Puppet MastersS


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Baucus warns of 'huge train wreck' enacting ObamaCare provisions

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© AP Photo/J. Scott ApplewhiteSenate Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. questions Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius as she testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, April 17, 2013, before the committee's hearing on President Barack Obama's budget proposal for fiscal year 2014.
Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said Wednesday he fears a "train wreck" as the Obama administration implements its signature healthcare law.

Baucus, the chairman of the chamber's powerful Finance Committee and a key architect of the healthcare reform law, said he fears people do not understand how the law will work.

"I just see a huge train wreck coming down," he told Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at a Wednesday hearing. "You and I have discussed this many times, and I don't see any results yet."

Baucus pressed Sebelius for details about how the Health Department will explain the law and raise awareness of its provisions, which are supposed to take effect in just a matter of months.

"I'm very concerned that not enough is being done so far - very concerned," Baucus said.

Vader

U.S. military to step up presence in Jordan in light of Syria civil war

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A man stands in the remains of a house following a reported airstrike by the Syrian air force in Aleppo on Monday, April 15. Tensions in Syria first flared in March 2011, escalating into a civil war that still rages.
In a critical indication of growing U.S. military involvement in the civil war in Syria, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has ordered the deployment of more American troops to Jordan.

Hagel announced the deployment, which was first reported on CNN, in a statement to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday.

He said the troops will work alongside Jordanian forces to "improve readiness and prepare for a number of scenarios."
The troops, which will number up to 200, are from the headquarters of the 1st Armored Division at Fort Bliss, Texas, two Defense Department officials told CNN.

The deployment "creates an additional capability" beyond what has been there, one official said, and will give the United States the ability to "potentially form a joint task force for military operations, if ordered."

The new deployment will include communications and intelligence specialists who will assist the Jordanians and "be ready for military action" if President Barack Obama were to order it, the official said.

Bomb

Experts: Antigovernment groups probably not behind Boston bombings

boston marathan
© Julio Cortez/AP
While officials are still investigating who was behind the deadly bombings at the Boston Marathon, President Obama made it clear on Tuesday that authorities still don't know whether domestic or foreign actors are responsible for the attack.

But one message from domestic terrorism experts is clear: Most of the evidence points against an antigovernment group being responsible for the attack. Several militia groups, who fiercely and sometimes violently fight to keep their Second Amendment rights, have come out against the bombings in Boston.

While some of the factors surrounding the Boston bombings could point to these groups - a simplistic homemade bomb, causing mass casualties, falling on Tax Day - other factors don't add up. For many of these groups, the date that most matters to them is not Tax Day or Patriots' Day or even Hitler's birthday, but the anniversary of the Waco siege (pictured below). On April 19, 1993, 76 people died when a radical, antigovernment sect's compound in Texas burnt to the ground after days of firefights with federal officials. When Timothy McVeigh bombed the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people, it fell on the anniversary of the Waco raid, which he cited as a motivation for the attack.

Bomb

"False-flag" meme goes mainstream with Boston Marathon bombing

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© unknown
On September 11th, 2001, the US media began chanting "Bin Laden" in unison almost from the moment the attack was reported. The possibility that US government insiders had orchestrated the attack - in order to blame Muslims, launch wars on Muslim countries, and seize near-absolute power - was never mentioned.

Bin Laden's repeated statements that he deplored the 9/11 attacks, considered them un-Islamic, and suspected that American supporters of Israel were behind them failed to penetrate the corporate media bubble. When the FBI definitively stated that Bin Laden was "not wanted" for 9/11 because there was "no hard evidence" of his involvement, the media blacked out the story.

But after the Boston bombings of April 16th, 2013, even the corporate monopoly media could no longer ignore the possibility of a false-flag attack. Yahoo News asked "Who's behind the Boston Marathon bombings?" and offered 4 theories: (1) Islamic jihadists, (2) Right-wing militia types, (3) the government, and (4) a criminally-insane lone wolf.

Numbers (1), (2), and (4), of course, are the usual suspects. But including (3) "the government" on the suspects list is unprecedented for a mainstream news story reporting on a domestic terror incident.

Bad Guys

Best of the Web: The Boston bombings in context: How the FBI fosters, funds and equips American terrorists

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The Boston Marathon bombing has provoked shock, grief and outrage from around the world. After decades of conditioning, the public automatically equates such terrorism with Muslim radicals. But the evidence shows that every major terror plot on American soil in the past 10 years has been fostered, funded and equipped by one organization: the FBI.

People around the world watched in horror this week as explosions rocked the finish line of the Boston Marathon, turning a day of sportsmanship and celebration into one of shock, grief and outrage. As with all such events, the desire to discover who was behind this cowardly act has driven many into a speculative frenzy. And, in a sad reminder of the indoctrination that the Western world has been under for over a decade now in the mythical "war of terror," it did not take long at all before the collective finger of the mob was pointed squarely in the direction of Muslim terrorists.


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Failure of U.S. war on terror and hyper security state: Clueless on Boston

Boston marathon bombings
© EPA
The bombing at the Boston Marathon was a tragic event, which like the events of 9-11, caused, are causing and have caused, untold suffering and pain to innocent unsuspecting civilians, and my heart and I am sure the hearts of all normal, thinking people go out to the innocent people who were killed or had their lives torn apart. Condolences certainly go out to all of those affected by this, but in light of more than a decade of a U.S. war on terror, the tragedy would indicate a complete and utter failure in protecting the citizenry.

Even before the dust had settled the finger pointing began worldwide and the usual suspects were named: Al-Qaeda, Muslims, Tuareg sympathizers, terrorists of every persuasion and, according to one Russian media outlet citing CNN, a "dark-skinned" suspect. Of course it is a natural function, when an event like this occurs, after the initial shock and trauma recede, to feel anger and a desire for retribution, yet no one has really pointed the finger where it should be pointed because people are too afraid or too conditioned or both to actually face the truth that is right before their eyes.

Americans love to point to the perpetrators of their endless events of mass violence, child killings, mass shootings and now terrorism as being some sort of abomination and isolated single events or as being in some way "evil victimizing innocents" yet refuse, no matter how clear and in their faces the evidence is, that American society, their own government and they themselves and the culture they support are directly to blame.

Attention

Obama quietly passed law making insider trading easier for US politicians

The whole concept of avoiding 'conflicts of interest' is a virtue now consigned to history in the United States.

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© 21st Century Wire
Remember the good old days, when the good men and women of America got into politics to help serve their country, and not for the money?

Imagine if you were able to pass a law that would regulate your own behavior and ultimately define the consequences of that behavior. That's what all politicians in Washington DC do on a regular basis.

When it comes to regulating their investments whilst in office, they are able to pass laws that allow them to use special foreknowledge (that only lawmakers and government regulators have) for personal gain.

It's all about finding that golden loophole. Once upon a time it was called "insider trading"... hardly a crime on Wall Street anymore (props to Goldman Sachs), and neither in Washington DC, or so it seems, according to the President and his legislative branch.

Now we know how hard it is to be a politician these days. Many of you genuinely feel that their should be some additional value-added perks to your job as a public servant. After all, our elected officials deserve some extra compensation for shunning the public sector and offering their incredible talents for the public good, right?

While tragic events in Boston are dominating the national media this week, US President Barack Obama quietly signed a bill, and one which passed rather swiftly through Congress we might add... it's a bill that prevents key financial disclosure forms filed by senior governmental employees from being posted online. In a rare display of cross-party cooperation, both sides of the aisle seemed happy to approve (surprise, surprise) by unanimous consent.

Bomb

Israeli police head to US to aid in Boston Marathon bombing investigation

 Israel Police, Major General Yohanan Danino
© AFP Photo / Jack GuezThe head of the Israel Police, Major General Yohanan Danino
The investigation into Monday's deadly bombing at the Boston Marathon has officially gone international: law enforcement officials from Israel have been sent to the United States to assist in the probe.

Israel Police Chief Yohanan Danino says he has dispatched officials to Boston, Massachusetts, where they will meet with Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and other authorities, the Times of Israel Reports.

Citing an earlier report published by the newspaper Maariv, Times of Israel writes that Danino has dispatched police officers to participate in discussions that "will center on the Boston Marathon bombings and deepening professional cooperation between the law enforcement agencies of both countries."

The paper reports that Israeli law enforcement planned the trip before the deadly pair of bombings on Monday that has so far claimed three lives, but the discussions will now shift focus in order to see how help from abroad can expand the investigation.

In an address made Tuesday, Israel President Shimon Peres said that tragedies such as this week's incident in Boston, sadly, bring people together from across the world.

"When it comes to events like this, all of us are one family. We feel a part of the people who paid such a high price. God bless them," Peres said. "Today the real problem is terror, and terror is not an extension of policy: Their policy is terror, their policy is to threaten. Terrorists divide people, they kill innocent people."

Bad Guys

Surprise! Multinationals insulated from lawsuits over atrocities overseas

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Chief Justice John Roberts said a company couldn’t be sued under the Alien Tort Statute simply because it had a “corporate presence” in the U.S.
The U.S. Supreme Court insulated multinational corporations from at least some lawsuits over atrocities overseas, scaling back a favorite legal tool of human-rights activists.

The justices threw out a suit accusing two foreign-based units of Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA) of facilitating torture and executions in Nigeria. The majority said the 1789 Alien Tort Statute generally doesn't apply to conduct beyond U.S. borders.

In the Shell case, "all the relevant conduct took place outside the United States," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court. The justices were unanimous on the outcome in the Shell case, while dividing in their reasoning.

The ruling may help a number of companies defeat similar lawsuits. Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM), Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO), Chiquita Brands International Inc. (CQB), Siemens AG, Daimler AG and Rio Tinto Group (RIO) are all fighting Alien Tort Statute claims.

Sheeple

DC Senate buildings temporarily evacuated, locked down; president sent suspicious letter

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Politico reporter Ginger Gibson Instagrammed a photo of a bomb squad in the Russell Building.
12:50 p.m. - The Daily Caller's Alex Pappas reports that a loudspeaker message at the Hart Senate Office Building announced that "all tests were negative" - indicating that no poison was found on the suspicious letters.

12:47 p.m. - The Daily Caller's Alex Pappas reports that a loudspeaker message at the Hart Senate Office Building announced that the Hart building is clear, and both Senate buildings are now open. The Capitol Police issued a statement saying that the suspicious packages have been removed.

12:41 p.m. - The Daily Caller's Alex Pappas reports that the bomb squad has left the Russell Senate Office Building, the closed hallway has been reopened. A spokesman for Sen. Richard Shelby has confirmed to TheDC that their Russell office received a suspicious package.

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TheDC’s Alex Pappas snapped this photo of a bomb squad leaving the Russell Senate Office Building.