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Brazil braces for corruption appeal, could make or break ex-president Lula

Dom Phillips
The Guardian
Wed, 24 Jan 2018 03:06 UTC
Lula/Rousseff
© Eraldo Peres/AP
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Brazil’s former president, with his successor Dilma Rousseff.
Brazil is bracing for a historic court decision which could remove the most popular leader in modern Brazilian history from an election he is currently poised to win - and may prove devastating to the leftwing Workers' party he founded.

Nerves are stretched taut ahead of Wednesday's appeals court decision, in which three judges will decide whether or not to uphold the conviction of former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on corruption and money laundering charges. Lula - who is still hugely popular after his 2003-2010 two-term presidency - is currently the early favourite in October's presidential election.

Porto Alegre's rightwing mayor Nelson Marchezan asked for the army to protect the city from thousands of Lula supporters expected to descend. The Workers' party president, Gleisi Hoffmann, said last week that for Lula to be arrested, "they will have to kill people" - although she later qualified the remark.

Comment: UPDATE: The appeals court unanimously upheld the conviction of Lula and increased his sentence to 12 years in prison. This is not the end of it:
But Lula still has options. An electoral court must make the final ruling on a candidacy, and would only do so once a candidate had registered.

Lula can appeal Wednesday's decision by the appeals court in Porto Alegre to Brazil's top appeals court or to the Supreme Court to delay a final ruling, possibly avoiding jail and stringing the process out long enough to register his candidacy by the Aug. 15 deadline.

At a nighttime rally in a central Sao Paulo plaza, Lula stood atop a sound truck and rallied supporters, blasting the ruling as a "lie", and strongly maintained his innocence.

Lula said that if the three judges could "show me the crime I committed, I would give up trying to be a candidate."

"I want the judges to know that I am not worried like they think I should be," Lula said. "They cannot jail ideas or hope."


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Attention

Is Podesta screwed? Senate Judiciary committee releases letter to Podesta

Jim Holt
Gateway Pundit
Sun, 28 Jan 2018 00:00 UTC
Grassley
© unknown
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley
On Friday Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) sent a batch of letters to DNC leaders demanding information regarding their interactions with dossier author Christopher Steele.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is investigating the FBI's involvement with dossier author Christopher Steele. It is being reported the FBI relied on the phony, Hillary-funded Russia dossier to obtain a FISA warrant to spy on Trump's campaign during the 2016 presidential election.

The batch of letters were sent to former DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, former interim DNC chairwoman Donna Brazile, current DNC chair, Tom Perez, former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and former Clinton campaign chief strategist Joel Benenson.

Grassley and Graham cited the bombshell Washington Post report released in October of 2016 revealing Hillary Clinton's campaign and the DNC funded the garbage Russia dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele.

Comment: See also: Clinton, Podesta, others in Senate 'dossier' crosshairs given two weeks to respond

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Dollar

Russian parliament moving to make "CryptoRuble" legal tender

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Sat, 27 Jan 2018 19:10 UTC
cryptorubble
With legislation to regulate the mining and trading of cryptocurrencies still awaiting consideration by the Russian Parliament, one lawmaker has introduced a draft bill to create a national cryptocurrency called "the CryptoRuble."
"The amendments proposed by the draft law ... codify the digital financial asset as a legal means of payment on the territory of Russia," the document's explanatory note reads.
Interestingly, the draft law was submitted by a Communist Party MP named Rizvan Kurbanov. The law proposes several amendments to the Russian Civil Code that will make the CryptoRuble a legal means of payment circulated nationwide.

Comment: Could this be a move towards ending the global domination of the petrodollar? See also: Bitcoin is racist: Deep State demonization of cryptocurrencies begins

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Briefcase

Something to hide? Justice Department is withholding majority of FBI Strzok-Page texts from Congress

Byron York
The Washington Examiner
Sat, 27 Jan 2018 20:25 UTC
US Justice Department
© Associated Press/Andrew Harnik
There is much confusion over some basic facts of the Strzok-Page texts, and even then, the answers are complicated. So far, the Justice Department has identified about 50,000 of them.
The Justice Department has given Congress less than 15 percent of the texts between FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page - and that is all Congress is likely to get, at least until department experts finish an effort to recover an unknown number of previously lost texts that were sent and received during a key five-month period during the Trump-Russia investigation.

There is much confusion over some basic facts of the Strzok-Page texts. How many are there? How many relate to the two most politically-charged investigations in years, the Trump-Russia probe and the Hillary Clinton email investigation? How many have been turned over to Congress? And how many are left to be turned over to Congress?

The answers are complicated, but here is what I have been able to figure out from conversations with the Justice Department and Capitol Hill investigators.

Comment:

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Star of David

The power of The Lobby: Jewish groups bully New Orleans into rescinding BDS resolution


teleSUR
Sat, 27 Jan 2018 19:26 UTC
Palestinian protesters New York
© Reuters
Protesters shout, "Free Palestine", during a march demanding an end to the escalating Israeli-Palestinian hostilities in that region, in midtown Manhattan, New York.
The pro-Israeli groups "immediately" attacked the city's council over the "anti-semitic" resolution backed by the Palestinian boycott movement.

Just weeks after passing a resolution backed by the pro-Palestinian Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions, BDS, movement, the New Orleans city council rescinded the resolution after it came under heavy fire from Jewish and pro-Israeli groups.

While the resolution had made no mention of Israel, Palestine or BDS, it called for investigating and blacklisting corporations and companies that do work with states or groups that violate human rights in line with BDS principles. The resolution was in fact drafted by the Palestinian Solidarity Committee branch in the city, a member organization of the BDS movement.

The resolution was celebrated by pro-Palestinian activists as a victory for BDS and its principles and thus was immediately attacked by conservative Jewish groups and pro-Israel politicians in the U.S..

Comment: It should frighten every thinking person that the Israeli Lobby's reach not only extends world-wide , but right down to city level politics. If that isn't meddling in another country's affairs, what is?

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Bad Guys

Shocker: US, Poland against gas pipeline linking Russia to Germany

Matthew Lee
Fox News
Sat, 27 Jan 2018 08:27 UTC
rex tillerson poland 2
The United States and Poland are taking a strong joint stand against a planned gas pipeline linking Russia to Germany.

They say it's a Russian scheme to politicize energy and undermine attempts to diversify European fuel supplies and make European countries less dependent on Moscow.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is visiting Poland, and he's joining Polish Foreign Minister Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz in denouncing the planned pipeline.

Comment: Of course the US is opposed to it--they want to sell gas for twice as much as Russia. Plus, they certainly don't want Germany and Russia establishing more mutually beneficial relationships:

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SOTT Logo S

The Rising Chinese Dream: How China Became Great Again

Chris Kanthan
Sott.net
Sun, 28 Jan 2018 18:56 UTC
chinese dream
The most spectacular economic miracle has been flying under the radar for two decades now, but its impact will be universally acknowledged very soon. This is the story of China. The flip side of that miracle is a coalition of a superpowers and former empires, straddled with a shrinking middle class, rising debt and dwindling geopolitical hegemony. That is the story of America and Europe. Let's take a look at the stories and see how they're intertwined.

Most people still think of China as a "communist," polluted, poor country that either makes horrible, cheap stuff or assembles expensive products for western corporations. In terms of GDP per capita, China is ranked 70th in the world, below many Latin American countries. And there are 40 million Chinese who still live on less than $2 a day.

However, 87% of Chinese say their country is going in the right direction (that number is 43% for America). Why? Here is the paradoxical truth: while the average individual may not be rich, China as a nation has transformed itself into a global powerhouse. China's GDP is now the 2nd largest in the world. In terms of PPP - Purchasing Power Parity - China's economy is actually bigger than the U.S. This is because $100 in China will get you lot more than $100 in America.

China is also #1 in the world in foreign-exchange reserves - it has more than $3 trillion saved up, which includes $1.2 trillion of U.S. treasury bonds. Can't be that poor, right?
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Info

Netanyahu to meet Putin in Moscow to discuss better coordination on Syria and Iran


RT
Sun, 28 Jan 2018 20:05 UTC
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin
© Alexey Nikolsky / Reuters
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Monday to discuss ways to strengthen coordination between Russian and Israeli air forces, so as to avoid confrontation in Syria.

Netanyahu's visit to Russia is scheduled to last only five hours. According to the Kremlin, the two leaders plan to discuss"Russian-Israeli cooperation in trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian areas as well as some pressing international and regional issues, including the situation in the Middle East and in Syria."

Netanyahu and Putin will exchange views on ways of "strengthening coordination between the Israeli Army and the Russian armed forces on Syria, as well as a whole series of issues important for the security of Israel," Netanyahu said, as cited by TASS.

Comment: See also:

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Eye 2

How Obama made sure Killary would dodge indictment in email scandal

Ryan Saavedra
The Daily Wire
Thu, 25 Jan 2018 18:32 UTC
Obama
© Pete Marovich-Pool/Getty Images
The corruption of the Obama administration continues to unravel . . .

A new analysis from former assistant U.S. attorney Andy McCarthy thoroughly explains how former President Barack Obama made sure that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not indicted in the criminal investigation into her use of a private email server.

In his most recent column, National Review's McCarthy argues that the decision not to indict Clinton was Obama's call - not the FBI's and not the Department of Justice's - as Obama used a pseudonymous email account to communicate with Clinton on her non-secure email account.
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Star of David

As a state Israel, are you real?

Jonathan Ofir
Mondoweiss
Sun, 28 Jan 2018 17:54 UTC
Michael Oren

Michael Oren
This week, three things related to Israel made my jaw drop:
  1. It turned out that centrist Israeli lawmaker (deputy minister and former Ambassador to the US) Michael Oren had not merely opined that the Tamimi family was "not a real family", but that he had initiated a parliamentary committee investigation into this matter, already 2 years ago.
  2. Palestinian-Israeli lawmakers were expelled from Israel's parliament plenum during US Vice President Mike Pence's speech, for lifting signs of protest.Their expulsion took about 10 seconds from the moment they lifted signs, and the rest of the crowd cheered.
  3. The publication by Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman (in The New York Times), of how Israel in the 1980s was so bent on assassinating Yasser Arafat, that it was willing to bomb a crowded stadium in Beirut where he was to speak, willing to down commercial airliners if he was aboard, and willing to have Israeli journalists killed (including Uri Avnery) as collateral, if they could only provide a trail to him when meeting the Palestinian leader.
And that's just in one week. Where do you even start, right? Let's start with Michael Oren.
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