else) in spite of outward appearances. Americans are under educated and encouraged to make decisions based on emotion from constant barrage of extra loud advertising from birth selling illusion.
Americans brain chemistry is most likely as messed up as the rest of their bodies from junk or molested food. Are they even capable of normal thought?
Donald Trump has convinced at least a third of Americans that only he, Fox, Breitbart and one or two other sources are telling the Truth, every one else is lying and that he is their friend.
Is it possible we are just plane doomed and there's no way out?
I loathe the cotton candy clown and his Quislings; however, I must admit, his presence as President of the United States has forced everyone (left, right, religious, non-religious) to look behind the curtain. He has done more to dis-spell the idealism of both liberal and conservative, Democrat and Republican, rich and poor, than any other elected official in history. The sheer amount of mind-numbing absurdity resulting from a publicity stunt that got out of control ..I am 70 and I have seen a lot. This is beyond anything I could ever imagine. America is not going to improve or even remain the same. It is in a 4 year march into worse, three years to go.EarlyBird , says: December 21, 2017 at 5:23 pmSheesh. Should I shoot myself now, or wait until I get home?dvxprime , says: December 21, 2017 at 5:46 pmMr. Kuntzler has an honest and fairly accurate assessment of the situation. And as usual, the liberal audience that TAC is trying so hard to reach, is tossing out their usual talking points whilst being in denial of the situation.Slooch , says: December 21, 2017 at 7:03 pmThe Holy Bible teaches us that repentance is the first crucial step on the path towards salvation. Until the progressives, from their alleged "elite" down the rank and file at Kos, HuffPo, whatever, take a good, long, hard look at the current national dumpster fire and start claiming some responsibility, America has no chance of solving problems or fixing anything.
Kunstler must have had a good time writing this, and I had a good time reading it. Skewed perspective, wild overstatement, and obsessive cherry-picking of the rare checkable facts are mixed with a little eye of newt and toe of frog and smothered in a oar and roll of rhetoric that was thrilling to be immersed in. Good work!jp , says: December 21, 2017 at 8:09 pmaah, same old Kunstler, slightly retailored for the Trump years.c.meyer , says: December 21, 2017 at 8:30 pmfor those of you familiar with him, remember his "peak oil" mania from the late 00s and early 2010s? every blog post was about it. every new year was going to be IT: the long emergency would start, people would be Mad Maxing over oil supplies cos prices at the pump would be $10 a gallon or somesuch.
in this new rant, i did a control-F for "peak oil" and hey, not a mention. I guess even cranks like Kunstler know when to give a tired horse a rest.
So what else is new. Too 'clever', overwritten, no new ideas. Can't anyone move beyond clichés?Active investor , says: December 22, 2017 at 12:35 amKunstler once again waxes eloquent on the American body politic. Every word rings true, except when it doesn't. At times poetic, at other times paranoid, Kunstler does us a great service by pointing a finger at the deepest pain points in America, any one of which could be the geyser that brings on catastrophic failure.JonF , says: December 22, 2017 at 9:52 amHowever, as has been pointed out, he definitely does not hang out with black people. For example, the statement:
But the residue of the "Black Power" movement is still present in the widespread ambivalence about making covenant with a common culture, and it has only been exacerbated by a now long-running "multiculturalism and diversity" crusade that effectively nullifies the concept of a national common culture.
The notion of a 'national common culture' is interesting but pretty much a fantasy that never existed, save colonial times.
Yet Kunstler's voice is one that must be heard, even if he is mostly tuning in to the widespread radicalism on both ends of the spectrum, albeit in relatively small numbers. Let's face it, people are in the streets marching, yelling, and hating and mass murders keep happening, with the regularity of Old Faithful. And he makes a good point about academia loosing touch with reality much of the time. He's spot on about the false expectations of what technology can do for the economy, which is inflated with fiat currency and God knows how many charlatans and hucksters. And yes, the white working class is feeling increasingly like a 'victim group.'
While Kunstler may be more a poet than a lawyer, more songwriter than historian, my gut feeling is that America had better take notice of him, as The American ship of state is being swept by a ferocious tide and the helmsman is high on Fentanyl (made in China).
Re: The crisis actually had its roots in the Clinton Administration's use of the Community Reinvestment Actkevin on the left , says: December 22, 2017 at 10:49 amHere we go again with this rotting zombie which rises from its grave no matter how many times it has been debunked by statisticians and reputable economists (and no, not just those on the left– the ranks include Bruce Bartlett for example, a solid Reaganist). To reiterate again : the CRA played no role in the mortgage boom and bust. Among other facts in the way of that hypothesis is the fact that riskiest loans were being made by non-bank lenders (Countrywide) who were not covered by the CRA which only applied to actual banks– and the banks did not really get into the game full tilt, lowering their lending standards, until late in the game, c. 2005, in response to their loss of business to the non-bank lenders. Ditto for the GSEs, which did not lower their standards until 2005 and even then relied on wall Street to vet the subprime loans they were buying.
To be sure, blaming Wall Street for everything is also wrong-headed, though wall Street certainly did some stupid, greedy and shady things (No, I am not letting them off the hook!) But the cast of miscreants is numbered in the millions and it stretches around the planet. Everyone (for example) who got into the get-rich-quick Ponzi scheme of house flipping, especially if they lied about their income to do so. And everyone who took out a HELOC (Home Equity Line of Credit) and foolishly charged it up on a consumption binge. And shall we talk about the mortgage brokers who coached people into lying, the loan officers who steered customers into the riskiest (and highest earning) loans they could, the sellers who asked palace-prices for crackerbox hovels, the appraisers who rubber-stamped such prices, the regulators who turned a blind eye to all the fraud and malfeasance, the ratings agencies who handed out AAA ratings to securities full of junk, the politicians who rejoiced over the apparent "Bush Boom" well, I could continue, but you get the picture.
We have met the enemy and he was us.
"The Holy Bible teaches us that repentance is the first crucial step on the path towards salvation. Until the progressives, from their alleged "elite" down the rank and file at Kos, HuffPo, whatever, take a good, long, hard look at the current national dumpster fire and start claiming some responsibility, America has no chance of solving problems or fixing anything."Pretty sure that calling other people to repent of their sin of disagreeing with you is not quite what the Holy Bible intended.
Dec 22, 2017 | www.unz.com
Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 6:11 pm GMT
@Art Deco The way I see it "an ocean of blood" in Iraq was unleashed following US invasion, and it included plenty of American blood. Young healthy American men lost their lifes in Iraq, lost their their bodyparts (arms, legs, their nuts), lost their sanity, and as an American I can't imagine that you were pleased about that. Certainly, most of your countrymen didn't feel this way, they didn't feel this war was worth it for the US.Randal , December 18, 2017 at 6:13 pm GMT@Art DecoFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 6:15 pm GMTWe had no treaty commitments with either Serbia or Iraq
The treaty commitment in question was with almost the entire rest of the world, namely when your country entirely voluntarily signed up to a commitment to "refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state". If your country had retained the slightest trace of integrity and self-respect it would at least have had the decency to withdraw from membership of the the UN when it chose to breach those treaty commitments.
And if anything Americans make their own shamelessness worse when they fabricate imaginary pretexts for weaselling out of their country's commitment, such as a wholly imaginary entitlement for them to decide for themselves when there is a "humanitarian" justification for doing so, or make up wholesale fantasy allegations about "weapons of mass destruction" that even if true wouldn't justify war.
An entire nation state behaving like a lying '60s hippy or a shamelessly dishonest aggressor.
I'm sure you're proud.
and both places had it coming.
A straightforward confession of lawless rogue state behaviour, basically.
Do you actually think somehow you are improving your country's position with such arguments? Better for a real American patriot to just stop digging and keep sheepishly quiet about the past three decades of foreign policy.
@reiner Tor The fact is neither did Crimeans really want to join Russia (polls didn't show that), and yet our re-unification has been a huge success! I honestly can't think of good reason, why we can't go futher.Mr. XYZ , December 18, 2017 at 6:20 pm GMT: Would Russia have been interested in joining both the E.U. and NATO?Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 6:27 pm GMT@reiner Tor Neither apply.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 6:30 pm GMT@Felix Keverich "an ocean of blood" in Iraq was unleashed following US invasion,Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 6:32 pm GMTBy various and sundry Sunni insurgents, who continue to distort and disfigure life in the provinces where they have a critical mass of the population. The Kurdish and Shia provinces are quiet.
@Randal Do you actually think somehow you are improving your country's position with such arguments?Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 6:34 pm GMTDepends on the degree to which my interlocutor lives in a bubble breathing in the air of his own mephitic resentments.
And if anything Americans make their own shamelessness worse when they fabricate imaginary pretextsRandal , December 18, 2017 at 6:38 pm GMTThere were no imaginary pretexts. You need to get out more.
@Swedish FamilyMitleser , December 18, 2017 at 6:39 pm GMTAnother possibility is that the change since 2014 is rather the result of more anti-American reporting in Russia's state-owned media.
There seems no evident reason to look for another explanation for the drops in pro-American sentiment. They seem eminently justified by the US's behaviour over the period 1990-date and perfectly unsurprising.
What needs to be explained is not the sustained low opinion after 2014 but rather the remarkable recoveries after 1999, 2003 and 2008.
In the west, opinion of the US was managed upwards with the Obama presidency because he fitted so well with US sphere establishment antiracist and leftist dogmas that he had almost universally positive (even hagiographic) mainstream media coverage throughout the US sphere, but with Trump opinions of the US are mostly back down where Bush II left them. It seems unlikely the Russian media would have been as sycophantically pro-Obama merely for his blackness and Democrat-ness, though, and of course he wasn't around anyway in 2000 and in 2004.
It's understandable that following a particular instance of particularly bad US behaviour (such as Kosovo or Iraq) opinion of the US in US sphere states would dip dramatically (as it did, mostly) and then recover slowly to roughly its long term mean, because those crimes were not directed against the interests of US sphere states or elites. But they very much were targeted at Russia or its interests and disadvantageous to Russia and its global status. Russians had few excuses for failing to see that the US was an implacable and dangerous enemy from at least Kosovo onward, and yet they repeatedly chose to pretend to themselves that it wasn't.
@Swedish FamilyFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 6:40 pm GMTThis would mean, as I suspect, that the pendulum will swing back once the Kremlin loosens its tight grip of the media.
Why are you assuming that the pendulum would swing back?
The Kremlin is still playing nice with Western "partners".
The alternative does not have to be more pro-American.@Art Deco As I recall the Sunnies and Shias killed and disfigured American servicemen together, which caused Americans to elect Obama and run away from the country. And now these Shia communities vote for pro-Iran politicians, who gradually turn Iraq into Iranian puppet -- is this why American soldiers died?inertial , December 18, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMTC'mon, Iraq invasion was a disaster for the US whichever way you look at it. That's what happens when you start a war for the wrong reasons.
@reiner Tor Correction. It's the elites that don't want to join Russia. And the reason they don't is because the West gives them goodies for being anti-Russian. This kind of strategy worked pretty well so far (for the West) in Eastern Europe and it will continue to work for some time yet. But not forever, not in Ukraine and Belorussia.reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMTThat's because the population of these places is Russian (no matter what they were taught to call themselves by the Commies.) Their culture is Russian. The rulers of Ukraine and, to a much lesser degree, Belorussia are trying to erect cultural barriers between themselves and Russia. Good luck with that, in the 21st century. It's more likely the culture will further homogenize, as is the trend anywhere in the world. Eventually it will tell.
Now, the question is if Russians will even want Ukraine back. This is not so clear.
@Art Deco They do.Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 6:47 pm GMT@Mr. XYZGerman_reader , December 18, 2017 at 6:52 pm GMTWould Russia have been interested in joining both the E.U. and NATO?
Integration into West is what Russians wanted.
An example
IF RUSSIA HAD THE CHANCE TO BECOME A FULL MEMBER OF THE EUROPEAN UNION NOW, WOULD YOU BE FOR OR AGAINST THIS? (N=800)
08/2009:
For: 53%
Against: 21%
Difficult to say: 27%https://www.levada.ru/en/2016/06/10/russia-s-friends-and-enemies-2/
@Art Deco That's just dumb. The reasons officially given for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 -- Saddam's regime hiding weapons of mass destruction and being an intolerable threat to the outside world -- were a transparently false pretext for war, and that was clearly discernible at the time. Saddam's regime was extremely brutal and increasingly Islamic or even Islamist in character, but by 2003 it wasn't a serious threat to anyone outside Iraq anymore the worst thing it did was send money to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers (bad, but hardly an existential threat). Admittedly there was the question how to deal with his regime in coming years, whether to eventually relax sanctions or to keep them in place for the foreseeable future. But there was no urgent need to invade Iraq that was purely a war of choice which the US started in a demented attempt at reshaping the region according to its own preferences. If you don't understand why many people find that rather questionable, it's you who needs to get out more.Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 6:56 pm GMT@Randalreiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 7:04 pm GMTWhat needs to be explained is not the sustained low opinion after 2014 but rather the remarkable recoveries after 1999, 2003 and 2008.
Yugoslavia and Iraq were not that close to Russia and Russian elite was still pushing for Integration into West at that time. After 2008, "Reset" and Obama happened.
It seems unlikely the Russian media would have been as sycophantically pro-Obama merely for his blackness and Democrat-ness, though, and of course he wasn't around anyway in 2000 and in 2004.
Keep in mind that Obama's opponent in 2008 was McCain, that McCain.
Just like Trump, Obama seemed like the lesser evil and not to blame for previous conflicts.@Art Deco Hungary joined NATO a few days (weeks? can't remember) before the start of the Kosovo-related bombardment of Serbia. I attended university in a city in the south of Hungary, close to the Serbian border. I could see the NATO planes flying by above us every night when going home from a bar or club (both of which I frequented a lot).reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 7:12 pm GMTI was a staunch Atlanticist at the time, and I believed all the propaganda about the supposed genocide which later turned out not to have gone through the formality of actually taking place. But it was never properly reported as the scandal it was -- it was claimed that the Serbs were murdering tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of Kosovo Albanians, but it never happened. They might have killed a few hundred, at worst a few thousand civilians, but that's different from what the propaganda claimed at the time. I only found out that there was no genocide of Albanians in Kosovo when I searched the internet for it some time after the Iraq invasion. By that time I was no longer an Atlanticist. Most people are totally unaware that there was any lying going on while selling us the war.
@German_readerGerman_reader , December 18, 2017 at 7:34 pm GMTand that was clearly discernible at the time
Yes. It was the thing which opened my eyes and made me question some previous policies, especially the bombardment of Serbia. I wasn't any longer comfortable of being in NATO, especially since it started to get obvious that Hungarian elites (at least the leftists among them) used our membership to dismantle our military and use the savings on handouts for their electorate, or -- worse -- outright steal it. While it increasingly looked like NATO wasn't really protecting our interests, since our enemies were mostly our neighbors (some of them). This kind of false safety didn't feel alright.
@reiner Tor "Yes. It was the thing which opened my eyes"AP , December 18, 2017 at 7:45 pm GMTSame for me. I was 15 during the Kosovo war and believed NATO's narrative, couldn't understand how anybody could be against the war, given previous Serb atrocities during the Bosnian war it seemed to make sense. And after 9/11 I was very pro-US, e.g. I argued vehemently with a stupid leftie teacher who was against the Afghanistan war (and I still believe that war was justified, so I don't think I'm just some mindless anti-American fool). But Iraq was just too much, too much obvious lying and those lies were so stupid it was hard not to feel that there was something deeply wrong with a large part of the American public if they were gullible enough to believe such nonsense. At least for me it was a real turning point in the evolution of my political views.
@Felix KeverichDFH , December 18, 2017 at 7:45 pm GMTRussians know more about these things than you do. The vast majority of us do not regard Belarus and Ukraine as part of "заграница" -- foreign countries. Ukrainians and in particular Belorussians are simply variants of us, just like regional differences exist between the Russians in Siberia and Kuban'.
The last two sentences contradict the first.
Russians tend to be rather ignorant of Ukrainians, and you are no different.
@Mitleser Western Europe, with the best will in the world, doesn't need more Slav/Muslim immigrants. Europeans would have never agreed to it.reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 7:48 pm GMT@German_readerDarin , December 18, 2017 at 7:53 pm GMTAfghanistan war (and I still believe that war was justified
Destroying the Taliban government, yes. Building "democracy" is just stupid, though. They should've quickly left after the initial victory and let the Afghans to just eat each other with Stroganoff sauce if they so wished. It's not our business.
@inertialAP , December 18, 2017 at 7:56 pm GMTThat's because the population of these places is Russian (no matter what they were taught to call themselves by the Commies.) Their culture is Russian.
This is for them to decide, not for you.
It's more likely the culture will further homogenize, as is the trend anywhere in the world.
Yeah, the culture homogenizes around the world, into global Hollywood corporate culture. In the long there, "traditional Russian culture" is as doomed as "traditional Ukrainian culture" and "traditional American culture" if there is anything left of it.
@Felix KeverichGerman_reader , December 18, 2017 at 7:56 pm GMTThe fact is neither did Crimeans really want to join Russia (polls didn't show that)
Nonsense, Mr. Clueless-About-Ukraine:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_status_referendum,_2014#Polling
Polling by the Razumkov Centre in 2008 found that 63.8% of Crimeans (76% of Russians, 55% of Ukrainians, and 14% of Crimean Tatars, respectively) would like Crimea to secede from Ukraine and join Russia and 53.8% would like to preserve its current status, but with expanded powers and rights . A poll by the International Republican Institute in May 2013 found that 53% wanted "Autonomy in Ukraine (as today)", 12% were for "Crimean Tatar autonomy within Ukraine", 2% for "Common oblast of Ukraine" and 23% voted for "Crimea should be separated and given to Russia".
The takeaway is that Crimeans were satisfied being part of Ukraine as long as Ukraine had an ethnic Russian, generally pro-Russian president like Yanukovich in charge (2013 poll), but preferred being part of Russia to being part of a Ukrainian state run by Ukrainians (2008 poll, post-Maidan).
@reiner Tor Totally agree, there should just have been a quick punitive expedition, trying to "fix" Afghanistan is pointless.AP , December 18, 2017 at 7:59 pm GMT@inertialMitleser , December 18, 2017 at 8:05 pm GMTThat's because the population of these places is Russian (no matter what they were taught to call themselves by the Commies.) Their culture is Russian.
Believer of Russian nationalist fairytales tells Russian nationalist fairytales. You managed to fit 3 of them into 2 sentences, good job.
@DFH Oh, Western Europe does not mind Slav/Muslim immigrants.Randal , December 18, 2017 at 8:07 pm GMT
In fact, they love them.
They would not have agreed for other reasons without admitting them in public.@Felix KeverichFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:07 pm GMTAs I recall the Sunnies and Shias killed and disfigured American servicemen together,
The amusing thing is that American apologists for their country's military interventionism like Art Deco more usually spend their time heaping all the blame on Iran and the Shia. As well as internet opinionators, that incudes some of the most senior US military figures like obsessively anti-Iranian SecDef James Mattis:
James Mattis' 33-Year Grudge Against Iran
That's something that ought to seriously concern anyone with a rational view of world affairs.
which caused Americans to elect Obama and run away from the country.
In fact the Americans had already admitted defeat and agreed to pull out before Obama took office. Bush II signed the withdrawal agreement on 14th December 2008. After that, US forces in Iraq were arguably no longer occupiers and were de jure as well as de facto present on the sufferance of the Iraqi government. The US regime had clearly hoped to have an Iraqi collaboration government for the long term, as a base from which to attack Iran, but the long Iraqi sunni and shia resistances scuppered that idea. The sunnis had fought hard, but were mostly defeated and many of them ended up collaborating with the US occupiers, as indeed had much of the shia, for entirely understandable reasons in both cases.
Military occupations are morally complicated like that.
@AP I was referring specifically to Russian attitudes about Ukrainians. I know that among Ukrainians themselves, there is quite the confusion on this subject.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:09 pm GMT@Felix Keverich As I recall the Sunnies and Shias killed and disfigured American servicemen together, which caused Americans to elect Obama and run away from the country. And now these Shia communities vote for pro-Iran politicians, who gradually turn Iraq into Iranian puppet -- is this why American soldiers died?Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:11 pm GMTYour memory is bad. The three Kurdish provinces never suffered much. Political violence in the Shia provinces was finally suppressed over a series of months in late 2007 and early 2008. It was also contained to a degree in the six provinces with Sunnis. And that is how matters remained for six years. ISIS was active in those provinces which have had public order problems consistently since 2003.
Iran has influence in Iraq. It is an 'Iranian' puppet only when unzdwellers require rhetorical flourishes.
@Randal In fact the Americans had already admitted defeatRandal , December 18, 2017 at 8:15 pm GMTWere we defeated, Iraq would be ruled by the Ba'ath Party or networks of Sunni tribesman. It is not. This isn't that difficult Randal.
@Mitleser Fair points, though you seem to concede to the Russian elites a significant degree of competence at managing public opinion, in 2000 and in 2004.AP , December 18, 2017 at 8:16 pm GMTI was under the impression that Putin personally was still quite naïve about the US even after Kosovo, which partly accounts for his rather desperately helpful approach after 9/11, though not so much after Iraq.
But I have been told by Russians who ought to have some knowledge of these things that Putin and the wider regime were not so naïve even back in the late 1990s, so the case can be made both ways.
@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:17 pm GMTreclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' -- an actual Russian nation-state.
In which 25 million or so Ukrainians actively resist you, and another 5 million or so Ukrainians plus a few million Belarusians nonviolently resent your rule. You will reduce the cities or parts of them to something like Aleppo, and rebuild them (perhaps with coerced local labor) while under a sanctions regime. Obviously there will have to be a militarized occupation regime and prison camps and a network of informants. A proud home.
Again, what really matters here is not the size of the country, it's that all the land that's historically Russian should be fully within the borders of this country.
Baltics were Russian longer than Ukraine. Central Poland became Russian at the same time as did half of Ukraine. According to the 1897 census, there were about as many Great Russian speakers in Kiev governate as in Warsaw. Take the Baltics and Warsaw back too?
@German_reader That's just dumb.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:20 pm GMTNo, it's just an argument you're not used to having to answer.
The reasons officially given for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 -- Saddam's regime hiding weapons of mass destruction and being an intolerable threat to the outside world -- were a transparently false pretext for war, and that was clearly discernible at the time.
It was nothing of the kind. That was on the list of concerns Bush had. Bush's trilemmas don't go away just because Eurotrash strike poses and have impoverished imaginations.
@reiner Tor I was a staunch Atlanticist at the time, and I believed all the propaganda about the supposed genocideinertial , December 18, 2017 at 8:20 pm GMTThe concern at the time was that Serbia was beginning an ethnic cleansing operation contra the Albania population, but carry on.
@Darin This is for them to decide, not for you.Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:21 pm GMTYes, of course. Just don't assume they will decide the way you think.
@AP These polls vary greatly from time to time and depending on the group conducting them. These polls are meaningless : most ordinary people go about their daily lives never thinking about that kind of issues, when suddenly prompted by a pollster they give a meaningless answer.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:24 pm GMTI'm sure, support for reunification will go up in Belarus, if the Kremlin shows some leadership on this issue. We will find enough people willing to work with us, the rest will just have to accept the new reality and go about their daily lifes as usual.
The situation in Ukraine is different, it differs wildly by region and will require us to modify our approach.
@German_reader US started in a demented attempt at reshaping the region according to its own preferences.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMTIt did nothing of the kind. It ejected two governments for reasons of state. One we'd been a state of belligerency with for 12 years, the other was responsible for a gruesome casus belli. Now, having done that, we needed to put in place a new government. There was no better alternative means of so doing than electoral contests.
@inertial Yes, of course. Just don't assume they will decide the way you think.Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMTThey've had ample opportunity over a period of 26 years to make the decision you favor. It hasn't happened, and there's no reason to fancy they'll be more amenable a decade from now.
@Felix KeverichRandal , December 18, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMTHow do you see this happening? Why would the Kremlin give up its control of the media? These people are smart enough to understand that whoever controls the media controls public opinion.
They are indeed, but my assumption is that Russia's present elite is, for the most part, corruptible. Putin will be gone before 2024, and his successor will be under immense pressure -- carrot and stick -- to deregulate Russia's media landscape, which will make foreign money pour into Russian media outlets, which will in turn lead to more positive coverage and more positive views of the West. Only a few days ago, we learnt that Washington ruled out signing a non-interference agreement with Moscow since it would preclude Washington from meddling in Russia's internal affairs. What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia?
@Art DecoFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:32 pm GMTWere we defeated, Iraq would be ruled by the Ba'ath Party or networks of Sunni tribesman. It is not. This isn't that difficult Randal.
Well this is an old chestnut that is really just an attempt to abuse definitions of victory and defeat on your part.
The US invasion of Iraq itself was initially a military success. It ended in complete military victory over the Iraqi regime and nation, the complete surrender of the Iraqi military and the occupation of the country.
However, the US regime's wider war aims were not achieved because they were unable to impose a collaboration government and use the country as a base for further projection of US power in the ME (primarily against Iran, on behalf of Israel), and the overall result of the war and the subsequent occupation was catastrophic for any honest assessment of American national interests (as opposed to the interests of the lobbies manipulating US regime policy). The costs were significant, the reputational damage was also significant, and the overall result was to replace a contained and essentially broken opponent with vigorous sunni jihadist forces together with a resurgent Iran unwilling to kowtow to the US as most ME states are.
So the best honest assessment is that the US was defeated in Iraq, despite an initial military victory.
@Randalmelanf , December 18, 2017 at 8:32 pm GMTThe amusing thing is that American apologists for their country's military interventionism like Art Deco more usually spend their time heaping all the blame on Iran and the Shia. As well as internet opinionators, that incudes some of the most senior US military figures like obsessively anti-Iranian SecDef James Mattis
I suspect the reason this happens is because ambitious American officers know that hating Iran (hating enemies of Israel in general) is what gets you promoted. It wasn't an accident that James Mattis was appointed Secretary of Defense -- he is Bill Kristol's favourite.
@Swedish FamilyFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:38 pm GMTAnother possibility is that the change since 2014 is rather the result of more anti-American reporting in Russia's state-owned media. This would mean, as I suspect, that the pendulum will swing back once the Kremlin loosens its tight grip of the media.
Definitely no
American propaganda (itself without the help of Putin) were able to convince the Russians that America is the enemy. Propaganda of Putin to this could add almost nothing.@Art Deco US military is still butthurt over the Iran's support for Shia militias, targeting US troops during Iraq occupation. Clearly, the Shias hurt them a lot, and it was very unexpected for the US, because Americans actually brought Shias into power.Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 8:42 pm GMT@Randalmelanf , December 18, 2017 at 8:43 pm GMTFair points, though you seem to concede to the Russian elites a significant degree of competence at managing public opinion, in 2000 and in 2004.
I am just taking into account that the early 00s were right after the 1990s when pro-Americanism was at its peak in Russia. Yugoslavia and Iraq were too distant too alienate the majority permanently.
I was under the impression that Putin personally was still quite naïve about the US even after Kosovo, which partly accounts for his rather desperately helpful approach after 9/11, though not so much after Iraq.
Why do you think did he suggest joining NATO as an option?
Not because NATO are "good guys", but because it would ensure that Russia has a voice that cannot be ignored. After all, the Kosovo War showed the limits of the UNSC and by extension of Russia's voice in the unipolar world.@MitleserGerman_reader , December 18, 2017 at 8:44 pm GMTIntegration into West is what Russians wanted.
An example
08/2009:Since then, everything has changed
@Art Deco Official justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weapons of mass destruction which didn't exist in 2003. Your statement that this was merely one item "on the list of the concerns" Bush had, amounts to an admission that this was merely a pretext and that the real object of the war was a political reordering of the region according to US preferences (which of course backfired given that the Iraq war increased Iran's power and status).Randal , December 18, 2017 at 8:48 pm GMT
Calling me "Eurotrash" oh well, I get it, US nationalists like you think you're the responsible adults dealing with a dangerous world, while ungrateful European pussies favor appeasement, are free riders on US benevolent hegemony etc. I've heard and read all that a thousand times before, it's all very unoriginal by now.@reiner TorMitleser , December 18, 2017 at 8:51 pm GMTDestroying the Taliban government, yes. Building "democracy" is just stupid, though. They should've quickly left after the initial victory and let the Afghans to just eat each other with Stroganoff sauce if they so wished. It's not our business.
In fact destroying the Taliban government was both illegal and foolish (but the latter was by far the more important). It seems clear now the Taliban were quite willing to hand bin Laden over for trial in a third party country, and pretty clearly either had had no clue what he had been planning or were crapping themselves at what he had achieved. Bush declined that offer because he had an urgent political need to be seen to be kicking some foreign ass in order to appease American shame.
The illegality is not a particularly big deal in the case of Afghanistan because it's clear that in the post-9/11 context the US could easily have gotten UNSC authorisation for the attack and made it legal. Bush II deliberately declined to do so precisely in order to make the point that the US (in Americans' view) is above petty details of international law and its own treaty commitments. A rogue state, in other words.
But an attack on Afghanistan was unnecessary and foolish (for genuine American national interests, that is, not for the self-interested lobbies driving policy obviously), as the astronomical ongoing costs have demonstrated. A trial of bin Laden would have been highly informative (and some would argue that was why the US regime was not interested in such a thing), and would if nothing else have brought him out into the open. Yes, he would have had the opportunity to grandstand, but if the US were really such an innocent victim of unprovoked aggression why would the US have anything to fear from that? The whole world, pretty much, was on the US's side after 9/11.
The US could have treated terrorism as what it is, after 9/11 -- a criminal matter. It chose instead to make it a military matter, because that suited the various lobbies seeking to benefit from a more militarised and aggressive US foreign policy. The result of a US attack on the government of (most of) Afghanistan would always have been either a chaotic jihadi-riddled anarchy in Afghanistan worse than the Taliban-controlled regime that existed in 2001, or a US-backed regime trying to hold the lid down on the jihadists, that the US would have to prop up forever. And so indeed it came to pass.
@Swedish FamilyFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:52 pm GMTPutin will be gone before 2024, and his successor will be under immense pressure -- carrot and stick -- to deregulate Russia's media landscape, which will make foreign money pour into Russian media outlets, which will in turn lead to more positive coverage and more positive views of the West.
There is no reason to assume that West will offer the Russian elite enough carrot to deregulate the Russian media order and the stick is just more reason not to do it and to retain control.
What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia?
And you think that people in Russian elite are not aware of it?
@APSwedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 8:59 pm GMTIn which 25 million or so Ukrainians actively resist you, and another 5 million or so Ukrainians plus a few million Belarusians nonviolently resent your rule. You will reduce the cities or parts of them to something like Aleppo, and rebuild them (perhaps with coerced local labor) while under a sanctions regime.
This is a fantasy. Look, the effective size of Ukrainian army right now is around 70.000 -- does this look like a strong, united nation willing and able to defend itself?
On the left side of the Dnieper truly crazy svidomy types is a small minority -- they stand out from the crowd, can be easily identified and neutralised just like in Donbass. A typical Ukrainian nationalist east of Dnieper is a business owner, university educated white collar professional, a student, a journalist, "human rights activist" -- these are not the kind of individuals, who will engage in guerilla warfare, they will just flee (like they already fled from Donbass).
@RandalAndrei Martyanov , Website December 18, 2017 at 8:59 pm GMTIn the west, opinion of the US was managed upwards with the Obama presidency because he fitted so well with US sphere establishment antiracist and leftist dogmas that he had almost universally positive (even hagiographic) mainstream media coverage throughout the US sphere, but with Trump opinions of the US are mostly back down where Bush II left them.
I agree with most of this, but you leave out precisely why public opinion shifts. My, rather cynical, view is that media is by far the main driver in shifting public views, and so whoever gives the media marching orders is the Pied Piper here.
An example close to home was the consternation among some of my conservative friends over the events Charlottesville. They knew nothing about the American alt-right, and still less about the context of what happened that day, yet they still spoke of what a disgrace it was for Trump not to distance himself from these deplorables. This was, of course, fully the making of Swedish media. The 1996 Presidential Election campaign suggests that the Russian public is no less suggestible, and so does Russian (and Ukrainian) opinions on the crisis in the Donbass.
@German_readerAndrei Martyanov , Website December 18, 2017 at 9:01 pm GMTUS nationalists like you
He is not US "nationalist". Agree with the rest of your post.
Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:03 pm GMTwhile the percentage of Russians with actively negative views emerged essentially out of nowhere
LOL!!
@Swedish Family ruled out signing a non-interference agreement with Moscow since it would preclude Washington from meddling in Russia's internal affairs. What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia?Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:04 pm GMTIt tells me the reporters are confused or you are. There is no 'agreement' that will prevent 'Russia' from 'meddling' in American political life or the converse. The utility of agreements is that they make understandings between nations more precise and incorporate triggers which provide signals to one party or the other as to when the deal is off.
@Swedish Family Why would the Kremlin give up its control of the media?utu , December 18, 2017 at 9:07 pm GMTWhy do people give up 'control' of anything? Because they cannot be bothered anymore.
@inertial Soviets and Soviet Union were always in awe of America. You could see it in "between-the-lines" of the texts of the so-called anti-imperialist, anti-American Soviet propaganda. It was about catching up with American in steel production and TV sets ownership and so on. American was the ultimate goal and people did not think of American as an enemy.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:09 pm GMTThen there is the fact that Bolsheviks and Soviet Union owed a lot to America though this knowledge was not commonly known. Perhaps one should take look at these hidden connections to see what was the real mechanism bending the plug being pulled off the USSR. There might be even an analogy to South Africa but that is another story.
@German_reader Official justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weapons of mass destructionArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:11 pm GMTNo, that's what you noticed in an amongst everything else being discussed by officials and in the papers at the time.
which didn't exist in 2003.
It's a reasonable inference the stockpiles were largely destroyed. To what extent they were able to ship stockpiles to co-operating third parties is not altogether certain. You know the stockpiles were largely destroyed because . we were occupying the country .
@German_reader , amounts to an admission that this was merely a pretext aSean , December 18, 2017 at 9:12 pm GMTIt amounts to no such thing. That you have three reasons for doing something does not render one of them a 'real' reason and the others artificial.
Two powerful countries beside one another are natural enemies, they can never be friends until one has been relegated by defeat. Britain and France were enemies until France became too weak to present a threat, then Britain's enemy was Germany (it still is, Brexit is another Dunkirk with the UK realising it cannot compete with Germany on the continent). Russia cannot be a friend of China against the US until Russia has been relegated in the way France has been. France has irrecoverably given up control of its currency, they are relegated to Germany's sidekick.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:13 pm GMTChina is like Bitcoin. The smart money (Google) is going there. Received wisdom in the US keeps expecting China's economic growth to slow down but it isn't going to happen. When it becomes clear that the US is going to be overtaken, America will try and slow down China's economic growth, that will be Russia's opportunity.
@German_reader given that the Iraq war increased Iran's power and status).reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 9:16 pm GMTDo they have one more soldier at their command and one more piece of equipment because we had troops in Iraq?
@Art Deco What stockpiles are you talking about?Johann Ricke , December 18, 2017 at 9:19 pm GMT@German_readerSwedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 9:19 pm GMTOfficial justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weapons of mass destruction which didn't exist in 2003.
It was one of many reasons. You don't set a guy on Death Row free just because one of the charges didn't stick. The biggest reason was Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, which should have resulted in his removal from power. We settled on a truce because George HW Bush did not want to pay the price, and the (mostly-Sunni) Arab coalition members did not want (1) a democracy in Iraq and (2) a Shiite-dominated Iraq. Bush's son ended up footing the political bill for that piece of unfinished business. The lesson is that you can delay paying the piper, but the bill always comes due.
@melanfreiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 9:20 pm GMTAmerican propaganda (itself without the help of Putin) were able to convince the Russians that America is the enemy. Propaganda of Putin to this could add almost nothing.
Being Russian, you would be in a better position than I am to comment on this, but the obvious counter to that line is who channeled this American propaganda to the Russian public and for what purpose? This article might hold the answer:
http://www.unz.com/tsaker/re-visiting-russian-counter-propaganda-methods/
@Art Deco Well, they can now send troops to Syria on land.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:25 pm GMT@German_reader Calling me "Eurotrash"Randal , December 18, 2017 at 9:26 pm GMTI didn't have you in particular in mind.
oh well, I get it, US nationalists like you think you're the responsible adults dealing with a dangerous world, while ungrateful European pussies favor appeasement, are free riders on US benevolent hegemony etc. I've heard and read all that a thousand times before, it's all very unoriginal by now.
No, I'm a fat middle aged man who thinks most of what people say on political topics is some species of self-congratulation. And a great deal of it is perverse. The two phenomena are symbiotic. And, of course, I'm unimpressed with kvetching foreigners. Kvetching Europeans might ask where is the evidence that they with their own skills and resources can improve some situation using methods which differ from those we have applied and kvetching Latin Americans can quit sticking the bill for their unhappy histories with Uncle Sam, and kvetching Arabs can at least take responsibility for something rather than projecting it on some wire-pulling other (Jews, Americans, conspiracy x).
@Art DecoMitleser , December 18, 2017 at 9:28 pm GMTDo they have one more soldier at their command and one more piece of equipment because we had troops in Iraq?
Well, according to the likes of Mattis they certainly do. Have you never heard of the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMU), a large faction of which reportedly swear allegiance directly to Khamenei.
Is that "victory" for you?
An of course they now have a direct land route to Hezbollah, to make it easier for them to assist that national defence militia to deter further Israeli attacks. That's something they never could have had when Saddam was in charge of Iraq.
Is that "victory" for you?
And they don't have to worry about their western neighbour invading them with US backing again.
Is that "victory" for you?
@reiner Tor And they can recruit more easily in post-Saddam Iraq.AP , December 18, 2017 at 9:28 pm GMT@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:29 pm GMTThese polls vary greatly from time to time and depending on the group conducting them. These polls are meaningless: most ordinary people go about their daily lives never thinking about that kind of issues, when suddenly prompted by a pollster they give a meaningless answer.
So according to you when hundreds or thousands of people are asked a question they are not prepared for, their collective answer is meaningless and does not indicate their preference?
So it's a total coincidence that when Ukraine was ruled by Ukrainians most Crimeans preferred to join Russia, when Ukraine was ruled by a Russian, Crimeans were satisfied within Ukraine but when Ukrainian nationalists came to power Crimeans again preferred being part of Russia?
Are all political polls also meaningless according to you, or just ones that contradict your idealistic views?
@Sean Brexit is another Dunkirk with the UK realising it cannot compete with Germany on the continent).Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 9:31 pm GMTNo, it's an effort by the British public to reclaim for elected officials discretion which had been transferred to unaccountable microbes in Brussels.
@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:36 pm GMTThis is a fantasy. Look, the effective size of Ukrainian army right now is around 70.000 -- does this look like a strong, united nation willing and able to defend itself?
In fairness, the young Ukrainians I have spoken to avoid the "draft" mainly out of fear that they will be underequipped and used as cannon fodder. (I'm not sure "draft" is the word I'm looking for. My understanding is that they are temporarily exempt from military service if they study at university or have good jobs.)
@Randal Well, according to the likes of Mattis they certainly do. Have you never heard of the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMU), a large faction of which reportedly swear allegiance directly to Khamenei.Randal , December 18, 2017 at 9:38 pm GMTYou can get away with more by using the prefix 'there has even been speculation'/
An of course they now have a direct land route to Hezbollah, to make it easier for them to assist that national defence militia to deter further Israeli attacks. That's something they never could have had when Saddam was in charge of Iraq.
They've been supplying Hezbollah for 35 years.
And they don't have to worry about their western neighbour invading them with US backing again.
Their western neighbor never invaded them 'with U.S. backing'. During the latter half of the Iraq war, Iraq restored diplomatic relations with the United States and received some agricultural credits and other odds and ends.
Iran will be under threat from their western neighbor should they have something that neighbor wishes to forcibly seize.
@Johann RickeArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:39 pm GMTBush's son ended up footing the political bill for that piece of unfinished business.
No, Bush II chose to invade Iraq entirely voluntarily. There was no good reason to do so, and the very good reasons why his father had sensibly chosen not to invade still largely applied (even more so in some cases, given Iraq's even weaker state).
The lesson is that you can delay paying the piper, but the bill always comes due.
This is of course self-serving fantasy. The Russians told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Germans told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The French told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Turks told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The sensible British told you there was no need to invade Iraq, but for some reason you preferred to listen to the words of the staring-eyed sycophant who happened to be Prime Minister at the time, instead.
More fool the Yanks. Most everyone else honest on the topic was giving you sensible advice. Bush II (whose incompetence is now generally accepted) chose to ignore that advice, and committed what is generally now regarded as the most egregious example of a foreign policy blunder since Vietnam at least, and probably since Suez, and will likely be taught as such around the world (including in the US, once the partisan apologists have given up trying to rationalise it) for generations to come.
@Sean Received wisdom in the US keeps expecting China's economic growth to slow down but it isn't going to happen. When it becomes clear that the US is going to be overtaken, America will try and slow down China's economic growth, that will be Russia's opportunity.melanf , December 18, 2017 at 9:46 pm GMThttps://www.amazon.com/MITI-Japanese-Miracle-Industrial-1925-1975/dp/0804712069
Whatever.
@Swedish FamilySwedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 9:50 pm GMTbut the obvious counter to that line is who channeled this American propaganda to the Russian public and for what purpose?
It is known -- the minions of Putin translated into Russian language American (and European) propaganda, and putting it on the website http://inosmi.ru/ .
The Americans also try: there is a special "Radio Liberty" that 24-hour broadcasts (in Russian) hate speech against the Russian.
But it only speeds up the process (which will happen anyway) .@Art DecoGerman_reader , December 18, 2017 at 9:51 pm GMTThey've been supplying Hezbollah for 35 years.
Only by air.
For the last four years, Iran was shipping weapons and ammunition to the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and Hezbollah through an air route. This method allowed Israel to identify, track and target Iranian arms shipments to Hezbollah easily, as only few cargo airplanes land in Syrian airports every day.
However, now Israel will be incapable of identifying any Iranian shipment on the new ground route, as it will be used by thousands of Iraq and Syrian companies on daily basis in the upcoming months. Experts believe that this will give Hezbollah and the SAA a huge advantage over Israel and will allow Iran to increase its supplies to its allies.
@Art Deco US elites and media are constantly freaking out about some Iranian "empire" supposedly being created and threatening US allies in the mideast since you seem to put great trust in their credibility, shouldn't that concern you? Personally I think those fears are exaggerated, but how can it be denied that Iran's influence has increased a lot in recent years and that the removal of Saddam's regime facilitated that development? Iranian revolutionary guards and Iranian-backed Shia militias operate in Iraq, the Iraqi government maintains close ties to Iran, and Iran is also an active participant in the Syrian civil war would that have been conceivable like this before 2003?Randal , December 18, 2017 at 9:52 pm GMT@MitleserSean , December 18, 2017 at 9:57 pm GMTWhy do you think did he suggest joining NATO as an option?
Not because NATO are "good guys", but because it would ensure that Russia has a voice that cannot be ignored. After all, the Kosovo War showed the limits of the UNSC and by extension of Russia's voice in the unipolar world.Well you have to wonder if he was just trolling the Americans, or if he was really naïve enough to expect a serious response.
@Art Deco Lord Weinstock said Britain could be de-industrialised in the EU, and how right he was.AP , December 18, 2017 at 10:12 pm GMT@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 10:14 pm GMTThis is a fantasy. Look, the effective size of Ukrainian army right now is around 70.000 -- does this look like a strong, united nation willing and able to defend itself?
It was about 50,000 in 2014, about 200,000-250,000 now.
Polish military has 105,000 personnel. Poland also not united or willing to defend itself?
On the left side of the Dnieper truly crazy svidomy types is a small minority -- they stand out from the crowd, can be easily identified and neutralised just like in Donbass
Avakov, Poroshenko's interior minister and sponsor of the neo-Nazi Azov battalion, in 2010 got 48% of the vote in Kharkiv's mayoral race in 2010 when he ran as the "Orange" candidate. In 2012 election about 30% of Kharkiv oblast voters chose nationalist candidates, vs. about 10% in Donetsk oblast. Vkontakte, a good source for judging youth attitudes, was split 50/50 between pro-Maidan and anti-Maidan in Kharkiv (IIRC it was 80/20 anti-Maidan winning in Donetsk). Kharkiv is just like Donbas, right?
A typical Ukrainian nationalist east of Dnieper is a business owner, university educated white collar professional, a student, a journalist, "human rights activist"
Football hooligans in these places are also Ukrainian nationalists. Azov battalion and Right Sector are both based in Eastern Ukraine.
Here is how Azov started:
The Azov Battalion has its roots in a group of Ultras of FC Metalist Kharkiv named "Sect 82″ (1982 is the year of the founding of the group).[18] "Sect 82″ was (at least until September 2013) allied with FC Spartak Moscow Ultras.[18] Late February 2014, during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine when a separatist movement was active in Kharkiv, "Sect 82″ occupied the Kharkiv Oblast regional administration building in Kharkiv and served as a local "self-defense"-force.[18] Soon, on the basis of "Sect 82″ there was formed a volunteer militia called "Eastern Corps".[18]
Here is Azov battalion commander-turned-Kiev oblast police chief, Kharkiv native Vadim Troyan:
Does he look like an intellectual to you? Before Maidan he was a cop.
these are not the kind of individuals, who will engage in guerilla warfare,
On the contrary, they will probably dig in while seeking cover in urban areas that they know well, where they have some significant support (as Donbas rebels did in Donetsk), forcing the Russian invaders to fight house to house and causing massive damage while fighting native boys such as Azov. About 1/3 of Kharkiv overall and 1/2 of its youth are nationalists. I wouldn't expect mass resistance by the Kharkiv population itself, but passive support for the rebels by many. Russia will then end up rebuilding a large city full of a resentful population that will remember its dead (same problem Kiev will face if it gets Donbas back). This scenario can be repeated for Odessa. Dnipropetrovsk, the home base of Right Sector, is actually much more nationalistic than either Odessa or Kharkiv. And Kiev is a different world again. Bitter urban warfare in a city of 3 million (officially, most likely about 4 million) followed by massive reconstruction and maintenance of a repression regime while under international sanctions.
Russia's government has adequate intelligence services who know better what Ukraine is actually like, than you do. There is a reason why they limited their support to Crimea and Donbas.
Your wishful thinking about Ukraine would be charming and harmless if not for the fact that such wishful thinking often leads to tragic actions that harm both the invader and the invaded. Remember the Iraqis were supposed to welcome the American liberators with flowers after their cakewalk.
@Swedish Family Only by air.neutral , December 18, 2017 at 10:16 pm GMTHow often has Israel shot down Iranian aircraft?
However, now Israel will be incapable of identifying any Iranian shipment on the new ground route,
Not buying.
@APArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 10:20 pm GMTDoes he look like an intellectual to you?
The question reminds me of this:
@Sean The share of value-added in industry as a share of global product has been declining for over 50 years. In the EU, industry accounts for 24.5% of value added. In Britain, the figure is 20.2%. Not seeing why that animates you.AP , December 18, 2017 at 10:22 pm GMT@Swedish FamilyArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 10:28 pm GMTIn fairness, the young Ukrainians I have spoken to avoid the "draft" mainly out of fear that they will be underequipped and used as cannon fodder.
Correct. The thinking often was -- "the corrupt officers will screw up and get us killed, or sell out our positions to the Russians for money, if the Russians came to our city I'd fight them but I don't wanna go to Donbas.." This is very different from avoiding the draft because one wouldn't mind if Russia annexed Ukraine. Indeed, Dnipropetrovsk in the East has contributed a lot to Ukraine's war effort, primarily because it borders Donbas -- ones hears from people there that if they don't fight in Donbas and keep the rebels contained there, they'd have to fight at home.
US elites and media are constantly freaking out about some Iranian "empire" supposedly being created and threatening US allies in the mideastFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 10:39 pm GMTNo, they aren't. The political class has been anxious about Iran because it's sinking a lot of resources into building weapons of mass destruction, because key actors therein adhere to apocalyptic conceptions, and because it's a weirdly (and gratuitously) hostile country.
since you seem to put great trust in their credibility, shouldn't that concern you? Personally I think those fears are exaggerated, but how can it be denied that Iran's influence has increased a lot in recent years and that the removal of Saddam's regime facilitated that development? Iranian revolutionary guards and Iranian-backed Shia militias operate in Iraq, the Iraqi government maintains close ties to Iran, and Iran is also an active participant in the Syrian civil war would that have been conceivable like this before 2003?
You keep alluding to things that cannot be quantified or even readily verified. Iran's taken advantage of disordered situations in the past (in Lebanon), so it's not surprising they do so in Syria. The disordered situation there is a function of the breakdown of government in Syria, not of the Iraq war. Whether any influence Iran has in Iraq turns out to be abiding remains to be seen. The anxiety about Iraq has concerned it's inclination to subvert friendly governments and drop atomic weaponry on Israel. Not sure how their subrosa dealings with the Iraqi government further the latter (or even the former).
@AP LMAO, Ukrainians are nothing like Arabs. They are soft Eastern-European types. And in Eastern regions like Kharkov most of them will be on our side.German_reader , December 18, 2017 at 10:46 pm GMTThe best thing about Ukrainian neo-Nazis such as Azov battalion is that there is very few of them -- no more than 10.000 in the entire country. I assume Russian security services know all of them by name.
To deal with Ukronazi problem, I would first take out their leaders, then target their HQs, arms depots and training camps. I would kill or intimidate their sponsors. Ukronazis would be left decapitated, without resources, undermanned and demoralised, trying to fight an insurgency amongst the population that hates and despises them. It will be a short lived insurgency.
@Art DecoTalha , December 18, 2017 at 10:56 pm GMTNo, they aren't.
The supposed threat of an Iranian empire is a common theme in interventionist US media and in certain think tanks/pressure groups, even five minutes of googling produced this:
https://nypost.com/2015/02/01/the-iranian-dream-of-a-reborn-persian-empire/
http://www.defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/may-clifford-d-the-new-persian-empire/ (btw, the Foundation for defense of democracies agrees with me that the removal of Saddam's regime was to Iran's benefit).
Obviously I don't want Iran to acquire nuclear weapons, though imo US policy in this regard has been rather counter-productive recently.
Regarding the Iraq war, it's probably pointless to continue the discussion, if you want to continue regarding it as a great idea, I won't argue with you.I remember my dad telling me that the Carter administration was the highlight of America-love in Pakistan. Slowly went downhill from there and crashed at Dubya.AP , December 18, 2017 at 10:58 pm GMTPeace.
@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 11:04 pm GMTLMAO, Ukrainians are nothing like Arabs. They are soft Eastern-European types.
And Russians and Poles were also soft when someone invaded their country? Ukrainians are not modern western Euros.
And in Eastern regions like Kharkov most of them will be on our side.
Most pensioners. It will be about 50/50 among young fighting-age people.
The best thing about Ukrainian neo-Nazis such as Azov battalion is that there is very few of them -- no more than 10.000 in the entire country
Maybe. Ukrainian government claims 46,000 in volunteer self-defense battalions (including Azov) but this is probably an exaggeration.
OTOH there are a couple 100,000 demobilized young people with combat experience who would be willing to fight if their homeland were attacked, who are not neo-Nazis in Azov. Plus a military of 200,000-250,000 people, many of whom would imitate the Donbas rebels and probably redeploy in places like Kharkiv where they have cover. Good look fighting it out block by block.
trying to fight an insurgency amongst the population that hates and despises them
In 2010, 48% of Kharkiv voters chose a nationalist for their mayor. In 2012 about 30% voted for nationalist parties. Judging by pro vs, anti-Maidan, the youth are evenly split although in 2014 the Ukrainian nationalist youths ended up controlling the streets, not the Russian nationalist ones as in Donbas. This is in the most pro-Russian part of Ukraine.
Suuure, the population of Kharkiv will despise their kids, grandkids, nephews, classmates etc,. but will welcome the invaders from Russia who will be bombing their city. Such idealism and optimism in Russia!
It will be a short lived insurgency.
And Iraq was supposed to be a cakewalk.
@German_reader The supposed threat of an Iranian empire is a common theme in interventionist US mediaJohann Ricke , December 18, 2017 at 11:06 pm GMT"Imperial" or "Imperialist" is a term of art among IR specialists referring to active revisionist powers in a given state system.
The people you are linking to are a mixed bunch. One's a lapsed reporter. Two are opinion journalists with background (one in the military and one in the intelligence services, or so he says), one has been out of office for 40 years (and, IMO, is engaging in the academic's exercise of attention-seeking through counter-factual utterance; there's little downside to that), and one actually is someone who has been a policy-maker in the last generation (and he's offering a critique of the Iran deal, which was not a Bush administration initiative).
@RandalArt Deco , December 18, 2017 at 11:06 pm GMTThis is of course self-serving fantasy. The Russians told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Germans told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The French told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Turks told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The sensible British told you there was no need to invade Iraq, but for some reason you preferred to listen to the words of the staring-eyed sycophant who happened to be Prime Minister at the time, instead.
Who gives a damn what they think? These are the same countries that plunged the world into two World Wars that killed 100m people between them. Their blinkered and self-serving stupidity is a model for what not to do.
@Talha I remember my dad telling me that the Carter administration was the highlight of America-love in Pakistan. Slowly went downhill from there and crashed at Dubya.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 11:10 pm GMTI remember Gen. Zia on the front page of The New York Times ridiculing Mr. Carter in plain terms (the $400 million aid offer was 'peanuts').
@Randal The Russians told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Germans told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The French told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Turks told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The sensible British told you there was no need to invade Iraq,Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 11:13 pm GMTThe sensible British were a co-operating force in invading Iraq. As for the rest, they all have their shticks and interests (and no, I don't stipulate that you've characterized their opinion correctly either).
@Felix KeverichRandal , December 18, 2017 at 11:14 pm GMTSounds like fun.
@German_readerFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 11:15 pm GMTAnd after 9/11 I was very pro-US, e.g. I argued vehemently with a stupid leftie teacher who was against the Afghanistan war (and I still believe that war was justified, so I don't think I'm just some mindless anti-American fool). But Iraq was just too much, too much obvious lying and those lies were so stupid it was hard not to feel that there was something deeply wrong with a large part of the American public if they were gullible enough to believe such nonsense. At least for me it was a real turning point in the evolution of my political views.
The common factor amongst you, reiner and myself here is that none of us come from a dogmatically anti-American background or personal world-view, nor from a dogmatically pacifist one.
As I've probably noted here previously, I grew up very pro-American and very pro-NATO in the late Cold War, and as a strong supporter of Thatcher and Reagan. I saw the fall of the Soviet Union as a glorious triumph and a vindication of all the endless arguments against anti-American lefties and CND numpties. I also strongly supported the Falklands War (the last genuinely justified and intelligent war fought by my country, imo) and also the war against Iraq in 1990/1, though I'm a little less certain on that one nowadays. I'm significantly older than you both, it seems, however, and it was watching US foreign policy in the 1990s, culminating in the Kosovo war, that convinced me that the US is now the problem and not the solution.
When the facts changed, I changed my opinion.
So I was a war or two ahead of you, chronologically, because I'm older, but we've travelled pretty much the same road. Our views on America have been created by US foreign policy choices.
@AP Again, supporting Maidan doesn't mean you're ready to take up Kalashnikov and go fight. Ukrainian youth is dodging draft en masse. It's a fact.RadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:16 pm GMTThis is what typical Maidanist Ukrainian youths look like; these people certainly don't look like they have a lot of fight in them:
They remind me of Navalny supporters in Russia. These kind of people can throw a tantrum, but they are fundamentally weak people, who are easily crushed.
@Donnyess I haven't heard either Russia, or the Right in the USA, alleging that African-"Americans" are taking white Americans' jobs.RadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:17 pm GMTGenerally, I don't know anyone in the USA whose complaint about African-"Americans" is that they are working.
@Felix Keverich Similarly, it doesn't seem likely that the US government will give up its control and influence over the "independent media" that many Americans still think we have.Randal , December 18, 2017 at 11:18 pm GMT@Johann RickeRadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:22 pm GMTWho gives a damn what they think?
Well history has proven them to have been correct and the US regime wrong on Iraq, so that pretty much tells you how far your arrogance will get you outside your own echo chamber.
US foreign policy is pretty much a byword for incompetence even amongst its own allies, at least when they are talking off the record.
@Art Deco Folks in Belarus shouldn't make up their minds about applying to the EU until they speak with regular German, French, English, and Swedish people about the effects of the Islamic / Third World immivasion that the EU has imposed on them. My wife and I speak & correspond with Germans living in Germany frequently, and the real state of affairs for non-elite Germans is getting worse fast, with no good end in sight.Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 11:24 pm GMTAnyone who does not desire to die or at best live subjugated under sharia -- and sharia run largely by cruel dimwits from Africa and Arabia -- ought to stay out (or GET out of) the EU.
@RadicalCenter It shocks me, the amount of supposedly 'smart', 'educated' people in the US, who seriously think "free press" is a thing.Randal , December 18, 2017 at 11:25 pm GMT@Art DecoJohann Ricke , December 18, 2017 at 11:31 pm GMTThe sensible British were a co-operating force in invading Iraq.
That was the staring-eyed sycophant's work.
The man who opened the floodgates to immigration because he thought multiculturalism is a great idea.
As for the rest, they all have their shticks and interests
Of course. Unlike the exceptional United States of course, the only country in the world whose government never has any axe to grind in the nobility of purpose and intent it displays in all the wars it has ever fought.
You seem to be degenerating into a caricature of the ignorant, arrogant American.
@RandalTalha , December 18, 2017 at 11:40 pm GMTWell history has proven them to have been correct and the US regime wrong on Iraq, so that pretty much tells you how far your arrogance will get you outside your own echo chamber.
"History" has proven no such thing. What went wrong in Iraq was principally Bush's underestimate of the number of American casualties and the cost to the US treasury*, for which he and the GOP paid a serious political price. However, it's also clear that the Shiites and Kurds, an 80% majority, have no regrets that Saddam is gone. While both communities seem to think that we should continue to bear a bigger chunk of the price of pacifying Iraq's bellicose Sunni Arabs, it's also obvious that they are not electing Tikritis or even Sunni Arabs to office, as they would if they were nostalgic for Saddam's rule. The big picture, really, is that the scale of the fighting has probably convinced both Shiites and Kurds that they could not have toppled Saddam without the assistance of Uncle Sam. They could certainly not have kept Iraq's revived Sunni Arabs (in the form of ISIS) at bay without American assistance.
* These costs were larger than projected, but small compared to the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Whether or not Iraq can be secured as an American ally in the decades ahead, both the gamble and the relatively nugatory price paid will, in retrospect, be seen as a reasonable one, given Iraq's strategic location.
@Art Deco Sure, but the ordinary folks liked him -- he seemed like a humble man with faith from humble beginnings. Pakistanis could relate to someone like that.RadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:51 pm GMT
I was just a wee lad at the time, so I'm only conveying what my dad told me.
Peace.
@Art Deco Well, there is some reason to think that membership in the EU will become a steadily less attractive prospect.Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 11:54 pm GMTThe substantial demographic changes sweeping northern and western Europe now will become far larger as (1) new "migration" occurs from Africa and the Middle East and Pakistan into Europe; (2) "family reunification" chain migration goes on endlessly from the same places into Europe; and (3) Muslims continue to dramatically outbreed non-Muslims in Europe.
(Even if Muslims in Europe drop their total fertility rate to replacement, around 2.1 I think, the non-Muslim Europeans have TFRs like 1.4 and 1.5 and 1.6, the very definition of dying peoples.)
And that doesn't even account for the flight of non-Muslims out of Europe as it becomes ever more violent, frightening, chaotic, and impoverished. That flight could become a massive phenomenon. (We have acquaintances in Germany and Austria already mulling over the idea, with great sadness and anger in their hearts.)
On current trends, what reason is there to think that "Germany" and "France" and "England" and "Sweden" won't in fact be heavily Islamic / African (and in the case of Germany, Turkish) hellholes in the lifetime of many of us here?
Granted, Russia has too many Muslims itself, and I don't know enough to predict whether they will be willing and able to remove the excessive number of Central Asian Muslims (guestworkers or otherwise) from their territory. But Russia is not giving itself away to Muslims at a breakneck pace like the terminally naïve Germans, French, English, and Swedes are doing with their own countries.
The point is, Belarus and Ukraine won't be faced with a choice between Russia and the "Europe" that we still envision from the recent past.
Belarus and Ukraine will likely face a choice between a tenuous independence that they lack the force to maintain, union or close formal affiliation with Russia, or a "Europe" where white Europeans are outnumbered, terrified, massively taxed to pay for their younger and more confident Islamic / African overlords, and ultimately subjugated and killed / inter-bred into nonexistence.
The Europe that you are positing as an alternative to Russia, already doesn't quite exist anymore. Soon it won't exist at all in any recognizable or desirable form. Russia merely needs to be a better alternative than THAT.
@RadicalCenter Fine. The EU is poorly constructed and a threat to self-government.RadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:59 pm GMTMr. Felix fancies White Russia is Russia's property. There's a constituency in White Russia for re-incorporation into Russia, but it amounts to about 1/4 of the population and is half the proportion it was 20 years ago. Kinda think it really shouldn't be Mr. Felix's call, but he doesn't see it that way.
@German_reader Agree with much of what you say. With a big exception": most Europeans ARE pussies who try to appease the Islamic and African aggressors and freeloaders they are importing into their lands at a furious pace. Besonders die Deutschen.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 12:03 am GMTAt least SOME decent portion of Americans are trying to resist the Mexican and Third World takeover of our country. Albeit probably without success.
Summary: we're probably screwed, you're almost certainly screwed worse and faster.
Keep patting yourself on the back. But grow that beard now and bend over -- and beat the rush.
@RadicalCenter Belarus and Ukraine will likely face a choice between a tenuous independence that they lack the force to maintain,Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 12:07 am GMTJust to point out that occasions where a state has had its sovereignty extinguished since 1945 are as follows: East Germany (1990, voluntary), South Yemen (1990, voluntary, but triggering an insurrection), Kuwait (1990, temporary), South VietNam (1975/76, conquered). Not real common. N.B. the Axis rampage in Europe and Asia during the War: the only thing that stuck was Soviet Russia's seizure of the Baltic states.
@Felix Keverich Why don't you present us a photo of yourself, so that we can see what a true Russian warrior looks like?German_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:08 am GMTI think I've found one of you?
@RadicalCenterRandal , December 19, 2017 at 12:08 am GMTAt least SOME decent portion of Americans are trying to resist the Mexican and Third World takeover of our country.
30 years too late, though I'll readily admit that I was somewhat impressed how normal US citizens managed to kill off amnesty proposals during Bush's 2nd administration by lobbying their congressmen etc. Quite the contrast with what's going on in my own country where people just meekly submit to everything.
And I've never denied that many Europeans are quite decadent they should certainly spend more for their own defense, maybe even bring back conscription.@Johann Rickeutu , December 19, 2017 at 12:16 am GMTWhat went wrong in Iraq was principally Bush's underestimate of the number of American casualties and the cost to the US treasury
No, what went wrong in Iraq from the pov of any kind of honest assessment of an American national interest was that an unnecessary war was fought justified by lies that have seriously discredited the nation that told them, and that the results of the war were hugely counter to said American national interests: the conversion of a contained and broken former enemy state into a jihadist free fire training and recruitment zone combined with a strong ally of a supposed enemy state, Iran.
Whether the direct material cost of the war is acceptable or not is rather beside the point. It's a matter between Bush II and the parents, relatives and friends of those Americans who lost their lives or their health, and between Bush II and American taxpayers. If it had been achieved cost-free it still wouldn't have been worth it, because it was a defeat.
But it's no accident that the costs of the war were "underestimated". As usual, if the Bush II regime had been honest about the likely costs of their proposed war, there would have been a political outcry against it and they'd have been forced to back down as Obama was over Syria.
However, it's also clear that the Shiites and Kurds, an 80% majority, have no regrets that Saddam is gone
Amusing to see you are currently pretending that what Iraqi Kurds and Shiites feel matters. It's always entertaining to see just how shameless Americans can be at their game of alternately pretending to care for foreigners' views (when they need to justify a war) and regarding foreigners with utter contempt and disregard (when said foreigners are saying something Americans don't like to hear).
They could certainly not have kept Iraq's revived Sunni Arabs (in the form of ISIS) at bay without American assistance.
Well that partly depends upon how much support the US regime allowed its Gulf sunni Arab proxies to funnel to said jihadists, I suppose. But most likely they'd have crushed them in due course with Iranian backing.
In Iraq, IS were fine as long as they stayed out of the strongly Shiite areas in the south. They'd have quickly been whipped if they'd ventured there. Just as IS were fine in Syria as long as they were taking relatively remote land over from a government and army in desperate straits as a result of a disastrous externally funded civil war, but were soon beaten when the Russians stepped in and started actually fighting them rather than pretending to do so only as long as it didn't interfere too much with their real goal of overthrowing the Syria government, American-style.
@German_reader I see that Art Deco got more active than usual. Seems that the destruction of Iraq is close to his heart. Several days ago Ron Unz had this to say about him:Randal , December 19, 2017 at 12:27 am GMThttp://www.unz.com/jderbyshire/time-to-stop-importing-an-immigrant-overclass/#comment-2116171
Exactly! It's pretty obvious that this "Art Deco" fellow is just a Jewish-activist type, and given his very extensive posting history, perhaps even an organized "troll." But he's certainly one of the most sophisticated ones, with the vast majority of his comments being level-headed, moderate, and very well-informed, generally focusing on all sorts of other topics, perhaps with the deliberate intent of building up his personal credibility for the periodic Jewish matters that actually so agitate him.To which I added:
http://www.unz.com/jderbyshire/time-to-stop-importing-an-immigrant-overclass/#comment-2116402
The quality and wide range of his comments are really impressive. As if it was coming form a super intelligent AI Hal that has access to all kinds of databases at his finger tips. And then there is always the same gradient of his angle: the reality is as it is; reality is as you have been told so far; do not try to keep coming with weird theories and speculations because they are all false; there is nothing interesting to see. His quality and scope are not congruent with his angle. All his knowledge and all his data and he hasn't found anything interesting that would not conform to what we all read in newspapers. Amazing. If America had its High Office of Doctrine and Faith he could have been its supreme director.His overactivity here is somewhat out of character and after reading his comments here I doubt that Ron Unz would call him "one of the most sophisticated ones." I also would take back the "really impressive" part too. Perhaps some other individuum was assigned to Art Deco handle this Monday.
Speaking of US foreign policy stupidity and arrogance, the response to the latest evidence that Trump will continue the inglorious Clinton/Bush II/Obama tradition of destructive corrupt/incompetent buffoonery:German_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:28 am GMTUS outnumbered 14 to 1 as it vetoes UN vote on status of Jerusalem
And here's the profoundly noxious Nikki Haley "lying for her country" (except, bizarrely, it isn't even really for her own country). Her appointment by Trump certainly was one of the first signs that he was going to seriously let America down:
The resolution was denounced in furious language by the US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, who described it as "an insult" that would not be forgotten. "The United States will not be told by any country where we can put our embassy," she said.
"It's scandalous to say we are putting back peace efforts," she added. "The fact that this veto is being done in defence of American sovereignty and in defence of America's role in the Middle East peace process is not a source of embarrassment for us; it should be an embarrassment to the remainder of the security council."
The real nature of the UN resolution the execrable Haley was so faux-offended by:
The UK and France had indicated in advance that they would would back the text, which demanded that all countries comply with pre-existing UNSC resolutions on Jerusalem, dating back to 1967, including requirements that the city's final status be decided in direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
But requiring Israel and its US poodles to act in good faith is surely anti-Semitic, after all. The real beneficiary (he thinks, at least) of Trump's and Haley's buffoonery was suitably condescending in his patting of his poodles' heads:
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, tweeted: "Thank you, Ambassador Haley. On Hanukkah, you spoke like a Maccabi. You lit a candle of truth. You dispel the darkness. One defeated the many. Truth defeated lies. Thank you, President Trump."
@utu Art Deco isn't Jewish iirc, but an (Irish?) Catholic from the northeastern US. And I suppose his views aren't even that extreme, but pretty much standard among many US right-wingers (a serious problem imo), so it makes little sense to attack him personally.utu , December 19, 2017 at 12:29 am GMT@German_reader Official justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weaponsutu , December 19, 2017 at 12:35 am GMTThe fact that Iraq had no WMD was actually critical to making the claims that it had them. If Iraq had them it would officially relinquish them which would take away the ostensive cause for the invasion.
I am really amazed that now 14 years after the invasion there are some who still argue about the WMD. Iraq was to be destroyed because this was the plan. The plan to reorganize the ME that consisted of destruction of secular and semi-secure states like Iraq and Syria. The WDM was just an excuse that nobody really argued for or against in good faith including Brits or Germans or Turks. Everybody knew the writing on the wall.
@German_reader it makes little sense to attack him personallyGerman_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:41 am GMTYes, personal attacks are counterproductive but I can't resit, I just can't help it, so I must to say what I said already several times in the past: you are a cuck. You are a hopeless case.
@utuGerman_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:48 am GMTThe plan to reorganize the ME that consisted of destruction of secular and semi-secure states like Iraq and Syria.
Has to be admitted though that Iraq became increasingly less secular during the 1990s, with Saddam's regime pushing Islamization as a new source of legitimacy. It's probably no accident that former Baath people and officers of Saddam's army were prominent among the leadership of IS.
Still hardly sufficient reason for the Iraq war though.@utu With all due respect to you and Ron Unz, but the idea that someone like "Art Deco" is an "organized troll" who creates an elaborate fake persona (which he then maintains over multiple years on several different websites -- I first encountered him years ago on the American conservative's site) to spread pro-Jewish views seems somewhat paranoid to me.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 3:16 am GMT
I have no reason to doubt he's genuine (as far as that's possible on the internet), his views aren't unusual.@German_reader Agree with everything you just wrote. And please understand, I love the Germans and I'm angry at them in the way that you'd be angry at a brother who refuses to stop destroying himself with drugs or whatever.John Gruskos , December 19, 2017 at 3:25 am GMT@German_reader The commenter using the name "Art Deco" is NOT an American nationalist.Cato , December 19, 2017 at 3:43 am GMTHe is neocon trash.
@Felix Keverich Northern Kazakhstan is/was ethnically Russian, since the 1700s. This should have been folded into Russia; the North Caucasus should have been cut loose. My opinion.AP , December 19, 2017 at 3:53 am GMT@Felix Keverich Typical Russian mistakes regarding Ukraine: weak student-types in Russia are the main supporters of Ukraine in Russia, thus the same type must be the main pro-Maidan people in Ukraine. Because Ukraine = Russia. This silly dream of Ukraine being just like Russia leads to ridiculous ideas and hopes.AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:10 am GMTAs I already said, the Azov battalion grew out of brawling football ultras in Kharkiv. Maidan itself was a cross-section -- of students, yes, but also plenty of Afghan war vets, workers, far right brawlers, professionals, etc. It's wasn't simply "weak" students, nor was it simply far-right fascists (another claim by Russia) but a mass effort of the western half of the country.
Here are Afghan war vets at Maidan:
Look at those weak Maidan people running away from the enemy:
Azov people in their native Kharkiv:
Kharkiv kids:
Ukrainian youth is dodging draft en masse. It's a fact.
Dodging the draft in order to avoid fighting in Donbas, where you are not wanted by the locals, is very different from dodging the draft to avoid fighting when your own town is being invaded.
@AP Summer camp was in Kiev, but there is another outside Kharkiv.Anon , Disclaimer December 19, 2017 at 5:08 am GMTTo be clear, most Ukrainians fighting against Russia are not these unsavory types, though they make for dramatic video. Point is that pro-Maidan types in Ukraine are far from being exclusively liberal student-types.
@RadicalCenter Said a dude who invested in an Asian woman.utu , December 19, 2017 at 6:59 am GMT@German_reader Still hardly sufficient reason for the Iraq war though.jimbojones , December 19, 2017 at 8:01 am GMTWhat do you mean by that? Are you so out of touch? You really do not understand what was the reason behind Iraq 2003 war and then fucking it up when Gen. Garner was recalled and replaced with Paul Bremer who drove Iraq to the ground? Repeat after me: Iraq was destroyed because this was the only objective of 2003 Iraq war. The mission was accomplished 100%.
A few points:LondonBob , December 19, 2017 at 8:18 am GMT
- The Russians ALWAYS were Americanophiles -- ever since the Revolution. Russia has been an American ally most often explicit but occasionally tacit -- in EVERY major American conflict, including the War on Terror and excluding Korea and Vietnam (both not major compared to the Civil War or WW2). The only comparable Great Power US ally is France. Russia and the US are natural allies.
- Russians are Americanophiles -- they like Hollywood movies, American music, American idealism, American video games, American fashion, American inventions, American support in WW2, American can-do-aittude, American badassery and Americana in general.
- There are two Ukraines. One is essentially a part of Russia, and a chunk of it was repatriated in 2014. The other was historically Polish and Habsburg. It is a strange entity that is not Russian.
- The Maidan was a foreign-backed putsch against a democratically elected government. Yanukovich was certainly a corrupt scoundrel. But he was a democratically elected corrupt scoundrel. To claim Russian intervention in his election is a joke in light of the CIA-backed 2004 and 2014 coups. Moreover, post-democratic post-Yanukovich Ukraine is clearly inferior to its predecessor. For one thing, under Yanukovich, Sevastopol was still Ukrainian@Andrei Martyanov Art Deco is a Zionist, just checkout his reaction when you point out Israel assassinated JFK.LondonBob , December 19, 2017 at 8:19 am GMT@utu Israel wanted Iraq destroyed, it was.Anatoly Karlin , Website December 19, 2017 at 1:35 pm GMT@Felix Keverich I think this poll is the most relevant for assessing the question, since it covered different regions and used the same methodology.Anon , Disclaimer December 19, 2017 at 1:39 pm GMTTakeaway:
1. Support for uniting into a single state with Russia at 41% in Crimea at a time when it was becoming quite clear the Yanukovych regime was doomed.
2. Now translates into ~90% support (according to both Russian and international polls) in Crimea. I.e., a more than a standard deviation shift in "Russophile" sentiment on this matter.
3. Assuming a similar shift in other regions, Novorossiya would be quite fine being with Russia post facto . Though there would be significant discontent in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson (e.g., probably on the scale of Donbass unhappiness with the Ukraine before 2014).
4. Central and West Ukraine would not be, which is why their reintegration would be far more difficult -- and probably best left for sometime in the future.
5. What we have instead seen is a one standard deviation shift in "Ukrainophile" sentiment within all those regions that remained in the Ukraine. If this change is "deep," then AP is quite correct that their assimilation into Russia has been made impossible by Putin's vacillations in 2014.
@LondonBob Check out any American's reaction when some random Londoner tells him Israel assassinated JFK.for-the-record , December 19, 2017 at 2:15 pm GMT@German_reader they [Germans] should certainly spend more for their own defense, maybe even bring back conscription .AP , December 19, 2017 at 2:18 pm GMTWith all due respect, and making allowance for your relative youth, that is simply rubbish. Defense against whom? Russia? Iran? As your posts make it eminently clear, the real enemy of Germany is within, not without.
@jimbojonesMr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 2:35 pm GMTThe Maidan was a foreign-backed putsch against a democratically elected government
Typical Russian nationalist half-truth about Ukraine.
To be clear -- Yanukovich was democratically elected in 2010, into a position where his powers were limited and where he was faced with a hostile parliament. His post-election accumulation of powers (overthrowing the Opposition parliament, granting himself additional powers, stacking the court with local judges from his hometown) was not democratic. None of these actions enjoyed popular support, none were made through democratic processes such as referendums or popular elections. Had that been the case, he would not have been overthrown in what was a popular mass revolt by half the country.
There are two Ukraines. One is essentially a part of Russia, and a chunk of it was repatriated in 2014. The other was historically Polish and Habsburg. It is a strange entity that is not Russian.
A bit closer to the truth, but much too simplistic in a way that favors Russian idealism. Crimea (60% Russian) was simply not Ukraine, so lumping it in together with a place such as Kharkiv (oblast 70% Ukrainian) and saying that Russia took one part of this uniformly "Russian Ukraine" is not accurate.
You are correct that the western half of the country are a non-Russian Polish-but-not Habsburg central Ukraine/Volynia, and Polish-and-Habsburg Galicia.
But the other half consisted of two parts: ethnic Russian Crimea (60% Russian) and largely ethniuc-Russian urban Donbas (about 45% Russian, 50% Ukrainian), and a heavily Russified but ethnic Ukrainian Kharkiv oblast (70% Ukrainian, 26% Russian), Dnipropetrovsk (80% Ukrainian, 20% Russian), Kherson (82% Ukrainian, 14% Russian), and Odessa oblast (63% Ukrainian, 21% Russian).
The former group (Crimea definitely, and urban Donbas less strongly) like being part of Russia. The latter group, on the other hand, preferred that Ukraine and Russia have friendly ties, preferred Russian as a legal language, preferred economic union with Russia, but did not favor loss of independence. Think of them as pro-NAFTA American-phile Canadians who would nevertheless be opposed to annexation by the USA and would be angered if the USA grabbed a chunk of Canada. In grabbing a chunk of Ukraine and supporting a rebellion in which Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk kids are being shot by Russian-trained fighters using Russian-supplied bullets, Putin has turned these people off the Russian state.
@Anatoly KarlinFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 2:41 pm GMT3. Assuming a similar shift in other regions, Novorossiya would be quite fine being with Russia post facto. Though there would be significant discontent in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson (e.g., probably on the scale of Donbass unhappiness with the Ukraine before 2014).
'Asumptions' like this are what provide Swiss cheese the airy substance that makes it less caloric! Looks like only the retired sovok population in the countryside is up to supporting your mythical 'NovoRosija' while the more populated city dwellers would be opposed, even by your own admission (and even this is questionable). I'm surprised that the dutifully loyal and most astute opposition (AP) has let this blooper pass without any comment?
@Anatoly Karlin I think when answering this question, most people simple give what they consider to be the socially acceptable answer, especially in comtemporary Ukraine, where you will go to prison for displaying Russian flag -- who wants to be seen as a "separatist"?AP , December 19, 2017 at 2:51 pm GMTIn Crimea it has become more socially acceptable to identify with Russia following the reunification, which is why the number of people who answer this way shot up . The same effect will seen in Belarus and Ukraine -- I'm fairly certain of it.
Though there would be significant discontent in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson
Discontent will be limited to educated, affluent, upwardly mobile circles of society. Demographic profile of Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper resembles demographic profile of Navalny supporters in Russia. These people are not fighters. Most of them will react to Russian takeover by self-deporting -- they have the money and resources to do it.
Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 2:53 pm GMTDemographic profile of Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper resembles demographic profile of Navalny supporters in Russia. These people are not fighters.
Repeating your claim over and over again doesn't make it true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion
The Azov Battalion has its roots in a group of Ultras of FC Metalist Kharkiv named "Sect 82″ (1982 is the year of the founding of the group).[18] "Sect 82″ was (at least until September 2013) allied with FC Spartak Moscow Ultras.[18] Late February 2014, during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine when a separatist movement was active in Kharkiv, "Sect 82″ occupied the Kharkiv Oblast regional administration building in Kharkiv and served as a local "self-defense"-force.[18] Soon, on the basis of "Sect 82″ there was formed a volunteer militia called "Eastern Corps".[18]
The brawling East Ukrainian nationalists who took the streets of Kharkiv and Odessa were not mostly rich, fey hipsters.
@Felix KeverichAndrei Martyanov , Website December 19, 2017 at 2:55 pm GMTDiscontent will be limited to educated, affluent, upwardly mobile circles of society.
So, even by tour own admission, the only folks that would be for unifying with Russia are the uneducated, poor and those with no hopes of ever amounting to much in society. I don't agree with you, but I do see your logic. These are just the type of people that are the most easily manipulated by Russian propoganda -- a lot of this went on in the Donbas, and we can see the results of that fiasco to this day.
@jimbojonesFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 3:10 pm GMTRussia and the US are natural allies.
While geopolitically and historically it is true:
a)Post-WWII American power elites are both incompetent and arrogant (which is a first derivative of incompetence) to understand that -- this is largely the problem with most "Western" elites.
b) Currently the United States doesn't have enough (if any) geopolitical currency and clout to "buy" Russia. In fact, Russia can take what she needs (and she doesn't have "global" appetites) with or without the US. Plus, China is way more interested in Russia's services that the US, which will continue to increasingly find out more about its own severe military-political limitations.
c) The United States foreign policy is not designed and is not being conducted to serve real US national interests. In fact, US can not even define those interests beyond the tiresome platitudes about "global interests" and being "exceptional".
d) Too late
@AP I like how I got you talking about the Ukronazis, it's kinda funny actually, so let me pose as Ukraine's "defender" here:Andrei Martyanov , Website December 19, 2017 at 3:21 pm GMTThis neo-Nazi scum is not in any way representative of the population of Eastern Ukraine. These are delinquents, criminals, low-lifes. They are despised, looked down upon by the normal people, pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian alike. A typical Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper is a business owner, a journalist, an office worker, a student who dodges draft. It's just the way it is.
@jimbojonesFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 3:24 pm GMTAmerican music
One substantial correction: generation which now is in power and defines most of Russia's dynamics, age group of 40s-50s, was largely influenced by British music, not American one, despite its definite presence in cultural menu in 1960 through 1980s. British music was on the order of magnitude more popular and influential in USSR. The love for American music was rather conditional and very selective. Of course, jazz was and is huge among educated and cultured, but in terms of pop/rock if one discounts immensely popular Eagles (for obvious reason), Donna Summer or something on the order of magnitude of Chicago, British pop-music was a different universe altogether. Beatles, Pink Floyd, Deep Purple or even British Glam were immense in 1970s, not to mention NWBHM in 1980s. One would have more luck hearing Iron Maiden blasting from windows somewhere in Russia than music of Michael Jackson.
@AP The way to think about Azov battalion is to treat them like a simple group of delinquents, for whom Ukrainian nationalism has become a path to obtain money, resources, bigger guns and perhaps even political power. Azov is simply a gang. And Russian security services have plenty of experience dealing with gangs, so I don't expect Ukronazis to pose a major challenge.Gerard2 , December 19, 2017 at 3:26 pm GMT@AP [MORE]RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 3:29 pm GMT@Anon Yes, a highly intelligent, hardworking, conservative, Christian Asian woman who loves and appreciates America, is the same as a Muslim African, Arab or Paki whose religion tells him to subjugate or kill us. No drastic difference in genetics or the impact on our culture, language, economy, and security there.reiner Tor , December 19, 2017 at 3:35 pm GMTMoreover, allowing our native-born white citizens to choose spouses from elsewhere is the same as admitting tens of millions of people with little to no screening whatsoever (the latter being admitted in the interest of those who actively seek the most dimwitted, violent, intimidating, slothful, hateful, and incompatible people psosible in order to endanger, impoverish, and dumb down out people and set the stage for us to "need" a police state to manage the chaos and crime they bring).
Your logic is impeccable, I'll admit.
How long have you been married, by the way? And how many children are you raising? I just ask because I am sure we can compare notes and I can benefit from your manly experience and expertise.
Get a consistent handle to use on this site. Then tell us personal details as many of us have done. Then we can have a further friendly chat, big anonymous man who comments on other men's wives.
@Felix Keverich I'm not sure about Ukrainian football hooligans, but football hooligans in Hungary are not necessarily "low -lifes, criminals, delinquents", in fact, the majority of them aren't. Most groups consist mostly of working class (including a lot of security guards and similar) members, but there are some middle class (I know of a school headmaster, though I think he's no longer very active in the group) and working class entrepreneur types (e.g. the car mechanic who ended up owning a car dealership) and similar. I think outright criminal types are a small minority. Since it costs money to attend the matches, outright failures (the permanently unemployed and similar ne'er-do-wells) are rarely found in such groups.reiner Tor , December 19, 2017 at 3:42 pm GMT@Andrei MartyanovArt Deco , December 19, 2017 at 3:43 pm GMTOne would have more luck hearing Iron Maiden blasting from windows somewhere in Russia than music of Michael Jackson.
What about Metallica or Slayer? The famous 1991 Monsters of Rock in Moscow featured I think Metallica in its prime and Pantera right before they became really big (and heavy).
@LondonBob Art Deco is a Zionist, just checkout his reaction when you point out Israel assassinated JFK.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 3:49 pm GMTMy reaction is that you need to take your risperidal, bathe, and quit pestering people for bits of cash. And make your clinic appointments. They're sick of seeing you at the ED.
@LondonBob Israel wanted Iraq destroyed, it was.Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 3:50 pm GMTThe actually existing Israeli officialdom advised the Bush administration to give priority to containing Iran.
@reiner Tor LOL I classify all football hooligans as low-lifes simply due to the nature of their pastime. Ukrainian neo-Nazi militias have been involved in actual crimes including murder, kidnapping and racketeering. Their criminal activities go unpunished by the regime, because they are considered "heroes" or something.AP , December 19, 2017 at 3:57 pm GMT@Felix Keverichreiner Tor , December 19, 2017 at 4:00 pm GMTI like how I got you talking about the Ukronazis
I never denied the presence of them.
This neo-Nazi scum is not in any way representative of the population of Eastern Ukraine.
If by "representative" you mean majority, sure. Neither are artsy students, or Afghan war veterans, or schoolteachers, any other group a majority.
Also not all of the street fighters turned militias neo-Nazis, as are Azov. Right Sector are not neo-Nazis, they are more fascists.
These are delinquents, criminals, low-lifes.
As reiner tor correctly pointed out, this movement which grew out of the football ultra community is rather working class but is not lumpens. You fail again.
A typical Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper is a business owner, a journalist, an office worker, a student who dodges draft
Are there more business owners, students (many of whom do not dodge the draft), office workers combined than there are ultras/far-right brawlers? Probably. 30% of Kharkiv voted for nationalist parties (mostly Tymoshenko's and Klitschko's moderates) in the 2012 parliamentary elections, under Yanukovich. That represents about 900,000 people in that oblast. There aren't 900,000 brawling far-rightists in Kharkiv. So?
The exteme nationalist Banderist Svoboda party got about 4% of the vote in Kharkiv oblast in 2012. This would make Bandera twice as popular in Kharkiv as the democratic opposition is in Russia.
@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 19, 2017 at 4:03 pm GMTI classify all football hooligans as low-lifes simply due to the nature of their pastime.
They are well integrated into the rest of society, so you can call them low-lifes, but they will still be quite different from ordinary criminals.
Ukrainian neo-Nazi militias have been involved in actual crimes including murder, kidnapping and racketeering.
But that's quite different from being professional criminals. Members of the Waffen-SS also committed unspeakable crimes, but they rarely had professional criminal backgrounds, and were, in fact, quite well integrated into German society.
@Talha he seemed like a humble man with faith from humble beginnings. Pakistanis could relate to someone like that.Anon , Disclaimer December 19, 2017 at 4:07 pm GMTCarter was an agribusinessman whose personal net worth (not counting his mother's holdings and siblings' holdings) was in seven digits in 1976. (His dipso brother managed the family business -- passably well -- from 1963 until 198?). John Osborne interviewed 1st, 2d, and 3d degree relations of Carter during the campaign and discovered the family was in satisfactory condition financially even during the Depression. Carter also spent the 2d World War -- the whole thing -- at the Naval Academy.
There's much to be said for Carter, but there's no doubt one of his shortcomings is vanity. Harry Truman is the closest thing to a humble man in the White House in the years since Pakistan was constituted. If you're looking for 'humble beginnings', the best examples are Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon.
@Art Deco Not relevant re humble beginnings but re Pakistan: you've probably heard the famous anecdote about Kennedy and Bhutto:AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:08 pm GMTK: "You know, you're a bright man. If you were an American I'd have you in my cabinet."
B: "No, Mr. President; if I were an American you would be in my cabinet."@Felix Keverichutu , December 19, 2017 at 4:08 pm GMTThe way to think about Azov battalion is to treat them like a simple group of delinquents, for whom Ukrainian nationalism has become a path to obtain money, resources, bigger guns and perhaps even political power
Yes, there are elements of this, but not only. If they were ethnic Russians, as in Donbas, they would have taken a different path, as did the pro-Russian militants in Donbas who are similar to the ethnic Ukrainian Azovites. Young guys who like to brawl and are ethnic Russians or identify s such joined organizations like Oplot and moved to Donbas to fight against Ukraine, similar types who identified as Ukrainians became Azovites or joined similar pro-Ukrainian militias. Also not all of these were delinquents, many were working class, security guards, etc.
Good that you admit that in Eastern Ukraine nationalism is not limited to student activists and businessmen.
And Russian security services have plenty of experience dealing with gangs,
They chose to stay away from Kharkiv and limit Russia's action to Donbas, knowing that there would be too much opposition, and not enough support, to Russian rule in Kharkiv to make the effort worthwhile.
@Anon Out of all hypotheses on the JFK assassination the one that Israel was behind it is the strongest. There is no question about it. From the day one when conspiracy theories were floated everything was done to hide how Israel benefited form the assassination.Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 4:13 pm GMT@reiner Tor I feel that comparing Azov to SS gives it too much credit.Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 4:25 pm GMTMy point is that this way of life is not something that many people in Ukraine are willing to actively participate in. Most people are not willing to condone it either. AP says that Azov and the like can act like underground insurgency in Eastern cities. But I don't see how this could work -- there will a thousand people around them willing to rat them out.
There is no pro-Ukrainian insurgency in Crimea or inside the republics in Donbass, and it's not due to the lack of local football hooligans.
@APArt Deco , December 19, 2017 at 4:31 pm GMTThat represents about 900,000 people in that oblast. There aren't 900,000 brawling far-rightists in Kharkiv. So?
This means these people won't pose a big problem. These folks will take care of themselves either through self-deportation or gradually coming to terms with the new reality in Kharkov, just like their compatriots in Crimea did.
Even among Svoboda voters, I suspect only a small minority of them are the militant types. We should be to contain them through the use of local proxies. The armies of Donbass republics currently number some 40-60 thousand men according to Cassad blog, which compares with the size of the entire Ukrainian army. We should be able to recruit more local Ukrainian proxies once we're in Kharkov.
@Gerard2 oligarchs, not nationalism are the driving force behind the "Ukrainian" mass crimes against humanity committing --Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 4:34 pm GMT@utu Out of all hypotheses on the JFK assassination the one that Israel was behind it is the strongest. There is no question about it. From the day one when conspiracy theories were floated everything was done to hide how Israel benefited form the assassination.AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:48 pm GMTActually, it's completely random and bizarre, but random and bizarre appeals to a certain sort of head case. Oliver Stone's thesis (that the military-industrial complex took down the President by subcontracting the job to a bunch of French Quarter homosexuals) is comparatively lucid.
@Felix KeverichFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 4:50 pm GMTAP says that Azov and the like can act like underground insurgency in Eastern cities. But I don't see how this could work -- there will a thousand people around them willing to rat them out.
About 1/3 of the population in Eastern Ukrainian regions voted for Ukrainian nationalists in 2012, compared to only 10% in Donbas. Three times as many. Likely after 2014 many of the hardcore pro-Russians left Kharkiv, just as hardcore pro-Ukrainians left Donetsk. Furthermore anti-Russian attitudes have hardened, due to the war, Crimea, etc. So there would be plenty of local support for native insurgents.
Russians say, correctly, that after Kiev has shelled Donetsk how can the people of Donetsk reconcile themselves with Kiev?
The time when Russia could have bloodlessly marched into Kharkiv is over. Ukrainian forces have dug in. How will Kharkiv people feel towards uninvited Russian invaders shelling their city in order to to take it under their control?
There is no pro-Ukrainian insurgency in Crimea or inside the republics in Donbass, and it's not due to the lack of local football hooligans.
Crimea was 60% Russian, Donbas Republics territory about 45% Russian; Kharkiv oblast is only 25% Russian.
With Donbas -- there are actually local pro-Ukrainian militants from Donbas, in the Donbas and Aidar battalions.
@AP It was a decision that Putin personally made. He wasn't going to move in Crimea either, until Maidanists overthrew his friendAP , December 19, 2017 at 4:56 pm GMTIt goes without saying that Putin doesn't share my nationalist approach to Ukraine problem: he does not see the destruction of Ukrainian project as necessary or even desirable. And I'm sure the restraint Putin has shown on Ukraine doesn't come from him being intimidated by Azov militia.
@Felix KeverichAP , December 19, 2017 at 5:00 pm GMTThese folks will take care of themselves either through self-deportation or gradually coming to terms with the new reality in Kharkov, just like their compatriots in Crimea did
The problem with this comparison is that Crimeans were far more in favor of joining Russia that are Kharkivites.
The armies of Donbass republics currently number some 40-60 thousand men according to Cassad blog, which compares with the size of the entire Ukrainian army.
Ukrainian military has 200,000 -- 250,000 active members and about 100,000 reserves. Where did you get your information? The end of 2014?
We should be able to recruit more local Ukrainian proxies once we're in Kharkov.
You would be able to recruit some local proxies in Kharkiv. Kiev even did so in Donbas. But given the fact that Ukrainian nationalism was 3 times more popular on Kharkiv than in Donetsk, and that Kharkiv youth were split 50/50 in terms of or versus anti Maidan support (versus 80/20 IIIRC anti-Maidan in Donbas), it would not be so easy. Moreover, by now many of the hardcore anti-Kiev people have already left Kharkiv, while Kharkiv has had some settlement by pro-Ukrainian dissidents from Donbas. So the situation even in 2014 was hard enough that Russia chose to stay away, now it is even worse for the pro-Russians.
@Felix KeverichFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:02 pm GMTAnd I'm sure the restraint Putin has shown on Ukraine doesn't come from him being intimidated by Azov militia.
This is rather a symptom of a much wider phenomenon: the population simply doesn't see itself as Russian and doesn't want to be part of Russia. So its hooligan-types go for Ukrainian, not Russian, nationalism as is the case in Russia.
@APFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:05 pm GMTThe time when Russia could have bloodlessly marched into Kharkiv is over. Ukrainian forces have dug in. How will Kharkiv people feel towards uninvited Russian invaders shelling their city in order to to take it under their control?
The locals will move to disarm Ukrainian forces, who have taken their city hostage, then welcome Russian liberators with open arms, what else they are going to do? lol
It's just a joke though. In reality there is virtually no Ukrainian forces in city of Kharkov. They don't have the manpower. Ukrainian regime managed to fortify Perekop and the perimeter of the people's republics, but the rest of Ukraine-Russia border remains completely undefended. It's wide open!
@AP Honestly, I doubt that this kind of stuff has much impact on Putin's decisionmaking.Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 5:09 pm GMT@Felix KeverichGerman_reader , December 19, 2017 at 5:20 pm GMTIt goes without saying that Putin doesn't share my nationalist approach to Ukraine problem: he does not see the destruction of Ukrainian project as necessary or even desirable.
Well there you have it. Putin is a much smarter guy than you are Felix (BTW, are you Jewish, all of the Felix's that I've known were Jewish?). Good to see that you're nothing more than a blackshirted illusionist.*
*фантазёр
@for-the-record German and European reliance on US security guarantees is a problem, since it's become pretty clear that the US political system is dysfunctional and US "elites" are dangerous extremists. We need our own security structures to be independent from the US so they can't drag us into their stupid projects or blackmail us anymore why do you think Merkel didn't react much to the revelations about American spying on Germany? Because we're totally dependent on the Americans in security matters.AP , December 19, 2017 at 5:25 pm GMT
And while I don't believe Russia or Iran are really serious threats to Europe, it would be foolish to have no credible deterrence.@Felix KeverichFelix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:34 pm GMT"How will Kharkiv people feel towards uninvited Russian invaders shelling their city in order to to take it under their control?"
They will move to disarm ther Ukrainian forces, who have taken their city hostage, then welcome their Russian liberators with open arms, what else they are going to do? lol
While about 1/3 of Kharkiv voted for Ukrainian nationalists, only perhaps 10%-20% of the city would actually like to be part of Russia (and I am being generous to you). So your idea is equivalent to American fantasies of Iraqis greeting their troops with flowers.
It's just a joke though. In reality there is virtually no Ukrainian forces in city of Kharkov. They don't have the manpower. Ukrainian regime managed to fortify Perekop and the perimeter of the people's republics, but the rest of Ukraine-Russia border remains completely undefended.
Are you living in 2014? Russian nationalists always like to think of Ukraine as if it is 2014-2015. It is comforting for them.
Ukraine currently has 200,000-250,000 active troops. About 60,000 of them are around Donbas.
Here is a map of various positions in 2017:
Kharkiv does appear to be lightly defended, though not undefended (it has a motorized infantry brigade and a lot of air defenses). The map does not include national guard units such as Azov, however, which would add a few thousand troops to Kharkiv's defense.
It looks like rather than stationing their military in forward positions vs. a possible Russian attack, Ukraine, has put lot of troops in Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Kiev and Odessa.
@APArt Deco , December 19, 2017 at 5:54 pm GMTUkrainian military has 200,000 -- 250,000 active members and about 100,000 reserves. Where did you get your information? The end of 2014?
I read Kassad blog, and he says Ukrainian formations assembled in Donbass number some 50-70 thousands men. The entire Ukrainian army is around 200.000 men, including the navy (LOL), the airforce, but most of it isn't combat ready. Ukraine doesn't just suffer from a lack of manpower, they don't have the resources to feed and clothe their soldiers, which limits their ability field an army.
By contrast the armies of people's republics have 40-60 thousand men -- that's impressive level of mobilisation, and they achieved this without implementing draft.
@AP So your idea is equivalent to American fantasies of Iraqis greeting their troops with flowers.Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:55 pm GMTThe local populations in Iraq were congenial to begin with, at least outside some Sunni centers. It was never an object of American policy to stay in Iraq indefinitely.
@APfor-the-record , December 19, 2017 at 5:55 pm GMTKharkiv does appear to be lightly defended, though not undefended (it has a motorized infantry brigade and a lot of air defenses).
How many people does this "motorized infantry brigade" have? And more importantly what is its level of combat readiness? Couldn't we just smash this brigade with a termobaric bomb while they are sleeping?
Ukraine is full of shit. They had 20.000 troops in Crimea, "a lot of air defenses" and it didn't make a iota of difference. Somehow you expect me to believe Ukraine has a completely different army now. Why should I? They don't have the resources to afford a better army, so it is logical to assume that Ukrainian army is still crap.
@German_reader And while I don't believe Russia or Iran are really serious threats to Europe, it would be foolish to have no credible deterrence.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 6:01 pm GMTWhat "credible deterrence" are you proposing for Germany? As has been clearly demonstrated, the only credible deterrence against a determined foe (of which Germany has none, at least externally) is nuclear. Is this what you are suggesting?
Germany has willingly supported the US (presumably in continuing gratitude for US support during the Cold War), it hasn't been "blackmailed" into this. Austria, on the other hand, has survived for more than 60 years without the US "umbrella" to protect it (and with a military strength rated below that of Angola and Chile), so why couldn't Germany? There is no need whatsoever for Germany to build up its military strength; rather, what Germany (sorely) lacks is the desire (and guts) to act independently of the US.
Russian nationalists always like to think of Ukraine as if it is 2014-2015. It is comforting for them.Andrei Martyanov , Website December 19, 2017 at 6:03 pm GMTBetwixt and between all the trash talking, they've forgotten that the last occasion on which one country attempted to conquer an absorb another country with a population anywhere near 30% of its own was during the 2d World War. Didn't work out so well for Germany and Japan.
@reiner TorArt Deco , December 19, 2017 at 6:03 pm GMTWhat about Metallica or Slayer? The famous 1991 Monsters of Rock in Moscow featured I think Metallica in its prime and Pantera right before they became really big (and heavy).
Metallica primarily and AC/DC. Pantera were more of a bonus. Nowhere near massive popularity of AC/DC and Metallica, who were main attraction. Earlier, in 1988, so called Moscow Peace Festival also saw a collection of heavy and glam metal luminaries such as Motley Crue, Cinderella, Bon Jovi, Scorpions, of course, etc. But, of course, Ozzy was met with a thunder by Luzhniki stadium. The only rock royalty who was allowed to give a first ever concert on Red Square was Sir Paul, with Putin being personally present. Speaks volumes. British rock was always dominant in USSR. In the end, every Soviet boy who was starting to play guitar had to know three chords of the House of the Rising Sun. Russians are also very progressive rock oriented and in 1970s Yes, Genesis, Gentle Giant etc. were huge. Soviet underground national anthem was Uriah Heep's masterpiece of July Morning. I believe Bulgaria still has July Morning gatherings every year. All of it was British influence. My generation also grew up with British Glam which for us was a pop-music of the day -- from Sweet to Slade, to T.Rex. And then there was: QUEEN.
@for-the-record Austria, on the other hand, has survived for more than 60 years without the US "umbrella" to protect it (and with a military strength rated below that of Angola and Chile), so why couldn't Germany?German_reader , December 19, 2017 at 6:32 pm GMTAustria hasn't been absorbed by Germany or Italy therefore Germany doesn't have a use for security guarantees or an armed force. Do I render your argument correctly?
@for-the-recordMr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 6:46 pm GMTGermany has willingly supported the US
Not completely true, Germany didn't participate in the Iraq war and in the bombing of Libya.
I'm hardly an expert on military matters, but it would seem just common sense to me that a state needs sufficient armed forces to protect its own territory if you don't have that, you risk becoming a passive object whose fate is decided by other powers. Doesn't mean Germany should have a monstrously bloated military budget like the US, just sufficient forces to protect its own territory and that of neighbouring allies (which is what the German army should be for instead of participating in futile counter-insurgency projects in places like Afghanistan). Potential for conflict in Europe is obviously greatest regarding Russia it's still quite low imo, and I want good relations with Russia and disagree vehemently with such insanely provocative ideas as NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia, but it would be stupid not to have credible deterrence (whose point it is to prevent hostilities after all). I don't think that's an anti-Russian position, it's just realistic.
Apart from that Germany doesn't probably need much in the way of military capabilities maybe some naval forces for participation in international anti-piracy missions.
Regarding nuclear weapons, that's obviously something Germany can't or shouldn't do on its own (probably wouldn't be tolerated anyway given 20th century history), so it would have to be in some form of common European project. Hard to tell now if something like this could eventually become possible or necessary.@Felix Keverich Sorry to prickle your little fantasy world once again tovarishch, but according to current CIA statistics Ukraine has 182,000 active personnel, and 1,000,000 reservists! For a complete rundown of Ukraine's military strength, read this and weep:RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 6:47 pm GMThttps://www.globalfirepower.com/country-military-strength-detail.asp?country_id=ukraine
@Art Deco "Clouseau He killed two customers, a Cossack, and a WAITER!!"Sean , December 19, 2017 at 6:47 pm GMT@Art Deco A lot of what used to be manufacturing, such as engineering design, is now put under the category of services. Manufacturing companies want to be listed as engaged in services because manufacturing is perceived as not profitable. Britain is alone among comparable countries in having lost significant amounts of productive capacity.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 6:48 pm GMT@Art Deco You have exquisite taste in movies, sir. Something we can agree on.Johann Ricke , December 19, 2017 at 7:06 pm GMT@AnonSean , December 19, 2017 at 7:13 pm GMTK: "You know, you're a bright man. If you were an American I'd have you in my cabinet."
B: "No, Mr. President; if I were an American you would be in my cabinet."The thing about many of these corrupt, worthless and incompetent Third World leaders is they're not lacking in self-esteem. Just ask Karzai. Or Maliki.
@Art Deco The potential power of China is an order of magnitude greater than Japan. After WW2 Japan, and to a lesser extent Germany, were too small to be a threat. Don't you believe all that Robert Kagan 'the US solved the problems that caused WW1 and 2′ stuff. China is a real hegemon in the making and they will take a run at it, unless they are contained by military pressure on their borders.for-the-record , December 19, 2017 at 7:42 pm GMTModern Japan is more like Singapore than China. China has economies of scale, they have a single integrated factory complex making laptops with has more workers than the British army. China will have a huge home market, like America. So by the time it dawns on America that China's growing power must be checked, economic measures will be ineffective.
@Art Deco Austria hasn't been absorbed by Germany or Italy therefore Germany doesn't have a use for security guarantees or an armed force. Do I render your argument correctly?Anonymous , Disclaimer December 19, 2017 at 7:45 pm GMTThat's about right, yes. Except I didn't say that Germany should have no military capability, only that there is no sense in increasing current military expenditure. A military capability can be useful for dealing with emergencies, such as tornadoes and hurricanes.
@Anon t. le 56% face.inertial , December 19, 2017 at 8:18 pm GMTAmerica's national IQ will be below 90 in a few decades so I really doubt that.
@Art Deco They've had ample opportunity over a period of 26 years to make the decision you favor. It hasn't happened, and there's no reason to fancy they'll be more amenable a decade from now.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 8:20 pm GMTYes, these people had been sold a vision. If only they leave behind the backward, Asiatic, mongoloid Russia, they will instantly Join Europe. They will have all of the good stuff: European level of prosperity, rule of law, international approval, and so on; and none of the bad stuff that they associated with Russia, like poverty, corruption, and civil strife.
Official Ukrainian propaganda worked overtime, and still works today, to hammer this into people's heads. And it's an attractive vision. An office dweller in Kiev wants to live in a shiny European capital, not in a bleak provincial city of a corrupt Asian empire. The problem is, it's ain't working. For a while Ukraine managed to get Russia to subsidize Ukrainian European dream. Now this is over. The vision is starting to fail even harder.
The experience of Communism shows that it may take decades but eventually people notice that the state ideology is a lie. Once they do, they change their mind about things rather quickly.
@Sean Manufacturing companies want to be listed as engaged in services because manufacturing is perceived as not profitable.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 8:23 pm GMTInventive parry. Not buying.
@Sean Modern Japan is more like Singapore than China.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 8:24 pm GMTThere are 120 million people living in Japan, settlements of every size, and agricultural land sufficient for Japan to supply demand for rice from domestic production. So, no.
@for-the-record That's about right, yes.Swedish Family , December 19, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMTYou said that, not me.
@Felix KeverichArt Deco , December 19, 2017 at 8:29 pm GMTIt goes without saying that Putin doesn't share my nationalist approach to Ukraine problem: he does not see the destruction of Ukrainian project as necessary or even desirable.
Agreed, and he happens to be in the right here. Russia actually has a good hand in Ukraine, if only she keeps her cool . More military adventurism is foolish for at least three reasons:
(1) All the civilian deaths in the Donbass, somewhat perversely, play to Russia's advantage in that they take some of the sting out of the "Ukraine is the victim" narrative. Common people know full well that the Ukrainian troops are hated in the Donbass (I once watched a Ukrainian soldier shock the audience by saying this on Shuster Live), and they know also that Kiev has a blame in all those dead women and children. These are promising conditions for future reconciliation, and they would be squandered overnight if Russian troops moved further westward.
(2) The geopolitical repercussions would be enormous. As I and others have already written, the present situation is just about what people in elite Western circles can stomach. Any Russian escalation would seriously jeopardize European trade with Russia, among other things.
(3) There is a good chance that Crimea will eventually be internationally recognized as part of the RF (a British parliamentary report on this matter in 2015, I think it was, made this quite clear). The same might also be true of the Donbass. These "acquisitions," too, would be jeopardized by more military action.
@inertial 1. You fancy they're bamboozled and you're not. Cute.Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 8:32 pm GMT2. You also fancy your interlocutors are economic illiterates and that they'll buy into the notion that the solution to the Ukraine's economic problems is to be forcibly incorporated into Russia. Such a change in political boundaries addresses no economic problems.
@Swedish Family (1) All the civilian deaths in the Donbass, somewhat perversely, play to Russia's advantage in that they take some of the sting out of the "Ukraine is the victim" narrative.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 8:32 pm GMTYou mean Putin mercs kill more Ukrainian civilians and we 'take some of the sting out of the 'Ukraine is a victim narrative'? Sounds like a plan.
There is a good chance that Crimea will eventually be internationally recognized as part of the RF (a British parliamentary report on this matter in 2015, I think it was, made this quite clear). The same might also be true of the Donbass. T
Did you cc the folks in Ramallah and Jerusalem about that?
@for-the-record That is terribly naïve.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 8:36 pm GMTI've been all over the comment boards calling for my country (the USA) to take a less belligerent, more honest, friendlier approach to Russia, and I've largely taken the side of Russia in the Ukraine and Syria controversies.
I also don't think Russia has any current designs on the territory of its western neighbors, or the desire for the dire consequences that would likely follow as the US and others react to such a move.
But that doesn't mean that it's prudent for Germany (or any other smaller, less populous country near Russia) to simply trust that Russia will never use military force against them in the future.
Nor should Germany assume that China will not ultimately find it worthwhile to take their territory or resources for its own massive, overcrowded, ambitious population.
Germany's military forces are grossly inadequate. Same for France. Same for the UK. None of them should purport to predict well into the future that Russia, China, and others (Turkey) will never be both willing and able to invade them. Nor should Germany et al. assume that the USA will always be in a position to jump in to defend Europeans in the absence of serious European militaries.
In fact, the western Europeans' glaring military weakness (and their obvious loss of the will to defend their people, their land, and their way of life) could serve to encourage physical aggression by, e.g., Turkey or Russia. Betting that you need a military merely "for dealing with emergencies, such as tornadoes and hurricanes" is a potentially fatal bet, with irreversible consequences.
@for-the-record Yes, Germany would be wise to acquire at least a small nuclear deterrent, just as France and the UK and Israel have.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 8:40 pm GMT@Johann Ricke So the costs of the US invasion/occupation/"reconstruction" of Iraq were (allegedly) less than the costs of the equally unnecessary and non-defensive US wars in Korea and Vietnam? Heck of an argument.Randal , December 19, 2017 at 9:16 pm GMTHow about this: we should have refrained from all three wars.
We should be using our resources to secure our own borders, to police the international waters and vital shipping lanes / chokepoints (fighting pirates and terrorists as necessary to those ends), and to actually defend our land and our people and deter aggression. That's it.
@RadicalCenterTalha , December 19, 2017 at 9:34 pm GMTGermany's military forces are grossly inadequate. Same for France. Same for the UK.
Grossly inadequate for what purpose?
What matters about military strength is its relation to neighbours' and potential enemies' strengths. Germany's military spending currently ranks number nine in the world (using the SIPRI figures per Wikipedia for simplicity ), which when you consider they are located in the middle of one of the safest continents (militarily speaking) in the world, surrounded by allies with whom military conflict is currently pretty much inconceivable, is quite impressive. Above them are only its European allies UK and France, the grossly bloated US and Saudi Arabian budgets, Russia and China, and Japan and India. Apart from South Korea who come next, Germany spends half as much again as the next on the list (Italy).
Germany's military shortcomings can in no plausible degree be attributed to not spending enough, unless you think Germany should be remilitarising for a potential war with Russia. Basically, Germany's military is toothless mostly because nobody in Germany really thinks it matters, nobody expects to be involved in a war, and such spending as it has is mostly purposed to suit a Germany integrated into NATO and the EU rather than an independent state. If there's a problem it's not down to insufficient spending but to how the money is currently spent.
Like you I'm a general believer in having a strong military, and in "si vis pacem, para bellum". But it's hard to see how Germany could really benefit from increased military spending. If they were to feel genuinely threatened, nuclear weapons would make much more sense (along with a radical reorganisation of the current spending and conventional military establishment).
There's a lot of American nonsense talked about European states underspending on their military, but the reality is that the US grossly overspends to serve its own global interventionist purposes. There's no reason why European states should spend to serve those purposes, which is what in reality increased European spending in the current context would be used for.
What we might see in some potential circumstances is increased German (and European in general) military spending in order to give them the confidence to break away from NATO and US control, and build the long trailed "European Defence Force". That looks a lot more likely after Brexit and in the context of the Trump presidency than it did a few years ago, but it's still something of a distant possibility. In that case, though, the increases would be mainly for morale building and transitional spending purposes, given that the combined EU military budget is already second in the world, behind only the ludicrous US.
@Art Deco Hey Art Deco (cool name by the way -- I love that style of architecture -- probably one of the only modern styles I like),Swedish Family , December 19, 2017 at 9:56 pm GMTWell, all I can say is he played it smooth enough to fool a heck of a lot of Pakistanis (not saying that's all that difficult).
Peace.
@Art DecoRadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 9:57 pm GMTYou mean Putin mercs kill more Ukrainian civilians and we 'take some of the sting out of the 'Ukraine is a victim narrative'? Sounds like a plan.
No, I wrote that those civilians are already gone and that both sides had a hand in their deaths, which will help the peace process since no side can claim sole victimhood.
And your assumption that the separatists are mercenaries is groundless speculation. Estimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine, and there is no evidence to suggest that they are fighting for the love of money.
Did you cc the folks in Ramallah and Jerusalem about that?
Risible comparison. Theirs is a conflict involving three major religions and the survival of the Israeli state at stake. On the Crimean question, we have already heard influential Westerners voice the possibility that it might one day be accepted as Russian, and if you read between the lines, many Ukrainians are of a similiar mind.
@Art Deco We're in agreement on all of that, AD.for-the-record , December 19, 2017 at 10:06 pm GMTBut the EU isn't merely a threat to self-government anymore. It is now actively and intentionally importing people who kill, rape, mug, beat, grope, harass, stalk, and generally disrespect and intimidate "their own" European people. The EU is an active threat to the lives and physical safety of European people. No people with the barest common sense and will to live will stay in the EU as these recent horrific events continue to unfold.
@RadicalCenter Nor should Germany assume that China will not ultimately find it worthwhile to take their territory or resources for its own massive, overcrowded, ambitious population.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 11:36 pm GMTThis is really a case of misplaced priorities.
Germany is in the process of losing its national identity built up over 2,000 years or so, and it has nothing to do with the Chinese (or the Russians either, for that matter). And China certainly doesn't need its military to successfully export its "massive, overcrowded, ambitious population" overseas (cf. Western Canada, Australia).
Focusing on the (non-existent, in my opinion) need for Germany to increase its current (already high) level of military expenditures will do nothing to preserve Germany as a European nation.
@for-the-record Take a look at my other comments. You'll see that I wholeheartedly agree with you about the moral sickness, cowardice, misplaced guilty, and terminal naivete of the Germans leading them to surrender their land, their property, their way of life, and their very lives to the Muslim and African savages they are importing.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 11:41 pm GMTAs a recent book by a German politician put it, "Deutschland schafft sich ab", or "Germany does away with itself."
But what has that to do with Germany also refusing to maintain a serious military defense force to deter potential threats from state actors such as Russia, Turkey, and China? Any nation worth its salt must both secure / guard its orders AND keep a military ready to fight external forces. Germany can and should do both, and right now it's doing neither.
@for-the-record As for China in particular: of course China is glad to export millions of its people to settle and become citizens in the USA, Canada, Australia, and the rest of the former "West."RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 11:45 pm GMTThey are thereby en route to acquiring real social influence, and ultimately some direct political power, in those places (especially Australia and the provinces of "British" Columbia and Alberta, owing to the very small white populations of those places compared to the immigration onslaught).
I lived part-time in Richmond and Vancouver, BC, and know just how quickly that region is becoming an alien culture -- Chinese more than anything, but also Muslim, Hindu, and Sikh. (Look up the career of crooked "Canadian" former pol and now radio-host Kash Heed, among many other examples.) I would expect that Mandarin will eventually become a co-equal official language of government (and public schools) in BC, with no effective opposition by those ever-"tolerant" Canadians ("We're not like those racist Americans, you know!").
But the people who have emigrated from China thus far are a drop in the bucket. China is still terribly overcrowded and lacks both land and natural resources needed to sustain its population. Actually outright TAKING swathes of Europe or, say, Africa, would help them a lot more than immigration. When the time is right -- say, after the US dollar loses its world reserve status and/or the US is beset by widespread racial conflict and riots -- China may well make its move in that regard. I hope not, and I don't think it will be very soon, but a wise country needs a strong military in the face of China and other threats.
@RadicalCenter Talha, you agreed with me again? I must be slippingAnatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 12:19 am GMTMerry Christmas, buddy -
@Felix Keverich Unfortunately, the Ukraine has been spending 5%* of its GDP on the military since c.2015 (versus close to 1% before 2014).Anatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 12:23 am GMTDoesn't really matter if tons of money continues to be stolen, or even the recession -- with that kind of raw increase, a major enhancement in capabilities is inevitable.
As I was already writing in 2016 :
Like it or not, but outright war with Maidanist Ukraine has been ruled out from the beginning, as the more perceptive analysts like Rostislav Ischenko have long recognized. If there was a time and a place for it, it was either in April 2014, or August 2014 at the very latest. Since then, the Ukrainian Army has gotten much stronger. It has been purged of its "Russophile" elements, and even though it has lost a substantial percentage of its remnant Soviet-era military capital in the war of attrition with the LDNR, it has more than made up for it with wartime XP gain and the banal fact of a quintupling in military spending as a percentage of GDP from 1% to 5%. This translates to an effective quadrupling in absolute military spending, even when accounting for Ukraine's post-Maidan economic collapse. Russia can still crush Ukraine in a full-scale conventional conflict, and that will remain the case for the foreseeable future, but it will no longer be the happy cruise to the Dnepr that it would have been two years earlier.
* There's a report that says actual Ukrainian military spending remained rather more modest at 2.5% of GDP ( https://www.osw.waw.pl/sites/default/files/prace_66_ang_best_army_ukraine_net.pdf ); even so, that still translates to huge improvements over 2014.
@Art Deco How so? Poland and France (together around equal to Germany's population) worked out perfectly for Nazi Germany.AP , December 20, 2017 at 12:26 am GMTAnd Japan could have kept China subjugated indefinitely without the American intervention.
Not of course to otherwise entertain your completely false and misleading comparison.
@Felix KeverichAP , December 20, 2017 at 12:35 am GMTThe entire Ukrainian army is around 200.000 men, including the navy (LOL), the airforce, but most of it isn't combat ready.
250,000. Combat readiness is very different from 2014.
Ukraine doesn't just suffer from a lack of manpower, they don't have the resources to feed and clothe their soldiers, which limits their ability field an army.
Again, it isn't 2014 anymore. Military budget has increased significantly, from 3.2 billion in 2015 to 5.17 billion in 2017. In spite of theft, much more is getting through.
By contrast the armies of people's republics have 40-60 thousand men -- that's impressive level of mobilisation, and they achieved this without implementing draft
It's one of the only ways to make any money in the Republics, so draft is unnecessaary.
@Swedish FamilyAnatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 12:35 am GMTEstimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine, and there is no evidence to suggest that they are fighting for the love of money.
80% are natives. Perhaps as much as 90%. However, often it a way to make a meager salary in those territories, so there is a mercenary aspect to it. Lots of unemployed workers go into the Republic military.
@Swedish FamilyAP , December 20, 2017 at 12:56 am GMTEstimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine, and there is no evidence to suggest that they are fighting for the love of money.
80% in 2014-15, to be precise; another 10% from the Kuban; 10% from Russia, the Russian world, and the world at large.
NAF salaries are good by post-2014 Donbass standards, but a massive cut for Russians -- no Russian went there to get rich.
That said, I strongly doubt there will ever be international recognition of Crimea, let alone Donbass. Israel has by far the world's most influential ethnic lobby. Even NATO member Turkey hasn't gotten Northern Cyprus internationally recognized, so what exactly are the chances of the international community (read: The West) recognizing the claims of Russia, which is fast becoming established in Western minds as the arch-enemy of civilization?
@Anatoly Karlin Fascinating link. The numbers for the military budget are a lot lower than reported elsewhere.AP , December 20, 2017 at 1:18 am GMTMobilization percentages by region:
"Among the leaders of the fourth and fifth wave of partial mobilisation were the Khmelnitsky,
Dnipropetrovsk, Vinnytsia, Kirovohrad and Zaporizhia regions, as well as the city
of Kyiv, whose mobilisation plan was fulfilled 80-100% (the record was Vinnytsia oblast,
which achieved 100% mobilisation). At the opposite extreme are the Kharkiv, Chernivtsi,
Donetsk, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lugansk, Sumy, Ternopil and Transcarpathian regions, where
the results of the mobilisation varied from 25 to 60%."Summary:
2014:
The true face of the Ukrainian armed forces was revealed by the Russian annexation of Crimea and the first weeks of the war in the Donbas -- they were nothing more than a fossilised structure, unfit for any effective function upon even a minimum engagement with the enemy, during which a significant part of the troops only realised whom they were representing in the course of the conflict and more than once, from the perspective of service in one of the post-Soviet military districts, they chose to serve in the Russian army
2017:
The war in the Donbas shaped the Ukrainian army. It gave awareness and motivation to the soldiers, and forced the leadership of the Defence Ministry and the government of the state to adapt the army's structure -- for the first time since its creation -- to real operational needs, and also to bear the costs of halting the collapses in the fields of training and equipment, at least to such an extent which would allow the army to fight a close battle with the pro-Russian separatists. Despite all these problems, the Ukrainian armed forces of the year 2017 now number 200,000, most of whom have come under fire, and are seasoned in battle. They have a trained reserve ready for mobilisation in the event of a larger conflict*; their weapons are not the latest or the most modern, but the vast majority of them now work properly; and they are ready for the defence of the vital interests of the state (even if some of the personnel still care primarily about their own vested interests). They have no chance of winning a potential military clash with Russia, but they have a reason to fight. The Ukrainian armed forces of the year 2014, in a situation where their home territory was occupied by foreign troops, were incapable of mounting an adequate response. The changes since the Donbas war started mean that Ukraine now has the best army it has ever had in its history.
* The Ukrainian armed forces have an operational reserve of 130,000 men, relatively well trained and with real combat experience, who since 2016 have been moulded out of veterans of the Donbas (as well as from formations subordinate to the Interior Ministry). It must be stressed, however, that those counted in the reserve represent only half of the veterans of the anti-terrorist operation (by October 2016, 280,000 Ukrainians had served in the Donbas in all formations subordinate to the government in Kyiv, with 266,000 reservists gaining combat status; at the beginning of February 2017, 193,400 reservists were in the armed forces). Thanks to that, at least in terms of the human factor, it should be possible in a relatively short period of time to increase the Ukrainian army's degree of combat readiness, as well as to fight a relatively close battle with a comparable opponent, something the Ukrainian armed forces were not capable of doing at the beginning of 2014.
@Art Deco I respectfully disagree with you about the Iraq war (one of the few areas on which I disagree with you).AP , December 20, 2017 at 1:21 am GMTI suppose had the West made a massive investment in Iraq, secured its Christian population, loaded it with US troops, and did to it what was done to Japan, over several decades, transforming it into a prosperous democratic US ally, removing Saddam (who deserves no sympathy) might have been a nice thing. It would have been a massive financial drain but having a "Japan", other than Israel, in the heart of the Middle East might have been worth it (I am not a Middle East expert but it seems the Shah's Persia was sort of being groomed for such a role).
Instead, it ended up being a disaster -- 100,000s dead in sectarian massacres, Christian population nearly destroyed, and other than Kurdish areas, an ally either of Iran or of militant anti-American Sunnis. At the cost, to the USA, of dead Americans, lots of money, and loss of soft power. I also suspect that America being stuck and preoccupied in Middle East conflicts gave room for Russia to act. I guess its a tribute to how strong America is, that it is still doing pretty well in spite of the debacle. A lesser power such as the USSR would have been sunk.
@Anatoly KarlinGerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:00 am GMTNAF salaries are good by post-2014 Donbass standards, but a massive cut for Russians -- no Russian went there to get rich.
Which further points to the critical role played by Russians. Many of the local volunteers are participating because doing so offers a salary, which is very important in a wrecked, sanctioned Donbas. The Russian 10%-20% are motivated, often Chechen combat vets. They are more important than their % indicates.
@Art Deco [MORE]Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:08 am GMT@AP [MORE]Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:30 am GMT@AP [MORE]Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:33 am GMT@Gerard2 ..and lets not forget the failure in mobilisation from the Ukrainian militaryTalha , December 20, 2017 at 4:05 am GMTThat and having to hire loads of Georgians, Chechens,Poles and other mercenaries.
Pretty much tallys perfectly with the failed shithole Ukraine government structure full of everyone else .but Ukrainians
@RadicalCenter Hey man -- when you're right, you're right -- that one was spot on.Mr. Hack , December 20, 2017 at 5:02 am GMTIf we can end the nonsense wars, we can at least solve a good chunk of the immigration crisis. It's all related.
Hope your family has a safe holiday and a good New Years.
Peace.
@Gerard2 [MORE]melanf , December 20, 2017 at 5:16 am GMTAmazing -- almost any discussion in this section turns to хохлосрач (ukrohitstorm)neutral , December 20, 2017 at 8:39 am GMT@melanf What is almost incomprehensible for me in these endless Russia vs Ukraine arguments is how they (yes both sides) always ignore the real issues and instead keep on raising relatively petty points while thinking that mass non white immigration and things like the EU commissioner of immigration stating openly that Europe needs endless immigration, are not important. It's like white South Africans who still debate the Boer war or the Irish debate the northern Ireland question, and are completely oblivious to the fact that these things don't matter anymore if you have an entirely new people ruling your land (ok in South Africa they were not new, but you know what I mean).ussr andy , December 20, 2017 at 9:52 am GMT@Swedish Family cool screen name ; )melanf , December 20, 2017 at 10:54 am GMT@Swedish Familyussr andy , December 20, 2017 at 10:55 am GMTEstimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine
much more than half
Donbass rebels: soldiers of the detachment of "Sparta". Data published by Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine:
@neutral yup, it's positively quaint , doubly so in light of the most-important-graph.gif.TT , December 20, 2017 at 11:16 am GMTThat's rght, and it happens to the whole world too including those countries destroyed by US and under its sanction. The bombastic propaganda MSM fake news and Hollywood have brainwashed all to harbour delusion that US is a perfect heaven paved with gold, honey and milk, people of high morality and freedom. Wait till they live there to find out reality of DemoNcracy made in USA.Anatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 11:42 am GMT@melanf I think it's mostly Gerard2. Mr. Hack is fairly hostile but coldly civil. Don't think this compares to Runet xoxlosraches at all (of course I try to cut any such developments in the bud).TT , December 20, 2017 at 12:05 pm GMTI have read a article mentioned something like Putin said, to annexed whole Ukraine means to share the enormous resource wealth of vast Russia land with them, which make no economic sense. If Russia is worst than Ukraine, then there won't be million of Ukrainian migrating over after the Maidan coup.Randal , December 20, 2017 at 12:59 pm GMTSo are all those Baltic states. Russia don't want these countries as it burden, it is probably only interested in selected strategic areas like the Eastern Ukraine industrial belt and military important Crimea warm water deep seaport, and skilled migrants. Ukraine has one of lowest per capital income now, with extreme corrupted politicians controlled by USNato waging foolish civil war killing own people resulting in collapsing economic and exudes of skilled people.
What it got to lose to unify with Russia to have peace, prosperity and been a nation of a great country instead of poor war torn? Plus a bonus of free Russia market access, unlimited cheap natural gas and pipeline toll to tax instead of buying LNG from US at double price.
Sorry this s just my opinion based on mostly fake news we are fed, only the Ukrainian know the best and able to decde themselves.
@Swedish FamilyMr. Hack , December 20, 2017 at 1:10 pm GMTAgreed, and he happens to be in the right here. Russia actually has a good hand in Ukraine, if only she keeps her cool. More military adventurism is foolish for at least three reasons:
Yes, this is my view also. I think Russia was never in a position to do much more than it has, and those who talk about more vigorous military interference are just naïve, or engaging in wishful thinking, about the consequences. I think Putin played a very bad hand as well as could reasonably be expected in Ukraine and Crimea. No doubt mistakes were made, and perhaps more support at the key moment for the separatists (assassinations of some of the key oligarchs who chose the Ukrainian side and employed thugs to suppress the separatists in eastern cities, perhaps) could have resulted in a better situation now with much more of the eastern part of Ukraine separated, but if Russians want someone to blame for the situation in Ukraine apart from their enemies, they should look at Yanukovich, not Putin.
In the long run, it seems likely the appeal of NATO and the EU (assuming both still even exist in their current forms in a few years time) is probably peaking, but strategic patience and only limited covert and economic interference is advisable.
The return of Crimea to Russia alone has been a dramatic improvement in the inherent stability of the region. A proper division of the territory currently forming the Ukraine into a genuine Ukrainian nation in the west and an eastern half returned to Russia would be the ideal long term outcome, but Russia can surely live with a neutralised Ukraine.
@Anatoly Karlin If presenting a Ukrainophile point of view at this website is considered to be 'pretty hostile' then so be it. I cannot countenance the slimy way that Gerard2 reponds to AP's comments. He was getting way out of line with his name calling and needed to be put in his place.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 1:15 pm GMT@RadicalCenter But the people who have emigrated from China thus far are a drop in the bucket. China is still terribly overcrowded and lacks both land and natural resources needed to sustain its population.Felix Keverich , December 20, 2017 at 1:18 pm GMTAs we speak, about 8.5% of the value-added in China's economy is attributable to agriculture and about 27% of the workforce is employed in agriculture. Industry and services are not land-intensive activities.
About 1/2 of China's land area consists of arid or alpine climates suitable for only light settlement. As for the rest, China's entire non-agricultural population could be settled at American suburban densities on about 23% of the whole.
You don't need 'natural resources' on site to 'sustain your population'. Imports of oil and minerals will do. As for foodstuffs, China's been a net importer since 2004. However, its food-trade deficit is currently about $35 bn, a single-digit fraction of China's total food consumption.
@Anatoly KarlinAnatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 1:32 pm GMTThere's a report that says actual Ukrainian military spending remained rather more modest at 2.5% of GDP ( https://www.osw.waw.pl/sites/default/files/prace_66_ang_best_army_ukraine_net.pdf ); even so, that still translates to huge improvements over 2014.
You realise that Ukraine's GDP declined in dollar terms by a factor of 2-3 times, right? A bigger share of a smaller economy translates into the same paltry sum. It is still under $5 billion.
Futhermore an army that's actively deployed and engaged in fighting spends more money than during peacetime. A lot of this money goes to fuel, repairs, providing for soldiers and their wages rather than qualitatively impoving capabilities of the army.
The bottomline is Ukraine spent the last 3,5 years preparing to fight a war against the People's Republic of Donetsk. I'll admit Ukrainian army can hold its own against the People's Republic of Donetsk. Yet it remains hopelessly outmatched in a potential clash with Russia. A short, but brutal bombing campaign can whipe out Ukrainian command and control, will make it impossible to mount any kind of effective defence. Ukrainian conscripts have no experience in urban warfare, and their national loyalties are unclear.
AP predicts that the cities of Kharkov, Dniepropetrovsk will be reduced to something akin to Aleppo. But it has taken 3 years of constant shelling to cause the damage in Aleppo. A more likely outcome is that Ukrainian soldiers will promptly ditch their uniforms, once they realise the Russian are coming and their command is gone.
@Felix Keverich Nominal GDP collapsed, but real GDP only fell by around 20%. This matters more, since the vast majority of Ukrainian military spending occurs in grivnas.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 1:33 pm GMTBy various calculations, Ukrainian military spending went up from 1% of GDP, to 2.5%-5%. Minus 20%, that translates to a doubling to quadrupling.
What it does mean is that they are even less capable of paying for advanced weapons from the West than before, but those were never going to make a cardinal difference anyway.
AP is certainly exaggerating wrt Kharkov looking like Aleppo and I certainly didn't agree with him on that. In reality Russia will still be able to smash the Ukraine, assuming no large-scale American intervention, but it will no longer be the trivial task it would have been in 2014, and will likely involve thousands as opposed to hundreds (or even dozens) of Russian military deaths in the event of an offensive up to the Dnieper.
@Gerard2 We'd all benefit if you'd sober up and add brevity and humor to your emotional outbursts and trash talk. No need for much verbiage in the absence of substantive information.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 1:44 pm GMT@AP The American occupation of Japan lasted 7 years, not 'several decades'. Japan was quite capable of rapid and autonomous economic development without the assistance of the United States or any other power. Neither was the United States government the author of Japanese parliamentary institutions, which antedate the war. There were certain social reforms enacted during the MacArthur regency (I think having to do with the agricultural sector). The emperor's power was further reduced in the 1946 constitution. A portion of the flag-rank military were put in front of firing squads. That's about it.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 1:49 pm GMTAgain, much of Iraq is quiet and has been for a decade. What's not would be the provinces where Sunnis form a critical mass. Their political vanguards are fouling their own nest and imposing costs on others in the vicinity, such as the country's Christian population and the Kurds living in mixed provinces like Kirkuk. You've seen severe internal disorders in the Arab world over 60 years in Algeria, Libya, the Sudan, the Yemen, the Dhofar region of Oman, Lebanon, Syria, and central Iraq. If you want to understand this, you have to look to how Arab societies themselves are ordered (in contrast to interwar or post-war German society).
@TT That's rght, and it happens to the whole world too including those countries destroyed by USFelix Keverich , December 20, 2017 at 1:50 pm GMTThere are no such places.
@APMr. Hack , December 20, 2017 at 1:52 pm GMTIt's one of the only ways to make any money in the Republics, so draft is unnecessaary.
It's not like the regime-controlled parts of the country are doing much better! LOL
My point is that this bodes well for our ability to recruit proxies in Ukraine, don't you think? We could easily assemble another 50.000-strong local army, once we're in Kharkov. That's the approach I would use in Ukraine: strip away parts of it piece by piece, create local proxies, use them to maintain control and absorb casualties in the fighting on the ground.
@Anatoly KarlinAP , December 20, 2017 at 1:58 pm GMTIn reality Russia will still be able to smash the Ukraine, assuming no large-scale American intervention, but it will no longer be the trivial task it would have been in 2014, and will likely involve thousands as opposed to hundreds (or even dozens) of Russian military deaths in the event of an offensive up to the Dnieper.
Fortunately, we'll not be seeing a replay of the sacking and destruction of Novgorod as was done in the 15th century by Ivan III, and all of its ugly repercussions in Ukraine. Besides, since the 15th century, we've seen the emergence of three separate nationalities out of the loose amalgamation of principalities known a Rus. Trying to recreate something (one Rus nation) out of something that never in effect existed, now in the 21st century is a ridiculous concept at best.
Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 2:01 pm GMT"It's one of the only ways to make any money in the Republics, so draft is unnecessaary."
It's not like the regime-controlled parts of the country are doing much better! LOL
Well, they are, at least in the center and west. Kievans don't volunteer to fight because they have no other way of making money. But you probably believe the fairytale that Ukraine is in total collapse, back to the 90s.
We could easily assemble another 50.000-strong local army, once we're in Kharkov.
If in the process of taking Kharkiv the local economy goes into ruin due to wrecked factories and sanctions so that picking up a gun is the only way to feed one's family for some people, sure. But again, keep in mind that Kharkiv is much less pro-Russian than Donbas so this could be more complicated.
@Anatoly Karlin How so? Poland and France (together around equal to Germany's population) worked out perfectly for Nazi Germany.AP , December 20, 2017 at 2:07 pm GMTYou're forgetting a few things. In the United States, about 1/3 of the country's productive capacity was devoted to the war effort during the period running from 1940 to 1946. I'll wager you it was higher than that in Britain and continental Europe. That's what Germany was drawing on to attempt to sustain its holdings for just the 4-5 year period in which they occupied France and Poland. (Russia currently devotes 4% of its productive capacity to the military). Germany had to be exceedingly coercive as well. They were facing escalating partisan resistance that whole time (especially in the Balkans).
Someone whose decisions matter is going to ask the question of whether it's really worth the candle.
@Art Deco Thanks for the correction. This suggests that transforming Iraq into a solidly pro-Western stable democracy would have been much harder than doing so for Japan. This I think would have been the only legitimate reason to invade in Iraq in 2003 (WMDs weren't there, and in 2003 the regime was not genocidal as it had been decades earlier when IMO an invasion would have been justified)Felix Keverich , December 20, 2017 at 2:08 pm GMTAgain, much of Iraq is quiet and has been for a decade. What's not would be the provinces where Sunnis form a critical mass. Their political vanguards are fouling their own nest and imposing costs on others in the vicinity, such as the country's Christian population and the Kurds living in mixed provinces like Kirkuk.
Correct, but most of this have been the case had the Baathists remained in power?
You've seen severe internal disorders in the Arab world over 60 years in Algeria, Libya, the Sudan, the Yemen, the Dhofar region of Oman, Lebanon, Syria, and central Iraq.
Which is why one ought to either not invade a country and remove a regime that maintains stability and peace, or if one does so -- take on the responsibility of investing massive effort and treasure in order to prevent the inevitable chaos and violence that would erupt as a result of one's invasion.
@Anatoly Karlin To be honest, I don't think it'll be necessary to sacrifice so many lives of Russian military personnel. Use LDNR army: transport them to Belgorod and with Russians they could move to take Kharkov, while facing minimal opposition. Then move futher to the West and South until the entire Ukrainian army in Donbass becomes encircled at which point they will likely surrender.Andrei Martyanov , Website December 20, 2017 at 2:13 pm GMTAfter supressing Ukrainian air-defence, our airforce should be able to destroy command and control, artillery, armoured formations, airfields, bridges over Dnieper, other infrustructure. Use the proxies to absord casualties in the fighting on the ground.
@Anatoly KarlinS3 , December 20, 2017 at 2:21 pm GMTbut it will no longer be the happy cruise to the Dnepr that it would have been two years earlier.
Anatoly, please, don't write on things you have no qualification on writing. You can not even grasp the generational (that is qualitative) abyss which separates two armed forces. The question will not be in this:
but it will no longer be the happy cruise to the Dnepr that it would have been two years earlier.
By the time the "cruising" would commence there will be no Ukrainian Army as an organized formation or even units left -- anything larger than platoon will be hunted down and annihilated. It is really painful to read this, honestly. The question is not in Russian "ambition" or rah-rah but in the fact that Ukraine's armed forces do not posses ANY C4ISR capability which is crucial for a dynamics of a modern war. None. Mopping up in the East would still be much easier than it would be in Central, let alone, Western Ukraine but Russia has no business there anyway. More complex issues were under consideration than merely probable losses of Russian Army when it was decided (rightly so) not to invade. I will open some "secret" -- nations DO bear collective responsibility and always were subjected to collective punishment -- latest example being Germany in both WWs -- the bacillus of Ukrainian "nationalism" is more effectively addressed by letting those moyahataskainikam experience all "privileges" of it. In the end, Russia's resources were used way better than paying for mentally ill country. 2019 is approaching fast.
P.S. In all of your military "analysis" on Ukraine one thing is missing leaving a gaping hole -- Russian Armed Forces themselves which since 2014 were increasing combat potential exponentially. Ukies? Not so much -- some patches here and there. Russian Armed Forces of 2018 are not those of 2013. Just for shits and giggles check how many Ratnik sets have been delivered to Russian Army since 2011. That may explain to you why timing in war and politics is everything.
@RadicalCenterAP , December 20, 2017 at 2:23 pm GMTflight of non-Muslims out of Europe
I think you mean Western Europe. If Germany's human capital drains to Poland et al in a reversal of the Cold War direction, those countries have a quite bright future. I wonder if any economic predictions have taken this into account yet.
@Anatoly KarlinAndrei Martyanov , Website December 20, 2017 at 2:31 pm GMTNominal GDP collapsed, but real GDP only fell by around 20%.
About 16% from 2013 to 2015 when Ukraine hit bottom:
https://www.worldeconomics.com/GrossDomesticProduct/Ukraine.gdp
AP is certainly exaggerating wrt Kharkov looking like Aleppo and I certainly didn't agree with him on that.
I wrote that parts of the city would look like that. I don't think there would be enough massive resistance that the entire city would be destroyed. But rooting out a couple thousand armed, experienced militiamen or soldiers in the urban area would cause a lot of expensive damage and, as is the case when civilians died in Kiev's efforts to secure Donbas, would probably not endear the invaders to the locals who after all do not want Russia to invade them.
And Kharkiv would be the easiest to take. Dnipropetrovsk would be much more Aleppo-like, and Kiev Felix was proposing for Russia to take all these areas.
@Felix KeverichGerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:34 pm GMTTo be honest, I don't think it'll be necessary to sacrifice so many lives of Russian military personnel.
The question is not in losses, per se. Russians CAN accept losses if the deal becomes hot in Ukraine -- it is obvious. The question is in geopolitical dynamics and the way said Russian Armed Forces were being honed since 2013, when Shoigu came on-board and the General Staff got its mojo returned to it. All Command and Control circuit of Ukie army will be destroyed with minimal losses if need be, and only then cavalry will be let in. How many Russian or LDNR lives? I don't know, I am sure GOU has estimates by now. Once you control escalation (Russia DOES control escalation today since can respond to any contingency) you get way more flexibility (geo)politcally. Today, namely December 2017, situation is such that Russia controls escalation completely. If Ukies want to attack, as they are inevitably forced to do so, we all know what will happen. Ukraine has about a year left to do something. Meanwhile considering EU intentions to sanction Poland, well, we are witnessing the start of a major shitstorm.
@AP [MORE]Mr. Hack , December 20, 2017 at 2:45 pm GMTGerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:48 pm GMTMost ukrops even admit that Kharkov could easily have gone in 2014, if Russia had wanted it/feasible
Really? So why didn't Russia take Kharkiv then? Why wan't it 'feasible', Mr.Know it All?
@Mr. HackArt Deco , December 20, 2017 at 2:49 pm GMTTrying to recreate something (one Rus nation) out of something that never in effect existed, now in the 21st century is a ridiculous concept at best.
A stupid comment for an adult. Ukraine, in effect never existed before Russia/Stalin/Lenin created it. Kiev is a historical Russian city, and 5 of the 7 most populated areas in Ukraine are Russian/Soviet created cities, Russian language is favourite spoken by most Ukrainians ( see even Saakashvili in court, speaking only in Russian even though he speaks fluent Ukrainian now and all the judges and lawyers speaking in Russian too), the millions of Ukrainians living happily in Russia and of course, the topic of what exactly is a Ukrainian is obselete because pretty much every Ukrainian has a close Russian relative the level of intermarriage was at the level of one culturally identical people.
AK: Improvement! The first paragraph was acceptable, hence not hidden.
@AP This suggests that transforming Iraq into a solidly pro-Western stable democracy would have been much harder than doing so for Japan.Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:52 pm GMTThat was never the object. The object was (1) to remove a hostile government and (2) replace it with a normal range government. Normal range governments aren't revanchist, aren't territorially grabby, are chary about subverting neighboring governments, and aren't in their international conduct notably driven by pride or political theo-ideology. The House of Saud, the Hashemites, Lebanon's parliamentary bosses, the Turkish military, the (post-Nasser) Egyptian military, etc. etc are all purveyors of normal-range government. NPR likely has transcripts of interview programs in early 2003 in which Wm. Kristol was a participant. Kristol was not a public official at the time, but he was the opinion-monger who most assiduously promoted the conquest of Iraq. Kristol never expected Iraq to be like Switzerland; he expected an Iraq that was 'tense' (his words), pluralistic, and willing to live in its international environment rather than against that environment.
Correct, but most of this have been the case had the Baathists remained in power?
I suspect the Shia and Kurd populations are pleased to be rid of the Baathists.
@Mr. Hack economics, hope that the west and their puppets in Kiev would act like sane and decent people, threat of sanctions and so on.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 2:53 pm GMTAs is obvious, if the west had remained neutral ( an absurd hypothetical because the west were the ringmasters of the farce in this failed state) ..and not supported the coup and then the evil war brought on the Donbass people, then a whole different situation works out in Ukraine ( for the better)
@AP Which is why one ought to either not invade a country and remove a regime that maintains stability and peace, oAP , December 20, 2017 at 3:03 pm GMTThat's a rather fantastical description of Iraq's 35 year slide under the Baathists.
@Art Deco I was speaking of 2003. Of course, for much of its history Saddam's regime was not that. Too bad it wasn't stopped then, if it was going to be stopped.AP , December 20, 2017 at 3:17 pm GMT@Gerard2S3 , December 20, 2017 at 3:23 pm GMTKharkov always was and will be as pro-Russian as Donbass
Kharkiv oblast: 71% Ukrainian, 26% Russian
Donetsk oblast: 57% Ukrainian, 38% Russian (skews more Russian in the Donbas Republic parts)Self-declared native language Kharkiv oblast: 54% Ukrainian, 44% Russian
Self-declared native language Donetsk oblast: 24% Ukrainian, 75% Russian(not the same thing as language actually spoken, but a decent reflection of national self-identity)
2012 parliamentary election results (rounding to nearest %):
Kharkiv oblast: 62% "Blue", 32% "Orange" -- including 4% Svoboda
Donetsk oblast -- 84% "Blue", 11% "Orange" -- including 1% SvobodaA good illustration of Russian wishful thinking fairytales compared to reality on the ground.
@S3 Nietzsche famously foresaw the rise and fall of communism and the destruction of Germany in the two world wars. He also liked to think of himself as a Polish nobleman. Maybe this is what he meant.Sean , December 20, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMT@Art Deco When calculated with constant pricing share of manufacturing in GDP in Germany, Italy and France is not very much, It has actually risen in Switzerland and the US, and risen greatly in Sweden, they are buying, people who think like you are selling out.Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 7:25 pm GMT[...]All of those supposedly knowledge-intensive services sell mostly to manufacturing firms, so their success depends on manufacturing success. It is not because the Americans invented superior financial techniques that the world's financial centre moved from London to New York in the mid-20th century. It is because the US became the leading industrial nation.
The weakness of manufacturing is at the heart of the UK's economic problems. Reversing three and a half decades of neglect will not be easy but, unless the country provides its industrial sector with more capital, stronger public support for R&D and better-trained workers, it will not be able to build the balanced and sustainable economy that it so desperately needs.
@AP Kharkiv oblast: 71% Ukrainian, 26% RussianArt Deco , December 20, 2017 at 7:40 pm GMT
Donetsk oblast: 57% Ukrainian, 38% Russian (skews more Russian in the Donbas Republic parts)@Sean When calculated with constant pricing share of manufacturing in GDP in Germany, Italy and France is not very much, It has actually risen in Switzerland and the US, and risen greatly in Sweden, they are buying, people who think like you are selling out.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 7:50 pm GMT"Not very much" according to whom? Manufacturing accounts for about 15% of Europe's domestic product, about 12% of that for North America, and about 8% for that of the Antipodes. It's higher in the Far East (about 24%), but Japan is in no danger of overtaking the United States in per capita product, it's larger manufacturing sector notwithstanding. There is no region of the globe bar the Far East where that sector much exceeds 15% of total value added. Comparatively large manufacturing sectors are characteristic of the more affluent middle income countries. As countries grow more productive and affluent, their consumption patterns and productive capacity shift to services.
I've no clue why you and this fellow at The Guardian have bought into the notion that there is something magical about manufacturing (it was a popular meme a generation ago, promoted by Felix Rohaytn). By way of example, Germany and Japan have lost ground economically to the UK and the US in the last 25 years, even though they devote ~21% of their productive capacity to manufacturing in contrast to the ~11%.of the Anglosphere. (Germany remains more affluent than Britain to the tune of about 11%, but about 15% less affluent than the United States).
@Gerard2 Wave them hands.Sean , December 20, 2017 at 8:44 pm GMT@Art Deco Sorry, mistake. I meant when you do the comparison with constant prices, manufacturing has not declined very much in the US ect . Britain is different it has lost a lot of manufacturing. Britain cannot build its own nuclear power station. Germany and France have taken the industry and would have come for the City next. Britain was to be the milch cow of the EU, so it got out.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 9:09 pm GMTSwitzerland is a rich mans country and so is Sweden. Business runs certain countries and those countries are actually adding to their productive capacity, so they are not acting like it is not profitable. That Guardian fellow is a professor of Economics at Oxford, and I already quoted you Lord Weinstock who ran just about Britain's most profitable company: it wasn't doing services. Once Weinstock retired his successor listened to the City financial geniuses, sold the manufacturing core of the business, and when times got bad the had nothing to fall back on and collapsed.
Germany does not have a single currency and Schengen Agreement free movement with the US. German goods are expensive in the US, the single currency and Schengen Agreement are an export promotion program for Germany industry. The Germans are going to deindustrialise the rest of the EU. Britain realised it had to get out now or be borged.
@Sean Britain hasn't lost any manufacturing output. It indubitably has fewer workers employed in manufacturing, but manufacturing output has not declined. What's happened is that growth in production since 1990 has been concentrated in the service sector.Sean , December 20, 2017 at 9:46 pm GMTThe decline in the salience of manufacturing in the British economy has been more rapid than it has elsewhere, but the same basic story has played out. The share of value added attributable to manufacturing hit bottom in Britain in 2006, btw.
As I am sure you know service sector employment is mainly masses on low wages, so low they are subsidized by the state in many cases, and increasingly on zero hours contracts. Hence low demand. Running Britain on a London and the SE boom on the rationale that the country is economically stronger relative to Germany and Japan is unstable because the strength of the country in not increasing in any meaningful sense. The recent votes in Britain should have made it clear that the country is not more stable for all the economic "success". The people feel Britain is getting weaker compared to Germany.reiner Tor , December 20, 2017 at 10:16 pm GMTNo one doubts that Britain has a manufacturing problem and the inefficiency is at the root of the loss of manufacturing but other counties are basically not the same, and that is why Britain left the EU. Germany is playing the manufacturing game on its own terms inside the EU with a single currency.
@Art DecoArt Deco , December 20, 2017 at 10:32 pm GMTthere is something magical about manufacturing
There is. Manufacturing productivity can easily be increased. Agriculture is more difficult, and by the time its fully motorized, it's already a very small portion of the total output. While services productivity is very low and cannot be easily increased. So an economy with no manufacturing cannot raise its productivity much. It's also more difficult to export services, so countries with low manufacturing will often experience huge current account deficits.
High value added services can be risky, especially finance, which makes the country vulnerable to credit cycles. The UK could export most financial services while credit was easy. During the credit crunch it suddenly exported way less. So it's very pro-cyclical, more so than manufacturing, because such countries still need to service their oversized (due to the size of the financial sector) debts and obligations. It makes them too leveraged.
@reiner Tor It's also more difficult to export services, so countries with low manufacturing will often experience huge current account deficits.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 11:02 pm GMTNo. They experience current account deficits because their savings rates are under par.
There is. Manufacturing productivity can easily be increased.
Doesn't matter if all that new output of glass, steel, and rubber hasn't much of a market because people are sated.
@Sean As I am sure you know service sector employment is mainly masses on low wages, so low they are subsidized by the state in many cases, and increasingly on zero hours contracts.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 11:07 pm GMTNo, I don't know that. The compensation scales in various industrial sectors (as a % of the mean across all private sectors) are as follows:
Utilites: 206%
Management of companies and enterprises: 201%
Mining: 178%
Information: 176%
Finance: 173%
Professional, scientific and technical services: 156%
Wholesale Trade: 127%
Manufacturing: 119%
Construction: 103%
Real estate: 99%
Transportation and Warehousing: 99%
Health Care and Social Assistance: 92%
Educational services [private]: 82%
Arts, entertainment, and recreation: 81%
Administrative and waste management services: 70%
Miscellaneous svs: 69%
Accommodation: 63%
Agriculture, Fishing, Forestry: 63%
Retail trade: 60%Wages in manufacturing are above the mean. More sophisticated technology means you're left with fewer employees (but with the skill sets to operate the machinery). (About 11% of the private sector workforce is in manufacturing).
@Sean As I am sure you know service sector employment is mainly masses on low wages, so low they are subsidized by the state in many cases, and increasingly on zero hours contracts. Hence low demand.Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 11:09 pm GMTThey're not running a current account deficit of 4.4% of gdp because they're suffering from 'low demand'
@Art Deco These are figures for the United States by way of illustration.RadicalCenter , December 21, 2017 at 1:03 am GMT@AP Turning Iraq into a stable democracy would have been a legitimate reason to wage war? Must respectfully and strenuously disagree. We would be constantly at war if that were the standard. And, in fact, we HAVE been constantly at war. It has to stop.RadicalCenter , December 21, 2017 at 1:12 am GMT@S3 Great point, S3, and I will correct my comment to exclude Eastern Europe from the prediction of likely substantial non-Muslim flight ("Eastern Europe" meaning, for this purpose, Poland, Hungary, Belarus if it is not so foolish as to join the EU, and whatever is left of Ukraine that is not re-claimed by Russia).AP , December 21, 2017 at 2:59 am GMTBut I'd also predict likely substantial "flight of non-Muslims out of Western and perhaps CENTRAL Europe", unfortunately.
Because I am not at all convinced, yet, that Austria will not continue to be colonized by Muslims. Austria may be colonized at a slower pace than Germany if the new Austrian government seriously secures its borders, deports some existing invaders who have not been granted citizenship yet, and refuses to take any new Muslim and/or African/Arab "refugees."
But even if that occurs, as I fervently hope, Muslims apparently will continue to constitute an ever-larger share of Austria's population -- based simply on the huge difference in fertility rates among non-Muslims compared to Muslims there. Even without any new immigration to Austria, an improbably happy state of affairs, Austrians simply don't have enough children to replace themselves. Not even close.
With Austrian TFR so persistently low, all Muslims in Austria need to do is maintain a TFR at replacement (say, 2.1), and they will take over the country.
That new government had better get to work if they don't want to see Austrians fleeing east (or to the USA) along with the droves of Germans who will certainly be underway.
@RadicalCenterS3 , December 21, 2017 at 4:09 am GMTTurning Iraq into a stable democracy would have been a legitimate reason to wage war
Yes. That doesn't necessarily mean we should have done it, even if that were the reason. As you said, we can't keep doing this everywhere all the time. Nor am I claiming it is possible (it was done in Japan but Japan is not Iraq). But if we did invade, and then did whatever had to be done to transform the place from a Baathist dictatorship with radical Islam simmering underneath, into a stable, decent, secular, Christian-tolerant and allied country, that would have been legitimate.
@RadicalCenter Does Austria have anything like the US's RICO Act? Creating something like it and generously applying it to immigrant crime would be one of my suggestions, a California-style three-strikes law would be another.Talha , December 21, 2017 at 4:26 am GMTThe in-your-face pro-natality propaganda does not seem to be working. So maybe something subtler is required, like asking television and film studios to produce more traditional role-models for women. More scenes of doting mothers and adorable babies. And yes, Kurz's wife should definitely be given a role.
@RadicalCenter On a roll.gT , December 21, 2017 at 7:34 am GMTIts very amusing reading all the comments so far. But reality is that Russia should take back all the lands conquered by the Tsars, and that includes Finland.Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 10:50 am GMTLook at America. Currently the US has troops stationed in other countries all over the world. And most of those "independent" countries can't take virtually no decision without America's approval. This is definitely the case with Germany and Japan, where their "presidents" have to take an oath of loyalty to the US on assuming office. Now America has even moved into Eastern Europe, and has troops and radars and nuclear capable missile batteries stationed there. So America is just expanding and expanding its grasp while Russia must contract its territories even further and further. Yippee.
So Russia must take back all the territories conquered by the Tsars so as to not lose this game of monopoly. Those in those territories not too happy about such matters can move to America or deal with the Red Army. This is not a matter of cost benefits analysis but a matter of Russia's national security, as in the case of Chechnya.
The territories to Russia's East are especially necessary for Russia's security; when the chips are down, when all the satellites have been blown out of space, all the aircraft blown out of the air, all the ground hardware blown to smithereens; when the battle is reduced to eye to eye rat like warfare, then those assorted Mongol mongrels from Russia's East come into their element. Genghis Khan was the biggest mass murderer in history, he made Hitler look like a school boy, his genes live on in those to Russia's East. So if America were to get involved in Ukraine Russia would have no issues losing a million troops in a matter of days while the US has never even lost a million troops in its civil war and WW2 combined.
Lets face it, those Mongol mongrels make much better fighters than the effete Sunni Arabs any day, so Russia should get them on her side. In Syria those ISIS idiots would never have got as far as they did were it not for those few Chechens in their midst's.
But alas, Russia has to eat humble pie at the moment, internationally and at the Olympics. But humble pie tastes good when its washed down with bottles of vodka, and its only momentarily after all.
@gT Look at America. Currently the US has troops stationed in other countries all over the world.Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 10:52 am GMTSince 1945, between 70% and 87% of American military manpower has been stationed in the United States and its possession. The vast bulk of the remainder is generally to be found in about a half-dozen countries. (In recent years, that would be Germany, Japan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait). Andrew Bacevich once went on a whinge about the stupidity of having a 'Southern Command' without bothering to tell his readers that the Southern Command had 2,000 billets at that time, that nearly half were stationed at Guantanamo Bay (an American possession since 1902), that no country had more than 200 American soldiers resident, and that the primary activity of the Southern Command was drug interdiction. On the entire African continent, there were 5,000 billets at that time.
And most of those "independent" countries can't take virtually no decision without America's approval. This is definitely the case with Germany and Japan, where their "presidents" have to take an oath of loyalty to the US on assuming office.
This is a fantasy.
@gT Why not post sober?gT , December 21, 2017 at 4:05 pm GMT@Art Deco Fantasy?Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 4:49 pm GMTRead here about Merkel obeying her real masters
and read here about "BERLIN IS WASHINGTON'S VASSAL UNTIL 2099″
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-183232
I especially like the bit about "Though most of the German officers were not originally inclined against America, a lot of them being educated in the United States, they are now experiencing disappointment and even disgust with Washington's policies." Seems its not only the Russians who are getting increasingly pissed off with the US when at first they actually liked the US. No wonder the Germans are just letting their submarines and tanks rot away.
Also https://www.veteranstodayarchives.com/2011/06/05/germany-still-under-the-control-of-foreign-powers/
(damn South Africans popping up everywhere)@gT Yes, a fantasy. That you put your gloss on news reports and locate other fantasists does not make it less of a fantasy.Andrei Martyanov , Website December 21, 2017 at 8:23 pm GMT@Art DecoSean , December 21, 2017 at 8:47 pm GMTThat you put your gloss on news reports
Pray tell how military-political analysis works without news? Your angle on OSI (Open Source Intelligence) would also be "interesting".
@Art Deco Switzerland has the second highest per capital value added manufacturing, Singapore is first. Successful profitable services do not seem stand alone in any actual economy.Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 11:29 pm GMTSuccessful profitable services do not seem stand alone in any actual economy.Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 11:33 pm GMTWell, you're not looking for them.
Switzerland has the second highest per capital value added manufacturing, Singapore is first.
About 19% of the value-added in their economies is attributable to manufacturing. You find the same ratio in Serbia, which no one will mistake for an affluent and economically dynamic country.
@Andrei Martyanov 1. There is no 'President of Japan'.Johann Ricke , December 22, 2017 at 1:03 am GMT2. Neither the Japanese Emperor nor the President of Germany take an oath of allegiance to the United States or any American official.
3. Neither the Chancellor of Germany nor the Prime Minister of Japan are incapable of making a decision without consulting the U.S. Embassy. (Manned by Caroline Kennedy at one point in Japan).
@Art DecoAbout 19% of the value-added in their economies is attributable to manufacturing.
The amusing thing is that the stock-in-trade of both Switzerland and Singapore is some combo of private banking, tax-avoidance and money laundering. That's why the per capita income is so high. It's bloated by the portfolio income of wealthy people like Marc Rich, Robert Mugabe and Zuckerberg's Brazilian business partner.
Sep 20, 2014 | abundanthope.net
On 21 st of September, the so-called "opposition" in Moscow and St. Petersburg is planning demonstrations that should gather 50-thousand people in the streets against (here I laughed) cessation of Russian aggression in Ukraine and the Russian suppression of Ukrainian independence.
Do you think that Putin has so many enemies in Moscow and St. Petersburg that out of despair and powerlessness people have to go out on the streets?
"Actually, we want to change the government, we do not want Putin. We are tired of his politics. We wait until we receive a new political movement and the resources that Russia has will not be in the hands of only a narrow number of the so-called "managers of Russia" and will be more parcelled out in the community. Here in Moscow actually are people who do not want Putin in power. But we do not go out on the streets rather talk among themselves. We do not have any tools, any party, no movement of which we would really identify with ".
These are the words of my friend, a forty-year-old resident of Moscow, who considers herself to be Putin dissident. The demonstrations in Moscow and St. Petersburg are organized by the so-called autonomous group People's Will (Narodnaya Volya).
In the era of Russia's encirclement by NATO, the upcomig regular weapons shipments for Ukraine money, it is not a surprise that Putin is taking preocupations against the so-called "pro-democratic" NGOs in Russia. It was after all NGOs in Kiev that led the coup.
"It expresses the need to understand the common struggle of all the oppressed people for their liberation from the oppression of the state, imperialist policy, regardless of who it comes from" "Freedom to nations, death to empires." – those are the ideas that Russian Nationalists preached during a demonstration in March.
Quite a different opinion on this subject has Mateusz Piskorski, a frequent visitor to Moscow and Ukraine. Founder of the European Centre for Geopolitical, in an interview which I conducted with him said about an organized demonstration on 21st of September:
"It's hard for me to imagine that someone has collected so many people with so much support for Putin in Russia reaching 80%. It made me curious: even existing opponents of Putin in case of the Crimea and the Ukraine fully support Putin. I think we sooner would gather 50,000 people under the banner of harder proceedings for Ukrainian crisis. Many Russian environments believes that Putin should have long ago defended civilians against Kiev attacks and long ago entered the army there. "
"At this stage, having that kind of support, Putin does not need to use any repressions because the opposition is a trace and artificial, i.e. Orchestrating in one way or another, financed, (today already illegally funded) by those who financed Euromaidan in Kiev. We even have a personal coincidence. The new United States Ambassador Jeffrey Teft, preparing earlier Euromaidan, (he was ambassador in Kiev earlier, worked with these NGOs – and indeed located in the pay of the Department of State in Ukraine), today he continues the same action in Moscow. He does not take into account that Russia is a country and Ukraine was not – or it will not be so easy, for sure. It would be necessary to pump there a lot more money than the $ 5 billion of which Americans told in the context of Ukraine ".
Mr. Matthew is right that now the Americans are trying to do 'more'. Russia is a country larger than Ukraine. So measures to be taken also need to be bigger. If you still do not know where you can take a 'pro-democracy dollars' this can help you:
The American Congress brought a bill, prepared by 26 Republicans, among which is jammed Russophobe, John McCain. Document number 2277 is placed on the official website of the Congress of the United States and is called "Russian Aggression Prevention Act 2014″, which can be translated as "the act of preventing aggression by Russia in 2014." In addition to all kinds of sanctions, to increase military presence and conduct military exercises around the borders of Russia, as well as increased activity in the field of educational exchange programs and cultural events held in the territory of the former Soviet Union, i t shall provide annual commitments of $ 10 billion in the period 2015-2017, for "the development of democracy in Russia " . We can read it on Infowars.
However, Putin is not stupid that's why he is dealing with NGO in American fashion. Now all NGOs in Russia are trampled as agents of influence and must formally demonstrate their funding.
In a statement published on March 26, Catherine Ashton – the same Margaret Ashton, whose conversation with the Estonian foreign minister leaked to the Internet telling us about the fact that behind the snipers firing at civilians stood the leaders of maydan. She stated that inspections and searches (NGOs) are carried out on vague grounds of legal concern, because they seem to be aimed at further undermining civil society activities in Russia.
The same open society which we saw in Kiev during the 'spontaneous' protests. George Soros, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar Network Omidyar and his foundation, as well as the National Endowment for Democracy, which is largely funded by the US Congress is one of the 'pro-democracy movements in Ukraine that funded the 'democracy' .
We may have the impression that Russia is in fact a totalitarian state like North Korea where there are almost no civil liberties. But let's not be naive. There's a reason why such institutions are officially called the agents of foreign influence in Russia. Just look at the coup d'état in Ukraine organized by them to know why.
Russia in its modern history has scored a single limited intervention in Georgia. USA attacks one country after another based on false evidence and their 'democratic intervention' we can probably count in tens.
As explicitly said Brzezinski, the trophy for the United States is Eurasia – that is why Putin cannot be summer for 'pro-democracy' movements in Moscow, unless he wants to share the fate of Qaddafi. The United States and its vassals from EU do not like it. They do not like strong, independent Russia that can speak for itself. So that is way they want to install a more 'pro-democracy' government in Moscow.
Mateusz Piskorski summed it in the aforementioned interview which he gave me;
"As long as Europe does not have its own leaders, Putin's popularity will grow. Hope was in the Germans and Merkel. But it proved that the influence of the United States is stronger than the German business and German citizens. Currently, tests are conducted that say that a large part of European societies would see Vladimir Putin as their own leader or prime minister. Putin, in contrast to other 'pro-democracy' puppets knows how to clearly articulate its national interest. On this political background to what we look right now, he looks like a real leader. "
Konrad Stachnio is an independent Poland based journalist, he hosted a number of radio and TV programs for the Polish edition of PrisonPlanet , exclusively for the online magazine " New Eastern Outlook"
First appeared: http://journal-neo.org/2014/09/20/try-new-maidan-in-russia-doubt-it/
http://journal-neo.org/2014/09/20/try-new-maidan-in-russia-doubt-it/
Dec 22, 2017 | www.unz.com
, December 18, 2017 at 6:11 pm GMT
@Art Deco The way I see it "an ocean of blood" in Iraq was unleashed following US invasion, and it included plenty of American blood. Young healthy American men lost their lifes in Iraq, lost their their bodyparts (arms, legs, their nuts), lost their sanity, and as an American I can't imagine that you were pleased about that. Certainly, most of your countrymen didn't feel this way, they didn't feel this war was worth it for the US.German_reader , December 18, 2017 at 6:52 pm GMT@Art Deco That's just dumb. The reasons officially given for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 -- Saddam's regime hiding weapons of mass destruction and being an intolerable threat to the outside world -- were a transparently false pretext for war, and that was clearly discernible at the time. Saddam's regime was extremely brutal and increasingly Islamic or even Islamist in character, but by 2003 it wasn't a serious threat to anyone outside Iraq anymore the worst thing it did was send money to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers (bad, but hardly an existential threat). Admittedly there was the question how to deal with his regime in coming years, whether to eventually relax sanctions or to keep them in place for the foreseeable future. But there was no urgent need to invade Iraq that was purely a war of choice which the US started in a demented attempt at reshaping the region according to its own preferences. If you don't understand why many people find that rather questionable, it's you who needs to get out more.reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 7:04 pm GMT@Art Deco Hungary joined NATO a few days (weeks? can't remember) before the start of the Kosovo-related bombardment of Serbia. I attended university in a city in the south of Hungary, close to the Serbian border. I could see the NATO planes flying by above us every night when going home from a bar or club (both of which I frequented a lot).reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 7:12 pm GMTI was a staunch Atlanticist at the time, and I believed all the propaganda about the supposed genocide which later turned out not to have gone through the formality of actually taking place. But it was never properly reported as the scandal it was -- it was claimed that the Serbs were murdering tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of Kosovo Albanians, but it never happened. They might have killed a few hundred, at worst a few thousand civilians, but that's different from what the propaganda claimed at the time. I only found out that there was no genocide of Albanians in Kosovo when I searched the internet for it some time after the Iraq invasion. By that time I was no longer an Atlanticist. Most people are totally unaware that there was any lying going on while selling us the war.
@German_readerGerman_reader , December 18, 2017 at 7:34 pm GMTand that was clearly discernible at the time
Yes. It was the thing which opened my eyes and made me question some previous policies, especially the bombardment of Serbia. I wasn't any longer comfortable of being in NATO, especially since it started to get obvious that Hungarian elites (at least the leftists among them) used our membership to dismantle our military and use the savings on handouts for their electorate, or -- worse -- outright steal it. While it increasingly looked like NATO wasn't really protecting our interests, since our enemies were mostly our neighbors (some of them). This kind of false safety didn't feel alright.
@reiner Tor "Yes. It was the thing which opened my eyes"Randal , December 18, 2017 at 8:07 pm GMTSame for me. I was 15 during the Kosovo war and believed NATO's narrative, couldn't understand how anybody could be against the war, given previous Serb atrocities during the Bosnian war it seemed to make sense. And after 9/11 I was very pro-US, e.g. I argued vehemently with a stupid leftie teacher who was against the Afghanistan war (and I still believe that war was justified, so I don't think I'm just some mindless anti-American fool). But Iraq was just too much, too much obvious lying and those lies were so stupid it was hard not to feel that there was something deeply wrong with a large part of the American public if they were gullible enough to believe such nonsense. At least for me it was a real turning point in the evolution of my political views.
@Felix KeverichRandal , December 18, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMTAs I recall the Sunnies and Shias killed and disfigured American servicemen together,
The amusing thing is that American apologists for their country's military interventionism like Art Deco more usually spend their time heaping all the blame on Iran and the Shia. As well as internet opinionators, that incudes some of the most senior US military figures like obsessively anti-Iranian SecDef James Mattis:
James Mattis' 33-Year Grudge Against Iran
That's something that ought to seriously concern anyone with a rational view of world affairs.
which caused Americans to elect Obama and run away from the country.
In fact the Americans had already admitted defeat and agreed to pull out before Obama took office. Bush II signed the withdrawal agreement on 14th December 2008. After that, US forces in Iraq were arguably no longer occupiers and were de jure as well as de facto present on the sufferance of the Iraqi government. The US regime had clearly hoped to have an Iraqi collaboration government for the long term, as a base from which to attack Iran, but the long Iraqi sunni and shia resistances scuppered that idea. The sunnis had fought hard, but were mostly defeated and many of them ended up collaborating with the US occupiers, as indeed had much of the shia, for entirely understandable reasons in both cases.
Military occupations are morally complicated like that.
@Art DecoFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:32 pm GMTWere we defeated, Iraq would be ruled by the Ba'ath Party or networks of Sunni tribesman. It is not. This isn't that difficult Randal.
Well this is an old chestnut that is really just an attempt to abuse definitions of victory and defeat on your part.
The US invasion of Iraq itself was initially a military success. It ended in complete military victory over the Iraqi regime and nation, the complete surrender of the Iraqi military and the occupation of the country.
However, the US regime's wider war aims were not achieved because they were unable to impose a collaboration government and use the country as a base for further projection of US power in the ME (primarily against Iran, on behalf of Israel), and the overall result of the war and the subsequent occupation was catastrophic for any honest assessment of American national interests (as opposed to the interests of the lobbies manipulating US regime policy). The costs were significant, the reputational damage was also significant, and the overall result was to replace a contained and essentially broken opponent with vigorous sunni jihadist forces together with a resurgent Iran unwilling to kowtow to the US as most ME states are.
So the best honest assessment is that the US was defeated in Iraq, despite an initial military victory.
@RandalFelix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:38 pm GMTThe amusing thing is that American apologists for their country's military interventionism like Art Deco more usually spend their time heaping all the blame on Iran and the Shia. As well as internet opinionators, that incudes some of the most senior US military figures like obsessively anti-Iranian SecDef James Mattis
I suspect the reason this happens is because ambitious American officers know that hating Iran (hating enemies of Israel in general) is what gets you promoted. It wasn't an accident that James Mattis was appointed Secretary of Defense -- he is Bill Kristol's favourite.
@Art Deco US military is still butthurt over the Iran's support for Shia militias, targeting US troops during Iraq occupation. Clearly, the Shias hurt them a lot, and it was very unexpected for the US, because Americans actually brought Shias into power.German_reader , December 18, 2017 at 8:44 pm GMT@Art Deco Official justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weapons of mass destruction which didn't exist in 2003. Your statement that this was merely one item "on the list of the concerns" Bush had, amounts to an admission that this was merely a pretext and that the real object of the war was a political reordering of the region according to US preferences (which of course backfired given that the Iraq war increased Iran's power and status).Johann Ricke , December 18, 2017 at 9:19 pm GMT
Calling me "Eurotrash" oh well, I get it, US nationalists like you think you're the responsible adults dealing with a dangerous world, while ungrateful European pussies favor appeasement, are free riders on US benevolent hegemony etc. I've heard and read all that a thousand times before, it's all very unoriginal by now.@German_readerRandal , December 18, 2017 at 9:38 pm GMTOfficial justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weapons of mass destruction which didn't exist in 2003.
It was one of many reasons. You don't set a guy on Death Row free just because one of the charges didn't stick. The biggest reason was Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, which should have resulted in his removal from power. We settled on a truce because George HW Bush did not want to pay the price, and the (mostly-Sunni) Arab coalition members did not want (1) a democracy in Iraq and (2) a Shiite-dominated Iraq. Bush's son ended up footing the political bill for that piece of unfinished business. The lesson is that you can delay paying the piper, but the bill always comes due.
@Johann RickeSwedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 9:50 pm GMTBush's son ended up footing the political bill for that piece of unfinished business.
No, Bush II chose to invade Iraq entirely voluntarily. There was no good reason to do so, and the very good reasons why his father had sensibly chosen not to invade still largely applied (even more so in some cases, given Iraq's even weaker state).
The lesson is that you can delay paying the piper, but the bill always comes due.
This is of course self-serving fantasy. The Russians told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Germans told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The French told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The Turks told you there was no need to invade Iraq. The sensible British told you there was no need to invade Iraq, but for some reason you preferred to listen to the words of the staring-eyed sycophant who happened to be Prime Minister at the time, instead.
More fool the Yanks. Most everyone else honest on the topic was giving you sensible advice. Bush II (whose incompetence is now generally accepted) chose to ignore that advice, and committed what is generally now regarded as the most egregious example of a foreign policy blunder since Vietnam at least, and probably since Suez, and will likely be taught as such around the world (including in the US, once the partisan apologists have given up trying to rationalise it) for generations to come.
@Art DecoRandal , December 18, 2017 at 11:25 pm GMTThey've been supplying Hezbollah for 35 years.
Only by air.
For the last four years, Iran was shipping weapons and ammunition to the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and Hezbollah through an air route. This method allowed Israel to identify, track and target Iranian arms shipments to Hezbollah easily, as only few cargo airplanes land in Syrian airports every day.
However, now Israel will be incapable of identifying any Iranian shipment on the new ground route, as it will be used by thousands of Iraq and Syrian companies on daily basis in the upcoming months. Experts believe that this will give Hezbollah and the SAA a huge advantage over Israel and will allow Iran to increase its supplies to its allies.
@Art DecoRadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:17 pm GMTThe sensible British were a co-operating force in invading Iraq.
That was the staring-eyed sycophant's work.
The man who opened the floodgates to immigration because he thought multiculturalism is a great idea.
As for the rest, they all have their shticks and interests
Of course. Unlike the exceptional United States of course, the only country in the world whose government never has any axe to grind in the nobility of purpose and intent it displays in all the wars it has ever fought.
You seem to be degenerating into a caricature of the ignorant, arrogant American.
@Felix Keverich Similarly, it doesn't seem likely that the US government will give up its control and influence over the "independent media" that many Americans still think we have.RadicalCenter , December 18, 2017 at 11:22 pm GMT@Art Deco Folks in Belarus shouldn't make up their minds about applying to the EU until they speak with regular German, French, English, and Swedish people about the effects of the Islamic / Third World immivasion that the EU has imposed on them. My wife and I speak & correspond with Germans living in Germany frequently, and the real state of affairs for non-elite Germans is getting worse fast, with no good end in sight.Johann Ricke , December 18, 2017 at 11:31 pm GMTAnyone who does not desire to die or at best live subjugated under sharia -- and sharia run largely by cruel dimwits from Africa and Arabia -- ought to stay out (or GET out of) the EU.
@RandalRandal , December 19, 2017 at 12:08 am GMTWell history has proven them to have been correct and the US regime wrong on Iraq, so that pretty much tells you how far your arrogance will get you outside your own echo chamber.
"History" has proven no such thing. What went wrong in Iraq was principally Bush's underestimate of the number of American casualties and the cost to the US treasury*, for which he and the GOP paid a serious political price. However, it's also clear that the Shiites and Kurds, an 80% majority, have no regrets that Saddam is gone. While both communities seem to think that we should continue to bear a bigger chunk of the price of pacifying Iraq's bellicose Sunni Arabs, it's also obvious that they are not electing Tikritis or even Sunni Arabs to office, as they would if they were nostalgic for Saddam's rule. The big picture, really, is that the scale of the fighting has probably convinced both Shiites and Kurds that they could not have toppled Saddam without the assistance of Uncle Sam. They could certainly not have kept Iraq's revived Sunni Arabs (in the form of ISIS) at bay without American assistance.
* These costs were larger than projected, but small compared to the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Whether or not Iraq can be secured as an American ally in the decades ahead, both the gamble and the relatively nugatory price paid will, in retrospect, be seen as a reasonable one, given Iraq's strategic location.
@Johann Rickeutu , December 19, 2017 at 12:16 am GMTWhat went wrong in Iraq was principally Bush's underestimate of the number of American casualties and the cost to the US treasury
No, what went wrong in Iraq from the pov of any kind of honest assessment of an American national interest was that an unnecessary war was fought justified by lies that have seriously discredited the nation that told them, and that the results of the war were hugely counter to said American national interests: the conversion of a contained and broken former enemy state into a jihadist free fire training and recruitment zone combined with a strong ally of a supposed enemy state, Iran.
Whether the direct material cost of the war is acceptable or not is rather beside the point. It's a matter between Bush II and the parents, relatives and friends of those Americans who lost their lives or their health, and between Bush II and American taxpayers. If it had been achieved cost-free it still wouldn't have been worth it, because it was a defeat.
But it's no accident that the costs of the war were "underestimated". As usual, if the Bush II regime had been honest about the likely costs of their proposed war, there would have been a political outcry against it and they'd have been forced to back down as Obama was over Syria.
However, it's also clear that the Shiites and Kurds, an 80% majority, have no regrets that Saddam is gone
Amusing to see you are currently pretending that what Iraqi Kurds and Shiites feel matters. It's always entertaining to see just how shameless Americans can be at their game of alternately pretending to care for foreigners' views (when they need to justify a war) and regarding foreigners with utter contempt and disregard (when said foreigners are saying something Americans don't like to hear).
They could certainly not have kept Iraq's revived Sunni Arabs (in the form of ISIS) at bay without American assistance.
Well that partly depends upon how much support the US regime allowed its Gulf sunni Arab proxies to funnel to said jihadists, I suppose. But most likely they'd have crushed them in due course with Iranian backing.
In Iraq, IS were fine as long as they stayed out of the strongly Shiite areas in the south. They'd have quickly been whipped if they'd ventured there. Just as IS were fine in Syria as long as they were taking relatively remote land over from a government and army in desperate straits as a result of a disastrous externally funded civil war, but were soon beaten when the Russians stepped in and started actually fighting them rather than pretending to do so only as long as it didn't interfere too much with their real goal of overthrowing the Syria government, American-style.
@German_reader I see that Art Deco got more active than usual. Seems that the destruction of Iraq is close to his heart. Several days ago Ron Unz had this to say about him:Randal , December 19, 2017 at 12:27 am GMThttp://www.unz.com/jderbyshire/time-to-stop-importing-an-immigrant-overclass/#comment-2116171
Exactly! It's pretty obvious that this "Art Deco" fellow is just a Jewish-activist type, and given his very extensive posting history, perhaps even an organized "troll." But he's certainly one of the most sophisticated ones, with the vast majority of his comments being level-headed, moderate, and very well-informed, generally focusing on all sorts of other topics, perhaps with the deliberate intent of building up his personal credibility for the periodic Jewish matters that actually so agitate him.To which I added:
http://www.unz.com/jderbyshire/time-to-stop-importing-an-immigrant-overclass/#comment-2116402
The quality and wide range of his comments are really impressive. As if it was coming form a super intelligent AI Hal that has access to all kinds of databases at his finger tips. And then there is always the same gradient of his angle: the reality is as it is; reality is as you have been told so far; do not try to keep coming with weird theories and speculations because they are all false; there is nothing interesting to see. His quality and scope are not congruent with his angle. All his knowledge and all his data and he hasn't found anything interesting that would not conform to what we all read in newspapers. Amazing. If America had its High Office of Doctrine and Faith he could have been its supreme director.His overactivity here is somewhat out of character and after reading his comments here I doubt that Ron Unz would call him "one of the most sophisticated ones." I also would take back the "really impressive" part too. Perhaps some other individuum was assigned to Art Deco handle this Monday.
Speaking of US foreign policy stupidity and arrogance, the response to the latest evidence that Trump will continue the inglorious Clinton/Bush II/Obama tradition of destructive corrupt/incompetent buffoonery:German_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:28 am GMTUS outnumbered 14 to 1 as it vetoes UN vote on status of Jerusalem
And here's the profoundly noxious Nikki Haley "lying for her country" (except, bizarrely, it isn't even really for her own country). Her appointment by Trump certainly was one of the first signs that he was going to seriously let America down:
The resolution was denounced in furious language by the US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, who described it as "an insult" that would not be forgotten. "The United States will not be told by any country where we can put our embassy," she said.
"It's scandalous to say we are putting back peace efforts," she added. "The fact that this veto is being done in defence of American sovereignty and in defence of America's role in the Middle East peace process is not a source of embarrassment for us; it should be an embarrassment to the remainder of the security council."
The real nature of the UN resolution the execrable Haley was so faux-offended by:
The UK and France had indicated in advance that they would would back the text, which demanded that all countries comply with pre-existing UNSC resolutions on Jerusalem, dating back to 1967, including requirements that the city's final status be decided in direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
But requiring Israel and its US poodles to act in good faith is surely anti-Semitic, after all. The real beneficiary (he thinks, at least) of Trump's and Haley's buffoonery was suitably condescending in his patting of his poodles' heads:
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, tweeted: "Thank you, Ambassador Haley. On Hanukkah, you spoke like a Maccabi. You lit a candle of truth. You dispel the darkness. One defeated the many. Truth defeated lies. Thank you, President Trump."
@utu Art Deco isn't Jewish iirc, but an (Irish?) Catholic from the northeastern US. And I suppose his views aren't even that extreme, but pretty much standard among many US right-wingers (a serious problem imo), so it makes little sense to attack him personally.utu , December 19, 2017 at 12:29 am GMT@German_reader Official justification for the Iraq war was concern about Iraq's supposedly hidden weaponsutu , December 19, 2017 at 12:35 am GMTThe fact that Iraq had no WMD was actually critical to making the claims that it had them. If Iraq had them it would officially relinquish them which would take away the ostensive cause for the invasion.
I am really amazed that now 14 years after the invasion there are some who still argue about the WMD. Iraq was to be destroyed because this was the plan. The plan to reorganize the ME that consisted of destruction of secular and semi-secure states like Iraq and Syria. The WDM was just an excuse that nobody really argued for or against in good faith including Brits or Germans or Turks. Everybody knew the writing on the wall.
@German_reader it makes little sense to attack him personallyGerman_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:41 am GMTYes, personal attacks are counterproductive but I can't resit, I just can't help it, so I must to say what I said already several times in the past: you are a cuck. You are a hopeless case.
@utuGerman_reader , December 19, 2017 at 12:48 am GMTThe plan to reorganize the ME that consisted of destruction of secular and semi-secure states like Iraq and Syria.
Has to be admitted though that Iraq became increasingly less secular during the 1990s, with Saddam's regime pushing Islamization as a new source of legitimacy. It's probably no accident that former Baath people and officers of Saddam's army were prominent among the leadership of IS.
Still hardly sufficient reason for the Iraq war though.@utu With all due respect to you and Ron Unz, but the idea that someone like "Art Deco" is an "organized troll" who creates an elaborate fake persona (which he then maintains over multiple years on several different websites -- I first encountered him years ago on the American conservative's site) to spread pro-Jewish views seems somewhat paranoid to me.RadicalCenter , December 19, 2017 at 3:16 am GMT
I have no reason to doubt he's genuine (as far as that's possible on the internet), his views aren't unusual.@German_reader Agree with everything you just wrote. And please understand, I love the Germans and I'm angry at them in the way that you'd be angry at a brother who refuses to stop destroying himself with drugs or whatever.John Gruskos , December 19, 2017 at 3:25 am GMT@German_reader The commenter using the name "Art Deco" is NOT an American nationalist.utu , December 19, 2017 at 6:59 am GMTHe is neocon trash.
@German_reader Still hardly sufficient reason for the Iraq war though.LondonBob , December 19, 2017 at 8:19 am GMTWhat do you mean by that? Are you so out of touch? You really do not understand what was the reason behind Iraq 2003 war and then fucking it up when Gen. Garner was recalled and replaced with Paul Bremer who drove Iraq to the ground? Repeat after me: Iraq was destroyed because this was the only objective of 2003 Iraq war. The mission was accomplished 100%.
@utu Israel wanted Iraq destroyed, it was.AP , December 20, 2017 at 1:18 am GMT@Art Deco I respectfully disagree with you about the Iraq war (one of the few areas on which I disagree with you).TT , December 20, 2017 at 11:16 am GMTI suppose had the West made a massive investment in Iraq, secured its Christian population, loaded it with US troops, and did to it what was done to Japan, over several decades, transforming it into a prosperous democratic US ally, removing Saddam (who deserves no sympathy) might have been a nice thing. It would have been a massive financial drain but having a "Japan", other than Israel, in the heart of the Middle East might have been worth it (I am not a Middle East expert but it seems the Shah's Persia was sort of being groomed for such a role).
Instead, it ended up being a disaster -- 100,000s dead in sectarian massacres, Christian population nearly destroyed, and other than Kurdish areas, an ally either of Iran or of militant anti-American Sunnis. At the cost, to the USA, of dead Americans, lots of money, and loss of soft power. I also suspect that America being stuck and preoccupied in Middle East conflicts gave room for Russia to act. I guess its a tribute to how strong America is, that it is still doing pretty well in spite of the debacle. A lesser power such as the USSR would have been sunk.
That's rght, and it happens to the whole world too including those countries destroyed by US and under its sanction. The bombastic propaganda MSM fake news and Hollywood have brainwashed all to harbour delusion that US is a perfect heaven paved with gold, honey and milk, people of high morality and freedom. Wait till they live there to find out reality of DemoNcracy made in USA.
Mar 23, 2017 |
fresno dan March 22, 2017 at 6:56 pmcraazyboy March 22, 2017 at 8:45 pmSo I see where Nunes in a ZeroHedge posting says that there might have been "incidental surveillance" of "Trump" (?Trump associates? ?Trump tower? ?Trump campaign?)
Now to the average NC reader, it kinda goes without saying. But I don't think Trump understands the scope of US government "surveillance" and I don't think the average citizen, certainly not the average Trump supporter, does either – the nuances and subtleties of it – the supposed "safeguards".I can understand the rationale for it .but this goes to show that when you give people an opportunity to use secret information for their own purposes .they will use secret information for their own purposes.
And at some point, the fact of the matter that the law regarding the "incidental" leaking appears to have been broken, and that this leaking IMHO was purposefully broken for political purposes .is going to come to the fore. Like bringing up "fake news" – some of these people on the anti Trump side seem not just incapable of playing 11th dimensional chess, they seem incapable of winning tic tac toe .
Was Obama behind it? I doubt it and I don't think it would be provable. But it seems like the intelligence agencies are spending more time monitoring repubs than Al queda. Now maybe repubs are worse than Al queda – I think its time we have a real debate instead of the pseudo debates and start asking how useful the CIA is REALLY. (and we can ask how useful repubs and dems are too)
Irredeemable Deplorable March 23, 2017 at 2:57 amIf Obama taped the information, stuffed the tape in one of Michelle's shoeboxes, then hid the shoebox in the Whitehouse basement, he could be in trouble. Ivanka is sure to search any shoeboxes she finds.
Lambert Strether Post author March 23, 2017 at 4:08 amOh the Trump supporters are all over this, don't worry. There are many more levels to what is going on than what is reported in the fakenews MSM.
Adm Roger of NSA made his November visit to Trump Tower, after a SCIF was installed there, to .be interviewed for a job uh-huh yeah.
Freedom Watch lawyer Larry Klayman has a whistle-blower who has stated on the record, publicly, he has 47 hard drives with over 600,000,00 pages of secret CIA documents that detail all the domestic spying operations, and likely much much more.
The rabbit hole goes very deep here. Attorney Klayman has stated he has been trying to out this for 2 years, and was stonewalled by swamp creatures, so he threatened to go public this week. Several very interesting videos, and a public letter, are out there, detailing all this. Nunes very likely saw his own conversations transcripted from surveillance taken at Trump Tower (he was part of the transition team), and realized the jig was up. Melania has moved out of Trump Tower to stay elsewhere, I am sure after finding out that many people in Washington where watching them at home in their private residence, whichi is also why Pres Trump sent out those famous angry tweets 2 weeks ago. Democrats on the Committee (and many others) are liars, and very possibly traitors, which is probably why Nunes neglected to inform them. Nunes did follow proper procedures, notifying Ryan first etc, you can ignore the MSM bluster there ..observe Nunes body language in the 2 videos of his dual press briefings he gave today, he appears shocked, angry, disturbed etc.
You all should be happy, because although Pres Trump has been vindicated here on all counts, the more important story for you is that the old line Democratic Party looks about to sink under the wieght of thier own lies and illegalities. This all stems from Obama's Jan 16 signing of the order broadening "co-operation" between the NSA and everybody else in Washington, so that mid-level analysts at almost any agency could now look at raw NSA intercepts, that is where all the "leaks" and "unmasking" are coming from.
AG Lynch, Obama, and countless others knew, or should have known, all about this, but I am sure they will play the usual "I was too stupid too know what was going on in my own organization" card.
> Was Obama behind it? I doubt it and I don't think it would be provable
I think he knew about it. After fulminating about weedy technicalities, let me just say that Obama's EO12333 expansion made sure that whatever anti-Trump information got picked up by the intelligence community could be spread widely, and would be hard to trace back to an individual source .
Mar 14, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
Jerry Brown : March 12, 2017 at 10:26 PM , 2017 at 10:26 PMNice post at Econospeak. The Safeway Amendment Scam - EconoSpeakpgl -> Jerry Brown... , March 13, 2017 at 01:48 AMEspecially agree with the conclusion- "Using disinformation to promote an agenda of shifting more costs onto workers to enhance profit margins. Isn't this what Paul Ryan means by "A Better Way"?"
Check out the latest from the disgusting Paul Ryan:Lee A. Arnold -> pgl... , March 13, 2017 at 04:41 AMhttp://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/paul-ryan-number-who-will-lose-coverage-up-to-people
He is gloating that we have more "choices" as he takes away any possible means for actually paying for our health care. This in a nutshell is the entire GOP approach. We are free to die.
"Free to die, Pay to live!"DrDick -> pgl... , March 13, 2017 at 07:33 AMIn my state, one company (BC/BS) controls 0ver 70% of the health insurance market and there are only two other even marginally significant players. Market based my ...
May 08, 2003 |
Nineteenth-century empires were often led on from one war to another as a result of developments which imperial governments did not plan and domestic populations did not desire. In part this was the result of plotting by individual 'prancing proconsuls', convinced they could gain a reputation at small risk, given the superiority of their armies to any conceivable opposition; but it was also the result of factors inherent in the imperial process.
The difference today is that overwhelming military advantage is possessed not by a set of competing Western states, but by one state alone. Other countries may possess elements of the technology, and many states are more warlike than America; but none possesses anything like the ability of the US to integrate these elements (including Intelligence) into an effective whole, and to combine them with weight of firepower, capacity to transport forces over long distances and national bellicosity. The most important question now facing the world is the use the Bush Administration will make of its military dominance, especially in the Middle East. The next question is when and in what form resistance to US domination over the Middle East will arise. That there will be resistance is certain. It would be contrary to every historical precedent to believe that such a quasi-imperial hegemony will not stir up resentment, which sooner or later is bound to find an effective means of expression.US domination over the Middle East will, for the most part, be exercised indirectly, and will provoke less grievance than direct administration would, but one likely cause of trouble is the 'proletarian colonisation' of Israel – the Jewish settlements in the Occupied Territories. Given past experience and the indications now coming from Israel, there is little reason to hope for any fundamental change in Israeli policies. Sharon may eventually withdraw a few settlements – allowing the US Administration and the Israeli lobby to present this as a major concession and sacrifice – but unless there is a tremendous upheaval in both Israeli and US domestic politics, he and his successors are unlikely to offer the Palestinians anything more than tightly controlled bantustans.
Palestinian terrorism, Israeli repression and wider Arab and Muslim resentment seem likely to continue for the foreseeable future.
How long it will be before serious resistance grows is hard to tell. In some 19th-century cases, notably Afghanistan, imperial rule never consolidated itself and was overthrown almost immediately by new revolts. In others, it lasted for decades without involving too much direct repression, and ended only after tremendous social, economic, political and cultural changes had taken place not only in the colonies and dependencies but in the Western imperial countries themselves. Any attempt to predict the future of the Middle East must recognise that the new era which began on 11 September 2001 has not only brought into the open certain latent pathologies in American and British society, culture and politics; it has also fully revealed the complete absence of democratic modernisation, or indeed any modernisation, in all too much of the Muslim world.
The fascination and the horror of the present time is that so many different and potentially disastrous possibilities suggest themselves. The immediate issue is whether the US will attack any other state. Or, to put the question another way: will the US move from hegemony to empire in the Middle East? And if it does, will it continue to march from victory to victory, or will it suffer defeats which will sour American public support for the entire enterprise?
For Britain, the most important question is whether Tony Blair, in his capacity as a senior adviser to President Bush, can help to stop US moves in this direction and, if he fails, whether Britain is prepared to play the only role it is likely to be offered in a US empire: that fulfilled by Nepal in the British Empire – a loyal provider of brave soldiers with special military skills. Will the British accept a situation in which their chief international function is to provide auxiliary cohorts to accompany the Roman legions of the US, with the added disadvantage that British cities, so far from being protected in return by the empire, will be exposed to destruction by 'barbarian' counter-attacks?
As is clear from their public comments, let alone their private conversations, the Neo-Conservatives in America and their allies in Israel would indeed like to see a long-term imperial war against any part of the Muslim world which defies the US and Israel, with ideological justification provided by the American mission civilisatrice – 'democratisation'. In the words of the Israeli Major-General Ya'akov Amidror, writing in April under the auspices of the Jerusalem Centre for Public Affairs, 'Iraq is not the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal is the Middle East, the Arab world and the Muslim world. Iraq will be the first step in this direction; winning the war against terrorism means structurally changing the entire area.' The Neo-Con model is the struggle against 'Communism', which they are convinced was won by the Reaganite conflation of military toughness and ideological crusading. The ultimate goal here would be world hegemony by means of absolute military superiority.
The Neo-Cons may be deluding themselves, however. It may well be that, as many US officials say in private, Bush's new national security strategy is 'a doctrine for one case only' – namely Iraq. Those who take this position can point to the unwillingness of most Americans to see themselves in imperial terms, coupled with their powerful aversion to foreign entanglements, commitments and sacrifices. The Bush Administration may have made menacing statements about Syria, but it has also assured the American people that the US military occupation of Iraq will last 18 months at the very most. Furthermore, if the economy continues to falter, it is still possible that Bush will be ejected from office in next year's elections. Should this happen, some of the US's imperial tendencies will no doubt remain in place – scholars as different as Andrew Bacevich and Walter Russell Mead have stressed the continuity in this regard from Bush through Clinton to Bush, and indeed throughout US history. However, without the specific configuration of hardline elements empowered by the Bush Administration, American ambitions would probably take on a less megalomaniac and frightening aspect.
In this analysis, both the grotesque public optimism of the Neo-Con rhetoric about democratisation and its exaggeration of threats to the US stem from the fact that it takes a lot to stir ordinary Americans out of their customary apathy with regard to international affairs. While it is true that an element of democratic messianism is built into what Samuel Huntington and others have called 'the American Creed', it is also the case that many Americans have a deep scepticism – healthy or chauvinist according to taste – about the ability of other countries to develop their own forms of democracy.
In the case of Iraq, this scepticism has been increased by the scenes of looting and disorder. In addition, there have been well-publicised harbingers both of incipient ethnic conflict and of strong mass opposition to a long-term US military presence and a US-chosen Iraqi Government. Even the Washington Post , which was one of the cheerleaders for this war in the 'serious' American press, and which has not been too anxious to publicise Iraqi civilian casualties, has reported frankly on the opposition to US plans for Iraq among the country's Shia population in particular.
Even if most Americans and a majority of the Administration want to move to indirect control over Iraq, the US may well find that it has no choice but to exercise direct rule. Indeed, even those who hated the war may find themselves morally trapped into supporting direct rule if the alternative appears to be a collapse into anarchy, immiseration and ethnic conflict. There is a tremendous difference in this regard between Iraq and Afghanistan. In Afghanistan, the mass of the population has been accustomed to fend for itself with very little help from the state, very little modern infrastructure and for that matter very little formal employment. In these circumstances, it was possible for the US to install a ramshackle pretence of a coalition government in Kabul, with a tenuous truce between its elements held in place by an international peacekeeping force backed by US firepower. The rest of the country could be left in the hands of warlords, clans and ethnic militias, as long as they made their territories open hunting ranges for US troops in their search for al-Qaida. The US forces launch these raids from airbases and heavily fortified, isolated camps in which most soldiers are kept rigidly separated from Afghans.
Doubtless many US planners would be delighted to dominate Iraq in the same semi-detached way, but Iraq is a far more modern society than Afghanistan, and much more heavily urbanised: without elements of modern infrastructure and services and a state to guarantee them, living standards there will not recover. Iraq needs a state; but for a whole set of reasons, it will find the creation of a workable democratic state extremely difficult. The destruction of the Baath regime has involved the destruction of the Sunni Arab military dominance on which the Iraqi state has depended since its creation by the British. Neither the US nor anyone else has any clear idea of what to put in its place (if one ignores the fatuous plan of Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz to install Ahmad Chalabi as an American puppet and Iraqi strongman). Equally important, the US will not allow the creation of a truly independent state. Ultimately, it may well see itself as having no choice but to create the state itself and remain deeply involved not just in supporting it but in running it, as the British did in Egypt for some sixty years.
Very often – perhaps most of the time – the old imperial powers preferred to exercise control indirectly, through client states. This was far cheaper, far easier to justify domestically and ran far less chance of provoking native revolt. The problem was that the very act of turning a country into a client tended to cripple the domestic prestige of the client regime, and to place such economic, political and moral pressures on it that it was liable to collapse. The imperial power then had the choice of either pulling out (and allowing the area to fall into the hands of enemies) or stepping in and imposing direct control. This phenomenon can be seen from Awadh and Punjab in the 1840s to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1989.
Of course, the threat to imperial client states did not come only from within their own borders. In a world where ethnic, clan, religious and personal loyalties spilled across national boundaries, a power that seized one territory was likely to find itself inexorably drawn to conquering its neighbours. There were always military, commercial or missionary interests to agitate for this expansion, often backed by exiled opposition groups ready to stress that the mass of the population would rejoice in an imperial invasion to bring them to power.
Whatever the Neo-Cons and the Israeli Government may wish, there is I believe no fixed intention on the part of the US Administration to attack either Syria or Iran, let alone Saudi Arabia. What it had in mind was that an easy and crushing US victory over Iraq would so terrify other Muslim states that they would give up any support for terrorist groups, collaborate fully in cracking down on terrorists and Islamist radicals, and abandon their own plans to develop weapons of mass destruction, thereby making it unnecessary for the US to attack them. This applied not only to perceived enemies such as Syria, Iran and Libya, but to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Yemen and other states seen as unreliable allies in the 'war against terrorism'. If the US restricts itself to this strategy and this goal, it may enjoy success – for a while at least. Several states in the region are clearly running very scared. Moreover, every single state in the region – including Iran – feels under threat from the forces of Sunni Islamist revolution as represented by al-Qaida and its ideological allies; so there is a genuine common interest in combating them.
But for this strategy to work across such a wide range of states and societies as those of the Muslim world, US policymakers would have to display considerable sensitivity and discrimination. These are virtues not usually associated with the Bush Administration, least of all in its present triumphalist mood. The policy is in any case not without its dangers. What happens if the various pressures put on the client regimes cause them to collapse? And what happens if an enemy calls America's bluff, and challenges it to invade? It is all too easy to see how a new US offensive could result. Another major terrorist attack on the US could upset all equations and incite another wave of mass hysteria that would make anything possible. If, for example, it were once again perceived to have been financed and staffed by Saudis, the pressure for an attack on Saudi Arabia could become overwhelming. The Iranian case is even trickier. According to informed European sources, the Iranians may be within two years of developing a nuclear deterrent (it's even possible that successful pressure on Russia to cut off nuclear trade would not make any crucial difference). Israel in particular is determined to forestall Iranian nuclear capability, and Israeli commentators have made it clear that Israel will take unilateral military action if necessary. If the US and Israeli Governments are indeed determined to stop Iran acquiring nuclear weapons, they may not have much time.
The second factor is the behaviour of the Shias of Iraq, and especially of Iranian-backed factions. Leading Shia groups have boycotted the initial discussions on forming a government. If they maintain this position, and if the US fails to create even the appearance of a viable Iraqi government, with disorder spreading in consequence, Iran will be blamed, rightly or not, by powerful elements in Washington. They will use it as an additional reason to strike against Iranian nuclear sites. In response, Tehran might well promote not only a further destabilisation of Iraq but a terrorist campaign against the US, which would in turn provoke more US retaliations until a full-scale war became a real possibility.
Although the idea of an American invasion of Iran is viewed with horror by most military analysts (and, as far as I can gather, by the uniformed military), the latest polls suggest that around 50 per cent of Americans are already prepared to support a war to prevent Iran acquiring nuclear weapons. Moreover, the voices of moderation among the military tend to be the same ones which warned – as I did – of the possibility of stiff Iraqi resistance to a US invasion and the dangers of urban warfare in Baghdad, opposed Rumsfeld's plans to invade with limited numbers of relatively lightly armed troops and felt vindicated in their concern by the initial setbacks around Nasiriya and elsewhere. The aftermath has shown Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld to have been correct in their purely military calculations about Iraq, and this will undoubtedly strengthen them in future clashes with the uniformed military. Rumsfeld's whole strategy of relying on lighter, more easily transportable forces is, of course, precisely designed to make such imperial expeditions easier.
As for the majority of Americans, well, they have already been duped once, by a propaganda programme which for systematic mendacity has few parallels in peacetime democracies: by the end of it, between 42 and 56 per cent of Americans (the polls vary) were convinced that Saddam Hussein was directly involved in the attacks of 11 September. This gave the run-up to the war a peculiarly nightmarish quality in the US. It was as if the full truth about Tonkin Gulf, instead of emerging in dribs and drabs over a decade, had been fully available and in the open the whole time – and the US intervention in Vietnam had happened anyway.
While the special place of Saddam Hussein in American demonology means that this wouldn't be an easy trick to repeat, the American public's ignorance of international affairs in general and the Muslim world in particular make it by no means impossible. It isn't just Fox TV: numerous even more rabid media outlets, the Christian Coalition and parts of the Israeli lobby are all dedicated to whipping up hatred of Arabs and Muslims. More important is the fact that most Americans accept Bush's equation of terrorism and 'evil', which makes it extremely difficult to conduct any serious public discussion of threats from the Muslim world in terms which would be acceptable or even comprehensible to a mass American audience. Add to this the severe constraints on the discussion of the role of Israel, and you have a state of public debate close to that described by Marcuse. If America suffered another massive terrorist attack in the coming years, the dangers would be incomparably greater.
If the plans of the Neo-Cons depended on mass support for imperialism within the US, they would be doomed to failure. The attacks of 11 September, however, have given American imperialists the added force of wounded nationalism – a much deeper, more popular and more dangerous phenomenon, strengthened by the Israeli nationalism of much of the American Jewish community. Another attack on the American mainland would further inflame that nationalism, and strengthen support for even more aggressive and ambitious 'retaliations'. The terrorists may hope that they will exhaust Americans' will to fight, as the Vietcong did; if so, they may have underestimated both the tenacity and the ferocity of Americans when they feel themselves to have been directly attacked. The capacity for ruthlessness of the nationalist or Jacksonian element in the American democratic tradition – as in the firebombing of Japan and North Korea, neither of which had targeted American civilians – has been noted by Walter Russell Mead, and was recently expressed by MacGregor Knox, an American ex-soldier, now a professor at the LSE: Europeans 'may believe that the natural order of things as they perceive it – the restraint of American power through European wisdom – will sooner or later triumph. But such expectations are delusional. Those who find militant Islam terrifying have clearly never seen a militant democracy.'
America could certainly be worn out by a protracted guerrilla struggle on the scale of Vietnam. It seems unlikely, however, that a similar struggle could be mounted in the Middle East – unless the US were to invade Iran, at which point all bets and predictions would be off. Another terrorist attack on the US mainland, using some form of weapons of mass destruction, far from demoralising the US population would probably whip it into chauvinist fury.
To understand why successful guerrilla warfare against the US is unlikely (quite apart from the fact that there are no jungles in the Middle East), it is necessary to remember that the imperial domination made possible by 19th-century Western military superiority was eventually destroyed by three factors: first, the development of military technology (notably such weapons as the automatic rifle, the grenade and modern explosives) which considerably narrowed the odds between Western armies and 'native' insurgents. Second, the development of modern ideologies of resistance – Communist, nationalist or a combination of the two – which in turn produced the cadres and structures to organise resistance. Third, weariness on the part of 'metropolitan' populations and elites, stemming partly from social and cultural change, and partly from a growing awareness that direct empire did not pay economically.
Guerrilla warfare against the US is now a good deal more difficult because of two undramatic but immensely important innovations: superbly effective and light bullet-proof vests and helmets which make the US and British soldier almost as well protected as the medieval knight; and night-vision equipment which denies the guerrilla the aid of his oldest friend and ally, darkness. Both of these advantages can be countered, but it will be a long time before the odds are narrowed again. Of course, local allies of the US can be targeted, but their deaths are hardly noticed by US public opinion. More and more, therefore, 'asymmetric warfare' will encourage a move to terrorism.
The absence or failure of revolutionary parties led by cadres working for mass mobilisation confirms this. The Islamists may alter this situation, despite the disillusioning fate of the Iranian Revolution. But as far as the nationalists are concerned, it has been tried in the past, and while it succeeded in expelling the colonialists and their local clients, it failed miserably to produce modernised states. Algeria is a clear example: a hideously savage but also heroic rebellion against a particularly revolting form of colonialism – which eventually led to such an utterly rotten and unsuccessful independent state that much of the population eventually turned to Islamic revolution.
And now this, too, is discredited, above all in the one major country where it succeeded, Iran. Arab states have failed to develop economically, politically and socially, and they have also failed properly to unite. When they have united for the purposes of war, they have been defeated. Rebellion against the US may take place in Iraq. Elsewhere, the mass response to the latest Arab defeat seems more likely to be a further wave of despair, disillusionment and retreat into private life – an 'internal emigration'. In some fortunate cases, this may lead to a new Islamist politics focused on genuine reform and democratic development – along the lines of the changes in Turkey. But a cynicism which only feeds corruption and oppression is just as likely a result.
Even if despair and apathy turn out to be the responses of the Arab majority, there will also be a minority which is too proud, too radical, too fanatical or too embittered – take your pick – for such a course. They are the natural recruits for terrorism, and it seems likely that their numbers will only have been increased by the latest American victory. We must fear both the strengthening of Islamist terrorism and the reappearance of secular nationalist terrorism, not only among Palestinians but among Arabs in general. The danger is not so much that the Bush Administration will consciously adopt the whole Neo-Con imperialist programme as that the Neo-Cons and their allies will contribute to tendencies stemming inexorably from the US occupation of Iraq and that the result will be a vicious circle of terrorism and war. If this proves to be the case, then the damage inflicted over time by the US on the Muslim world and by Muslims on the US and its allies is likely to be horrendous. We have already shown that we can destroy Muslim states. Even the most ferocious terrorist attacks will not do that to Western states; but if continued over decades, they stand a good chance of destroying democracy in America and any state associated with it.
Dec 18, 2017 | discussion.theguardian.com
MakeBeerNotWar -> Smallworld5 , 4 Dec 2014 03:17
'MEIN FUHRER!! - I CAN WALK!!!!'LOL Oh, yes- same here. My late father loved Peter Sellers and to my mother's annoyance would sometimes do Strangelove impersonations w jerking arm. His WWII convoy officer veteran half German (and fully German fluent) father also thought the film was funny as hell and few German Americans hated the Nazis as much as my grandfather did.
I saw the film for the very first time as a US Marine PFC stationed in Okinawa Autumn 1981 during of all things, a big typhoon which kept us confined to some scattered barracks up at then remote- and beautiful- Camp Schwab. Two bored captains touring my deserted barracks I stood duty in noticed in one cubicle a Beta video player and copy of the film and- kid you not- when I confessed I had never seen the film, ordered me to watch it with them and I was hooked. The two officers laughed hysterically like naughty little school boys on the bunk they sat on as I pulled up a wooden footlocker. Utterly brilliant and imo has aged well- a masterpiece.
Making of docu:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ6BiRtGTAk'I do not avoid women, Mandrake, but I do deny them my essence.' - Sellers' creepy chuckle in response to Sterling Hayden's deranged rant alone still has me howling.
I grew up during the "hottest" part of the Cold War with my family living literally next to a Nike nuclear SAM site(w armed sentries and scary dogs inside the barbed wire) in San Pedro, CA. - we never lost any sleep over it even tho my '50s conscript Army vet dad quipped we were a high priority target in any war w the Soviets.
http://www.ftmac.org/lanike1.htm
http://www.coldwarla.com/missile-sites.html
- I find myself missing the Cold War sometimes- the moral certainties were better defined.
Dec 03, 2017 | www.theguardian.com
MakeBeerNotWar -> Smallworld5 , 3 Dec 2014 20:23- Dr Strangelove would approve.MakeBeerNotWar , 3 Dec 2014 20:21I heard earlier today on the radio Carter is Obama's nom- I laughed as I called it here last week- Obama's Deep State masters' top pick as a very smooth below radar Trojan Horse neo con who will fly through confirmation and has doubtless has big plans. The GOP and the MIC will love him, new wars will be cooked up for Americans to die in and I'm sure he has less than democratic views on Americans who will protest their govt for this. The Soviets' crushing of the 1968 Prague Spring makes for a nice blueprint on how to silence dissent if the anti Occupy tactics don't work and a dialed down version of martial law could be here to stay.MarkThomason , 3 Dec 2014 18:41Ashton Carter was one of the most extreme of the neocon hawks in the upper levels of the Bush Admin. His specific assignment was to ensure there could never be a "peer competitor" by throwing money at the bleeding cutting edge of weapons technology.midnightschild10 , 3 Dec 2014 18:03Along the way, he was one of only two senior people openly advocated for a pre-emptive attack on N. Korea. Even Bush thought that was too much, and even Cheney did not support it, but Carter pushed it.
One can wonder how a neocon, wife of a leading neocon, came to be in charge in Ukraine, to declaim "f-the-EU" and boast of spending billions to promote this second color revolution, giving cookies to open Nazis along the way.
However, now with Carter we see that the neocons have captured the policy part of the Obama Admin -- it wasn't an accident, it was design that we did that, and now will go back into Iraq, attack Syria, and attack Iran.
What could go wrong with someone advocating bombing North Korea? Just the type of person the job requires. The only criteria for the job was: must love war. So, while we are bombing Iraq, Syria, Yemen, occasionally Pakistan, we can figure out how much we will pay contractors for armament to take care of Iran and North Korea as well. He will certainly fit into Obama's cabinet as another yes man. Just like so many who have no military experience outside of watching war movies and video games, he is exactly what Obama wants. Someone who agrees how easy it is to start wars. He probably won't face much opposition since Obama has become an official member of the neocons now running the country. Anyone who would caution that the unending wars are taking the country down the road that destroyed the Soviet Union need not apply. The US doesn't feel that domestic issues are a priority, why put money into fixing the failing infrastructure when you can buy more drones. He'll do fine as long as he takes his orders from Nuland, Psaki and Harf.zelazny , 3 Dec 2014 17:51Another sociopath willing to do the biding of the sociopaths who run the USA. The rich profit immensely from the department of war, as this article intimates. Every dead Muslim child means profits for rich Americans.Micheal Cairagan , 3 Dec 2014 17:25Don't know about secretary of war, but he was great in "The Butterfly Effect".MBDifani , 3 Dec 2014 16:05I wonder if Mr. Carter will last as long as the late Sec. of Defense McNamara who served from early '61 to early 1968 when Pres. Johnson moved him to the head of the UN World Bank. A former secretary was William Cohen, a Republican, who served under Clinton. Leon Panetta and Robert Gates did well, but both wrote critical books about Obama after leaving. A complex job, dealing with the White House and the four star hawks in the Pentagon. Oh, a few doves too.
Dec 18, 2017 | russia-insider.com
"The two (Trump and Clinton) cannot greet one another on stage, cannot say goodbye to one another at the end. They barely can get out the texts that have been prepared for them by their respective staffs. Repeating on stage what one may have said in the locker room."
"Billions of people around the world conclude with one word: Disgrace!"
- Vladimir Zhirinovsky - prominent Russian politician, leader of a major party in parliament.
The American public is now experiencing mass paranoia that is called Russia-gate. Obnoxious and dangerous as this officially encouraged madness may be, it is, alas, nothing new. As from 9/11, the same kind of group hypnosis was administered from the Nation's Capital on the body politic to serve the then agenda of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, turning back civil liberties that had accrued over generations without so much as a whimper from Congress, our political elites and the country at large.
This time the generalized paranoia started under the nominally left of center administration of Barack Obama in the closing months of his presidency. It has been fanned ever since by the centrists in both Democratic and Republican parties who want to either remove from office or politically cripple Donald Trump and his administration, that is to say, to overturn the results at the ballot box on November 8, 2016.
Foreign policy issues are instrumentalized for domestic political objectives. In 2001 it was the threat of Islamist terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Muslim world attacking the American homeland. Today it is the alleged manipulation of our open political system by our enemies in the Kremlin.
Americans are wont to forget that there is a world outside the borders of the USA and that others follow closely what is said and written in our media, especially by our political leadership and policy elites. They forget or do not care how the accusations and threats we direct at other countries in our domestic political squabbling, and still more the sanctions we impose on our ever changing list of authoritarians and other real or imagined enemies abroad might be interpreted there and what preparations or actions might be taken by those same enemies in self-defense, threatening not merely American interests but America's physical survival.
In no case is this more relevant than with respect to Russia, which, I remind readers, is the only country on earth capable of turning the entire Continental United States into ashes within a day. In point of fact, if Russia has prepared itself for war, as the latest issue of Newsweek magazine tells us, we have no one but our political leadership to blame for that state of affairs. They are tone deaf to what is said in Russia. We have no concern for Russian national interests and "red lines" as the Russians themselves define them. Our Senators and Congressmen listen only to what our home grown pundits and academics think the Russian interests should be if they are to fit in a world run by us. That is why the Senate can vote 98-2 in favor of making the sanctions against Russia laid down by executive order of Barack Obama into sanctions under federal legislation as happened this past summer.
There is in the United States a significant minority of journalists and experts who have been setting out the facts on why the Russia-gate story is deeply flawed if not a fabrication from the get-go. In this small but authoritative and responsible field, Consortium News stands out for its courage and dogged fact-checking and logic-checks. Others on the side of the angels include TruthDig.com and Antiwar.com .
The Russia-gate story has permutated over time as one or another element of the investigation into Donald Trump's alleged collusion with the Kremlin has become more or less promising. But the core issue has always been the allegation of Russian hacking of DNC computers on July 5, 2016 and the hand-over of thousands of compromising documents to Wikileaks for the purpose of discrediting putative Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and throwing the election to Donald Trump, who had at that time nearly clinched the Republican nomination.
Perhaps the most significant challenge to the official US intelligence story of Russian hacking released on January 6, 2017 was the forensic evidence assembled by a group of former intelligence officers with relevant technical expertise known as VIPS (Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity). Their work, arguing that the attack on the DNC computers was an inside job by someone with access to the hardware rather than a remote operation by persons outside the Democratic Party hierarchy and possibly outside the United States, was published in Consortium News ("Intel Vets Challenge 'Russia Hack' Evidence") on July 24, 2017.
The VIPS material was largely ignored by mainstream media, as might be expected. An editorial entitled "The unchecked threat from Russia" published by The Washington Post yesterday is a prime example of how our media bosses continue to whip up public fury against collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin even when, by their own admission, "no conclusive proof has surfaced."
The VIPS piece last July was based on the laws of physics, demonstrating that speed limitations on transfer of data over the internet at the time when the crime is alleged to have taken place rendered impossible the CIA, NSA and FBI scenario of Russian hacking In what follows, I will introduce a very different type of evidence challenging the official US intelligence story of Russian hacking and meddling in general, what I would call circumstantial evidence that goes to the core issue of what the Kremlin really wanted. Let us consider whether Mr. Putin had a motive to put his thumb on the scales in the American presidential election.
In the U.S., that is a slam-dunk question. But that comes from our talking to ourselves in the mirror. My evidence comes precisely from the other side of the issue: what the Kremlin elites were saying about the US elections and their preferred candidate to win while the campaign was still going on. I present it on a privileged basis because it is what I gathered on my several visits to Moscow and talks with a variety of insiders close to Vladimir Putin from September through the start of November, 2016. Moreover, there is no tampering with this evidence on my part, because the key elements were published at the time I gathered them, well before the US election. They appeared as incidental observations in lengthy essays dealing with a number of subjects and would not have attracted the attention they merit today.
* * * *
Political talk shows are a very popular component of Russian television programming on all channels, both state-run and commercial channels. They are mostly carried on prime time in the evening but also are showing in mid-afternoon, where they have displaced soap operas and cooking lessons as entertainment for housewives and pensioners. They are broadcast live either to the Moscow time zone or to the Far East time zone. Given the fact that Russia extends over 9 time zones, they are also video recorded and reshown locally at prime time. In the case of the highest quality and most watched programs produced by Vesti 24 for the Rossiya One channel, they also are posted in their entirety and in the original Russian on youtube, and they are accessible worldwide by anyone with a computer or tablet phone using a downloadable free app.
I underline the importance of accessibility of these programs globally via live streaming or podcasts on simple handheld gadgets. Russian speaking professionals in the States had every opportunity to observe much of what I report below, except, of course, for my private conversations with producers and panelists. But the gist of the mood in Moscow with respect to the US elections was accessible to anyone with an interest. As you know, no one reported on it at the time. American media simply were not interested in knowing what Russians were thinking since that might get in the way of their construction of what Russians should be thinking.
The panelists appearing on these different channels come from a rather small pool of Russian legislators, including chairmen of the relevant committees of the Duma (lower house) and Federation Council (upper house), leading journalists, think tank professors, retired military brass. The politicians are drawn from among the most visible and colorful personalities in the Duma parties, but also extend to Liberal parties such as Yabloko, which failed to cross the threshold of 5% in legislative elections and received no seats in parliament.
Then there are very often a number of foreigners among panelists. In the past and at the present, they are typically known for anti-Kremlin positions and so give the predominantly patriotic Russian panelists an opportunity to cross swords, send off sparks and keep the audience awake. These hostile foreigners coming from Ukraine or Poland are Russian speakers from their childhood. The Americans or Israelis who appear are generally former Soviet citizens who emigrated, whether before or after the fall of Communism, and speak native Russian.
"Freshness" is an especially valued commodity in this case, because there is a considerable overlap in the names and faces appearing on these talks whatever the channel. For this there is an objective reason: nearly all the Russian and even foreign guests live in Moscow and are available to be invited or disinvited on short notice given that these talk programs can change their programming if there is breaking news about which their audiences will want to hear commentary. In my own case, I was flown in especially by the various channels who paid airfare and hotel accommodation in Moscow as necessary on the condition that I appear only on their shows during my stay in the city. That is to say, my expenses were covered but there was no honorarium. I make this explicit to rebut in advance any notion that I/we outside panelists were in any way "paid by the Kremlin" or restricted in our freedom of speech on air.
During the period under review, I appeared on both state channels, Rossiya-1 and Pervy Kanal, as well as on the major commercial television channel, NTV. The dates and venues of my participation in these talk shows are as follows:
- September 11 – Sunday Evening with Vladimir Soloviev, Rossiya 1
- September 26 - Sixty Minutes with Yevgeni Popov and Olga Skabeyeva, Rossiya 1
- November 8-9 Time Will Tell.
For purposes of this essay, the pertinent appearances were on September 11 and 26. To this I add the Sixty Minutes show of October 20 which I watched on television but which aired content that I believe is important to this discussion.
My debut on the number one talk show in Russia, Sunday Evening with Vladimir Soloviev, on September 11 was invaluable not so much for what was said on air but for the exchange I had with the program's host, Vladimir Soloviev, in a five minute tête-à-tête in the guests' lounge before the program went on air.
Soloviev obviously had not yet read his guest list, did not know who I am and stood ready to respond to me when I walked up to him and unceremoniously put to him the question that interested me the most: whom did he want to see win the US presidential election. He did not hesitate, told me in no uncertain terms that he did not want to see Trump win because the man is volatile, unpredictable and weak. Soloviev added that he and others do not expect anything good in relations with the United States in general whoever won. He rejected the notion that Trump's turning the Neocons out of government would be a great thing in and of itself.
As I now understand, Soloviev's resistance to the idea that Trump could be a good thing was not just an example of Russians' prioritizing stability, the principle "better the devil you know," meaning Hillary. During a recent chat with a Russian ambassador, someone also close to power, I heard the conviction that the United States is like a big steamship which has its own inertia and cannot be turned around, that presidents come and go but American foreign policy remains the same. This view may be called cynical or realistic, depending on your taste, but it is reflective of the thinking that comes out from many of the panelists in the talk shows as you will find below in my quotations from the to-and-fro on air. It may also explain Soloviev's negativism.
To appreciate what weight the opinions of Vladimir Soloviev carry, you have to consider just who he is. That his talk show is the most professional from among numerous rival shows, that it attracts the most important politicians and expert guests is only part of the story. What is more to the point is that he is as close to Vladimir Putin as journalists can get.
In April, 2015 Vladimir Soloviev conducted a two hour interview with Putin that was aired on Rossiya 1 under the title "The President." In early January 2016, the television documentary "World Order," co-written and directed by Soloviev, set out in forceful terms Vladimir Putin's views on American and Western attempts to stamp out Russian sovereignty that first were spoken at the Munich Security Conference in February 2007 and have evolved and become ever more frank since.
Soloviev has a Ph.D. in economics from the Institute of World Economics and International Relations of the USSR Academy of Sciences. He was an active entrepreneur in the 1990s and spent some time back then in the USA, where his activities included teaching economics at the University of Alabama. He is fluent in English and has been an unofficial emissary of the Kremlin to the USA at various times.
For all of these reasons, I believe it is safe to say that Vladimir Soloviev represents the thinking of Russian elites close to their president, if not the views of Putin himself.
On September 27 , I took part in the Sixty Minutes talk show that was presented as a post mortem of the first Trump-Clinton debate the day before. I direct attention to this show because it demonstrates the sophistication and discernment of commentary about the United States and its electoral process. All of this runs against the "slam-dunk" scenario based on a cartoon-like representation of Russia and its decision makers.
The show's hosts tried hard to convey the essence of American political culture to their audience and they did some effective research to this end. Whereas French and other Western media devoted coverage on the day after the debates to the appearance of the American presidential candidates and especially to Hillary (what else attracts comment from the male world of journalism if not a lady's hair styling and sartorial choices), 'Sixty Minutes' tweaked this aspect of the debates to find politically relevant commentary.
To make their point, presenter Yevgeny Popov came on stage in a blue suit and blue tie very similar in coloring to Trump's, while his wife and co-presenter Olga Skabeyeva was wearing a garment in the same red hue as Hillary. They proceeded to note that these color choices of the candidates represented an inversion of the traditional colors of the Democratic and Republican parties in American political tradition. And they took this a step further by declaring it to be in line with the inversion of policies in the electoral platforms of the candidates. Hillary had taken over the hawkish foreign policy positions of the Republicans and their Neoconservative wing. Donald had taken over the dovish foreign policy positions normally associated with Democrats. Moreover, Donald also had gone up against the free trade policies that were an engrained part of Republican ideology up until now and were often rejected by Democrats with their traditional financial backers from among labor unions. All of these observations were essentially correct and astute as far as the campaigns went. It is curious to hear them coming from precisely Russian journalists, when they were largely missed by West European and American commentators.
As mentioned above, foreigners are often important to the Russian talk shows to add pepper and salt. In this case, we were largely decorative. The lion's share of the program was shared between the Russian politicians and journalists on the panel who very ably demonstrated in their own persona that Russian elites were split down the middle on whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton was their preferred next occupant of the Oval Office
The reasons given were not what you heard within the USA: that Trump is vulgar, that Trump is a bigot and misogynist. Instead the Russian Trump-skeptics were saying that he is impulsive and cannot be trusted to act with prudence if there is some mishap, some accidental event occurring between US and Russian forces in the field, for example. They gave expression to the cynical view that the positions occupied by Trump in the pre-election period are purely tactical, to differentiate himself from all competitors first in his own party during the primaries and now from Hillary. Thus, Trump could turn out to be no friend of Russia on the day after the elections.
A direct answer to these changes came from the pro-Trump members of the panel. It was best enunciated by the senior politician in the room, Vyacheslav Nikonov. Nikonov is a Duma member from Putin's United Russia party, the chair of the Education Committee in the 6th Duma. He is also chair of a government sponsored organization of Russian civil society, Russian World, which looks after the interests of Russians and Russian culture in the diaspora abroad.
Nikonov pointed to Trump's courage and determination which scarcely suggest merely tactical considerations driving his campaign. Said Nikonov, Trump had gone up against the entire US political establishment, against the whole of corporate mainstream media and was winning. Nikonov pointed to the surge in Trump poll statistics in the couple of weeks preceding the debate. And he ticked off the 4 swing states which Trump needed to win and where his fortunes were rising fast. Clearly his presentation was carefully prepared, not something casual and off-the-cuff.
During the exchange of doubters and backers of Trump among the Russians, one doubter spoke of Trump as a "non-systemic" politician. This may be loosely interpreted a meaning he is anti-establishment. But in the Russian context it had an odious connotation, being applied to Alexei Navalny and certain members of the American- and EU-backed Parnas political movement, and suggesting seditious intent.
In this connection, Nikonov put an entirely different spin on who Trump is and what he represents as an anti-establishment figure. But then again, maybe such partiality runs in the family. Nikonov is the grandson of Molotov, one of the leading figures who staged the Russian Revolution and governed the young Soviet state.
Who won the first Trump-Clinton debate? Here the producers of Sixty Minutes gave the final verdict to a Vesti news analyst from a remote location whose image was projected on a wall-sized screen. We were told that the debate was a draw: Trump had to demonstrate that he is presidential, which he did. Clinton had to demonstrate she had the stamina to resist the onslaught of 90 minutes with Trump and she also succeeded.
The October 20 program Evening with Vladimir Soloviev, which I watched on television from abroad, was devoted to the third Clinton-Trump debate. My single most important conclusion from the show was that, notwithstanding the very diverse panel, there was a bemused unanimity among them regarding the US presidential electoral campaign: that it was deplorable. They found both candidates to be disgraceful due to their flagrant weaknesses of character and/or records in office, but they were also disturbed by the whole political culture. Particular attention was devoted to the very one-sided position of the American mass media and the centrist establishments of both parties in favor of one candidate, Hillary Clinton. When Russians and former Russians use the terms "McCarthyism" and "managed democracy" to describe the American political process as they did on the show, they know acutely well whereof they speak.
Though flamboyant in his language the nationalist politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the LDPR Party, touched on a number of core concerns that bear repeating extensively, if not in full:
"The debates were weak. The two cannot greet one another on stage, cannot say goodbye to one another at the end. They barely can get out the texts that have been prepared for them by their respective staffs. Repeating on stage what one may have said in the locker room.
Billions of people around the world conclude with one word: disgrace! This is the worst electoral campaign ever. And mostly what we see is the style of the campaign. However much people criticize the USSR – the old fogies who ran it, one and the same, supposedly the conscience of the world.
Now we see the same thing in the USA: the exceptional country – the country that has bases everywhere, soldiers everywhere, is bombing everywhere in some city or other. They are making their 'experiments.' The next experiment is to have a woman in the White House. It will end badly.
Hillary has some kind of dependency. A passion for power – and that is dangerous for the person who will have her finger on the nuclear button. If she wins, on November 9th the world will be at the brink of a big war "
Zhirinovsky made no secret of his partiality for Trump, calling him "clean" and "a good man" whereas Hillary has "blood on her hands" for the deaths of hundreds of thousands due to her policies as Secretary of State. But then again, Zhirinovsky has made his political career over more than 30 years precisely by making outrageous statements that run up against what the Russian political establishment says aloud. Before Trump came along, Zhirinovsky had been the loudest voice in Russian politics in favor of Turkey and its president Erdogan, a position which he came to regret when the Turks shot down a Russian jet at the Syrian border, causing a great rupture in bilateral relations.
The final word on Russia's electoral preferences during the October 20 show was given by the moderator, Vladimir Soloviev: "There can be no illusions. Both Trump and Clinton have a very bad attitude to Russia. What Trump said about us and Syria was no compliment at all. The main theme of American political life right now is McCarthyism and anti-Russian hysteria."
This being Russia, one might assume that the deeply negative views of the ongoing presidential election reflected a general hostility to the USA on the part of the presenter and panelists. But nothing of the sort came out from their discussion. To be sure, there was the odd outburst from Zhirinovsky, who repeated a catchy line that he has delivered at other talk shows: essentially that the USA is eating Russia and the world's lunch given that it consumes the best 40% of what the world produces while it itself accounts for just 20% of world GDP. But otherwise the panelists, including Zhirinovsky, displayed informed respect and even admiration for what the United States has achieved and represents.
The following snippets of their conversation convey this very well and do not require attribution to one or another participant:
"America has the strongest economy, which is why people want to go there and there is a lot for us to borrow from it. We have to learn from them, and not be shy about it."
"Yes, they created the conditions for business. In the morning you file your application. After lunch you can open your business."
"America is a very complex country. It does not pay to demonize it. We have to understand precisely what we like and do not like. On this planet there is no way to avoid them. Whoever becomes president of the USA, the nuclear parity forces us to negotiate and reach agreement."
"The US has opened its doors to the most intelligent people of the world, made it attractive for them. Of course, this builds their exceptionalism. All directors, engineers, composers head there. Our problem is that we got rid of our tsar, our commissars but people are still hired hands. The top people go to the States because the pay is higher."
How are we to understand the discrepancy between the very low marks the panelists gave the US presidential race and their favorable marks for the US as an economic and military powerhouse. It appears to result from their understanding that there is a disconnect between Washington, the presidency and what makes the economy turn over. The panelists concluded that the USA has a political leadership at the national level that is unworthy and inappropriate to its position in the world. On this point, I expect that many American readers of this essay will concur.
* * * *
Ever since his candidacy took off in the spring of 2016, both Liberal Interventionists and Neoconservatives have been warning that a Donald Trump presidency would mean abandonment of US global leadership. They equated Donald's "America First" with isolationism. After all, it was in the openly "isolationist period" of American political history just before the outbreak of WWII that the original America First slogan first appeared.
However, isolationism never left us, even as the United States became engaged in and eventually dominated the world after the end of the Cold War. Even today more than half of the US Senators do not possess passports, meaning they have never been abroad, barring possible trips to Canada using their driver's licenses as ID.
And for those Americans who do travel abroad, the world outside US borders is all too often just an object of prestige tourism, a divertissement, where the lives of local people, their concerns and their interests do not exist on the same high plateau as American lives, concerns and interests. It is not that we are all Ugly Americans, but we are too well insulated from the travails of others and too puffed up with our own exceptionalism.
It is not surprising that in the US foreign policy is not a self-standing intellectual pursuit on a chessboard of its own but is strictly a subset of domestic policy calculations, and in particular of partisan electoral considerations. Indeed, that is very often the case in other countries, as well. The distinction is that the US footprint in the world is vastly greater than that of other countries and policy decisions taken in Washington, especially in the past 20 years of militarized foreign-policy making, spell war or peace, order or chaos in the territories under consideration.
As regards the Russian Federation, the ongoing hysteria over Russia-gate in particular, and over the perceived threat Russia poses to US national interests in general, risks tilting the world into nuclear war.
It is a luxury we manifestly cannot afford to indulge ourselves.
TONY LANE , December 17, 2017 9:59 AM
Kjell Hasthi -> TONY LANE , December 17, 2017 1:50 PMBut we all have to agree that the USA is the more infantile of all The Nations, and since the end of the last war they have made no effort to grow up. They have created RussiaGate where no other nation would dream up such Trivia.
Jimmy Robertson , December 17, 2017 9:22 AMJFK murder was about replacing the president elected by the people. Russia-gate has the same goal. When the American president is enemy, you are not American
tom -> Jimmy Robertson , December 17, 2017 9:23 AMAs shown in this article, the American media has a long track record of misreporting key news items:
https://viableopposition.bl...
The current cycle of fake news about Russia is definitely not a new phenomenon in the United States.
GKW -> tom , December 17, 2017 2:13 PM"Remember the Maine!"
John Tosh , December 17, 2017 9:47 AMDon't forget the Turner Joy and the gulf of Tonkin.
Guy -> John Tosh , December 17, 2017 1:16 PMCan someone tell the big fat cowards exercising around North Korea to please shut the hell up? Cowards make a lot of noise. When Libya was invaded there were no exercises, when Iraq was invaded there were no exercises...... when Vietnam was invaded there were no exercises....
It is obvious to the world that the fat cowards cannot attack a nuclear armed country. They are too yellow bellied to do anything but beat their chest like some stupid gorilla in an African jungle.
Please cut out the announcements of exercises after exercises, it is clogging the airwaves. We are all tired of your stupid exercises... if you want to attack go ahead and get your fat asses whipped like a slave running away from its masters.
Shameless cowards are now becoming highly annoying... it can be called Propaganda terrorism. Cut that nonsense out. You cannot beat North Korea, you know it, the rest of the world knows it. You cannot fight China or Russia, the rest of the world knows it ... so please shut up once and for all.
You are terrorizing the airwaves with your exercise after exercise after exercise. Practice control of the ships that are becoming a maritime hazzard to commercial ships. That is what you need to practice.
Nobody is impressed with your over-bloated expensive war equipment which fail under war conditions. Cut out the exercises before we start turning off our ears for your propaganda.
YELLOW BELIED COWARDS!!!!! Go poison an innocent person or kill a child....it may make you feel better... Big fat cowards.!
ALTERNATE HISTORY -> John Tosh , December 17, 2017 6:15 PMI am also very tired of the bluster . They flap their gums and taunt. Enough already . You have made fools of yourselves in the eyes of the world .
All the while the real diplomacy is going on between South Korea and China with North Korea paying close attention, I am sure. The Russian / Chinese proposal of a rail system from South Korea through North Korea and into China connecting to the connection grid of all of Asia is a far greater prospect for the peace initiative than the saber rattling presently outwardly being displayed.
tom , December 17, 2017 9:39 AMThey keep raising the ante, and the North Koreans keep calling their bluff. They are made to look ridiculous as they don't have a winnable hand and the North Koreans know it.
Emmet Sweeney , December 17, 2017 4:31 PM"American media simply were not interested in knowing what Russians were thinking since that might get in the way of their construction of what Russians should be thinking".
Reminds me of the classic American boss's remark: "Any time I want your opinion, I'll tell you it".
tom , December 17, 2017 9:20 AMThe whole thing is orchestrated by the Zionist state within a state which controls not only America but most of the West - and own the entire mainstream media. They cannot forgive Trump for wanting to make peace with Russia. Their hatred of Christian Russia is visceral and unhinged.
CaperAsh -> tom , December 17, 2017 4:17 PM'...by their own admission, "no conclusive proof has surfaced."'
This is actually quite a neat and elegant example of the kind of deceptive language routinely used by politicians and the media. It is, of course, entirely true that no conclusive proof has surfaced. Indeed, that must follow from the equally true and indisputable fact that no proof of any kind has surfaced. Actually, nothing even vaguely resembling proof has surfaced. There is no evidence at all - not the slightest scrap.
But by slipping in that little adjective "conclusive" the journalist manages to convey quite a strong impression that there is proof - only not quite conclusive proof.
It is just as dishonest and cynical as Ronald Reagan's 1984 campaign remark, "I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent's youth and inexperience".
John C Carleton , December 17, 2017 7:20 AMYes, but R's comment was delightfully witty, and a great 'high ground manoeuvre.'
Kjell Hasthi -> John C Carleton , December 17, 2017 1:43 PMRussiangate is concocted BS, to keep the ignorant American sheep , from understanding Israel picked the "president of the USA".
That American children are murdering innocent children in foreign lands, for the benefit of, not Israel, it is just a figment of the imagination, as the USSR was, and the USA is, but the owners of Israel, City of London, Usury bankers.
Pedophile scum!rosemerry , December 17, 2017 3:29 PM- understanding Israel picked the "president of the USA".
The fraud is in every election district. Israel cannot afford the bussing of Liberals. This is too large for some poor nation like Israel. You are making up "Israel", just like Gordon Duff. It tells me you are the same as Gordon Duff.
thomas malthaus -> Nationalist Globalist Oligarch , December 17, 2017 4:08 PMWhat an excellent article. If only people who have a very small knowledge of Russia/USA relations would bother to read this and reflect upon it, a lot of misconceptions could be cleared up if goodwill is part of the picture.
rosewood11 , December 17, 2017 2:03 PMI think at times the CIA is actually assisting the Russian security services with terror operations. I realize it doesn't make sense with Langley assisting ISIS in Syria, but that's the world we appear to have: selective cooperation.
I don't know if the FSB has the levels of electronics signals intelligence the US has, I do know the US and Russia may have cooperated in raids resulting in deaths of two Caucaus Emirates leaders in 2014-2015. I believe that group has since disbanded and members probably blended into other terror groups.
You can call me Al -> rosewood11 , December 17, 2017 5:59 PMThe thing that is absolutely ridiculous is that the American media and Deep State are what is causing this trouble. I don't know why they want to have a World War so badly, but the only thing keeping our two countries from destruction is Vladimir Putin's hard work and good nature, and Trump's defiance of his "staff."
These Deep State actors in the US have hidey-holes they can run to in case of the unthinkable, but they couldn't care less about the people of the US -- let alone Russia. Their day is coming, and they'll be praying for their mountains to fall on them when it does.
Anyone in the US that's paying any attention at all knows the real story on this, and none of those who do are blaming anyone in Russia. If the day ever comes that the US Deep State takes to their bunkers, they better be prepared to stay in there--Balrogs or no Balrogs--because those of us who manage to survive above will be looking for their sorry azzes when they come out!!!
Stop Bush and Clinton , December 17, 2017 8:41 PMI think that is a great comment.
Just to take your comment a little further ;- get to know every plumber and builder in your area as I am, get on a friendly basis and ask about these "Deep State actors in the US have hidey-holes" over a pint or two.
Then I am starting a crowdfunding fund to bring in "hundreds of thousands" to pay them to screw up their sewage facilities in their hidey-holes SO THEY CAN down in their own BS.
Nationalist Globalist Oligarch , December 17, 2017 2:54 PMAfter Uranium One, it would make sense to assume Russia would have preferred Hitlery in the White House - Uranium One gives Russia something they know all the details of and something they know the US public won't take lightly, so they could easily have blackmailed Hitlery with leaking those details.
Of course they also know Hitlery is a massive warmongering Nazi terrorist, but then again, looks like Trump doesn't differ very much from her on that.
Guy , December 17, 2017 1:07 PMNo need for paranoia, it is a veritable American love fest at the Kremlin, RIA, etc., ever since the CIA informed Moscow that they had "information" on an imminent attack in Russia.
Funny how the CIA has better intel on terrorism in Russia than the Russians do, even stranger than the RF leadership doesn't seem to question the situation what so ever.
Got to hand it to the Americans, a couple of months ago Putin joked about RF "cells" in the USA and now the CIA hands the RF a real cell all ready to go murder some Russians.
Some people talk a good game while some people actually take action.
Superior Europe , December 17, 2017 11:12 AMFor those of you that have some video viewing time available , you will probably enjoy the lecture at the National Press Club , not nearly well attended I might add for this quality venue, of Gilbert Doctoro.
I would highly recommend his latest book also .I am approx half way already and well worth the read.
Kjell Hasthi -> Superior Europe , December 17, 2017 1:37 PMNew legatum prosperity index is up: Europeans enjoy the greatest quality of life worldwide, Russians fall into more impoverishment and low quality of life. Its no secret that, for the past 150 years, Russian's wealth, quality of life and life expectancy is unacceptably low for European standards).
Norway, Finland, Switzerland, Sweden, Netherlands and Denmark occupying the 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th 7th and 8th places respectively.
- low for European standards ... ) .... Norway, Finland, Switzerland, Sweden Netherlands and Denmark
When you do copyworks, include your source. RI is not for illiterate globalist bots who cannot read an answer. The quality of trolls is now too low. The globalists are now hiring junk?
"German media reported on Saturday that BND covertly provided a number of journalists with information containing criticism of Russia before the data were disclosed by the agency."
Superior Europe is employed by Zionist BND?
Dec 11, 2017 | www.huffingtonpost.com
In his ground-breaking 1995 book Jihad vs. McWorld , political scientist Benjamin Barber posits that the global conflicts of the early 21st century would be driven by two opposing but equally undemocratic forces: neoliberal corporate globalization (which he dubbed "McWorld") and reactionary tribal nationalisms (which he dubbed "Jihad"). Although distinct in many ways, both of these forces, Barber persuasively argues, succeed by denying the possibilities for democratic consensus and action, and so both must be opposed by civic engagement and activism on a broad scale.
In the two decades since Barber's book, this conflict has seemed to play out along overtly cultural lines: with Islamic extremism representing jihad, in opposition to Western neoliberalism representing McWorld. Case in pitch-perfect point: the Al Qaeda terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. Yet despite his use of the Arabic word Jihad, Barber is clear that reactionary tribalism is a worldwide phenomenon -- and in 2016 we're seeing particularly striking examples of that tribalism in Western nations such as Great Britain and the United States.
Britain's vote this week in favor of leaving the European Union was driven entirely by such reactionary tribal nationalism. The far-right United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) and its leader Nigel Farage led the charge in favor of Leave , as exemplified by a recent UKIP poster featuring a photo of Syrian refugees with the caption " Breaking point: the EU has failed us ." Farage and his allies like to point to demographic statistics about how much the UK has changed in the last few decades , and more exactly how the nation's white majority has been somewhat shifted over that time by the arrival of sizeable African and Asian immigrant communities.
It's impossible not to link the UKIP's emphases on such issues of immigration and demography to the presidential campaign of the one prominent U.S. politician who is cheering for the Brexit vote : presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump. From his campaign-launching speech about Mexican immigrant "criminals and rapists" to his proposal to ban Muslim immigration and his "Make American Great Again" slogan, Trump has relied on reactionary tribal nationalism at every stage of his campaign, and has received the enthusiastic endorsement of white supremacist and far-right organizations as a result. For such American tribal nationalists, the 1965 Immigration Act is the chief bogeyman, the origin point of continuing demographic shifts that have placed white America in a precarious position.
The only problem with that narrative is that it's entirely inaccurate. What the 1965 Act did was reverse a recent, exclusionary trend in American immigration law and policy, returning the nation to the more inclusive and welcoming stance it had taken throughout the rest of its history. Moreover, while the numbers of Americans from Latin American, Asian, and Muslim cultures have increased in recent decades, all of those communities have been part of o ur national community from its origin points . Which is to say, this right-wing tribal nationalism isn't just opposed to fundamental realities of 21st century American identity -- it also depends on historical and national narratives that are as mythic as they are exclusionary.
Linking Brexit and Trump to global right-wing tribal nationalisms doesn't mean conflating them all, of course. Although Trump rallies have featured troubling instances of violence, and although the murderer of British politican Jo Cox was an avowed white supremacist and Leave supporter, the right-wing Islamic extremism of groups such as Al Qaeda, ISIS, and Boko Haram rely far more consistently and centrally on violence and terrorism in support of their worldview and goals. Such specific contexts and nuances are important and shouldn't be elided.
Yet at the same time, we can't understand our 21st century world without a recognition of this widespread phenomenon of global, tribal nationalism. From ISIS to UKIP, Trump to France's Jean-Marie Le Pen, such reactionary forces have become and remain dominant players across the world, influencing local and international politics, economics, and culture. Benjamin Barber called this trend two decades ago, and we would do well to read and remember his analyses -- as well as his call for civic engagement and activism to resist these forces and fight for democracy.
Ben Railton Professor & public scholar of American Studies, Follow Ben Railton on Twitter: www.twitter.com/AmericanStudier
Jul 18, 2017 | www.unz.com
For a year, the big question of Russiagate has boiled down to this: Did Donald Trump's campaign collude with the Russians in hacking the DNC? And until last week, the answer was "no."
As ex-CIA director Mike Morell said in March, "On the question of the Trump campaign conspiring with the Russians there is smoke, but there is no fire, at all. There's no little campfire, there's no little candle, there's no spark."
Well, last week, it appeared there had been a fire in Trump Tower. On June 9, 2016, Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort met with Russians -- in anticipation of promised dirt on Hillary Clinton's campaign. While not a crime, this was a blunder. For Donald Jr. had long insisted there had been no collusion with the Russians. Caught in flagrante, he went full Pinocchio for four days.
And as the details of that June 9 meeting spilled out, Trump defenders were left with egg on their faces, while anti-Trump media were able to keep the spotlight laser-focused on where they want it -- Russiagate.
This reality underscores a truth of our time. In the 19th century, power meant control of the means of production; today, power lies in control of the means of communication.
Who controls the media spotlight controls what people talk about and think about. And mainstream media are determined to keep that spotlight on Trump-Russia, and as far away as possible from their agenda -- breaking the Trump presidency and bringing him down.
Almost daily, there are leaks from the investigative and security arms of the U.S. government designed to damage this president.
Just days into Trump's presidency, a rifle-shot intel community leak of a December meeting between Trump national security adviser Gen. Michael Flynn and Russia's ambassador forced the firing of Flynn.
An Oval Office meeting with the Russian foreign minister in which Trump disclosed that Israeli intelligence had ferreted out evidence that ISIS was developing computer bombs to explode on airliners was leaked. This alerted ISIS, damaged the president, and imperiled Israeli intelligence sources and methods.
Some of the leaks from national security and investigative agencies are felonies, not only violations of the leaker's solemn oath to protect secrets, but of federal law.
Yet the press is happy to collude with these leakers and to pay them in the coin they seek. First, by publishing the secrets the leakers want revealed. Second, by protecting them from exposure to arrest and prosecution for the crimes they are committing.
The mutual agendas of the deep-state leakers and the mainstream media mesh perfectly.
Consider the original Russiagate offense.
Confidential emails of the DNC and John Podesta were hacked, i.e., stolen by Russian intelligence and given to WikiLeaks. And who was the third and indispensable party in this "Tinker to Evers to Chance" double-play combination?
The media itself. While deploring Russian hacking as an "act of war" against "our democracy," the media published the fruits of the hacking. It was the media that revealed what Podesta wrote and how the DNC tilted the tables against Bernie Sanders.
If the media believed Russian hacking was a crime against our democracy, why did they publish the fruits of that crime?
Is it not monumental hypocrisy to denounce Russia's hacking of the computers of Democratic political leaders and institutions, while splashing the contents of the theft all over Page 1?
Not only do our Beltway media traffic in stolen secrets and stolen goods, but the knowledge that they will publish secrets and protect those who leak them is an incentive for bureaucratic disloyalty and criminality.
Our mainstream media are like the fellow who avoids the risk of stealing cars, but wants to fence them once stolen and repainted.
Some journalists know exactly who is leaking against Trump, but they are as protective of their colleagues' "sources" as of their own. Thus, the public is left in the dark as to what the real agenda is here, and who is sabotaging a president in whom they placed so much hope.
And thus does democracy die in darkness.
Do the American people not have a "right to know" who are the leakers within the government who are daily spilling secrets to destroy their president? Are the identities of the saboteurs not a legitimate subject of investigation? Ought they not be exposed and rooted out?
Where is the special prosecutor to investigate the collusion between bureaucrats and members of the press who traffic in the stolen secrets of the republic?
Bottom line: Trump is facing a stacked deck.
People inside the executive branch are daily providing fresh meat to feed the scandal. Anti-Trump media are transfixed by it. It is the Watergate of their generation. They can smell the blood in the water. The Pulitzers are calling. And they love it, for they loathe Donald Trump both for who he is and what he stands for.
It is hard to see when this ends, or how it ends well for the country.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, "Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever."
Copyright 2017 Creators.com. ← Russia Baiters and Putin Haters Category: Ideology Tags: American Media , Donald Trump , Russia
NoseytheDuke , Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 5:27 am GMT
Pat, you are again presenting yourself to be a disinformation asset and are truly undermining your credibility here. The DNC and Podesta emails were leaked not hacked. Please write this out in full a hundred times on the blackboard or whiteboard of your choice. Maybe then it will sink in.Priss Factor , Website Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 5:57 am GMTThere is nothing there. Let the media cry Russia Russia Russia forever. Trump can do other things. People will lose interest in this. This is different from Watergate because there really was a burglary and a coverup. There's nothing remotely like this here.vinteuil , Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 8:43 am GMT1. If Russians really did it, they did it on their own. Trump team had nothing to do with it.
2. If Russians didn't do it, this is just the media wasting its resources and energy on nothing.
Let the media keep digging and digging and digging where they is no gold. Let them be distracted by Trump does something real. Because Buchanan lived through Watergate, I think he's over-thinking this. It's like dejavu to him. Sure, the media today are more deranged than ever. Media are also more cynical and in the control of globalists. But they got nothing on Russia. They have the cry of Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia, but unless they can provide solid evidence, this is nothing.
Pat Buchanan does his best – but apparently he just can't bring himself to doubt the integrity of America's "intelligence" services – even after their epic failure &/or deception when it came to Iraq's non-existent WMD's. "Confidential emails of the DNC and John Podesta were hacked, i.e., stolen by Russian intelligence and given to WikiLeaks." What reason do we have to believe this, other than the worthless word of these perpetually lying creeps?The Alarmist , Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 9:37 am GMTRandal , Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 11:37 am GMTIt is hard to see when this ends, or how it ends well for the country.
No it's not. The Republic died a long time ago: The Empire is in that rough middle period where the Praetorians choose the leader who suits them most, but occasionally have an unsuitable one slip past them. This ends with the barbarians moving in to assume all the trappings of being a Roman but lead the empire to a final crushing defeat at the hands of worse barbarians.
Buchanan still being too reasonable towards the enemies of US democracy (the Democrats and their neocon Republican allies trying to undermine and overthrow the elected US President), imo.Gg Mo , Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 12:59 pm GMTThere's still no need, unless Buchanan knows something a lot more significant than what he covers here, to give any credence whatsoever to the "Russia influencing the US election" black propaganda campaign. It should still be laughed at, rather than given the slightest credibility, whilst, as Buchanan does indeed do repeatedly, turning the issue upon the true criminals – those in US government circles leaking US security information to try to influence US politics.
Did Donald Trump's campaign collude with the Russians in hacking the DNC?
Clearly not, as far as anybody knows based upon information in the public domain. There's no evidence Russia's government hacked anything anyway. A meeting by campaign representatives with Russians claiming to have dirt on Trump's rival is not evidence of collusion in hacking.
Confidential emails of the DNC and John Podesta were hacked, i.e., stolen by Russian intelligence and given to WikiLeaks.
Again, Buchanan seems to be needlessly conceding ground to known liars and deluded zealots.
If there was any attempt by Russia to "influence" the US election it was trivial, and should be put into context whenever it is mentioned. That context includes the longstanding and ongoing efforts by the US to interfere massively in other countries' (including Russia's) elections and governments, and the routine acceptance of foreign interference in US politics by Israel in particular.
If Trump and his backers really wanted to put a halt to this laughable nonsense about foreign influence, he should start a high profile investigation of the nefarious "influencing" of US politics by foreign "agents of influence" in general, specifically including Israel and staffed by men who are not sympathetic to that country.
That would quickly result in the shutting down of mainstream media complaints about foreign influence.
@NoseytheDukeGg Mo , Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 1:05 pm GMTYup, His name was Seth Rich . (and let us never forget Michael Hastings and the Smith Mundt Modernization Act put in place for a Hillary win/steal.)
Yipes -- What is the matter with Buchanan? Is he taking weird prescription drugs for Alzheimers ?Andrei Martyanov , Website Show Comment Next New Comment July 18, 2017 at 1:45 pm GMTHe seems to be a bit of an apologist for KNOWN liars and he doesn't seem to understand that the MSM is absolutely the mouthpiece for these agencies, populated with agents like Cooper and Mika etc etc etc
It is hard to see when this ends, or how it ends well for the country.
It already didn't end well and it pains me to say this. What it may become only is worse. At this stage I don's see any "better" scenarios. The truth has been revealed.
Dec 14, 2017 | www.defenddemocracy.press
Published in The Nation on Dec 5, 2017Why are the media paying scant attention to Michael Flynn's admissions about Israel?
The indictment of former national-security adviser Michael Flynn on December 1 has confirmed that Donald Trump's inner circle colluded with a foreign power before entering the White House -- just not the foreign power that has been the subject of our national fixation for the past year. To be sure, the jury is still out on Russia, though there are new grounds for questioning the case for a plot tying the Kremlin to Trump Tower. But with Flynn's plea, we can now say for certain that the Trump team did collude -- with Israel.
To recap, Flynn has pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators about his conversations with then–Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the period after Trump's November 2016 victory. As Foreign Policy previously reported , Flynn reached out to Kislyak as part of "a vigorous diplomatic bid" to undermine President Obama's decision to allow a December 2016 Security Council resolution condemning illegal Israeli settlement building in the Occupied Territories. The indictment fills in some details.
According to the charge sheet , Flynn first made contact with Kislyak to discuss the Israel vote. We found out this weekend his reason for doing so. "[Special counsel Robert] Mueller's investigators have learned through witnesses and documents that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel asked the Trump transition team to lobby other countries to help Israel,"
The New York Times reported after Flynn's court appearance on Friday. "Investigators have learned that Mr. Flynn and [Trump son-in-law Jared] Kushner took the lead in those efforts" -- efforts which failed to change a single vote, including Russia's, which backed the measure in defiance of the Trump-Netanyahu subversion attempt.
In short, the first known contact between the Trump campaign and Russia after the election occurred in the service of a different foreign power, Israel, and was ultimately fruitless.
The next contact between Flynn and Kislyak was more productive. In late December, Obama imposed new sanctions on Russia for its alleged meddling in the 2016 election. A day later, Flynn called the Russian ambassador to request that the Kremlin, according to the plea document, "only respond to the U.S. Sanctions in a reciprocal manner." Flynn's overture came after a Trump transition colleague told him that the incoming administration "did not want Russia to escalate the situation." By all accounts, Russia complied.
Read also: Turkish FearsWhatever one thinks about this covert attempt to reduce tensions with a nuclear-armed power, it demonstrates an effort by the Trump transition, as with the Israel vote, to undermine the outgoing administration's policy. Trump critics have seized on that as a violation of the Logan Act, which bars citizens from having unauthorized negotiations with foreign governments in a dispute with the United States. But the Logan Act has seldom been used except as a partisan talking point , not a prosecutable offense. More importantly, there's the question as to whether Flynn's overture on sanctions prove a quid pro quo [a favor or advantage granted or expected in return for something].
Notwithstanding the post-election contact with Flynn, not only has Russia failed to gain a reduction in sanctions but its relations with Washington have deteriorated. In early August, Trump signed new sanctions on Russia overwhelmingly approved by Congress. The administration recently presented lawmakers with a list of targets that "reads like a who's who of the Russian defense and intelligence sectors," The New York Times noted. In September, Trump shut down the Russian consulate in San Francisco and two annexes in New York City and Washington, DC. Just last week, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson denounced Russia's "malicious tactics" against the West and vowed that sanctions imposed over Russian's role in Ukraine "will remain in place until Russia reverses the actions that triggered them."
Meanwhile, Trump has enlarged NATO over Russia's objections, carried out the "biggest military exercise in Eastern Europe since the Cold War" on Russia's border, appointed several anti-Russia hawks to key posts, and continues to deliberate over whether to supply Ukraine with a weapons package that Obama himself rejected out of fear it would worsen the country's civil war.
In the latest flare-up, Russia has ordered international media outlets to register as foreign agents in retaliation for the Justice Department first doing so to Washington-based RT America .
It is, of course, possible that all of this is an elaborate ruse to mask the secret, as yet unproven, conspiracy that many insist will lead to Trump's downfall. The fact that Flynn is now a cooperating witness has refueled hopes that this day is finally approaching. After all, why would Flynn lie about his contacts with Russia if he did not have something to hide? And why would Mueller offer him a plea deal if Flynn wasn't offering him a bigger fish to fry? (One plausible motive, as Buzzfeed notes , is that Flynn may have lied to hide his potential Logan Act violation.)
Read also: Trump and the Terrorists Support Le PenOnly time will tell whether Flynn has something to offer Mueller, or whether Mueller has gotten from him what he can. In the meantime, more than a year after the election, we still have exactly zero evidence of any cooperation between the Trump campaign and the Russian government -- nor, it must be repeated, any evidence to back up U.S. intelligence officials' claims that the Russian government meddled in the election. We do have instances of Trump campaign figures' -- namely, Donald Trump Jr. and low-level adviser George Papadopoulos -- making contact with people that they thought were Russian government intermediaries. But whatever they were told or believed, there is still no proof that their contacts led to an actual Kremlin connection.
What we do have is evidence that the Trump campaign colluded with Israel to subvert the U.S. government's official position at the United Nations Security Council. Yet reaction to that news has been quite a departure from the standards of Russiagate when it comes to foreign meddling.
The contrast was put on stark display on Sunday, when Jared Kushner appeared with billionaire Israeli-American media tycoon Haim Saban at the latter's annual forum on U.S.-Israel relations. Saban took a moment to thank Kushner for his role in the subversion effort that Flynn admitted to have undertaken on Israel's behalf. "To be honest with you, as far as I know there's nothing illegal there," Saban told his stage companion. "But I think that this crowd and myself want to thank you for making that effort, so thank you very much."
For all of the fears of Russian oligarchs' having influence over Trump, the comment from this American oligarch reveals a great deal about who really influences practically everyone in Washington, Republican or Democrat. Saban was not a Trump donor. He is, in fact, Bill and Hillary Clinton's top all-time financial supporter, to the tune of more than $25 million ; a benefactor whose generosity has helped build not just the Clinton Library but also the Democratic National Committee's headquarters.
Read also: The real Marine Le Pen: Α Warrior against Islam, like the "Fake pacifist" Trump?But there has been no outrage from democracy-defending #Resistance stalwarts over Saban's comments (and the Israeli subversion effort he endorsed). The same for news of Kushner's failure to disclose his leadership of a group that funded the illegal Israeli settlements that he tried to protect at the United Nations. And now we await to see how those who agonize over foreign influence on Trump will respond to his reported plans to move the American embassy to Jerusalem -- "a decision that would break with decades of U.S. policy and could fuel violence in the Middle East," as Haaretz notes .
It is unlikely that Trump will be challenged on Israel, because his approach is harmonic with a bipartisan consensus cemented in large part by the financial contributions of billionaires like Saban and his Republican pro-Israeli government counterpart, Sheldon Adelson. Hence, there are no editorials or opinion pieces denouncing Israel's ' Plot Against America ' or ' War on America ', or warnings that ' Odds Are, Israel Owns Trump ', or explorations of ' What Israel Did to Control the American Mind '. Likewise, there will be no new groups forming dubbed the ' Committee to Investigate Israel ' or the ' Tel Aviv Project '. In fact it is more than likely that, going forward, the media will give Israelgate the same treatment as cable's top Russiagate sleuth, MSNBC 's Rachel Maddow, gave during her exhaustive Flynn coverage so far, which is to not even mention it.
This weekend furnished us with another important contrast. Flynn's indictment was followed hours later by the passage of the Senate Republican tax bill, which stands to be one of the largest upward transfers of wealth in U.S. history. If protecting democracy is our goal, we may want to tune out the Russia-obsessed pundits and look closer to home.
* Aaron Maté is a host/producer for The Real News Network.
Published in www.newcoldwar.org
(New Cold War: Ukraine and Beyond)
Dec 08, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com
That sure sounds a lot like the current state of the media. We have witnessed this type of hysteria ourselves in just the last two days. First there was the Brian Ross debacle, which entailed Ross peddling the lie that Trump ordered Flynn to contact the Russians. That "fake news" elicited an emotional orgasm from Joy Behar on The View. She was on the verge of writhing on the floor as she prematurely celebrated what she thought would seal the impeachment of Donald Trump. Whoops. Ross had to retract that story.
... ... ...
Watergate and "Russiagate" do share a common trope. During Watergate the Washington Post was mostly a lone voice covering the story. Washington Post publisher at the time, Kate Graham, reportedly remarked that she was worried that none of the other papers were covering the story. And it was an important story. It exposed political corruption and abuse of power and a threat to our democracy.
How is that in common with Russiagate? The real story is that the FBI, the NSA and the CIA effectively conspired to try to destroy the Presidency of Donald Trump. Hardly anyone in the media, mainstream or fringe, are writing about this fact and trying to rally public support for action. What is one to say when confronted with the fact that the FBI paid money to a former British spy for alleged dirt on Donald Trump that was initially commissioned by the Clinton campaign. And who is the FBI Agent paying for the dossier? Why a fellow now revealed as a Clinton partisan.
Publius Tacitus , 05 December 2017 at 11:52 PMIt is a shame you wanted to start the discussion with such a stupid comment. I have made no representation whatsoever about the intelligence or lack of intelligence of Trump. I have expressed nothing regarding "my expectations" for him or his policies. I get it. You don't like the man and want to grind a meaningless axe.EEngineer said in reply to David E. Solomon... , 06 December 2017 at 01:12 AMwalrus , 06 December 2017 at 01:49 AMHow much of what we see is the real DJT and how much is a projected public persona?
There's truth and lies, but then there's just plain old bullshit which has nothing to do with either. He seems to throw a ton of it around as a diversionary tactic. I understand the technique, but I can't see through the smoke screen to divine what he's up to or who he really is. So I continue to dispassionately observe.
DJT's threat to "drain the swamp" has created fear, uncertainty and doubt amongst the swamp folk. They naturally fight back. By definition, all swamp critters must toe the neocon line else they would have been fired by previous incumbents. They are all therefore fair game for DJT.sbjonez , 06 December 2017 at 02:36 AMMaybe a citation could be offered here, but there does not appear to be any support for the assertion made by the author of this piece that "...the FBI paid money to a former British spy for alleged dirt on Donald Trump...".There were reports that the FBI 'considered' paying Steele to continue his work, ( a not altogether uncommon practice), yet within the more responsibly researched reports it was also clearly stated that in the end the FBI did not in fact pay Steele anything for any work at all.Dr. George W. Oprisko , 06 December 2017 at 03:32 AMAs it happens the FBI and most probably the others were created by executive order.Eric Newhill said in reply to Publius Tacitus ... , 06 December 2017 at 03:32 AMPerhaps it's time to end them by executive order.......
INDY
PT,Peter Reichard , 06 December 2017 at 05:21 AM
I admire your persistence and agree with the points you make in this and your other posts on the topic of Trump. This is an extremely important subject matter. A President was elected, lawfully, and a bunch of stupid ninnies got their panties in a knot over that and are therefore more or less willing to support a Borgist ("deep state", if you prefer) coup d'état. Said ninnies are immune to the rational arguments you present because they are not intelligent, they are hyper emotional and many of them belong to a cult called "[neo]liberalism" (or the "progressive movement", if you prefer).When you belong to a cult, you must suspend reason; make it subordinate to the hive mind. You lose all perspective. They believe all kids of ridiculous notions that fail to withstand the most basic rational scrutiny; like Islam and feminism can be allies, socialism would work if only it were applied correctly, if a man puts on a dress he has actually become a woman and that such a person would make a good 11 series in the military, low skill/low IQ immigrants - legal or otherwise - are actually good for the country......so of course they believe that a coup d'état is appropriate when the target is Trump. In their madness they have convinced themselves that Trump is uniquely dangerous. He is going to destroy the world via ignoring global warming, tax cuts, immigration reform, pushing the nuclear button just for fun; all of the above and maybe more. You know this, of course. You did mention "Trump Derangement Syndrome".
As for the rest of the subject matter, personally, I feel that what with all that has been revealed about the FBI, CIA and NSA, someone should be bringing the involved members of these agencies up on charges related to treason, sedition or whatever legal terms are correct. Actually, these people should have their doors kicked down and be brought out in hand cuffs. Death sentences should be on the table and should be applied when legally possible.
This is no more Watergate than a man in a dress is a woman.
The depths to which the govt, populace and values of this country have degenerated have never been more on display than in this witch hunt. We are in very bad shape. The media is thoroughly scurrilous. Officials in bureaucracies are treasonous and have no respect for the rule of law. Half of the citizens are insane and support the media and the traitors.
If someone doesn't at least just pull the plug on this "investigation", it's going to ruin what's left of this country. It may be too late. A lot of ninnies are going to wake up to a very harsh reality.
From day one the Republicans were trying to impeach Bill Clinton by investigating every dark corner of the Clintons' past and present until they could find something that would stick. Same thing with Trump except this time it goes far beyond the opposition party to include elements of the government, most of the media and even leading members of his own party. Elections be damned, we have an empire to maintain and he is seen by the establishment as too impulsive, unstable and so far uncontrollable to be allowed to stay in power. While no threat to the sacred cows of Wall Street and Israel or even to drain the swamp they are terrified of his unpredictability, hence the full court press unprecedented in American history to remove him from office. My very low opinion of Trump doesn't blind me to the dangers inherent in this effort. \English Outsider -> Publius Tacitus ... , 06 December 2017 at 05:45 AMPT - Isn't the point you've just made central? The issues here are far more important than the personalities?JMH said in reply to David E. Solomon... , 06 December 2017 at 07:29 AMI like what I've seen of our PM, Mrs May. Nice person, to my outsider's way of thinking. Doesn't alter the fact that I consider her policies and philosophy to be hopeless. And since we're never going to meet her in the pub that's what counts. Would it not be possible to separate things out in the same way with Trump? Set on one side the partisan arguments about his personality - politics is not a TV show - and consider him on the basis of what he may or may not do or be able to do?
You mention briefly the Steele affair. I still find it difficult to believe that an ex-UK Intelligence Officer can get mixed up in American politics to this extent and scarcely an eyebrow raised. Surely someone's asking questions somewhere about this? The facts are clear enough, for once.
Actually, I think he shares many of Bismark's qualities: "a political genius of a very unusual kind [whose success] rested on several sets of conflicting characteristics among which brutal, disarming honesty mingled with the wiles and deceits of a confidence man. He played his parts with perfect self-confidence, yet mixed them with rage, anxiety, illness, hypochrondria, and irrationality. ... He used democracy when it suited him, negotiated with revolutionaries and the dangerous Ferdinand Lassalle, the socialist who might have contested his authority. He utterly dominated his cabinet ministers with a sovereign contempt and blackened their reputations as soon as he no longer needed them. He outwitted the parliamentary parties, even the strongest of them, and betrayed all those ... who had put him into power. By 1870 even his closest friends ... realized that they had helped put a demonic figure into power.[6]"-wikiPatrick Armstrong , 06 December 2017 at 07:55 AMBernie can be Lasalle.
I think, I hope, I believe, I persuade myself that all is unfolding as it should. Mueller turns up nothing but further examples of officials pimping themselves out to foreign governments; meanwhile revelations of bias on his team; meanwhile chewing away at the Fusion GPS thing (one of the key pillars); meanwhile investigation of the FBI. And, off stage, a slow but powerful campaign exposing many of Trumnp's enemies as corrupt, perverted hypocrites. And, from time to time, unexpected presents like Brazile's book. But faster pleaseMartin Oline , 06 December 2017 at 08:02 AMI agree about the Trump Derangement Syndrome that has afflicted the media. I think they are suffering from O.C.T.D.: Obsessive Compulsive Trump Disorder. There are some in the media who are of the opinion that this may not be working with most Americans. I saw two pieces this morning from BBC and The New York Times:Ken Roberts , 06 December 2017 at 08:30 AM
- Trump May Be Winning http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42242839
- Why Don't Sanders Supporters Care About Trump.... https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/11/14/opinion/bernie-supporters-russia-investigation.html
Perhaps this is the start of a change or a recognition that the MSM's habitual crying wolf behavior is not resonating with Main Street. I can only hope, but I stopped watching the national news long ago.
The crucial point is not about respect for the man. It is respect for the office. All men are flawed, and high position exposes additional flaws. It is evident, to this outside observer, that Trump won "fair and square" according to the established procedures. The variety of "dirty tricks" used against him, both before the election and after, is astounding. There was a "back room" negotiation on election eve, visible in public as the long delay in final over-the-top results, and Trump's apology to his supporters for the delay, "it was complicated".Greco , 06 December 2017 at 08:56 AMThat truly is water under the bridge, and at least must be so, if you wish to preserve your republic. You all have the right to withhold consent and trash what you and your fathers and grandfathers have achieved. Most will not like the outcome. But I sincerely hope that you, each and collectively, instead will choose the positive aspects of this model:
"... that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."
Best wishes,
krThe ABC story had to be "clarified" given they originally reported Flynn had contacted the Russians DURING the election when in fact it was AFTER the election. The story had consequences on the stock market: https://seekingalpha.com/article/4129355-cost-fake-news-s-and-p-500 This all happened on the eve of the passage of Trump's tax cuts and it seemed timed to hurt the stock market. It may even possibly have torpedoed the tax cuts by putting into question Trump's legal standing as president.jdledell , 06 December 2017 at 10:04 AMI detest Trump as a person but still acknowledge that he is our current President. I will continue to fight against the implementation of his policies and work hard to to try to insure he does not win a second term. Other than that in 3 more years the American people will have an opportunity to judge his performance and make a decision on his worthiness to continue as President. That is as it should be.Fred -> David E. Solomon... , 06 December 2017 at 10:20 AMTrump has taken some hard shots, some deserved and some not. That is the nature of our current political system. When Trump traveled the nation proclaiming Obama was not American born and thus an illegitimate President is also an example of "all is fair in War and politics".
David,Publius Tacitus -> sbjonez... , 06 December 2017 at 10:35 AMHe was smart enough to get elected, defeating a dozen professional republicans and the Democratic machinery along with the MSM. "In the end you will see that he does not live up to your expectations." I thought he was a boor and a mediocre showman. In that regard he's exceeded mine by surviving this long.
You are correct that there is no public source yet confirming the FBI paid Steele. However, the FBI's refusal to turn over relevant documents regarding their relationship with Steele tells me there was money paid. What is indisputable is that the information in the dossier was used as a predicate to seek permission from a FISA court to go after Trump and his team. That is outrageous.rjj said in reply to JMH... , 06 December 2017 at 11:19 AMis this doom-and-gloom or hope-assaulting-experience? Am guessing that the only thing he has shares with Old Otto is a preference for the classic method of donning trousers.walter , 06 December 2017 at 12:06 PMOOPS! there's this (was reminded of it by the hyperventilatory "breaking news" about Blackwater/Erik Prince):
Bismarck held von Holstein in high esteem, and when the latter went to him with his plan for establishing a vast organization of almost universal spying, the Chancellor of the new German Empire immediately grasped the advantages he could obtain from it. ....Von Holstein ... had one great ambition; that of knowing everything about everybody and of ruling everybody through fear of the disclosures he could make were he at any time tempted to do so. ....
The German Foreign Office knew everything and made use of everything .... In the Prussian Intelligence Department as Holstein organized it there was hardly a person of note or consequence in Europe about whom everything was not known, including, of course, his weaknesses and cupboard skeletons. And this knowledge was used when necessary without any compunction or remorse. ....
His first care, whenever an individual capable at a given moment of playing a part, no matter how humble, in the great drama attracted his attention, was to ferret out all that could be learned about him or her. With few exceptions he contrived to lay his finger on a hidden secret. Once this preliminary step had been performed to his satisfaction, the rest was easy. The unfortunate victim was given to understand that he would be shamed publicly at any time, unless . . . unless . . .
As this has been the SOP of Karl Rove (presumably), of Jedgar, and before that [__fill in the blanks___], the only thing unprecedented about the Prince/Blackwater story is the disregard for omerta.
DISCLAIMER: The Princess Radziwill who published the passage on von Holstein was an opportunistic swashbucklereuse type and [guessing] would have been so even in less horrifically interesting times.
My humble opinion on what is going on. "The Borg" are individuals whose self-interest is tied to perpetuating "business as usual" in Washington DC. FBI agents, CIA, NSA need domestic and foreign conflict to aggrandize and justify their positions. They do not want our national problems solved...god forbid, budgets, salaries, bonuses, future contracting and consulting jobs might be reduced or eliminated.Sid Finster , 06 December 2017 at 12:16 PMHillary, Bush, Obama and "the establishment" knew unconsciously not to "rock the boat". Trump was seen as too independent and uneducated in the ways of The Borg to be trusted. He had un-borg-like views like "..what the hell are we doing supporting Al Quida?" "...grab her in the pussy.." "..lets make Jerusalem the capital of Israel.." "lets get along with Russia.." "..the Media is fake and biased.." all very un-PC and un-borg-like positions. Too disruptive of the status quo. Might actually solve some problems and reduce the importance of government.
I think the Borg determined he was N.O.K. (Not Our Kind). And he has royally pissed off the Media and he is in a death fight with the Media.
I find the whole idea that "Deutsche Bank has branches in Russia and lends money to Russian borrowers, therefore Russians control Deutsche Bank" idea to be comical.Sid Finster said in reply to English Outsider ... , 06 December 2017 at 12:18 PMI have clients who also regularly borrow money from Deutsche Bank. Are they now Russians? Are they controlled now by Russians? Do Russians control them? What role does DB play in all this web of control?
If I have my mortgage at the same bank as a slum lord/toxic waste generator/adult bookstore owner/CIA operative, am I now his puppet?
Asking for a friend.
Does nobody understand how banking law works? (in Germany and the US, banks are forbidden to lend to any client or client group in an amount that would give the borrower de facto control over the operations of the bank). Of course the smarter conspiracy theorists understand this. Any stick to beat a dog.
The difference is that the establishment/Deep State/Borg/whatever you want to call it approves of Steele's activities.Dr. Puck said in reply to Dr. George W. Oprisko ... , 06 December 2017 at 12:27 PMFYI History of the FBI. www.fbi.gov/history/brief-historySylvia 1 , 06 December 2017 at 12:48 PMThis is increasingly my take as well -- the FBI, CIA and NSA do seem to have "conspired" to destroy Donald Trump. I finger Brennan, Clapper, Susan Rice, Benjamin Rhodes, and maybe Samantha Power as being involved in the flood of illegal leaks earlier in the year that did so much to pave the way for Mueller's appointment.Eric Newhill , 06 December 2017 at 12:51 PMWhat I fail to understand is why Democrats are sitting back and cheering as these agencies work together to destroy a duly elected President of the USA. Does anyone really believe that if these agencies get away with it this time they will stop with Trump?
All these agencies are out of control and are completely unaccountable.PT,Peter VE said in reply to Sylvia 1... , 06 December 2017 at 05:05 PMAre you aware that the Office of Inspector General has been investigating politicization of the FBI and DOJ for 11 months now? The investigation was brought about at the recommendation of certain members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I believe. Among the allegations being looked into is that DOJ/FBI have highly political agents that should have at least recused themselves from certain investigations and that their politics may have influenced the course of the investigations.
Given the revelations around Strzok, Rhee and Weissman, on Mueller's team, you'd think we'd be hearing more about OIG case. IMO, we are about to though.
I'm also stunned by the stupidity of the Democrats. Any liberal who believes the intelligence agencies is a fool. They've just shown us their true nature by blocking the release of several thousand pages of records relating to the assassination of President Kennedy. If they can't allow the truth to come out after 54 years, they surely can't be trusted to be truthful about today's information.Cvillereader said in reply to Eric Newhill... , 06 December 2017 at 06:54 PMFox News, which has been fairly reliable of late, reported last night that the FBI OIG report will be finalized and made public sometime in the next 4-5 weeks.blue peacock , 07 December 2017 at 12:18 AMPublius TacitusJamesT -> Cvillereader... , 07 December 2017 at 12:48 AMThe real story is that the FBI, the NSA and the CIA effectively conspired to try to destroy the Presidency of Donald Trump.How can this conspiracy be investigated? Who could do it? Clearly not anyone from the DoJ, FBI, CIA and NSA as they are fully compromised.
If someone had told me 5 years ago that I would in 2017 consider Fox News to be the most reliable MSM news outlet, I would have rolled around on the ground laughing hysterically. Yet it is true. I am not quite sure what I should deduce from this but I think it is something along the lines of "one cannot be too cynical about the news media".Imagine , 07 December 2017 at 12:50 AMReal News: Outstanding official independent post-mortem of Charlottesville. Includes maneuver tactics, I think y'all will like it.AK said in reply to English Outsider ... , 07 December 2017 at 04:06 AMEnglish Outsider,AK said in reply to Richardstevenhack ... , 07 December 2017 at 04:23 AM"Any idea why?"
He certainly gives them plenty of ammunition. However, I believe a great deal of the vituperative outrage directed at him has much (possibly primarily) to do with exactly whom he bested in the general election. Not to pile on, but see David E. Solomon's comments on this thread.
One can't underestimate the cult of personality that was so carefully crafted around Hillary Clinton for the past two decades. Their chosen strategy of identity politics only kicked it into hyper-drive over the past eight years.
Still, this phenomenon existed long before Trump, The Politician, and even before Obama and his own cult. Many of these people were able to put their expectations on hold for eight long years. Obama was a result they could at least live with temporarily - " Just eight more years, and then they owe her. "
They had their very structures of reality built around a certain outcome, which didn't come to pass. So, the disappointment was all the more bitter when they realized that their waiting was in vain. That's a tidal wave of cognitive dissonance unleashed by that unimaginable (for some) occurrence of her defeat. He didn't put paid to Martin O'Malley or even Bernie Sanders. He vanquished The Queen. That sort of thing never goes down lightly.
Richardstevenhack," As I've said before, I think Trump only ran for President for 1) ego, and 2) he knows he will have access to billions of dollars of business deals once he leaves office, with the cachet of having been President.
You might as well assert that lions only hang out around watering holes because 1) there's water there, and 2) gazelles and zebras have to drink water. Can you point me to one President from living memory who did not 1) run for the Office at least partially out of ego, and 2) take advantage in his subsequent "private life" of these exact perks of having held the Office? I ask seriously, because it seems you are pining for a nobility in presidential politics which to my recollection hasn't existed for at least three generations. Cincinnatus, they ain't. Maybe Ike, but anyone else is a real stretch.
Dec 12, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com
Lyttenburgh , December 10, 2017 at 5:59 pm
C for Chutzpah.ButtFeed: How Secret Talks With Russia to Prevent Election Meddling Collapsed
With the 2018 midterms on the horizon, Moscow proposed a sweeping noninterference agreement with the United States, US officials tell BuzzFeed News. The Trump administration said no.
"To test the possibility of a mutual agreement, Putin dispatched Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov to Washington for a July 17 meeting with Under Secretary Tom Shannon, the No. 3 official at the State Department. The official US account of the meeting offered only a bland summary of conversations on "areas of mutual concern." But three US administration officials, including one inside the meeting, said Ryabkov handed over a document containing a bold proposal: A sweeping noninterference agreement between Moscow and Washington that would prohibit both governments from meddling in the other's domestic politics.
After examining the proposal, which has not previously been reported, US officials told Moscow there would be no deal.
"We said 'thank you very much but now is not the time for this,'" said a senior State Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic discussions."
Here you have it – a self-confession from the highest D.C. officials, that "democracy promotion = meddling in the elections"! Oh, but that's not all:
Jul 13, 2017 | consortiumnews.com
Exclusive: A documentary debunking the Magnitsky myth, which was an opening salvo in the New Cold War, was largely blocked from viewing in the West but has now become a factor in Russia-gate, reports Robert Parry.
Near the center of the current furor over Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with a Russian lawyer in June 2016 is a documentary that almost no one in the West has been allowed to see, a film that flips the script on the story of the late Sergei Magnitsky and his employer, hedge-fund operator William Browder.
The Russian lawyer, Natalie Veselnitskaya, who met with Trump Jr. and other advisers to Donald Trump Sr.'s campaign, represented a company that had run afoul of a U.S. investigation into money-laundering allegedly connected to the Magnitsky case and his death in a Russian prison in 2009. His death sparked a campaign spearheaded by Browder, who used his wealth and clout to lobby the U.S. Congress in 2012 to enact the Magnitsky Act to punish alleged human rights abusers in Russia. The law became what might be called the first shot in the New Cold War.
According to Browder's narrative, companies ostensibly under his control had been hijacked by corrupt Russian officials in furtherance of a $230 million tax-fraud scheme; he then dispatched his "lawyer" Magnitsky to investigate and – after supposedly uncovering evidence of the fraud – Magnitsky blew the whistle only to be arrested by the same corrupt officials who then had him locked up in prison where he died of heart failure from physical abuse.
Despite Russian denials – and the "dog ate my homework" quality of Browder's self-serving narrative – the dramatic tale became a cause celebre in the West. The story eventually attracted the attention of Russian filmmaker Andrei Nekrasov, a known critic of President Vladimir Putin. Nekrasov decided to produce a docu-drama that would present Browder's narrative to a wider public. Nekrasov even said he hoped that he might recruit Browder as the narrator of the tale.
However, the project took an unexpected turn when Nekrasov's research kept turning up contradictions to Browder's storyline, which began to look more and more like a corporate cover story. Nekrasov discovered that a woman working in Browder's company was the actual whistleblower and that Magnitsky – rather than a crusading lawyer – was an accountant who was implicated in the scheme.
So, the planned docudrama suddenly was transformed into a documentary with a dramatic reversal as Nekrasov struggles with what he knows will be a dangerous decision to confront Browder with what appear to be deceptions. In the film, you see Browder go from a friendly collaborator into an angry adversary who tries to bully Nekrasov into backing down.
Blocked Premiere
Ultimately, Nekrasov completes his extraordinary film – entitled "The Magnitsky Act: Behind the Scenes" – and it was set for a premiere at the European Parliament in Brussels in April 2016. However, at the last moment – faced with Browder's legal threats – the parliamentarians pulled the plug. Nekrasov encountered similar resistance in the United States, a situation that, in part, brought Natalie Veselnitskaya into this controversy.
Film director Andrei Nekrasov, who produced "The Magnitsky Act: Behind the Scenes."
As a lawyer defending Prevezon, a real-estate company registered in Cyprus, on a money-laundering charge, she was dealing with U.S. prosecutors in New York City and, in that role, became an advocate for lifting the U.S. sanctions, The Washington Post reported.
That was when she turned to promoter Rob Goldstone to set up a meeting at Trump Tower with Donald Trump Jr. To secure the sit-down on June 9, 2016, Goldstone dangled the prospect that Veselnitskaya had some derogatory financial information from the Russian government about Russians supporting the Democratic National Committee. Trump Jr. jumped at the possibility and brought senior Trump campaign advisers, Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner, along.
By all accounts, Veselnitskaya had little or nothing to offer about the DNC and turned the conversation instead to the Magnitsky Act and Putin's retaliatory measure to the sanctions, canceling a program in which American parents adopted Russian children. One source told me that Veselnitskaya also wanted to enhance her stature in Russia with the boast that she had taken a meeting at Trump Tower with Trump's son.
But another goal of Veselnitskaya's U.S. trip was to participate in an effort to give Americans a chance to see Nekrasov's blacklisted documentary. She traveled to Washington in the days after her Trump Tower meeting and attended a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, according to The Washington Post.
There were hopes to show the documentary to members of Congress but the offer was rebuffed. Instead a room was rented at the Newseum near Capitol Hill. Browder's lawyers. who had successfully intimidated the European Parliament, also tried to strong arm the Newseum, but its officials responded that they were only renting out a room and that they had allowed other controversial presentations in the past.
Their stand wasn't exactly a profile in courage. "We're not going to allow them not to show the film," said Scott Williams, the chief operating officer of the Newseum. "We often have people renting for events that other people would love not to have happen."
In an article about the controversy in June 2016, The New York Times added that "A screening at the Newseum is especially controversial because it could attract lawmakers or their aides." Heaven forbid!
One-Time Showing
So, Nekrasov's documentary got a one-time showing with Veselnitskaya reportedly in attendance and with a follow-up discussion moderated by journalist Seymour Hersh. However, except for that audience, the public of the United States and Europe has been essentially shielded from the documentary's discoveries, all the better for the Magnitsky myth to retain its power as a seminal propaganda moment of the New Cold War.
Financier William Browder (right) with Magnitsky's widow and son, along with European parliamentarians.
After the Newseum presentation, a Washington Post editorial branded Nekrasov's documentary Russian "agit-prop" and sought to discredit Nekrasov without addressing his many documented examples of Browder's misrepresenting both big and small facts in the case. Instead, the Post accused Nekrasov of using "facts highly selectively" and insinuated that he was merely a pawn in the Kremlin's "campaign to discredit Mr. Browder and the Magnitsky Act."
The Post also misrepresented the structure of the film by noting that it mixed fictional scenes with real-life interviews and action, a point that was technically true but willfully misleading because the fictional scenes were from Nekrasov's original idea for a docu-drama that he shows as part of explaining his evolution from a believer in Browder's self-exculpatory story to a skeptic. But the Post's deception is something that almost no American would realize because almost no one got to see the film.
The Post concluded smugly: "The film won't grab a wide audience, but it offers yet another example of the Kremlin's increasingly sophisticated efforts to spread its illiberal values and mind-set abroad. In the European Parliament and on French and German television networks, showings were put off recently after questions were raised about the accuracy of the film, including by Magnitsky's family.
"We don't worry that Mr. Nekrasov's film was screened here, in an open society. But it is important that such slick spin be fully exposed for its twisted story and sly deceptions."
The Post's gleeful editorial had the feel of something you might read in a totalitarian society where the public only hears about dissent when the Official Organs of the State denounce some almost unknown person for saying something that almost no one heard.
New Paradigm
The Post's satisfaction that Nekrasov's documentary would not draw a large audience represents what is becoming a new paradigm in U.S. mainstream journalism, the idea that it is the media's duty to protect the American people from seeing divergent narratives on sensitive geopolitical issues.
Over the past year, we have seen a growing hysteria about "Russian propaganda" and "fake news" with The New York Times and other major news outlets eagerly awaiting algorithms that can be unleashed on the Internet to eradicate information that groups like Google's First Draft Coalition deem "false."
First Draft consists of the Times, the Post, other mainstream outlets, and establishment-approved online news sites, such as Bellingcat with links to the pro-NATO think tank, Atlantic Council. First Draft's job will be to serve as a kind of Ministry of Truth and thus shield the public from information that is deemed propaganda or untrue.
In the meantime, there is the ad hoc approach that was applied to Nekrasov's documentary. Having missed the Newseum showing, I was only able to view the film because I was given a special password to an online version.
From searches that I did on Wednesday, Nekrasov's film was not available on Amazon although a pro-Magnitsky documentary was. I did find a streaming service that appeared to have the film available.
But the Post's editors were right in their expectation that "The film won't grab a wide audience." Instead, it has become a good example of how political and legal pressure can effectively black out what we used to call "the other side of the story." The film now, however, has unexpectedly become a factor in the larger drama of Russia-gate and the drive to remove Donald Trump Sr. from the White House.
Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America's Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com ).
Joseph A. Haran, Jr. , July 13, 2017 at 2:13 pm
Rob Roy , July 13, 2017 at 2:45 pmWhy are so many people–corporate executives, governments, journalists, politicians–afraid of William Browder? Why isn't Andrei Nekrasov's film available via digital versatile disk, for sale on line? Mr. Parry, why can't you find it? Oh, wait: You did! Heaven forbid we, your readers, should screen it. Since you, too, are helping keep that film a big fat secret at least give us a few clues as to where we can find it. Throw us a bone! Thank you.
ToivoS , July 13, 2017 at 4:01 pmParry isn't keeping the film viewing a secret. He was given a private password and perhaps can get permission to let the readers here have it. It isn't up to Parry himself but rather to the person(s) who have the rights to the password. I've come across this problem before.
Lisa , July 13, 2017 at 6:28 pmParry wrote: I did find a streaming service that appeared to have the film available.
Any link?? I am willing to buy it.
Lisa , July 13, 2017 at 6:31 pmThis may not be of much help, as the film is dubbed in Russian. If you want to look for the Russian versions on the internet, search for: "????? ?????? ????????? "????? ???????????. ?? ????????"
https://my.mail.ru/bk/n-osetrova/video/71/18682.html?time=155&from=videoplayer
I'll keep looking for the film with translation into some other language.
Lisa , July 13, 2017 at 6:45 pmSorry, the Russian text did not appear. Try with latin alphabet: Film Andreia Nekrasova "Zakon Magnitskogo. Za kulisami"
Abe , July 13, 2017 at 5:21 pmhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8d1ylakLMNU
This is the same dubbed version, on youtube.
backwardsevolution , July 13, 2017 at 5:51 pmHysterical agit-prop troll insists that world trembles in fear of "genuine American hero" William Browder. John McCain in 2012 was too busy trembling to notice that Browder had given up his US citizenship in 1998 in order to better profit from the Russian financial crisis.
incontinent reader , July 13, 2017 at 6:24 pmAbe – and to escape U.S. taxes.
Vincent Castigliola , July 13, 2017 at 2:38 pmWell stated.
Anna , July 13, 2017 at 5:54 pmMr. Parry,
Excellent report and analysis. Thanks for timely reminder regarding the Magitsky story and the fascinating background regarding Andrei Nekrasov's film, in particular its metamorphosis and subsequent aggressive suppression. Both of those factors render the film a particular credibility and wish on my part to view it.
Is there any chance you can share information regarding a means of accessing the forbidden film?
I am beginning to feel more and more like the citizens of the old USSR, who, were to my recollection and understanding back in the 50's and 60's:. Longing to read and hear facts suppressed by the communist state, dependent upon the Voice of America and underground news sources within the Soviet Union for the truth. RU, Consortium news, et. al. seem somewhat a parallel, and 1984 not so distant.
Last night, After watching Max Boot self destruct on Tucker Carlson, i was inspired to watch episode 2 of The Putin Interviews. I felt enlightened. If only the Establishment Media could turn from promoting its agenda of shaping and suppressing the news into accurately reporting it.
Media corruption is not so new. Yellow journalism around the turn of the 19th century, took us into a progression of wars. The War to End All Wars didn't. Blame the munitions makers and the Military Industrial Complex if you will, but a corrupt medial, at the very least enabled a progression of wars over the last 120 or so years.
Demonizing other countries is bad enough, but wilfully ignoring the potential for a nuclear war to end not only war, but life as we know it, is appalling.
Vincent Castigliola , July 13, 2017 at 9:41 pm"After watching Max Boot self destruct on Tucker Carlson "
Am I the only one who thinks that Max Boot should have been institutionalized for some time already? He is not well.Anna , July 14, 2017 at 9:31 amAnna,
Perhaps Max can share a suite with John McCain. Sadly, the illness is widespread and sometimes seems to be in the majority. Neo con/lib both are adamant in finding enemies and imposing punishment.Finding splinters, ignoring beams. Changing regimes everywhere. Making the world safe for Democracy. Unless a man they don't like get elected
orwell , July 14, 2017 at 3:44 pmMax Boot parents are Russain Jews who seemingly instilled in him a rabid hatred for everything Russian. The same is with Aperovitch, the CrowdStrike fraudster. The first Soviet (Bolshevik) government was 85% Jewish. Considering what happened to Russia under Bolsheviks, it seems that Russians are supremely tolerant people.
Cal , July 14, 2017 at 8:03 pmAnna, Anti-Semitism will get you NOWHERE, and you should be ashamed of yourself for injecting such HATRED into the rational discussion here.
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 1:02 amDear orwell
re Anna
Its not anti Semitic if its true .and its true he is a Russian Jew and its very obvious he hates Russia–as does the whole Jewish Zionist crowd in the US.
Taras77 , July 13, 2017 at 11:17 pmorwell, I wonder why the truth always turns out to be so anti-semitic!?
Zachary Smith , July 13, 2017 at 2:51 pmI hope you caught the preceding tucker interview with Ralph Peters, who says he is a retired us army LTC. He came off as completely deranged and hysterical. The two interviews back to back struck me as neo con desperation and panic. My respect for Tucker just went up for taking on these two wackos.
Dan Mason , July 13, 2017 at 6:42 pmThe fact that the film is being suppressed by everybody is significant to me. I don't know a thing about the "facts" of the Magnitsky case, and a quick look at the results of a Google search suggests this film isn't going to be available to me unless I shell out some unknown amount of money.
If the producers want the film to be seen, perhaps they ought to release it for download to any interested parties for a nominal sum. This will mean they won't make any profit, but on the other hand they will be able to spit in the eyes of the censors.
orwell , July 14, 2017 at 3:48 pmI went searching the net for access to this film and found that I was blocked at every turn. I did find a few links which all seemed to go to the same destination which claimed to provide access once I registered with their site. I decided to avoid that route. I don't really have that much interest in the Magnitsky affair, but I do wonder why we are being denied access to information. Who has this kind of influence, and why are they so fearful. I'm really afraid that we already live in a largely hidden Orwellian world. Now where did I put that tin foil hat?
Drew Hunkins , July 13, 2017 at 2:53 pmThe Orwellian World is NOT HIDDEN, it is clearly visible.
backwardsevolution , July 13, 2017 at 3:30 pmNekrasov, though he's a Putin critic, is a genuine hero in this instance. He ulitimately put his preconceptions aside and took the story where it truly led him. Nekrasov deserves boatloads of praise for his handling of Browder and his final documentary film product.
BannanaBoat , July 13, 2017 at 6:12 pmDrew – good comment. It's very hard to "turn", isn't it? I wonder if many people appreciate what it takes to do this. Easier to justify, turn a blind eye, but to actually stop, question, think, and then follow where the story leads you takes courage and strength.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 1:49 amEspecially when your bucking an aggressive billionaire.
Zim , July 13, 2017 at 3:11 pmBannanaBoat – that too!
Virginia , July 13, 2017 at 6:13 pmThis is interesting:
"In December 2015, The Wall Street Journal reported that Hillary Clinton opposed the Magnitsky Act while serving as secretary of state. Her opposition coincided with Bill Clinton giving a speech in Moscow for Renaissance Capital, a Russian investment bank! for which he was paid $500,000.
"Mr. Clinton also received a substantial payout in 2010 from Renaissance Capital, a Russian investment bank whose executives were at risk of being hurt by possible U.S. sanctions tied to a complex and controversial case of alleged corruption in Russia.
Members of Congress wrote to Mrs. Clinton in 2010 seeking to deny visas to people who had been implicated by Russian accountant Sergei Magnitsky, who was jailed and died in prison after he uncovered evidence of a large tax-refund fraud. William Browder, a foreign investor in Russia who had hired Mr. Magnitsky, alleged that the accountant had turned up evidence that Renaissance officials, among others, participated in the fraud."
The State Department opposed the sanctions bill at the time, as did the Russian government. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov pushed Hillary Clinton to oppose the legislation during a meeting in St. Petersburg in June 2012, citing that U.S.-Russia relations would suffer as a result."
More: http://observer.com/2017/07/natalia-veselnitskaya-hillary-clinton-magnitsky-act/
Bart in Virginia , July 13, 2017 at 3:15 pmVery interesting, Zim.
Cal , July 13, 2017 at 3:31 pm"[Veselnitskaya] traveled to Washington in the days after her Trump Tower meeting and attended a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, according to The Washington Post." The other day I saw photos of her sitting right behind Amb. McFaul in some past hearing. How did she get a seat on the front row?
Now I remember that Post editorial. I was one of only 20 commenters before they shut down comments. It was some heavy pearl clutching.
BobH , July 13, 2017 at 3:35 pmWOW..excellent reporting.
BobH , July 13, 2017 at 3:38 pmnice backgrounder for an ever evolving story censorship is censorship by any other name!
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 1:11 amafterthought couldn't the film be shown on RT America?
Abe , July 13, 2017 at 3:41 pmWould that not enable Bowder's employees online to claim that this documentary is Russian state propaganda, which it obviously is not because it would have been made available for free everywhere already just like RT. I believe that Nekrasov does not like RT and RT probably still does not like Nekrasov. The point of RT has never been the truth then the alternative point of view, as they advertised: Audi alteram partem.
Joe Tedesky , July 13, 2017 at 4:13 pm"The approach taken by Brennan's task force in assessing Russia and its president seems eerily reminiscent of the analytical blinders that hampered the U.S. intelligence community when it came to assessing the objectives and intent of Saddam Hussein and his inner leadership regarding weapons of mass destruction. The Russia NIA notes, 'Many of the key judgments rely on a body of reporting from multiple sources that are consistent with our understanding of Russian behavior.' There is no better indication of a tendency toward 'group think' than that statement.
Moreover, when one reflects on the fact much of this 'body of reporting' was shoehorned after the fact into an analytical premise predicated on a single source of foreign-provided intelligence, that statement suddenly loses much of its impact.
"The acknowledged deficit on the part of the U.S. intelligence community of fact-driven insight into the specifics of Russian presidential decision-making, and the nature of Vladimir Putin as an individual in general, likewise seems problematic. The U.S. intelligence community was hard wired into pre-conceived notions about how and what Saddam Hussein would think and decide, and as such remained blind to the fact that he would order the totality of his weapons of mass destruction to be destroyed in the summer of 1991, or that he could be telling the truth when later declaring that Iraq was free of WMD.
'President Putin has repeatedly and vociferously denied any Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election. Those who cite the findings of the Russia NIA as indisputable proof to the contrary, however, dismiss this denial out of hand. And yet nowhere in the Russia NIA is there any evidence that those who prepared it conducted anything remotely resembling the kind of 'analysis of alternatives' mandated by the ODNI when it comes to analytic standards used to prepare intelligence community assessments and estimates. Nor is there any evidence that the CIA's vaunted 'Red Cell' was approached to provide counterintuitive assessments of premises such as 'What if President Putin is telling the truth?'
'Throughout its history, the NIC has dealt with sources of information that far exceeded any sensitivity that might attach to Brennan's foreign intelligence source. The NIC had two experts that it could have turned to oversee a project like the Russia NIA!the NIO for Cyber Issues, and the Mission Manager of the Russian and Eurasia Mission Center; logic dictates that both should have been called upon, given the subject matter overlap between cyber intrusion and Russian intent.
'The excuse that Brennan's source was simply too sensitive to be shared with these individuals, and the analysts assigned to them, is ludicrous!both the NIO for cyber issues and the CIA's mission manager for Russia and Eurasia are cleared to receive the most highly classified intelligence and, moreover, are specifically mandated to oversee projects such as an investigation into Russian meddling in the American electoral process.
'President Trump has come under repeated criticism for his perceived slighting of the U.S. intelligence community in repeatedly citing the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction intelligence failure when downplaying intelligence reports, including the Russia NIA, about Russian interference in the 2016 election. Adding insult to injury, the president's most recent comments were made on foreign soil (Poland), on the eve of his first meeting with President Putin, at the G-20 Conference in Hamburg, Germany, where the issue of Russian meddling was the first topic on the agenda.
"The politics of the wisdom of the timing and location of such observations aside, the specific content of the president's statements appear factually sound."
Throwing a Curveball at 'Intelligence Community Consensus' on Russia By Scott Ritter http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/did-17-intelligence-agencies-really-come-to-consensus-on-russia/
Virginia , July 13, 2017 at 6:16 pmThanks Abe once again, for providing us with news which will never be printed or aired in our MSM. Brennan may ignore the NIC, as Congress and the Executive Branch constantly avoid paying attention to the GAO. Why even have these agencies, if our leaders aren't going to listen them?
Skip Scott , July 14, 2017 at 9:08 amAbe, I'm always amazed at how much you know. Thank you for sharing. If you have your comments in article form or on a site where they can be shared, I'd really like to know about it. I've tried, but I garble the many points you make when trying to explain historical events you've told us about.
John V. Walsh , July 13, 2017 at 3:54 pmThanks Abe. You are a real asset to us here at CN.
Roger Annis , July 13, 2017 at 4:02 pmVery good article! The entire Magnitsky saga has become so convoluted and mired in controversy and propaganda that it is very hard to understand. I remember vaguely the controversy surrounding the showing of the film at the Newseum. it is especially impressive that Nekrasov changed his opinion as fcts unfolded.
I will now try to get the docudrama and watch it.
If anyone has suggestions on how to do this, please let me know via a response. here.
Thanks.John-Albert Eadie , July 13, 2017 at 5:01 pmA 'Magnitsky Act' in Canada was approved by the (appointed) Senate several months ago and is now undergoing fine tuning in the House of Commons prior to a third and final vote of approval. The proposed law has the unanimous support of the parties in Parliament.
A column in today's Globe and Mail daily by the newspaper's 'chief political writer' tiptoes around the Magnitsky story, never once daring to admit that a contrary narrative exists to that of Bill Browder.
backwardsevolution , July 13, 2017 at 5:56 pmMagnitsky Act in Canada has been based on made-up `facts` as Globe & Mail reporting proves. Not news, but deepens my concern about Canada following the Cold War without examination.
Britton , July 13, 2017 at 4:05 pmRoger Annis – just little lemmings following the leader. Disgusting. I hope you posted a comment at the Globe and Mail, Roger, with a link to this article.
Joe Average , July 13, 2017 at 5:06 pmBrowder is a Communist Jew, his father has a Communist past according to his background so I know I can't trust anything he says. Hes just one of many shady interests undermining Putin I've seen over the years. His book Red Notice is just as shady. Good reporting Consortium News. Fox News promotes Browder like crazy every chance they get especially Fox Business channel.
ToivoS , July 13, 2017 at 6:02 pm"Browder is a Communist " Hedge Fund managers are hardly Communist – that's an oxymoron.
Joe Average , July 13, 2017 at 6:34 pmBill Browder's grandfather was Earl Browder, leader of the CPUSA from the the late 30s to late 40s. His father was also a communist. Bill jr parlayed those connections with the Soviet apparatchiks to gain a foothold in looting Russia of its state assets during the 1990s. No he was not a communist but neither were the leaders of the Soviet Union at the time of its dissolution (in name yes, but in fact not).
backwardsevolution , July 13, 2017 at 6:21 pmToivoS,
thank you for this background information.
My main intention had been to straighten out the blurring of calling a hedge fund manager communist. Nowadays everything gets blurred by people misrepresenting political concepts. Either the people have been dumbed-down by misinformation or misrepresenting is done in order to keep neo-liberalism the dominant economical model. On many occasions I had read comments of people seemingly believing that Nationalsocialism had been some variant of socialism. Even the ideas of Bernie Sanders had been misrepresented as socialist instead of social democratic ones.
Dave P. , July 13, 2017 at 7:37 pmJoe Average – Dave P. mentioned Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's book entitled "Two Hundred Years Together" the other day. I've been reading a long synopsis of this book. What Britton says appears to be quite true. I don't know about Browder, but from what I've read the Jews were instrumental in the communist party, in the deaths of so many Russians. It wasn't just the Jews, but they played a big part. It's no wonder Solzhenitsyn's book has been "lost in translation", at least into English, for so many years.
I've also heard that it was the Jewish commissars who, when the USSR fell apart, rushed off to grab everything they could (with the help of outside Jewish money) and became the Russian oligarchs we hear about today. This is probably what Britton is getting at: "His father has a communist past." You go from running the government to owning it. Anti-Putin because Putin put a stop to them.
Bruce Walker , July 13, 2017 at 9:29 pmbackwardsevolution: I worked with a Soviet emigre engineer – Jewish – on the same project in an Engineering design and construction company during early 1990's. He immigrated with his family around 1991. In Soviet Union, there being no private financial institutions or lawyers so to speak , many Jews went into science and engineering. A very interesting person, we were close work place friends. His elder brother had stayed behind back in Russia. His brother was in Moscow and involved in this plunder going on there. He used to tell me all these hair raising first hand stories about what was going on in Russia during that time. All the plunder flowed into the Western Countries.
In recent history, no country went through this kind of plunder on a scale Russia went through during ten or fifteen years starting in 1992. Russia was a very badly ravaged country when Putin took over. Means of production, finance, all came to halt, and society itself had completely broken down. It appears that the West has all the intentions to do it again.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 12:38 amI have read all the comments up to yours you have told it like it was in Russia in those years. Browder was the king of the crooks looting Russia. Then he got to John McCain with all his lies and bullshit and was responsible for the sanctions on Russia. All the comments aboutBrowders grandfather andCommunist party are all true but hardly important. Except that it probably was how Browder was able to get his fingers on the pie in Russia. And he sure did get his fingers in the pie BIG TIME.
I am a Canadian and am aware of Maginsky Act in Canada. Our Minister Chrystal Freeland met with William Brawder in Davos a few months ago both of these two you could say are not fans of Putin, I certainly don't know what they spoke about but other than lies from Browder there is no reason she should have been talking with him. I have made comments on other forums regarding these two meeting. Read Browders book and hopefully see the documentary that this article is about. When I read his book I knew instantly that he was a crook a charloten and a liar. Just the kind of folk John McCain and a lot of other folks in US politics love. You all have a nice Peacefull day
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 12:58 amJoe Average – "I guess that this book puts blame for Communism entirely on the Jewish people and that this gave even further rise to antisemitism in the Germany of the 1930's."
No, it doesn't put the blame entirely on the Jews; it just spells out that they did play a large part. As one Jewish scholar said, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was too much of an academic, too intelligent to ever put the blame entirely on one group. But something like 40 – 60 million died – shot, taken out on boats with rocks around their necks and thrown overboard, starved, gassed in rail cars, poisoned, worked to death, froze, you name it. Every other human slaughter pales in comparison. Good old man, so civilized (sarc)!
But someone(s) has been instrumental in keeping this book from being translated into English (or so I've read many places online). Solzhenitsyn's "Gulag Archipelago" and his other books have been translated, but not this one. (Although I just found one site that has almost all of the chapters translated, but not all). Several people ordered the book off Amazon, only to find out that it was in the Russian language. LOL
Solzhenitsyn does say at one point in the book: "Communist rebellions in Germany post-WWI was a big reason for the revival of anti-Semitism (as there was no serious anti-Semitism in the imperial [Kaiser] Germany of 1870 – 1918)."
Lots of Jewish people made it into the upper levels of the Soviet government, academia, etc. (and lots of them were murdered too). I might skip reading these types of books until I get older. Too bleak. Hard enough reading about the day-to-day stuff here without going back in time for more fun!
I remember reading Naomi Klein's "Shock Doctrine," but I just could not get through the chapter on the USSR falling apart. I started reading it, but I didn't want to finish it (and I didn't) because it just made me angry. The West was too unfair! Russia was asking for help, but instead the West just looted. I'd say that Russia was very lucky to have someone like Putin clean it up.
Keep smiling, Joe.
Chucky LeRoi , July 14, 2017 at 9:56 amDave P. – I told you, you are a wealth of information, a walking encyclopedia. Interesting about your co-worker. Sounds like it was a free-for-all in Russia. Yes, I totally agree that Putin has done and is doing all he can to bring his country back up. Very difficult job he is doing, and I hope he is successful at keeping the West out as much as he can, at least until Russia is strong and sure enough to invite them in on their own terms.
Now go and tell your wife what I said about you being a "walking encyclopedia". She'll probably have a good laugh. (Not that you're not, but you know what she'll say: "Okay, smartie, now go and do the dishes.")
Joe Average , July 13, 2017 at 8:10 pmJust some small scale, local color kind of stuff, but living in the USA, west coast specifically, it was quite noticeable in the mid to late '90's how many Russians with money were suddenly appearing. No apparent skills or 'jobs', but seemingly able to pay for stuff. Expensive stuff.
A neighbor invited us to her 'place in the mountains', which turned out to be where a lumber company had almost terra-formed an area and was selling off the results. Her advice: When you go to the lake (i.e., the low area now gathering runoff, paddle boats rentals, concession stand) you will see a lot of men with huge stomachs and tiny Speedos. They will be very rude, pushy, confrontational. Ignore them, DO NOT comment on their rudeness or try to deal with their manners. They are Russians, and the amount of trouble it will stir up – and probable repercussions – are simply not worth it.
Back in town, the anecdotes start piling up quickly. I am talking crowbars through windows (for a perceived insult). A beating where the victim – who was probably trying something shady – was so pulped the emergency room staff couldn't tell if the implement used was a 2X4 or a baseball bat. When found he had with $3k in his pocket: robbery was not the motive. More traffic accidents involving guys with very nice cars and serious attitude problems. I could go on. More and more often somewhere in the relating of these incidents the phrase " this Russian guy " would come up. It was the increased use of this phrase that was so noticeable.
And now the disclaimer.
Before anybody goes off, I am not anti-Russian, Russo-phobic, what have you. I studied the Russian language in high school and college (admittedly decades ago). My tax guy is Russian. I love him. My day to day interactions have led me to this pop psychology observation: the extreme conditions that produced that people and culture produced extremes. When they are of the good, loving , caring, cultured, helpful sort, you could ask for no better friends. The generosity can be embarrassing. When they are of the materialistic, evil, self-centered don't f**k with me I am THE BADDEST ASS ON THE PLANET sort, the level of mania and self-importance is impossible to deal with, just get as far away as possible. It's worked for me.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 12:50 ambackwardsevolution,
thanks for the info. I'll add the book to the list of books onto my to-read list. As far as I know a Kibbutz could be described as a Communist microcosm. The whole idea of Communism itself is based on Marx (a Jew by birth). A while ago I had started reading "Mein Kampf". I've got to finish the book, in order to see if my assumption is correct. I guess that this book puts blame for Communism entirely on the Jewish people and that this gave even further rise to antisemitism in the Germany of the 1930's.
The most known Russian Oligarchs that I've heard of are mainly of Jewish origin, but as far as I know they had been too young to be commissars at the time of the demise of the USSR. At least one aspect I've read of many times is that a lot of them built their fortunes with the help of quite shady business dealings.
With regard to President Putin I've read that he made a deal with the oligarchs: they should pay their taxes, keep/invest their money in Russia and keep out of politics. In return he wouldn't dig too deep into their past. Right at the moment everybody in the West is against President Putin, because he stopped the looting of his country and its citizens and that's something our Western oligarchs and financial institutions don't like.
On a side note: Several years ago I had started to read several volumes about German history. Back then I didn't notice an important aspect that should attract my attention a few years later when reading about the rise of John D. Rockefeller. Charlemagne (Charles the Great) took over power from the Merovingians. Prior to becoming King of the Franks he had been Hausmeier (Mayor of the Palace) for the Merovingians. Mayor of the Palace was the title of the manager of the household, which seems to be similar to a procurator and/or accountant (bookkeeper). The similarity of the beginnings of both careers struck me. John D. Rockefeller started as a bookkeeper. If you look at Bill Gates you'll realize that he was smart enough to buy an operating system for a few dollars, improved it and sold it to IBM on a large scale. The widely celebrated Steve Jobs was basically the marketing guy, whilst the real brain behind (the product) Apple had been Steve Wozniak.
Another side note: If we're going down the path of neo-liberalism it will lead us straight back to feudalism – at least if the economy doesn't blow up (PCR, Michael Hudson, Mike Whitney, Mike Maloney, Jim Rogers, Richard D. Wolff, and many more economists make excellent points that our present Western economy can't go on forever and is kept alive artificially).
Miranda Keefe , July 14, 2017 at 5:48 amJoe Average – somehow my reply to you ended up above your post. What? How did that happen? You can find it there. Thanks for the interesting info about John D. Rockefeller, Gates, Jobs and Wozniak. Some are good managers, others good at sales, while others are the creative inventors.
Yes, Joe, I totally agree that we are headed back to feudalism. I don't think we'll have much choice as the oil is running out. We'll probably be okay, but our children? I worry about them. They'll notice a big change in their lifetimes. The discovery and capture of oil pulled forward a large population. As we scale back, we could be in trouble, food-wise. Or at least it looks that way.
Thanks, Joe.
Anna , July 14, 2017 at 9:45 amCharlemagne did not take over from the Merovingians. The Mayor of the Palace was not an accountant.
During the 7th Century the Mayor of the Place more and more became the actual ruler of the Franks. The office had existed for over a century and was basically the "prime minister" to the king. By the time Pepin of Herstal, a scion of a powerful Frankish family, took the position in 680, the king was ceremonial leader doing ritual and the Mayor ruled- like the relationship of the Emperor and the Shogun in Japan. In 687 Pepin's Austrasia conquered Neustria and Burgundy and he added "Duke of the Franks" to his titles. The office became hereditary.
When Pepin died in 714 there was some unrest as nobles from various parts of the joint kingdoms attempted to get different ones of his heirs in the office until his son Charles Martel took the reins in 718. This is the famous Charles Martel who defeated the Moors at Tours in 732. But that was not his only accomplishment as he basically extended the Frankish kingdom to include Saxony. Charles not only ruled but when the king died he picked which possible heir would become king. Finally near the end of his reign he didn't even bother replacing the king and the throne was empty.
When Charles Martel died in 741 he followed Frankish custom and divided his kingdom among his sons. By 747 his younger son, Pepin the Short, had consolidated his rule and with the support of the Pope, deposed the last Merovingian King and became the first Carolingian King in 751- the dynasty taking its name from Charles Martel. Thus Pepin reunited the two aspects of the Frankish ruler, combining the rule of the Mayor with the ceremonial reign of the King into the new Kingship.
Pepin expanded the kingdom beyond the Frankish lands even more and his son, Charlemagne, continued that. Charlemagne was 8 when his father took the title of King. Charlemagne never was the Mayor of the Palace, but grew up as the prince. He became King of the Franks in 768 ruling with his brother, sole King in 781, and then started becoming King of other countries until he united it all in 800 as the restored Western Roman Emperor.
When he died in 814 the Empire was divided into three Kingdoms and they never reunited again. The western one evolved into France. The eastern one evolved in the Holy Roman Empire and eventually Germany. The middle one never solidified but became the Low Countries, Switzerland, and the Italian states.
Joe Average , July 14, 2017 at 11:32 pmThe Canadian Minister Chrysta Freeland met with William Brawder in Davos a few months ago " -- Birds of a feather flock together. Mrs. Chrystal Freeland has a very interesting background for which she is very proud of: her granddad was a Ukrainian Nazi collaborator denounced by Jewish investigators: https://consortiumnews.com/2017/02/27/a-nazi-skeleton-in-the-family-closet/
Since the inti-Russian tenor of the Canadian Minister Chrysta Freeland is in accord with the US ziocons anti-Russian policies (never mind all this fuss about WWII Jewish mass graves in Ukraine), "Chrysta" is totally approved by the US government.
Cal , July 13, 2017 at 10:13 pmI'll reply to myself in order to send a response to backwardsevolution and Miranda Keefe.
For a change I'll be so bold to ignore gentleman style and reply in the order of the posts – instead of Ladies first.
backwardsevolution,
in my first paragraph I failed to make a clear distinction. I started with the remark that I'm adding the book "Two Hundred Years Together" to my to-read list and then mentioned that I'm right now reading "Mein Kampf". All remarks after mentioning the latter book are directed at this one – and not the one of Solzhenitsyn.
Miranda Keefe,
I'm aware that accountant isn't an exact characterization of the concept of a Mayor of the Palace. As a precaution I had added the phrase "seems to be similar". You're correct with the statement that Charlemagne was descendant Karl Martel. At first I intended to write that Karolinger (Carolings) took over from Merowinger (Merovingians), because those details are irrelevant to the point that I wanted to make. It would've been an information overload. My main point was the power of accountants and related fields such as sales and marketing. Neither John D. Rockefeller, Bill Gates nor Steve Jobs actually created their products from scratch.
Many of those who are listed as billionaires haven't been creators / inventors themselves. Completely decoupled from actual production is banking. Warren Buffet is started as an investment salesman, later stock broker and investor. Oversimplified you could describe this activity as accounting or sales. It's the same with George Soros and Carl Icahn. Without proper supervision money managers (or accountants) had and still do screw those who had hired them. One of those victims is former billionaire heiress Madeleine Schickedanz ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madeleine_Schickedanz ). Generalized you could also say that BlackRock is your money manager accountant. If you've got some investment (that dates back before 2008), which promises you a higher interest rate after a term of lets say 20 years, the company with which you have the contract with may have invested your money with BlackRock. The financial crisis of 2008 has shown that finance (accountants / money managers) are taking over. Aren't investment bankers the ones who get paid large bonuses in case of success and don't face hardly any consequences in case of failure? Well, whatever turn future might take, one thing is for sure: whenever SHTF even the most colorful printed pieces of paper will not taste very well.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 1:54 amHistory's Greatest Heist: The Looting of Russia by the Bolsheviks on
http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1nppst
History's Greatest Heist: The Looting of Russia by the Bolsheviks . EVER SINCE THE Emperor Constantine established the legal position of the church in the
Many Bolsheviks fled to Germany , taking with them some loot that enabled them to get established in Germany. Lots of invaluable art work also.
Cal , July 14, 2017 at 2:22 pmCal – read about "History's Greatest Heist" on Amazon. Sounds interesting. Was one of the main reasons for the Czar's overthrow to steal and then flee? It's got to have been on some minds. A lot of people got killed, and they would have had wedding rings, gold, etc. That doesn't even include the wealth that could be stolen from the Czar. Was the theft just one of those things that happened through opportunism, or was it one of the main reasons for the overthrow in the first place, get some dough and run with it?
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 4:09 pm@ backwards
" Was the theft just one of those things that happened through opportunism, or was it one of the main reasons for the overthrow"'
imo some of both. I am sure when they were selling off Russian valuables to finance their revolution a lot of them set aside some loot for themselves.
Brad Owen , July 14, 2017 at 11:45 amCal – thank you. Good books like this get us closer and closer to the truth. Thank goodness for these people.
Brad Owen , July 14, 2017 at 12:13 pmAn autocratic oligarch would probably be a better description. He probably believes like other Synarchist financiers that they should rightfully rule the World, and see democratic processes as heresy against "The Natural Order for human society", or some such belief.
mike k , July 13, 2017 at 4:11 pmLooking up "A short definition of Synarchism (a Post-Napoleonic social phenomenon) by Lyndon LaRouche" would give much insight into what's going on. People from the intelligence community made sure a copy of a 1940 army intelligence dossier labelled something like "Synarchism:NAZI/Communist" got into Lyndon's hands. It speaks of the the Synarchist method of attacking a targeted society from both extreme (Right-Left) ends of the political spectrum. I guess this is dialectics? I suppose the existence of the one extreme legitimizes the harsh, anti-democratic/anti-human measures taken to exterminate it by the other extreme, actually destroying the targeted society in the process. America, USSR, and (Sun Yat Sen's old Republic of) China were the targeted societies in the pre-WWII/WWII yearsfor their "sins" of championing We The People against Oligarchy. FDR knew the Synarchist threat and sided with Russia and China against Germany and Japan. He knew that, after dealing with the battlefield NAZIs, the "Boardroom" NAZIs would have to be dealt with Post-War. That all changed with his death.The Synarchists are still at it today, hence all the rabid Russo-phobia, the Pacific Pivot, and the drive towards war. This is all being foiled with Trump's friendly, cooperative approach towards Russia and China.
Joe Tedesky , July 13, 2017 at 4:21 pmBig Brother at work – always protecting us from upsetting information. How nice of him to insure our comfort. No need for us to bother with all of this confusing stuff, he can do all that for us. The mainstream media will tell us all we need to know .. (Virginia – please notice my use of irony.)
Joe Average , July 13, 2017 at 5:09 pmDo you remember mike K when porn was censored, and there were two sides to every issue as compromise was always on the table? Now porn is accessible on cable TV, and there is only one side to every issue, and that's I'm right about everything and your not, what compromise with you?
Don't get me wrong, I don't really care how we deal with porn, but I am very concerned to why censorship is showing up whereas we can't see certain things, for certain reasons we know nothing about. Also, I find it unnerving that we as a society continue to stay so undivided. Sure, we can't all see the same things the same way, but maybe it's me, and I'm getting older by the minute, but where is our cooperation to at least try and work with each other?
Always like reading your comments mike K Joe
Joe Tedesky , July 13, 2017 at 5:27 pmJoe,
when it comes to the choice of watching porn and bodies torn apart (real war pictures), I prefer the first one, although we in the West should be confronted with the horrible pictures of what we're assisting/doing.
mike k , July 13, 2017 at 6:07 pmThis is where the Two Joe's are alike.
Cal , July 13, 2017 at 10:15 pmI do remember those days Joe. I am 86 now, so a lot has changed since 1931. With the 'greed is good' philosophy in vogue now, those who seek compromise are seen as suckers for the more single minded to take advantage of. Respect for rules of decency is just about gone, especially at the top of the wealth pyramid.
BannanaBoat , July 13, 2017 at 6:36 pmYep
ranney , July 13, 2017 at 4:37 pmDistraction from critical thinking, excellent observation ( please forget the NeoCon Demos they are responsible for half of the nightmare USA society has become.
John , July 13, 2017 at 4:40 pmWow Robert, what a fascinating article! And how complicated things become "when first we practice to deceive".
Abe thank you for the link to Ritter's article; that's a really good one too!Abe , July 13, 2017 at 7:01 pmIf we get into a shooting war with Russia and the human race somehow survives it Robert Parry' s name will one day appear in the history books as the person who most thoroughly documented the events leading up to that war. He will be considered to be a top historian as well as a top journalist.
Abe , July 13, 2017 at 7:16 pm"Browder, who abjured his American citizenship in 1998 to become a British subject, reveals more about his own selective advocacy of democratic principles than about the film itself. He might recall that in his former homeland freedom of the press remains a cherished value."
A Response to William Browder
By Rachel Bauman
http://nationalinterest.org/feature/response-william-browder-16654Abe , July 13, 2017 at 7:19 pmWilliam Browder is a "shareholder activist" the way Mikhail Khodorkovsky is a "human rights activist".
Both loudly bleat the "story" of their heroic "fight for justice" for billionaire Jewish oligarchs: themselves.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 2:50 am"never driven by the money"
https://www.thejc.com/culture/books/be-careful-of-putin-he-is-a-true-enemy-of-jews-1.61745Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 1:56 amAbe – "never driven by the money". No, he would never be that type of guy (sarc)!
"It's hard to know what Browder will do next. He rules out any government ambitions, instead saying he can achieve more by lobbying it.
This summer, he says he met "big Hollywood players" in a bid to turn his book into a major film.
"The most important next step in the campaign is to adapt the book into a Hollywood feature film," he says. "I have been approached by many film-makers and spent part of the summer in LA meeting with screenwriters, producers and directors to figure out what the best constellation of players will be on this.
"There are a lot of people looking at it. It's still difficult to say who we will end up choosing. There are many interesting options, but I'm not going to name any names."
What the ..? I can see it now, George Clooney in the lead role, Mr. White Helmets himself, with his twins in tow.
Abe , July 13, 2017 at 7:39 pmIs it not impressive how money buys out reality in the modern world? This is why one can safely assume that whatever is told in the MSM is completely opposite to the truth. Would MSM have to push it if it were the truth? You may call this Kiza's Law if you like (modestly): " The truth is always opposite to what MSM say! " The 0.1% of situations where this is not the case is the margin of error.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 3:15 am"no figure in this saga has a more tangled family relationship with the Kremlin than the London-based hedge fund manager Bill Browder [ ]
"there's a reticence in his Jewish narrative. One of his first jobs in London is with the investment operation of the publishing billionaire Robert Maxwell. As it happens, Maxwell was originally a Czech Jewish Holocaust survivor who fled and became a decorated British soldier, then helped in 1948 to set up the secret arms supply line to newly independent Israel from communist Czechoslovakia. He was also rumored to be a longtime Mossad agent. But you learn none of that from Browder's memoir.
"The silence is particularly striking because when Browder launches his own fund, he hires a former Israeli Mossad agent, Ariel, to set up his security operation, manned mainly by Israelis. Over time, Browder and Ariel become close. How did that connection come about? Was it through Maxwell? Wherever it started, the origin would add to the story. Why not tell it?
"When Browder sets up his own fund, Hermitage Capital Management -- named for the famed czarist-era St. Petersburg art museum, though that's not explained either -- his first investor is Beny Steinmetz, the Israeli diamond billionaire. Browder tells how Steinmetz introduced him to the Lebanese-Brazilian Jewish banking billionaire Edmond Safra, who invests and becomes not just a partner but also a mentor and friend.
"Safra is also internationally renowned as the dean of Sephardi Jewish philanthropy; the main backer of Israel's Shas party, the Sephardi Torah Guardians, and of New York's Holocaust memorial museum, and a megadonor to Yeshiva University, Hebrew University, the Weizmann Institute and much more. Browder must have known all that. Considering the closeness of the two, it's surprising that none of it gets mentioned.
"It's possible that Browder's reticence about his Jewish connections is simply another instance of the inarticulateness that seizes so many American Jews when they try to address their Jewishness."
http://forward.com/news/376788/the-secret-jewish-history-of-donald-trump-jrs-russia-scandal/
Abe , July 14, 2017 at 11:37 pmAbe – what a web. Money makes money, doesn't it? It's often what club you belong to and who you know. I remember a millionaire in my area long ago who went bankrupt. The wealthy simply chipped in, gave him some start-up money, and he was off to the races again. Simple as that. And I would think that the Jews are an even tighter group who invest with each other, are privy to inside information, get laws changed in favor of each other, pay people off when one gets in trouble. Browder seems a shifty sort. As the article says, he leaves a lot out.
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 2:26 amIn 1988, Stanton Wheeler (Yale University – Law School), David L. Weisburd (Hebrew University of Jerusalem; George Mason University – The Department of Criminology, Law & Society; Hebrew University of Jerusalem – Faculty of Law). Elin Waring (Yale University – Law School), and Nancy Bode (Government of the State of Minnesota) published a major study on white collar crime in America.
Part of a larger program of research on white-collar crime supported by a grant from the United States Department of Justice's National Institute of Justice, the study included "the more special forms associated with the abuse of political power [ ] or abuse of financial power". The study was also published as a Hebrew University of Jerusalem Legal Research Paper
The research team noted that Jews were over-represented relative to their share of the U.S. population:
"With respect to religion, there is one clear finding. Although many in both white collar and common crime categories do not claim a particular religious faith [ ] It would be a fair summary of our. data to say that, demographically speaking, white collar offenders are predominantly middle-aged white males with an over-representation of Jews."
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2632989
In 1991, David L. Weisburd published his study of Crimes of the Middle Classes: White-Collar Offenders in the Federal Courts, Weisburd found that although Jews comprised only around 2% of the United States population, they contributed at least 9% of lower category white-collar crimes (bank embezzlement, tax fraud and bank fraud), at least 15% of moderate category white-collar crimes (mail fraud, false claims, and bribery), and at least 33% of high category white-collar crimes (antitrust and securities fraud). Weisburg showed greater frequency of Jewish offenders at the top of the hierarchy of white collar crime. In Weisbug's sample of financial crime in America, Jews were responsible for 23.9%.
Cal , July 16, 2017 at 5:41 amWhat I find most interesting is how Putin handles the Jews.
It is obvious that he is the one who saved the country of Russia from the looting of the 90s by the Russian-American Jewish mafia. This is the most direct explanation for his demonisation in the West, his feat will never be forgiven, not even in history books (a demon forever). Even to this day, for example in Syria, Putin's main confrontation is not against US then against the Zionist Jews, whose principal tool is US. Yet, there is not a single anti-Semitic sentence that Putin ever uttered. Also, Putin let the Jewish oligarchs who plundered Russia keep their money if they accepted the authority of the Russian state, kept employing Russians and paying Russian taxes. But he openly confronted those who refused (Berezovsky, Khodorovsky etc). Furthermore, Putin lets Israel bomb Syria under his protection to abandon. Finally, Putin is known in Russia as a great supporter of Jews and Israel, almost a good friend of Nutty Yahoo.
Therefore, it appears to me that the Putin's principal strategy is to appeal to the honest Jewish majority to restrain the criminal Jewish minority (including the criminally insane), to divide them instead of confronting them all as a group, which is what the anti-Semitic Europeans have traditionally been doing. His judo-technique is in using Jewish power to restrain the Jews. I still do not know if his strategy will succeed in the long run, but it certainly is an interesting new approach (unless I do not know history enough) to an ancient problem. It is almost funny how so many US people think that the problem with the nefarious Jewish money power started with US, if they are even aware of it.
Abe , July 15, 2017 at 5:11 pm" His judo-technique is in using Jewish power to restrain the Jews. "
The Jews have no power without their uber Jew money men, most of whom are ardent Zionist.
And because they get some benefits from the lobbying heft of the Zionist control of congress they arent going to go against them.HIDE BEHIND , July 13, 2017 at 7:43 pmBill Browder with American-Israeli interviewer Natasha Mozgovaya, TV host for Voice of America.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbgNeQ_xINMIn this 2015 tirade, Browder declared "Someone has to punch Putin in the nose" and urged "supplying arms to the Ukrainians and putting troops, NATO troops, in all of the surrounding countries".
The choice of Mozgovaya as interviewer was significant to promote Browder with the Russian Jewish community abroad.
Born in the Soviet Union in 1979, Mozgovaya immigrated to Israel with her family in 1990. She became a correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronoth in 2000. Although working most of the time in Hebrew, her reports in Russian appeared in various publications in Russia.
Mozgovaya covered the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, including interviews with President Victor Yushenko and his partner-rival Yulia Timoshenko, as well as the Russian Mafia and Russian oligarchs. During the presidency of Vladimir Putin, Mozgovaya gave one of the last interviews with the Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. She interviewed Garry Kasparov, Edward Limonov, Boris Berezovsky, Chechen exiles such as Ahmed Zakaev, and the widow of ex-KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko.
In 2008, Mozgovaya left Yedioth Ahronoth to become the Washington Bureau Chief for Haaretz newspaper in Washington, D.C.. She was a frequent lecturer on Israel and Middle Eastern affairs at U.S. think-tanks. In 2013, Mozgovaya started working at the Voice of America.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 2:07 amGramps was decended from an old Irish New England Yankee lineage and in my youth he always dragged me along when the town meetings were held, so my ideas of American DEmocracy stem from that background, one of open participation.
The local newspapers had more social chit chat than political news of international or for that mstter State or Federal shenanigansbut everu member in that far flung settled communit read them from front to back; ss a child I got to read the funny and sports pages until Gramps got finidhed reading the "News Section, always the news first yhen the lesser BS when time allowed,this habit instilled in me the sence of
priority.
Aftrr I had read his dection of paper he would talk with me,even being a yonker, in a serious but opinionated manner, of the Editorial section which had local commentary letterd to the editor as large as somtimes too pages.
I wonder today at which section of papersf at all, is read by american public, and at how manyadults discuss importsn news worthy tppics with their children.
At advent of TV we still had trustworthy journalist to finally be seen after years of but reading their columns or listening on radios,almost tottaly all males but men of honesty and character, and worthy of trust.
They wrre a part of all social stratas, had lived real lives and yes most eere well educated but not the elitist thinking jrrks who are no more than parrots repeating whatevrr a teleprompter or bias of their employers say to write.
Wrll back to Gramps and hid home spun wisdom: He alwsys ,and shoeed by example at those old and somrtimes boistrous town Halls, that first you askef a question, thought about the answer, and then questioned the answer.
This made the one being question responsible for the words he spoke.
So those who have doubts by a presumed independent journalist, damn right they should question his motives, which in reality begin to answer our unspoken questions we can no longer ask those boobs for bombs and political sychophants and their paymasters of popular media outlets.
As one who likes effeciency in prodution one monitors data to spot trends and sny aberations bring questions so yes I note this journalist deviation from the norms as well.
I can only question the why, by looking at data from surrounding trends in order to later be able to question his answers.Joe Tedesky , July 13, 2017 at 10:53 pmHide Behind – sounds like you had a smart grandpa, and someone who cared enough about you to talk things over with you (even though he was opinionated). I try to talk things over with my kids, sometimes too much. They're known on occasion to say, "Okay, enough. We're full." I wait a few days, and then fill them up some more! Ha.
F. G. Sanford , July 14, 2017 at 12:42 amHere's a thought; will letting go of Trump Jr's infraction cancel out a guilty verdict of Hillary Clinton's transgressions?
I keep hearing Hillary references while people defend Donald Trump Jr over his meeting with Russian Natalia Veselnitskaya. My thinking started over how I keep hearing pundits speak to Trump Jr's 'intent'. Didn't Comey find Hillary impossible to prosecute due to her lack of 'intent'? Actually I always thought that to be prosecuted under espionage charges, the law didn't need to prove intent, but then again we are talking about Hillary here.
The more I keep hearing Trump defenders make mention of Hillary's deliberate mistakes, and the more I keep hearing Democrates point to Donald Jr's opportunistic failures, the more similarity I see between the two rivals, and the more I see an agreed upon truce ending up in a tie. Remember we live in a one party system with two wings.
Am I going down the wrong road here, or could forgiving Trump Jr allow Hillary to get a free get out of jail card?
Joe Tedesky , July 14, 2017 at 1:29 amI've been saying all along, our government is just a big can of worms, and neither side can expose the other without opening it. But insiders on both sides are flashing their can openers like it's a game of chicken. My guess is, everybody is gonna get a free pass. I read somewhere that Preet Bharara had the goods on a whole bunch of bankers, but he sat on it clear up to the election. Then, he got fired. So much for draining the swamp. If they prosecute Hillary, it looks like a grudge match. If they prosecute Junior, it looks like revenge. If they prosecute Lynch, it looks like racism. When you deal with a government this corrupt, everybody looks innocent by comparison. I'm still betting nobody goes to jail, as long as the "deep state" thinks they have Trump under control.
Lisa , July 14, 2017 at 4:22 amIt's like we are sitting on the top of a hill looking down at a bunch of little armies attacking each other, or something.
I'm really screwy, I have contemplated to if Petraues dropped a dime on himself for having a extra martial affair, just to get out of the Benghazi mess. Just thought I'd tell you that for full disclosure.
When it comes to Hillary, does anyone remember how in the beginning of her email investigation she pointed to Colin Powell setting precedent to use a private computer? That little snitch Hillary is always the one when caught to start pointing the finger .she would never have lasted in the Mafia, but she's smart enough to know what works best in Washington DC.
I'm just starting to see the magic; get the goods on Trump Jr then make a deal with the new FBI director.
Okay go ahead and laugh, but before you do pass the popcorn, and let's see how this all plays out.
Believe half of what you hear, and nothing of what you see.
Joe
Joe Tedesky , July 14, 2017 at 10:59 am"Believe half of what you hear, and nothing of what you see."
Joe, where does this quote originate? Or is it a paraphrase?
I once had an American lecturer (political science) at the university, and he stressed the idea that we should not believe anything we read or hear and only half of what we see. This was l-o-o-ng ago, in the 60's.Gregory Herr , July 14, 2017 at 9:12 pmThe first time I ever heard that line, 'believe nothing of what you see', was a friend of mine said it after we watched Roberto Clemente throw a third base runner out going towards home plate, as Robert threw the ball without a bounce to the catcher who was standing up, from the deep right field corner of the field .oh those were the days.
Joe Tedesky , July 14, 2017 at 9:56 pmJT,
Clemente had an unbelievable arm! The consummate baseball player I have family in western PA, an uncle your age in fact who remembers Clemente well. Roberto also happened to be a great human being.Gregory Herr , July 14, 2017 at 10:12 pmI got loss at Forbes Field. I was seven years old, it was 1957. I got separated from my older cousin, we got in for 50 cents to sit in the left field bleachers. Like I said I loss my older cousin so I walked, and walked, and just about the time I wanted my mum the most I saw daylight. I followed the daylight out of the big garage door, and I was standing within a foot of this long white foul line. All of a sudden this Black guy started yelling at me in somekind of broken English to, 'get off the field, get out of here'. Then I felt a field ushers hand grab my shoulder, and as I turned I saw my cousin standing on the fan side of the right field side of the field. The usher picked me up and threw me over to my cousin, with a warning for him to keep his eye on me. That Black baseball player was a young rookie who was recently just drafted from the then Brooklyn Dodgers .#21 Roberto Clemente.
Zachary Smith , July 15, 2017 at 9:00 pmYou were a charmed boy and now you are a charmed man. Great story life is a Field of Dreams sometimes.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 2:01 amBelieve half of what you hear, and nothing of what you see.
My introduction to this had the wording the other way around:
"Don't believe anything you hear and only half of what you see."
This was because the workplace was saturated with rumors, and unfortunately there was a practice of management and union representatives "play-acting" for their audience. So what you "saw" was as likely as not a little theatrical production with no real meaning whatever. The two fellows shouting at each other might well be laughing about it over a cup of coffee an hour later.
Gregory Herr , July 14, 2017 at 10:20 pmSanford – "But insiders on both sides are flashing their can openers " That's funny writing.
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 2:41 amyessir, love it
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 6:19 pmAbsolutely, one of the best political metaphors ever (unfortunately works in English language only).
Abe , July 14, 2017 at 2:13 amBTW, they are flashing at each other not only can openers then also jail cells and grassy knolls these days. But the can openers would still be most scary.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 3:00 amIsraeli banks have helped launder money for Russian oligarchs, while large-scale fraudulent industries, like binary options, have been allowed to flourish here.
A May 2009 diplomatic cable by the US ambassador to Israel warned that "many Russian oligarchs of Jewish origin and Jewish members of organized crime groups have received Israeli citizenship, or at least maintain residences in the country."
The United States estimated at the time that Russian crime groups had "laundered as much as $10 billion through Israeli holdings."
In 2009, then Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara charged 17 managers and employees of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims for defrauding Germany 42.5 million dollars by creating thousands of false benefit applications for people who had not suffered in the Holocaust.
The scam operated by creating phony applications with false birth dates and invented histories of persecution to process compensation claims. In some cases the recipients were born after World War II and at least one person was not even Jewish.
Among those charged was Semyon Domnitser, a former director of the conference. Many of the applicants were recruited from Brooklyn's Russian community. All those charged hail from Brooklyn.
When a phony applicant got a check, the scammers were given a cut, Bharara said. The fraud which has been going on for 16 years was related to the 400 million dollars which Germany pays out each year to Holocaust survivors.
Later, in November 2015, Bharara's office charged three Israeli men in a 23-count indictment that alleged that they ran a extensive computer hacking and fraud scheme that targeted JPMorgan Chase, The Wall Street Journal, and ten other companies.
According to prosecutors, the Israeli's operation generated "hundreds of millions of dollars of illegal profit" and exposed the personal information of more than 100 million people.
Despite his service as a useful idiot propagating the Magnitsky Myth, Bharara discovered that for Russian Jewish oligarchs, criminals and scam artists, the motto is "Nikogda ne zabyt'!" Perhaps more recognizable by the German phrase: "Niemals vergessen!"
Cal , July 14, 2017 at 2:14 pmAbe – wow, what a story. I guess it's lucrative to "never forget"! Bandits.
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 4:21 pmhttps://www.ncjrs.gov/App/publications/Abstract.aspx?id=6180
National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS)
NCJRS Abstract
The document referenced below is part of the NCJRS Library collection. To conduct further searches of the collection, visit the NCJRS Abstracts Database. See the Obtain Documents page for direction on how to access resources online, via mail, through interlibrary loans, or in a local library.NCJ Number: NCJ 006180
Title: CRIMINALITY AMONG JEWS – AN OVERVIEWUnited States of America
Journal: ISSUES IN CRIMINOLOGY Volume:6 Issue:2 Dated:(SUMMER 1971) Pages:1-39
Date Published: 1971
Page Count: 15
.
Abstract: THE CONCLUSION OF MOST STUDIES IS THAT JEWS HAVE A LOW CRIME RATE. IT IS LOWER THAN THAT OF NON-JEWS TAKEN AS A WHOLE, LOWER THAN THAT OF OTHER RELIGIOUS GROUPS,HOWEVER, THE JEWISH CRIME RATE TENDS TO BE HIGHER THAN THAT OF NONJEWS AND OTHER RELIGIOUS GROUPS FOR WHITE-COLLAR OFFENSES,
THAT IS, COMMERCIAL OR COMMERCIALLY RELATED CRIMES, SUCH AS FRAUD, FRAUDULENT BANKRUPTCY, AND EMBEZZLEMENT.
Index Term(s): Behavioral and Social Sciences ; Adult offenders ; Minorities ; Behavioral science research ; Offender classification
Country: United States of America
Language: EnglishSkip Scott , July 15, 2017 at 1:57 pmCal – that does not surprise me at all. Of course they would be where the money is, and once you have money, you get nothing but the best defense. "I've got time and money on my side. Go ahead and take me to court. I'll string this thing along and it'll cost you a fortune. So let's deal. I'm good with a fine."
A rap on the knuckles, a fine, and no court case, no discovery of the truth that the people can see. Of course they'd be there. That IS the only place to be if you want to be a true criminal.
BannanaBoat , July 14, 2017 at 10:45 amThanks again Abe, you are a wealth of information. I think you have to allow for anyone to make a mistake, and Bharara has done a lot of good.
Cal , July 13, 2017 at 11:39 pmUSA justice for Oilygarchs; Ignore capital crimes and mass destruction ; concentrate on entertaining shenanigans.
BannanaBoat , July 14, 2017 at 10:52 amIf Trump wants to survive he better let go of his son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
Lets start here:
Trump's personal attorneys are reportedly fed up with Jared Kushner
http://www.businessinsider.com/jared-kushner-trump-lawyers-donald-jr-emails-2017-7Longtime Trump attorney Marc Kasowitz and his team have directed their grievance at Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and senior White House adviser.
Citing a person familiar with Trump's legal team, The Times said Kasowitz has bristled at Kushner's "whispering in the president's ear" about stories on the Russia investigation without telling Kasowitz and his team.
The Times' source said the attorneys, who were hired as private counsel to Trump in light of the Russia investigation, view Kushner "as an obstacle and a freelancer" motivated to protect himself over over Trump. The lawyers reportedly told colleagues the work environment among Trump's inner circle was untenable, The Times said, suggesting Kasowitz could resignSecond
Who thinks Jared works for Trump? I don't.
Jared works for his father Charles Kushner, the former jail bird who hired prostitutes to blackmail his brother in law into not testifying against him. Jared spent every weekend his father was in prison visiting him.,,they are inseparable.Third
So what is Jared doing in his WH position to help his father and his failing RE empire?Trying to get loans from China, Russia, Qatar,Qatar
And why Is Robert Mueller Probing Jared Kushner's Finances?
Because of this no doubt:..seeking a loan for the Kushners from a Russian bank.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/03/sergei-gorkov-russian-banker-jared-kushner
The White House and the bank have offered differing accounts of the Kushner-Gorkov sit-down. While the White House said Kushner met Gorkov and other foreign representatives as a transition official to "help advance the president's foreign policy goals." Vnesheconombank, also known as VEB, said it was part of talks with business leaders about the bank's development strategy.
It said Kushner was representing Kushner companies, his family real estate empire.Jared Kushner 'tried and failed to get a $500m loan from Qatar before
http://www.independent.co.uk › News › World › Americas › US politics
2 days ago –
Jared Kushner tried and failed to secure a $500m loan from one of Qatar's richest businessmen, before pushing his father-in-law to toe a hard line with the country, it has been alleged. This intersection between Mr Kushner's real estate dealings and his father-in-law'sThe Kushners are about to lose their shirts..unless one of those foreign country's banks gives them the money.
At Kushners' Flagship Building, Mounting Debt and a Foundered Deal
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/03/nyregion/kushner-companies-666-fifth-avenue.html
The Fifth Avenue skyscraper was supposed to be the Kushner Companies' flagship in the heart of Manhattan -- a record-setting $1.8 billion souvenir proclaiming that the New Jersey developers Charles Kushner and his son Jared were playing in the big leagues.
And while it has been a visible symbol of their status, it has also it has also been a financial headache almost from the start. On Wednesday, the Kushners announced that talks had broken off with a Chinese financial conglomerate for a deal worth billions to redevelop the 41-story tower, at 666 Fifth Avenue, into a flashy 80-story ultraluxury skyscraper comprising a chic retail mall, a hotel and high-priced condominiums"Get these cockroaches out of the WH please.,,,Jared and his sister are running around the world trying to get money in exchange for giving them something from the Trump WH.
Cal , July 14, 2017 at 2:16 pmThe NYC skyline displays 666 in really really really HUGE !!!! numbers. Perhaps the USA government as Cheney announced has gone to the very very very DARK side.
Chris Kinder , July 14, 2017 at 12:15 amYea 666 probably isn't a coincidence .lol
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 1:58 amWhat I think most comments overlook here is the following: the US is the primary imperialist aggressor in the world today, and Russia, though it is an imperialist competitor, is much weaker and is generally losing ground. Early on, the US promised that NATO would not be extended into Eastern Europe, but now look at what's happened: not only does the US have NATO allies and and missiles in Eastern Europe, but it also engineered a coup against a pro-Russian regime in Ukraine, and is now trying to drive Russia out of Eastern Ukraine, as in Crimea and the Donbass and other areas of Eastern Ukraine, which are basically Russian going back more than a century. Putin is pretty mild compered to the US' aggressive stance. That's number one.
Number two is that the current anti-Russian hysteria in the US is all about maintaining the same war-mongering stance against Russia that existed in the cold war, and also about washing clean the Democratic Party leadership's crimes in the last election. Did the Russians hack the election? Maybe they tried, but the point is that what was exposed–the emails etc–were true information! They show that the DNC worked to deprive Bernie Sanders of the nomination, and hide crimes of the Clintons'! These exposures, not any Russian connection to the exposures, are what really lost Hillary the election.
So, what is going on here? The Democrats are trying to hide their many transgressions behind an anti-Russian scare, why? Because it is working, and because it fits in with US imperialist anti-Russian aims which span the entire post-war period, and continue today. And because it might help get Trump impeached. I would not mind that result one bit, but the Democrats are no alternative: that has been shown to be true over and over again.
This is all part of the US attempt to be the dominant imperialist power in the world–something which it has pursued since the end of the last world war, and something which both Democrats and Republicans–ie, the US ruling class behind them–are committed to. Revolutionaries say: the main enemy is at home, and that is what I say now. That is no endorsement of Russian imperialism, but a rejection of all imperialism and the capitalist exploitative system that gives rise to it.
Thanks for your attention -- Chris Kinder
mike k , July 14, 2017 at 11:35 amChris – good post. Thanks.
Paranam Kid , July 14, 2017 at 6:40 amChris, I think most commenters here are aware of everything you summarized above, but we just don't put all that in each individual post.
HIDE BEHIND , July 14, 2017 at 10:02 amIt is ironic that Browder on his website describes himself as running a battle against corporate corruption in Russia, and there is a quote by Walter Isaacson: "Bill Browder is an amazing moral crusader". http://www.billbrowder.com/bio
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 1:55 pmOne cannot talk of Russian monry laundering in US without exposing the Jewish Israeli and many AIPAC connections.
I studied not so much the Jewish Orthodoxy but mainly the evolution of noth their outlook upon G.. but also how those who do not believe in a G.. and still keep their cultural cohesiveness
The largest money laundering group in US is
both Jewish and Israeli, and while helping those of their cultural similarities, their ecpertise goes. Very deep in Eastern U.S. politics and especially strong in all commercial real estate, funding, setting up bribes to permitting officials,contractors and owners of construvtion firms.
Financials some quite large are within this Jew/Israel connections, as all they who offshore need those proper connections to do so. take bribes need the funding cleaned and
flow out through very large tax free Jewish Charity Orgd, the largest ones are those of Orthodox.
GOV Christie years ago headed the largest sting operation to try and uproot what at that time he believed was just statewide tax fraud and laundering operations, many odd cash flows into political party hacks running for evrry gov position electefd or appointed.
Catchng a member of one of the most influential Orthofox familys mrmbers, that member rolled on many many indivifuals of his own culture.
It was only when Vhristies investigative team began turning up far larger cases of laundering and political donations thst msinly centered in NY Stste and City, fid he then find out howuch power this grouping had.
Soon darn near every AIPAC aided elected politico from city state and rspecially Congress was warning him to end investigation.
Which he did.
His reward was for his fat ass to be funded for a run towards US Presidency, without any visibly open opposition by that cultural grouping.
No it is not odd for Jewery to charge goyim usury or to aid in political schemes that advance their groups aims.
One thing to remenber by the Bible thumpers who delay any talks of Israel ; Christian Zionist, is that to be of their culture one does not have to believe in G.
There are a few excellent books written about early days Jewish immigrant Pre Irish andblre Sicilian mafias.
The Jewish one remainst to this day but are as well orgNized as the untold history of what is known as "The Southern mafia.Deborah Andrew , July 14, 2017 at 10:03 amHide Behind – fascinating! I guess if we ever knew half of what goes on behind the scenes, we'd be shocked. We only ever know things like this exist when people like you enlighten us, or when there's a blockbuster movie about it. Thanks.
BannanaBoat , July 14, 2017 at 11:00 amWith great respect and appreciation for your writing about the current unsubstantiated conversations/writing about 'Russia-gate' I would ask if 'the other side of a story' is really what we want or, is it that we want all the facts. Analysis and opinions, that include the facts, may differ. However, it is the readers who will evaluate the varied analysis and opinions when they include all the facts known. I raise this question, as it seems to me that we have a binary approach to our thinking and decision making. Something is either good or bad, this or that. Sides are taken. Labels are added (such as conservative and progressive). Would we not be wiser and would our decision making not be wiser if it were based on a set of principles? My own preference: the precautionary principle and the principle of do no harm. I am suggesting that we abandon the phrase and notion of the 'other side of the story' and replace it with: based on the facts now known, or, based on all the facts revealed to date or, until more facts are revealed it appears
Zachary Smith , July 14, 2017 at 11:04 amHEAR -- HEAR -- Excellent --
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 2:52 amI would ask if 'the other side of a story' is really what we want or, is it that we want all the facts.
Replying to a question with another question isn't really good form, but given my knowledge level of this case I can see no alternative.
How do you propose to determine the "facts" when virtually none of the characters involved in the affair appear trustworthy? Also, there is a lot of evidence (displayed by Mr. Parry) that another set of "characters" we call the Mainstream Media are extremely biased and one-sided with their coverage of the story.
Again – Where am I going to find those "facts" you speak of?
backwardsevolution , July 14, 2017 at 2:02 pmSpot on.
Cal , July 14, 2017 at 8:52 pmDeborah Andrew – good comment, but the problem is that we never seem to get "the other side of the story" from the MSM. You are right in pointing out that "the other side of the story" probably isn't ALL there is (as nothing is completely black and white), but at least it's something. The only way we can ever get to the truth is to put the facts together and question them, but how are you going to do that when the facts are kept away from us?
It can be very frustrating, can't it, Deborah? Cheers.
Michael Kenny , July 14, 2017 at 11:22 amNice comment.
None of us can know the exact truth of anything we ourselves haven't seen or been involved in. The best we can do is try to find trusted sources, be objective, analytical and compare different stories and known the backgrounds and possible agendas of the people involved in a issue or story.
We can use some clues to help us cull thru what we hear and read.
Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
Note: The first rule and last five (or six, depending on situation) rules are generally not directly within the ability of the traditional disinfo artist to apply. These rules are generally used more directly by those at the leadership, key players, or planning level of the criminal conspiracy or conspiracy to cover up.
1. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. Regardless of what you know, don't discuss it -- especially if you are a public figure, news anchor, etc. If it's not reported, it didn't happen, and you never have to deal with the issues.
2. Become incredulous and indignant. Avoid discussing key issues and instead focus on side issues which can be used show the topic as being critical of some otherwise sacrosanct group or theme. This is also known as the 'How dare you!' gambit.
3. Create rumor mongers. Avoid discussing issues by describing all charges, regardless of venue or evidence, as mere rumors and wild accusations. Other derogatory terms mutually exclusive of truth may work as well. This method which works especially well with a silent press, because the only way the public can learn of the facts are through such 'arguable rumors'. If you can associate the material with the Internet, use this fact to certify it a 'wild rumor' from a 'bunch of kids on the Internet' which can have no basis in fact.
4. Use a straw man. Find or create a seeming element of your opponent's argument which you can easily knock down to make yourself look good and the opponent to look bad. Either make up an issue you may safely imply exists based on your interpretation of the opponent/opponent arguments/situation, or select the weakest aspect of the weakest charges. Amplify their significance and destroy them in a way which appears to debunk all the charges, real and fabricated alike, while actually avoiding discussion of the real issues.
5. Sidetrack opponents with name calling and ridicule. This is also known as the primary 'attack the messenger' ploy, though other methods qualify as variants of that approach. Associate opponents with unpopular titles such as 'kooks', 'right-wing', 'liberal', 'left-wing', 'terrorists', 'conspiracy buffs', 'radicals', 'militia', 'racists', 'religious fanatics', 'sexual deviates', and so forth. This makes others shrink from support out of fear of gaining the same label, and you avoid dealing with issues.
6. Hit and Run. In any public forum, make a brief attack of your opponent or the opponent position and then scamper off before an answer can be fielded, or simply ignore any answer. This works extremely well in Internet and letters-to-the-editor environments where a steady stream of new identities can be called upon without having to explain criticism, reasoning -- simply make an accusation or other attack, never discussing issues, and never answering any subsequent response, for that would dignify the opponent's viewpoint.
7. Question motives. Twist or amplify any fact which could be taken to imply that the opponent operates out of a hidden personal agenda or other bias. This avoids discussing issues and forces the accuser on the defensive.
8. Invoke authority. Claim for yourself or associate yourself with authority and present your argument with enough 'jargon' and 'minutia' to illustrate you are 'one who knows', and simply say it isn't so without discussing issues or demonstrating concretely why or citing sources.
9. Play Dumb. No matter what evidence or logical argument is offered, avoid discussing issues except with denials they have any credibility, make any sense, provide any proof, contain or make a point, have logic, or support a conclusion. Mix well for maximum effect.
10. Associate opponent charges with old news. A derivative of the straw man -- usually, in any large-scale matter of high visibility, someone will make charges early on which can be or were already easily dealt with – a kind of investment for the future should the matter not be so easily contained.) Where it can be foreseen, have your own side raise a straw man issue and have it dealt with early on as part of the initial contingency plans. Subsequent charges, regardless of validity or new ground uncovered, can usually then be associated with the original charge and dismissed as simply being a rehash without need to address current issues -- so much the better where the opponent is or was involved with the original source.
11. Establish and rely upon fall-back positions. Using a minor matter or element of the facts, take the 'high road' and 'confess' with candor that some innocent mistake, in hindsight, was made -- but that opponents have seized on the opportunity to blow it all out of proportion and imply greater criminalities which, 'just isn't so.' Others can reinforce this on your behalf, later, and even publicly 'call for an end to the nonsense' because you have already 'done the right thing.' Done properly, this can garner sympathy and respect for 'coming clean' and 'owning up' to your mistakes without addressing more serious issues.
12. Enigmas have no solution. Drawing upon the overall umbrella of events surrounding the crime and the multitude of players and events, paint the entire affair as too complex to solve. This causes those otherwise following the matter to begin to lose interest more quickly without having to address the actual issues.
13. Alice in Wonderland Logic. Avoid discussion of the issues by reasoning backwards or with an apparent deductive logic which forbears any actual material fact.
14. Demand complete solutions. Avoid the issues by requiring opponents to solve the crime at hand completely, a ploy which works best with issues qualifying for rule 10.
15. Fit the facts to alternate conclusions. This requires creative thinking unless the crime was planned with contingency conclusions in place.
16. Vanish evidence and witnesses. If it does not exist, it is not fact, and you won't have to address the issue.
17. Change the subject. Usually in connection with one of the other ploys listed here, find a way to side-track the discussion with abrasive or controversial comments in hopes of turning attention to a new, more manageable topic. This works especially well with companions who can 'argue' with you over the new topic and polarize the discussion arena in order to avoid discussing more key issues.
18. Emotionalize, Antagonize, and Goad Opponents. If you can't do anything else, chide and taunt your opponents and draw them into emotional responses which will tend to make them look foolish and overly motivated, and generally render their material somewhat less coherent. Not only will you avoid discussing the issues in the first instance, but even if their emotional response addresses the issue, you can further avoid the issues by then focusing on how 'sensitive they are to criticism.'
19. Ignore proof presented, demand impossible proofs. This is perhaps a variant of the 'play dumb' rule. Regardless of what material may be presented by an opponent in public forums, claim the material irrelevant and demand proof that is impossible for the opponent to come by (it may exist, but not be at his disposal, or it may be something which is known to be safely destroyed or withheld, such as a murder weapon.) In order to completely avoid discussing issues, it may be required that you to categorically deny and be critical of media or books as valid sources, deny that witnesses are acceptable, or even deny that statements made by government or other authorities have any meaning or relevance.
20. False evidence. Whenever possible, introduce new facts or clues designed and manufactured to conflict with opponent presentations -- as useful tools to neutralize sensitive issues or impede resolution. This works best when the crime was designed with contingencies for the purpose, and the facts cannot be easily separated from the fabrications.
21. Call a Grand Jury, Special Prosecutor, or other empowered investigative body. Subvert the (process) to your benefit and effectively neutralize all sensitive issues without open discussion. Once convened, the evidence and testimony are required to be secret when properly handled. For instance, if you own the prosecuting attorney, it can insure a Grand Jury hears no useful evidence and that the evidence is sealed and unavailable to subsequent investigators. Once a favorable verdict is achieved, the matter can be considered officially closed. Usually, this technique is applied to find the guilty innocent, but it can also be used to obtain charges when seeking to frame a victim.
22. Manufacture a new truth. Create your own expert(s), group(s), author(s), leader(s) or influence existing ones willing to forge new ground via scientific, investigative, or social research or testimony which concludes favorably. In this way, if you must actually address issues, you can do so authoritatively.
23. Create bigger distractions. If the above does not seem to be working to distract from sensitive issues, or to prevent unwanted media coverage of unstoppable events such as trials, create bigger news stories (or treat them as such) to distract the multitudes.
24. Silence critics. If the above methods do not prevail, consider removing opponents from circulation by some definitive solution so that the need to address issues is removed entirely. This can be by their death, arrest and detention, blackmail or destruction of theircharacter by release of blackmail information, or merely by destroying them financially, emotionally, or severely damaging their health.
25. Vanish. If you are a key holder of secrets or otherwise overly illuminated and you think the heat is getting too hot, to avoid the issues, vacate the kitchen. .
Note: There are other ways to attack truth, but these listed are the most common, and others are likely derivatives of these. In the end, you can usually spot the professional disinfo players by one or more of seven (now 8) distinct traits:
Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
by H. Michael Sweeney
copyright (c) 1997, 2000 All rights reserved(Revised April 2000 – formerly SEVEN Traits)
1) Avoidance. They never actually discuss issues head-on or provide constructive input, generally avoiding citation of references or credentials. Rather, they merely imply this, that, and the other. Virtually everything about their presentation implies their authority and expert knowledge in the matter without any further justification for credibility.
2) Selectivity. They tend to pick and choose opponents carefully, either applying the hit-and-run approach against mere commentators supportive of opponents, or focusing heavier attacks on key opponents who are known to directly address issues. .
3) Coincidental. They tend to surface suddenly and somewhat coincidentally with a new controversial topic with no clear prior record of participation in general discussions in the particular public arena involved. They likewise tend to vanish once the topic is no longer of general concern. They were likely directed or elected to be there for a reason, and vanish with the reason.
4) Teamwork. They tend to operate in self-congratulatory and complementary packs or teams. Of course, this can happen naturally in any public forum, but there will likely be an ongoing pattern of frequent exchanges of this sort where professionals are involved. Sometimes one of the players will infiltrate the opponent camp to become a source for straw man or other tactics designed to dilute opponent presentation strength.
5) Anti-conspiratorial. They almost always have disdain for 'conspiracy theorists' and, usually, for those who in any way believe JFK was not killed by LHO. Ask yourself why, if they hold such disdain for conspiracy theorists, do they focus on defending a single topic discussed in a NG focusing on conspiracies? One might think they would either be trying to make fools of everyone on every topic, or simply ignore the group they hold in such disdain.Or, one might more rightly conclude they have an ulterior motive for their actions in going out of their way to focus as they do.
6) Artificial Emotions. An odd kind of 'artificial' emotionalism and an unusually thick skin -- an ability to persevere and persist even in the face of overwhelming criticism and unacceptance. You might have outright rage and indignation one moment, ho-hum the next, and more anger later -- an emotional yo-yo. With respect to being thick-skinned, no amount of criticism will deter them from doing their job, and they will generally continue their old disinfo patterns without any adjustments to criticisms of how obvious it is that they play that game -- where a more rational individual who truly cares what others think might seek to improve their communications style, substance, and so forth, or simply give up.
7) Inconsistent. There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat 'freudian', so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within.
8) BONUS TRAIT: Time Constant. Wth respect to News Groups, is the response time factor. There are three ways this can be seen to work, especially when the government or other empowered player is involved in a cover up operation:
1) ANY NG posting by a targeted proponent for truth can result in an IMMEDIATE response. The government and other empowered players can afford to pay people to sit there and watch for an opportunity to do some damage. SINCE DISINFO IN A NG ONLY WORKS IF THE READER SEES IT – FAST RESPONSE IS CALLED FOR, or the visitor may be swayed towards truth.
2) When dealing in more direct ways with a disinformationalist, such as email, DELAY IS CALLED FOR – there will usually be a minimum of a 48-72 hour delay. This allows a sit-down team discussion on response strategy for best effect, and even enough time to 'get permission' or instruction from a formal chain of command.
3) In the NG example 1) above, it will often ALSO be seen that bigger guns are drawn and fired after the same 48-72 hours delay – the team approach in play. This is especially true when the targeted truth seeker or their comments are considered more important with respect to potential to reveal truth. Thus, a serious truth sayer will be attacked twice for the same sin.Skip Scott , July 14, 2017 at 1:40 pmI don't really see Mr Parry's point. The banning of Nekrasov's film isn't proof of the accuracy of its contents and even less does it prove that anything that runs counter to Nekrasov's argument is false. Nor does proving that a mainstream meida story is false prove that an internet story saying the opposite is true. "A calls B a liar. B proves that A is a liar. That proves that B is truthful." Not very logical! What seems to be established is that the lawyer in question represents a Russian-owned company, a money-laundering prosecution against which was settled last May on the basis of what the company called a "surprise" offer from prosecutors that was "too good to refuse". This "Russian government attorney" (dixit Goldstone) had information concerning illegal campaign contributions to the Democratic National Committee. Trump Jr jumped at it and it makes no difference whether he was tricked or even whether he actually got anything, his intent was clear. In addition DNC "dirt" did indeed appear on the internet via Wikileaks, just as "dirt" appeared in the French election. MacronLeaks proves Russiagate and "Juniorgate" confirms MacronLeaks. The question now is did Trump, as president, intervene to bring about this "too good to refuse" offer? That question cannot just be written off with the "no evidence" argument.
Abe , July 14, 2017 at 9:27 pmGod, you are persistent if nothing else. Keep repeating the same lie until it is taken as true, just like the MSM. You say that Russia-gate, Macron leaks, etc can't be written off with the "no evidence" argument (how is that logical?), and then you trash a film you haven't even seen because it doesn't fit your narrative. Maybe some evidence is provided in the film, did you consider that possibility? That fact that Nekrasov started out to make a pro Broder film, and then switched sides, leads me to believe he found some disturbing evidence. And if you look into Nekrasov you will find that he is no fan of Putin, so one has to wonder what his motive is if he is lying.
I am wondering if you ever look back at previous posts, because you never reply to a rebuttal. If you did, you would see that you are almost universally seen by the commenters here as a troll. If you are being paid, I suppose it might not matter much to you. However, your employer should look for someone with more intelligent arguments. He is wasting his money on you.
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 3:04 amPropaganda trolls attempt to trash the information space by dismissing, distracting, diverting, denying, deceiving and distorting the facts.
The trolls aim at confusing rather than convincing the audience.
The tag team troll performance of "Michael Kenny" and "David" is accompanied by loud declarations that they have "logic" on their side and "evidence" somewhere. Then they shriek that they're being "censored".
Propaganda trolls target the comments section of independent investigative journalism sites like Consortium News, typically showing up when articles discuss the West's "regime change" wars and deception operations.
Pro-Israel Hasbara propaganda trolls also strive to discredit websites, articles, and videos critical of Israel and Zionism. Hasbara smear tactics have intensified due to increasing Israeli threats of military aggression, Israeli collusion with the United States in "regime change" projects from the Middle East to Eastern Europe, and Israeli links to international organized crime and terrorism in Syria.
Abe , July 15, 2017 at 4:15 pmGee Abe, you are a magician (and I thought that you only quote excellent articles). Short and sharp.
exiled off mainstreet , July 14, 2017 at 1:54 pmWhen they have a hard time selling that they're being "censored" (after more than a dozen comments), trolls complain that they're being "dismissed" and "invalidated" by "hostile voices".
mike k , July 14, 2017 at 2:01 pmAaron Kesel, in Activistpost documents the links between Veselnitskaya and Fusion GPS, the company engaged by the Clintons to prepare the defamatory Christopher Steele Dossier against Trump later used by Comey to help gin up the Russian influence conspiracy theory. In the article, it is true the GPS connection may have involved her lobbying efforts to overturn the Magnitsky law, not the dossier, but it is also interesting that she is on record as anti-Trump and having associations with Clinton democrats. Though it may have been part of the beginnings of a conspiracy, the conspiracy may have developed later and the meeting became something they related back to to bolster this fraudulent dangerous initiative.
Skip Scott , July 14, 2017 at 5:51 pmI think as you say Skip that most on this blog have seen through Michael Kenny's stuff. Nobody's buying it. He's harmless. If he's here on his own dime, if we don't feed him, he will get bored and go away. If he's being payed, he may persist, but so what. Sometimes I check the MSM just to see what the propaganda line is. Kenny is like that; his shallow arguments tell me what we must counter to wake people up.
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 3:14 amYeah mike k, I know you're right. I don't know why I let the guy get under my skin. Perhaps it's because he never responds to a rebuttal.
Philippe Lemoine , July 14, 2017 at 3:41 pmThen you would have to waste more time rebutting the (equally empty) rebuttal.
The second thing is that many trolls suffer from DID, that is the Dissociative Identity Disorder, aka sock puppetry. There is a bit of similarity in argument between David and Michael and HAWKINS, only one of them rebuts quite often.
Joe Tedesky , July 14, 2017 at 4:43 pmAnother excellent article! I wrote a very detailed blog post in which I methodically take apart the latest "revelation" about Donald Trump Jr.'s emails. I talk a lot about the Magnitsky Act, which is very relevant to this whole story.
Philippe Lemoine , July 14, 2017 at 5:14 pmI always like reading your articles Philippe, you have a real talent. Maybe read what I wrote above, but I'm sensing this Trump Jr affair will help Hillary more than anything, to give her a reprieve from any further FBI investigations. I mean somehow, I'm sure by Hillary's standards and desires, that this whole crazy investigation thing has to end. So, would it not seem reasonable to believe that by allowing Donald Jr to be taken off the hook, that Hillary likewise will enjoy the taste of forgiveness?
Tell me if you think this Donald Trump Jr scandal could lead to this Joe
PS if so this could be a good next article to write there I go telling the band what to play, but seriously if this Russian conclusion episode goes on much longer, could you not see a grand bargain and a deal being made?
Abe , July 14, 2017 at 6:48 pmThanks for the compliment, I'm glad you like the blog. I wasn't under the impression that Clinton was under any particular danger from the Justice Department, but even if she was, she doesn't have the power to stop this Trump/Russia collusion nonsense because it's pushed by a lot of people that have nothing to do with her except for the fact that they would have preferred her to win.
Philippe Lemoine , July 14, 2017 at 10:27 pmExcellent summary and analysis, Philippe. Key observation:
"as even the New York Times admits, there is no evidence that Natalia Veselnitskaya, the lawyer who met Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort for 20-30 minutes on 9 June 2016, provided any such information during that meeting. Donald Trump Jr. said that, although he asked her about it, she didn't give them anything on Clinton, but talked to him about the Magnitsky Act and Russia's decision to block adoption by American couples in retaliation. Of course, if we just had his word, we'd have no particularly good reason to believe him. But the fact remains that no documents of the sort described in Goldstone's ridiculous email ever surfaced during the campaign, which makes what he is saying about how the meeting went down pretty convincing, at least on this specific point. It should be noted that Donald Trump Jr. has offered to testify under oath about anything related to this meeting. Moreover, he also said during the interview he gave to Sean Hannity that there was no follow-up to this meeting, which is unlikely to be a lie since he must know that, given the hysteria about this meeting, it would come out. He may not be the brightest guy in the world, but surely he or at least the people who advised him before that interview are not that stupid."
exiled off mainstreet , July 16, 2017 at 1:31 pmThanks!
Mike , July 14, 2017 at 9:36 pmYour own necpluribus article was one of the best I've seen summarising the whole controversy, and your exhaustive responses to the pro-deep state critics was edifying. I am now convinced that your view of Veselnitskaya's role in the affair and the nature her connections to the dossier drafting company GPS being based on their unrelated work on the magnitsky law is accurate.
Big Tim , July 15, 2017 at 12:31 amPretty interesting:
Rake , July 15, 2017 at 9:13 am"Bill Browder, born into a notable Jewish family in Chicago, is the grandson of Earl Browder, the former leader of the Communist Party USA,[2] and the son of Eva (Tislowitz) and Felix Browder, a mathematician. He grew up in Chicago, Illinois, and attended the University of Chicago where he studied economics. He received an MBA from Stanford Business School[3] in 1989 where his classmates included Gary Kremen and Rich Kelley. In 1998, Browder gave up his US citizenship and became a British citizen.[4] Prior to setting up Hermitage, Browder worked in the Eastern European practice of the Boston Consulting Group[5] in London and managed the Russian proprietary investments desk at Salomon Brothers.[6]"
Anna , July 15, 2017 at 10:25 amSuccessfully keeping a salient argument from being heard is scary, given the social media and alternative media players who are all ripe to uncover a bombshell. Sy Hersh needs to convince Nekrasov to get his documentary to WkiLeaks.
P. Clark , July 15, 2017 at 12:01 pm"Sy Hersh needs to convince Nekrasov to get his documentary to WkiLeaks."
Agree.Cal , July 15, 2017 at 8:10 pmWhen Trump suggested that a Mexican-American judge might be biased because of this ethnicity the media said this was racist. Yet these same outlets like the New York Times are now routinely questioning Russian-American loyalty because of their ethnicity. As usual a ridiculous double standard. Basically the assumption is all Russians are bad. We didn't even have this during the cold war.
MichaelAngeloRaphaelo , July 15, 2017 at 12:17 pmYes indeed P. Clark .that kind or hypocrisy makes my head explode!
Roy G Biv , July 15, 2017 at 12:50 pmEnough's Enough
STOP DNC/DEMs
#CryBabyFakeNewsBSSupport Duly ELECTED
@POTUS @realDonaldTrump
#BoycottFakeNewsSponsors
#DrainTheSwamp
#MAGAFinnish wonderer , July 15, 2017 at 1:19 pmCN article on 911 truthers:
Mark Dankof , July 15, 2017 at 3:21 pmWow, I just learned via this article that in US Nekrasov is labeled as "pro-Kremlin" by WaPo. That's just too funny. He's in a relationship with a Finnish MEP Heidi Hautala, who is very well known for her anti-Russia mentality. Nekrasov is defenetly anti-Kremlin if something. He was supposed to make an anti-Kremlin documentary, but the facts turned out to be different than he thought, but still finished his documentary.
Roy G Biv , July 15, 2017 at 4:38 pmThe lengths to which the Neo Conservative War Cabal will go to destroy freedom of speech and access to alternative news sources underscores that the United States is becoming an Orwellian agitation-propaganda police state equally dedicated to igniting World War III for Netanyahu, the Central Banks, our Wahhabic Petrodollar Partners, and a pipeline consortium or two. The Old American Republic is dead.
Abe , July 15, 2017 at 5:41 pmInteresting to note that each and everyone of David's comments were bleached from this page. Looks like he was right about the censorship. Sad.
David , July 16, 2017 at 3:51 pmNote "allegations that are unsupported by facts".
https://consortiumnews.com/2016/01/19/a-reminder-about-comment-rules-2/
Kiza , July 15, 2017 at 6:06 pmDuly noted Abe. But you should adhere to the first part of the statement that you somehow forgot to include:
From Editor Robert Parry: At Consortiumnews, we welcome substantive comments about our articles, but comments should avoid abusive language toward other commenters or our writers, racial or religious slurs (including anti-Semitism and Islamophobia), and allegations that are unsupported by facts.
Roy G Biv , July 16, 2017 at 5:44 amMy favorite was David's claim that he contributed to this zine whilst it was publishing articles not to his liking (/sarc). I kindly reminded him that people pay much more money to have publishing the way they like it – for example how much Bezos paid for Washington Post, or Omidyar to establish The Intercept.
Except for such funny component, David's comments were totally substance free and useless. Nothing lost with bleaching.
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 1:53 pmYou're practicing disinformation. He actually said he contributed early on and had problems with the recent course of the CN trajectory. Censorship is cowardly.
David , July 16, 2017 at 3:57 pmConsortium News welcomes substantive comments.
"David" was presenting allegations unsupported by facts and disrupting on-topic discussion.
Violations of CN comment policy are taken down by the moderator. Period. It has nothing to do with "censorship".
Stop practicing disinformation and spin, "Roy G Biv".
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 5:02 pmI stopped contributing after the unintellectual dismissal of scientific 911 truthers. And it's easy for you to paint over my comments as they have been scrubbed. There was plenty of useful substance, it just ran against the tide. Sorry you didn't appreciate it the contrary viewpoint or have the curiosity to read the backstory.
dub , July 15, 2017 at 9:44 pmThe cowardly claim of "censorship".
The typical troll whine is that their "contrary viewpoint" was "dismissed" merely because it "ran against the tide".
No. Your allegations were unsupported by facts. They still are.
Martyrdom is just another troll tactic.
Roy G Biv , July 16, 2017 at 5:56 amtorrent for the film?
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 1:16 pmHere is the pdf of the legal brief about the Magnitsky film submitted by Senator Grassly to Homeland Security Chief. Interesting read and casts doubt on the claims made in the film, refutes several claims actually. Skip past Chuck Grassly's first two page intro to get to the meat of it. If you are serious about a debate on the merits of the case, this is essential reading.
David , July 16, 2017 at 1:50 pmYes, very interesting read. By all means, examine the brief.
But forget the spin from "Roy G Biv" because the brief actually refutes nothing about Andrei Nekrasov's film.
It simply notes that the Russian government was understandably concerned about "unscrupulous swindler" and "sleazy crook" William Browder.
After your finished reading the brief, try to remember any time when Congress dared to examine a lobbying campaign undertaken on behalf of Israeli (which is to say, predominantly Russian Jewish) interests, the circumstances surrounding a pro-Israel lobbying effort and the potential FARA violations involved. or the background of a Jewish "Russian immigrant".
Note on page 3 of the cover letter the CC to The Honorable Dianne Feinstein, Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. Feinstein was born Dianne Emiel Goldman in San Francisco, to Betty (née Rosenburg), a former model, and Leon Goldman, a surgeon. Feinstein's paternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Poland. Her maternal grandparents, the Rosenburg family, were from Saint Petersburg, Russia. While they were of German-Jewish ancestry, they practiced the Russian Orthodox faith as was required for Jews residing in Saint Petersburg.
In 1980, Feinstein married Richard C. Blum, an investment banker. In 2003, Feinstein was ranked the fifth-wealthiest senator, with an estimated net worth of US$26 million. By 2005 her net worth had increased to between US$43 million and US$99 million.
Like the rest of Congress, Feinstein knows the "right way" to vote.
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 2:11 pmSo you're saying because a Jew Senator was CC'd it invalidates the information? Read the first page again. The Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee is obligated to CC these submissions to the ranking member of the Committee, Jew heritage or not. Misinformation and disinformation from you Abe, or generously, maybe lazy reading. The italicized unscrupulous swindler and sleazy crook comments were quoting the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov after the Washington screening of Nekrasov's film and demonstrating Russia's intentions to discredit Browder. You are practiced at the art of deception. Hopefully readers will simply look for themselves.
David , July 16, 2017 at 2:55 pmAh, comrade "David". We see you're back muttering about "disinformation" using your "own name".
My statements about Senator Feinstein are entirely supported by facts. You really should look into that.
Also, please note that quotation marks are not italics.
And please note that the Russian Foreign Minister is legally authorized to present the view of the Russian government.
Browder is pretty effective at discrediting himself. He simply has to open his mouth.
I encourage readers to look for themselves, and not simply take the word of one Browder's sockpuppets.
David , July 16, 2017 at 2:59 pmIt won't last papushka. Every post and pended moderated post was scrubbed yesterday, to the cheers of you and your mean spirited friends. But truth is truth and should be defended. So to the point, I reread the Judiciary Committee linked document, and the items you specified are in italics, because the report is quoting Lavrov's comments to a Moscow news paper and "another paper" as evidence of Russia's efforts to undermine the credibility and standing of Browder. This is hardly obscure. It's plain as day if you just read it.
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 4:01 pmAlso Abe, before I get deleted again, I don't question any of you geneological description of Feinstein. I merely pointed out that she is the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, and it is normal for the Chairman of the Committee (Republican) to CC the ranking member. Unless of course it is Devin Nunes, then fairness and tradition goes out the window.
David , July 16, 2017 at 5:07 pmIt's plain as day, "David" or whatever other name you're trolling under, that you're here to loudly "defend" the "credibility" and "standing" of William Browder.
Sorry, but you're going to have to "defend" Browder with something other than your usual innuendo, blather about 9-11, and slurs against RP.
Otherwise it will be recognized for what it is, repeated violation of CN comment policy, and taken down by the moderator again.
Good luck to any troll who wants to "defend" Browder's record.
But you're gonna have to earn your pay with something other than your signature unsupported allegations, 9-11 diversions, and the "non-Jewish Russian haters gonna hate" propaganda shtick.
Anonymous , July 16, 2017 at 10:26 amI wish you would stop with the name calling. I am not a troll. I have been trying to make simple rational points. You respond by calling me names and wholly ignoring and/or misrepresenting and obfuscating easily verifiable facts. I suspect you are the moderator of this page, and if so am surprised by your consistent negative references to Jews. I'm not Jewish but you're really over the top. Of course you have many friends here so you get little push back, but I really hope you are not Bob or Sam.
MillyBloom54 , July 16, 2017 at 12:31 pmWe can see that it was what can be considered to be a Complex situation, where it was said that someone had Dirt on Hillary Clinton, but there was No collusion and there was No attempted collusion, but there was Patriotism and Concern for Others during a Perplexing situation.
This is because of what is Known as Arkancide, and which is associated with some People who say they have Dirt on the Clintons.
The Obvious and Humane thing to do was to arrange to meet the Russian Lawyer, who it was Alleged to have Dirt on Hillary Clinton, regardless of any possible Alleged Electoral advantage against Hillary Clinton, and until further information, there may have been some National Security Concerns, because it was Known that Hillary Clinton committed Espionage with Top Secret Information on her Unauthorized, Clandestine, Secret Email Server, and the Obvious cover up by the Department of Justice and the FBI, and so it was with this background that this Complex situation had to be dealt with.
This is because there is Greater Protection for a Person who has Dirt or Alleged Dirt on the Clintons, if that Information is share with other People.
This is because it is a Complete Waste of time to go to the Authorities, because they will Not do anything against Clinton Crimes, and a former Haitian Government Official was found dead only days before he was to give Testimony regarding the Clinton Foundation.
We saw this with Seth Rich, where the Police Videos has been withheld, and we have seen the Obstruction in investigating that Crime.
The message to Leakers is that Seth Rich was taken to hospital and Treated and was on his way to Fully Recovering, but he died in hospital, and those who were thinking of Leaking Understood the message from that.
There was Also concern for Rob Goldstone, who Alleged that the Russian Lawyer had Dirt on the Clintons.
We Know that is is said Goldstone that he did Not want to hear what was said at the meeting.
This is because Goldstone wanted associates of Candidate Donald Trump to Know that he did Not know what was said at that meeting.
We now Know that the meeting was a set up to Improperly obtain a FISA Warrant, which was Requested in June of 2016, and that is same the month and the year as the meeting that the Russian Lawyer attended.
There was what was an Unusual granting of a Special Visa so that the Russian Lawyer could attend that set up, which was Improperly Used to Request a FISA Warrant in order to Improperly Spy on an Opposition Political Candidate in order to Improperly gain an Electoral advantage in an Undemocratic manner, because if anything wrong was intended by Associates of Candidate Donald Trump, then there were enough People in that meeting who were the Equivalent of Establishment Democrats and Establishment Republicans, because we Know that after that meeting, that the husband of the former Florida chair of the Trump campaign obtained a front row seat to a June 2016 House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing for the Russian Lawyer.
There are Americans who consider that the 2 Major Political Party Tyranny has Betrayed the Constitution and the Principles of Democracy, because they oppose President Donald Trump's Election Integrity Commission, because they think that the Establishment Republicans and the Establishment Democrats are the Bribed and Corrupted Puppets of the Shadow Regime.
We Know from Senator Sanders, that if Americans want a Political Revolution, then they will need their own Political Party.
There are Americans who think that a Group of Democratic Party Voters and Republican Party Voters who have No association with the Democratic Party or the Republican Party, and that they may be named The Guardians of American Democracy.
These Guardians of American Democracy would be a numerous Group of People, and they would ask Republican Voters to Vote for the Democratic Party Representative instead of the Republican who is in Congress and who is seeking Reelection, in exchange for Democratic Party Voters to Vote for the Republican Party Candidate instead of the Democrat who is in Congress and who is seeking Reelection, and the same can be done for the Senate, because the American People have to Decide if it is they the Shadow Regime, or if it is We the People, and the Establishment Republicans and the Establishment Democrats are the Bribed and Corrupt Puppets of the Shadow Regime, and there would be equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats replaced in this manner, and so it will Not affect their numbers in the Congress or the Senate.
There could be People who think that Debbie Wasserman Schultz was Unacceptability Biased and Unacceptability Corrupt during the Democratic Party Primaries, and that if she wants a Democratic Party Candidate to be Elected in her Congressional District, then she Should announce that she will Not be contesting the next Election, and there could be People who think that Speaker Paul Ryan was Unacceptability Disloyal by insufficiently endorse the Republican Presidential nominee, and with other matters, and that if he wants a Republican Party Candidate to be Elected in his Congressional District, then he Should announce that he will Not be contesting the next Election, and then the Guardians of American Democracy can look at other Dinos and Rinos, including those in the Senate, because the Constitution says the words: We the People.
There are Many Americans who have Noticed that Criminal Elites escape Justice, and Corruption is the norm in American Politics.
There are those who Supported Senator Sanders who Realize that Senator Sanders would have been Impeached had he become President, and they Know that they Need President Donald Trump to prepare the Political Landscape so that someone like Senator Sanders could be President, without a Coup attempt that is being attempted on President Donald Trump, and while these People may not Vote for the Republicans, they can Refuse to Vote for the Democratic Party, until the conditions are there for a Constitutional Republic and a Constitutional Democracy, and they want the Illegal Mueller Team to recuse themselves from this pile of Vile and Putrid McCarthyist Lies Invented by their Shadow Regime Puppet Masters,
There are Many Americans who want Voter Identification and Paper Ballots for Elections, and they have seen how several States are Opposed to President Donald Trump's Commission on Election Integrity, because they want to Rig their Elections, and this is Why there are Many Americans who want America to be a Constitutional Republic and a Constitutional Democracy.
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 1:32 pmI just read this article in the Washington Monthly, and wish to read informed comments about this issue. There are suggestions that organized crime from Russian was heavily involved. This is a complicated mess of money, greed, etc.
http://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/07/10/trumps-inner-circle-met-with-no-ordinary-russian-lawyer/
David , July 16, 2017 at 3:22 pmYes, very interesting read. By all means, examine the article, which concludes:
"So, let's please stay focused on why this matters.
"And why was Preet Bharara fired again?"
Israeli banks have helped launder money for Russian oligarchs, while large-scale fraudulent industries have been allowed to flourish in Israel.
A May 2009 diplomatic cable by the US ambassador to Israel warned that "many Russian oligarchs of Jewish origin and Jewish members of organized crime groups have received Israeli citizenship, or at least maintain residences in the country."
The United States estimated at the time that Russian crime groups had "laundered as much as $10 billion through Israeli holdings."
In 2009, then Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara charged 17 managers and employees of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims for defrauding Germany 42.5 million dollars by creating thousands of false benefit applications for people who had not suffered in the Holocaust.
The scam operated by creating phony applications with false birth dates and invented histories of persecution to process compensation claims. In some cases the recipients were born after World War II and at least one person was not even Jewish.
Among those charged was Semyon Domnitser, a former director of the conference. Many of the applicants were recruited from Brooklyn's Russian community. All those charged hail from Brooklyn.
When a phony applicant got a check, the scammers were given a cut, Bharara said. The fraud which has been going on for 16 years was related to the 400 million dollars which Germany pays out each year to Holocaust survivors.
Later, in November 2015, Bharara's office charged three Israeli men in a 23-count indictment that alleged that they ran a extensive computer hacking and fraud scheme that targeted JPMorgan Chase, The Wall Street Journal, and ten other companies.
According to prosecutors, the Israeli's operation generated "hundreds of millions of dollars of illegal profit" and exposed the personal information of more than 100 million people.
Why was Bharara fired?
Any real investigation of Russia-Gate will draw international attention towards Russian Jewish corruption in the FIRE (Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate) sectors, and lead back to Israel.
Ain't gonna happen.
David , July 16, 2017 at 3:33 pmRemember Milly that essentially one of the first things Trump did when he came into office was fire Preet, and just days before the long awaited trial. Then, Jeff Sessions settled the case for 6 million without any testimony on a 230 million dollar case, days after. Spectacular and brazen, and structured to hide the identities of which properties were bought by which investors. Hmmmm.
Abe , July 16, 2017 at 4:37 pmBy the way Milly, great summary article you have linked and one that everyone who is championing the Nekrasov film should read.
The "great" article was not written by a journalist. It's an opinion piece written by Martin Longman, a blogger and Democratic Party political consultant.
From 2012 to 2013, Longman worked for Democracy for America (DFA) a political action committee, headquartered in South Burlington, Vermont, founded by former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean.
Since March 2014, political animal Longman has managed the The Washington Monthly website and online magazine.
Although it claims to be "an independent voice", the Washington Monthly is funded by the Ford Foundation, JP Morgan Chase Foundation, and well-heeled corporate entities http://washingtonmonthly.com/about/
Longman's credentials as a "progressive" alarmist are well established. Since 2005, he has been the publisher of Booman Tribune. Longman admits that BooMan is related to the 'bogey man' (aka, bogy man, boogeyman), an evil imaginary character who harms children.
Vladimir Putin is the latest bogey man of the Democratic Party and its equally pro-Israel "opposition".
Neither party wants the conversation to involve Jewish Russian organized crime, because that leads to Israel and the pro-Israel AIPAC lobby that funds both the Republican and Democratic parties.
Very interesting.
Dec 10, 2017 | www.facebook.com
The investigation to somehow blame Russia for Donald Trump's election has now merged with another establishment goal of isolating and intimidating whistleblowers and other dissidents, as Dennis J Bernstein describes.
The Russia-gate investigation has reached into the ranks of journalism with the House Intelligence Committee's subpoena of Randy Credico, who produced a series about WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for Pacifica Radio and apparently is suspected of having passed on early word about leaked Democratic emails to Donald Trump's supporter Roger Stone.
The Credico subpoena, after he declined a request for a "voluntary" interview, underscores how the investigation is moving into areas of "guilt by association" and further isolating whistleblowers who defy the powers-that-be through unauthorized release of information to the public, a point made by National Security Agency whistleblower Thomas Drake in an interview.
Drake knows well what it means to blow the whistle on government misconduct and get prosecuted for it. A former senior NSA executive, Drake complained about a multi-billion-dollar fraud, waste, and widespread violation of the rights of civilians through secret mass surveillance programs. As a result, the Obama administration indicted Drake in 2010, "as the first whistleblower since Daniel Ellsberg charged with espionage," according to the Institute for Public Accuracy.
In 2011, the government's case against him, which carried a potential 35 years in prison, collapsed. Drake went free in a plea deal and was awarded the 2011 Ridenhour Truth Telling Prize.
I interviewed Drake about the significance of Credico's subpoena, which Credico believes resulted from his journalism about the persecution of Julian Assange for releasing information that powerful people would prefer kept hidden from the public. (I had a small role in Credico's 14-part radio series, Julian Assange: Countdown to Freedom . It was broadcast first as part of his Live on the Fly Series, over WBAI and later on KPFA and across the country on community radio.)
Credico got his start as a satirist and became a political candidate for mayor of New York City and later governor of New York, making mainstream politicians deal with issues they would rather not deal with.
I spoke to Thomas Drake by telephone on Nov. 30, 2017.
Dennis Bernstein: How do you look at Russiagate, based on what you know about what has already transpired in terms of the movement of information? How do you see Credico's role in this?
Thomas Drake: Information is the coin of the realm. It is the currency of power. Anyone who questions authority or is perceived as mocking authority -- as hanging out with "State enemies" -- had better be careful. But this latest development is quite troubling, I must say. This is the normalization of everything that has been going on since 9/11. Randy is a sort of 21st century Diogenes who is confronting authority and pointing out corruption. This subpoena sends a chilling message. It's a double whammy for Randy because, in the eyes of the US government, he is a media figure hanging out with the wrong media figure [Julian Assange].
Dennis Bernstein: Could you say a little bit about what your work was and what you tried to do with your expose?
Thomas Drake: My experience was quite telling, in terms of how far the government will go to try to destroy someone's life. The attempt by the government to silence me was extraordinary. They threw everything they had at me, all because I spoke the truth. I spoke up about abuse of power, I spoke up about the mass surveillance regime. My crime was that I made the choice to go to the media. And the government was not just coming after me, they were sending a really chilling message to the media: If you print this, you are also under the gun.
Dennis Bernstein: We have heard the charges again and again, that this was a Russian hack. What was the source? Let's trace it back as best we can.
Thomas Drake: In this hyper-inflated, politicized environment, it is extremely difficult to wade through the massive amount of disinformation on all sides. Hacking is something all modern nation-states engage in, including the United States, including Russia. The challenge here is trying to figure out who the players are, whose ox is being gored, and who is doing the goring.
From all accounts, Trump was duly elected. Now you have the Mueller investigation and the House investigation. Where is this all leading? The US intelligence agency hasn't done itself any favors. The ICA provides no proof either, in terms of allegations that the Russians "hacked" the election. We do have the evidence disclosed by Reality Winner that maybe there was some interference. But the hyper-politicization is making it extraordinarily difficult.
The advantage that intelligence has is that they can hide behind what they are doing. They don't actually have to tell the truth, they can shade it, they can influence it and shape it. This is where information can be politicized and used as a weapon. Randy has found himself caught up in these investigations by virtue of being a media figure and hanging out with "the wrong people."
Dennis Bernstein: It looks like the Russiagaters in Congress are trying to corner Randy. All his life he has spoken truth to power. But what do you think the role of the press should be?
Thomas Drake: The press amplifies just about everything they focus on, especially with today's 24-hour, in-your-face social media. Even the mainstream media is publishing directly to their webpages. You have to get behind the cacophony of all that noise and ask, "Why?" What are the intentions here?
I believe there are still enough independent journalists who are looking further and deeper. But clearly there are those who are hell-bent on making life as difficult as possible for the current president and those who are going to defend him to the hilt. I was not surprised at all that Trump won. A significant percentage of the American electorate were looking for something different.
Dennis Bernstein : Well, if you consider the content of those emails .Certainly, the Clinton folks got rid of Bernie Sanders.
Thomas Drake: That would have been an interesting race, to have Bernie vs. Trump. Sanders was appealing, especially to young audiences. He was raising legitimate issues.
Dennis Bernstein: In Clinton, they had a known quantity who supported the national security state.
Thomas Drake: The national security establishment was far more comfortable having Clinton as president. Someone central to my own case, General Michael Hayden, just a couple days ago went apoplectic because of a tweet from Trump taking on the mainstream media. Hayden got over 100,000 likes on his response. Well, Hayden was central to what we did in deep secrecy at the highest levels of government after 9/11, engaging in widespread surveillance and then justifying it as "raw executive authority."
Now you have this interesting dynamic where the national security establishment is effectively undermining a duly elected president of the United States. I recognize that Trump is vulnerable, but these types of investigations often become highly politicized. I worry that what is really happening is being sacrificed on the altar of entertainment and the stage of political theater.
What is happening to Randy is symptomatic of a larger trend. If you dare speak truth to power, you are going to pay the price. Is Randy that much of a threat, just because he is questioning authority? Are we afraid of the press? Are we afraid of having the uncomfortable conversations, of dealing with the inconvenient truths about ourselves?
Dennis J Bernstein is a host of "Flashpoints" on the Pacifica radio network and the author of Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom . You can access the audio archives at www.flashpoints.net .
exiled off mainstreet , December 7, 2017 at 4:23 pm"Raw Executive Authority" means Totalitarianism/Fascism.
Jerry Alatalo , December 7, 2017 at 3:34 pmYeah, it is definitely a way of describing the concept of fascism without using the word. The present Yankee regime seems to be quite far along that road, and the full-on types seem to be engaged in a coup to eliminate those they fear may not be as much in the fascist deep-state bag.
jaycee , December 7, 2017 at 3:56 pmIt is highly encouraging to know that a great many good and decent men and women Americans are 100% supportive of Mr, Randy Credico as he prepares for his testimony before the House Intelligence Committee. Remember all those standing right there beside you, speak what rightly needs to be spoken, and make history Mr. Credico!
mike k , December 7, 2017 at 5:49 pmThe intensification of panic/hysteria was obviously triggered by the shock election of Trump. Where this is all heading is on display in Australia, as the government is writing legislation to "criminalise covert and deceptive activities of foreign actors that fall short of espionage but are intended to interfere with our democratic systems and processes or support the intelligence activities of a foreign government." The legislation will apparently be accompanied by new requirements of public registration of those deemed "foreign agents". (see http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/12/07/auch-d07.html ).
This will be an attack on free speech, free thought, and political freedoms, justified by an orchestrated hysteria which ridiculously assumes a "pure" political realm (i.e. the "homeland") under assault by impure foreign agents and their dirty ideas. Yes, that is a fascist construct and the liberal establishment will see it through, not the alt-right blowhards.
john wilson , December 8, 2017 at 5:48 amHow disgusting to have to live today in the society so accurately described by Orwell in 1984. It was a nice book to read, but not to live in!
fudmier , December 7, 2017 at 4:42 pmActually Mike, the book was a prophesy but you aren't seen nothing yet. You me and the rest of the posters here may well find ourselves going for a visit to room 101 yet.
Al Pinto , December 7, 2017 at 5:23 pmThose who govern (527 of them) at the pleasure of the constitution are about to breach the contract that entitles them to govern. Limiting the scope of information allowed to those who are the governed, silencing the voices of those with concerns and serious doubts, policing every word uttered by those who are the governed, as well as abusing the constitutional privilege of force and judicial authority, to deny peaceful protests of the innocents is approaching the final straw.
The governors and their corporate sponsors have imposed on those the governors govern much concern. Exactly the condition that existed prior to July 4, 1776, which elicited the following:
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the Political bands which connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the laws of nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
I submit the actions and intentions of those who govern that are revealed and discussed in this article https://consortiumnews.com/2017/12/07/russia-gates-reach-into-journalism/ should be among the list of impels that support the next declaration.
mike k , December 7, 2017 at 5:53 pmThose who govern (527 of them and the puppet master oligarch behind them) will make certain that there's no support for the next declaration. There's no respect to the opinions of the mankind, what matters is keeping the current status quo in place and further advance it by silencing the independent media.
Maybe when the next "Mother of all bubbles" come, there's an opportunity for the mankind to be heard, but it's doubtful. What has taken place during the last bubble is that the rich has gotten richer and the poor, well, you know the routine.
https://usawatchdog.com/mother-of-all-bubbles-too-big-to-pop-peter-schiff/
john wilson , December 8, 2017 at 5:44 amTruth is he enemy of coercive power. Lies and secrecy are essential in leading the sheeple to their slaughter.
Christene Bartels , December 8, 2017 at 9:57 amPerhaps the one good thing about Trumps election is that its shows democracy is still just about alive and breathing in the US, because as is pointed out in this article, Trump was never expected to win and those who lost are still in a state of shock and disbelief.
Trump's election has also shown us in vivid technicolour, just what is really going on in the deep state. Absolutely none of this stuff would have come out had Clinton won and anything there was would have been covered up as though under the concrete foundation of a tower block. However, Trump still has four years left and as a British prime minister once said, "a week is a long time in politics". Well four more years of Trump is a hell of a lot longer so who knows what might happen in that time.
One things for sure: the Neocons, the deep state, and all the rest of the skunks that infest Washington will make absolutely sure that future elections will go the way as planned, so perhaps we should celebrate Trump, because he may well be the last manifestation of the democracy in the US.
In the end, what will bring this monstrously lumbering "Russia-gate" dog and pony show crashing down is that stupid, fake Fusion GPS dossier that was commissioned, paid for, and disseminated by Team Hillary and the DNC. Then, as with the sinking of the Titanic, all of the flotsam and jetsam floating within its radius of destruction will go down with it. What will left to pluck from the lifeboats afterwards is anyone's guess. All thanks to Hillary.
Apparently, Santa isn't the only one making a list and checking it twice this year. He's going to have to share the limelight with Karma.
Nov 13, 2017 | www.truthdig.com
Nearly a year after the presidential election, the scandal over accusations of Russian political interference in the 2016 election has gone beyond Donald Trump and reached into the nebulous world of online media. On November 1, Congress held hearings on "Extremist Content and Russian Disinformation Online." The proceedings saw executives from Facebook, Twitter and Youtube subjected to tongue-lashings from lawmakers like Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, who howled about Russian online trolls "spread[ing] stories about abuse of black Americans by law enforcement."
In perhaps the most chilling moment of the hearings, and the most overlooked, Clint Watts, a former U.S. Army officer who had branded himself an expert on Russian meddling, appeared before a nearly empty Senate chamber. Watts conjured up a stark landscape of American carnage, with shadowy Russian operatives stage managing the chaos.
"Civil wars don't start with gunshots, they start with words," he proclaimed. "America's war with itself has already begun. We all must act now on the social media battlefield to quell information rebellions that can quickly lead to violent confrontations and easily transform us into the Divided States of America."
Next, Watts suggested a government-imposed campaign of media censorship: "Stopping the false information artillery barrage landing on social media users comes only when those outlets distributing bogus stories are silenced: silence the guns and the barrage will end."
The censorious overtone of Watts' testimony was unmistakable. He demanded that government news inquisitors drive dissident media off the internet and warned that Americans would spear one another with bayonets if they failed to act. And not one member of Congress rose to object. In fact, many echoed his call for media suppression in the House and Senate hearings, with Democrats like Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Jackie Speier agreeing the most vehemently. The spectacle perfectly illustrated the madness of Russiagate, with liberal lawmakers springboarding off the fear of Russian meddling to demand that Americans be forbidden from consuming the wrong kinds of media -- including content that amplified the message of progressive causes like Black Lives Matter.
Details of exactly what transpired vis a vis Russia and the U.S. in social media in 2016 are still emerging. This year, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence published a declassified version of the intelligence community's report on "Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent U.S. Elections," written by CIA, FBI and NSA, with its central conclusion that Russian efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election represent the most recent expression of Moscow's longstanding desire to undermine the U.S.-led liberal democratic order."
To be sure, there is ample evidence that Russian-linked trolls have attempted to exploit wedge issues on social media platforms. But the impact of these schemes on real-world events appears to have been exaggerated. According to Facebook's data , 56 percent of Russian-linked ads appeared after the 2016 presidential election, and another 25 percent "were never shown to anyone." The ads were said to have "reached" over 100 million people, but that assumes that Facebook users did not scroll through or otherwise ignore them, as they do with most ads. Content emanating from "Russia-linked" sources on YouTube, meanwhile, managed to rack up hit totals in the hundreds , not exactly a viral smash.
Facebook posts traced to the infamous Internet Research Agency troll factory in Russia amounted to only 0.0004 percent of total content that appeared on the social network. (Some of these posts targeted "animal lovers with memes of adorable puppies," while another hawked an LGBT-themed " Buff Bernie coloring book for Berniacs.") According to its " deliberately broad" review , Twitter found that only 0.74 percent of its election-related tweets were "Russian-linked." Google, for its part, documented a grand total of $4,700 of "Russian-linked ad spending" during the 2016 election cycle. While some have argued that the Russian-linked ads were micro-targeted, and could have shifted key electoral voting blocs, these ads appeared in a media climate awash in a multi-billion dollar deluge of political ad spending from both established parties and dark money super PACs.
However, a blitz of feverish corporate media coverage and tension-filled congressional hearings has convinced a whopping 82 percent of Democrats that "Russian-backed" social media content played a central role in swinging the 2016 election. Russian meddling has even earned comparisons by lawmakers to Pearl Harbor, to "acts of war," and by Hillary Clinton to the attacks of 9/11 . And in an inadvertent way, these overblown comparisons were apt.
As during the aftermath of 9/11, the fallout from Russiagate has spawned a multimillion-dollar industry of pundits and self-styled experts eager to exploit the frenetic atmosphere for publicity and profits. Many of these figures have emerged out of the swamp that flowed from the war on terror and are gravitating toward the growing Russia fearmongering industrial complex in search of new opportunities. Few of these characters have become as prominent as Clint Watts.
So who is Watts, and how did he emerge seemingly from nowhere to become the star congressional witness on Russian meddling?
Dubious Expertise, Impressive Salesmanship
A former U.S. Army officer who spent years in obscurity at a defense industry funded think tank called the Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI), Watts has become a go-to source for cable news producers and print journalists on the subject of Russian bots, always available with a comment that reinforces the sense that America is under sustained cyborg attack. This September, his employers at FPRI hailed him as "the leading expert on developments related to Russian-backed efforts to not only influence the 2016 presidential election, but also to inflame racial and cultural divisions within the U.S. and across Europe."
Watts boasts an impressive-looking bio that is replete with fancy sounding fellowships at national security-oriented outfits, including George Washington University's Center Cyber and Homeland Security. His bio also indicates that he served on an FBI Joint Terror Task Force.
Though Watts is best known for his punditry on Russian interference, it's fair to say he is as much an expert on Russian affairs as Harvey Weinstein is a trusted voice on feminism. Indeed, Watts appears to speak no Russian, has no record of reporting or scholarship from inside Russia, and has produced little to no work of any discernible academic value on Russian affairs.
Whether or not he has the substance to support his claims of expertise, Watts has proven a talented salesman, catering to popular fears about Russian interference while he plies credulous lawmakers with ease.
Before Congress, a String of Deceptions
Back on March 30, as the narrative of Russian meddling gathered momentum, Watts made his first appearance before the Senate Select Intelligence Committee.
Seated at the front of a hearing room packed with reporters, Watts introduced Congress to concepts of Russian meddling that were novel at the time, but which have become part of Beltway newspeak. His testimony turned out to be a signal moment in Russiagate, helping transition the narrative of the scandal from Russia-Trump collusion to the wider issue of online influence.
In the widely publicized testimony, Watts explained to the panel of senators that he first noticed the pernicious presence of Russian social media bots after he co-authored an article in 2014 in Foreign Affairs titled, " The Good and The Bad of Ahrar al Sham ." The article urged the US to arm a group of Syrian Salafi insurgents known for its human rights abuses , sectarianism and off-and-on alliances with Al Qaeda. Watts and his co-authors insisted that Ahrar al-Sham was the best proxy force for wreaking havoc on the Syrian government weakening its allies in Iran and Russia. Right below the headline, Watts and his co-authors celebrated Ahrar al-Sham as "an Al Qaeda linked group worth befriending."
Watts rehashed the same argument at FPRI a year later, urging the U.S. government to harness jihadist terror as a weapon against Russia. "The U.S. at a minimum, through covert or semi-covert platforms, should take advantage and amplify these free alternative [jihadist] narratives to provide Russia some payback for recent years' aggression," he wrote. In another paper, Watts asked , "Why shouldn't the U.S. redirect some of the jihadi hatred towards those with the dirtiest hands in the Syrian conflict: Russia and Iran?" Watts did not specify whether the theater of covert warfare should be limited to the Syrian battlefield, or if he sought to encourage jihadists to carry out terrorist acts inside Russia and Iran.
The premise of these op-eds should have raised serious concerns about Watts and his colleagues, and even questions about their sanity. They had marketed themselves as national security experts, yet they were lobbying the US to "befriend" the allies of Al Qaeda, the group that brought down the Twin Towers. (Ahrar al-Sham was founded by Abu Khalid al-Suri, a Madrid bombing suspect who was named by Spanish investigators as Osama bin-Laden's courier.) Anyone cynical enough to put such ideas into public circulation should have expected a backlash. But when the inevitable wave of criticism came, Watts dismissed it all as a Russian bot attack.
Addressing the Senate panel, Watts said that those who took to social media to mock and criticize his Foreign Affairs article were, in fact, Russian bots. He provided no evidence to support the claim, and a look at his single tweet promoting the article shows that he was criticized only once (by @Navsteva, a Twitter user known for defending the Syrian government against regime change proponents, not an automated bot). Nevertheless, Watts painted the incident as proof that Russia had revived a Cold War information warfare strategy of "Active Measures," which was supposedly aimed at "crumbl[ing] democracies from the inside out [by] creating political divisions."
Next, Watts introduced his signature theme, claiming that Russia manipulated civil rights protests to exploit divisions in American society. Declaring that "pro-Russian" outlets were spreading "chaos in Black Lives Matter protests" by deploying active measures, Watts did not bother to say what those measures were. In fact, the only piece of proof he offered (in a Daily Beast transcript of his testimony) was a single link to an RT article that factually documented a squabble between Black Lives Matter protesters and white supremacists -- an incident that had been widely covered by other outlets, from the Houston Chronicle to the Washington Post . Watts did not explain how this one report by RT sowed any chaos, or whether it had any effect at all on actual events.
Watts then moved to the main course of his testimony, focusing on how Trump employed Russian "active measures" to attack his opponents. Watts told the Senate panel that the Russian-backed news outlets RT and Sputnik had produced a false report on the U.S. airbase in Incirlik, Turkey being "overrun by terrorists." He presented the Russian stories as the anchor for a massive influence operation that featured swarms of Russian bots across social media. And he claimed that then-Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort invoked the incident to deflect from negative media coverage, suggesting that Trump was coordinating strategy with the Kremlin. In reality, it was Watts who was spreading the fake news.
In the articles cited by Watts during his testimony, neither RT nor Sputnik made any reference to "terrorists" taking over Incirlik Airbase. Rather, these outlets compiled tweets by Turkish activists and sourced their coverage to a report by Hurriyet, one of Turkey's largest mainstream papers. In fact, the incident was reported by virtually every major Turkish news organization ( here , here , here and here ). What's more, the events appeared to have taken place approximately as RT and Sputnik reported it, with protesters readying to protect the airbase from a coup while Turkish police sealed the base's entrances and exits. A look at RT's coverage shows the network even downplayed the severity of the event, citing a tweet by a U.S.-based national security analysis group stating, "We are not finding any evidence of a coup or takeover." This stands entirely at odds with Watts' claim that RT exaggerated the incident to spark chaos.
Watts has pushed his bogus narrative of RT and Sputnik's Incirlik coverage in numerous outlets, including Politico . Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen echoed Watts' false account on the Senate floor while arguing for legislation to force RT out of the U.S. market on political grounds. And Jim Rutenberg, the New York Times' media correspondent, reproduced Watts' distorted account in a major feature on RT and Sputnik's "new theory of war." Almost no one, not one major media organization or public figure, has bothered to fact check these false claims, and few have questioned the agenda behind them.
Questions emailed to Watts via his employers at FPRI received no reply.
Another Watts Deception, This Time Discredited in Court
During his Senate testimony, Watts introduced a second, and even more distorted claim of Trump employing Russian "active measures" to attack his political foes. The details of the story are complex and difficult for a passive audience to absorb, which is probably why Watts has been able to get away with pushing it for so long.
Watts' testimony was the culmination of a mainstream media deception that forced an aspiring reporter out of his job, drove him to contemplate suicide, and ultimately prompted him to take matters into his own hands by suing his antagonists.
The episode began during a Trump rally at the height of the 2016 presidential campaign, when Trump read out an email purportedly from longtime Hillary Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal (the father of this writer), hoping to embarrass Clinton over Benghazi. The text of the email turned out to be part of a column written by the pro-Clinton Newsweek columnist Kurt Eichenwald, not an email by Blumenthal.
The source of Trump's falsehood appeared to have been a report by Bill Moran, then a reporter for Sputnik, the news service funded by the Russian government. Having confused Eichenwald's writing for a Blumenthal email, Moran scrubbed his erroneous article within 20 minutes. Somehow, Moran's retracted article had found its way onto the Trump campaign's radar, a not atypical event for a campaign that had relied on material from far-out sites like Infowars to undercut its opponents.
In his column at Newsweek, Eichenwald framed Moran's honest mistake as the leading edge of a secret Russian influence operation. With help from pro-Clinton elements, Eichenwald's column went viral, earning him slots on CNN and MSNBC, where he howled about the nefarious Russian-Trump-Wikileaks plot he believed he had just exposed. (Glenn Greenwald was perhaps the only reporter with a national platform to highlight Eichenwald's falsifications .) Moran was fired as a result of the fallout, and would have to spend the next several months fighting to correct the record.
When Moran appealed to Eichenwald for a public clarification, Eichenwald staunchly refused. Instead, he offered Moran a job at the New Republic in exchange for his silence and warned him, "If you go public, you'll regret it." (Eichenwald had no role at the New Republic or any clear ability to influence the magazine's hiring decisions.) Moran refused to cooperate, prompting Eichenwald to publish a follow-up piece painting himself as the victim of a Russian "active measures" campaign, and to cast Moran once again as a foreign agent.
When Watts revived Eichenwald's bogus version of events in his Senate testimony, Moran began to spiral into the depths of depression. He even entertained thoughts of suicide. But he ultimately decided to fight, filing a lawsuit against Newsweek's parent company for defamation and libel.
Representing himself in court, Moran elicited a settlement from Newsweek that forced the magazine to scrub all of Eichenwald's articles about him -- a tacit admission that they were false from top to bottom. This meant that the most consequential claim Watts made before the Senate was also a whopping lie.
The day after Watts' deception-laden appearance, he was nevertheless transformed from an obscure national security into a cable news star, with invites from Morning Joe, Rachel Maddow, Meet the Press, and the liberal comedian Samantha Bee, among many others. His testimony received coverage from the gamut of major news outlets, and even earned him a fawning profile from CNN. From out of the blue, Watts had become the star witness of Russiagate, and one of corporate media's favorite pundits.
FPRI, a Pro-War Think Tank Founded by White Supremacist Eugenicists
Before he emerged in the spotlight of Russiagate, Watts languished at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, earning little name recognition outside the insular world of national security pundits. Based in Philadelphia, the FPRI has been described by journalist Mark Ames as "one of the looniest (and spookiest) extreme-right think tanks since the early Cold War days, promoting 'winnable' nuclear war, maximum confrontation with Russia, and attacking anti-colonialism as dangerously unworkable."
Daniel Pipes, the arch-Islamophobe pundit and former FPRI fellow, offered a similar characterization of the think tank, albeit from an alternately opposed angle. "Put most baldly, we have always advocated an activist U.S. foreign policy," Pipes said in a 1991 address to FPRI. He added that the think tank's staff "is not shy about the use of force; were we members of Congress in January 1991, all of us would not only have voted with President Bush and Operation Desert Storm, we would have led the charge."
FPRI was co-founded by Robert Strausz-Hupé, a far-right Austrian emigre, with help from conservative corporations and covert funding from the CIA From the campus of the University of Pennsylvania, Strausz-Hupé gathered a "Philadelphia School" of Cold War hardliners to develop a strategy for protracted war against the Soviet Union. His brain trust included FPRI co-founder Stefan Possony, an Austrian fascist who was a board member of the World Anti-Communist League, the international fascist organization described by journalists Scott Anderson and Jon Lee Anderson as a network of "those responsible for death squads, apartheid, torture, and the extermination of European Jewry." True to his fascist roots, Possony co-authored a racialist tract, " The Geography of Intellect ," that argued that blacks were biologically inferior and that the people of the global South were "genetically unpromising." Strausz-Hupé seized on Possony's racialist theories to inveigh against anti-colonial movements led by "populations incapable of rational thought."
While clamoring for a preemptive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union -- and acknowledging that their preferred strategy would cause mass casualties in American cities -- Strausz-Hupé and his band of hawks developed a monomaniacal obsession with Russian propaganda. By the time of the Cuban missile crisis, they were stricken with paranoia, arguing on the pages of the New York Times that filmmaker Stanley Kubrick was a Soviet useful idiot whose film, Dr. Strangelove , advanced "the principal Communist objectives to drive a wedge between the American people and their military leaders."
Ultimately, Strausz-Hupé's fanaticism cost him an ambassadorship, as Sen. William Fulbright scuttled his appointment to serve in Morocco on the grounds that his "hard line, no compromise" approach to communism could shatter the delicate balance of diplomacy. Today, he is remembered fondly on FPRI's website as "an intellectual and intellectual impresario, administrator, statesman, and visionary." His militaristic legacy continues thanks to the prolific presence -- and bellicose politics -- of Watts.
The Paranoid Style
This year, FPRI dedicated its annual gala to honoring Watts' success in mainstreaming the narrative of Russian online meddling. Since I first transcribed a Soundcloud recording of Watts' keynote address, the file has been mysteriously scrubbed from the internet. It is unclear what prompted the removal, however, it is easy to understand why Watts would not want his comments examined by a critical listener. His speech offered a window into a paranoid mindset with a tendency for overblown, unverifiable claims about Russian influence.
While much of the speech was a rehash of Watts' Senate testimony, he spent an unusual amount of time describing the threat he believed Russian intelligence agents posed to his own security. "If you speak up too much, you'll get knocked down," Watts said, claiming that think tank fellows who had been too vocal about Russian meddling had seen their laptops "burned up by malware."
"If someone rises up in prominence, they will suddenly be -- whoof! -- swiped down out of nowhere by some crazy disclosure from their email," Watts added, referring to unspecified Russian retaliatory measures. As usual, he didn't produce concrete evidence or offer any examples.
"Anybody remember the reporters that were outed after the election? Or maybe they tossed up a question to the Clinton campaign and they were gone the next day?" he asked his audience. "That's how it goes."
It was unclear which reporters Watts was referring to, or what incident he could have possibly been alluding to. He offered no details, only innuendo about the state of siege Kremlin actors had supposedly imposed on him and his freedom-fighting colleagues. He even predicted he'd be "hacked and cyber attacked when this recording comes out."
According to Watts, Russian "active measures" had singlehandedly augmented Republican opinion in support of the Kremlin. "It is the greatest success in influence operations in the history of the world," Watts confidently proclaimed. He contrasted Russia's success with his own failures as an American agent of influence working for the U.S. military, a saga in his career that remains largely unexamined.
Domestic Agent of Influence
"I worked in influence operations in counter-terrorism for 15 years," Watts boasted to his audience at FPRI. "We didn't break one or two percent [increase in the approval rating of US foreign policy] in fifteen years and we spent billions a year in tax dollars doing it. I was paid off of those programs. We had almost no success throughout the Middle East."
By Watts' own admission, he had been part of a secret propaganda campaign aimed at manipulating the opinions of Middle Easterners in favor of the hostile American military operating in their midst. And he failed massively, wasting "billions a year in tax dollars."
Given his penchant for deception, this may have been yet another tall tale aimed at burnishing his image as an internet era James Bond. But if the story was even partially true, Watts had inadvertently exposed a severe scandal that, in a fairer world, might have triggered congressional hearings.
Whatever took place, it appears that Watts and his Cold Warrior colleagues are now waging another expensive influence operation, this time directed against the American public. By deploying deceptions, half-truths and hyperbole with the full consent of Congress and in collaboration with the mainstream press, they have managed to convince a majority of Americans that Russia is "trying to knock us down and take us over," as Watts remarked at the FPRI's gala.
In just a matter of months, public consent for an unprecedented array of hostile measures against Russia, from sanctions and consular raids to arbitrary crackdowns on Russian-backed news organizations, has been assiduously manufactured.
It was not until this summer, however, that the influence operation Watts helped establish reached critical capacity. He had approached one of Washington's most respected think tanks, the German Marshall Fund, and secured support for an initiative called the Alliance for Securing Democracy. The new initiative became responsible for a daily blacklist of subversive, "pro-Russian" media outlets, targeting them with the backing of a who's who of national security honchos, from Bill Kristol to former CIA director and ex-Hillary Clinton surrogate Michael Morrell, along with favorable promotion from some of the country's most respected news organizations.
In the next installment of this investigation, we will see how a collection of cranks, counter-terror retreads and online vigilantes overseen by the German Marshall Fund have waged a search-and-destroy mission against dissident media under the guise of combating Russian "active measures," and how the mainstream press has enabled their censorious agenda.
Read part two here .
Max Blumenthal is a senior editor of the Grayzone Project at AlterNet, and the award-winning author of " Goliath ," " Republican Gomorrah ," and " The 51 Day War ." He is the co-host of the podcast, Moderate Rebels . Follow him on Twitter at @MaxBlumenthal .
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Noah172 , , December 8, 2017 at 11:58 amDec 09, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
And for that matter, let us recall that it was the best and brightest of the Republican Party's defense and national security elite that led the nation into its worst foreign policy debacle since Vietnam. Did you see Ken Burns's recent Vietnam documentary? Did you see Errol Morris's fantastic documentary The Fog of War , about Robert McNamara and Vietnam? Those were Democratic Party elites, but the most important fact is that they were American elites, just as the Republican elites that led us into Iraq. And it was American elites -- Republican and Democrat -- that led us into the 2008 economic crash, beginning with the Clinton-era deregulation of Wall Street, continued through the George W. Bush era.
My problem with Donald Trump is not so much that he's a populist rebuke to the GOP elites (who deserve it) but that he's a loudmouth incompetent who's so bad at it -- and his most ardent supporters let him get away with it. This tax bill, which he embraces, gives lie to any substantive claim that Trump is a populist.
... ... ...
Yes, the GOP is putrefying. So is the Democratic Party (as Edsall's analysis reveals). The rot began long before Donald Trump showed up on the political scene. He is both symptom and catalyst, but he didn't start the rot.
Noah172 December 8, 2017 at 11:56 am
He's absolutely right, of course, and the Republicans who voted for that unpopular (see here and here), help-the-rich, deficit-exploding tax billOh, get off it. The bill greatly expands the standard deduction, which reduces the value of all itemized deductions (itemized deductions help the wealthy). It reduces the mortgage interest and SALT deductions, which subsidize rich New Yorkers and Californians (the real reason Democrats hate this bill). It increases the child credit (maybe not enough, but some). A number of analyses show that it will give a modest post-tax income boost across the income spectrum. As for the estate tax thing, remember that heirs pay capital gains and other taxes (e.g. local property) on their inherited assets; tweaking the cost-basis people calculate on inherited assets (I would set it to zero if I were king) could get the feds the same revenue as an estate tax.
It is not a perfect or even that great of a bill, but stop robotically repeating every apocalyptic denunciation of it (literally apocalyptic: Nancy Pelosi said the bill is "Armageddon" and "the end of the world"; and others are screaming that the bill will murder people).
NFR: On tax policy and economics, he's governing like a standard-issue plutocratic RepublicanBen H , , December 8, 2017 at 12:12 pmNot on trade. Not on immigration. Pay attention.
On foreign policy, he's reducing American power abroad and making war more likely
Have you gone back to neoconservatism?
[NFR: Please. It delights me to think of the yoga-like contortions you're having to do to justify your man's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. -- RD]
Until you can talk about the problem -- that the 'Republican Intellectual Elite' means the neocons (who promote each other and keep everyone else out) -- you can't do anything about it. This group polices what is intellectually respectable on the right and and you aren't allowed to cross them if you want to stay on the inside.Ben H , says: December 8, 2017 at 12:37 pmPotentially influential people can't talk about these guys because if you do you lose your job. This happens even now, there was a case within the last couple of months that comes to mind.
Even though this group's plans have proceed disastrous time after time, these people are beyond criticism and never suffer any consequences when their actions lead to real world death and destruction.
[NFR: But that's just it -- neoconservatism *was* the conservative establishment, until Trump came along. -- RD]
No, neoconservatism still is the conservative establishment. If you want a 'fellow' of some institute to represent the 'conservative' point of view you are going to get someone who is more or less a neocon.Kent , says: December 8, 2017 at 12:44 pmTrump has not changed a thing about who the establishment is: but he threatens change which is one reason why they hate him. It's not that they have gone away but that they have been discredited and won't go away because they have the infrastructure.
"More and more former Republicans wake up every day and realize: "I'm homeless. I'm politically homeless."DBN , says: December 8, 2017 at 12:57 pmSheepishly raises hand. I was always a Republican not because of any of a thousand issues, but because I believed Republicans knew how to run an efficient, financially prudent government. It was the party of conservative values like work and integrity.
Democrats were the party of budget deficits, handouts, war and favored constituencies. The Republicans have become the Democrats of old, just tweaking who gets the handouts.
GWB's second term was the first time I ever voted for a democrats across the line. Not because I care about their policies (they're basically Republican anyway), but just because its the only way I have to slap the GOP in my small way.
The GOP has become the party of radical incompetence. An embarrassment. I see little difference between Trump and Hillary. And most Republicans I know think there is an ocean between them. That's how small their world has become.
The rot afflicting the G.O.P. is comprehensive -- moral, intellectual, political and reputational. More and more former Republicans wake up every day and realize: "I'm homeless. I'm politically homeless."Cry me a river. A lot of Americans have felt this way way for decades. Pew Research Center polling has consistently shown that the largest group of Americans tilts socially to the right but economically to the left. There has not been a party since FDRs Democrats that felt like a home for these people.
Given that we have a two-party system, and that's unlikely to change, I would rather that at least one party begin represent a significant portion of the population again.
Dec 08, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com
Publius Tacitus -> sbjonez... , 06 December 2017 at 10:35 AM
You are correct that there is no public source yet confirming the FBI paid Steele. However, the FBI's refusal to turn over relevant documents regarding their relationship with Steele tells me there was money paid. What is indisputable is that th information in the dossier was used as a predicate to seek permission from a FISA court to go after Trump and his team. That is outrageous.Sylvia 1 , 06 December 2017 at 12:48 PM
This is increasingly my take as well -- the FBI, CIA and NSA do seem to have "conspired" to destroy Donald Trump. I finger Brennan, Clapper, Susan Rice, Benjamin Rhodes, and maybe Samantha Power as being involved in the flood of illegal leaks earlier in the year that did so much to pave the way for Mueller's appointment.blue peacock , 07 December 2017 at 12:18 AMWhat I fail to understand is why Democrats are sitting back and cheering as these agencies work together to destroy a duly elected President of the USA. Does anyone really believe that if these agencies get away with it this time they will stop with Trump?
All these agencies are out of control and are completely unaccountable.Publius TacitusThe real story is that the FBI, the NSA and the CIA effectively conspired to try to destroy the Presidency of Donald Trump.How can this conspiracy be investigated? Who could do it? Clearly not anyone from the DoJ, FBI, CIA and NSA as they are fully compromised.
Dec 08, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com
WJ , 05 December 2017 at 08:16 PM
Sir,turcopolier , 05 December 2017 at 09:36 PMWhat is your take on this fellow Peter P. Strzok II? His back history is purportedly Georgetown, Army Intelligence (his father PP Strzok I is Army Corp of Engineers), and was until recently deputy director of counterintelligence at FBI with focus on Russia and China.
He is the fellow who altered Comey's draft to read "extremely careless" instead of "grossly negligent", he interviewed HRC, Mills, Abedin (and gave the latter two immunity); he pushed for the continued payment of Steele in the amount of $50,000 for further Dossier research in the face of some resistance (cf James Rosen);
he also interviewed Flynn, and for most of the first half of 2017 and for all of 2016 appears to have been the most important and influential agent working on the HRC-Trump-Russia nexus. James Rosen suggests he has CIA connections as well.
The dude has also no internet presence. There is not much information out there on a person who seems to be pretty influential in DC / FBI / Foreign Intel circles.
He screwed up, and a lawyer, sent texts, and now is gone. Does he strike you as fishy at all, or is this kind of stuff pretty common for people in his field and position.
WJfanto said in reply to WJ... , 05 December 2017 at 10:51 PMI know nothing of him other than what is in the press but his partisan interference in investigations appears to be a blot on the honor of the FBI but then I am old fashioned. pl
WJ,The Twisted Genius -> WJ... , 05 December 2017 at 11:27 PM
I first learned about this man from a comment of David Habakkuk (in an earlier post) and was curious to learn more about him. As you point out, ´internet is not your friend´ in his case. Your comment gives so far the most information about his doings. Thank you. According to David Habakkuk that surname is polish, but it possibly be other slavic origin as well ( possibly Jidish ?)WJ,rjj said in reply to The Twisted Genius ... , 06 December 2017 at 12:20 PMGiven Strzok's career, I wouldn't expect to find much, if anything, about him on the internet. If he spent his career working "in the shadows," he rightly would have stayed off the internet. He certainly would have had CIA connections if he was involved in CI activities targeting Russian and China. Anyone actively working in a classified environment would be grossly negligent to allow himself to be plastered all over the internet. Why do you think I still use a light cover of TTG just to post here years after retiring? It's just force of habit.
I was glad to hear that Mueller banished him to HR as soon as his anti-Trump emails were discovered. If he stayed, he would have cast an ugly shadow over the Mueller investigation. It's much like the partisan shadow extending over much of the NY FBI office. Their pro-Trump/anti-Clinton stance was notorious. I also think the FBI should review the entire Clinton email server file in light of this.
Don't know how bureaucracies work in DC. Remembering how placement in HR was a goal for activists. HR is obscure and unglamorous - how is it banishment for someone with an agenda who works in the shadows?
Dec 07, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org
Den Lille Abe | Dec 5, 2017 3:05:41 PM | 6
Ukraine has become a tragical farce, is such a paradox exists.pB | Dec 5, 2017 3:23:48 PM | 7
I doubt anybody can dissect who finances Saakashvili. To me he seems to be anothe proxy, Timoshenko ?
The Ukranian people are the victims here, untold billions being stolen from the people, a lethargic civil war, that could have been avoided...
What beggars belief really is that some Ukranian politicians held the belief that they could join NATO and Sevastopol become a NATO base.. That is just alternate reality, and it must be clear to anyone that it was a no-go. There is a reason Finland is not part of NATO, even though they are fiercely independent.
The Ukrainian politicians should have taken lessons in "Real-Politik" from Willy Brandt.Sorry, im against all the antirussian hysteria, but the idea that shakavili is now being paid by the russians to stir up trouble is just to delicious an irony, not to believeDaniel | Dec 5, 2017 3:24:25 PM | 8Saakashvili was the President of Georgia who shelled and invaded South Ossetia back in 2012. This led to the "Russo-Georgian War" when Russia came to the assistance of the people of South Ossetia.James | Dec 5, 2017 3:37:25 PM | 9Faux Newz had an interesting moment when they interviewed a young American girl who had recently fled the war. They assumed she was onboard the Russophobia train, but she and her aunt insisted that Saakashvili was the aggressor and Russia had come to their rescue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCqIaINP-bE
So, I would doubt that Saakashvili is supported by Russia. It's not impossible since RealPolitiks can make for very strange bedfellows. Saakashvili is a fugitive in two countries right now, and could be a useful tool for further delegitimizing the Ukrainian putsch regime.
But history and contexts matters.
I think it is Yulia Tymoshenko behind SaakashviliPiotr Berman | Dec 5, 2017 3:55:38 PM | 10
She seems to be the only oligarch not making out like a bandit plundering Ukraine!!! This time round!!!I feel sorry for the Ukrainian people.
At the end of the Soviet Union they had the most potential, but for some reason they seem to have too many corrupt and ideologically ( neo Nazi) driven politicians. A recipe for conflict in a country made up of bits and pieces of other countries with Greeks, Hungarians, Jews, Russians, poles and other groups with their own cultures and identities. The Soviet Union could keep a lid on all this as it was a large multi- ethnic space, but Ukraine seeking a single identity is causing the country to splitSaakashvili is a clown and is not the saviour they need. But he could force the country to declare early elections - then Tymoshenko will reveal herself
From what I recall about Saakashvili entering illegally Ukraine from Poland, he was helped by the supporters of Timoshenko party.Kalen | Dec 5, 2017 4:09:45 PM | 13Concerning the "clownish character", he does not seem to stand out from Ukrainian norm. There are tons of reasons for popular discontent, and a considerable surplus of leaders who want to channel that discontent, and as followers of American political scene know, it helps to be "colorful" (note to HRC: some people are natural in that respect, and some, including those that you can see in your bathroom, are anything but).
Support for Batkivshchina, the political party of Timoshenko, was in high single digits, and anti-corruption credibility could lift it a bit. Timoshenko herself oscillated between "Russian stooge" and ultra-nationalist, and had some period as a tycoon with shady deals (with Gasprom). She is also a former prime minister with passable tenure, and, given her age, has pretty hair and face. Energetic Misha can complement her nicely.
Saakashvilli was and is American puppet in Ukraine and at home in Georgia and hence he was not blown up like those who do not have explicitly protection from US embassy in the maddening frenzy of collapsing political and moral system in Ukraine spurring brutal murder spree among warring oligarchic mafia fighting for IMF loot.Jen | Dec 5, 2017 5:01:01 PM | 16Now even authentic Ukrainian Nazis are fed up with Poroshenko the pig, and want him dead due to him being an western agent of as they put it moral decay and culture anihilatiing globalism and that include promotion of LGBT mafia he belongs himself. A war between Nazi grass roots in the west of Ukraine as well as moderate Russian ethnic conservatives in Donbass area against US/NATO trained and equipped SBU run Kiev regime continues demonstrated by sheer terror brutality and murder as well as comical episodes like that while collapse of quite developed civil society continues into barbarism under US plans as it happened in Afghanistan, Iraq and now in Yemen and Ukraine.
Could Mikhail Khodorkovsky be the "Russian middleman" financing the antics of Saakashvili and his supporters?psychohistorian | Dec 5, 2017 5:40:59 PM | 17Tymoshenko may be paying Saakashvili and his supporters but this would not work for her long-term, in that if she became President, Saakashvili would feel entitled to demand a senior position in her government and he might become a thorn in her side. He could easily switch sides if she denies him a position and work to undermine her. So no, I don't think Tymoshenko would be paying him.
More likely someone or a government outside Ukraine who could play Poroshenko, Tymoshenko or another ambitious oligarch politician off against one other, who would use Saakashvili and his fan base as tools to push Ukrainian politics this way and that, and who has the money to do so, is paying Saakashvili.
I am beginning to think that the strategy is to have enough geo-political balls in the air that obscure and suck focus from the real shit going on so no global consensus can emerge to stop the insanity.FB | Dec 5, 2017 6:05:08 PM | 20And it seems to be working for the moment as it has for the past couple of centuries of rule by the private finance elite.
Well...that is one pretty good sketch of pure slapstick...had me in stitches for a while...Daniel | Dec 5, 2017 6:16:46 PM | 21The problem with Ukraine is simple...the US interference since day one...
Think Russia under Yeltsin...but which never got fixed...
Ukraine has been part of Russia for hundreds of years...the difference between the 'Ukrainian' language and Russian is so superficial as to be something like the difference between say American and Australian English...
...kind of like 'Serbian' and 'Croatian'...
Belarus is an example of a stable post-Soviet society that knows well it doesn't belong in this Frankenstein 'Europe' of today...
The Orange Revolution was brought on by the usual suspects...ie US and its Euro proxies...and it failed miserably...
In the next election the people brought Yanukovich back...not to mention that he had won that disputed election in 2004 anyway...
Then in 2014...the crazy neocons of the Kagan clan went for the gusto...a full-blown putch...with paid snipers and blackwater mercenaries...
And so the people of Ukraine are sliding into a European version of Yemen...
Ukraine inherited a large part of the Soviet military industrial capacity after 1991...including the crucial human expertise in very high tech sectors like jet and rocket engines...airframes...and much more...
It was a no-brainer that these industries and the educational system underpinning them could be a springboard for mutually beneficial economic integration with Russia...think of Airbus and its French, German and other European partners...
Russia is today a medium-income country with a per capita GDP [PPP] on a par with EU member Greece and not far behind Italy and Spain...
For the ordinary person Russia is a paradise compared to Ukraine...with three times higher income...
We find Ukraine trailing countries like Namibia, El Salvador and Morocco...
Even the Eastern European countries like Czech, Poland and Hungary are still far from the income levels of the major Western European countries...relatively speaking they have not improved their lot from the Soviet days...
Only now all their industries are foreign-owned...bought for pennies on the dollar...they pay high prices for second-class food...
And where they had free university education that was probably second to none in quality...now they pay through the nose...
Even in the Czech Republic which is the highest income country of the former eastern bloc...many people feel that things have not improved in the last 25 years...
Have living standards in Eastern Europe decreased after Communism?
The fall has been greatest for Ukraine...and certainly this can be traced back to the constant tugging of the West...not to say outright interference on a criminal level...
Even Germany has long since realized that it needs Russia and that Russia is good for German business...so how is it that Russia's immediate neighbors...many of which were part of Russia for centuries...think that they can now burn all bridges...?
It is insane...that's the kind of change only a neocon can believe in...
psychohistorian @17pantaraxia | Dec 5, 2017 6:54:50 PM | 22That's pretty much my take. We are constantly bombarded by "Breaking News" events that amount to an endless parade of squirrels for us to chase, while real stuff is going on largely under the radar.
I don't know how deep the connections of that ancient financial elite really go. I think everyone here agrees that they own/control both party flavors in the US, though some still want to believe that Trump is somehow breaking that mold (a thesis I find completely unsubstantiated except as portrayed in the Reality TV Show of political theater).
But, are Russia or China really somewhat independent competitors, or is even that level of seeming conflict really just manufactured diversion? When I see IMF backing for both of those countries, I have to wonder just how much BRIC, One Road, etc. are sincere resistance to the Globalists.
Was Hitler really just a tool for the banksters? Did the Bolsheviks really hijack the Russian Revolution at the behest of the global banksters?
Is resistance really futile, or are we led to believe the Globalists are much more powerful than they really are, and their Empire is really just a house of cards that we, the people could topple easily with mass strikes and boycotts, combined with establishing our own means of providing the basic necessities to survive the Revolution?
I see large numbers of Honduran police have publicly refused to follow regime orders against their fellow citizens. Every successful revolution has followed from significant numbers of the enforcers of the Elite refusing orders and joining with the people.
Saakashvili's involvement in Ukraine goes deeper than his purported anti-corruption campaign. It seems he was one of the players behind the Maidan massacre, while being aligned with that scumbag zionist-Ukrainian oligarch Kolomoisky. (see below)pantaraxia | Dec 5, 2017 7:30:55 PM | 23Another False Flag Terror ADMISSION: Snipers In the Ukraine "Protests"
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-11-17/another-false-flag-terror-admission-snipers-ukraine-%E2%80%9Cprotests%E2%80%9DItaly's 11th largest newspaper – Il Giornale – reported on an admission by several of the snipers
Revazishvilli's confessions and two other Georgians reveal a different and disconcerting truth. Revazishvilli and his two companions are a former member of the security services of former Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili and two former militants of his party."
Coincidentally (?) Georgian mercenaries were also a significant component of Kolomoisky's private army which committed some of the worst atrocities and repeatedly undermined any attempts to establish a ceasefire. Kolomoisky was forced to back down by the U.S. from his confrontational stance with Valtzman (Poroshenko) over the division of spoils from the systematic looting of the Ukraine. His ouster as Governor of Dnipropetrovsk and subsequent marginalization from the 'spoils of the victors' by Poroshenko likely produced one very unhappy customer. Kolomoisky, given his history and past actions, does not seem to be the type of character who would take this lying down.(see following article) His ties to Saakashvili are quite extensive prior to the rift over Odessa (staged or backstabbing?)
NATO, MH17, Mossad and Kolomoisky: Beware the 'Chameleon'
https://www.sott.net/article/282898-NATO-MH17-Mossad-and-Kolomoisky-Beware-the-ChameleonSome of the Georgians who serve in Kolomoisky's Army have reportedly been trained in the use of BUK missile systems previously sold by Ukraine to Georgia under the presidency of Mikheil Saakashvili. Kolomoisky has utilized ex-President Saakashvili's "consulting services" in Dnipropetrovsk in the military and political campaign against the breakaway people's republics of Donetsk and Luhansk.
elsi | Dec 5, 2017 7:32:27 PM | 24
@20 FB"The problem with Ukraine is simple...the US interference since day one "
Its not quite that simple. The problem with Ukraine is that it has become a mafia state run by organized crime with some three dozen oligarchs controlling approximately 85% of the economy.
President Kuchma's regime institutionalized the organized crime element in the government in a manner similar to Yeltsin's action in Russia. The fact that the U.S. government aligned itself with one oligarchic faction came subsequent to this.I agree with some here who seem to suggest that this is no more than smoke and mirrors, since the real thing, which is no other than spreading and consolidation of fascism throughout Europe and the world, is happening behind the scenes....While you laugh at Saakashvili, nobody thinks of Parubyi....fudmier | Dec 5, 2017 8:17:56 PM | 25"Nazism in Europe is precisely NATO"
http://www.voltairenet.org/article196854.html
"(...)So this is Andriy Parubiy who, as the President of the Ukrainian Parliament (a position conferred on him in April 2016 for his democratic achievements), was received on 5 June at Montecitorio by the President of the House, Laura Boldrini. "Italy - emphasized President Boldrini - has always condemned the illegal action that took place to the detriment of the Ukrainian territory". Thus she has gobbled up the Nato version according to which it was Russia that had illegally annexed Crimea, a version that fails to take into account that the Russians of Crimea chose to break away from Ukraine and to re-enter Russia - a decision taken to pre-empt an attack, just like the decision taken by the Russians of Donbass, by Neo Nazi battalions and Kiev's other forces.The cordial conversation was concluded by signing a memorandum of understanding that "further strengthens parliamentary cooperation between the two assemblies, both at the political and administrative level".
Thus it strengthens cooperation between the Italian Republic, born out of the Resistance against Nazi-fascism, and a regime that created in Ukraine a situation analogous to that which brought into being the fascism of the 1920s and Nazism in the 1930s. The Azov battalion, whose Nazi signature is represented by the emblem inspired by the SS Das Reich emblem, has been incorporated into the National Guard, transformed into a regular military unit and promoted to the rank of a regiment for special operations.
Then it was supplied with armoured transport and artillery. With other Neo-Nazi formations, transformed into regular units, it is trained by US instructors from the 173a Air Transport division, transferred from Vicenza to Ukraine, flanked by others from Nato.
The Ukraine of Kiev has thus become the "nursery" for born-again Nazism right in the heart of Europe. Neo-Nazis flow into Kiev from all over Europe, including Italy. After being trained and tested out in military action against the Russians of Ukraine in Donbass, they have been made to return to their countries. Now it is left to Nato to rejuvenate the ranks of Gladio."
13,18, and 19 may be correct.. I am no expert, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikheil_Saakashvili (mentions):psychohistorian | Dec 5, 2017 8:18:33 PM | 26
IIR (Intnl Law) TSNU-Kyiv (Ukraine, 1992) Poroshenko discovered. HRTs officer after Pres Zviad Gamsakhurdia (Georgia)deposed; (US State Dept(Ed Muskie Graduate Fellowship mentioned?). Columbia Law School, LLm 1994; GW Univ Law School; diploma Intl Institute of HR, Strasbourg, France. Check wikipedia for details.https://www.yahoo.com/news/georgias-saakashvili-appointed-aide-ukraine-leader-095756606.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL0KqlQkmZs
@ Daniel who engaged me with contextual musings, pantaraxia who writes that the US is behind one of the oligarchs and elsi who agrees that there is lots of "smoke and mirrors"ben | Dec 5, 2017 8:36:19 PM | 27First to pantaraxia I want to write that while you may see the US behind one faction of oligarchs, I would argue (without links) that the global private finance elite are behind each and every oligarch you can name...it is a religion after all, don't you know? If one is an oligarch in our small world you can take it to the bank (pun intended) that they are well connected/subserviant to the top-rung elite in some way.
To Elsi, Fascism provides a powerful front for the structure of our current form of social organization with private finance and private property protected by unfettered inheritance at the core of elite support. All/most of the corporations form the circle around the private finance core and are controlled by the top rung elite where they are not outright owned.
To Daniel I would state my ongoing postulate that turning private finance into a public utility and ending inheritance/ongoing ownership of private property would structurally change the incentives we live our lives by....for the better. I would posit that any successful evolution of our species must make that one change to our social structure and the results would "solve all our problems" by changing the fundamental way in which we relate to each other....competition/cooperation.
Daniel @ 21 said: "When I see IMF backing for both of those countries, I have to wonder just how much BRIC, One Road, etc. are sincere resistance to the Globalists."fudmier | Dec 5, 2017 8:48:34 PM | 28Something I've pondered for quite some time now. Makes one think all this nonsense is just smoke and mirrors to confuse the peons, as the global elites fleece the sheep.
17, and 24 have hit the nail on the head.. the whole idea of revealing hidden news is to implement a strategy designed to weaken the power of the masses in favor of the leaders of the masses. Divide and conquer is a method that implements that strategy. When controversial subject matter is discussed it weakens consensus. DQ applied to any controversial subject, weakens the consensus power of the mass(es) much like a second person on one side of a see-saw weakens the power of the first person to decide for him(her)self which end is up. Worse, when the two persons counter balance the see-saw, a third person can jump to the middle and easily control which of the first two are in the air and on the ground. Deep in the strategy is emotion. A controversial subject matter elicits emotions at various levels on both sides of controversy.E | Dec 5, 2017 9:04:05 PM | 29
example: 1000 people.. 500 believe in gun control; 500 believe in open gun society.How did that happen? What news article could arouse desired or planned response? Let us say in each of the 500 groups; 30 persons (60 in all) are highly emotionally aroused by the issue; so target them, they will fight to death those who profess their opposite thought or belief and they will receive the support of the 430 on their side to start with. Now you have it.
90% of the news is about that.. D&C has been a propaganda technology since Rome days, but beginning around 1860, using propaganda to effect D&C technology was developed into a profession and the governments made that technology into a weapon of war.
I believe if the humanity of the world cannot find leadership to solve problems, then the masses are going to have to find ways to solve problems in spite of the nation states and the technology used by the nation states to prevent mass solutions that work. Every human being alive needs to understand the importance of contributing to the needs of the masses.There's also this:Grieved | Dec 5, 2017 10:01:33 PM | 34
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/3846671.html
Ukrainian politician Daniel Papiev said on a Ukrainian talk show that, although a census hasn't been held for many years, the most "optimistic" number is that the population of Ukraine has declined to 32 million. When the USSR collapsed, Ukraine's population was 52 million, and before Maidan, it was a little over 45 million. Now it's 32. A loss of nearly 20 million people (2 million due to Crimea joining Russia) is an "impressive" result by any measure (even during the 1932-33 famine years, the Ukrainian population actually rose). Ukrainian politicians regularly state that at current levels of growth, it will take until the 2030s to reach "pre-Maidan" levels. If the population keeps declining like this, even that looks optimistic. It seems that there must be a lot more Ukrainians working in the shadow economy both in the EU and in Russia than is officially known about.@16 Jennonsense factory | Dec 6, 2017 12:04:57 AM | 38Slightly off-topic and trivial, but Tatyana Montyan said that Tymoshenko always used other people's money, and never shared it with anyone. I assume you've seen this clip from 2014 but if not you'll probably find it entertaining, since you have an interest in the players. Montoyan mentions Yulya around the 10:00 mark:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAtarbgbfHc10:07 Yulia has always been very greedy and has never worked with her own money, and the people knew that the Party of Regions guys at least pay their bills,10:17 They will pay with some government positions, bribes, some land and so on, Yulya could only say: "Thank you very much!"
10:27 And that's why I know that all BYT party structures in Cherkassy worked for the Party of Regions. I think around the country it's the same.
10:38 She was winning in the polls in fact, but she lost, of course, because she didn't want to invest in protecting her results
10:48 So now the situation will be the same. She has nothing. She has always been working with other's resources.
The whole clip is funny. Montoyan says that Poroshenko is a thief and the son of a thief, and that she met Tymoshenko who was at the time just a small-time thief.
More seriously, I owe this interview for the understanding that Ukraine is completely run by thieves for thieves. Once one knows that, all mysteries of statecraft are solved. There truly is no statecraft. Event the wars against the Donbass are to allocate war funds to be stolen.
@Daniel 8, Minor correction the U.S.-backed Georgian attack on Ossetia was in 2008. That was a Condoleezza Rice-arranged action, which turned into a debacle.nonsense factory | Dec 6, 2017 2:47:26 PM | 50
Here's one decent summary from Dec 2008: (A bit biased towards standard western narrative, but better than a lot of the "Russia just attacked Georgia!" claims by CBS etc.)"The tense but relatively stable situation blew up late in the evening of August 7, when on the order of president Mikheil Saakashvili, Georgia's army swept into South Ossetia, leveling much of Tskhinvali and surrounding villages and sending some 30,000 refugees fleeing north into Russia. Within hours, Russia's de facto czar Vladimir Putin counterattacked -- some say he'd set a trap -- and by the end of that long weekend the Georgians were in panicked retreat. The Russian army then pushed straight through South Ossetia and deep into Georgia proper, halting less than an hour's drive from Saakashvili's luxurious palace."American military advisers had been training and supplying Georgian troops up to a few days before the invasion. There were at least 100 in the country, so you can guess that Saakashvili wouldn't have acted without the green light from the U.S. Part of the whole 'encircle Russia' strategy developed after it became clear Putin wouldn't let western interests take control of Russian natural resources. In any case, it's fairly hard to see how the Russian government would ever work with Saakashvili after that.
Everyone in the current Ukrainian government seems half-crazy at least, a bunch of oligarchs and mafia dons with all the usual squabbles over power and prestige.
This is a walk down memory lane, I was watching this pretty closely at the time (I have a grandmother whose family is from Ossetia, so it was of personal interest). It was all a pretty crude brutal power play over pipeline control, with reckless disregard for the consequences - another Outlaw US Empire stunt. The coordinated timing to the Beijing Olympics (@40 Hague) is strange - deliberate?Rusty Pipes | Dec 6, 2017 5:03:48 PM | 51One factor I was unaware of at the time is the explosion on the BTC pipeline in Turkey (the BTC runs from the Caspian Sea through Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey to the Mediterranean) on August 5, 2008. Originally Kurdish separatists claimed credit although nobody seems to be sure. Regardless, the main U.S. interest in Eastern Europe is controlling the pipeline routes to Europe. In Central Asia, the game is controlling oilfield production, while not allowing exports through Iran or Russia.
@47 mischi the Israeli involvement likely revolved around this Israeli proposal from 2006:
[Israeli] National Infrastructures Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told the Ambassador on June 21 that he recently returned from an oil and gas conference in Azerbaijan, where he met with government officials and discussed extending the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline to Israel. According to Ben-Eliezer, the pipeline is currently expected to run 220 km. from Azerbaijan to Georgia and Turkey. Adding Israel would extend the pipeline an additional 400 km., and Azerbaijan could subsequently use the Ashkelon-Eilat pipeline to transmit oil to the Red Sea for sale to customers in East Asia.As part of this, the U.S. suggested joint military drills with Turkey, Israel and Georgia:
TGS will consider future regional Special Operations Forces (SOF) exercises in cooperation with Israel, Georgia, and Azerbaijan. (2007) . . .. . . [Nasrallah] was also quoted as saying that Israel exported failed generals to train the Georgian army, referring to Brig. Gen. (res.) Gal Hirsch, who resigned his command after the Second Lebanon War
See More extensive discussion of Israel's role via Time (2008)There are also many credible reports of Georgia using cluster munitions manufactured by Israel against Ossetia civilians and Russian forces; Human Rights Watch claimed Russia used cluster munitions as well; Georgia admitted to it but Russia denied using them. HRW often does not come across as impartial in these conflicts.
Georgia used the M85 submunition during the conflict, fired from GRADLAR rockets, which were purchased from Israel. . . it was also likely that the Georgians felt so overwhelmed by the Russian attack, they merely fired off everything they had with little thought to strike distance or consequences on the civilian population.The overall agenda here has been the US State Department & Pentagon-coordinated plan to help Exxon and Chevron export oil from their leases in Kazakhstan (Israel being a bit player looking to secure oil supplies and transit fees):
Feb 2010: We are focused on helping the Kazakhstanis implement the Kazakhstan-Caspian Transportation System (KCTS), which envisions a virtual pipeline of tankers transporting large volumes of crude from Kazakhstan's Caspian coast to Baku, from where it will flow onward to market through Georgia, including through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline.Kill and slaughter for oil profits, same old game.
@nonsense factory#50:The agenda of Human Rights Watch (which was founded as Helsinki Watch)frequently aligns with that of the US State Dept., ignoring or downplaying crimes of friends of the US and highlighting alleged crimes of US enemies.
Dec 07, 2017 | www.unz.com
Reading the mainstream media headlines relating to the flipping of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn to provide evidence relating to the allegations about Russian interference in America's last presidential election requires the suspension of one's cognitive processes. Ignoring completely what had actually occurred, the "Russian story" with its subset of "getting Trump" was on display all through the weekend, both in the print and on the live media.
Flynn's guilty plea is laconic, merely admitting that he had lied to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) about what was said during two telephone conversations with then Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak, but there is considerable back story that emerged after the plea became public.
The two phone calls in question include absolutely nothing about possible collusion with Russia to change the outcome of the U.S. election, which allegedly was the raison d'etre behind the creation of Robert Mueller's Special Counsel office in the first place. Both took place more than a month after the election and both were initiated by the Americans involved. I am increasingly convinced that Mueller ain't got nuthin' but this process will grind out interminably and the press will be hot on the trail until there is nowhere else to go.
Based on the information revealed regarding the two conversations, and, unlike the highly nuance-sensitive editors working for the mainstream media, this is the headline that I would have written for a featured article based on what I consider to be important: "Israel Colluded with Incoming Trump Team to Subvert U.S. Foreign Policy," with a possible subheading "FBI Entraps National Security Adviser."
The first phone call to Kislyak, on December 22 nd , was made by Flynn at the direction of Jared Kushner, who in turn had been approached by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu had learned that the Obama Administrating was going to abstain on a United Nations vote condemning the Israeli settlements policy, meaning that for the first time in years a U.N. resolution critical of Israel would pass without drawing a U.S. veto. Kushner, acting for Netanyahu, asked Flynn to contact each delegate from the various countries on the Security Council to delay or kill the resolution. Flynn agreed to do so, which included a call to the Russians. Kislyak took the call but did not agree to veto Security Council Resolution 2334, which passed unanimously on December 23 rd .
The second phone call, made by Flynn on December 29 th from a beach in the Dominican Republic, where he was on vacation, may have been ordered by Trump himself. It was a response to an Obama move to expel Russian diplomats and close two Embassy buildings over allegations of Moscow's interfering in the 2016 election. Flynn asked the Russians not to reciprocate, making the point that there would be a new administration in place in three weeks and the relationship between the two countries might change for the better. Kislyak apparently convinced Russian President Vladimir Putin not to go tit-for-tat.
In taking the phone calls from a soon-to-be senior American official who would within weeks be part of a new administration in Washington, the Russians did nothing wrong. It would not be inappropriate to have some conversations with an incoming government team. Apart from holding off on retaliatory sanctions, Kislyak also did nothing that might be regarded as particularly responsive to Team Trump overtures. If it was an attempt to interfere in American politics, it certainly was low-keyed, and one might well describe it positively as a willingness to give the new Trump Administration a chance to improve relations.
The first phone call about Israel was not as benign as the second one about sanctions. Son-in-law Jared Kushner is Trump's point man on the Middle East. He and his family have extensive ties both to Israel and to Netanyahu personally, to include Netanyahu's staying at the Kushner family home in New York. The Kushner Family Foundation has funded some of Israel's illegal settlements and also a number of conservative political groups in that country. Jared has served as a director of that foundation and it is reported that he failed to disclose the relationship when he filled out his background investigation sheet for a security clearance. All of which suggests that if you are looking for possible foreign government collusion with the incoming Trumpsters, look no further.
And it should be observed that the Israelis were not exactly shy about their disapproval of Obama and their willingness to express their views to the incoming Trump. Netanyahu said that he would do so and Trump even responded with a tweet of his own expressing disagreement with the Obama decision to abstain on the vote, but the White House knew that the comment would be coming and there was no indication from the president-elect that he was actively trying to derail or undo it.
Kushner, however, goes far beyond merely disagreeing over an aspect of foreign policy as he was trying to clandestinely reverse a decision made by his own legally constituted government. His closeness to Netanyahu makes him, in intelligence terms, a quite likely Israeli government agent of influence, even if he doesn't quite see himself that way. He is currently working on a new peace plan for the Middle East which starts out with permanently demilitarizing the Palestinians. It will no doubt continue in the tradition of former plans which aggrandized Jewish power while stiffing the Arabs. And not to worry about the team that will be allegedly representing American interests. It is already being reported that they consist of "good, observant Jews" and will not be a problem, even though Israeli-American mega-fundraiser Haim Saban apparently described them on Sunday as "With all due respect, it's a bunch of Orthodox Jews who have no idea about anything."
What exactly did Kushner seek from Flynn? He asked the soon-to-be National Security Adviser to get the Russians to undermine and subvert what was being done by the still-in-power American government in Washington headed by President Barack Obama. In legal terms this does not quite equate to the Constitution's definition of treason since Israel is not technically an enemy, but it most certainly would be covered by the Logan Act of 1799, which bars private citizens from negotiating with foreign governments on behalf of the United States and also could be construed as a "conspiracy against the United States" that the Mueller investigation has exploited against former Trump associate Paul Manafort. As Kushner is Jewish and certainly could be accused of dual loyalty in extremis , this part of the story obviously makes many in the U.S. Establishment and media uncomfortable, so it is being ignored and expunged from the record as quickly as possible. And don't expect Special Counsel Mueller to do anything about the Israel connection. As an experienced operator in the Washington swamp he knows full well that the Congressmen currently calling for blood in an investigation involving Russia will turn 180 degrees against him if he tries to go after Netanyahu.
And just to demonstrate exactly how the story is shaped to protect Israel, here is a piece from the generally reliable The Hill written by Morgan Chalfant on 5 take-aways from Flynn's guilty plea . Israel is not even identified and, if one reads the two mentions of the U.N. vote connected to the first call, it appears to be deliberately omitted. The first citation reads "He also lied when he said he did not ask Kislyak to delay or defeat a vote on a pending U.N. Security Council resolution " and the second is "Prosecutors also say that a senior member of the transition team on Dec. 22 directed Flynn to contact officials from Russia and other governments about their stance on the U.N. resolution 'and to influence those governments to delay the vote or defeat the resolution.'" Does omitting Israel and emphasizing the Russian aspect of the story throughout the rest of the piece change what it says and how it is perceived? You betcha.
For me, there was also a second take-away from the Flynn story apart from the collusion with Israel. It involves the use of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to set-up Flynn shortly after he had been installed as National Security Adviser. Insofar as I can determine, the FBI entrapment of Flynn has only been examined in a serious way in the media by Robert Parry at Consortium News.
Michael Flynn was actually interviewed by the FBI regarding his two phone conversations on January 24 th shortly after assumed office as National Security Adviser. During his interview, he was not made aware that the Bureau already had recordings and transcripts of his phone conversations, so, in a manner of speaking, he was being set-up to fail. Mis-remembering, forgetting or attempting to avoid implication of others in the administration would inevitably all be plausibly construed as lying since the FBI knew exactly what was said.
To be sure, many would agree that the sleazy Flynn deserves everything he gets, but the logic used to set-up the possible Flynn entrapment by the FBI, i.e. that there was unauthorized contact with a foreign official, is in itself curious as Flynn was a private citizen at the time and such contact is not in itself illegal. And it also opens the door to the Bureau's investigating other individuals who have committed no crime but who find that they cannot recall details of phone calls they were parties to that were being recorded by the government six months or a year before. That can easily be construed as "lying" or "perjury" with consequences that include possible prison time.
So there are two observations one might make about the Flynn saga as it currently stands. First, Israel, not Russia, was colluding with the Trump Administration prior to inauguration day to do something highly unethical and quite probably illegal, which should surprise no one. And second, record all your phone conversations with foreign government officials. The NSA and FBI will have a copy in any event, but you might want to retain your own records to make sure their transcript is accurate.
Philip M. Giraldi, is a former CIA Operations officer who is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax exempt educational foundation that seeks a more interests based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is www.councilforthenationalinterest.org, address us P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville, VA 20132, and email address is [email protected] .
CanSpeccy , Website December 5, 2017 at 5:52 am GMT
How is it that the FBI interrogates an agent of the President Elect on secret negotiations conducted on behalf of the President Elect?Kiza , December 5, 2017 at 5:53 am GMTAnd isn't that agent of the President Elect obliged, as a matter of national security, to conceal the details of those secret negotiations from anyone who attempts to extract them from him, lying as necessary to do so?
And anyhow, what was the point? Why the interrogation? The negotiations were made over the telephone, so the US Government, and presumably, therefore, the FBI, could obtain a transcript if they needed to know what was said.
The whole story seems nonsensical. But if anyone comes out of this looking good, maybe it will be Flynn. while it is the FBI and Robert Mueller who get their come uppance.
Nothing new, but a very clear summary of the situation, as one would expect from Mr Giraldi – including the customary warping of reality by the TPTB (substitution of "Israel" with "Russia").Anon , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 6:09 am GMTPerhaps, the article is too tepid only on the legal entrapment combined with NSA recording of communications. Who says that this will be applied only to conversations with foreign nationals? I am sure that other statutes exist or will be quickly created to entrap anyone who does not remember word-for-word what was said in his communications with anyone else: thus lying to the Police etc. This is a magnificent self-awarded gift to the US regime which will only keep giving. I am waiting for the vassals to follow closely behind – the five-eyes and EU countries to develop similar entrapment resources.
What is the point of recording someone's communications if you cannot also put him in jail at will?
I expect the Jewish media will get orders from Israel to back off if they try to target Kushner. He's a useful, pro-Israel link to Trump for Netanyahu, and too valuable to get rid of just because left-wing media Jews want to take down Trump. Trump is a lot more pro-Israel than the leftists, and Netanyahu knows it.Cloak And Dagger , December 5, 2017 at 6:27 am GMTOver the years, Israel has paid Jewish-American reporters for writing pro-Israel puff pieces in US news, and Netanyahu could just threaten to cut off the lucre to bring them in line. Or, if he is really angry, he could send a few Mossad agents to have a talk with the Jewish reporters about how they're hurting Israel, and if that happens, then too bad because the Mossad will have to do something about them.
Anyway, it looks like Mueller's investigation will halt at Flynn. If Mueller tries to go farther, something 'interesting' may happen to him. If he does, I expect to see a full smackdown of his investigation from every direction with accusations against his honesty and probity, followed by his firing once enough public rage has been ginned up against him so that all liberal protests in his favor are drowned out by the fury of the lynch mob.
Phil, this makes me feel even worse than I did before. I knew that RussiaGate was nonsense from the Hillary camp, however, the fact that Trump would bring his son-in-law into the WH and allow him to collude with Israel against the national interests of this country, fills me with dismay.Hank Rearden , December 5, 2017 at 6:45 am GMTWhile I supported Trump mostly as an anti-Hillary stance and not because I saw him as someone who would bring about great positive change to our country (e.g. draining the swamp), I had hoped that his pandering to Israel during the election campaign was mostly political SOP. Since last November, however, he has gradually lost me. I am happy that he has not started new wars, but with the accelerated donkey-felating of Israel, I am not confident that we won't soon embark on more wars for Israel and more funds to that shitty country from our taxes.
Not a very merry Christmas.
Michael Flynn was actually interviewed because he was stupid enough to talk to the police. Never talk to the police. Don't believe me, this is a detective who says don't talk to the police:Wally , Website December 5, 2017 at 7:29 am GMTDon't Talk to Cops, Part 2
An experienced police officer tells you why you should never agree to be interviewed by the police.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08fZQWjDVKEOf course, nowadays if you assert your 5th Amendment right to not talk, street cops will construe that as mental illness, so it's acceptable to do as Kenny Suitter does. Remind them verbally that you're not talking to them by saying: "I don't answer questions."
How To Survive A Traffic Stop: "I Don't Answer Questions"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwYBshAScmEOr better yet, shut your cakehole and hold a sign that says "I remain silent. No searches. I want my lawyer." Even works at Soviet no suspicion checkpoints in the USSA. Mostly.
Checkpoint: I REMAIN SILENT-NO SEARCHES-I WANT MY LAWYER
Justin Raimondo of Antiwar.com is on this as well:Jon Baptist , December 5, 2017 at 7:36 am GMTFrom 'Russia-Gate' to 'Israel-Gate'
http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2017/12/03/russia-gate-israel-gate/
Bravo to Phil Giraldi for calling out and writing about these treasonous bastards. Thanks to Unz for giving him the platform. Keep reporting and hopefully there will be enough people that will stand up and prevent this tyranny from developing further.Mark James , December 5, 2017 at 7:43 am GMTThe Russian collusion story will flower eventually. I feel certain of that. But really, who among us did not feel that Kushner would be doing Israel's bidding, from back as far as the spring of 2016? Who thought that 'One President at a time' would apply to Jarad and the administration elect?jilles dykstra , December 5, 2017 at 8:13 am GMTIt has never been made clear why Flynn was the man as far as Jarad and Ivanka were concerned? Was it merely because they viewed him as a dupe for their plans?
Was Obama setting up the new administration with someone he knew was already criminally exposed–Flynn–and was the almost certain hire –because of Kushner– as well as because of the current president's strong objections?Yes it seems like the term "duel loyalty" was almost made for Kushner. With Jarad's title of Ambassador without portfolio Israel didn't even have to effort a move of the US embassy to Jerusalem –it was a given– and as far as permission to attack Iran? I'm afraid that seems in the cards as well.
If Israel isn't mentioned–by US Media– it should be. While all calls are not recorded by NSA it is likely that those countries with the greatest presence in spy assets within the US (Rus/Isl) undoubtedly are. Yes Flynn lied to the FBI. I don't think there's much question Kushner will too.https://www.rt.com/news/411937-syria-intercepts-israeli-missiles/LondonBob , December 5, 2017 at 8:38 am GMTI suppose here we have an important cause of Russiagate, Israel sees that Syria is not destabilised, just physically destroyed, thanks to Russian interference.
USA support is the only reason Israel still exists, good relations between USA and Russia may mean the end of Israel, in any case the end of Israeli power in the ME.
And if USA support ends, what about German support ?
Will Israel get another two billion submarine, for which the German taxpayer pays some 400 million ?
At the same time, I fear we see that no anti missile system is capable of destroying many missiles if they come at the same time.
When, I hope never, Russia fires most of its 1600 old fashioned ballistic missiles at the USA, some will het through, I suppose.Well I said if Mueller wants to make himself useful he could take down Kushner. Be interesting to see if we get any follow up on him, or if it quietly dies in the dark as you surmise, these things always seem to once they have the potential to impact negatively on Zionist interests. Will that kill the whole investigation, it certainly seems to be coming to a dead end anyway?jacques sheete , December 5, 2017 at 12:12 pm GMTAnonymous , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 12:16 pm GMTFirst, Israel, not Russia, was colluding with the Trump Administration prior to inauguration day to do something highly unethical and quite probably illegal, which should surprise no one.
Well, it certainly doesn't surprise me and I'm (happily) a nobody. Anyway, at least the Ziocreeps are consistent.
Looks like Oncle Joey was right again.
"Blame others for your own sins."
J. V. Stalin, Anarchism Or Socialism ? December, 1906 -- January, 1907
Why does "Israel" seem to be at, or very near, the center of most major issues of the day once the curtain is lifted a bit, and why are they nearly always suspected of doing something unjust and shady if not downright criminal?
And what about the eternal victim image we dumb goyim are supposed to imbibe with our mammy's milk?
While I agree with Giraldi on Israel's outrageous influence on U.S. politics, I am much more concerned by how the FBI has become a thoroughly corrupt secret police for the Establishment and Deep State. And the Department of Just-Us is all part of it. It's so fucking Orwellian.Michael Kenny , December 5, 2017 at 1:55 pm GMTThe FBI went into that interview with the plan to get Flynn. He never had a chance. Even if he had a transcript of his phone conversations, and provided answers from that, they would've manipulated him into a BS process crime.
I'm a former investigator and worked with a former S/A (not FBI) who told me about when he worked cases with the FBI. They will lie and fabricate stuff in order to set people up and then make threats on what people didn't say. If you're a target of the FBI it makes no difference how honest you are and how precise and accurate your answers are to their questions.
Apart from all that, I trust people with last name Kushner over people with the last name of Mueller or Strzok
Smoke screen! The spooks are more spooked than ever! What exactly did the US intelligence services get up to that they're now so scared of Russiagate? Mr Giraldi is in such a panic that he totally fails to make the point in the title. He essentially admits Russian interference but does not establish, nor even, in fact, claim, that there is any connection between Israel and Russian interference. Israel has no need to engage in undercover interference to influence US politics. It does so quite openly and has the Israel Lobby to support it. It certainly has no need of Russian help! One might also ask what disadvantage there would have been for Israel if Hillary was elected. Why would they feel the need to manipulate the election in Trump's favour? Thus, it's not an "either or" situation, as Mr Giraldi tries to present it. Regardless of whether or not there was also Israeli interference, Russian interference, with the help of American "associates", is well established and confirmed by an almost identical pattern of interference in the French presidential election. More interestingly, though, what has emerged from Flynn's testimony so far is that the initiative came from the Trump campaign, not the Russians. The evidence available up to that point suggested that the Russians had taken the initiative and more or less set up the naïve "bunch of Orthodox Jews". It's little wonder therefore that both Putin's American supporters and Trump's personal lawyer are running around in panic!Rurik , December 5, 2017 at 3:47 pm GMTSvigor , December 5, 2017 at 3:48 pm GMTIsrael, not Russia, was colluding with the Trump Administration prior to inauguration day to do something highly unethical and quite probably illegal,
And don't expect Special Counsel Mueller to do anything about the Israel connection. As an experienced operator in the Washington swamp he knows full well that the Congressmen currently calling for blood in an investigation involving Russia will turn 180 degrees against him if he tries to go after Netanyahu.
Mueller was head of the FBI during the 9/11 "investigation"
you don't get anymore 'swamp creature' than that
more here:
Trump succeeded in convincing Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to order his UN delegation to delay the vote. Egypt then withdrew its sponsorship of 2334. However, four members of the Security Council -- Malaysia, New Zealand, Senegal and Venezuela – counteracted Sisi's abandonment and brought the resolution to a Council vote. It passed and was enacted due to the American abstention. It is quite certain that the Obama administration sought the assistance of its intelligence and military ally, New Zealand, in bolstering Malaysia, Senegal, and Venezuela against furious backroom opposition from Israel and the Trump transition team. Trump and Kushner decided that just prior to Flynn's indictment, they would demonstrate their fealty to Israel by announcing that the United States was going to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Such actions, far from showing "collusion" with a foreign power, point to conflicted loyalty, at the very least.
Netanyahu told New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray McCully that New Zealand's support for the resolution would be tantamount to a declaration of war against Israel,
when I read the above quote, it seemed too explosive not to have a link, so I 'Binged' it
from the first link:
Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly told New Zealand's foreign minister that support for a UN resolution condemning Israeli settlement-building in the occupied territories would be viewed as a "declaration of war".
anyways, more from the article
There has never been a successful prosecution under the Logan Act and likely there will never be one. However, those who possessed access to classified information – Trump, Kushner, Flynn, Haley, and others – who were simultaneously taking orders from Israel on matters of US national security, could be found guilty of violating the US Espionage Act .
too funny!
To be sure, many would agree that the sleazy Flynn deserves everything he gets,
if he was talking money from Turkey, to represent their interests- while masquerading as our National Security Advisor, then I wouldn't mind seeing him hanged by the neck until it snapped or until he stopped dancing.
but then that's how I feel about all acts of treason against my nation, and the scum who serve the interests of our deadliest enemy at the direct expense of this nation they swore a sacred oath to.
I wonder how clean the Democrats' hands are, vis-a-vis the Logan Act? Has every incoming Democrat administration really been so squeaky clean in its dealings with foreign agents?Corvinus , December 5, 2017 at 4:13 pm GMTThe two phone calls in question include absolutely nothing about possible collusion with Russia to change the outcome of the U.S. election, which allegedly was the raison d'etre behind the creation of Robert Mueller's Special Counsel office in the first place. Both took place more than a month after the election and both were initiated by the Americans involved. I am increasingly convinced that Mueller ain't got nuthin' but this process will grind out interminably and the press will be hot on the trail until there is nowhere else to go.
IANAL; does the old "fruit of the poison tree" apply to investigations/prosecutions as a whole, or just to evidence found/used therein? Because the fact that one of the interviewers, (((Strzok))) (caveat: (((echoes))) based on personal Jewdar only (facial phrenology, name, occupation, politics, corruption); was unable to confirm via Gewgle) has been ejected from Mueller's team seems germane. Maybe he'll only impact the trial, the way Fuhrman impacted OJ's trial?
It's interesting how central the Logan Act has been in all this, considering how it's never been used to prosecute anyone in its over 217 years of existence. The Jews and their lackeys are now reduced to using blue Laws; to return to the "mobs Jews stirred up that turned on them" motif, what if we started prosecuting Jews with blue laws against, say, sodomy?
The NYT has a new piece up, titled "Why the Trump Team should fear the Logan Act."
Why the Trump team should fear the Swamp's use of blue laws? Because the Swamp is totally corrupt and they hate Trump, that's why.
The Kushner Family Foundation has funded some of Israel's illegal settlements and also a number of conservative political groups in that country.
It would be interesting to know more about that; how much more worthy do the Kushners regard Israel as being of Conservative advocacy, compared to their ostensible homeland, the United States? Because they seem to be fairly leftist in their desires for the latter.
His closeness to Netanyahu makes him, in intelligence terms, a quite likely Israeli government agent of influence, even if he doesn't quite see himself that way.
How Jews see themselves is very often a study in rationalization and self-deception; eminently worthy of study, but never to be taken at face value.
I expect the Jewish media will get orders from Israel to back off if they try to target Kushner. He's a useful, pro-Israel link to Trump for Netanyahu, and too valuable to get rid of just because left-wing media Jews want to take down Trump. Trump is a lot more pro-Israel than the leftists, and Netanyahu knows it.
Trump may be marginally more pro-Zionist than the communist (AKA leftist) establishment, but it's not really possible for Trump to be "a lot more pro-Israel"; there isn't enough daylight available – the communists are too pro-Zionist for that.
And I doubt that margin is really worth the trouble; the Diaspora Wing of the Tribe hates Hates HATES Trump and wants him gone Gone GONE. It's harder to do business with the Swamp when it's mobilized to destroy the current administration; being seen as too cozy with the object of their hatred is counter-productive.
Over the years, Israel has paid Jewish-American reporters for writing pro-Israel puff pieces in US news, and Netanyahu could just threaten to cut off the lucre to bring them in line.
The money flow is very much in the opposite direction; from the Jewish diaspora to Israel, not the other way around.
Or better yet, shut your cakehole and hold a sign that says "I remain silent. No searches. I want my lawyer." Even works at Soviet no suspicion checkpoints in the USSA. Mostly.
It's also a good idea to keep asking cops if you can leave. They often have to wait on K-9 units, for which demand outstrips supply. And they have regulations as to how long they're allowed to keep you waiting before they conduct their search, and crucially don't have to volunteer the fact that they have limits on how long they're allowed to make you wait . But they do have to tell you if you're free to leave, if you're free to leave. So ask them every 5 minutes or so, "may I leave now?"
While I agree with Giraldi on Israel's outrageous influence on U.S. politics, I am much more concerned by how the FBI has become a thoroughly corrupt secret police for the Establishment and Deep State. And the Department of Just-Us is all part of it. It's so fucking Orwellian.
The upper ranks seem to be thick with Jews, too. Which should surprise no one who knows even a bit about Soviet history.
@AnonymousEagle Eye , December 5, 2017 at 4:39 pm GMT"I'm a former investigator and worked with a former S/A (not FBI) who told me about when he worked cases with the FBI. They will lie and fabricate stuff in order to set people up and then make threats on what people didn't say."
Double Fake News Story.
You, as well as Girabaldi, really need to become educated as far as the Mueller investigation is concerned.
https://twitter.com/SethAbramson?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
@CanSpeccySolontoCroesus , December 5, 2017 at 4:58 pm GMTWho within the Administration allowed Flynn to be interviewed by the FBI on January 24, 2017?
It seems Flynn was intentionally set up by disloyal legal and other advisers on Trump's team, obviously to drive a wedge into the incoming administration.
No lawyer worth his salt would allow such an interview to proceed without serious preparation and safeguards. Having just assumed office, the White House had legitimate reasons to slow-walk any FBI requests. In particular, Team Trump should and could have waited until the FBI was cleansed of the worst hold-overs and swamp creatures (such as Deputy AG Rosenstein who later appointed Mueller).
Flynn was NOT obligated to allow an FBI interview at all, and could legitimately have argued that he was entitled to executive privilege. Of course, the MSM were out to get Trump from the outset, and no doubt coordinated their story with Comey and Mueller.
@JakeAnon , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 5:57 pm GMTBuchanan's latest article, Is Flynn's Defection a Death Blow? , asks Why Why Why did Flynn lie to the FBI.
He committed the Martha Stewart offense. An ankle monitor is not that big a deal; Martha's still baking cupcakes in recycled soda cans and selling overpriced stuff.
So maybe Flynn is actually a patriot, and fell on a rubber sword on purpose, in order to expose the Israel connection that he perceived as getting out of hand??
One can dream.
Nothing new. Israel was meddling in the US political system even before it was created. But the deep state will summarily reject the truth and keep pushing its fairy tale about "evil Russia": after all, Israel is not a suitable bogeyman to justify totally insane "defense" budget, which now exceeds the sum total of defense budgets of the rest of the world. Russia, like the USSR before it, is used to justify shameless feeding frenzy of Pentagon contractors. They are destroying the US more effectively than any enemy could, but their greed blinds them to the fact.CanSpeccy , Website December 5, 2017 at 6:21 pm GMT@Eagle EyeAnon , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 6:34 pm GMTFlynn was NOT obligated to allow an FBI interview at all, and could legitimately have argued that he was entitled to executive privilege.
So by agreeing to an FBI interview, was Flynn setting up the swamp dwellers? For example, to demonstrate, in due course, that he was compelled to lie to protect national security from a lawless and out of control FBI.
@LondonBobAnon , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 6:56 pm GMTThe former US Secretary of Defense William J. Perry:
"When the Cold War ended, I believed that we no longer had to take that risk [nuclear annihilation] During my period as the Secretary of Defense in the 90s, I oversaw the dismantlement of 8,000 nuclear weapons evenly divided between the United States and the former Soviet Union. And I thought then that we were well on our way to putting behind us this deadly existential threat, But that was not to be. Today, inexplicably to me, we're recreating the geopolitical hostility of the Cold War, and we're rebuilding the nuclear dangers. We are doing this without any serious public discussion or any real understanding of the consequences of these actions. We are sleepwalking into a new Cold War, and there's very real danger that we will blunder into a nuclear war." http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-12-03/former-us-defense-secretary-explains-why-nuclear-holocaust-now-likelyPaul Craig Roberts (the former US Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy): https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2017/12/05/walking-into-armageddon/
"The power of the military/security complex and the Israel Lobby, the two prime war-mongers of the 21st century, have immobilized the President of the United States. The real reason that the military/security complex is after Gen. Flynn is that he is the former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency and he said on a TV news show that the decision by the Obama regime to send ISIS to overthrow Syria was a "willful decision" that went against his recommendation . In other words, Flynn let the cat out of the bag that ISIS was not an independently formed organization but a tool of US policy. Private interests and agendas have control over the US government. Washington works by selling legislation to the interest groups in exchange for campaign contributions. The private interests that provide the money that elects politiicans get the laws that they want."@Michael KennyAnon , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 7:06 pm GMT"Panic." Yes – the panic is palpable in the Israelis'/Lobby' words and deeds in relation to Syria's sovereignty. The ziocon's mad irritation with the end of slaughter in Syria deprives them of reason. Thence the visceral, irrational, overwhelming hatred of Russians by the moral midgets that profess "Israel first." The supremacist fools would initiate a nuclear conflict to prevail in a fight with their Arab cousins. Could not you just leave the western civilization alone?
"The power of the military/security complex and the Israel Lobby, the two prime war-mongers of the 21st century" – so true! We are witnessing the end of your profitable "eternal victimhood."
@ShermanEagle Eye , December 5, 2017 at 7:29 pm GMTAnd look where Kushner's "competence" has taken the investigation into Russiagate . Amazing, indeed.
Also, what could be more valuable for Israel (the only theocratic apartheid "democracy" in the Middle East) than the sweet and devoted friendship with the so upright and moral Saudis! And none other than the aspiring Jared has procured this special friendship. Jared is really good at clearing the fog of Israeli "democratic" morals.@CanSpeccyBeckow , December 5, 2017 at 7:43 pm GMTSo by agreeing to an FBI interview, was Flynn setting up the swamp dwellers?
Not impossible but this sounds like too much 4D chess. Also, the public exposure of Flynn is immediate and harmful, whereas any gain against the Deep State is deferred and speculative.
@CanSpeccyrenfro , December 5, 2017 at 7:50 pm GMTLet's imagine this story if it happened in a different country:
An opposition leader wins a close election after a government uses all its power and media control to elect a selected successor. During the transition, the state police investigates the members of the incoming administration and puts them under surveillance. Street mobs that support the previous government are unleashed on the streets to intimidate the elected president and his supporters. After the opposition is sworn in, the old-regime loyalists immediately start investigating them and threaten them with removal from office.
Media who supported the previous administration goes on a hysterical witch-hunt. A special committee is formed to investigate the incoming president and any people connected to him. Eventually people are charged with talking to ' foreigners ' and ' lying ' about it when interrogated by the state police. The losing candidate openly disparages the legitimacy of the elected president. Media cheers it on and constantly predicts how very soon the interloper who somehow managed to win the elections will be removed.
If this happened in a different country, Washington would now be talking sanctions or worse.
@RurikAnon , Disclaimer December 5, 2017 at 8:37 pm GMTKennedy was the only president to go after Israel and the Jews US Fifth Column.
In addition to demanding Israel open their nuke facilities for inspection his adm and AG supported the 1963 Fulbright Senate hearings on the ZOA and its Jews in the US. The ZOA then became AIPAC under Johnson.That's why they killed him.
DOJ orders the AZC to Register as a Foreign Agent
"Attached hereto is the entire file relating to the American Zionist Council and our efforts to obtain its registration under the terms of the Foreign Agents Registration Act "
Documents
In the early 1960′s Israel funneled $5 million (more than $35 million in today's dollars) into US propaganda and lobbying operations. The funds were channeled via the quasi governmental Jewish Agency's New York office into an Israel lobby umbrella group, the American Zionist Council. Senate Foreign Relations Committee investigations and hearings documented funding flows, propaganda, and public relations efforts and put them into the record. But the true fate of the American Zionist Council was never known, except that its major functions were visibly shut down and shifted over to a former AZC unit known as the "Kenen Committee," called the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (or AIPAC) in the late 1960′s. The following chronology provides links to images of original Department of Justice case files released on June 10, 2008 under a Freedom of Information Act filing.
John F. Kennedy President, Robert F. Kennedy Attorney General
Document/File Date Contents
08/27/1962 AZC internal memo – Lenore Karp to Rabbi Jerome Unger about AZC Department of Public Information literature distribution.
Undated 1962-1963 AZC Public Relations Plan summary
10/31/1962 Assistant Attorney General and Director of the Internal Security Division J. Walter Yeagley notifies Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy " we are soliciting next week the registration of the American Zionist Council under the Foreign Agents Registration Act You may be aware that the American Zionist Council is composed of representatives of the various Zionist organizations in the United States including the Zionist Organization of America."
11/06/1962 Nathan B. Lenvin, head of the FARA section, memo to central files, about a meeting with Jewish Agency representative Maurice M. Boukstein who asks about FARA applicability to AZC. " in his view it was doubtful that any great protest would be made since in the discussions he has had with various officials connected both with the Zionist Council and the Jewish Agency he had made it clear in his view an agency relationship would result which may require registration.'"
11/14/1962 Edwin Guthman letter to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach about future AZC FARA registration order. "I doubt very much there will be any fuss. I don't think the American Zionist Council is in any position to do so the Council has compromised its position." OK'd by Robert F. Kennedy.
11/21/1962 DOJ orders AZC to register under FARA " receipt of such funds from the American Section of the Jewish Agency for Israel constitutes the Council an agent of a foreign principal the Council's registration is requested."
12/06/1962 AZC President Rabbi Irving Miller response to DOJ "The request for registration contained in your letter raises many questions of fact and of relationships which first must be resolved by us before compliance can be made. Therefore, it is requested that you be good enough to grant us a delay of 120 days "
01/02/1963
Archive Isaiah L. Kenen incorporates the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in Washington, DC
01/24/1963
DOJ draft file memo about 01/23/1963 DOJ meeting with AZC head legal counsel Simon H. Rifkind " he had advised his client to discontinue completely the agency relationship and cut off the receipt of any additional funds Mr. Lenvin pointed out specifically that the termination of the 'activities' on the part of AZC did not absolve it of its obligation to register "01/25/1963 Article in the National Jewish Post, filed in FARA Section – "AZC Gives Up $ to Avoid Foreign Agent Registration"
02/01/1963 DOJ Executive Assistant Thomas Hall memo to Nathan Lenvin updating meeting notes "Mr. Hall emphasized that a contrary conclusion would not of course be reached during the course of this meeting and suggested that the subject submit a detailed argument as to why it was of the opinion it should not be required to register ."
02/08/1963 DOJ AZC January 23, 1963 meeting notes by Nathan Lenvin filed "discontinuance of receipt of such funds thus terminating the agency relationship did not absolve the Council of its obligation to register."
02/19/1963 American Council for Judaism (AJC) newsletter. "The American Zionist Council (coordinating political action arm of all U.S. Zionist organizations) was asked last month by the Justice Department to register as a 'foreign agent' of the State of Israel."
03/07/1963 New York Times reporter Tony Lewis calls FARA section to verify AZC foreign agent order state AJC press release.
3/23/1963 AZC Counsel "Memorandum of Law in support of our position that the American Zionist Council is not required to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938."
04/01/1963 Nathan Lenvin file memo of DOJ AZC meeting on April 1, 1963- AZC Memorandum of Law rejected. " if necessary I would be willing to recommend, if the representatives of the Council insisted upon these points, that the matter be litigated."continued
@Talhanickels , December 5, 2017 at 9:51 pm GMTOkay, makes more sense.
As far as tech goes Google (Brin at least) and Facebook were significantly Jewish at starting; Amazon is heavily reliant on investment capital and probably a significant portion of the early developers were Jewish; they were well represented in the 90s tech scene. Also the relationship between computing and finance, plus the emigration of Soviet Jews, was probably a factor.
@Cloak And Daggerlavoisier , Website December 5, 2017 at 10:47 pm GMTHonestly, impeachment would be a good thing, because it would throw the US into such chaos that it might be less able to wreak death and destruction around the world.
It also would finally lift the scales off the Trumpees eyes and make it clear that the whole thing is rotten to the core."Russiagate Becomes Israelgate."Cyrano , December 5, 2017 at 11:00 pm GMTCorrection: Russiagate was ALWAYS Israelgate.
This site is full of Jewish conspiracy theorists. I am not one of them. The only Jewish "conspiracy" that I have ever been able to detect is that they "conspire" to be successful. As opposed to the rest of us, I guess – who conspire to be failures in life. Jews are opportunists, they take advantage of the rules that the stupid gentiles make. And good on them, they have shown remarkable skills doing that.Anon , Disclaimer December 6, 2017 at 12:26 am GMTIn the middle ages when the only way to be rich was to own a land, European countries forbade the Jews from owning land. Then when the center of economic activity switched to the cities – guess who was the best positioned to take full advantage of the situation – the Jews. They became merchants, lawyers, bankers and so on.
I guess the stupid Europeans should have foreseen this development and as soon as the cities became centers of wealth and economic activity – they should have gone Pol Pot on the Jews – banish them to the countryside to do some farming there. So stop bitching about the current situation in the US, it's not fault of the Jews, they are just taking advantage of the stupidity of the US gentile elites.
Too many commenters cloud the issue by equating every Jew with a Zionist. This is just as wrong as counting every German as a Nazi. Many Jews are appalled by the aggressiveness of Israel and apartheid it practices.CanSpeccy , Website December 6, 2017 at 12:44 am GMT@BeckowCanSpeccy , Website December 6, 2017 at 12:54 am GMTAgreed. The Lib-Dems and their corpo/media/Follywood allies are attempting to destroy the legitimacy of an elected president by means of fake news, fake indignation and fake charges of treason.
But Trump surely has deep state allies as well as opponents, and thus will have been aware before the inauguration of what he could expect, and would therefore likely have set traps for the opposition.
The fact that the Mueller probe is losing all credibility suggests that the opposition may yet come off worse than the President.
@renfroI suggest everyone who is fed up with Trump's Israel First betrayal of the US let him know .
Is Trump an Israel Firster, or simply a friend of Israel. Trump ran a nationalistic election campaign and appears to be following through on his commitment to restoring the border, restricting Muslim immigration, etc. Such policies are exactly in line with those of Israel. So why would Trump not be pro-Israel? And in fact, the stronger Israel becomes, the less the US need aid Israel or tolerate American Israeli firsters.
The real issue is not Zionist influence in America but globalist influence in America. Is Trump pursuing a globalist agenda that will destroy America as a coherent nation state, or does he reject the Obama/Clinton project for the submergence of the American nation by a flood of settlers with a contempt for Americans, especially white, Chrisitan Americans.
Sep 14, 2015 | The Guardian
The waning clout stems from the lobby siding with the revanchist Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, whose Iran strategy since the 2012 US presidential campaign has been to unabashedly side with Republican hawks. AIPAC's alignment with the position effectively caused the group to marginalize itself; the GOP is now the only place where AIPAC can today find lockstep support. The tens of millions AIPAC spent lobbying against the deal were unable to obscure this dynamic.
We may not look back at this as a sea change – some Senate Democrats who held firm against opposition to the deal are working with AIPAC to pass subsequent legislation that contains poison pills designed to kill it – but rather as a rising tide eroding the once sturdy bipartisan pro-Israeli government consensus on Capitol Hill. Some relationships have been frayed; previously stalwart allies of the Israel's interests, such as Vice President Joe Biden, have reportedly said the Iran deal fight soured them on AIPAC.
Even with the boundaries of its abilities on display, however, AIPAC will continue its efforts. "We urge those who have blocked a vote today to reconsider," the group said in a spin-heavy statement casting a pretty objective defeat as victory with the headline, "Bipartisan Senate Majority Rejects Iran Nuclear Deal." The group's allies in the Senate Republican Party have already promised to rehash the procedural vote next week, and its lobbyists are still rallying for support in the House. But the Senate's refusal to halt US support for the deal means that Senate Democrats are unlikely to reconsider, especially after witnessing Thursday's Republican hijinx in the House. These ploys look like little more than efforts to embarrass Obama into needing to cast a veto.
If Republicans' rhetoric leading up to to their flop in the Senate – Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina took to the floor during the debate and pulled out an old trick from the run-up to the Iraq war: blaming Iran for 9/11 and saying a failure to act would result in a worse attack – is any indication, even Democrats like the pro-Israel hawk Chuck Schumer will find it untenable to sidle up to AIPAC and the Republicans.
Opponents of the deal want to say the Democrats played politics instead of evaluating the deal honestly. That charge is ironic, to say the least, since most experts agree the nuclear deal is sound and the best agreement diplomacy could achieve. But there were politics at play: rather than siding with Obama, Congressional Democrats lined up against the Republican/Netanyahu alliance. The adamance of AIPAC ended up working against its stated interests.
Groups like AIPAC will go on touting their bipartisan bona fides without considering that their adoption of Netanyahu's own partisanship doomed them to a partisan result. Meanwhile, the ensuing fight, which will no doubt bring more of the legislative chaos we saw this week, won't be a cakewalk, so to speak, but will put the lie to AIPAC's claims it has a bipartisan consensus behind it. Despite their best efforts, Obama won't be the one embarrassed by the scrambling on the horizon.
TiredOldDog 13 Sep 2015 21:47a foreign country whose still hell bent on committing war crimes
I guess this may mean Israel. If it does, how about we compare Assad's Syria, Iran and Israel. How many war crimes per day in the last 4 years and, maybe, some forecasts. Otherwise it's the usual gratuitous use of bad words at Israel. It has a purpose. To denigrate and dehumanize Israel or, at least, Zionism.
ID7612455 13 Sep 2015 18:04
The problem with the right in the USA is that they offer no alternatives, nothing, nada and zilch they have become the opposition party of opposition. They rely on talking point memes and fear, and it has become the party of extremism and simplicity offering low hanging fruit and red meat this was on perfect display at their anti Iran deal rally, palin, trump, beck and phil robinson who commands ducks apparently.
winemaster2 13 Sep 2015 17:01
Put a Brush Mustache on the control freak, greed creed, Nentanhayu the SOB not only looks like but has the same mentality as Hitler and his Nazism crap.
Martin Hutton -> mantishrimp 12 Sep 2015 23:50
I wondered when someone was going to bring up that "forgotten" fact. Is it any wonder the Iranians don't trust the US. After the US's spying exploits during the Iraqi WMD inspections, why are you surprised that Iran asks for 24 days notice of inspection (enough time to clear out conventional weapons development but not enough to remove evidence of nuclear weapons development).
mantishrimp 12 Sep 2015 20:51
Most Americans don't know the CIA overthrew the Iranian government in 1953 and installed the Shaw. Most Republicans know that most Americans will believe what Fox news tells them. Republicans live in an alternate universe where there is no climate change, mammon is worshiped and wisdom is rejected hatred is accepted negotiation is replaced by perpetual warfare. Now most Americans are tired of stupid leadership and the Republicans are in big trouble.
ByThePeople -> Sieggy 12 Sep 2015 20:27
Is pitiful how for months and months, certain individuals blathered on and on and on when it was fairly clear from the get go that this was a done deal and no one was about cater to the war criminal. I suppose it was good for them, sucking every last dime they could out of the AICPA & Co. while they acted like there was 'a chance'. Nope, only chance is that at the end of the day, a politician is a politician and he'll suck you dry as long as you let 'em.
What a pleasure it is to see the United States Congress finally not pimp themselves out completely to a foreign country whose still hell bent on committing war crimes. A once off I suppose, but it's one small step for Americans.
ByThePeople 12 Sep 2015 20:15
AIPAC - Eventually everything is seen for what is truly is.
ambushinthenight -> Greg Zeglen 12 Sep 2015 18:18
Seems that it makes a lot of sense to most everyone else in the world, it is now at the point where it really makes no difference whether the U.S. ratifies the deal or not. Israel is opposed because they wish to maintain their nuclear weapons monopoly in the region. Politicians here object for one of two reasons. They are Israeli first and foremost not American or for political expediency and a chance to try undo another of this President's achievements. Been a futile effort so far I'd say.
hello1678 -> BrianGriffin 12 Sep 2015 16:42
With the threat you describe from Israel it seems only sensible for Iran to develop nuclear weapons - if my was country (Scotland) was in Iran's place and what you said is true i would only support politicians who promised fast and large scale production of atomic weapons to counter the clear threat to my nation.
nardone -> Bruce Bahmani 12 Sep 2015 14:12
Netanyahu loves to play the victim, but he is the primary cause that Jews worldwide, but especially in the United States, are rethinking the idea of "Israel." I know very few people who willingly identify with a strident right wing government comprised of rabid nationalists, religious fundamentalists, and a violent, almost apocalyptic settler community.
The Israeli electorate has indicated which path it wishes to travel, but that does not obligate Jews throughout the world to support a government whose policies they find odious.
Greg Zeglen -> Glenn Gang 12 Sep 2015 13:51
good point which is found almost nowhere else...it is still necessary to understand that the whole line of diplomacy regarding the west on the part of Iran has been for generations one of deceit...and people are intensely jealous of what they hold dear - especially safety and liberty with in their country....
EarthyByNature -> Bruce Bahmani 12 Sep 2015 13:45
I do trust your on salary with a decent benefits package with the Israeli government or one of it's slavish US lobbyists. Let's face it, got to be hard work pouring out such hateful drivel.
BrianGriffin -> imipak 12 Sep 2015 12:53
The USA took about six years to build a bomb from scratch. The UK took almost six years to build a bomb. Russia was able to build a bomb in only four years (1945-1949). France took four years to build a bomb. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction
The Chinese only took four years. http://www.china.org.cn/english/congress/228244.htm
steelhead 12 Sep 2015 12:48
As part of this deal the US and allies should guarantee Iran protection against Israeli aggression. Otherwise, considering Israel's threats, Iran is well justified in seeking a nuclear deterrent.
BrianGriffin -> HauptmannGurski 12 Sep 2015 12:35
"Europe needs business desperately."
Sieggy 12 Sep 2015 12:32
In other words, once again, Obama out-played and out-thought both the GOP and AIPAC. He was playing multidimensional chess while they were playing checkers. The democrats kept their party discipline while the republicans ran around like a schoolyard full of sugared-up children. This is what happens when you have grownups competing with adolescents. The republican party, to put it very bluntly, can't get it together long enough to whistle 'Yankee Doodle Dandy' in unison.
They lost. Again. And worse than being losers, they're sore, whining, sniveling, blubbering losers. Even when they've been spanked - hard - they swear it's not over and they're gonna get even, just you wait and see! Get over it. They lost - badly - and the simple fact that their party is coming apart at the seams before our very eyes means they're going to be losing a lot more, too.
AIPAC's defeat shows that their grip on the testicles of congress has been broken. All the way around, a glorious victory for Obama, and an ignominious defeat for the republicans. And most especially, Israel. Their primary goal was to keep Iran isolated and economically weak. They knew full well that the Iranians hadn't had a nuclear program since 2003, but Netanhayu needed an existential threat to Israel in order to justify his grip on power. All of this charade has bee at the instigation of and directed by Israel. And they lost They were beaten by that hated schwartze and the liberals that Israel normally counts on for unthinking support.
Their worst loss, however, was losing the support of the American jews. Older, orthodox jews are Israel-firsters. The younger, less observant jews are Americans first. Netanhayu's behavior has driven a wedge between the US and Israel that is only going to deepen over time. And on top of that, Iran is re-entering the community of nations, and soon their economy will dominate the region. Bibi overplayed his hand very, very stupidly, and the real price that Israel will pay for his bungling will unfold over the next few decades.
BrianGriffin -> TiredOldDog 12 Sep 2015 12:18
"The Constitution provides that the president 'shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators present concur'"
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Treaties.htm
Hardly a done deal. If Obama releases funds to Iran he probably would be committing an impeachable crime under US law. Even many Democrats would vote to impeach Obama for providing billions to a sworn enemy of Israel.
Glenn Gang -> Bruce Bahmani 12 Sep 2015 12:07
"...institutionally Iranclad(sic) HATRED towards the west..." Since you like all-caps so much, try this: "B.S."
The American propel(sic) actually figured out something else---that hardline haters like yourself are desperate to keep the cycle of Islamophobic mistrust and suspicion alive, and blind themselves to the fact that the rest of us have left you behind.
FACT: More than half of the population of Iran today was NOT EVEN BORN when radical students captured the U.S. Embassy in Teheran in 1979.
People like you, Bruce, conveniently ignore the fact that Ahmedinejad and his hardline followers were voted out of power in 2013, and that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei further marginalized them by allowing the election of new President Hassan Rouhani to stand, though he was and is an outspoken reformer advocating rapprochement with the west. While his outward rhetoric still has stern warnings about anticipated treachery by the 'Great Satan', Khamenei has allowed the Vienna agreement to go forward, and shows no sign of interfering with its implementation.
He is an old man, but he is neither stupid nor senile, and has clearly seen the crippling effects the international sanctions have had on his country and his people. Haters like you, Bruce, will insist that he ALWAYS has evil motives, just as Iranian hardliners (like Ahmedinejad) will ALWAYS believe that the U.S. has sinister motives and cannot EVER be trusted to uphold our end of any agreement. You ascribe HATRED in all caps to Iran, the whole country, while not acknowledging your own simmering hatred.
People like you will always find a 'boogeyman,' someone else to blame for your problems, real or imagined. You should get some help.
beenheretoolong 12 Sep 2015 10:57
No doubt Netanyahu will raise the level of his anger; he just can't accept that a United States president would do anything on which Israel hadn't stamped its imprimatur. It gets tiresome listening to him.
geneob 12 Sep 2015 10:12
It is this deal that feeds the military industrial complex. We've already heard Kerry give Israel and Saudi Arabia assurances of more weapons. And that $150 billion released to Iran? A healthy portion will be spent for arms..American, Russian, Chinese. Most of the commenters have this completely backwards. This deal means a bonanza for the arms industry.
Jack Hughes 12 Sep 2015 08:38
The Iran nuclear agreement accomplishes the US policy goal of preventing the creation of the fissionable material required for an Iranian nuclear weapons program.
What the agreement does not do is eliminate Iran as a regional military and economic power, as the Israelis and Saudis -- who have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to lobby American politicians and brainwash American TV viewers -- would prefer.
To reject the agreement is to accept the status quo, which is unacceptable, leaving an immediate and unprovoked American-led bombing campaign as the only other option.
Rejection equals war. It's not surprising that the same crowd most stridently demanding rejection of the agreement advocated the disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq. These homicidal fools never learn, or don't care as long as it's not their lives at risk.
American politicians opposed to the agreement are serving their short-term partisan political interests and, under America's system of legalized bribery, their Israeli and Saudi paymasters -- not America's long-term policy interests.
ID293404 -> Jeremiah2000 12 Sep 2015 05:01
And how did the Republicans' foreign policy work out? Reagan created and financed Al Qaeda. Then Bush II invades Iraq with promises the Iraqis will welcome us with flowers (!), the war will be over in a few weeks and pay for itself, and the middle east will have a nascent democracy (Iraq) that will be a grateful US ally.
He then has pictures taken of himself in a jet pilot's uniform on a US aircraft carrier with a huge sign saying Mission Accomplished. He attacks Afghanistan to capture Osama, lets him get away, and then attacks Iraq instead, which had nothing to do with 9/11 and no ties with Al Qaeda.
So then we have two interminable wars going on, thanks to brilliant Republican foreign policy, and spend gazillions of dollars while creating a mess that may never be straightened out. Never mind all the friends we won in the middle east and the enhanced reputation of our country through torture, the use of mercenaries, and the deaths and displacement of hundreds of thousands of civilians. Yeah, we really need those bright Republicans running the show over in the Middle East!
HauptmannGurski -> lazman 12 Sep 2015 02:31
That is a very difficult point to understand, just look at this sentence "not understanding the fact in international affairs that to disrespect an American president is to disrespect Americans" ... too much emperor thinking for me. We have this conversation with regard to Putin everywhere now, so we disrespect all 143 million Russians? There's not a lot of disrespect around for Japanese PM Abe and Chinese Xi - does this now mean we respect them and all Japanese and Chinese? Election campaigns create such enormous personality cults that people seem to lose perspective.
On the Iran deal, if the US had dropped out of it it would have caused quite a rift because many countries would have just done what they wanted anyway. The international Atomic Energy Organisation or what it is would have done their inspections. Siemens would have sold medical machines. Countries would grow up as it were. But as cooperation is always better than confrontation it is nice the US have stayed in the agreement that was apparently 10 years in the making. It couldn't have gone on like that. With Europe needing gazillions to finance Greece, Ukraine, and millions of refugees (the next waves will roll on with the next spring and summer from April), Europe needs business desparately. Israel was happy to buy oil through Marc Rich under sanctions, now it's Europe's turn to snatch some business.
imipak -> BrianGriffin 11 Sep 2015 21:56
Iran lacks weapons-grade uranium and the means to produce it. Iran has made no efforts towards nuclear weapons technology for over a decade. Iran is a signatory of the NPT and is entitled to the rights enshrined therein. If Israel launches a nuclear war against Iran over Iran having a medical reactor (needed to produce isotopes for medicine, isotopes America can barely produce enough of for itself) that poses no security threat to anyone, then Israel will have transgressed so many international laws that if it survives the radioactive fallout (unlikely), it won't survive the political fallout.
It is a crime of the highest order to use weapons of mass destruction (although that didn't stop the Israelis using them against Palestinian civilians) and pre-emtive self-defence is why most believe Bush and Blair should be on trial at the ICJ, or (given the severity of their crimes) Nuremberg.
Israel's right to self-defense is questionable, I'm not sure any such right exists for anyone, but even allowing for it, Israel has no right to wage unprovoked war on another nation on the grounds of a potential threat discovered through divination using tea leaves.
imipak -> Jeremiah2000 11 Sep 2015 21:43
Iran's sponsorship of terrorism is of no concern. Such acts do not determine its competency to handle nuclear material at the 5% level (which you can find naturally). There are only three questions that matter - can Iran produce the 90-95% purity needed to build a bomb (no), can Iran produce such purity clandestinely (no), and can Iran use its nuclear technology to threaten Israel (no).
Israel also supports international terrorism, has used chemical weapons against civilians, has directly indulged in terrorism, actually has nuclear weapons and is paranoid enough that it may use them against other nations without cause.
I respect Israel's right to exist and the intelligence of most Israelis. But I neither respect nor tolerate unreasoned fear nor delusions of Godhood.
imipak -> commish 11 Sep 2015 21:33
I've seen Iranian statements playing internal politics, but I have never seen any actual Iranian threats. I've seen plenty about Israel assassinating people in other countries, using incendiaries and chemical weapons against civilians in other countries, conducting illegal kidnappings overseas, using terrorism as a weapon of war, developing nuclear weapons illegally, ethnically cleansing illegally occupied territories, that sort of thing.
Until such time as Israel implements the Oslo Accords, withdraws to its internationally recognized boundary and provides the International Court of Justice a full accounting of state-enacted and state-sponsored terrorism, it gets no claims on sainthood and gets no free rides.
Iran has its own crimes to answer, but directly threatening Israel in words or deeds has not been one of them within this past decade. Its actual crimes are substantial and cannot be ignored, but it is guilty only of those and not fictional works claimed by psychotic paranoid ultra-nationalists.
imipak -> moishe 11 Sep 2015 21:18
Domestic politics. Of no real consequence, it's just a way of controlling a populace through fear and a never-ending pseudo-war. It's how Iran actually feels that is important.
For the last decade, they've backed off any nuclear weapons research and you can't make a bomb with centrifuges that can only manage 20% enriched uranium. You need something like 90% enrichment, which requires centrifuges many, many times more advanced. It'd be hard to smuggle something like that in and the Iranians lack the skills, technology and science to make them.
Iran's conventional forces are busy fighting ISIS. What they do afterwards is a concern, but Israel has a sizable military presence on the Golan Heights. The most likely outcome is for Iran to install puppet regimes (or directly control) Syria and ISIS' caliphate.
I could see those two regions plus Iraq being fully absorbed into Iran, that would make some sense given the new geopolitical situation. But that would tie up Iran for decades. Which would not be a bad thing and America would be better off encouraging it rather than sabre-rattling.
(These are areas that contribute a lot to global warming and political instability elsewhere. Merging the lot and encouraging nuclear energy will do a lot for the planet. The inherent instability of large empires will reduce mischief-making elsewhere to more acceptable levels - they'll be too busy. It's idle hands that you need to be scared of.)
Israelis worry too much. If they spent less time fretting and more time developing, they'd be impervious to any natural or unnatural threat by now. Their teaching of Roman history needs work, but basically Israel has a combined intellect vastly superior to that of any nearby nation.
That matters. If you throw away fear and focus only on problems, you can stop and even defeat armies and empires vastly greater than your own. History is replete with examples, so is the mythologicized history of the Israeli people. Israel's fear is Israel's only threat.
mostfree 11 Sep 2015 21:10
Warmongers on all sides would had loved another round of fear and hysteria. Those dark military industrial complexes on all sides are dissipating in the face of the high rising light of peace for now . Please let it shine.
bishoppeter4 11 Sep 2015 20:09
The rabid Republicans working for a foreign power against the interest of the United States -- US citizens will know just what to do.
Jeremiah2000 -> Carolyn Walas Libbey 11 Sep 2015 19:21
"Netanyahu has no right to dictate what the US does."
But he has every right to point out how Obama is a weak fool. How's Obama's red line working in Syria? How is his toppling of Qadaffi in Libya working? How about his completely inept dealings with Egypt, throwing support behind the Muslim Brotherhood leaders? The leftists cheer Obama's weakening of American influence abroad. But they don't talk much about its replacement with Russian and Chinese influence. Russian build-up in Syria part of secret deal with Iran's Quds Force leader. Obama and Kerry are sending a strongly worded message.
Susan Dechancey -> whateverworks4u 11 Sep 2015 19:05
Incredible to see someone prefer war to diplomacy - guess you are an armchair General not a real one.
Susan Dechancey -> commish 11 Sep 2015 19:04
Except all its neighbours ... not only threatened but entered military conflict and stole land ... murdered Iranian Scientists but apart from that just a kitten
Susan Dechancey -> moishe 11 Sep 2015 19:00
Israel has nukes so why are they afraid ?? Iran will never use nukes against Israel and even Mossad told nuttyyahoo sabre rattling
Susan Dechancey 11 Sep 2015 18:57
Iran is not a made-up country like Iraq it is as old as Greece. If the Iraq war was sold as pushover and failed miserably then an Iran war would be unthinkable. War can be started in an instant diplomacy take time. UK, France, Germany & EU all agree its an acceptable alternative to war. So as these countries hardly ever agree it is clear the deal is a good one.
To be honest the USA can do what it likes now .. UK has set up an embassy - trade missions are landing Tehran from Europe. So if Israel and US congress want war - they will be alone and maybe if US keeps up the Nuttyahoo rhetoric European firms can win contracts to help us pay for the last US regime change Iraq / Isis / Refugees...
lswingly -> commish 11 Sep 2015 16:58
Rank and file Americans don't even know what the Iran deal is. And can't be bothered to actually find out. They just listen to sound bites from politicians the loudest of whom have been the wildly partisan republicans claiming that it gives Iran a green light to a nuclear weapon. Not to mention those "less safe" polls are completely loaded. Certain buzz words will always produce negative results. If you associate something positive "feeling safe" or "in favor of" anything that Iran signs off on it comes across as indirectly supporting Iran and skews the results of the poll. "Iran" has been so strongly associated with evil and negative all you have to do is insert it into a sentence to make people feel negatively about the entire sentence. In order to get true data on the deal you would have to poll people on the individual clauses the deal.
It's no different from how when you run a poll on who's in favor "Obamacare" the results will be majority negative. But if you poll on whether you are in favor of "The Affordable Care Act" most people are in favor of it and if you break it down and poll on the individual planks of "Obamacare" people overwhelming approve of the things that "Obamacare does". The disapproval is based on the fact that Republican's have successfully turned "Obamacare" into a pejorative and has almost no reflection of people feelings on actual policy.
To illustrate how meaningless those poll numbers are a Jewish poll (supposedly the people who have the most to lose if this deal is bad) found that a narrow majority of Jews approve of the deal. You're numbers are essentially meaningless.
The alternative to this plan is essentially war if not now, in the very near future, according to almost all non-partisan policy wonks. Go run a poll on whether we should go to war with Iran and see how that turns out. Last time we destabilized the region we removed a secular dictator who was enemies with Al Queda and created a power vacuum that led to increased religious extremism and the rise of Isis. You want to double down on that strategy?
MadManMark -> whateverworks4u 11 Sep 2015 16:34
You need to reread this article. It's exactly this attitude of yours (and AIPAC and Netanyahu) that this deal is not 100% perfect, but then subsequently failed to suggest ANY way to get something better -- other than war, which I'm sorry most people don't want another Republican "preemptive" war -- caused a lot people originally uncertain about this deal (like me) to conclude there may not be a better alternative. Again, read the article: What you think about me, I now think about deal critics like you ("It seems people will endorse anything to justify their political views.)
USfan 11 Sep 2015 15:34
American Jews are facing one of the most interesting choices of recent US history. The Republican Party, which is pissing into a stiff wind of unfavorable demographics, seems to have decided it can even the playing field by peeling Jews away from the Democrats with promises to do whatever Israel wants. So we have the very strange (but quite real) prospect of Jews increasingly throwing in their lot with the party of Christian extremists whose ranks also include violent antiSemites.
Interesting times. We'll see how this plays out. My family is Jewish and I have not been shy in telling them that alliances with the GOP for short-term gains for Israel is not a wise policy. The GOP establishment are not antiSemtic but the base often is, and if Trump's candidacy shows anything it's that the base is in control of the Republicans.
But we'll see.
niyiakinlabu 11 Sep 2015 15:29
Central question: how come nobody talks about Israel's nukes?
hello1678 -> BrianGriffin 11 Sep 2015 14:02
Iran will not accept being forced into dependence on outside powers. We may dislike their government but they have as much right as anyone else to enrich their own fuel.
JackHep 11 Sep 2015 13:30
Netanyahu is an example of all that is bad about the Israeli political, hence military industrial, establishment. Why Cameron's government allowed him on British soil is beyond belief. Surely the PM's treatment of other "hate preachers" would not have been lost on Netanyahu? Sadly our PM seems to miss the point with Israel.
talenttruth 11 Sep 2015 13:12
The American Warmonger Establishment (that now fully entrenched "Military Industrial Complex" against which no more keen observer than President Dwight Eisenhower warned us), is rip-shit over the Iran Agreement. WHAT? We can't Do More War? That will be terrible for further increasing our obscene 1-percent wealth. Let's side with Israeli wingnut Netanyahu, who cynically leverages "an eye for an eye for an eye for an eye" to hold his "Power."
And let's be treasonous against the United States by trying to undermine U.S. Foreign Policy FOR OUR OWN PROFIT. We are LONG overdue for serious jail time for these sociopaths, who already have our country "brainwashed" into 53% of our budget going to the War Profiteers and to pretending to be a 19th century Neo-Colonial Power -- in an Endless State of Eternal War. These people are INSANE. Time to simply say so.
Boredwiththeusa 11 Sep 2015 12:58
At the rally to end the Iran deal in the Capitol on Wednesday, one of the AIPAC worshipping attendees had this to say to Jim Newell of Slate:
""Obama is a black, Jew-hating, jihadist putting America and Israel and the rest of the planet in grave danger," said Bob Kunst of Miami. Kunst-pairing a Hillary Clinton rubber mask with a blue T-shirt reading "INFIDEL"-was holding one sign that accused Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry of "Fulfilling Hitler's Dreams" and another that queried, "DIDN'T WE LEARN ANYTHING FROM 1938?"
His only reassurance was that, when Iran launches its attack on the mainland, it'll be stopped quickly by America's heavily armed citizenry."
That is indicative of the mindset of those opposed to the agreement.
Boredwiththeusa 11 Sep 2015 12:47
AIPAC is a dangerous anti-american organization, and a real and extant threat to the sovereignty of the U.S. Any elected official acting in concert with AIPAC is colluding with a foreign government to harm the U.S. and should be considered treasonous and an enemy of the American people.
tunejunky 11 Sep 2015 12:47
AIPAC, its constituent republicans, and the government of Israel all made the same mistake in a common episode of hubris. by not understanding the American public, war, and without the deference shown from a proxy to its hegemon, Israel's right wing has flown the Israeli cause into a wall. not understanding the fact in international affairs that to disrespect an American president is to disrespect Americans, the Israeli government acted as a spoiled first-born - while to American eyes it was a greedy, ungrateful ward foisted upon barely willing hands. it presumed far too much and is receiving the much deserved rebuke.
impartial12 11 Sep 2015 12:37
This deal is the best thing that happened in the region in a while. We tried war and death. It didn't work out. Why not try this?
Jan 16, 2015 | The Guardian
Patriotic group formed to defend Russia against pro-democracy protesters by Shaun Walker
The group, which calls itself anti-Maidan, said on Thursday it would fight any attempts to bring Russians on to the streets to protest against the government. Its name is a reference to the Maidan protests in Kiev last year that eventually led to the toppling of former Ukraine president Viktor Yanukovych.
"All street movements and colour revolutions lead to blood. Women, children and old people suffer first," said Dmitry Sablin, previously a long-standing MP from President Vladimir Putin's United Russia party, who recently became a senator in Russia's upper house of parliament.
"It is not acceptable for the minority to force its will upon the majority, as happened in Ukraine," he added. "Under the slogan of fighting for democracy there is instead total fear, total propaganda, and no freedom."
jgbg -> RunLukeRun, 16 Jan 2015 06:36BINGO....well done. You've got Neo Nazi's, US Aid, CIA infiltrators, indiscriminate slaughter and Nazi battalions....all in just 8 sentences. great job
I guess these are exactly the sort of people who will enrich the EU:
Nazis on the march in Kiev this month
Would you like to claim that the Azov and Aidar battalions aren't a bunch of Nazis?
Here's a Guardian article about Azov.
The State Department funding of NGOs in Ukraine "promoting the right kind of democracy" to the tune of $5 billion is a matter of record, courtesy of "Fuck the EU" Nuland.
As for CIA involvement, the director of the CIA has visited Ukraine at least twice in 2014 - once under a false identity. If the head of the equivalent Russian organisation had made similar visits, that would be a problem, no?
TuleCarbonari -> garethgj 16 Jan 2015 06:21
Yes, he should leave Syria to paid mercenaries. Do you really want us to believe you still don't know those fighters in Syria are George Soros' militias? Come on man, go get yourself informed.
jgbg -> Strummered 16 Jan 2015 06:19
You can't campaign for greater democracy, it's dangerous, it's far too democratic.
The USA cannot pay people to campaign in Russia to have the right kind of democracy i.e. someone acceptable to the US government at the helm.
Instead of funding anti-government NGOs in other countries, perhaps the USA should first spend the money fixing the huge inequalities and other problems in their own country.
jgbg -> Glenn J. Hill 16 Jan 2015 06:12
What???? Have you been smoking?? Sorry but your Putin Thugs are NOT funded by my country.
I think he is referring the the NGOs which have spent large sums of money on "promoting democracy" in Georgia and Ukraine. Many of these are funded by the National Endowment for Democracy and the US State Department. Some have funding from organisations which are in turn, funded by George Soros. These organisations were seen to back the Rose Revolution in Georgia and both revolutions in Ukraine. Georgia ended up with a president who worked as a lawyer in a US firm linked to the right wing of the Republican Party. Ukraine has a prime minister who was brought up in the USA and a president whom a US ambassador to Ukraine described as "our insider" (in a US Embassy cable leaked by Wikileaks).
The funding of similar organisations in Russia (e.g. Soldiers' Mothers) has been exposed since a law was brought in, requiring foreign funded NGOs to register and publish annual accounts.
Just because some Russians are paranoid about US interference, that doesn't mean they are wrong.
Anette Mor -> Hektor Uranga 16 Jan 2015 06:09
He was let out to form a party and take part in Moscow mayor election. He got respectable 20%. But shown no platform other than anti- corruption. There is anti-corruption hysteria in Russia already. People asked for positive agenda. He got none. The party base disintegrated. The court against him was because there was a case filed. I can agree the state might found this timely. But we cannot blaim on Russian state absence of positive position in Navalny him self. He is reactive on current issues but got zero vision. Russia is a merit based society. They look for brilliance in the leader. He is just a different caliber. Can contribute but not lead. His best way is to choose a district and stand for a parliament seat. The state already shown his is welcomed to enter big politics. Just need to stop lookibg to abroad for scripts. The list of names for US sanction was taking from his and his mates lists. After such exposure he lost any groups with many Russians.
Anette Mor -> notoriousANDinfamous 16 Jan 2015 05:50
I do not disregard positive side of democracy or negative side of dictatorship. I just offer a different scale. Put value of every human life above any ideology. The west is full of aggressive radicals from animal activists and greens to extremist gays and atheists. There is a need to downgrade some concepts and upgrade other, so yhe measures are universal. Bombing for democracy is equaly bad as bombing for personal power.
Anette Mor -> gilstra 16 Jan 2015 05:41
This is really not Guardian problem. They got every right to choose anti-Russian rant as the main topic. The problem is the balance. Nobody watching it and the media as a whole distorting the picture. Double standards are not good too. RT to stay permitted in the UK was told to interrupt every person they interview expressing directly opposite view. Might be OK with some theoretical conversation. But how you going to interrupt mother who just most a child by argument in favor of the killer? The regulator said BBC is out of their reach. But guardian should not be. Yet every material is one sided.
Asimpleguest -> romans
International Observer
''The New Ukraine Is Run by Rogues, Sexpots, Warlords, Lunatics and Oligarchs''
PeraIlic
"Decisions should be made in Moscow and not in Washington or Brussels," said Nikolai Starikov, a nationalist writer and marginal politician.
Never mind that he's marginal politician. This man really knows how to express himself briefly:
An Interview with Popular Russian Author and Politician Nikolai Starikov
Those defending NATO expansion say that those countries wanted to be part of NATO.
Okay. But Cuba also wanted to house Soviet missiles voluntarily.
If America did not object to Russian missiles in Cuba, would you support Ukraine joining NATO?That would be a great trust-building measure on their part, and Russia would feel that America is a friend.
imperfetto
This article contains unacceptable, apparently carefully wrapped up, distorsions of what is happening in Russia. A piece of journalism which tell us something about the level of propaganda that most mainstream media in our 'free' west have set up in the attempt to organise yet another coup, this time under the thick walls of the Kremlin. This newspaper seem to pursue this goal, as it shows to have taken sides: stand by NATO and of course the British interests. If this implies misguiding the readers on what is taking place in Russia\Ukraine or elsewhere (Syria for example) well...that's too bad, the answer would be. Goals justify the means...so forget about honesty, fair play and truthfullness. If it needs to be a war (we have decided so, because it is convenient) then... lies are not lies...but clever tools that we are allowed to use in order to destroy our enemy.
The patriots are most probably a neurotic sort of reaction to what most Russians now perceive to be an attempt from NSA, CIA..and more in general of the US/EU geo-political strategies (much more of the US, of course, as the EU and Britain simply follow the instructions) to dismantle the present Russian system (the political establishment first and then the ARMY).
The idea is to create an internal turmoil through some pretexts (gay, feminism, scandals...etc.) in the hope that a growing movement of protesters may finally shake up the 'palace' and foster the conditions for a coupe to take place. Then the right people will occupy the key chairs. Who are these subdued figures to be? They would be corrupted oligarchs, allowing the US to guide, control the Russian public life (haven't we noticed that three important ministers in Kiev are AMERICAN citizens!)
But, from what I understand, Russia is a democratic country. Its leader has been elected by the voters. Contrary to what is happening here in the west (where all media seem to the have joined the club of the one-way-thinking against Russia), some important media of that country do have a chance to criticize Putin and his policies. That's right, in a democratic republic. But, instead, the attempt to enact another Maidan, that is a FASCIST assault to the DUMA, would require a due response.
Thus, perhaps we could without any Patriots of the sort, that may feed the pernicious attention of western media. There should merely be the enforcement of the law:
a minority can express their opinion, as long as they do not attempt to overthrow the parliament, which is an expression of Russian people.
VladimirM
"The 'orange beast' is sharpening its teeth and looking to Russia," said The Surgeon, whose real name is Alexander Zaldostanov.
Actually, he used a Russian word "зверек", not "зверь". The latter can be rendered as "beast" but what he said was closer to "rodent", a small animal. So, using this word he just stressed his contemptious attitude rather than a degree of threat.
Kondratiev
There is at least anecdotal evidence that Maiden protestors were paid - see: http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-and-eu-are-paying-ukrainian-rioters-and-protesters/5369316 .
Bosula
These patriotic groups do seem extreme, but probably less extreme and odd than many of the current Ukrainian crop of politicians. Here is an article from the New York Observer that will get you up to speed....
The New York Observer:The New Ukraine Is Run by Rogues, Sexpots, Warlords, Lunatics and Oligarchs
Robert Sandlin -> GreenKnighht
Did you forget the people in charge of the Ukraine then were Ukrainian communists.That many of the deaths were also ethnic Russian-Ukrainians.And the ones making policy in the USSR as a whole,in that period were mostly not ethnic-Russians.The leader was Georgian,his secret police chief and many of their enforcers were Jewish-Soviets.And his closest helpers were also mostly non-ethnic Russians.Recruited from all the important ethnic groups in the USSR,including many Ukrainians.It is a canard of the Wests to blame Russia for the famine that also killed many Russians.I'm sick of hearing the bs from the West over that tragic time trying to stir Russophobia.
seventh
Well, you know a government is seriously in the shit when it has to employ biker gangs to defend it.
Robert Sandlin -> seventh
Really? The government doesn't employ them. Defending the government is the job of the police and military. These civilian volunteers are only helping to show traitors in the pay of Westerners that the common people won't tolerate treason like happened in Ukraine, to strike Russia.Good for them,that should let potential 5th columnists know their bs isn't wanted in Russia.
Bulagen
I watch here in full swing manipulation of public opinion of Europeans, who imagines that they have "democracy" and "freedom of speech". All opinions, alternative General line, aimed at all discredit Russia in the eyes of the population of Europe ruthlessly removed the wording that Putin bots hinder communication "civilized public." And I am even more convinced that all this hysteria about "the problems of democracy in Russia" is nothing more than an attempt to sell Denyen horse (the so-called democratic values) to modern Trojans (Russians).
jezzam -> Bulagen
All the wealthiest, healthiest and happiest societies adhere to "so-called democratic values". They would also greatly benefit the Russian people. Putin opposes these values purely because they would threaten his power.
sashasmirnoff -> jezzam
The "wealthiest, healthiest and happiest societies"? That is description of whom?
I will generalize here - if by those you mean the "West" you are mistaken. The vast majority of it's populace are carrying a huge burden of personal debt - it is the bank that owns their houses and new autos. There is a tiny stratum that indeed is wildly wealthy, frequently referred to as the 1%, but in fact is much less numerous.
The West is generally regarded as being the least healthy society, largely due to horrifying diet, sedentary lifestyle, and considerable stress due to (amongst other things) the aforementioned struggle to not drown in huge personal debt.
I'm not certain as to how you qualify or quantify "happiness", but the West is also experiencing a mental health crisis, manifested in aberrant behaviour, wild consumption of pharmaceuticals to treat or drown out depression, suicide, high rates of incarceration etc. All symptoms of a deeply unhappy and unhealthy society.
One more thing - the supposed wealth and happiness of the West is predicated on the poverty and misery of those the West colonizes and exploits. The last thing on Earth the West would like to see is the extension of "democratic values" to those unfortunates. That would totally ruin the World Order.
Robert Sandlin -> kawarthan
Well the Ukrainians have the corner on Black and Brown shirts.So those colors are already taken.Blue,Red,White,maybe those?
Paultoo -> Robert Sandlin
Looking at the picture of that "patriotic" Russian biker it seems that Ukraine don´t have the corner on black shirts!
WardwarkOwner
Why do these uprisings/ internal conflicts seem to happen to energy producing countries or those that are on major oil/gas pipeline routes far more often than other countries?
Jackblob -> WardwarkOwner
I don't see any uprising in Canada, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, China, Mexico, the UAE, Iran, Norway, Qatar, etc.
So what exactly is your point?
Petros -> Sotrep Jackblob
Well there is problem in Sudan Iraq Syria Libya Nigeria . you have conflicts made up by USA to change governments and get raw materials . so ward is right . you just pretending to be blind . in mexico ppl dying pretty much each day from corrupt people .
PullingTheStrings
If you scrap off the BS from this article they do have a point, because it has been a popular tactic of a certain country to change another countries government *Cough* America *Cough* by organising protests/riots within a target country
if that doesnt work they escalate that to fire fights and if that doesn't work they move onto say Downing a aeroplane and very quickly claiming its the other side fault without having any evidence or claim they have WMD's well anything to try to take the moral high ground on the situation even thou they caused the situation usual for selfish, arrogant and greedy reasons.
Jackblob -> PullingTheStrings
For some reason I do not trust you to discern the BS from the truth since your entire comment is an act of deflection.
The truth is most Russians are very poor, more poor than the people of India. This latest economic turmoil will make it even worse. Meanwhile, Putin and a handful of his cronies hold all the wealth. He proved he did not care about his people when he sent the FSB to bomb Moscow apartment buildings to start a war in Chechnya and ultimately to cancel elections.
Now Putin sees the potential for widespread protests and he is preparing to confront any protests with violent vigilante groups like those seen in other repressive countries.
Bob Vavich -> Jackblob
Wow, this is quite an assertion that Russians are poorer than Indians. I have been to India and I have been to Russia and I don't like using anecdotes to make a point. I can tell you that I have never seen as much poverty as in India. I can also tell you that when I drove through the low income neighborhood of Detroit or Houston, I felt like I was in a post apocalyptic world. Burned out and boarded up houses. Loitering and crime ridden streets. I can go on and on about social injustice. Regardless your comments are even more slanted than the assertion you are making about "Pulling the Strings".
Jackblob -> Bob Vavich
I was just as surprised to learn that Indians earn more than Russians. My source for that info comes from PBS's latest broadcast of Frontline entitled "Putin's Way".
Also, I doubt you've visited many small and lesser known cities in Russia. It's as if the Soviet Union had just collapsed and they were forgotten. Worse, actually.
Hamdog
Weren't the Maidan protests anti-democracy since they used violence to remove a democratically elected leader? Just another anti-ruskie hit piece from the Guardian.
We in the West love democracy, assuming you vote for the right person.
In the US you only get 2 choices - it may be twice as many as you get with a dictatorship but it's hardly democracy.
E1ouise -> Hamdog
Yanukovych was voted out of office by the *elected parliment* after he fled to Russia. Why don't you know this yet?
secondiceberg -> E1ouise
Excuse me, he was forced out of the country at gunpoint before the opposition "voted him out" the next day.
Bosula -> secondiceberg
Yes. That is correct. And armed Maidan thugs (Svoboda and Right Sector) stood around the Rada with weapons while the vote taken.
Also the 'election' of the coup government was unconstitutional under article 111 of the Ukraine's own Constitution (Goggle - check for yourself). This is an undisputed and uncomfortable 'fact' which the US and the EU never mention (never) when drawn on the issue.
Sourcrowd
The soviet union didn't go through some kind of denazification akin to Germany after it disintegrated. Russia today looks more and more like Germany after WWI - full of self pity and blaming everyone but themselves for their own failures.
Down2dirt -> Sourcrowd
I would like to hear more about that denazification of Germany and how did that go.
Since the day one the West and the GDR used nazis for their laboratories, clandestine and civil services...State owned museums still refuse to give back artwork to their rightful owners that were robbed during 1930-45.
I don' t condone Putin's and Russia polity (one of the most neoliberal countries), but you appear to be clueless about this particular subject and don' t know what you are talking about.
Bosula -> Sourcrowd
Are you thinking about Ukraine here, maybe?
Bosula
A more interesting story would have been the similarities between this anti maidan group in Russia and Maidan in Kiev.
Both have have their military arm, are dangerous and violent, and both very nationalistic and right wing. Both appear to have strong links to politicians as well.
Such an analysis might show that Russian and Ukrainian nationalist groups have more in common than they would like to believe.
TuleCarbonari -> Bosula
A very important difference is the Russians are defending their elected government. The Ukrainians were hired by the West to promote a coup d'etat against an elected government, this against the will of the majority in Ukraine and only 3 months from general election in the country. The coup was indeed a way of stopping the elections.
Flinryan
Oh I see Russia has re-entered the media cross hairs in a timely fashion. I wonder what's going to happen in the coming weeks.
MarcelFromage -> Flinryan
I wonder what's going to happen in the coming weeks.
Nothing new - the Russian Federation will continue its illegal occupation of Crimea and continue to bring death and destruction to eastern Ukraine. And generally be a pain for the rest of the international community.
secondiceberg -> MarcelFromage
And the US will continue to murder innocent civilians in the Middle East, Northern Africa and wherever else it wants to plant its bloody army boots. And will also continue to use its NGO's and CIA to foment colour revolutions in other countries, as it did in Ukraine. Kiev had its revolution. Eastern Ukraine is having its revolution. Tit for Tat.
Velska
CIF seems flooded by Putin's sock puppets, i.e. mindless robots who just repeat statements favouring pro-Putinist dictatorship.
To be sure, there's much to hope for in the US democracy, where bribery is legal. I'm not sure whether bribery in Russia is a legal requirement or just a fact of life. But certainly Russia is far from democratic, has actually never been.
Bosula -> Velska
You can take your sock off now and wipe your hands clean.
secondiceberg -> Velska
What kind of democracy is the US when you have a federal agency spying on everything you do and say? Do you think they are just going to sit on what information they think they get?
What will you do when they come knocking at your door, abduct you for some silly comment you made, and then rendition you to another country so that you will not be able to claim any legal rights? Let Russia look after itself in the face of "war-footing" threats from the U.S.
Fight for social justice and freedom in your own country.
cichonio
"All street movements and colour revolutions lead to blood. Women, children and old people suffer first,"
That's why they are ready to use weapons and violence against a foe who hasn't really been seen yet.
Also,
"Decisions should be made in Moscow and not in Washington or Brussels,"
I think decisions about Ukraine should be made in Kiev.
Bosula -> cichonio
Yes. Decisions should be made in Kiev, but why are they being made in Washington then? How much does this compromise Kiev as its agenda is very different from the agenda the US have with Russia. Ukraine is weakened daily with its civil war and the killing its own people, but this conflict benefits the US as further weakens and places Russia in a new cold war type environment.
Why are key government ministries in Ukraine (like Finance) headed by overseas nationals. Utterly bizarre.
secondiceberg -> cichonio
So do I, by the legally elected government that was illegally deposed at gunpoint. Ukraine actually has two presidents. Only one of them is legal and it is not Poroshenko.
Bob Vavich -> cichonio
Yes, if they are taken by all Ukrainians and not a minority. Potroshenko was elected with a turnout of 46%. Of this he scored say over half, hardly a majority. More likely, the right wing Western Galicia came out to vote and the Russian speaking were discouraged. What would one expect when the new government first decree is to eliminate Russian as a second official language. Mind you a language spoken by the majority. Makes you think? Maybe. Probably not.
SHappens
"Personally I am a fan of the civilised, democratic intelligent way of deciding conflicts, but if we need to take up weapons then of course I will be ready," said Yulia Bereznikova, the ultimate fighting champion.
This quite illustrates Russians way of doing. Smart, open to dialogue and patient but dont mess with them for too long. Once on their horses nothing will stop them.
They are ready to fight against the anti Russian sentiment injected from outside citing Ukraine and Navalny-Soros, not against democracy.
"It is not acceptable for the minority to force its will upon the majority, as happened in Ukraine," he added. "Under the slogan of fighting for democracy there is instead total fear, total propaganda, and no freedom."
ploughmanlunch
After witnessing what happened during Maidan, and subsequently to Ukraine, I understand some Russians reluctance to see a similar scenario played out in Russia.
That being said, I am also wary of vigilantism.
FlangeTube
"Pro-democracy" protests? They have democracy. They have an elected leader with a high approval rating. Stop trying twisting language, these people are not "pro-democracy" they are anti-Putin. That, as much as this paper tries to sell the idea, is not the same thing.
Drumming up odd-balls to defend the elected government in Russia is all well and good, but I would think the other 75% (the ones who like Putin, and aren't in biker gangs) should get a say too.
As for the anti-Maidan quotes - of course that was organised. Nuland said so, for crying out loud. Kerry and others were there, Brennan was there. Of course the Western powers were partly involved. And it wasn't peaceful protests, it was violence directed against elected officials, throwing Molotov cocktails at policemen. It culminated in the burning alive of 40+ people in Odessa.
Sergei Konyushenko
Btw, Shaun is always very best at finding the most important issues to raise?
FallenKezef
It's an interesting point, what happened in the Ukraine was an undemocratic coup which was justified after the fact by an election once the previous incumbent was safely exiled.
Had that happened to a pro-western government we'd be crying foul. But because it happened to a pro-Russian government it's ok.
I don't blame Russians for wanting to avoid a repeat in their own country.
Spaceguy1 One
The Crimea referendum "15% for" myth - Human rights investigations
The idea that only 15% of Crimeans voted to join Russia is speeding around the internet after an article was published in Forbes magazine written by Professor Paul Roderick Gregory.
Professor Gregory has, dishonestly, arrived at his 15% figure by taking the minimum figure for Crimea for both turnout and for voters for union, calling them the maximum, and then ignoring Sevastopol. He has also pretended the report is based on the "real results," when it seems to be little more than the imprecise estimates of a small working group who were apparently against the idea of the referendum in the first place.
It appears that Professor Gregory is intent on deceiving his readers about the vote in Crimea and its legitimacy, probably as part of the widespread campaign to deny the people of Crimea their legitimate rights to self-determination and to demonize Russia in the process.
http://humanrightsinvestigations.org/2014/05/06/the-crimea-referendum-15-percent-for-myth/
vr13vr
This is not an unexpected result. EU and US governments are going out of way to stir people's opinion in the former Soviet republics. And they also set the precedent of conducting at least two "revolutions" by street violence in Ukraine and a dozen - elsewhere. There are obviously people in Russia who believe the changes have to be by discussion and voting not by street disturbance and stone throwing.
Beckow
Reduced to facts in the article, a group in Russia said that they will come out and protest in the streets if there are anti-government demonstrations. They said that their side also needs to be represented, since the protesters don't represent the majority.
That's all. What is so "undemocratic" about that? Or can only pro-Western people ever demonstrate? In a democracy a biker with a tatoo is equal to an urbane lawyer with Western connections. That's the way democracies should work.
About funding for Maidan protesters "for which there is no evidence". This is an interesting point. There were students from Lviv who said they were given "college credit" for being at Maidan. And how exactly have tens of thousands of mostly young men lived on streets in Kiev with food and clothes (even some weapons) with no support?
Isn't that a bit of circumstantial evidence that "somebody" supported them. I guess in this case we need to see the invoices, is that always the case or just when Russia issues are involved?
rezevici
Very sad news from Russia. If Putin or the government doesn't condemn this project of the "patriots", if he and government doesn't react against announcement of civilian militia's plan to use violence, I'll truly turn to observe Putin as a tsar.
The ethics of Russians will be on display.
Anette Mor -> rezevici
PeraIlicThere are specific politicians who rejected participation in normal political process but chosen street riots instead. The door to politics is open, they can form parties and take part in elections. but then there is a need for a clear political and economical platform and patience to win over the votes. These people refuse to do so, They just want street riots. Several years public watch these groups and simply had enough. There is some edgy opposition which attracts minority but they play fair. Nobody against them protecting and demonstrating even when the call for revolutionary means for getting power, like communists or national-socialists. But these who got no program other than violent riots as such are not opposition. They still have an agenda which they cannot openly display. So they attract public by spreading slander and rising tension. Nothing anti-democratic in forming a group of people who confront these actions. They are just another group taking part in very complex process.
There is evidence, but also recognition from US officials. That at least is not a secret anymore.by Shaun Walker: "Maidan in Kiev did not appear just like that. Everyone was paid, everyone was paid to be there, was paid for every stone that was thrown, for every bottle thrown," said Sablin, echoing a frequently repeated Russian claim for which there is no evidence.
Indeed, Shaun! On what would you like us to believe so much money had been spent?Is the US training and funding the Ukraine opposition? Nuland herself claimed in December that the US had spent $5 billion since the 1990s on "democratization" programs in Ukraine. On what would she like us to believe the money had been spent?
We know that the US State Department invests heavily -- more than $100 million from 2008-2012 alone -- on international "Internet freedom" activities. This includes heavy State Department funding, for example, to the New Americas Foundation's...
...Commotion Project (sometimes referred to as the "Internet in a Suitcase"). This is an initiative from the New America Foundation's Open Technology Initiative to build a mobile mesh network that can literally be carried around in a suitcase, to allow activists to continue to communicate even when a government tries to shut down the Internet, as happened in several Arab Spring countries during the recent uprisings.
You antipathy against the author speaks volumes about the contents of his article.
All of this stems from the stupid EU meddling in Ukraine.
We shouldn't get involved in the EUs regime change agenda. Time to leave the EU.
And also time for us to not get involved in any wars.
daffyddw
Thank you, thank you all, you wonderful putin-bots. I haven't enjoyed a thread so much in ages. Bless you all, little brothers.
susandbs12 -> daffyddw
Putinbot = someone who has a different opinion to you.
Presumably you want a totalitarian state where only your views are legitimate.
Grow up and stop being childish and just accept that there are people who hold different views from you, so what?
LaAsotChayim
Pro democracy protests?? Would that be same protests that Kiev had where Neo-nazis burned unarmed police officers alive, or the ones in Syria when terrorists (now formed ISIS) where killing Government troops? Are these the pro-democracy protests (all financed via "US aid" implemented by CIA infiltrators) that the Guardian wants us to care about?
How about the reporting on the indiscriminate slaughter of Eastern Ukrainians by Kiev's government troops and Nazi battalions?? Hey, guardian??!!
Anette Mor -> Strummered
Democracy is overrated. It does not automatically ensure equality for minorities. In Russia with its 100 nationalities and all world religions simple straight forward majority rule does not bring any good.
A safety net is required. Benevolent dictator is one of the forms for such safety net. Putin fits well as he is fair and gained trust from all faith, nationalities and social groups. There are other mechanisms in Russia to ensure equality. Many of them came from USSR including low chamber of Russian parliament called Nationalities chamber. representation there is disproportional to the number of population but reflecting minorities voice - one sit per nation, no matter how big or small.
The system of different national administrative units for large and small and smallest nationalities depending how much of autonomic administration each can afford to manage. People in the West should stop preaching democracy. It is nothing but dictatorship of majority. That is why Middle East lost all its tolerance. Majority rules, minorities are suppressed.
kowalli -> Glenn J. Hill
US has a separate line in the budget to pay for such "democratic" protests
kowalli -> Glenn J. Hill
U.S. Embassy Grants Program. The U.S. Embassy Grants Program announces a competition for Russian non-governmental organizations to carry out specific projects.
http://moscow.usembassy.gov/democracy.html
and this is only one of them, many more in budget.
MartinArvay
pro-democracy protesters?
like ISIL, Right Sector, UÇK?
They are right
Feb 01, 2016 | chroniclesmagazine.org
View all posts from this blogOn January 23 Freedom and Prosperity Radio , Virginia's only syndicated political talk radio show, broadcast an interview with Srdja Trifkovic on the subject of Islam and the ongoing Muslim invasion of Europe. Here is the full transcript of the interview. ( Audio )
FPR: Your book The Sword of the Prophet was published back in 2002, yet here we are-15 years later-still scratching our heads over this problem. Defeating Jihad you wrote ten years ago, and yet we are still fumbling around in the dark. It seems like we don't have the ability to say what is right and what is wrong. We've lost the ability we had had during the Cold War to say out way is better than their way . . .
ST: I'm afraid the problem is deeper than that. It is in the unwillingness of the ruling elite in the Western world to come to grips with the nature of Islam-as-such. There is this constant tendency by the politicians, the media and the academia to treat jihadism as some sort of aberration which is alien to "true" Islam. We had an example of that in 2014, when President Obama went so far as to say that ISIS was "un-Islamic"! It is rather curious that the President of the United States assumes the authority of a theologian who can pass definite judgments on whether a certain phenomenon is "Islamic" or not. Likewise we have this constant repetition of the mantra of the "religion of peace and tolerance," which is simply not supported by 14 centuries of historical experience. What I've tried to emphasize in both those books you've mentioned, and in my various other writings and public appearances, is that the problem of Islam resides in the core texts, in the Kuran and the Hadith , the "Traditions" of the prophet of Islam, Muhammed. This is the source from which the historical practice has been derived ever since. The problem is not in the jihadists misinterpreting Islam, but rather in interpreting it all too well. This mythical "moderate Islam," for which everybody seems to be looking these days, is an exception and not the rule.
In answer to your question, I'd say that "scratching one's head" is-by now-only the phenomenon of those who refuse to face reality. Reasonable people who are capable of judging phenomena on their merits and on the basis of ample empirical evidence, are no longer in doubt. They see that the problem is not in the alleged misinterpretation of the Islamic teaching, but rather in its rigorous application and literal understanding. I'm afraid things will not get better, because with each and every new jihadist attack, such as the Charlie Hebdo slaughter in Paris a year ago, or again in Paris last November, or the New Year's Eve violence in Germany, we are witnessing-time and over again-the same problem. The Islamic mindset, the Islamic understanding of the world, the Muslim Weltanschauung , world outlook, is fundamentally incompatible with the Western value system and the Western way of life.
FPR: . . . It seems obvious, regarding Islam, that its "freedom of religion" is impacting other people, and it's dictated to do so-it must go out and fight the infidels. And that's where we have the disconnect. Maybe there is some traction to the statement, as you put it, that fundamentalism reflects a far more thorough following of Islam, and that it is simply incompatible with the Constitution?
ST: It is inevitable, because if you are an orthodox, practicing, mainstream Muslim, then you necessarily believe in the need to impose Sharia as the law of the land. Sharia is much more than a legal code. It is also a political program, it is a code of social behavior, it is the blueprint for the totality of human experience. That's why it is impossible to make Sharia compatible with the liberal principle of "live and let live": it is inherently aggressive to non-Islam. In the Islamic paradigm, the world is divided in the Manichean manner, black-and-white, into "the World of Faith," Dar al-Islam , literally "the world of submission," and "the World of War, Dar al-Harb .
It is the divine duty of each and every Muslim to seek the expansion of Dar al-Islam at the expense of Dar al-Harb until the one true faith is triumphant throughout the world. In this sense the Islamic mindset is very similar to Bolshevism. The Bolsheviks also believed that "the first country of Socialism" should expand its reach and control until the whole world has undergone the proletarian revolution and has become one in the march to the Utopia of communism. There is constant inner tension in the Islamic world, in the sense that for as long as non-Islam exists, it is inherently perceived as "the other," as an abomination. In that sense, Muslims perceive any concession made by the West-for instance in allowing mass immigration into Western Europe-not as a gesture of good will and multicultural tolerance, but as a sign of weakness that needs to be exploited and used as a means to an end.
FPR: The Roman Catholic Church has its Catechism which decides the issues of doctrine. Until there's an Islamic "catechism" which can say "no, this is no longer the right interpretation, this is not what it means any more"-and I don't think this would be a short-term thing, because you'd still have the splinter groups dissenting against the "traitors"-but is this the only way to go to the center of theological jurisprudence in the Islamic world?
ST: The problem is twofold. First of all, there is no "interpretation" of the Kuran . Classical Islamic sources are adamant that the Kuran needs to be taken at face value, literally. If it says in Sura 9, verse 5, "fight the infidels wherever you find them, and let them go if they convert," or if it says time and over again that the choice for a non-Muslim is to accept Islam, or to live as a second-class citizen-the dhimmi -under Islamic supremacy, or else to be killed it is very hard to imagine what sort of authority in the Islamic world would be capable of saying "now we are going to relativize and soften the message."
The second part of the problem is that there is no single authority in Islam. It is not organized in a hierarchical way like the Roman Catholic Church, where if the Pope speaks ex cathedra his pronouncements are obligatory for all Catholics everywhere. Islam is a diffused religion, with various centers of learning and various ullema who may or may not agree on certain peripheral details. Yet any any one of them who'd dare say "look, now we rally need to reinterpret the fundamental sources, the Kuran and the Hadith, so as to make it compatible with the pluralist society"-they'd immediately be condemned as heretics. We've seen attempts at reform in the past. In the end the orthodox interpretation always prevails, because it is-sadly-the right interpretation of the core texts. With neither the hierarchy capable of imposing a new form of teaching on the faithful, nor the existence of alternative core texts which would provide grounds for such reinterpretation, it is very hard to see how it could be done.
FPR: How do we go forward? . . . How does the end-game play out?
ST: I'd say that in modern times the main culprit was Zbigniew Brzezynski, who freely admitted in an interview with the French weekly magazine Le Nouvel Observateur in 1998 that he had this, as he called it, "brilliant idea" to let the Islamist genie out of the bottle to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan following the Soviet occupation in 1979. At that time he was President Carter's National Security Advisor. The transmission belt, from the CIA and various other U.S. agencies to the jihadists in Afghanistan, went via Pakistan. The ISI, the all-powerful military Inter-Service Intelligence-an institution which is pro-jihadist to boot-was used by the U.S. to arm elements which later morphed into al-Qaeda. The breeding ground for the modern, one might say postmodern form of jihadism, was Afghanistan-and it was made possible by U.S. policy inputs which helped its development.
But if we look at the past 14 centuries, time and over again we see the same phenomenon. The first time they tried to conquer Europe was across the Straits of Gibraltar and across the Iberian Peninsula, today's Spain. Then they crossed the Pyrinees and were only stopped at Poitiers by Charles Martel in 732AD. Then they were gradually being pushed back, and the Reconquista -- the reconquest of Spain-lasted 800 years, until 1492, when Cordoba finally fell to the Christian forces. Then came the second, Ottoman onslaught, in the XIVth century, which went across the Dardanelles into the Balkan Peninsula. The Turks were only finally stopped at the gates of Vienna in 1683. Pushing Turkey out of Europe went all the way to 1912, to the First Balkan War.
So we may say that we are now witnessing the third Islamic conquest of Europe. This time it is not using armed janissaries, it is using so-called refugees. In fact most of them are healthy young men, and the whole process is obviously a strategic exercise -- a joint venture between Ankara and Riyadh, who are logistically and financially helping this mass transfer of people from the Turkish and Middle Eastern refugee camps to the heart of Europe. The effect may be the same, but this time it is far more dangerous because, on the European side-unlike in 732, or 1683-there is no political will and there is no moral strength to resist. This is happening because the migrants, the invaders, see Europe as the candy store with a busted lock and they are taking advantage of that fact.
FPR: When you see the horrors of rapes and sexual assaults that took place across Germany, and now we see the Germans' response . . . vigilantes on their streets . . . this is something that we either control politically and with leadership, or else it falls apart into anarchy, Prof. Trifkovic?
ST: Instead of anarchy I think we will have a form of postmodern totalitarianism. The elite class, the government of Germany etc, and the media, will demonize those who try to resist. In fact we already have the spectacle of the minister of the interior of one of the German states saying that "hate speech" on the social networks and websites was far worse than the "incidents" in Cologne. And the Mayor of Cologne-an ultra-feminist who is also a pro-immigration enthusiast-said that in order to prevent such events in the future women should observe a "code of conduct" and keep distance "at an arm's length" from men. It's a classic example of blaming the victim. The victims of Islamic violence should change their behavior in order to adapt themselves to the code of conduct and values of the invaders. This is truly unprecedented.
Instead of utter anarchy, I think we are more likely to see the ever more stringent control of the social media. The German government has already imposed on Google and Twitter which is based on the German draconian "hate speech" legislation, rather than on the universally accepted standards. On the whole we see everywhere in Europe that when you have a political party or a person trying to call a spade by its name, to call for a moratorium on immigration or for a fundamental change in the way of thinking, they will be demonized. The same applies to Marine Le Pen in France and to her party, the Front National , or to Geert Wilders in Holland, or to Strache in Austria. Whoever tries to articulate a coherent plan of action that includes a ban or limits on Islamic immigration is immediately demonized as a right-wing fanatic or a fascist. Instead of facing the reality of the situation, that you have a multi-million Islamic diaspora in Europe which is not assimilating, which refuses even to accept a code of conduct of the host population, the reaction is always the same: blame the victim, and demonize those who try to articulate some form of resistance.
FPR: Dr. Trifkovic, how does a country such as ours, the United States, fix this problem . . .
ST: The answer is fairly simple, but it would require a fundamental transformation of the mindset of the political decision-makers. It is to start treating Islamic activism not as "religious" but as an eminently political activity -- subversive political activity, in the same way as communist subversion was treated during the Cold War. In both cases we have a committed, highly motivated group of people who want to effect a fundamental transformation of the United States in a way that is contrary to the U.S. Constitution, to the American way of life, and to the American values. It is time to stop the Islamists from hiding behind the "freedom of religion" mantra. What they are seeking is not some "freedom of religion" but the freedom to organize in order to pursue political subversion. They do not accept the U.S. Constitution.
To start with, every single potential U.S. citizen from the Islamic world needs to be interviewed in great detail about his or her beliefs and commitments. It is simply impossible for a believing Muslim to swear the oath of allegiance to the United States. None of them, if they are true believers, can regard the U.S. Constitution as superior to the Sharia-which is the law of God, while the U.S. Constitution is a man-made document. I happen to know the oath because I am myself a naturalized U.S. citizen. They can do it "in good faith" from their point of view by practicing taqqiya . This is the Arab word for the art of dissimulation, when the Muslim lies to the infidel in order to protect the faith. For them to lie to investigators or to immigration officials about their beliefs and their objectives does not create any conflict of conscience. The prophet of Islam himself has mandated the use of taqqiya if it serves the objective of spreading the faith.
FPR: Can a civil war come out of this? Is it conceivable?
ST: If there is to be a civil war in Europe, it would be pursued between the elite class which wants to continue pursuing multiculturalism and unlimited immigration --for example Germany, where over a million migrants from the Middle East, North Africa etc. were admitted in 2015 alone-and the majority of the population who have not been consulted, and who feel that their home country is being irretrievably lost. I do not believe that there will be many people fighting on the side of the multiculturalists' suicide, but nevertheless we still have very effective forces of coercion and control on the government side which can be deployed to prevent the articulation of any long-term, coherent plan of resistance.
FPR: Where can people continue to read you writings, Dr. Trifkovic?
ST: On Chroniclesmagazine.org where I publish weekly online commentaries, and also in the print edition of Chronicles where I have my regular column.
Apr 15, 2015 | antiwar.com
Former Washington insider and four-star General Wesley Clark spilled the beans several years ago on how Paul Wolfowitz and his neoconservative co-conspirators implemented their sweeping plan to destabilize key Middle Eastern countries once it became clear that post-Soviet Russia "won't stop us."As I recently reviewed a YouTube eight-minute clip of General Clark's October 2007 speech, what leaped out at me was that the neocons had been enabled by their assessment that -- after the collapse of the Soviet Union – Russia had become neutralized and posed no deterrent to U.S. military action in the Middle East.
While Clark's public exposé largely escaped attention in the neocon-friendly "mainstream media" (surprise, surprise!), he recounted being told by a senior general at the Pentagon shortly after the 9/11 attacks in 2001 about the Donald Rumsfeld/Paul Wolfowitz-led plan for "regime change" in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran.
This was startling enough, I grant you, since officially the United States presents itself as a nation that respects international law, frowns upon other powerful nations overthrowing the governments of weaker states, and – in the aftermath of World War II – condemned past aggressions by Nazi Germany and decried Soviet "subversion" of pro-U.S. nations.
But what caught my eye this time was the significance of Clark's depiction of Wolfowitz in 1992 gloating over what he judged to be a major lesson learned from the Desert Storm attack on Iraq in 1991; namely, "the Soviets won't stop us."
That remark directly addresses a question that has troubled me since March 2003 when George W. Bush attacked Iraq. Would the neocons – widely known as "the crazies" at least among the remaining sane people of Washington – have been crazy enough to opt for war to re-arrange the Middle East if the Soviet Union had not fallen apart in 1991?
The question is not an idle one. Despite the debacle in Iraq and elsewhere, the neocon "crazies" still exercise huge influence in Establishment Washington. Thus, the question now becomes whether, with Russia far more stable and much stronger, the "crazies" are prepared to risk military escalation with Russia over Ukraine, what retired U.S. diplomat William R. Polk deemed a potentially dangerous nuclear confrontation, a "Cuban Missile Crisis in reverse."
Putin's Comment
The geopolitical vacuum that enabled the neocons to try out their "regime change" scheme in the Middle East may have been what Russian President Vladimir Putin was referring to in his state-of-the-nation address on April 25, 2005, when he called the collapse of the Soviet Union "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [past] century." Putin's comment has been a favorite meme of those who seek to demonize Putin by portraying him as lusting to re-establish a powerful USSR through aggression in Europe.
But, commenting two years after the Iraq invasion, Putin seemed correct at least in how the neocons exploited the absence of the Russian counterweight to over-extend American power in ways that were harmful to the world, devastating to the people at the receiving end of the neocon interventions, and even detrimental to the United States.
If one takes a step back and attempts an unbiased look at the spread of violence in the Middle East over the past quarter-century, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Putin's comment was on the mark. With Russia a much-weakened military power in the 1990s and early 2000s, there was nothing to deter U.S. policymakers from the kind of adventurism at Russia's soft underbelly that, in earlier years, would have carried considerable risk of armed U.S.-USSR confrontation.
I lived in the USSR during the 1970s and would not wish that kind of restrictive regime on anyone. Until it fell apart, though, it was militarily strong enough to deter Wolfowitz-style adventurism. And I will say that – for the millions of people now dead, injured or displaced by U.S. military action in the Middle East over the past dozen years – the collapse of the Soviet Union as a deterrent to U.S. war-making was not only a "geopolitical catastrophe" but an unmitigated disaster.
Visiting Wolfowitz
In his 2007 speech, General Clark related how in early 1991 he dropped in on Paul Wolfowitz, then Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (and later, from 2001 to 2005, Deputy Secretary of Defense). It was just after a major Shia uprising in Iraq in March 1991. President George H.W. Bush's administration had provoked it, but then did nothing to rescue the Shia from brutal retaliation by Saddam Hussein, who had just survived his Persian Gulf defeat.
According to Clark, Wolfowitz said: "We should have gotten rid of Saddam Hussein. The truth is, one thing we did learn is that we can use our military in the Middle East and the Soviets won't stop us. We've got about five or 10 years to clean up those old Soviet client regimes – Syria, Iran (sic), Iraq – before the next great superpower comes on to challenge us."
It's now been more than 10 years, of course. But do not be deceived into thinking Wolfowitz and his neocon colleagues believe they have failed in any major way. The unrest they initiated keeps mounting – in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Lebanon – not to mention fresh violence now in full swing in Yemen and the crisis in Ukraine. Yet, the Teflon coating painted on the neocons continues to cover and protect them in the "mainstream media."
True, one neocon disappointment is Iran. It is more stable and less isolated than before; it is playing a sophisticated role in Iraq; and it is on the verge of concluding a major nuclear agreement with the West – barring the throwing of a neocon/Israeli monkey wrench into the works to thwart it, as has been done in the past.
An earlier setback for the neocons came at the end of August 2013 when President Barack Obama decided not to let himself be mouse-trapped by the neocons into ordering U.S. forces to attack Syria. Wolfowitz et al. were on the threshold of having the U.S. formally join the war against Bashar al-Assad's government of Syria when there was the proverbial slip between cup and lip. With the aid of the neocons' new devil-incarnate Vladimir Putin, Obama faced them down and avoided war.
A week after it became clear that the neocons were not going to get their war in Syria, I found myself at the main CNN studio in Washington together with Paul Wolfowitz and former Sen. Joe Lieberman, another important neocon. As I reported in "How War on Syria Lost Its Way," the scene was surreal – funereal, even, with both Wolfowitz and Lieberman very much down-in-the-mouth, behaving as though they had just watched their favorite team lose the Super Bowl.
Israeli/Neocon Preferences
But the neocons are nothing if not resilient. Despite their grotesque disasters, like the Iraq War, and their disappointments, like not getting their war on Syria, they neither learn lessons nor change goals. They just readjust their aim, shooting now at Putin over Ukraine as a way to clear the path again for "regime change" in Syria and Iran. [See Consortiumnews.com's "Why Neocons Seek to Destabilize Russia."]
The neocons also can take some solace from their "success" at enflaming the Middle East with Shia and Sunni now at each other's throats – a bad thing for many people of the world and certainly for the many innocent victims in the region, but not so bad for the neocons. After all, it is the view of Israeli leaders and their neocon bedfellows (and women) that the internecine wars among Muslims provide at least some short-term advantages for Israel as it consolidates control over the Palestinian West Bank.
In a Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity memorandum for President Obama on Sept. 6, 2013, we called attention to an uncommonly candid report about Israeli/neocon motivation, written by none other than the Israel-friendly New York Times Bureau Chief in Jerusalem Jodi Rudoren on Sept. 2, 2013, just two days after Obama took advantage of Putin's success in persuading the Syrians to allow their chemical weapons to be destroyed and called off the planned attack on Syria, causing consternation among neocons in Washington.
Rudoren can perhaps be excused for her naďve lack of "political correctness." She had been barely a year on the job, had very little prior experience with reporting on the Middle East, and – in the excitement about the almost-attack on Syria – she apparently forgot the strictures normally imposed on the Times' reporting from Jerusalem. In any case, Israel's priorities became crystal clear in what Rudoren wrote.
In her article, entitled "Israel Backs Limited Strike Against Syria," Rudoren noted that the Israelis were arguing, quietly, that the best outcome for Syria's (then) 2 ˝-year-old civil war, at least for the moment, was no outcome:
"For Jerusalem, the status quo, horrific as it may be from a humanitarian perspective, seems preferable to either a victory by Mr. Assad's government and his Iranian backers or a strengthening of rebel groups, increasingly dominated by Sunni jihadis.
"'This is a playoff situation in which you need both teams to lose, but at least you don't want one to win - we'll settle for a tie,' said Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli consul general in New York. 'Let them both bleed, hemorrhage to death: that's the strategic thinking here. As long as this lingers, there's no real threat from Syria.'"
Clear enough? If this is the way Israel's leaders continue to regard the situation in Syria, then they look on deeper U.S. involvement – overt or covert – as likely to ensure that there is no early resolution of the conflict there. The longer Sunni and Shia are killing each other, not only in Syria but also across the region as a whole, the safer Tel Aviv's leaders calculate Israel is.
Favoring Jihadis
But Israeli leaders have also made clear that if one side must win, they would prefer the Sunni side, despite its bloody extremists from Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. In September 2013, shortly after Rudoren's article, Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren, then a close adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told the Jerusalem Post that Israel favored the Sunni extremists over Assad.
"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," Oren said in an interview. "We always wanted 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." He said this was the case even if the "bad guys" were affiliated with Al-Qaeda.
In June 2014, Oren – then speaking as a former ambassador – said Israel would even prefer a victory by the Islamic State, which was massacring captured Iraqi soldiers and beheading Westerners, than the continuation of the Iranian-backed Assad in Syria. "From Israel's perspective, if there's got to be an evil that's got to prevail, let the Sunni evil prevail," Oren said.
Netanyahu sounded a similar theme in his March 3, 2015 speech to the U.S. Congress in which he trivialized the threat from the Islamic State with its "butcher knives, captured weapons and YouTube" when compared to Iran, which he accused of "gobbling up the nations" of the Middle East.
That Syria's main ally is Iran with which it has a mutual defense treaty plays a role in Israeli calculations. Accordingly, while some Western leaders would like to achieve a realistic if imperfect settlement of the Syrian civil war, others who enjoy considerable influence in Washington would just as soon see the Assad government and the entire region bleed out.
As cynical and cruel as this strategy is, it isn't all that hard to understand. Yet, it seems to be one of those complicated, politically charged situations well above the pay-grade of the sophomores advising President Obama – who, sad to say, are no match for the neocons in the Washington Establishment. Not to mention the Netanyahu-mesmerized Congress.
Corker Uncorked
Speaking of Congress, a year after Rudoren's report, Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tennessee, who now chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, divulged some details about the military attack that had been planned against Syria, while lamenting that it was canceled. In doing so, Corker called Obama's abrupt change on Aug. 31, 2013, in opting for negotiations over open war on Syria, "the worst moment in U.S. foreign policy since I've been here." Following the neocon script, Corker blasted the deal (since fully implemented) with Putin and the Syrians to rid Syria of its chemical weapons.
Corker complained, "In essence – I'm sorry to be slightly rhetorical – we jumped into Putin's lap." A big No-No, of course – especially in Congress – to "jump into Putin's lap" even though Obama was able to achieve the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons without the United States jumping into another Middle East war.
It would have been nice, of course, if General Clark had thought to share his inside-Pentagon information earlier with the rest of us. In no way should he be seen as a whistleblower.
At the time of his September 2007 speech, he was deep into his quixotic attempt to win the Democratic nomination for president in 2008. In other words, Clark broke the omerta code of silence observed by virtually all U.S. generals, even post-retirement, merely to put some distance between himself and the debacle in Iraq – and win some favor among anti-war Democrats. It didn't work, so he endorsed Hillary Clinton; that didn't work, so he endorsed Barack Obama.
Wolfowitz, typically, has landed on his feet. He is now presidential hopeful Jeb Bush's foreign policy/defense adviser, no doubt outlining his preferred approach to the Middle East chessboard to his new boss. Does anyone know the plural of "bedlam?"
Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. He is a 30-year veteran of the CIA and Army intelligence and co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS). McGovern served for considerable periods in all four of CIA's main directorates.
Reprinted with permission from Consortium News.
Oct 08, 2017 | www.amazon.com
True existence of these multimegaton hydrogen bombs has so drastically changed the Grand Strategy of world powers that, today and for the future, that strategy is being carried out by the invisible forces of the CIA, what remains of the KGB, and their lesser counterparts around the world.
Men in positions of great power have been forced to realize that their aspirations and responsibilities have exceeded the horizons of their own experience, knowledge, and capability. Yet, because they are in chargeof this high-technology society, they are compelled to do something. This overpowering necessity to do something -- although our leaders do not know precisely what to do or how to do it -- creates in the power elite an overbearing fear of the people. It is the fear not of you and me as individuals but of the smoldering threat of vast populations and of potential uprisings of the masses.
This power elite is not easy to define; but the fact that it exists makes itself known from time to time. Concerning the power elite, R. Buckminster Fuller wrote of the "vastly ambitious individuals who [have] become so effectively powerful because of their ability to remain invisible while operating behind the national scenery." Fuller noted also, "Always their victories [are] in the name of some powerful sovereign-ruled country. The real power structures [are] always the invisible ones behind the visible sovereign powers."
The power elite is not a group from one nation or even of one alliance of nations. It operates throughout the world and no doubt has done so for many, many centuries.
... ... ...
From this point ot view, warfare, and the preparation tor war, is an absolute necessity for the welfare of the state and for control of population masses, as has been so ably documented in that remarkable novel by Leonard Lewin Report From Iron Mountain on the Possibility and Desirability of Peace and attributed by Lewin to "the Special Study Group in 1966," an organization whose existence was so highly classified that there is no record, to this day, of who the men in the group were or with what sectors of the government or private life they were connected.
This report, as presented in the novel, avers that war is necessary to sustain society, the nation, and national sovereignty, a view that has existed for millennia. Through the ages, totally uncontrolled warfare -- the only kind of "real" war -- got bigger and "better" as time and technology churned on, finally culminating in World War II with the introduction of atomic bombs.
Not long after that great war, the world leaders were faced suddenly with the reality of a great dilemma. At the root of this dilemma was the new fission-fusion-fission H-bomb. Is it some uncontrollable Manichean device, or is it truly a weapon of war?
... ... ...
Such knowledge is sufficient. The dilemma is now fact. There can no longer be a classic or traditional war, at least not the all-out, go-for-broke-type warfare there has been down through the ages, a war that leads to a meaningful victory for one side and abject defeat for the other.
Witness what has been called warfare in Korea, and Vietnam, and the later, more limited experiment with new weaponry called the Gulf War in Iraq.
... ... ...
This is why, even before the end of World War II, the newly structured bipolar confrontation between the world of Communism and the West resulted in the employment of enormous intelligence agencies that had the power, invisibly, to wage underground warfare, economic and well as military, anywhere -- including methods of warfare never before imagined. These conflicts had to be tactically designed to remain short of the utilization of the H-bomb by either side. There can never be victories in such wars, but tremendous loss of life could occur, and there is the much-desired consumption and attrition of trillions of dollars', and rubles', worth of war equipment.
One objective of this book is to discuss these new forces. It will present an insider's view of the CIA story and provide comparisons with the intelligence organizations -- those invisible forces -- of other countries. To be more realistic with the priorities of these agencies themselves, more will be said about operational matters than about actual intelligence gathering as a profession.
This subject cannot be explored fully without a discussion of assassination. Since WWII, there has been an epidemic of murders at the highest level in many countries. Without question the most dynamic of these assassinations was the murder of President John F. Kennedy, but JFK was just one of many in a long list that includes bankers, corporate leaders, newsmen, rising political spokesmen, and religious leaders.
The ever-present threat of assassination seriously limits the number of men who would normally attempt to strive for positions of leadership, if for no other reason than that they could be singled out for murder at any time. This is not a new tactic, but it is one that has become increasingly utilized in pressure spots around the world.
It is essential to note that there are two principal categories of intelligence organizations and that their functions are determined generally by the characteristics of the type of government they serve -- not by the citizens of the government, but by its leaders.
Under totalitarian or highly centralized nondemocratic regimes, the intelligence organization is a political, secret service with police powers. It is designed primarily to provide personal security to those who control the authority of the state against all political opponents, foreign and domestic. These leaders are forced to depend upon these secret elite forces to remain alive and in power. Such an organization operates in deep secrecy and has the responsibility for carrying out espionage, counterespionage, and pseudoterrorism. This methodology is as true of Israel, Chile, or Jordan as it has been of the Soviet Union.
The second category of intelligence organization is one whose agents are limited to the gathering and reporting of intelligence and who have no police functions or the power to arrest at home or abroad. This type of organization is what the CIA was created to be; however, it does not exist.
Over the decades since the CIA was created, it has acquired more sinister functions. All intelligence agencies, in time, tend to develop along similar lines. The CIA today is a far cry hum the agency that was created in 1947 by the National Security Act. As President Harry S. Truman confided to close friends, the greatest mistake of his administration took place when he signed that National Security Act of 1947 into law. It was that act which, among other things it did, created the Central Intelligence Agency.3
Nov 29, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com
marknesop , , November 28, 2017 at 2:13 pm
Ha, ha!!! The Victim Of The Aggressor Country seldom fails to entertain. Here we have VR Deputy Chairperson Ira Gerashchenko bossing Europe around , and telling it that the Victim Of The Aggressor Country's parliamentary delegation will continue to insist on Russia not returning to the Council of Europe. Because, she says, Russia has stolen part of the territory of the VOTAC which was a gift from Russia in the first place (although she doesn't mention that last part), thereby setting a precedent for every country which has a province 'liberated' by the west to term it stolen by the west. But that wasn't my favourite part. No; this is – "We live at the time of a certain degrading of European institutions and their external weakening, including by Russia. You can accept it and go with the flow but you can also recognize the fact try to resist it."Beautiful, Ira!! Inspiring!! And how many degraded European leaders are Billionaires who openly own an impressive slate of businesses and media in their countries, which they continue to operate and profit from while piously declaring their only interest is the welfare of the country? Which is, by the bye, the most corrupt country in Europe ? How many Prosecutors-General has the VOTAC had since its glorious liberation from the yoke of the Moskali? Yes, you can certainly teach Yurrup a thing or two about integrity.
It must be embarrassing to be European these days. To be dressed down by the corrupt country you support on handouts because you are not doing enough to support it. First we had the 'Me' generation. Then we had the 'Me' country.
Nov 27, 2017 | www.unz.com
Mike Whitney November 17, 2017
On Sunday, Former CIA Director John Brennan and Former National Intelligence Director (NID) James Clapper appeared on CNN's morning talk show, State of the Union, to discuss Donald Trump's brief meeting with Vladimir Putin in Vietnam. The two ex-Intel chiefs were sharply critical of Trump and wondered why the president did not "not acknowledge and embrace" the idea that Russia meddled in the 2016 elections. According to Brennan, Russia not only "poses a national security problem" for the US, but also "Putin is committed to undermining our system, our democracy, and our whole process."
Naturally, CNN anchor, Jake Tapper, never challenged Brennan or Clapper on any of the many claims they made regarding Russia nor did he interrupt either man while they made, what appeared to be, carefully scripted remarks about Trump, Putin and the ongoing investigation.
There were no surprise announcements during the interview and neither Brennan or Clapper added anything new to the list of allegations that have been repeated ad nauseam in the media for the last year. The only time Tapper veered off course at all was when he asked Brennan whether he thought "any laws were broken by the Trump campaign? Here's what Brennan said:
I'm just a former intelligence officer. I never had the responsibility for determining whether or not criminal actions were taken. But, since leaving office on the 20th of January, I think more and more of this iceberg is emerging above the surface of the water, some of the things that I knew about, but some of the things I didn't know about, in terms of some of the social media efforts that Russia employed. So, I think what Bob Mueller, who, again, is another quintessential public servant, is doing is trying to get to the bottom of this. And I think we're going to find out how large this iceberg really is.
In other words, after an arduous 12 month-long investigation involving both Houses of Congress, a Special Counsel, and a small army of high-paid Washington attorneys, the only straw Brennan has found to hold on to, is a few innocuous advertisements posted on Facebook and Twitter that had no noticeable impact on the election at all. That's a very weak foundation upon which to build a case for foreign espionage or presidential collusion. It's hard not to conclude that the public has been seriously misled by the leaders of this campaign.
The Intel bosses continue to believe that they can overcome the lack of evidence by repeating the same claims over and over again. The problem with this theory is that Brennan's claims don't match the findings of his own "Gold Standard" report, the so called Intelligence Community Assessment or ICA which was published on January 6, 2017 and which supposedly provides rock solid evidence of Russian meddling. The greatly over-hyped ICA proves nothing of the kind, in fact, the report features a sweeping disclaimer that cautions readers against drawing any rash conclusions from the analysts observations. Here's the money-quote from the report:
Judgments are not intended to imply that we have proof that shows something to be a fact. Assessments are based on collected information, which is often incomplete or fragmentary, as well as logic, argumentation, and precedents.
So, while Brennan continues to insist that the Kremlin was involved in the elections, his own analysts suggest that any such judgments should be taken with a very large grain of salt. Nothing is certain, information is "incomplete or fragmentary", and the entire report is based on what-amounts-to 'educated guesswork.' Is Brennan confused about the report's findings or is he deliberately trying to mislead the American people about its conclusions?
Here's Brennan again on Sunday:
I think Mr. Trump knows that the intelligence agencies, specifically CIA, NSA and FBI, the ones that really have responsibility for counterintelligence and looking at what Russia does, it's very clear that the Russians interfered in the election. And it's still puzzling as to why Mr. Trump does not acknowledge that and embrace it, and also push back hard against Mr. Putin. The Russian threat to our democracy and our democratic foundations is real.
There appears to be a significant discrepancy between Brennan's unshakable belief in Russian intervention and the findings of his own "hand picked" analysts who said with emphatic clarity: "Judgments are not intended to imply that we have proof that shows something to be a fact."
Why is it so hard for Brennan to wrap his mind around that simple, unambiguous statement? The reason Brennan's intelligence analysts admit that they have no proof, is because they have no proof. That might sound obvious, but we have to assume that it isn't given that both Houses of Congress and a Special Counsel are still bogged down in an investigation that has yet to provide even a solid lead let alone any compelling evidence.
We also have to assume that most people do not understand that there is not sufficient evidence to justify the massive investigations that are currently underway. (What probable cause?) Adds placed in Facebook do not constitute hard evidence of foreign espionage or election rigging. They indicate the desperation of the people who are leading the investigation. The fact that serious people are even talking about social media just underscores the fact that the search for proof has produced nothing.
These investigations are taking place because powerful elites want to vilify an emerging geopolitical rival (Russia) and prevent Trump from normalizing relations with Moscow, not because there is any evidence of criminal wrongdoing. As the Intel analysts themselves acknowledge, there is no proof of criminal wrongdoing or any other wrongdoing for that matter. What there is, is a political agenda to discredit Trump and demonize Russia. That's the fuel that is driving the present campaign.
Russia-gate is not about 'meddling', it's about politics. And Brennan and Clapper are critical players in the current drama. They're supposed to be the elder statesmen who selflessly defend the country from foreign threats. But are they or is this just role-playing that doesn't square with what we already know about the two men? Here's thumbnail sketch of Clapper written by former-CIA officer Ray McGovern that will help to clarify the point:
Clapper played a key role in the bogus Iraq-WMD intelligence when he was head of the National Geo-spatial Agency and hid the fact that there was zero evidence in satellite imagery of any weapons of mass destruction before the Iraq invasion. When no WMDs were found, Clapper told the media that he thought they were shipped off to Syria.
In 2013, Clapper perjured himself before Congress by denying NSA's unconstitutional blanket surveillance of Americans. After evidence emerged revealing the falsity of Clapper's testimony, he wrote a letter to Congress admitting, "My response was clearly erroneous – for which I apologize." .
Clapper also has demonstrated an ugly bias about Russians. On May 28, as a former DNI, Clapper explained Russian "interference" in the U.S. election to NBC's Chuck Todd on May 28 with a tutorial on what everyone should know about "the historical practices of the Russians." Clapper said, "the Russians, typically, are almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique." ("Mocking Trump Doesn't Prove Russia's Guilt", Ray McGovern, Consortium News)
So, Clapper concealed information that could have slowed or prevented the rush to war in Iraq. That's a significant failing on his part that suggests either poor judgment or moral weakness. Which is it?
He also lied about spying on the American people. Why? Why would he do that? And why should we trust someone who not only spied on us but also paved the way to war in Iraq?
And the rap-sheet on Brennan is even worse than Clapper's. Check out this blurb from Glenn Greenwald at The Guardian:
"Brennan, as a Bush-era CIA official, had expressly endorsed Bush's programs of torture (other than waterboarding) and rendition and also was a vocal advocate of immunizing lawbreaking telecoms for their role in the illegal Bush NSA eavesdropping program
Obama then appointed him as his top counter-terrorism adviser . In that position, Brennan last year got caught outright lying when he claimed Obama's drone program caused no civilian deaths in Pakistan over the prior year .
Brennan has also been in charge of many of Obama's most controversial and radical policies, including "signature strikes" in Yemen – targeting people without even knowing who they are – and generally seizing the power to determine who will be marked for execution without any due process, oversight or transparency .." ("John Brennan's extremism and dishonesty rewarded with CIA Director nomination", Glenn Greenwald, The Guardian)
So, Brennan supported kidnapping (rendition), torture (enhanced interrogation techniques) and targeted assassinations (drone attacks). And this is the man we are supposed to trust about Russia? Keep in mind, the jihadist militants that have been tearing apart Syria for the last six years were armed and trained by the CIA Brennan's CIA
These radical militias have been defeated largely due to Russian military intervention. Do you think that this defeat at the hands of Putin may have shaped Brennan's attitude towards Russia?
Of course, it has. Brennan never makes any attempt to conceal his hatred for Putin or Russia.
As we noted earlier, Brennan and Clapper are central figures in the Russia-gate story, but their records show we can't trust what they have to say. They are like the eyewitness in a murder trial whose testimony is 'thrown out' because he is exposed as a compulsive liar. The same rule applies to Clapper and Brennan, that is, when the main proponents of the Russia hacking story are shown to be untrustworthy, we must discount what they have to say.
Which is why the Russia-gate narrative is beginning to unravel.
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 [email protected] .
Curmudgeon , November 23, 2017 at 6:46 pm GMT
What!!!! Someone from the management of an intelligence agency lying? I'm shocked!Dan Hayes , November 25, 2017 at 7:51 am GMTFrom the presented evidence: Serial Fabricators! I have much more confidence in the veracity of used car salesmen than that of Messrs. Brennan and Clapper.m___ , November 25, 2017 at 8:22 am GMTFake news, and stale news. By when an algorithm of Goolag to "clean" the internet of current house-hold garbage?Carroll Price , November 25, 2017 at 1:24 pm GMTBecoming friends with Russia, the only potential enemy available, would destroy the MIC. A real possibility the Washington establishment will never allow to happen.Che Guava , November 25, 2017 at 1:58 pm GMT@WorkingClassChris Bridges , November 25, 2017 at 2:54 pm GMTWhat is that having to do with the content of Mr. Whitney's good article? Mr. Whitney, to me you are of the quarter or less of Counterpunch writers who are to making sense most of the time. . . . and am always liking your writing style. Trump could have been or be a great pres. of your nation, but between dropping advisors for no good reason, becoming frightened and drawing away from his desire for rapprochement with the Russian Federation, worst of all, from this distant perspective, to appointing his daughter and son-in-law as senior advisors. Both are overpriveleged morons.
Clapper is a befuddled old fool and can be safely ignored. Brennan is something far more sinister. He is an extreme leftist and there should be an investigation into how this wacko was allowed to join the CIA – he openly admits voting for CPUSA chief Gus Hall in 1976. Brennan is, besides, a resentful CIA failure.Michael Kenny , November 25, 2017 at 2:56 pm GMTHe was denied entry to the elite Directorate of Operations (or couldn't cut the mustard and was banished from it) and spent his career stewing away in anger as a despised analyst at CIA headquarters.
Brennan spent his time at CIA attempting to undermine the organization.
Pompeo should have reversed every single thing he did the minute he took office, starting with firing every CIA employee brought into the Agency by Brennan (this can be done – CIA employees have no Civil Service protection). That Brennan is still at large after his outrageous involvement in the phony Russia dossier is an indictment of Jeff Sessions, Trump, the DOJ and the FBI. He could be indicted on a host of Federal charges if somebody had the guts to do it.
The umpteenth version of a now standard article.Beefcake the Mighty , November 25, 2017 at 3:07 pm GMTWe all know that the Russiagate narrative isn't starting to unravel and this and other (wholly untrustworthy) internet authors' claims are not proved by simply repeating them over and over again (to borrow a phrase!). In fact, Russiagate is expanding. It has gone from mere Russian interference in the election to dubious financial transactions between wealthy Americans, including Trump, and, to put it very politely, "dubious" Russians. It has also expanded to Europe.
What is emerging, therefore, is a collusion between wealthy Americans, no doubt with major investments in Russia, US internet sites, probably financed by the aforementioned wealthy Americans, dubious Russian financiers, Putin, Marine Le Pen, Nigel Farage and no doubt others to manipulate, perhaps rig, elections and referenda in the US and Europe. It's not about politics. It's about money and conflicts of interest.
We also get the now standard argument that Trump is just dying to "normalize" relations with Russia but is being held back by some dastardly group or other. As we all know, of course, "normalizing relations with Moscow" in Orwellian translates into English as "capitulating to Putin in Ukraine". Putin's frantic attempts to get Trump to let him win in Syria is why this old line is suddenly back on the table.
Finally, the idea of the Russian Federation as an emerging geopolitical rival is amusing. That country has existed as a sovereign state only for about 25 years and is merely the largest piece of wreckage from the collapse of the Soviet Union. In a world that is slowly being dominated by China, Russia is a very minor player.
Professional liars. But, there was some question/doubt about this?DESERT FOX , November 25, 2017 at 3:15 pm GMTBrennan and Clapper are agent provocateurs for the Zionists who control the U.S. government and the 17 gestapo agencies which in fact are controlled by dual citizen Zionists ie ISRAEL.jacques sheete , November 25, 2017 at 5:25 pm GMTBrennan and Clapper are under Zionist control and thus are traitors to the constitution of America and should be tried and sent to prison for life.
@Michael KennyClyde , November 25, 2017 at 5:30 pm GMTIt's not about politics. It's about money and conflicts of interest.
And since when are the three not related?
It's too bad that good people, like MW, need to waste their time and energy investigating and publishing what's obviously state sponsored utter rubbish designed to support some of the money bag crowd in one way or another.
Why does it even need to be stated that most of what's supposed to be a big deal to us prols, peasants and piss ants is nothing but propaganda, and of a particularly transparent and low grade variety,even?
@Chris BridgesColleen Pater , November 25, 2017 at 5:31 pm GMTClapper is a befuddled old fool and can be safely ignored. Brennan is something far more sinister.
Clapper told some whoppers while he was head of all our intelligence agencies under Obama. But you are correct that Brennan is far more toxic. He was this way under Obama and post-Obama. He has been one of the biggest Trump saboteurs. And most effective. One ugly customer!
@Curmudgeonjilles dykstra , November 25, 2017 at 6:20 pm GMTWhy should we care if the russians spent billions on trying to exert their influence on us, we do it we have an alphabet soup of projects to do exactly that and god knows what else to every nation on earth.In fact we do it to our own people these social websites and "news" sites universities media etc are nothing but one huge propaganda machine intended to render democracy nothing more than a distraction so elites can go about doing what they want.
Long ago, when car radio's still had antennae long enough to receive long wave transmissions, I often listened to BBCW radio, 848 Mhz.jilles dykstra , November 25, 2017 at 6:34 pm GMT
I still remember the statement 'you can always tell when a politician lies, he then moves his lips'.@Michael KennyRoger n Me , November 25, 2017 at 7:24 pm GMTCapitulating to Putin in Ukraine. The assertion is that the CIA spent five billion dollar in Ukraine in order to overthrow the legitimate democratic government. Of course nobody can prove the assertion. What is crystal clear is that the members of EU parliament Verhofstadt, Van Baalen and Timmermans held speeches in Kiev urging the people to overthrow the government.
Their speeches could be seen live on tv, or were rebroadcast.Timmermans held the crocodile tears speech at the UN about the MH17 victims. How, why, and through whom over 300 people were killed in Ukraine airspace we do not know until now. All there is is vague insinuations towards Russia, the country for which the disaster was a disaster, EU sanctions all of a sudden were possible.
That the political annexation by the west failed is best seen in E Ukraine, where the wealth is, in gas and oil. A son, and a son in law, of Biden, and Kerry were promised well paid jobs as CEO's of companies who were to exploit the E Ukrainian wealth, they are still waiting for the jobs.
I remember when they actually prosecuted for someone for lying to Congress. Unfortunately, it was a former baseball player named Roger Clemons over the vitally important question of whether or not he had taken steroids. Obviously a vital question that every sports tabloid wants to know.Cyrano , November 25, 2017 at 7:27 pm GMTI just hope that the Russians realize that with enormous power comes enormous responsibility. I hope that they'll choose the next US president wisely.I.F. Stoned , November 25, 2017 at 7:36 pm GMTThere is real danger there is -- now that we know that the Russians can elect pretty much anyone in the US – that come the next elections, some charismatic, possibly independent candidate, might seduce the Russians with promises of improved ties, and after they elect him, he might turn to be a real wacko job who might end up not only worsening the ties between the superpowers, but he might end up destroying the world. Be cautious, Russians.
If we want to talk about meddling in the election ..Vikki , November 25, 2017 at 7:44 pm GMTLets compare CNN giving hours and hours of free and very favorable air time to the Hillary campaign?
versus
A news website paying for a handful of thousand dollar adds on Twitter?
I remember studies that showed that during the crooked, corrupt and rigged Democratic Primaries, that there was a large disparity in favorable stories about Hillary versus the number that were favorable for Bernie. And CNN happily seemed to give lots of airtime to any Hillary surrogate who wanted to red bait and smear Bernie as a socialist.
We saw the same sort of disparity in the amount of favorable coverage of Trump vs Hillary. Likewise, any Hillary surrogate who wanted to spread the official campaign message that Trump was a racist, was a fascist, and said some rude things about women was always welcome on the CNN airwaves.
And, just recently, we had the web page editor for the NYT state publicly that they deliberately tilted their web page stories to convince voters to vote against Trump.
And that's just the tip of the iceberg if we want to talk about how the American corporate (aka mainstream) media tried very hard to tilt the whole election towards putting the Crooked Clintons back into the White House.
But, OMG, the story in the same corrupt media is that awful and evil RT spend a whole thousand dollars on an ad trying to promote their website.
@jilles dykstraBottom , November 25, 2017 at 7:55 pm GMTAs to the US spending $5 billion of US taxpayers money to 'destabilize Ukraine', we can prove that. Or at least we can take the word of a US official that this was true. Hillary's Assistant Secretary of State said this publicly at the National Press Club on Dec 13, 2013 . a few months before the violent coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of Ukraine.
@Colleen PaterAdrian E. , November 25, 2017 at 8:57 pm GMTHillary is the one who spend BILLIONS trying to become President. The only thing that so far has been traced to Russia is a few hundred thousand in Twitter Ads that otherwise served the legitimate purpose of trying to promote the web news sites. And most of those ads didn't concern political stories, but instead stories about cute puppies to draw clicks.
The interesting development is that, after no proof for the "Russian hacking" allegations could be found, they turned to simple ads (for amounts that are extremely small compared to what the campaigns spent) and social media postings. This was accompanied by loosening the criteria, they did not even pretend any more that they had indications that these social media activities were connected to the Russian state, they just had to be "Russia-linked". In the case of Twitter, this includes anyone who has ever logged in from Russia, uses Cyrillic signs in the account metadata (that could also be connected with a number of other countries), logged in from a Russian IP address, paid something with a Russian credit card etc., and only one condition had to be fulfilled for an account to be counted as "Russia-linked".Fred D , November 26, 2017 at 12:24 am GMTOf course, with such a large country, there are certainly some social media activities that are "linked" with it. There can be many reasons – people who travel, migrants in both directions, or simply Russians with an interest in US politics. From what is known, the ads and postings were so diverse – some right-wing and pro-Trump, some leftwing or critical of Trump, and many not directly linked to the elections – and distributed over a large time with many after the elections that it does not seem too unlikely as a result of social media activities of random people who have some connection with Russia.
Of course, we may speculate in each case, why someone posted something or bought an ad. But before speculating, it would be necessary to have data about ads and social media postings linked to other countries. For example, it could be determined with the same criteria which ads and postings were Brazile-linked, Germany-linked, and Philippines-linked. Probably, there, a similar random collection would emerge. Only if there is something special about the Russia-linked ads and postings, it would even make sense to speculate about the reasons.
We don't know whether these "Russia-linked" ads and social media positings were just random activities by people related to Russia (e.g. about 2% of the US population have Russian as their native language, some may not have many contacts with Russia any more and don't travel there regularly, but others do) or whether a part of them was the result of an organized campaign, but in any case, from what was written in the media, the volume of these social media activities does not seem to be very large (but in order to judge that, social media activities linked to other countries with the same criteria would be needed).
What I find hilarious is how people sometimes try to insert a collusion angle even if it is not about hacking, but about social media ads and postings. This becomes completely absurd. Then, the idea is that Russians contacted the Trump campaign in order to find out which ads they should buy and what they should post on social media. Why should they do so? If the Trump campaign had ideas about what to post and what kind of ads to buy, why didn't they just do it themselves or via an American company? What would be the point of the Trump campaign spending $564 million on the campaign, but then do a small part of the campaign via Russians who then spent a few thousand dollars for buying ads and posting messages the Trump campaign had advised them to via "collusion"? After all, if they had done it themselves or via an American intermediary, there would be nothing nefarious or suspicious about this, this idea that for a very small part of their campaign, they colluded with Russians and told them what to post and which ads to buy almost sounds as if they deliberately wanted to behave in a strange way that could then fit a preconceived collusion narrative. And even if they had outsourced some small part of their campaign to a Russian company for some odd reasons, would that make it nefarious?
I think the Russiagate theorists should at least make sure that their theories don't violate basic principles of common sense. If they want to use the hacking story, the involvement of Russian secret services might theoretically make sense – it might not be so easy for the Trump campaign to hack servers themselves (though phishing is hardly something so sophisticated that only secret services can do it, we're not talking about something like Stuxnet), and something illegal would be involved. That is a theory that could in principle make sense, the only problem is, that no evidence for this is available (and the Russians are certainly not the only ones who might have had an interest in these mails, another plausible theory is that it was an insider who disliked how the Clinton campaign took over the DNC early on and created better conditions for Clinton than for Sanders, and it could have been any hacker who, for some reason disliked Hillary Clinton, the DNC, and Podesta). If the Russiagate theorists switch over to simple social media activity because there is no evidence for Russian secret services being responsible for giving e-mails to Wikileaks, they also have to sacrifice the whole "collusion" part of the story. It might be that some Russians used social media in an organized way, but to invent a story that the Trump campaign "colluded" with Russians for a small part of their social media election campaign hardly makes sense.
The only condition under which it might somehow make sense would be if someone thought Russians are intellectually vastly superior to Americans and know much better what potential voters care about, and their capabilities are even vastly above Cambridge Analytics. Then, it might somehow make sense for the Trump campaign to hand over a part of the social media activities to Russians, and this might somehow be seen as an unfair advantage – but again, if, with that assumption, the Russians are intellectually so vastly superior that can have a significant influence with very small amounts of money and works while the Trump and Clinton campaigns spend billions, why would they have to "collude" with the Trump campaign, people who would be intellectually so much below them according to that assumption? Maybe real genius for targeting potential voters only emerges when Americans and Russians with complementary abilities collaborate? In any case, it is already very difficult just to construct a version of that theory that does not violate basic principles of common sense.
Mind controlled MoronWHAT , November 26, 2017 at 2:19 am GMT@Michael Kennyrobt , November 26, 2017 at 3:11 am GMT"Let him win in Syria"?
Dude, it`s like the first legit amusing line from you. Now bring another!
@CyranoCyrano , November 26, 2017 at 3:54 am GMTSarcasm is probably the only way to deal with it. I find myself all the time asking people if they are serious or joking. Sadly, many claim they are serious.
Currently it seems that peaceful and productive relations with a foreign power are Bad Things.
Mr Putin did amusingly say one time to a ditzy US 'journalist':
"Have you all lost your minds over there?"@robtexiled off mainstreet , November 26, 2017 at 5:03 am GMTI really truly believe that the only way to force the stupids who came up with that ridiculous story about "Russia influencing the elections" – to drop it – is to make incessantly fun of them until they finally realize how really truly stupid they are.
@DESERT FOXSarah Toga , November 26, 2017 at 5:10 am GMTThe facts support this viewpoint, including the dual citizen element of it. By the way, I oppose the death penalty except if it is applied to major serial war criminals. I recognize that all legal systems are too corrupt to be given the power of life and death, and that this is particularly true of the US system, which sets the benchmark for corruption. The corruption of the US political system, meanwhile, is revealed by the fact that this absurd Russiagate story is still being peddled and is accepted as received wisdom despite the manifold evidence proving its absurd falsity. What the article shows is that Clapper and Brennan are serial war criminals and that their latest gambit threatens our very existence. We would be better off if the utopia of a legal system incorruptible enough to allow for the death penalty did exist in the US rather than the corrupt system allowing somebody like Mueller to act extra-legally on this absurd basis was continuing in operation. By the way, the Canadian satellite media is still publishing stories trying to resuscitate the Steele dossier paid by the DNC and the yankee government as factual. The whole thing would be comical if it were not deadly serious. Those still backing the story publicly are either dangerously deluded or criminal themselves.
Does Brennan have that dark calloused spot on his forehead yet from use of his "prayer rug" ?DESERT FOX , November 26, 2017 at 3:16 pm GMT@exiled off mainstreetAnon , Disclaimer November 26, 2017 at 6:40 pm GMTThe U.S. gov is a criminal organization ran by criminal for criminals and sexual perverts and pedophiles , if interested, read these two books , THE FRANKLIN COVERUP by the late John DeCamp and THE TRANCE FORMATIO of AMERICA by Cathy Obrien and see their interviews on YouTube, the books can be had on amazon.com.
The books reveal a shocking look at the top ones in the demonrat and republicon parties, and I do mean shocking.
@Carroll PriceAnon , Disclaimer November 26, 2017 at 6:43 pm GMTThe US, Russian Federation, and the Nuland-Kagan revolution in Kiev in 2014:
"The interviews with three snipers of Georgian nationality, conducted by the Italian journalist Gian Micalessin and aired as a breathtaking documentary on Milan-based Canale 5 (Matrix program) last week, still have not paved its way to the international mainstream media.
The documentary features Alexander Revazishvili, Koba Nergadze and Zalogi Kvaratskhelia, Georgian military officers They claim that on Jan 15, 2014 they landed in Kiev equipped with fake documents Having received 1000 USD each one and being promised to be paid 5000 USD after the "job is done", they were tasked to prepare sniper positions inside the buildings of Hotel Ukraine and Conservatory, dominant over the Maidan Square. Along with other snipers (some of them were Lithuanians) they were put under command of an American military operative Brian Christopher Boyenger. The coordinating team also included Mamulashvili and infamous Segrey Pashinsky, who was detained by protesters on Feb 18, 2017 with a sniper rifle in the boot of his car The weapons came on stage on February 18 and were distributed to the various Georgian and Lithuanian groups. "There were three or four weapons in each bag, there were Makarov guns, AKM guns, rifles, and a lot of cartridges." – witnesses Nergadze.
The following day, Mamulashvili and Pashinsky explained to snipers that they should shoot at the square and sow chaos.
"I listened to the screams," recalls Revazishvili. "There were many dead and injured downstairs. My first and only thought was to leave in a hurry before they caught up with me. Otherwise, they would tear me apart."Four years later, Revazishvili and his two companions report they have not yet received the promised 5000 USD bills as a payment and have decided to tell the truth about those who "used and abandoned" them."
Well that was a clear picture of a sausage-making during the US-sponsored regime change in Ukraine. The neo-Nazi in the US-supported "government" in Kiev came about naturally.
@Carroll PriceAn addition to the previous post.
The Maidan revolution and its neo-Nazi consequence makes an amazing monument to the Kagans' clan:"Thousands of Ukrainian ultra-nationalists marched in Kiev, Thursday, celebrating the 106th birthday of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) leader Stepan Bandera [famous Nazis collaborator]. Among the main organisers were representatives of Right Sector and Svoboda." https://www.liveleak.com/view?i=6a7_1420142767#gDHooVSL6b0yQ1SG.99
"Members of the Ukrainian neo-Nazi Azov volunteer battalion and their ultranationalist civilian sympathizers have conducted a torchlit procession in the center of the eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol, held under the slogan "coming after you!" http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_72571.shtml
"A leader of Ukrainian Jewry condemned the hosting in Lviv of a festival celebrating a Nazi collaborator on the anniversary of a major pogrom against the city's Jews." http://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/Ukraine-city-to-hold-festival-in-honor-of-Nazi-collaborator-498159
The wide-spread desecration of Jewish cemetries by Ukrainian thugs (a post-Maidan phenomenon) has spilled to Poland: "Yet another case of vandalism by Ukrainian nationalists is on the record in Poland. This time, an old Jewish cemetery in Kraków became the target of thugs from the neighboring state. The graves of Polish Jews who died over a century ago were destroyed by those hot-blood Ukrainians." https://www.reddit.com/r/antisemitism/comments/5npnj5/ukrainian_nationalists_stand_behind_desecration/
"Vandals desecrated the Korinovskaya Jewish Cemetery in Kiev. They destroyed two entire sections: 27 and 28. These acts of vandalism are very systematic: every night they destroy one or two headstones. According to the elderly women who look after the place, these vandals are usually drunken youths who come there to wreak destruction. The Zaddik of Chernobyl is buried in this cemetery. These vandals destroyed his gravestone, smearing Satanic Cult symbols on it."
http://antisemitism.org.il/article/58386/ukraine-8211-desecration-jewish-cemetery-kiev
Nov 28, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
How Washington's chronic deceit -- especially towards Russia -- has sabotaged U.S. foreign policy.
For any country, the foundation of successful diplomacy is a reputation for credibility and reliability. Governments are wary of concluding agreements with a negotiating partner that violates existing commitments and has a record of duplicity. Recent U.S. administrations have ignored that principle, and their actions have backfired majorly, damaging American foreign policy in the process.
The consequences of previous deceit are most evident in the ongoing effort to achieve a diplomatic solution to the North Korean nuclear crisis. During his recent trip to East Asia, President Trump urged Kim Jong-un's regime to "come to the negotiating table" and "do the right thing" -- relinquish the country's nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs. Presumably, that concession would lead to a lifting (or at least an easing) of international economic sanctions and a more normal relationship between Pyongyang and the international community.
Unfortunately, North Korean leaders have abundant reasons to be wary of such U.S. enticements. Trump's transparent attempt to renege on Washington's commitment to the deal with Iran known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) -- which the United States and other major powers signed in 2015 to curb Tehran's nuclear program -- certainly does not increase Pyongyang's incentive to sign a similar agreement. His decision to decertify Iran's compliance with the JCPOA, even when the United Nations confirms that Tehran is adhering to its obligations, appears more than a little disingenuous.
North Korea is likely focused on another incident that raises even greater doubts about U.S. credibility. Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi capitulated on the nuclear issue in December of 2003, abandoning his country's nuclear program and reiterating a commitment to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. In exchange, the United States and its allies lifted economic sanctions and welcomed Libya back into the community of respectable nations. Barely seven years later, though, Washington and its NATO partners double-crossed Qaddafi, launching airstrikes and cruise missile attacks to assist rebels in their campaign to overthrow the Libyan strongman. North Korea and other powers took notice of Qaddafi's fate, making the already difficult task of getting a de-nuclearization agreement with Pyongyang nearly impossible.
The Libya intervention sullied America's reputation in another way. Washington and its NATO allies prevailed on the UN Security Council to pass a resolution endorsing a military intervention to protect innocent civilians. Russia and China refrained from vetoing that resolution after Washington's assurances that military action would be limited in scope and solely for humanitarian purposes. Once the assault began, it quickly became evident that the resolution was merely a fig leaf for another U.S.-led regime-change war.
Beijing, and especially Moscow, understandably felt duped. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates succinctly described Russia's reaction, both short-term and long-term:
The Russians later firmly believed they had been deceived on Libya. They had been persuaded to abstain at the UN on the grounds that the resolution provided for a humanitarian mission to prevent the slaughter of civilians. Yet as the list of bombing targets steadily grew, it became obvious that very few targets were off-limits, and that NATO was intent on getting rid of Qaddafi. Convinced they had been tricked, the Russians would subsequently block any such future resolutions, including against President Bashar al-Assad in Syria.
The Libya episode was hardly the first time the Russians concluded that U.S. leaders had cynically misled them . Moscow asserts that when East Germany unraveled in 1990, both U.S. Secretary of State James Baker and West German Foreign Minister Hans Dietrich Genscher offered verbal assurances that, if Russia accepted a unified Germany within NATO, the alliance would not expand beyond Germany's eastern border. The official U.S. position that there was nothing in writing affirming such a limitation is correct -- and the clarity, extent, and duration of any verbal commitment to refrain from enlargement are certainly matters of intense controversy . But invoking a "you didn't get it in writing" dodge does not inspire another government's trust.
There seems to be no limit to Washington's desire to crowd Russia. NATO has even added the Baltic republics, which had been part of the Soviet Union itself. In early 2008, President George W. Bush unsuccessfully tried to admit Georgia and Ukraine, which would have engineered yet another alliance move eastward. By that time, Vladimir Putin and other Russian leaders were beyond furious.
The timing of Bush's attempted ploy could scarcely have been worse. It came on the heels of Russia's resentment at another example of U.S. duplicity. In 1999, Moscow had reluctantly accepted a UN mandate to cover NATO's military intervention against Serbia, a long-standing Russian client. The alliance airstrikes and subsequent moves to detach and occupy Serbia's restless province of Kosovo for the ostensible reason of protecting innocent civilians from atrocities was the same "humanitarian" justification that the West would use subsequently in Libya.
Nine years after the initial Kosovo intervention, the United States adopted an evasive policy move, showing utter contempt for Russia's wishes and interests in the process. Kosovo wanted to declare its formal independence from Serbia, but it was clear that such a move would face a certain Russian (and probable Chinese) veto in the UN Security Council. Washington and an ad-hoc coalition of European Union countries brazenly bypassed the Council and approved Pristina's independence declaration. It was an extremely controversial move. Not even all EU members were on board with the policy, since some of them (e.g., Spain) had secessionist problems of their own.
Russia's leaders protested vehemently and warned that the West's unauthorized action established a dangerous, destabilizing international precedent. Washington rebuffed their complaints, arguing that the Kosovo situation was unique. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs R. Nicholas Burns made that point explicitly in a February 2008 State Department briefing. Both the illogic and the hubris of that position were breathtaking.
It is painful for any American to admit that the United States has acquired a well-deserved reputation for duplicity in its foreign policy. But the evidence for that proposition is quite substantial. Indeed, disingenuous U.S. behavior regarding NATO expansion and the resolution of Kosovo's political status may be the single most important factor for the poisoned bilateral relationship with Moscow. The U.S. track record of duplicity and betrayal is one reason why prospects for resolving the North Korean nuclear issue through diplomacy are so bleak.
Actions have consequences, and Washington's reputation for disingenuous behavior has complicated America's own foreign policy objectives. This is a textbook example of a great power shooting itself in the foot.
Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow in defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, is the author of 10 books, the contributing editor of 10 books, and the author of more than 700 articles and policy studies on international affairs.
Magdi , says: November 28, 2017 at 5:46 am
you are dead ON! I have been saying this since IRAQHerbert Heebert , says: November 28, 2017 at 7:47 am
fiasco (not one Iraqi onboard on 9/11) we should have invaded egypt and saudi arabia. how the foolish american public(sheep) just buys the american propaganda is beyond me.. don't blame the Russians one spittle!!A few points:Viriato , says: November 28, 2017 at 9:25 am1. I think North Korea might also be looking at the example of Ukraine, and Russia's clear violation of the Budapest Memorandum.
2. It's silly to put so much weight on Baker's verbal assurance re: NATO expansion.
3. I would suggest Mr. Carpenter make a list of Russia's betrayals. But I have the impression he is not interested.
Excellent piece. The US really has destroyed its credibility over the years.craigsummers , says: November 28, 2017 at 10:09 amThis points Ted Galen Carpenter makes in this piece go a long way toward explaining Russia's destabilizing behavior in recent years.
One point in particular jumped out at me:
"Kosovo wanted to declare its formal independence from Serbia, but it was clear that such a move would face a certain Russian (and probable Chinese) veto in the UN Security Council. Washington and an ad-hoc coalition of European Union countries brazenly bypassed the Council and approved Pristina's independence declaration. It was an extremely controversial move. Not even all EU members were on board with the policy, since some of them (e.g., Spain) had secessionist problems of their own. Russia's leaders protested vehemently and warned that the West's unauthorized action established a dangerous, destabilizing international precedent. Washington rebuffed their complaints, arguing that the Kosovo situation was unique."
This -- in the context of the long history of US and EU deceit and duplicity in their dealings with Russia is why Russia is supporting Catalan separatism (e.g. RT en Espańol's constant attacks on Spain and promotion of the separatists). The US and the EU effectively gave Russia permission to do this back in the 1990s. We set a precedent for their actions in Catalonia -- and, more famously, in Ukraine.
This
Mr. CarpenterDOD , says: November 28, 2017 at 10:23 amYou have made a reasonable case that the US and Europe have not always been reliable, but the expansion of NATO is not one of them. No one forced any eastern European country to join NATO and the EU – decisions that indicate these countries feared a Russian revival after the collapse of the USSR. Russia always believed that these countries were in their near abroad or backyard.
The idea of a "sphere of influence" is a cold war relic which Russia invoked with the Medvedev Doctrine in 2008. This is currently on display in Ukraine. Russia is aggressively denying Ukraine their sovereignty. Who could possibly blame former Soviet Block countries for hightailing it to NATO during a lull in Russian aggression?
One could scarcely ask for a better summary of why the Cold War seems, sadly, to be reheating as well as why Democratic attempts to blame it on Russian meddling are a equally sad evasion of their share of bipartisan responsibility for creating this mess. Reinhold Niebuhr's prayer for, "the courage to change the things I can," is painfully appropriate.Michael Kenny , says: November 28, 2017 at 12:12 pmThe whole weakness of the author's argument is a classic American one: very few Americans seem to be able to get their heads around the fact that the Soviet Union ceased to exist 26 years ago! They are still totally locked into their cold war mentality. He thus unquestioningly accepts Putin's pre-1789 "sphere of influence" theory in which there are "superior" and "inferior" races, with only the superior races being entitled to have a sovereign state and the inferior races being forced to submit to being ruled by foreigners. Mr Carpenter really needs to put his cold war mentality aside and come into the 21st century!Will Harrington , says: November 28, 2017 at 12:58 pmMost seriously of all, Mr Carpenter offers no solution for improving relations between the US and Russia. Saying that past US actions were wrong, even if true, says nothing about the present and offers nothing for the future. At best, Mr Carpenter's article is empty moralising.
And the unspoken, but perfectly obvious, subtext, namely that the US should "atone for its sins" by capitulating to Putin, is morally reprehensible and politically unrealistic. Since, by Mr Carpenter's own account, the problem is caused by US wrongdoing, isn't it for the US to put things right (for example, by getting Putin out of Ukraine) and not simply make a mess in someone else's country and then run for home with its tail between its legs? Who gave Americans the right to give away other people's countries?
Herbert HeevertWill Harrington , says: November 28, 2017 at 1:15 pmThe one problem with your argument if, you are an american as I am, is that Russia is not acting in our names. If the US government, supposedly a government of, by, and for the people breaks its word, then you and I are foresworn oathbreakers as well because the government is (theoretically, at least) acting on OUR authority.
Craig SummersNoldorElf , says: November 28, 2017 at 1:31 pmReally?! "Russia always believed that these countries were in their near abroad or backyard."
I think that if you look at a map or a globe, you will find that this is not a belief but a fact. How you could overlook this, I don't know.
"The idea of a "sphere of influence" is a cold war relic "
If you are going to try and use history to influence opinion, it is best to check your facts. This is a very old concept.What do you think the Great Game between Imperial Russia and the British Empire in Central Asia was about? For that matter, what we call the Byzantine Commonwealth was a clearly attempt by the Romaoi to establish a political, cultural, and religious sphere of influence to support the power of the Empire, much as the United States has been doing over the past several decades.
You could make the case that Iraq too in 2003 is another reason why the Russians and the North Koreans distrust the US.Jeeves , says: November 28, 2017 at 1:42 pmAt this point, it is fairly certain that the Bush Administration knew that Saddam was not building nuclear weapons of mass destruction, which is what Bush strongly implied in his ramp up to the war.
One other takeaway that the North Koreans mag have from the 2003 Iraq invasion is that the US will lie any way to get what it wants.
Not saying that Russia or North Korea are perfect. Far from it. But the US needs to take a hard look in the mirror.
What Craigsummers said.SteveM , says: November 28, 2017 at 1:49 pmAnd, Mr. Carpenter, when you have time off from your job as Russian apologist, learn the meaning of "verbal." It's not a synonym for "oral."
Re: craigsummers, "No one forced any eastern European country to join NATO and the EU – decisions that indicate these countries feared a Russian revival after the collapse of the USSR. Russia always believed that these countries were in their near abroad or backyard."b. , says: November 28, 2017 at 2:33 pmExcept both here and abroad, the Global Cop Elites in Washington shape the strategy space through propaganda, fear-mongering and subversion. Moreover, the Eastern European countries are happy to join NATO when it's the American taxpayers who foot a large percentage of the bill.
Standard U.S. MO: create the threat, inflate the threat, send in the War Machine at massive cost to sustain the threat.
Rather than being broadened, NATO should have been ratcheted back after the fall of the Soviet Union, and the U.S. military presence in Europe massively reduced. Then normalized relations between Europe and Russia would have been designed and developed by Europe and Russia. Not the 800 pound Gorilla Global Cop that is good at little more than breaking things. (And perversely, after flushing TRILLIONS of tax dollars down the toilet, duping Americans to wildly applaud the "Warrior-Heroes" for a job well done.)
The 2008 war between Georgia and Russia was, per observers at the time, in Russian word and thought directly linked to the Balkan 's precedent.Janek , says: November 28, 2017 at 2:45 pmThe subtext here – of nation states, sovereignty, separatism and secessionist movements – is even more relevant with respect to US-China relationships. Since WW2 and that brief, transient monopoly on nuclear weapons, US foreign policy has eroded the Peace of Westphalia while attempting to erect an "international order" of convenience on top if it.
Both China and Russia know that nothing will stop the expansionism of US "national interests". In response to the doctrinal aspirations of the Soviets, the US has committed itself to an ideology that is just a greedy and relentless. In retrospect, it is hard to tell how many decades ago the Cold War stopped being about opposition to Soviet ideology, and instead became about "projecting" – in every sense of the word – an equally globalist US ideology.
We are the redcoats now. Now wonder the neocons and neolibs are shouting "Russia!" at every opportunity.
I am amazed how many masochistic conservatives are in USA conservative circles especially in the CATO institute. Mr. T. G. Carpenter, as is clear from not only this and other articles, is a staunch defender of Yalta and proponent of Yalta 2 after the Cold War ended. As far as I remember Libya was the hatchet job of the Europeans especially the French and British. B. Obama at first didn't want to attack Libya but gave in after lobbying by the French, British and the neoliberal/neo-conservative lobby and supporters of the Arab Spring in the USA. America lost credibility after and only since the conservatives neoliberals and neocons manipulated USA and the West's foreign politics for thirty plus years. USA is still a democratic country so it is easy to blame everything on the US. In today's Putin's Russia similar critics of the Russian politics wouldn't be so "easy".SteveM , says: November 28, 2017 at 2:45 pmThe Central Europe doesn't want Russia's sphere of influence precisely because of centuries of Russian occupation and atrocities in there especially after WW2, brutal and bloody invasion of Hungary, Czechoslovakia, the Cuban Crisis, Afghanistan, Chechnya etc. Now you have infiltration by Russia of the American electoral process and political system and some conservatives still can't connect the dots and see what is going on. I wonder why the western conservatives and US in particular are such great supporters of Russia. If Russia should be allowed to keep her sphere of influence after the Cold War then what was the reason to fight the Cold War in the first place. Wouldn't it be easier to surrender to Russia right after WW2.
One other observation about Russia that should be made but isn't is that the Russia-phobes can't point to an actual motive for Russian military aggression. There is no "Putin Plan" for conquest and domination by Russia like in Das Kapital or Hitler's Mein Kampf . What strategic value would Russia see from overrunning Poland and then having to perpetually suppress 35 million resistors? Or retaking the Baltic states that have only minority ethnic Russian populations?Mark , says: November 28, 2017 at 3:00 pmPutin is a rationally calculating man. He has made his strategic objectives well known. They are economic. He sees Russia as the great linchpin of the pan-Eurasian One Belt/One Road (OB/OR) initiative proposed by China as well as the AIIB. In that construct, Europe and East Asia are Russia's customers and bilateral trading partners. Military conquest would wreck that vision and Putin knows it.
In the gangster movies, a mob boss often says that he hates bloodshed because it's bad for business. That's Putin. He's been remarkably restrained when egged on by Big Mouth Nikki Haley, Mad Dog Mattis or that other Pentagon nutcase Phillip Breedlove (former Supreme Commander of NATO) who have gone out of their way to demonize Russia. Unfortunately, with those Pentagon hacks whispering in Trump's ear, too much war-mongering is never enough.
U.S. foreign policy is an unmitigated disaster. The War Machine Hammer wrecks everything that it touches while sending the befuddled taxpayers the bill.
"And, Mr. Carpenter, when you have time off from your job as Russian apologist, learn the meaning of "verbal." It's not a synonym for "oral."I imagine you thought you were being funny; and you were, just not in the way you foresaw. In fact, verbal is a synonym for oral; to wit, "spoken rather than written; oral. "a verbal agreement". Synonyms: oral, spoken, stated, said, verbalized, expressed."
Of course anyone who attempts to portray the United States as duplicitous and sneaky (those are synonyms!)is immediately branded a "Russian apologist". As if there are certain countries which automatically have no rights, and can be assumed to be lying every time they speak. Except they're not, and the verbal agreement that NATO would not advance further east in exchange for Russian cooperation has been acknowledged by western principals who were present.
As SteveM implies, NATO's reason for being evaporated with the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, and was dead as a dodo with the breakup of the Soviet Union. Everything since has been a rationalization for keeping it going, including regular demonizations of imaginary enemies until they become real enemies. You can't just 'join NATO' because it's the in-crowd, you know. No, there are actually criteria, one of which is the premise that your acceptance materially enhances the security of the alliance. Pretty comical imagining Montenegro in that context, isn't it?
When you meet individual Americans, they are frequently so nice and level-headed that you are perplexed trying to imagine where their leaders come from. And while we're on that subject, America does not actually have a foreign policy, as such. Its foreign policy is to bend every other living soul on the planet to the service of America.
Nov 22, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com
outthere , 22 November 2017 at 03:24 PM
Here is an analysis of how much Israel spent to influence USA elections
Washington - Which Nation is Really Interfering in the Electoral Process?
http://viableopposition.blogspot.ru/2017/07/washington-which-nation-is-really.html
Nov 22, 2017 | www.unz.com
survey-of-disinfo , November 20, 2017 at 1:50 pm GMT@ErebusJust imagine what songs Bandar Bush is singing in "the Ritz" these days. Want to sue Saudi Arabia for money because of 9/11? No problem, judge. Here are the names, here are the numbers, and here are the facts.
Disagree regarding multipolar order. The super structures for Globalism are untouched in all this theatrical displays. All parties seem to participate actively in key Globalist institutions.
Petrodollar is not and was never a component of NWO. It was an instrument of American supremacy. There are no planned superpowers in the NWO vision. Only Super-Institutions .