Puppet MastersS


Propaganda

Fake news is a big business. By suing the free press, the Trump campaign could save them

Dianna Berry
The National Pulse
Sun, 08 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC
crowd/fake news sign
© AP/Paul SancyaTrump rally Washington Township, Michigan
The election of President Trump revealed a previously under-appreciated bias throughout the legacy media. The veneer of neutrality in journalism disappeared. Mistrust and division have since flourished, and news outlets appear to be dead set on assisting efforts to undermine and remove the President, instead of simply reporting the facts.

Who will pay the price for this deluge of falsity?

Until recently, the public has borne the cost of fake news - from accusations of being "low information" or "Russian bots", to being hectored online, our free speech curtailed, and of course constantly being referred to as "conspiracy theorists". Now, however, several major media outlets are facing lawsuits charging them with defamation and libel.

The President's re-election campaign recently filed libel suits seeking damages "in the millions of dollars" against the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Last year, "smirking" teenager Nick Sandmann sued the Washington Post alongside CNN, and NBC Universal seeking $800 million in compensation for libel.

CNN settled the case against them in January for an undisclosed amount. Sandmann intends to file several other suits against media outlets who falsely reported on the events at the March for Life 2019.
Read More...
Mail

A letter from 'locked down' Lombardy

Rachana Raizada
The Saker
Fri, 13 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC
Girl,mask,cathedral
© ROPIA dozen provinces across the north of Italy have been placed on 'cordon sanitaire.'
A few days ago, I walked down the street to the supermarket to buy food past glittering skyscrapers, the seat of Lombardy's regional government. According to an interview in the New York Times [1] with the region's President Attilio Fontana, on the sixth floor, "two dozen epidemiologists and public health experts form the nerve center of the effort to contain a coronavirus outbreak in Italy...They track those whom infected people might have had contact with." Really? A telephone prevents illness? Of course, contract tracing is extremely important. But once you find infected people, what preparations have you made to deal with them? Fontana forgets to mention this minor detail to the NYT.

A man sitting on a bench grumbled: "Why is everything closed?" he demanded angrily. "Do you know anyone who is ill?" Three passersby shook their heads. As we stood (one metre from each other), we agreed that we don't know anyone who is ill, nor does anyone we know know anyone who is ill with Covid-19 (the disease) or who's tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 (the pathogen). Of course, this charming vignette is no longer possible. Now I can only go out for necessities: food, medicines, work (although all non-essential consumer-facing businesses are shut)...or cigarettes. Before I can go out, I have to download a form, copy it out (because I am not a prepper who stockpiled printer toner), provide proof etc. Just finished listening to a long legal audio explaining what to do if stopped by police. But Italian police are generally friendly. I digress.

Wait! Wasn't it China who's authoritarian? I've been stuck at home since Feb 23 with rules changing at dizzying speed and getting more draconian by the minute and red zones (now "security zones") extending from 11 tiny towns nobody had heard of, to Lombardy and Veneto, to the whole country.

So what is the problem? Why is Italy shut down?
Read More...
Star of David

Difficult to oust, Netanyahu utilizes COVID-19 crisis hype while Israel depends on Palestinian medical staff

Philip Weiss
Mondoweiss
Wed, 18 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC
Netanyahu
© Office of Israeli PMNetanyahu berates Israelis for frolicking on beaches, when they should be socially distancing one another. Mar 17, 2020.
Last night Benjamin Netanyahu gave another informal speech to his country demanding changes in personal behavior to combat the COVID-19 crisis. He called the pandemic a "plague, not a children's game... a matter of life and death" and railed at the Israelis he sees crowding the beaches in Tel Aviv "frolicking" and touching one another as they pass. "Love is distance," he said, in urging citizens to self-isolate.

Netanyahu's fatherly tone, along with racist attacks on his rivals, and his boasting that Israel is at the "forefront" of global responses to the contagion, has put him right where he wants to be politically: the indispensable Prime Minister, even as his rival Benny Gantz struggles to build a coalition to put him out of office.

"It's going to be virtually-I'm not going to say impossible, but it's going to very, very difficult to oust Netanyahu at this juncture," says Eli Kowaz of the Israel Policy Forum. "For [rival] Benny Gantz to form a minority government, now in the middle of all this- I think it would be controversial within Israel."

Comment: Netanyahu will never let a crisis go to waste - especially if he can utilize it to save himself!

See also:

Read More...
Oil Well

Washington targets firms linked to Iran's national oil company with fresh sanctions


Sputnik
Thu, 19 Mar 2020 14:17 UTC
Iranflag/oil facility
© Ali Mohammadi—Bloomberg/Getty ImagesAn Iranian national flag flies at the Persian Gulf Star Co. (PGSPC) gas condensate refinery in Bandar Abbas, Iran.
The United States reimposed crippling economic sanctions on Iran in mid-2018 that were waived under the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran, after accusing it of breaching the historic pact.

The US has imposed fresh sanctions on five companies linked to the National Iranian Oil Company, the Treasury Department announced on Thursday.

The sanctioned companies are: Petro Grand FZE, Alphabet International Dmcc, Swissol Trade DMCC, Alam Althrwa General Trading L.L.C and ALWANEO CO L.L.C

All five entities became subject to secondary sanctions for dealing with a company that already was on the sanctions' list.
Read More...
Bad Guys

The indictment of Concord was meant to prove Russia interfered in the US presidential election. But it was just a political sham

Scott Ritter
RT
Thu, 19 Mar 2020 18:41 UTC
US embassy
© Getty Images / Samuel Corum
Now that the Department of Justice has rightly dismissed the case, it just shows that the allegations were aimed at shaping public opinion - and that it's all about the politicization of the US Justice System

It was the indictment that shook America. Or at least, it was supposed to. For months, prosecutors working for Robert Mueller - the special prosecutor charged with investigating allegations of collusion between the campaign of then-candidate Donald Trump and various Russian actors to tip the scales of the 2016 US presidential election in Trump's favor - had been slaving away behind a wall of secrecy. Set up in May 2017, the Mueller team had little to show for its efforts save for a handful of guilty pleas by Trump associates for lying to federal agents. No evidence had been provided to an increasingly skeptical public to sustain the notion that the Russians had actively interfered in the election.

Comment: Will this news register with the public now that everyone is caught in the coronavirus hoax pandemic? Of course not, which is why this news was perfectly timed.

For a brief history of this case see:

Read More...
Brain

Canada sent 16 tonnes of medical equipment to China, now faces shortage

Sam McGriskin
The Post Millennial
Thu, 19 Mar 2020 18:48 UTC
Patty Hadju
Canada's government is asking for products that can aid in the coronavirus pandemic following a large shipment of medical products and equipment to China. (Health Minister Patty Hadju pictured)
The government of Canada is asking for products and services that can be used to aid in the coronavirus pandemic on buyandsell.gc.ca. This follows a large shipment of medical products and equipment to China according to the Toronto Sun. Now Canadians may need China to return the favour.

On the main page of the website it says, "Are you a business that can supply products and services in support of Canada's response to COVID-19? Canada wants to hear from you."

Canadian Chamber of Commerce President and CEO, Perrin Beatty posted a message to social media saying, "Are you a manufacturer who can retool to manufacture critical medical equipment? "If your answer is 'yes', the federal government wants to hear from you ASAP. The need for ventilators and N95 safety masks is particularly acute. Please contact celine.caira@canada.ca."
Read More...
Clipboard

Tulsi Gabbard suspends presidential campaign, endorses Biden


RT
Thu, 19 Mar 2020 15:02 UTC
Vice President Joe Biden , Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
© REUTERS/Sam WolfeDemocratic U.S. presidential candidate and former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden speaks with his fellow Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
Hawaii congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard has suspended her presidential campaign and endorsed Democratic frontrunner Joe Biden, citing the establishment favorite's primary victories and the coronavirus as her reasons.

Gabbard made the surprise announcement on Thursday in a video posted to her Twitter account, explaining she was dropping out to focus on dealing with the coronavirus epidemic in Hawaii and potentially serving in her National Guard capacity should she be called to action.

The endorsement of Biden came as a particular surprise, given Gabbard's opposition to "regime change wars," a central plank of her platform. As vice president under Barack Obama, Biden was deeply involved in expanding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan into conflicts in Yemen, Libya, Syria, Somalia, and Pakistan.

"Although I may not agree with the Vice President on every issue, I know that he has a good heart and is motivated by his love for our country and the American people," Gabbard said in a statement.
Read More...
Eagle

The US invasion of Iraq lives on in infamy

Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies
Global Research
Wed, 18 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC
US troops
While the world is consumed with the terrifying coronavirus pandemic, on March 19 the Trump administration will be marking the 17th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq by ramping up the conflict there. After an Iran-aligned militia allegedly struck a U.S. base near Baghdad on March 11, the U.S. military carried out retaliatory strikes against five of the militia's weapons factories and announced it is sending two more aircraft carriers to the region, as well as new Patriot missile systems and hundreds more troops to operate them. This contradicts the January vote of the Iraqi Parliament that called for U.S. troops to leave the country. It also goes against the sentiment of most Americans, who think the Iraq war was not worth fighting, and against the campaign promise of Donald Trump to end the endless wars.

Seventeen years ago, the U.S. armed forces attacked and invaded Iraq with a force of over 460,000 troops from all its armed services, supported by 46,000 UK troops, 2,000 from Australia and a few hundred from Poland, Spain, Portugal and Denmark. The "shock and awe" aerial bombardment unleashed 29,200 bombs and missiles on Iraq in the first five weeks of the war.

The U.S. invasion was a crime of aggression under international law, and was actively opposed by people and countries all over the world, including 30 million people who took to the streets in 60 countries on February 15, 2003, to express their horror that this could really be happening at the dawn of the 21st century. American historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr., who was a speechwriter for President John F. Kennedy, compared the U.S. invasion of Iraq to Japan's preemptive attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 and wrote, "Today, it is we Americans who live in infamy."
Read More...
Bizarro Earth

Merkel's coronavirus-WWII speech, Italy cases rise, Israel shuts borders & monitors citizens with terrorism tech, US to add ANOTHER $1 trillion in stimulus


RT
Wed, 18 Mar 2020 20:27 UTC
Merkel
© Bundesregierung/Steffen Kugler/HandoutChancellor Angela Merkel addressing the nation on coronavirus disease (COVID-19) measures in Berlin, Germany, March 18, 2020.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel made an emotional appeal to the nation, urging solidarity in face of the coronavirus epidemic that she described as the nation's greatest challenge since the Second World War.

"This is serious, and you need to take it seriously," she said, addressing the nation on Wednesday evening. "There has been no such challenge to our country since German reunification - no, since World War II - that relies so much on our joint action in solidarity."

The fact that it was Merkel's first-ever such speech in her 15 years in power - aside from the traditional holiday addresses at New Year - underscored the gravity of the situation.

Comment: Australia and New Zealand banned non-residents from entering starting on March 20. Italy is extending its nationwide lockdown. New Delhi imposed a 1-week ban on commercial flights. France tightened their lockdown restrictions: can't stray more than 2km from home. Germany has called up reservists to help in the 'fight'. The UK's vague emergency legislation gives police the power to detain suspected Covid sufferers. (If you have a cold, watch out!) A UK man was arrested after claiming to be infected and deliberately coughing at staff in a shop near Birmingham. UK supermarkets are swamped with panic buyers, and a foodbank was broken into and ransacked.

Russia recorded its first official death (a 79-yo woman with underlying health conditions), and another woman faces court after allegedly spreading fake news (saying infected people were in her region). The EU's Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier tested positive, as did Prince Albert of Monaco. The US Navy saw its second case aboard one of their warships, despite "aggressive mitigation strategy".

Meanwhile, China reported no new local cases. Official death numbers passed 9k, and according to Iran's health ministry, one Iranian dies every 10 minutes as a result of the virus. Baltimore's mayor is asking for residents to stop shooting each other, to free up hospital beds. The Dutch PM says not to worry about toilet paper; Netherlands has so much "we can s**t for 10 years". The American CDC is telling nurses to use bandanas and scarves as masks as a result of a shortage. And global markets continue to fall; the Fed rolls out a third emergency program in 2 days; and European stocks are mostly down despite the promise of a huge stimulus by the central bank.

See also:

Read More...
Stock Down

Dow loses all gains from Trump administration

Andrew Kerr
Daily Caller
Wed, 18 Mar 2020 12:54 UTC
stock panic
© BRYAN R. SMITH/AFP via Getty Images
The Dow Jones industrial average dipped as low as 19,716 on Wednesday, erasing all gains made since President Donald Trump's inauguration.

The coronavirus pandemic has sent the Dow careening as much as 9,835 points in five weeks, down 33.28% from its all-time high of 29,551 set on Feb. 12.

The Dow closed at 19,732 on Trump's inauguration day Jan. 20, 2019.

Comment: See also:

Read More...