Best of the Web:


Che Guevara

Best of the Web: 'OAS misled public': MIT study finds 'NO evidence of fraud' in Bolivia election that saw Evo Morales ousted in military coup


Comment: Which means the OAS and Chrystia Freeland's Lima Group rigged it. TEXTBOOK 'meddling in other countries' democratic affairs'...


evo morales
© Reuters / Mariana Greif
A new MIT study has found no evidence of fraud in Bolivia's 2019 election, despite allegations of serious irregularities by the Organization of American States (OAS), which led to the ousting of Evo Morales in a military coup.

John Curiel and Jack R Williams examined the OAS's report and published their findings in the Washington Post on Thursday. "As specialists in election integrity, we find that the statistical evidence does not support the claim of fraud in Bolivia's October election," they wrote.

The MIT researchers said the OAS had adopted a "novel approach to fraud analysis" and that its statistical conclusions would appear to be "deeply flawed."

Comment: Previously:


Eye 2

Best of the Web: Biden treated Ukraine 'as his private property', says purged prosecutor Shokin on Burisma scandal - UkraineGate documentary

biden
© REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko
Former top Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin says he was pushed out under pressure from US Vice President Joe Biden, after he seized the assets of the oligarch behind Burisma, the gas company that employed Biden's son.

President Donald Trump's efforts to investigate Biden's role in getting Shokin fired served as a pretext for his impeachment in the House of Representatives back in December. However, after Trump was acquitted by the Senate, the US media forgot about Burisma — and Ukraine.

French investigative journalist Olivier Berruyer, founder of popular anti-corruption and economics blog Les Crises, did not. In the fourth installment of his documentary series 'UkraineGate: Inconvenient facts,' Shokin reveals why and how he was ousted and what role the US has played in Ukraine.

Network

Best of the Web: Anglo-American hypocrisy: US & Britain are buying more and more oil from Russia


Comment: "Do as we say, not as we do!"

They sanction everyone else for trading with Russia, making it cheaper for them to swoop in and cut deals.


oil platform
© REUTERS / Maxim Shemetov
Russia more than doubled crude oil supplies to the United States and Britain in 2019, data from the Federal Customs Service (FCS) has revealed.

A fall in prices for the Russian Urals oil, combined with US sanctions against Venezuela and Iran, were among the reasons for such an increase in purchases.

According to the data cited by business news outlet RBC, in October Russia became the second-largest supplier of oil and petroleum products to the United States. At the end of 2019, crude oil exports from Russia amounted to almost $2.2 billion, 2.4 times more than in 2018. In physical terms, the volume of oil exports from Russia to the US surged from 1.8 million to 4.7 million tons.

Bullseye

Best of the Web: At least Trump is honest: Let 'adversaries' fight Islamic State while US steals the spoils

trump
© Reuters / CARLOS BARRIA
Few US presidents have brazenly confessed the underlying motives of American foreign policy like Donald Trump has. But are we getting the full picture, and what's missing from Donald Trump's confessions?

US President Donald Trump did the unthinkable and admitted some much-needed truth about US foreign policy. By declaring that it is time for the US to pass the fight against the terror group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) over to Russia, Iran, Iraq, and Syria, while suggesting that the US should instead focus on maintaining control of oil resources in the region, he willingly shone a whole new light on the true motives of the powers-that-be in the Middle East region.

Most notable is his willingness to pass control of the war against IS onto one of his prime arch enemies: Iran. Stating that "Iran hates ISIS and they should do it" is probably the most surprising statement to ever leave Donald Trump's mouth, and that's really saying something.

Bullseye

Best of the Web: Debunking The Smear That Assange Recklessly Published Unredacted Documents

julian assange headline news
This is a new section for my newly updated ongoing mega-article Debunking All The Assange Smears, a resource for debating 30 of the most common smears against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Use it, share it, and let me know if there's anything you think should be changed or added.

The prosecution in the Assange extradition trial has falsely alleged that WikiLeaks recklessly published unredacted files in 2011 which endangered people's lives. In reality the Pentagon admitted that no one was harmed as a result of the leaks during the Manning trial, and the unredacted files were actually published elsewhere as the result of a Guardian journalist recklessly included a real password in a book about WikiLeaks.

A key government witness during the Chelsea Manning trial, Brig. Gen. Robert Carr, testified under oath that no one was hurt by them. Additionally, the Defense Secretary at the time, Robert M Gates, said that the leaks were "awkward" and "embarrassing" but the consequences for US foreign policy were "fairly modest". It was also leaked at the time that insiders were saying the damage was limited and "containable", and they were exaggerating the damage in an attempt to get Manning punished more severely.

Comment: Luke Harding is almost certainly British intelligence. Leigh probably is too, although he's now 'retired'. Unfortunately Julian didn't know who he was getting involved with when he first partnered with The Guardian...
Haaretz, 27 Feb 2012

The WikiLeaks press statement also mentions "private intelligence staff who align themselves closely with U.S. government policies and channel tips to the Mossad - including through an information mule in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Yossi Melman, who conspired with Guardian journalist David Leigh to secretly, and in violation of WikiLeaks' contract with the Guardian, move WikiLeaks U.S. diplomatic cables to Israel."
See also:


Fireball 2

Best of the Web: Eerie green meteor fireball turns night into day over Tucson, Arizona

Meteor fireball over Arizona
© YouTube/S Paris (screen capture)
If you looked up at the sky early Wednesday morning, you may have noticed something spectacular. And it definitely wasn't a bird or a plane.

On Wednesday, YouTuber S Paris captured an object zooming through the sky on his dashcam at around 5:30 a.m. In the video's description, S Paris believes the object that came down is a meteor.

With the sun still down, the video showcased a clear visual of the meteor flying through the sky.

According to YouTuber, the video was captured on the southeast side of Tucson.


Beaker

Best of the Web: A top-tier Chinese virology lab is unable to quell the coronavirus conspiracy theories around it


Comment: Suspicions are growing about the centrality of that BSL-4 WHO-approved biolab in Wuhan, China, to the Cornonavirus outbreak, which is why the media is running interference on it...


wuhan biolab
The WHO-certified and affiliated top tier BSL-4 bio-lab in Wuhan city, Hubei Province, central China... where it's almost certain the CoVid-19 virus escaped from
A Chinese state-owned virology lab in Wuhan, the epicenter of China's coronavirus epidemic, is finding it extremely hard to quell conspiracy theories proliferating around the institution — a sign of the sharply decreased level of public trust in the government since the outbreak of the virus.

At the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a subsidiary of the state-owned research institute the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), scientists carry out virus research at a lab with the highest level of biological containment available on the mainland. Its construction was approved in 2003, during China's last deadly coronavirus outbreak, SARS, and completed five years ago, according to Nature journal. The lab came under spotlight in late January, after Chinese scientists said the virus could have a connection to bats via an intermediary, such as some form of game sold at a seafood market in Wuhan. As the lab has researchers who study bat-related viruses, it became a target of online suspicion that coalesced into theories that the virus could have escaped from the lab, or be a bio-weapon gone wrong.


Comment: That isn't why it's suspicious. It's suspicious because those lab researchers were located at Ground Zero of the outbreak: the country's only BSL-4 lab!

All that stuff about bats, snakes, pangolins and the fish/wet market was probably disinformation in an effort to pawn blame for it off onto ordinary people.


Comment: The outbreak is not a 'conspiracy' per se. It's probably an accident. It's only a conspiracy insofar as they're not openly admitting that messing around with vaccines caused the very thing they're supposedly all about preventing.

All to protect the 'settled sciences' (read: biotech industry) of genetics, viruses and vaccines. In reality, they understand very little about the elements they're fiddling with...


Handcuffs

Best of the Web: British show-trial: Craig Murray reports on Day 2 of the Assange extradition hearing

assange extradition trial court sketch
© Reuters/Julia QuenzlerCourtroom sketch of Julian Assange's extradition hearing, Monday February 24, 2020
This afternoon Julian's Spanish lawyer, Baltasar Garzon, left court to return to Madrid. On the way out he naturally stopped to shake hands with his client, proffering his fingers through the narrow slit in the bulletproof glass cage. Assange half stood to take his lawyer's hand. The two security guards in the cage with Assange immediately sprang up, putting hands on Julian and forcing him to sit down, preventing the handshake.

That was not by any means the worst thing today, but it is a striking image of the senseless brute force continually used against a man accused of publishing documents. That a man cannot even shake his lawyer's hand goodbye is against the entire spirit in which the members of the legal system like to pretend the law is practised. I offer that startling moment as encapsulating yesterday's events in court.

Comment: Assange's lawyers explode with frustration:
'Lies, lies and more lies': Lawyer slams day 2 of Julian Assange's US extradition hearing

As the hearing began, James Lewis QC, representing the US government, complained that the defense was receiving transcripts of court proceedings while the prosecution was not. Edward Fitzgerald QC, representing Assange, said the transcripts were privately made and they would share a copy if the prosecution paid half the costs.

At one point, journalist Kevin Gosztola, who was present in the press annex, tweeted to complain that Lewis "won't speak into the microphone" and that reporters "cannot hear a word."

Next, attention turned to WikiLeaks' 'most wanted' list of leaks it had asked for people to submit to the site. Summers said the list did not mention anything about US diplomatic cables and dismissed the "fantasy" claim that Manning uploaded the cables after seeing a request for them on that list.

To counteract the claim that Assange had recklessly released the leaks and put lives at risk (one of the prosecution's key arguments), the defense noted that Assange had partnered with major media organization to read and redact the cables, where necessary, before releasing them.

Shortly before midday, the public gallery was closed off to journalists, causing some confusion among journalists. The court rose for a short time to deal with the issue, before resuming again.

The defense continued to argue that documents Manning leaked on Iraq were "non-sensitive," would be of no use to an enemy and included no names. What's more, the defense claimed that Manning didn't require a username and passport to access the database where she obtained the Iraq and Afghanistan war logs, making the US government's hacking charge false.
Assange claims his ability to communicate with his defense team is being stymied and they are all still being spied on. He is currently being kept in the prisoner's dock as if he was a murderer:
"The other side must have something like 100 contact hours each day," Assange said upon the conclusion of the adjournment, before adding that his legal team is being spied on.
There is already enough spying on my lawyers as it is. There are a number of unnamed embassy officials here. There are two microphones in here. What's the point of asking if I can concentrate if I can't participate?
"I am as much a participant in these proceedings as I am at Wimbledon," Assange wistfully joked while alleging that there was a microphone in the glass defendants dock.

"It is your call Madam," the prosecutors said. Defense counsel Edward Fitzgerald argued that Assange is "no threat to anyone," adding: "He is a gentle man of an intellectual nature. There's no reason for him not to sit with us."
After Judge Baraitser threw out the comment on the Extradition Treaty, Assange's defense is arguing on Day 3 that his detention has violated multiple legal codes:
Presiding judge Vanessa Baraitser said during the close of Tuesday's proceedings that, although Article 4.1 of the US/UK Extradition Treaty cited does forbid political extraditions, this does not, in fact, appear in the UK Extradition Act - the only legal document which has force in court.

Picking up that point on Wednesday, Fitzgerald argued that international human rights law provides jurisdiction for an abuse of process argument under Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which prohibits arbitrary detention.

Fitzgerald cited numerous precedents tying international law and the ECHR with English law in determining the legality of detention, essentially arguing that Assange's detention is illegal under all three.

The defense also argued that many of the prosecution's arguments in favor of extradition were based on international law and precedent, not English. Any subsequent acts of parliament are irrelevant when the specific defense which precludes extradition for so-called 'political offenses' is contained within the treaty signed between the US and the UK.



Russian Flag

Best of the Web: Russia isn't dividing us — our leaders are

Bernie Sanders rally
© Mario Tama/Getty ImagesSen. Bernie Sanders waves to supporters at a campaign rally on February 21st in Las Vegas.
The latest act in the comedy began Friday, just before voting opened in the Nevada Democratic caucus. The Washington Post ran a story — sourced, I'm not joking, to "people familiar with the matter" — explaining that Bernie Sanders had been briefed that "Russia is attempting to help his presidential campaign as part of an effort to interfere with the Democratic contest."

Sanders was quick to see through the gambit. "I'll let you guess about one day before the Nevada caucus," he said. "Why do you think it came out?" He pointed to a Post reporter: "It was The Washington Post? Good friends." The Post, after all, has spent years dumping on Sanders, a fervent critic of the paper's billionaire creep of an owner, Jeff Bezos.

Intelligence officials and pundits have been screeching for years that patriotism demands voters reject the foreign agent Donald Trump and the Russian asset Bernie Sanders, and support a conventional establishment politician. Voters responded by moving toward Trump in national approval surveys and speeding Sanders to the top of the Democratic Party ticket. A more thorough disavowal of official propaganda would be difficult to imagine.

Comment: See also:


Yoda

Best of the Web: Day 1 of Assange's US extradition hearing: Key facts to know

assange extradition trial court sketch
© Reuters/Julia QuenzlerCourtroom sketch of Julian Assange's extradition hearing, Monday February 24, 2020
Opening arguments were made on the first day of the US extradition hearing of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, with the prosecution claiming his leaks risked lives while the defense argued that his case was politically motivated.

Monday's hearing lasted six hours, including breaks, and Judge Vanessa Baraitser heard arguments from James Lewis QC, representing the US government, and Edward Fitzgerald QC, representing Assange.

The journalist's supporters amassed outside Woolwich Crown Court, loudly chanting, holding 'free Assange' placards and blowing vuvuzelas. Inside the courtroom, Assange sat clean-shaven, with a new haircut and wearing glasses and a gray suit.

Comment: Assange's father, John Shipton, sounded the alarm once again on the dangers waiting for journalists if his son's prosecution is successful:
If Julian Assange's transfer to the US isn't stopped, other journalists and publishers face the imminent risk of being persecuted, detained or even tortured, his father exclaimed as his extradition trial got under way in London.

"We're here to vigorously and firmly support Julian in this ten-year-long oppression and political action that's [reached its] culmination here in Belmarsh," his father John Shipton told reporters outside the courthouse, which is adjacent to the prison.

Shipton, himself an anti-war activist in his youth, lashed out at "the oppression of journalism [and] the ceaseless malice" directed against his son. He drew attention again to the "ten-year-long arbitrary detention of Julian," as well as his inhuman and degrading treatment at HM Prison Belmarsh, which amounted to torture, according to UN Rapporteur Nils Melzer.
That is what will happen to journalists, publishers and publications if this extradition, this political extradition of Julian Assange, is successful.
The Guardian reports that Assange continues to be abused in Belmarsh Prison
Julian Assange was handcuffed 11 times, stripped naked twice and had his case files confiscated after the first day of his extradition hearing, according to his lawyers, who complained of interference in his ability to take part.

Their appeal to the judge overseeing the trial at Woolwich crown court in south-east London was also supported by legal counsel for the US government, who said it was essential the WikiLeaks founder be given a fair trial.

Edward Fitzgerald QC, acting for Assange, said the case files, which the prisoner was reading in court on Monday, were confiscated by guards when he returned to prison later that night and that he was put in five cells.

The judge, Vanessa Baraitser, replied that she did not have the legal power to comment or rule on Assange's conditions but encouraged the defence team to formally raise the matter with the prison.

The details emerged on the second day of Assange's extradition hearing, during which his legal team denied that he had "knowingly placed lives at risk" by publishing unredacted US government files.

The court was told Wikileaks had entered into a collaboration with the Guardian, El País, the New York Times and other media outlets to make redactions to 250,000 leaked cables secret cables in 2010 and publish them.

Mark Summers, QC, claimed the unredacted files had been published because a password to this material had appeared in a Guardian book on the affair. "The gates got opened not by Assange or WikiLeaks but by another member of that partnership," he said.

The Guardian denied the claim.
Kristinn Hrafnsson, the head of Wikileaks, continues to point to the elephant in the room. Assange is really on trial for exposing war crimes committed by the U.S.:
"There's absolutely nothing new that is being presented here this morning by the Crown Prosecution Service on behalf of US prosecution," Hrafnsson told a crowd of journalists who gathered outside Woolwich Crown Court where the extradition hearing for Assange began.

Lawyers representing US authorities presented arguments that were "more of the same things we've been hearing for ten years." Back in July 2010, WikiLeaks was accused of putting US lives at risk by exposing its military and intelligence operations worldwide, but "ten years later, there is no evidence of such harm."

"And to the contrary, a Pentagon official was forced to admit in Manning's trial in 2013 that nobody was physically harmed because of the revelations in 2010 and 2011. And now, in 2020, they are in court, not able to present a single evidence of that harm," Hrafnsson reminded the press, before hitting back at the US side.
And I'm sitting there listening to these claims, these subjective claims, and thinking: Why aren't we discussing the harm that was revealed by WikiLeaks in 2010 and 2011? Why aren't we talking in court about war crimes, the assassination of innocent civilians by the military, the slaughtering of Reuters journalists?
At any rate, the very existence of the extradition trial is a disgrace, Hrafnsson pointed out: "It is a shameful thing that we have to defend journalism in a court of law in this country."

The imprisoned publisher's legal team believe he is unlikely to receive a fair and unbiased trial in the US, but the ongoing proceedings in Britain are also far from flawless.

The courtroom in Woolwich has only a dozen seats reserved for the general public, Hrafnsson revealed, and journalists have trouble getting inside.

"Very hard to talk about open and transparent proceedings, especially when the microphones are so bad that you have to stretch your ear to hear what is being presented," the WikiLeaks editor-in-chief added.