Welcome to Sott.net
Mon, 08 Nov 2021
The World for People who Think

Puppet Masters
Map

Nuke

Trump thinks building US nuclear arsenal will help China and Russia 'come to their senses'


RT
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 16:18 UTC
trump
© Evan Vucci / AP
US President Donald Trump threatened Russia and China that Washington intends to build up its nuclear arsenal until "people come to their senses."

The president said his words were directed towards Moscow and Beijing, as he prepared to unilaterally leave the Intermediate Nuclear Forces in Europe (INF) treaty. The US president implied China should be part of any new nuclear arms control treaty.

"Russia has not adhered to the agreement," neither in form or in spirit, Trump told reporters outside the White House on Monday, before departing for a campaign rally in Texas.

Comment: This may just be bluster from Trump, but it also might not be given the substantial increases in military spending under Trump. This rhetoric really has little to do with Russia, China, and least of all a course of action toward greater sensibility. It feeds the US war machine and lines the pockets of military contractors, and that's about all.

      Read More...
Attention

Macedonia parliament votes in favor of renaming country North Macedonia, just reaching necessary two-thirds majority


The Guardian
Fri, 19 Oct 2018 03:36 UTC
Two thirds majority just reached to rename Macedonia in key stage of ending dispute with Greece
PM Zoran Zaev North Macedonia name change
© Robert Atanasovski/AFP/Getty Images
Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev gives a press conference after the parliament voted to start drafting constitutional amendments to rename the country.
Macedonia's parliament has voted to start the process of renaming the country North Macedonia, a major step towards ending a decades-long stalemate with Greece and opening a door to NATO and the EU.

A total of 80 deputies in the 120-seat parliament voted in favour of renaming the Balkan country Republic of North Macedonia - just reaching the two-thirds majority needed to enact constitutional changes.

The move could unblock its bids to join NATO and the European Union, long blocked by Greece, which argues that "Macedonia" implied territorial claims to a Greek province of the same name.

The two countries reached agreement on the name change in June. But hurdles remain before the change can be formalised.

A referendum on the agreement several weeks ago failed to pass the turnout threshold of 50 percent, leaving it up to the Skopje parliament to settle the issue.

Comment: Russia's FM has responded, claiming the US orchestrated an 'unfair vote' in the country's parliament as the measure passed by only a narrow margin after a failed popular referendum due to a 'boycott' by voters. See also:

      Read More...
Blackbox

Has Khashoggi's murder set back the US-Israel effort to confront Iran?

Philip Weiss
Mondoweiss
Mon, 22 Oct 2018 16:06 UTC
Middle East Eye: Klišeji, laži i dvostruki standardi - Iskrivljeni pogled Jareda Kushnera na Palestinu
The uproar over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul October 2 is obviously the biggest story in the world right now and though Israel is maintaining a strategic silence so as not to hurt its new ally, responses to the outrage in the U.S. are not all ideological, or ascribable to the Israel lobby.

The thrust of American mainstream commentary on the case appears to be: the murder is too much to swallow, but Saudi Arabia is too valuable an ally to lose, given the US-Israeli-Saudi alliance against Iran and the Saudi role of imposing a possible "deal" on the Palestinians. So Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman needs to get out of the way.

Israel is already a big loser in the fallout from the murder, as it is throwing shade on Israel's rightwing friends, including Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law and Mideast negotiator and counterpart of bin Salman.

Comment: See also: One good thing to come out of this barbarism: it has forced political commentators to speak plainly about the way geopolitics really works. The U.S. and its media pundits love to criticize Russia for dealing with 'dictatorships', but now they're defending the U.S. doing exactly the same thing, by acknowledging that Saudi Arabia has been a repressive totalitarian theocracy for decades - but we need them so we ignore all that. There is no virtue in politics, just virtue signalling.

      Read More...
Bullseye

Carter Page: Americans should be 'scared' about end of INF treaty


RT
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 07:56 UTC
Former Donald Trump adviser Carter Page
© RT
Former Donald Trump adviser Carter Page
The 'Russiagate' hysteria that originated with the Democrat-funded Steele Dossier has damaged relations between Washington and Moscow to the point of ending the INF Treaty, former Trump adviser Carter Page has told RT.

Ending the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces in Europe (INF) treaty is something Americans should be "scared about," Page told RT America's Scottie Nell Hughes in an exclusive interview on Monday. He said he'd worked on implementing that and other nuclear treaties when he was at the Pentagon in the early 1990s, and that there are "deep problems" between the US and Russia that "misunderstandings" over the Trump presidency are only making worse.

President Donald Trump announced on Monday he was preparing to pull the US out of the 1987 arms control treaty, citing the claim by the two previous administrations that Russia "has not adhered to the agreement."

Comment: The Deep State has been working overtime since Trump got elected, frequently through the Democrats, to damage relations between the US and Russia, and unfortunately it's working.

      Read More...
Arrow Down

'Bring her own noose': Tory MP's attack Theresa May using violent language as she faces a vote of no confidence over Brexit negotiations


RT
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 07:34 UTC
Theresa May
© Reuters / Toby Melville
A number of Tory MPs have been quoted using violent language such as "bring her own noose," to attack British PM Theresa May, claiming she is on course to face a vote of no confidence this week from all wings of the party.

On Wednesday, May will be summoned before the Tory backbench 1922 committee, in what has been described as a last ditch attempt for the PM to save her job - a process dubbed "a show trial" by one Conservative MP, the Sunday Times reports.

Ahead of the critical meeting, a series of Conservative MPs launched an unprecedented attack on May, with language more befitting of a trailer for a blockbuster war or action movie. The paper quotes one unnamed Tory MP as saying: "The moment is coming when the knife gets heated, stuck in her front and twisted. She'll be dead soon."

An ally of former Brexit secretary David Davis, who is being tipped as an interim leader said May was now entering "the killing zone", and a third remarked: "Assassination is in the air." The Mail on Sunday quotes one senior Brexiteer: "She should bring her own noose to the '22. Short of an uncharacteristically powerful, persuasive and coherent performance, then I think her time will be up."

Comment:

      Read More...
Snowflake Cold

Climate change poses 'existential threat' like Nazi Germany in WWII says loony Ocasio-Cortez


RT
Sun, 21 Oct 2018 15:21 UTC
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
© Reuters / Jonathan Bachman
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
House of Representatives candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has likened climate change to Nazi Germany, saying the two pose a similar kind of "existential threat."

"So we talk about existential threats, the last time we had a really major existential threat to this country was around World War II," the Democratic Socialist told a crowd at a campaign event on Friday. "And so we've been here before and we have a blueprint of doing this before."

"What we did was that we chose to mobilize our entire economy and industrialized our entire economy and we put hundreds of thousands if not millions of people to work in defending our shores and defending this country," the 29-year-old stated. "We have to do the same thing in order to get us to 100 percent renewable energy, and that's just the truth of it."

Comment: Wonder why the Dem leadership won't give Ocasio-Cortez their seal of approval? Maybe even they recognize she's gone off the deep end?

      Read More...
Bad Guys

'Monstrosity': Merkel threatens to cut arms exports to Saudi's until Khashoggi incident cleared up


RT
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 08:02 UTC
Jamal Khashoggi
© AFP / Mohammed al-Shaikh
Jamal Khashoggi
The killing of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate is a "monstrosity," German Chancellor Angela Merkel has stated, adding that Berlin will not sell arms to Riyadh while the issue remains unclear.

"It must be cleared up. As long as it's not cleared up, there will be no arms exports to Saudi Arabia. I assure you of that very decidedly," Merkel said during a campaign rally in Ortenberg on Monday.

Her comment reiterates a statement made on Sunday, in which she said there is an "urgent need for clarification of exacty what happened" to Khashoggi and condemned his killing "in the strongest terms."

Her comment about Germany refusing to sell arms to Riyadh while the issue remains unclear is significant, as the country approved weapons exports to Saudi Arabia worth €416.4 million this year, reportedly making Riyadh Germany's second-best arms customer after Algeria.

Comment: The hard facts are that Germany (and others making weapons sales) won't forgo the income streams for long; one can surmise that a Saudi confession, apology and promises to behave will do the trick. See also:

      Read More...
Rocket

'Moscow will not sit idly': US withdrawal from INF will force Russia to 'restore the balance' - Peskov


RT
Tue, 23 Oct 2018 07:58 UTC
US Pershing missile 1962
© Getty
US Army's Pershing ballistic missile is ready for firing, Cape Canaveral, Florida, April 21, 1962
US withdrawal from the landmark INF treaty would make the world a more dangerous place, and would force Moscow to step in and "restore the balance," Russian presidential spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.

If indeed Washington turns its back on the landmark agreement, the ban on the production of short and intermediate range missiles would be lifted.

US President Donald Trump sent shock waves over the weekend, promising to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF). Using the evergreen 'Russia violated agreements' argument, he called the accord "unacceptable."

Comment: The only beneficiaries of the maneuver will be the nuclear weapons industry and defense contractors.

See also:

      Read More...
Snakes in Suits

Hypocrite David Miliband reminded of his Saudi dealings as he decries Saudi-led genocide in Yemen


RT
Mon, 22 Oct 2018 10:50 UTC
david miliband
Did David Miliband forget Britain's selling of Typhoon fighter jets to Saudi Arabia while he was Foreign Secretary? The ex-MP was labelled a hypocrite after he decries the kingdom over their war in Yemen.

Tweets derided the former MP and his apparent aboutface. One read: "Typhoon jets anyone," while another asked: "Didn't you approve the sale of fighter jets now bombing them [Yemenis] when [you were] foreign secretary?"


One tweet from the anti-War on Terror group Cage UK read: "David Miliband when Foreign Sec used to sell the same bombs that kill the people he now wants to help..."

Comment: Miliband is a prime example of the shameless and duplicitous UK establishment, and he is complicit in the Saudi's genocidal war on Yemen: For more, check out SOTT radio's: NewsReal: Saudi Arabia: A Wretched Hive of Scum And Villainy, Fully Supported by The West

      Read More...
USA

Trump: 'I'm a nationalist'

Quint Forgey
Politico
Mon, 22 Oct 2018 20:50 UTC
Trump nationalist
© Evan Vucci/AP Photo
President Donald Trump speaks Monday during a campaign rally for Sen. Ted Cruz in Houston.
President Donald Trump on Monday evening proudly asserted that he is a "nationalist" - a designation some of his fiercest critics have previously wielded against him as an attack on what they deem nativist policy pursuits by his administration.

"You know, they have a word, it sort of became old-fashioned. It's called a nationalist," Trump said at a campaign event in Houston, where he rallied voters to support Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) in November's midterm elections.

Comment: Now that the SJW crowd has labelled the term "nationalist" as a dog-whistle for white supremacy, despite the fact that it's never been intended that way, Trump's declaration has set people off to an unreasonable degree.



If we take the definition of nationalist as "Devotion to the interests or culture of one's nation", wouldn't one want every president to be a nationalist?

See also:

      Read More...
Amazon Smile
Revolt! T-shirts