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Fri, 05 Nov 2021
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Campaign pivot? Beto O'Rourke hires Obama strategist who lobbied for SeaWorld, Keystone XL, private prisons

BetoO'Rourke
© Washington Post
Beto O'Rourke
Beto O'Rourke's Thursday hiring of Jeff Berman, a Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton veteran, is the latest step his presidential campaign has taken away from the insurgent energy of his Senate run and toward a more centrist and corporate strategic direction.

Berman, who is joining O'Rourke's campaign as senior adviser for delegate strategy, is perhaps most well known for his expertise in the arcane system of delegate selection, which he used to help Barack Obama win the Democratic nomination in 2008. An often overlooked part of his record, though, is his stint at law and lobbying firm Bryan Cave, a position for which he was hired immediately after Obama's presidential campaign. (As reporter Ken Silverstein remarked in Harpers at the time: "That was fast.") According to the federal lobbying registry, between 2009 and 2011 Berman's clients on behalf of Bryan Cave included the private prison company GEO Group; TransCanada, the company behind the Keystone XL pipeline; and SeaWorld, which was then owned by massive private equity firm Blackstone.

Many of these clients are ostensibly on the opposite side of many of the issues that O'Rourke is campaigning on. Take, for example, immigration, a central theme of O'Rourke's presidential run: He launched his campaign in the border town of El Paso, Texas, railing against Donald Trump's immigration policies and stating, "For more than 100 years, this community has welcomed generations of immigrants from across the Rio Grande." Yet the GEO Group, for which Berman's work (along with other lobbyists) made Bryan Cave $60,000 in 2010, has profited handily from its business of running private prisons, including immigrant detention centers.

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Footprints

UN: Withdrawal of Houthi rebels from Yemeni port facilities on course

Houthis shakehands
© Abduljabbar Zeyad/Reuters
Coastguard officer shakes hands with Houthi members as they withdraw from Hodeidah port.
The United Nations says the first day of the withdrawal from western Yemen of Iranian-backed Houthi rebels from two of the three Red Sea port facilities they've vowed to evacuate under a peace deal has gone according to plan.

The UN has been monitoring the withdrawal from the Red Sea port facilities of Saleef and Ras Isa, which the rebels have held since 2014. The UN monitors plan to report to the Security Council about the situation on May 15. "All three ports were monitored simultaneously by United Nations teams as the military forces left the ports and the coast guard took over responsibility for security," a UN statement on May 12 said.

The UN statement comes a day after the Yemeni government accused the rebels of "staging a new ploy" by faking the withdrawal. Provincial Governor Al-Hasan Taher told AFP the rebels were handing the ports "to themselves without any monitoring by the United Nations and the government side."

The UN says the Houthi rebels announced late on May 10 that they would unilaterally redeploy their forces out of three Red Sea port facilities over four days beginning on May 11 - potentially opening the way for the delivery of humanitarian aid needed to prevent a famine that threatens millions of people.

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Attention

'The Russians are coming' for European Parliament elections - but please don't ask for proof!

EU posters
© Workers put up election posters in The Netherlands ahead of EU Parliament Elections. AFP/Robin Utrecht
Workers put up election posters in The Netherlands ahead of EU Parliament Elections.
Those dastardly Russian hackers are alive and well and meddling in the upcoming European Parliament elections, warned the New York Times. Just don't expect to see any proof, because the paper offers none.

Fresh from interfering in seemingly everything wrong in America, unidentified Russian hackers have shifted their attention to Europe, deploying information warfare tactics to give a boost to populist and right-wing parties ahead of next month's European Parliament elections. At least according to a New York Times article, given the front-page treatment on Sunday.

The story is heavy with accusation. The Russians, it states, are busy "spreading disinformation, encouraging discord and amplifying distrust in the centrist parties that have governed for decades." Among their tools are news websites that "bear the same electronic signatures as pro-Kremlin websites," Twitter accounts, Facebook profiles, and WhatsApp groups. "They're working to destroy everything that was built post-World War II," Jones said, an explanation rivaling George W. Bush's "they hate our freedom" for its nonsensical reductionism.

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Stock Up

Asian economies to take over '7% Growth Club' in 2020s, but China is not on the list

The Taj Mahal
© Pexels
The Taj Mahal
Asian countries are expected to be the main drivers of global growth through the next decade, with growth rates at around 7 percent. China, however, will be absent from the club, according to Standard Chartered predictions.

Five of the seven rapidly growing economies will be in Asia, the bank's analysts, Global Chief Economist David Mann and India-based head of thematic research Madhur Jha have concluded, according to Bloomberg, citing their research. The list includes India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Myanmar, and the Philippines, while the two remaining countries in the club are in Africa - Ethiopia and Cote d'Ivoire.

While all the countries listed are predicted to enjoy surges in per-capita GDP, the research notes that it does not necessarily mean that people's lives will become much better in spheres such as health and education, and have better access to goods and services. However, the growth can result in higher incomes and "reduce socio-political instability and make it easier to introduce structural reforms, creating a virtuous cycle."

Comment: It's not so important that China continues to grow at record levels, just at levels it can sustain. It's also worth noting that some of those countries listed above have China and its global initiatives to thank for some of their current growth. As Pepe Escobar writes in Pepe Escobar: The hardcore is yet to come for US & China:
What happens is that global supply chains will be redirected to economies that offer comparative advantages in relation to China, such as Vietnam, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Cambodia and Laos. And this redirection is already happening anyway - including by Chinese companies.

BRI represents a massive geopolitical and financial investment by China, as well as its partners; over 130 states and territories have signed on. Beijing is using its immense pool of capital to make its own transition towards a consumer-based economy while advancing the necessary pan-Eurasian infrastructure development - with all those ports, high-speed rail, fiber optics, electrical grids expanding to most Global South latitudes.



Sherlock

FBI's redacted 9/11 'Dancing Israelis' photos analyzed

redacted dancing israeli photos

Comment: 9/11 researcher Ryan Dawson gives an interview regarding his analysis of redacted photos released by the FBI.


There are still 66 more missing pictures.
dancing israelis release form

Comment: A previous analysis by The Corbett Report:

Dancing Israelis on 9/11 points to the real criminals of that day: 'Our purpose was to document the event'


Briefcase

Swedish prosecutor reopens Assange rape allegations case

Julian Assange
© Jack Taylor/Getty Images
Sweden's Director of Public Prosecutions Eva-Marie Persson has announced that the investigation into allegations of rape by whistleblower and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been reopened.

"I have taken the decision to reopen the preliminary investigation," Persson told reporters at a press conference on Monday, confirming her office's decision. "As Mr Assange is currently incarcerated in the UK the circumstances now allow him to be extradited to Sweden on a rape warrant," she added.

The rape charges were leveled against Assange in a case which began almost a decade ago, before he sought refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012. He has repeatedly denied the allegations.

The statute of limitations expired on part of one charge in Sweden's overall case against Assange, however, the time limit in respect of a rape allegation by one of the women does not expire until 2020.


Comment: More from RT:
[Wikileaks Editor-in-Chief] Kristinn Hrafnsson said that "there has been considerable political pressure on Sweden to reopen their investigation, but there has always been political pressure surrounding this case."

Hrafnsson added that, in his estimation at least, the "case has been mishandled throughout" after a Swedish prosecutor initially found that "no crime at all" had occurred, after which time the case was reopened.

A lawyer representing the woman making the allegation against Assange stressed the importance of prosecutors moving quickly because the statute of limitations is approaching next year.

"My client feels great gratitude and she is very hopeful about getting restitution and we both hope that justice will win," lawyer Elisabeth Massi Fritz said at a news conference.



Briefcase

Pakistan and IMF reach agreement on 3-year $6 billion bailout package

imf protest pakistan

A protest in Islamabad last year against a proposed IMF bailout.
Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have reached a staff-level agreement on a new three-year, $6 billion bailout package following months of negotiations.

The accord, which must still be approved by the IMF board of directors in Washington, is intended to shore up Pakistan's public finances and strengthen its slowing economy.

The long-delayed package would be Pakistan's 13th bailout since the late 1980s.

In a statement on May 12, the IMF said that its team reached a deal "on economic policies that could be supported by a 39-month Extended Fund Arrangement (EFF) for about $6 billion."

It said the package will include "an ambitious structural reform agenda" to boost growth, which the lender expects to slow to 2.9 percent this year from 5.2 percent in 2018.

Comment: The International News gives some added information:
"We have to wait for memorandum of economic and political policy to be released by IMF after the approval by executive board to know the exact details of the IMF loan agreement," Dr Ashfaque Hassan Khan Principal and Dean of school of Social Sciences and Humanities in NUST stated this while giving its response to IMF statement about deal with Pakistan here on Sunday evening.

However, the loan programme will be for 39 months instead of three years (36 months). But the most starling thing is that the agreement is subject to IMF management approval and to approval by the Executive Board, subject to the timely implementation of prior actions and confirmation of international partners' financial commitments.

This means the government, Dr Ashfaque said, have to take many prior actions to qualify for the approval of the loan from executive board of IMF which may include the satisfactory actions against money laundering and terror financing as for the first time in IMF loan programme under Extended Fund Facility programme the words of anti-money laundering and terror financing have been used. This means that unless and until Pakistan satisfies FATF on the said issues, IMF executive board will not extend green signal to $6 billion loan programme for Pakistan.

"Under the prior action, the government will have to bring down primary deficit from 3 percent to 0.6 percent in next budgetary year which will be an uphill task for the government." He explained that the primary deficit means total revenue less than non-interest expenditure.

He further says that apart from debt servicing, the deficit between revenue and expenditure on defence, running development budget expenditure that stand at 3 percent will be brought down to 0.6 percent in next financial year. This means that Pakistan will be having no option but to place huge cut on development budget or on defence budget and if the government does not want to cut either development budget or defence budget, then it will have to generate massive revenue through taxation. Dr Khan said massive increase through taxation will not be possible at a time when the growth has tumbled to just 3.3 percent and in next two year it may go down more or may stand stagnant. "When the growth will be in the lowest ebb, that massive revenue generation will be impossible through huge taxation."



Propaganda

Propaganda alert: Israeli minister says Iran may attack Israel if US standoff escalates

Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz
© REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany/File Photo
Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz speaks during an interview with Reuters in Cairo, Egypt January 14, 2019.
An Israeli cabinet minister warned on Sunday of possible direct or proxy Iranian attacks on Israel should the stand-off between Tehran and Washington escalate.

The United States has increased economic and military pressure on Iran, with President Donald Trump on Thursday urging its leaders to talk to him about giving up their nuclear program and saying he could not rule out an armed confrontation.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, which supports Trump's hard tack against its arch-foe, has largely been reticent about the spiraling tensions.

Parting with the silence, Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz said that, in the Gulf, "things are heating up".

Comment: Steinitz is making these statements knowing full well that "things are heating up" precisely because Israel is pushing its neocon proxies in the US to make things heat up. Toppling Iran's current leadership is a top priority for the power-hungry crazies in both Israel and the US.


Star of David

Another Eurovision hasbara fail: Israel takes heat for promo joking about occupation, greedy Jews & 'lovely b*tches'

eurovision israel
© AFP / Ronen Zvulun
The 2019 Eurovision Song Contest logo is seen on partitions near the Eurovision Village, an area for fans of the contest.
Eurovision organizers wanted to advertise Israel to tourists and show that the locals aren't afraid to laugh at themselves but missed the mark completely uniting the most fierce political rivals in outrage.

The clip, released by state-owned Kan broadcaster ahead of the Eurovision Song Contest in Tel-Aviv next week, begins with a pair of terrified European guests arriving at Ben Gurion International Airport. They are jumped on by the contest's host Lucy Ayoub and the channel's journalist Elia Grinfeld, who break into a catchy song full of various stereotypes about Israel.

"Don't say a word, I know what you just heard, that it's a land of war and occupation. But we have so much more than that," Lucy and Elia reassure the visitors in the opening verse of their 4-minute-long musical number.

They then insist that people in Israel treat each other as "frenemies" because most of them have "complex identities."

Comment: Israel is so desperate to make hosting the discredited Eurovision contest a success they have lost all common sense. How about not shooting children, stop stealing land in the West Bank, and lifting the siege on Gaza. That would clean up their image big-time.


Brick Wall

Trump's 'deal of the century' will likely give Israel control over West Bank settlements

Israeli barrier
© REUTERS/Mohamad Torokman
Palestinians use a ladder to climb over a section of the controversial Israeli barrier as they try to make their way to attend the first Friday prayers of Ramadan in Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa mosque, near Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank May 10, 2019
The US peace deal for the Middle East includes establishing Israeli law over the Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, an Israeli TV channel has reported. The condition has been a no-go for Palestine.

More than two years in the making and bogged down by delays, the Trump administration's "peace deal" for Israel and Palestine is finally expected to be unveiled next month. With that day approaching, parts of the draft, shrouded in a thick veil of secrecy, have been leaked to media, confirming the general expectations of it being heavily skewed in Israel's favor.

The latest leak reported by Channel 12 on Sunday suggested that the deal envisages the implementation of Israeli civil law over its settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law. The practice of rampant settlement construction has become a hallmark of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government. The PM, who is set to become the longest-serving Israeli leader this summer after his re-election last month, made the issue of Israel's sovereignty over the West Bank settlements one of the core tenets of his campaign.

Comment: Trump's lopsided, heavily biased and idiotic 'deal of the century' is quite simply another political disaster in the making.

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