In a somber show of U.S. support for Ukraine's new leadership, Secretary of State John Kerry walked the streets Tuesday where nearly 100 anti-government protesters were gunned down by police last month, and promised beseeching crowds that American aid is on the way.
The Obama administration announced a $1 billion energy subsidy package in Washington as Kerry was arriving in Kiev. The fast-moving developments came as the United States readied economic sanctions amid worries that Moscow was ready to stretch its military reach further into the mainland of the former Soviet republic.
Kerry headed straight to Institutska Street at the start of an hours-long visit intended to bolster the new government that took over just a week ago when Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych fled. He lay a bouquet of red roses, and twice the Roman Catholic secretary of state made the sign of the cross at a shrine set up to memorialize protesters who were killed during mid-February riots.
Puppet Masters
© NBC/Andrew Kravchenko
Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland and Ambassador Geoff Pyatt walk inside the protester's tent camp in Kiev, Ukraine, in December 2013.
Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland and Ambassador Geoff Pyatt walk inside the protester's tent camp in Kiev, Ukraine, in December 2013.
If you have not listened to the conversation between Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Ambassador to the Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt that was leaked a little over a month ago on YouTube, please click on the video posted below. As Robert Wenzel recently discussed, this video is solid proof that Obama administration officials were plotting who the new leaders of Ukraine would be several weeks before a violent revolution ousted President Viktor Yanukovych from power...
During the clip, Nuland and Pyatt discuss their desired outcome for the crisis in Ukraine. Now that 3 weeks have passed since the leak and events have developed, it is instructive to listen to the recording once again. (See below.) Keep in mind that this leak was made on February 2, which means the conversation occurred before that date. Viktor Yanukovych did not lose power over the Ukrainian government until more than three weeks later February 24th.Here is the video:
The recording reveals Nuland and Pyatt discussing whether Vitali Klitschko, sometimes referred to as "Klitsch" in the recording, should be named the deputy prime minister and seems to assume that Arseniy Yatseniuk, sometimes referred to in the recording as "Yats," will become prime minister. Since that conversation, Yatseniuk has, indeed, become prime minister. Anybody that tells you that the US is not running the "revolution" from behind the scenes is blowing smoke.
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Marcy Wheeler, who is the new site's "senior policy analyst," speculated that the Ukraine revolution was likely a "coup" engineered by "deep" forces on behalf of "Pax Americana":
"There's quite a bit of evidence of coup-ness. Q is how many levels deep interference from both sides is."These are serious claims. So serious that I decided to investigate them. And what I found was shocking.
Wheeler is partly correct. Pando has confirmed that the American government - in the form of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) - played a major role in funding opposition groups prior to the revolution. Moreover, a large percentage of the rest of the funding to those same groups came from a US billionaire who has previously worked closely with US government agencies to further his own business interests. This was by no means a US-backed "coup," but clear evidence shows that US investment was a force multiplier for many of the groups involved in overthrowing Yanukovych.
© Ivan Sekretarev/AP
Simferopol, Crimea, on 2 March. ‘Underlying the crisis in Crimea and Russia’s fierce resistance to potential changes is Nato’s undisguised ambition to continue two decades of expansion.'
Simferopol, Crimea, on 2 March. ‘Underlying the crisis in Crimea and Russia’s fierce resistance to potential changes is Nato’s undisguised ambition to continue two decades of expansion.'
Were he talking about the country's economic plight he would have a point. Instead, along with much of the US and European media, he was over-dramatising developments in the east, where Russian speakers are understandably alarmed after the new Kiev authorities scrapped a law allowing Russian as an official language in their areas. They see it as proof that the anti-Russian ultra-nationalists from western Ukraine who were the dominant force in last month's insurrection still control it. Eastern Ukrainians fear similar tactics of storming public buildings could be used against their elected officials.
Kerry's rush to punish Russia and Nato's decision to respond to Kiev's call by holding a meeting of member states' ambassadors in Brussels today were mistakes. Ukraine is not part of the alliance, so none of the obligations of common defence come into play. Nato should refrain from interfering in Ukraine by word or deed. The fact that it insists on getting engaged reveals the elephant in the room: underlying the crisis in Crimea and Russia's fierce resistance to potential changes is Nato's undisguised ambition to continue two decades of expansion into what used to be called "post-Soviet space", led by Bill Clinton and taken up by successive administrations in Washington. At the back of Pentagon minds, no doubt, is the dream that a US navy will one day replace the Russian Black Sea fleet in the Crimean ports of Sevastopol and Balaclava.
© Amnesty International
Nabeela, eight-year-old granddaughter of Mamana Bibi. Mamana was killed by an illegal U.S. drone strike in Pakistan. The U.S. is exploiting the lawless and remote nature of the region to evade accountability for its drone program, including killings that may constitute extrajudicial executions or war crimes.
Nabeela, eight-year-old granddaughter of Mamana Bibi. Mamana was killed by an illegal U.S. drone strike in Pakistan. The U.S. is exploiting the lawless and remote nature of the region to evade accountability for its drone program, including killings that may constitute extrajudicial executions or war crimes.
Unfortunately, during the last five years, no world leader has done more to undermine international law than Barack Obama. He treats it with rhetorical adulation and behavioral contempt, helping to further normalize a might-makes-right approach to global affairs that is the antithesis of international law.
Fifty years ago, another former law professor, Senator Wayne Morse, condemned such arrogance of power. "I don't know why we think, just because we're mighty, that we have the right to try to substitute might for right," Morse said on national TV in 1964. "And that's the American policy in Southeast Asia - just as unsound when we do it as when Russia does it."
Today, Uncle Sam continues to preen as the globe's big sheriff on the side of international law even while functioning as the world's biggest outlaw.
Rather than striving for an evenhanded assessment of how "international law" has become so much coin of the hypocrisy realm, mainline U.S. media are now transfixed with Kremlin villainy.
Let's call a spade a spade: Western politicians have usurped an elected leader.
Even in this era of rampant political spin and platitudes, where George Orwell's claim that political language is used and abused to 'make lies sound truthful and murder respectable' has never been truer, the commentary on Ukraine stands out for its dishonesty. Western observers tell us there has been a revolution in that benighted nation. They claim revolutionaries have overthrown a dictator. They say the people of Ukraine have risen up and deposed their despot, and are now 'experiencing the intense emotions expressed so eloquently by Thomas Paine in 1776 [in his writings on the American War of Independence]'. It is hard to remember the last time political language was so thoroughly used to obfuscate reality, to impose inappropriate historical narratives on to a messy modern-day event. For what we have in Ukraine is not revolution, but regime change, set in motion far more by the machinations of Western politicians than by the stone-throwing of Ukrainians.
© Unknown
The truth of what has happened in Ukraine is this: the EU and Washington have effectively brought about regime change, replacing an elected pro-Russian regime with an unelected, still-being-formed new government that is more amenable to the institutions of the West.
The truth of what has happened in Ukraine is this: the EU and Washington have effectively brought about regime change, replacing an elected pro-Russian regime with an unelected, still-being-formed new government that is more amenable to the institutions of the West.
Patrick Rock won't be getting his Lordhood now.
A senior aide to David Cameron resigned from Downing Street last month the day before being arrested on allegations relating to child abuse images.
Patrick Rock, who was involved in drawing up the government's policy for the large internet firms on online pornography filters, resigned after No 10 was alerted to the allegations.
Rock was arrested at his west London flat the next morning. Officers from the National Crime Agency subsequently examined computers and offices used in Downing Street by Rock, the deputy director of No 10's policy unit, according to the Daily Mail, which disclosed news of his arrest.
No 10 confirmed on Monday evening that Rock had been arrested. A spokesman: "On the evening of 12 February, Downing Street was first made aware of a potential offence relating to child abuse imagery. It was immediately referred to the National Crime Agency (CEOP).
Comment: Note how the UK government first fired Rock before he was seen being arrested, then ensured the story would not break for a month.
Keep in mind that it may yet turn out that this particular Tory has been 'thrown to the wolves', as happened the last time someone was falsely accused (Lord McAlpine) in an effort to blow smoke over the existence of Britain's high-level pedophile network.
See also:
Confirmed: British Labour and Conservative governments in 1970s gave elite pedophile network nearly half a million quid
Panic among UK leaders as high-level pedophile network is covered up: BBC Newsnight program suspended for naming senior Conservative pedophile
More evidence emerges of powerful pedophile network at apex of British establishment
Jimmy Savile scandal exposes pedophile network at heart of British establishment
President Obama has even promised "costs" for military action by Russia in the Ukraine. The problem is, the United States of America lacks the moral high ground necessary to lecture Russian officials about wars of invasion. With any luck, this means the U.S. will just sit back and watch while Russians start pouring Coke products into the sewers and rejecting the Big Mac. Seems those are the types of consequences the U.S. heaped on the rest of the world when they condemned the 2003 invasion of Iraq: French wine in the sewers and freedom fries for all!
© Fotolia/Irochka
Sergei Glazyev said the United States would be the first to suffer in the event of any sanctions regime.
"The Americans are threatening Russia with sanctions and pulling the EU into a trade and economic war with Russia," Glazyev said. "Most of the sanctions against Russia will bring harm to the United States itself, because as far as trade relations with the United States go, we don't depend on them in any way."
Glazyev noted that Russia is a creditor to the United States.
"We hold a decent amount of treasury bonds - more than $200 billion - and if the United States dares to freeze accounts of Russian businesses and citizens, we can no longer view America as a reliable partner," he said. "We will encourage everybody to dump US Treasury bonds, get rid of dollars as an unreliable currency and leave the US market."
© YouTube user Игорь Гаврилюк·
Far-right radicals in Ukraine stormed a city council meeting last week, wearing masks and armed with bats and hammers.
A group of nationalist-radical group 'Right Sector' broke into a City Council meeting where members of the Party of Regions were sitting in the town of Vasilkov, outside the Ukrainian capital, Kiev.
Armed members of the group entered, hinting that members of the Party of Regions should "voluntarily" resign. This was after admitting that they just invaded another local meeting, where they had successfully got other elected members of the Party of Regions to resign. The members replied that they had already done so that morning.
Comment: Reader may want to read this article to understand the motivation behind the $1 billion dollar energy subsidy aid.
IMF sponsored "Democracy" in the Ukraine