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How Mueller deputy Andrew Weissmann's offer to drop a Ukrainian oligarch's charges could boomerang on DOJ

John Solomon
The Hill
Mon, 22 Jul 2019 19:09 UTC
Andrew Weissman
© Getty
Andrew Weissman
The ink was still drying on special counsel Robert Mueller's appointment papers when his chief deputy, the famously aggressive and occasionally controversial prosecutor Andrew Weissmann, made a bold but secret overture in early June 2017.

Weissmann quietly reached out to the American lawyers for Ukrainian oligarch Dmitry Firtash with a tempting offer: Give us some dirt on Donald Trump in the Russia case, and Team Mueller might make his 2014 U.S. criminal charges go away.

The specifics of the never-before-reported offer were confirmed to me by multiple sources with direct knowledge, as well as in contemporaneous defense memos I read.
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Bulb

Iranian President Rohani hints at possible tanker swap with UK, talks with US


RFE/RL
Wed, 24 Jul 2019 18:14 UTC
Iranian President Hassan Rohani

Iranian President Hassan Rohani
Iranian President Hassan Rohani has hinted that Tehran is open to a possible tanker swap with Britain and indirect talks with the United States over its nuclear program and sanctions.

"We don't want tensions with some European countries," Rohani said in comments posted on the official government website on July 24.

Rohani said if Britain were to "cease the incorrect acts that they have done, including that of Gibraltar, Iran's response would be" appropriate to their actions.
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Chess

China to build 'world-class' military in new strategy as US 'stirs up rivalry' between major powers


RT
Wed, 24 Jul 2019 17:49 UTC
chinese soldier
© Global Look Press / Li Mangmang / ZUMAPRESS.com
The US erodes global security and seeks "absolute superiority," but Beijing won't follow the "beaten track" of big powers in seeking hegemony, focusing instead on having a "world-class" army, says a new Chinese military document.

China has markedly sharpened its tone towards the US in a white paper on national defense rolled out on Wednesday. The paper, published by the Defense Ministry, blames Washington for adopting "unilateral policies" as well as provoking competition among major world powers.

Beijing believes the US is after "technological and institutional innovation in pursuit of absolute military superiority," it also undermines "global strategic stability" by heavily investing in nuclear, space, cyber, and missile defense assets.
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Bulb

'Pro-China' Boris Johnson 'enthusiastic' about belt and road plan

Zhenhua Lu
South China Morning Post
Wed, 24 Jul 2019 17:32 UTC
Boris Johnson
© Reuters
Britain’s next prime minister says he is “very pro-China”.
Boris Johnson, Britain's prime minister-designate, said his government would be very "pro-China", in an interview with a Hong Kong-based Chinese-language broadcaster shortly before he was chosen to succeed Theresa May on Tuesday.

Speaking to Phoenix TV, Johnson backed Chinese President Xi Jinping's infrastructure-based Belt and Road Initiative and said his government would maintain an open market for Chinese investors in Britain.

"We are very enthusiastic about the Belt and Road Initiative. We are very interested in what President Xi is doing [for the plan]," he said.
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Dominoes

EU trade chief: We have 35 billion euro list ready if US hits EU with car tariffs


CNBC
Tue, 23 Jul 2019 17:17 UTC
European Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom
© Eric Vidal | Reuters
European Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom
The European Union would retaliate with extra duties on 35 billion euros ($39.1 billion) worth of U.S. goods if Washington went ahead with tariffs on EU cars, the bloc's trade chief said on Tuesday.

"We will not accept any managed trade, quotas or voluntary export restraints and, if there were to be tariffs, we would have a rebalancing list," European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom told a committee of the European Parliament.

"It is already basically prepared, worth 35 billion euros. I do hope we do not have to use that one," she continued.
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Dollars

JP Morgan says dump US dollar as its century of global dominance coming to end


RT
Wed, 24 Jul 2019 17:09 UTC
dollar
© Getty Images / Buena Vista Images
The US dollar will struggle to remain the top international currency in the coming decades as the rising power of Asian economies is set to undermine its leading position, Wall Street bank JPMorgan Chase has predicted.

"The US dollar has been the world's dominant reserve currency for almost a century," the bank's strategist Craig Cohen wrote in a report earlier this month.
However, we believe the dollar could lose its status as the world's dominant currency...due to structural reasons as well as cyclical impediments.
Many other currencies came to their demise throughout history, thanks to shifts in global economic centers, which is now poised to move towards Asia, the strategist points out. While China's accession to global superpower status is believed to be one of the factors of this shift, it's not the only one.
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Dollars

Facebook agrees to pay record $5bn fine to FTC over privacy violations, critics call it a 'parking ticket'


RT
Wed, 24 Jul 2019 17:07 UTC
zuckerberg
© Reuters / Leah Millis
Mark Zuckerberg
The Federal Trade Commission announced on Wednesday that Facebook agreed to pay a record-breaking $5 billion fine over privacy violations. The penalty follows an investigation into the Cambridge Analytica data-sharing scandal.

"The $5 billion penalty against Facebook is the largest ever imposed on any company for violating consumers' privacy and almost 20 times greater than the largest privacy or data security penalty ever imposed worldwide," the FTC said in a press release. It added that "it is one of the largest penalties ever assessed by the US government for any violation."

According to FTC Chairman Joe Simons, "Despite repeated promises to its billions of users worldwide that they could control how their personal information is shared, Facebook undermined consumers' choices."

Facebook has also agreed to pay an additional $100 million to settle allegations that it misled investors about the seriousness of the misuse of users' data, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said.
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Bullseye

No foreign military presence is key to Persian Gulf stability - Russia's security concept


RT
Wed, 24 Jul 2019 16:38 UTC
MH-60S Sea Hawk helicopter
© Reuters / US Navy
Russia has unveiled its Concept of Collective Security in the Persian Gulf, outlining arms control, joint anti-terrorist efforts and giving up on foreign military presence as keys conditions for stability in the turbulent region.

The concept singled out security in the Persian Gulf as "one of the prime regional problems of today." The document, presented by Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov at the Foreign Ministry in Moscow on Tuesday, with diplomats from Iran, Gulf Arab States, the US, UK, China, EU and other countries in attendance, noted that tensions in the strategic area, which have remained high over the past several decades, threaten the political and economic wellbeing on a global scale.
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Bad Guys

As Trump Backs Down, the Pips Squeak

Tom Luongo
Strategic Culture Foundation
Sun, 21 Jul 2019 16:08 UTC
houthis yemen drones
© Hussam Al-Sanabani/Twitter
Houthi leader Saleh Alsmad unveils a Qasef-1 drone, an indigenous hi-tech development, on February 26, 2017
Last week it was all fire and brimstone. The US was threatening more sanctions on Iran, the Brits were seizing oil tankers and Iran was violating the JCPOA.

This week things look different all of a sudden. An oil tanker goes dark while passing through the Strait of Hormuz, the story fails to get any real traction and the US allows Iranian Foreign Minister, recently sanctioned, to do his job at the United Nations.


Comment: This was before Iran's announcement that it had, indeed, seized the tanker, which has created a new, but smaller, wave of hysteria.


Trump then holds a cabinet meeting where he reiterates that "We're not looking for regime change. We want them out of Yemen."

I thought National Security Advisor John Bolton said the US would apply pressure until "the pips squeak."


Comment: Then again, it's at least plausible that Bolton isn't so much of an adviser as a negotiating strategy.


Where the pips are squeaking is on the Arabian Peninsula, not across the Persian Gulf in Bandar Abbas. Specifically, I'm talking about the United Arab Emirates. The UAE sent a delegation to Tehran recently that coincided with its partial withdrawal of troops from Yemen.

Comment: See also:

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Star of David

Laughable nonsense: Netanyahu claims Middle East would fall to Islamic extremism without Israel


RT
Tue, 23 Jul 2019 15:29 UTC
Benjamin Netanyahu
© Oded Balilty/Pool via REUTERS
Never one to mince his words, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that Israel is the sole force fending off a radical Islamic takeover of the Middle East, arguing Tel Aviv is an indispensable defender of the entire region.

Netanyahu shared this insight with a delegation of Arab journalists and bloggers on a visit to Israel on Tuesday.

"I have told them one thing I believe in: the only force that prevents the collapse of the middle east from within it is Israel," the prime minister said in a Facebook post quoting his remarks, adding "without Israel, the middle east would collapse under the yoke of the forces of Islamic extremism."
By being present here, ... Israel is preventing the collapse of the middle east and falling into the hands of radical Islam.
Though the PM's post only said the attending journalists had come from nations that "do not maintain any diplomatic relations with Israel," a Knesset press release said that the visiting media figures came from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.

Comment: Only Netanyahu can lie so much in so few words. Everything he says is not only wrong, but completely opposite to the truth. Without Israel, the Middle East would probably be much more peaceful - Israel has been the instigator and cause of countless wars, intrigue and injustice since its inception. Its behavior is the main spark of tension in the region. It is NOT the "defender" of the entire region, nor is it anywhere close to being the "sole force" fending off radical Islam. In fact, Israel was conspicuously absent in the fight on al-Qaeda and ISIS in Syria, choosing instead to treat their fighters and offer them air support whenever the Syrian Army threatened the terrorists' hold. Not only did Israel not fight the extremists in Syria, it actively supported them.

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