Interview with Asam Ismi of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives

Peter Koenig: Is BRICS (Brazil, Russia, China, India and South Africa) a viable alternative to the present U.S.-dominated world economic system and does it have the potential to replace it? Are we witnessing the birth of a new international economic order in BRICS and the Russia-China energy deal?

Asad Ismi: The BRICS have a great potential to become a viable alternative to the dollar dominated economic system. The creation of the BRICS development bank is an indication in this direction. The bank could temporarily even act as a BRICS Central Bank and when the time comes issue a new BRICS currency, for example the Bricso. Together the BRICS account for almost 30% of world GDP and for about 45% of the world population. However, the US is using any means they can to destabilize the BRICS one by one. Take Brazil, though Dilma Rousseff has won easily the first round of elections, but after Washington's slandering her government for corruption and high indebtedness - the usual non-substantiated arguments - her campaign had to work hard until reason prevailed. I'm confident, people's trust will confirm her in the second round.

There is a massive effort of de-dollarization going on by the BRICS, led by Russia and China, the two strongest BRICS members. Since June 2014 regular and sizable ruble - yuan swaps have taken place to free the two countries from the traditional trading currency, the US dollar. In early July this year, after meeting with Vladimir Putin, Elvira Nabiullina, Governor of the Russian Central Bank, declared in an international media event, just before her impending meeting with the Governor of the Central Bank of China in Beijing, "We are discussing with China and our BRICS partners the establishment of a system of multilateral swaps that will allow to transfer resources to one or another country, if needed. A part of the currency reserves can be directed to [the new system]", - thus announcing the emergence of an international anti-dollar alliance.

Every year, without fail, the president dies all over again. For a few days every autumn, the entire media is overwhelmed by those haunting photos from Dallas. Those cruelly happy and innocent pictures of a young president smiling and waving at bystanders, the first lady clutching a bouquet of roses. With their soft, prelapsarian colors, they seem to hail from another universe - one that has been stolen from us.

Perhaps it is that feeling of loss that explains the lingering sense of grief over John F. Kennedy's assassination year after year, when the anniversaries of other, equally shocking events - from Pearl Harbor to 9/11 - are generally quieter affairs. But there is also something unfinished about Kennedy's death, a lingering suspicion that no one has ever been able to banish.

Foreign missions are ostensibly sent to monitor and correct perceived problems on the ground. They are equipped with the language of appropriate righteousness, and the clothing of good will. That, at least, is what the operation brief is meant to state. Often, the language fades.

The mission suffers metamorphosis. Deals are done on the ground. Money changes hands. Favours are done. It is not so much building Rome as becoming Rome that becomes important. Join what one cannot change - many local conditions simply resist transformation from the outside.

The EU's rule of law mission in Kosovo, Eulex, was one such creation. It remains the EU's biggest foreign crisis mission, despite a slimming operation that cut staff from 2,200 to 1,600. The Economist suggested, rather freely, that the deployment of Eulex in 2008 "delighted" Kosovars. "Many hoped it would stamp out organised crime and corruption."[1] Certainly, the legal infrastructure on the ground proved sparse and susceptible to manipulation. But the big fish were never going to enter Eulex's nets. They were the political untouchables, at least without sufficient evidence for conviction. The reputation of the group, as a result, waned.

Critics started gathering ammunition. Andrea Capussela, formerly involved in the economic side of things in the EU's policy in Kosovo, found Eulex indifferent, even timid, in getting the cores of corruption. At worst, it proved craven. The errors in the prosecution side of things started mounting. Prominent local Kosovars, instead of facing a legal brief, found themselves in clover.

As if it weren't enough that the U.S. government (along with fellow reprobate countries Canada and Ukraine) voted against a UN resolution that essentially said fascism is bad, now Washington has stated their intention to continue working with Turkey to provide support to their terrorist proxies in Syria, which is ostensibly "battling" the Islamic State there. Sputnik reports:

Washington will continue to cooperate with Ankara on providing support to "moderate opposition" in Syria, which is battling Islamic State (IS) extremists, the White House said in a statement following a meeting between US Vice President Joe Biden and Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

"The two leaders agreed on the need to degrade and defeat ISIL, to work towards a political transition in Syria, and provide support for the Iraqi Security Forces and the moderate Syrian opposition," the statement, released Friday, said.

According to the White House, Biden and Davutoglu discussed "the fight against ISIL in Iraq and Syria" during their Friday meeting in Ankara, which followed the US Vice President's visit to Ukraine.

Of course, by "battling", Washington actually means colluding with, jumping camps to, being defeated by, and 'surrendering' to IS. Of course, none of this - the U.S. supporting Nazis and terrorists - is really a surprise. As a Sott.net editor wrote in a comment to Riley Waggaman's recent piece for Russia Insider, 'Ukrainian Nazis Seem Nice': For the last 2 or 3 generations, the leaders of the West (led by the Late, Great United States) have been closet fascists. First they brought over the cream of the Nazi crop during Project Paperclip, and it's been all downhill since then. But at least they had the decency to keep their anti-human, pathocratic proclivities at least partially concealed. Now they're openly supporting neo-Nazis in Ukraine and voting against resolutions condemning Nazism.

Judge Andrew P. Napolitano, once a Fox News TV show host - and now an outspoken critic of the US government - delivered a short, intriguing, and, I believe, important speech at the Mises Institute in Costa Mesa, California, on November 8th, 2014.

He began by talking about the origins of Natural Laws, beginning with this quote from Sir Thomas More's treason case under Henry VIII:

Some men say the earth is flat.
Some men say the earth is round.
But if it is flat, could Parliament make it round?
And if it round, could the kings command flatten it?

More was appealing to the jury of the Laws of Nature that restrain even the government. This was the classic Natural Law argument. More was not the originator of this argument; that was Saint Thomas Aquinas nearly 800 years ago. The English liberal philosopher John Locke picked up on this, as did Thomas Jefferson when he wrote the Declaration of Independence, and James Madison when he was a Scrivener for the US Constitution.

Thomas Jefferson's version of More's phrase -- "We are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights and among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" -- articulates the view that our rights come from our humanity.

Napolitano asks: What are these rights that come from humanity? And how can the government trample them? The concept of Natural Rights articulated by Aquinas is that there are areas of human behavior for which we do not need a government permission slip in order to make free choices. Things like freedom to develop your own personality, to think as you wish, to say what you think, the right to worship or not to worship, to assemble in groups or to refuse to assemble, to petition the government for redress of your differences, and the right to defend yourself against tyrants. These are the quintessential 'American rights'. The right to be left alone, for example, codified in the Fourth Amendment today is called the 'right to privacy'.

An interesting juxtaposition of news items caught my attention today. First there's this, from an interview with Russia's envoy to NATO:

"As far as I remember, even NATO officials themselves admit they have no credible materials confirming that Russian weaponry and military vehicles cross the border and that Russian troops are being amassed along the border with Ukraine," Alexander Grushko said in an interview with the Rossiya-24 TV channel.

Take that for what it's worth. But keep in mind that it makes a whole lot more sense than Kiev, the U.S. and NATO's hysterical screeching, which has not been accompanied by a single shred of actual evidence. Also remember that it's claims like this - that Russia is militarily supporting the Novorussian Armed Forces in the former "eastern Ukraine" - that have been the reasoning behind the West's current sanction war on Russia. For example:

• US to Work with Allies to Impose Additional Costs on Russia Over Ukraine
• US, EU 'Actively Discussing' Further Sanctions Against Russia: State Dept.

The "reform" measure makes room for industry-funded experts on the EPA's advisory board

Congressional climate wars were dominated Tuesday by the U.S. Senate, which spent the day debating, and ultimately failing to pass, a bill approving the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. While all that was happening, and largely unnoticed, the House was busy doing what it does best: attacking science.

H.R. 1422, which passed 229-191, would shake up the EPA's Scientific Advisory Board, placing restrictions on those pesky scientists and creating room for experts with overt financial ties to the industries affected by EPA regulations.

The bill is being framed as a play for transparency: Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texas, argued that the board's current structure is problematic because it "excludes industry experts, but not officials for environmental advocacy groups." The inclusion of industry experts, he said, would right this injustice.

But the White House, which threatened to veto the bill, said it would "negatively affect the appointment of experts and would weaken the scientific independence and integrity of the SAB."

The conflict in East Ukraine is "a choice between civilization and barbarism," warns Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, obviously alluding to the Associated Press photograph of "a Ukrainian volunteer soldier, with emblems of WWII SS Galician division."

What was once described as a poor choice of Halloween costume by Prince Harry is now in vogue with celebrated government forces participating in Ukraine's Anti-Terror Operation. Incredible, that only a few years ago, Nazi emblems and the people who wore them were under the cloud of critical disapproval - what is posterity? Or "civilization," for that matter?

Nazi symbols representing European integration have become so trendy in West Ukraine that The Daily Beast feels the need to ask, "Why are swastikas hot in West Ukraine?" Is it because handsomepants Russell Brand has reclaimed the swastika as the ancient mascot of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir? Of course.

Moscow will seek new partners in countries that have not imposed sanctions on it if Western oil and gas companies pull out of projects with Russia, RIA news agency quoted Energy Minister Alexander Novak as saying on Saturday.

The sanctions over Russia's role in the Ukraine crisis have targeted the delivery of oil technology, goods and services, aiming to make it harder for Moscow to access new oil sources.

"If (Western) companies decide for themselves not to take part in organizing investment projects in the long term, we will invite investors from countries which have not imposed sanctions against us and our oil and gas companies," Novak was quoted as saying in response to a question at a meeting with students.

Baghdad says ISIL militants have stolen more than one million tons of grain from northern Iraq before transferring the loot to neighboring Syria.

Iraqi Agriculture Minister Falah Hassan al-Zeidan said in a statement on Tuesday that ISIL terrorists had taken wheat and barley to areas of Syria they currently control.

ISIL "in the past four months has stolen more than one million tons of wheat and grain from Iraq and transported it to Syria through Mosul," al-Zeidan said.

The statement added that the grain had been taken "from Nineveh Province to the Syrian cities of Raqqa and Deir al-Zor."

Back in August, the former director general of Iraq's Grain Board, Hassan Ibrahim, said the militants had seized 40,000 to 50,000 tons of wheat in Nineveh and the western province of Anbar, before moving it to Syria.

Iraqi officials say the militants consider eastern Syria to be "safe for them" and for this reason they are transferring the stolen crop "to preserve it."

After entering northern Iraq from Syria back in June, ISIL militants took over government grain silos in Nineveh and Salahuddin provinces, where nearly half of the country's wheat and barley is grown.

ISIL terrorists operating in the region have currently gained control over large areas of territory across Syria and Iraq. They have carried out atrocities in both countries, including mass executions and beheadings of local residents as well as foreign nationals.