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Best of the Web: Bolivia: What happens to the lithium industry without Morales?

EvoMoralesQuote
Bolivia's President Evo Morales was overthrown in a military coup on November 10. He is now in Mexico. Before he left office, Morales had been involved in a long project to bring economic and social democracy to his long-exploited country. It is important to recall that Bolivia has suffered a series of coups, often conducted by the military and the oligarchy on behalf of transnational mining companies. Initially, these were tin firms, but tin is no longer the main target in Bolivia. The main target is its massive deposits of lithium, crucial for the electric car.

Over the past 13 years, Morales has tried to build a different relationship between his country and its resources. He has not wanted the resources to benefit the transnational mining firms, but rather to benefit his own population. Part of that promise was met as Bolivia's poverty rate has declined, and as Bolivia's population was able to improve its social indicators. Nationalization of resources combined with the use of its income to fund social development has played a role. The attitude of the Morales government toward the transnational firms produced a harsh response from them, many of them taking Bolivia to court.

Over the course of the past few years, Bolivia has struggled to raise investment to develop the lithium reserves in a way that brings the wealth back into the country for its people. Morales' Vice President Álvaro García Linera had said that lithium is the "fuel that will feed the world." Bolivia was unable to make deals with Western transnational firms; it decided to partner with Chinese firms. This made the Morales government vulnerable. It had walked into the new Cold War between the West and China. The coup against Morales cannot be understood without a glance at this clash.

Comment: See also:


Laptop

Inside job? Labour undergoes second cyber-attack in two days


Comment: No doubt Russia will be blamed, but it's more likely British or Israeli intelligence is behind this attack, given that they have been waging war on Corbyn since they declared him 'national security threat #1' back when he was elected leader of the Labour Party in September 2015.


Corbyn
© YouTube/RevolutionBahrainMCUK Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn
The Labour party has faced a second cyber-attack, a day after experiencing what it called a "sophisticated and large-scale" attempt to disrupt its digital systems.

It is understood the party was the subject of a second distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on Tuesday afternoon. Such attacks use "botnets" - networks of compromised computers - to flood a server with requests that overwhelm it.

A Labour spokeswoman said: "We have ongoing security processes in place to protect our platforms, so users may be experiencing some differences. We are dealing with this quickly and efficiently."

Labour has not said who it suspects is behind the attacks, but said it was confident its security systems ensured there was no data breach.

Comment: Reuters, 12/11/2019: Corbyn 'very nervous' about elections due to cyber attack
British opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said on Tuesday a large-scale cyber attack on his party's digital platforms just weeks before a national election had made him nervous about the rest of the campaign.

"If this is a sign of things to come in this election, I feel very nervous about it all because a cyber attack against a political party in an election is suspicious and something one is very worried about," he said when asked by a reporter about the attack during a campaign event.

Corbyn said the party was looking into who might have been behind the attack.



Wolf

Without quorum or vote, random blonde declares herself 'interim president' in Bolivia


Comment: The Venezuela coup attempt of 2019 gave us Random Guy Named Juan. Now meet Random Chica Named Jeanine...


Bolivian Senator Jeanine Anez
© Reuters/Carlos Garcia RawlinsBolivian Senator Jeanine Anez gestures after she declared herself as Interim President of Bolivia, at the balcony of the Presidential Palace in La Paz, November 12, 2019.
Opposition politician Jeanine Añez has declared herself "interim president" of Bolivia without a vote, but the party of ousted President Evo Morales said that the Senate had no quorum and the legislature's session was not legal.

Añez's actions echo those of Juan Guaido in Venezuela, who declared himself "interim president" in January with the backing of Washington and the Organization of American States (OAS). While Guaido has repeatedly failed to oust President Nicolas Maduro, however, the opposition in Bolivia - also backed by the US and OAS - has been able to force the resignation of Morales after the military defected to their side.

Comment: thesaker.is: 12/11/2019: Peskov: Bolivia was an orchestrated coup to overthrow Morales!


RT, 12/11/2019: Marco Rubio blames Putin for Bolivian coup coverage he doesn't like
Eager to find some way to implicate Russia in Bolivia's political crisis and control of the US narrative, Republican senator Marco Rubio branded any skeptical coverage of events as an example of how "Putin uses disinformation."

Rubio did not specify exactly what kind of "fake news" he was referring to, but his past statements and support for the Bolivian opposition indicate that he is displeased with media coverage accurately referring to Morales' ousting under military pressure as a coup.

Twitter was quick to step in and point out that Rubio's description of how 'Russian' propaganda spreads is indeed quite similar to how the US government maintains narrative control on issues of foreign policy — usually by ensuring that misleading or outright false official statements proliferate rapidly in the media.


Journalist Dan Cohen said Rubio's interpretation of what was happening with coverage of Bolivia amounted to "pure projection."

"I mean, the US just assisted with a right wing fascist coup to overturn a democratic election... you're like a cartoon," another user wrote.

"If you disagree with Marco Rubio's warped neocon version of reality with regard to Bolivia, then you might be spreading Russian disinformation. Very convenient." added journalist Rania Khalek.


Rubio does have quite the incentive to keep pushing the line that Morales was ousted in a popular uprising though — and that Russia must be behind any other narrative. Leaked audio recordings show that right-wing Rubio was among a group of US senators actively plotting with the Bolivian opposition to overthrow the socialist leader.
See also:


TV

Impeachment turns into a Schiff show: Unconstitutional, no crimes and only far-left Democrat support

Schiff
© wtop.comHouse Intelligence Committee chair Adam Schiff
You just can't break the truth. No matter how far you may bend it, it is always the truth. The Democrats are learning this lesson again and it is going to be really ugly this time and it should.

Speaker Pelosi and her band of socialist Democrats went 'all-in' on an impeachment of President Trump. They've wanted this since before the 2017 Inauguration. However, in their rage they forgot and are missing a couple of key points - one, there must be high crimes, misdemeanors, treason or bribery - and two, there must be public support. Unfortunately for the Dems, they have neither.

The Schiff Sham is unconstitutional

As the Democrats move forward with their insane impeachment hearing in the House, the levels of insanity reach new levels. The Schiff Sham is unconstitutional, that is why it is so insane!

The Democrats created an impeachment process where the individual leading the process was involved in creating it with a CIA spy who leaked information from a Presidential call. The same CIA spy was kicked out of the White House in 2017 for leaking.

Bulb

Best of the Web: Ukrainian oligarch Kolomoysky blasts US in NYT interview, calls for 'new Warsaw Pact' with Russia - "They're stronger anyway"


Comment: Some variant of this was always going to come about. That it took them over 5 years of dancing with the devil, and over 10,000 lives, sums up the utter fecklessness and lack of foresight of the Ukrainian political elite.

Putin has been proven correct in his strategy since the Americans' coup in 2014 to just keep Ukraine on a leash but otherwise stay out of it; Kiev would eventually see the light and come crawling back.


A tycoon who spent millions of dollars arming anti-Russian fighters in Ukraine has emerged from the shadows to blast the Europe he once idolized. The oligarch now sees alliance with Russia as the only option for his country.
Igor Kolomoysky
© Reuters / Valentyn OgirenkoIgor Kolomoysky is one of Ukraine's most powerful tycoons.
Igor Kolomoysky, the oligarch seen by many as the shadow power behind Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, has changed his tune sharply from the days of the 2014 Maidan rebellion.

Back then he was an ally of pro-European President Petro Poroshenko, who even appointed him governor of the Dnepropetrovsk region. Once installed there, Kolomoysky placed a bounty on captured fighters from the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk republics, who fought against the new authorities in Kiev, and spent a reported $10 million per month fielding his own private militia, also funding ultranationalist volunteer units, like the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion.

"We'll just have to kill them," he said of the rebels at the time.

Comment: This "chancer" who "only wants money" couldn't "see objectively" in 2014 that Ukrainians want "people want peace, a good life, and not to be at war."

But now he does?

We shall see.

In the meantime, what can the Americans do about this? Sanction Kolomoysky? Sanction Zelensky and the Ukrainian govt itself?!


Star of David

Israel hits home of Islamic Jihad official in Damascus, killing his son, after bombing home of top Islamic Jihad commander in Gaza


Comment: Note: 'Islamic Jihad' has nothing to do with those so-called Islamic jihadists who wrecked Libya, Iraq and Syria. This is the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine, a self-defence organization in the Gaza Strip and West Bank that was founded in 1981. A political rival to Hamas, this Islamic Jihad is backed by Iran, partners with Hezbollah, and has been increasing in strength since Israel put the squeeze on Hamas. Hence Israel's extra-territorial targeting of two of its leaders in Gaza and Syria this week...


islamic jihad soldier gaza
© Reuters/Mohammed SalemA Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant stands guard at the scene of an Israeli strike that killed the group's field commander Baha Abu Al-Atta in Gaza City November 12, 2019.
A strike on a Damascus home belonging to an Islamic Jihad official has killed the man's son, in what appears to be part of an Israeli operation to assassinate leaders of the Palestinian militant group in Gaza and Syria.

Islamic Jihad issued a statement on Tuesday confirming the attack, identifying the official as Akram al-Ajouri. A separate missile strike reportedly hit a civilian building near the Lebanese Embassy in the western district of the capital that is home to Damascus University and several diplomatic missions.

The group did not immediately accuse anyone of carrying out the strike, although it occurred shortly after an Israeli attack killed a top Islamic Jihad commander in Gaza.


Comment: Israel did not confine its attacks to Gaza, but also attacked the neighborhood of the Lebanese Embassy in Syria, where two people were killed and six wounded:
A suspected missile strike hit a civilian building near the Lebanese Embassy in the western district of the capital that is home to Damascus University and many diplomatic premises late on Monday night. It is not yet clear who is behind the attack.

A number of photos emerged on social media depicting the aftermath of the strike, which appears to have damaged at least one building, which also caught fire.


Some users online speculated that Israel may have carried out the strike as the attack allegedly come from the Lebanese airspace, which had previously been violated by the IAF on numerous occasions to bomb targets inside Syria. Israel neither confirms nor denies "foreign media reports" of its cross border strikes as part of a long-standing information policy.
Rockets were launched into Israel in response to Akram al-Ajouri.'s assassination:
Islamic Jihad has vowed revenge, and seems to have received the support of Hamas, the group that currently rules Gaza. Israel has warned Hamas not to get involved, RT's Paula Slier reported from Jerusalem.

Some of the rockets fired into Israel from Gaza have reportedly been intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defense system, but many managed to come through as well. There have been no reports of Israeli casualties as of yet.


Slier says the strikes on two leaders indicate "a resumption in the israeli policy of targeted assassinations." Since the August 2014 assassination of senior Hamas commander Raed al-Attar, Israel has only admitted to one other targeted killing, that of Hamed Ahmed Abed Khudari in May this year.

Bibi is attempting to hang on to relevance with murder:
On 10 September, rockets fired in the direction of Ashdod and nearby Ashkelon, reportedly orchestrated from Gaza by Islamic Jihad chief al-Ata, triggered sirens that forced Netanyahu to interrupt a campaign speech and rush off the stage in order to take shelter.

​Although the Israeli prime minister later returned to continue the address, he was reportedly frustrated by the incident, which happened just a week before the Knesset election on 17 September, and forced his security officials to proceed with an operation to eliminate Baha Abu al-Ata. It was, however, reported that military commanders forced Netanyahu to postpone the operation, fearing too many civilian deaths.
The plan to target al-Ata was then reportedly discussed by Israeli ministers several times following the 10 September attack and approved on 3 November, but the Cabinet was forced to delay the operation after Education Minister from the hardline party Jewish Home Rafi Peretz hinted at the plan, openly discussing the idea of reviving targeted killings. The Cabinet's final decision to kill the Islamic Jihad commander was then reportedly made on 10 November.
The IDF announced via Twitter, on 12 November, that Gaza-based Jihadist commander Baha Abu al-Ata had been killed as a result of an Israeli military strike on his home in the early hours of Tuesday, targeting only the specific room where the militant and his wife were sleeping, thus leaving other parts of the building intact. An IDF spokesman later said that al-Ata was "a ticking bomb" and allegedly plotting "imminent" attacks on Israel.



Quenelle

On the campaign trail: Boris Johnson gets no-nonsense telling off from Yorkshire flood victims


Comment: In fact, he got a right boll*cking. It is in no way a sure thing that Boris will win next month's general election...


boris johnson yorkshire
© Reuters / Pool / Danny LawsonBritish Prime Minister Boris Johnson attempts to talk to a local woman in Stainforth, South Yorkshire
British PM Boris Johnson probably wishes he had stayed indoors after coming under fire from a number of angry victims of severe floods in South Yorkshire during a walkabout to see how the recovery operation was progressing.

Johnson was paying a visit to Stainforth on Wednesday, one of the places that has suffered most from torrential rainfall that has seen much of South Yorkshire as well as communities in the East Midlands and Lincolnshire underwater over the last week.

The prime minister attempted to have a chat with one resident who was busily helping with recovery work, but received a wholly unwelcoming response.
"I'm not very happy about talking to you, so if you don't mind I'll just mooch on with what I'm doing. Because you've not helped us... I don't want you to meet us. "

If Johnson thought that would be his only uncomfortable altercation with a member of the public, he was soon to be disappointed. Approaching other victims of the flood, one of them shouted: "Took your time, Boris." While another said: "Where have you been?"

Comment: New boss, same as the old boss... At least the people seem to see it!


Bomb

Military veterans have become America's walking wounded

Come you masters of war / You that build the big guns

You that build the death planes / You that build all the bombs

You that hide behind walls / You that hide behind desks

I just want you to know / I can see through your masks....

You fasten all the triggers / For the others to fire

Then you sit back and watch / When the death count gets higher

You hide in your mansion / While the young people's blood

Flows out of their bodies / And is buried in the mud.

— Bob Dylan, "Masters of War"
US Military Veterans
© ABC News
War drives the American police state.

The military-industrial complex is the world's largest employer.

War sustains our way of life while killing us at the same time. As Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent and author Chris Hedges observes:
War is like a poison. And just as a cancer patient must at times ingest a poison to fight off a disease, so there are times in a society when we must ingest the poison of war to survive. But what we must understand is that just as the disease can kill us, so can the poison. If we don't understand what war is, how it perverts us, how it corrupts us, how it dehumanizes us, how it ultimately invites us to our own self-annihilation, then we can become the victim of war itself.
War also entertains us with its carnage, its killing fields, its thrills and chills and bloodied battles set to music and memorialized in books, on television, in video games, and in superhero films and blockbuster Hollywood movies financed in part by the military.

Americans are fed a steady diet of pro-war propaganda that keeps them content to wave flags with patriotic fervor and less inclined to look too closely at the mounting body counts, the ruined lives, the ravaged countries, the blowback arising from ill-advised targeted-drone killings and bombing campaigns in foreign lands, or the transformation of our own homeland into a warzone.

Nowhere is this double-edged irony more apparent than during military holidays, when we get treated to a generous serving of praise and grandstanding by politicians, corporations and others with similarly self-serving motives eager to go on record as being pro-military.

Yet war is a grisly business, a horror of epic proportions.

Bullseye

Boris Johnson's amnesty for Northern Ireland soldiers is a license to kill

british soldiers
© AFP / DARDE
Boris Johnson's pledge to end prosecutions of soldiers accused of unlawful killings during Northern Ireland's conflict not only denies justice for victims, it's a license for British forces in all conflicts to kill with impunity.

Prime Minister Johnson made his announcement on the annual Armistice Day commemorating the end of World War I. In a blatant electioneering ploy, he said if his Conservative government is re-elected on December 12, then British law will be amended to bar any future prosecution of soldiers for alleged atrocities committed during Northern Ireland's three-decade conflict (1969-1998).

Such an amnesty has long been called for by right-wing Tory lawmakers, many of them ex-servicemen, as well as the military establishment and jingoistic British media. The Daily Mail has been campaigning to end what it calls 'witch-hunts' of veteran soldiers accused of unlawful killings in Northern Ireland.

Johnson's vow to scrap prosecutions is red meat to his increasingly right-wing Conservative Party and supporters, and is no doubt aimed at rallying voters in elections next month to push through his Brexit plans.

Sheeple

Russian to the wrong conclusions? UK 'liberal-leftists' dancing to the Browder/Clinton tune

dancing russians
© AFP / LEON NEAL
Russophobia has reared its head in the UK general election campaign, with 'centrists' & 'liberal-leftists' getting into a right old flap over the delayed release of a report into alleged Russian interference in British politics.

For a long while we were told that Jeremy Corbyn, the anti-war UK Labour leader, and his left-wing Director of Communications Seumas Milne, were 'Kremlin stooges.' Now it seems that the right-wing Tory leader Boris Johnson, his Special Adviser Dom Cummings, and the whole UK government are too. That's how psychedelic Russophobia (November 2019 version) has become. The whole of our establishment is riddled with Kremlin agents! 'Putin controls EVERYTHING.'

The trigger for the latest and most doolally outbreak yet of this virulent and highly contagious mental disease has been the UK government's decision to delay the release of an Intelligence and Security Committee report into alleged Russian interference in British politics until after the December 12 general election.