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Ukraine arms deal with UAE is just NATO backdoor to arm Kiev

Finian Cunningham
Strategic Culture Foundation
Wed, 25 Feb 2015 16:45 UTC
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The announcement this week that the Kiev regime struck a major deal with the United Arab Emirates for military weapons raises strong suspicions that the US-led NATO alliance has found a new backdoor into Ukraine. We say «new» because it is believed that the US and its NATO allies, Poland and Lithuania, are already covertly supplying weapons to the Kiev regime.

Kiev President Petro Poroshenko hailed the new strategic partnership with the Persian Gulf kingdom while attending the International Defence Exhibition (IDEX) in the UAE capital, Abu Dhabi. Poroshenko, who was royally received by UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al Nayhan, declared himself a «president of peace» but that Ukraine, or rather the rump state that his regime commands, needed strong defence because of its «Russian enemy».

A giveaway to the real significance of the surprise development is that Poroshenko and his Arab hosts also reportedly held discreet meetings with Pentagon officials and US weapons manufacturing executives during the weapons exhibition. That indicates that Washington is coordinating the expected arms transfers.

Although the Kiev-UAE partnership lacked any public detail, one can safely assume that the Arab supply of weapons to Ukraine is simply a conduit for American and NATO military support to the Western-backed junta, which seized power in Ukraine last year in an illegal coup. Its war of aggression on the separatist eastern Ukraine has inflicted at least 6,000 deaths, mainly among the ethnic Russian civilian population.

Earlier this month it soon became clear that Washington and its NATO allies would pay a heavy political price for an audacious move to openly increase their military involvement in the Ukraine conflict. When Washington announced that it intended to go ahead with Congressional provisions to send «lethal aid» to Kiev there was much international consternation over such a reckless move.
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Chess

The real story on Iran, US, Russia and China

Pepe Escobar
Sputnik
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 15:37 UTC
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© Sputnik/ Alexei Nikolsky
The real story is, and will continue to be, how Iran, the key power in Southwest Asia, is about to be positioned in the nonstop complex ballet between the US, Russia and China. That's one of the key vectors of the New Great Game in Eurasia.

The real story was never about how warmonger Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, a foreign leader, would crudely use the House of Cards, sorry, the US Capitol, as a lowly re-election bully pulpit to mould the US presidency and American foreign policy.

A graphic indication is that while "Bomb Iran" Bibi was distilling his 39-minute harangue in Washington, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif were engaged in their third round of nuclear negotiations in Montreux.

The real story is also only partially about this perennial soap opera — the Iranian nuclear dossier. By the end of this month there will be a deadline to reach a framework agreement, and by June - optimistically - a comprehensive final settlement.

Comment: Quite the "soap opera" it is. The US and Israel with their proxy IS is not winning the hearts and minds of the people and are running out of options. Could they throw a temper tantrum and start an all out war?

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Cult

Victoria Nuland's next Coup d'etat: Georgia

Henry Kamens
New Eastern Outlook
Wed, 04 Mar 2015 00:00 UTC
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© Reuters/Gleb Garanich
"Would you like cookies or bullets with that Coup d'etat?"
Former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili has been saying for six months that he will be back in six months! No elections are due to be held and he can't run for president again. Now, unfortunately, we might know what he meant.

On February 17 Victoria Nuland, a US Assistant Secretary of State, visited Tbilisi. She is best known for being an outspoken supporter of the coup d'etat in Kiev a year ago, which led to the violent overthrow of then-president Viktor Yanukovich and the ongoing fighting over this now nearly failed state. She appeared in Tbilisi at the same time Saakashvili officially became an "advisor" to Ukraine's new incumbent, Petro Poroshenko.

Nuland's notoriety as a field-tested battleaxe precedes her. Both she and her husband, Robert Kagan, are products of the Bush-Cheney neo-con regime and are closely linked with its "1984" mindset of conducting continuous war, which was the basis of the defence strategy outlined by the Cheney Defense Department in the waning days of the Bush Administration, the now-notorious "Project for a New American Century".

Nuland and Kagan both subscribe to the old doctrine of "manifest destiny" which this document was based on. According to this, America must remain the undisputed leader of the world, because that is the reason for America's existence. As a diplomat she has been employed to serve America's interests, but, like many official US representatives, she has taken the view that the US interest is the only one, there is no such thing as a general or even broader interest, as her famous "Fuck the EU" remark last year testifies.

Comment: 'Mad dog for "democracy,"' Victoria Nuland, has been unleashed for quite a while now. Watch her as she continues to spin her web and machinations in order to increase the U.S.'s 'sphere of influence' where it has no right to. And thus destroying the lives of millions of people who are facing Western freedom at the end of a loaded gun. Her pathological persistence is only representative of a much larger problem however: the goal of subjugating people world-wide in order to maintain the mantle of U.S. pre-eminence and world control.

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2 + 2 = 4

Pop quiz! How many constitutional freedoms have been lost in the U.S.?


Washington's Blog
Fri, 27 Feb 2015 04:17 UTC
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© 21stCenturyWire.com
How Many Constitutional Freedoms Have We Lost?

This post explains the liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights - the first 10 amendments to the United States Constitution - and provides a scorecard on the extent of the loss of each right.

First Amendment

The 1st Amendment protects speech, religion, assembly and the press:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
The Supreme Court has also interpreted the First Amendment as protecting freedom of association.

However, the government is arresting those speaking out... and violently crushing peaceful assemblies which attempt to petition the government for redress.

A federal judge found that the law allowing indefinite detention of Americans without due process has a "chilling effect" on free speech. And see this and this.

There are also enacted laws allowing the secret service to arrest anyone protesting near the president or other designated folks (that might explain incidents like this).

Mass spying by the NSA violates our freedom of association.

The threat of being labeled a terrorist for exercising our First Amendment rights certainly violates the First Amendment. The government is using laws to crush dissent, and it's gotten so bad that even U.S. Supreme Court justices are saying that we are descending into tyranny. (And the U.S. is doing the same things that tyrannical governments have done for 5,000 years to crush dissent.)

For example, the following actions may get an American citizen living on U.S. soil labeled as a "suspected terrorist" today:
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Chess

Italian prime minister begins trip to Kiev and Moscow


ITAR-TASS
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 03:54 UTC
Matteo Renzi
© EPA
Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.
Italy's Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who took the office exactly a year ago, is beginning a short tour, which includes visits first to Kiev, and then to Moscow.

In Ukraine, Renzi will have a meeting with President Petro Poroshenko, and on March 5 he will come to Russia, where he will have meetings with Russia's President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. Italy's presidential press service said the talks will focus on international issues - settlement of the crisis in Ukraine, the situations in the Middle East and in Libya, as well as fighting terrorism.

Renzi's route repeats exactly the 2014 route Federica Mogherini - the then Prime Minister, and currently the EU foreign affairs chief. This was also the order of visits to the two capital cities of Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and France's President Francois Hollande in early February before the meeting in Minsk, where the parties signed an agreement on ceasefire in Ukraine's south-east.

Comment: Wonder if this oil situation between Italy and Libya have anything to do with this: Italy threatens military intervention in Libya?

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Vader

Presidential candidate Scott Walker plans to sign bill banning abortions after 20 weeks


Raw Story
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 04:04 UTC
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Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker says he will sign into law a ban on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

Mr. Walker on Tuesday issued what he called an "open letter on life" in which he stated his support for the ban, saying he expects the Republican-controlled Legislature to pass such a bill.

Mr. Walker, a likely presidential candidate, also says he supports a federal ban.

Putting a ban on abortions after 20 weeks is based on the assertion that fetuses are capable of feeling pain at that point.

Opponents of the ban say such claims are disputed in medical research, while supporters say there is evidence that by 20-weeks gestation, fetuses react to pain stimuli.

The U.S. Supreme Court's landmark 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade allowed states to limit abortions in cases where there's a viable chance the fetus could survive outside of the womb, generally considered to be between 22 and 24 weeks.

Comment: This guy is definitely proving his "worth" to the pathological elite in the US. A woman's right to choose has been a fundamental right for over 40 years, and if the elites have their way, that right along with many others will be taken away as soon as possible. No wonder he is a presidential candidate. He's doing all he can to appeal to them.

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Red Flag

Italy threatens military intervention in Libya

Marianne Arens
World Socialist Web Site
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 04:04 UTC
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Four years after an international coalition intervened to force the overthrow of Libya's long-time ruler Muammar Gaddafi, Italy's government is pressing for a new military intervention.

This is being sold to the public based on the rising influence of Islamist militias, which are supposedly also threatening Italy. In reality, the drive to intervention is being driven by major Italian oil and business interests in the North African country, where Italy has a long and bloody colonial history. The sabre-rattling over Libya also serves to divert attention from the growing domestic social and political tensions.

Defence Minister Roberta Pinnotti declared on 15 February that a military mission in Libya was "urgently required." Italy was prepared to lead a coalition of European and North African states, and send 5,000 soldiers to Libya, she told the Messagero newspaper.

Comment: Could Libya cutting oil exports to Italy have anything to do with this?

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Eye 2

Deputy of European Parliament from Latvia denied permission into Russia


ITAR-TASS
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 03:46 UTC
Sandra Kalniete
© AP Photo Archive/LUXPRESS/Jean-Claude Ernst
Sandra Kalniete (right).
Sandra Kalniete — deputy of the European Parliament from Latvia, who arrived in Russia to attend the funeral of Boris Nemtsov, has not been admitted into Russia because of her "anti-Russian activities and in retaliation for sanctions taken by the European Union against a number of Russian officials," spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry Alexander Lukashevich said on Tuesday.

"The Latvian side had been warned about the Russian act beforehand," the spokesman said.

"The reason of the arrival of the above-mentioned deputy of the European parliament was no other than provocation," Lukashevich said.

Sandra Kalniete arrived in Moscow late on March 2 to attend the funeral of Boris Nemtsov. She was detained at Sheremetyevo airport in Moscow, where her passport was taken away for checks. Afterwards, she was informed that she was denied permission to visit Russia.

Comment: Ha, good on Russia!

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Mr. Potato

Norway's Nobel Peace Prize Committee replaces Jagland

Mark Lewis
AP
Tue, 03 Mar 2015 03:31 UTC
Thorbjoern Jagland
© AP
Thorbjoern Jagland, former chair of The Norwegian Nobel Committee, arrives at the Nobel institute in Oslo, Tuesday, March 3, 2015.
The Nobel Peace Prize awarding Norwegian Nobel Committee on Tuesday elected a new chairman to replace Thorbjoern Jagland, whose six-year tenure has been lined with controversies.

Jagland will remain a member of the voting panel but was a contentious leader, attracting criticism for his dual role as committee chairman and head of the European Council when the prize was awarded to the European Union in 2012. His leadership also was clouded by the decision to give the prize to Barack Obama in 2009 after he had just been elected president, and the 2010 prize to the jailed dissident Liu Xiabo drew fury from China.

The former labor politician was replaced by the panel's deputy chairman, Kaci Kullmann Five, a former conservative party leader. She denied that Jagland's ousting had anything to do with pressure from China, which froze diplomatic ties to Norway after the 2010 award.

Comment: This Norwegian Nobel Committee is such a joke. Does anyone really care who the chairman is or who wins the prize?

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Chess

Who is trying to destabilize the Balkans?

Filip Kovacevic
Boiling Frogs Post
Wed, 04 Mar 2015 00:50 UTC
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The US-NATO Empire is trying to shift the blame for the ensuing political & economic crises on the ultimate "fall country"- Russia.

Though seemingly spontaneous, it is likely that the US Secretary of State John Kerry knew that several sentences he said during the hearing of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs on February 24, 2015 could create a storm of media controversy across the Balkan region. Although he said many things concerning this year's activities of the US foreign policy establishment during the nearly three-hour long session, these few sentences took the spotlight because they had to do with the Balkans and Russia.[1] In the Washington's resurgent warmongering political discourse, Russia is once again, after two decades, being presented to the American people as the enemy number one (the "evil empire").

Comment: More and more the US/NATO machinations are becoming obvious to almost everyone.

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