Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) lashed out Monday at critics of fellow 2020 presidential hopeful Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) including Hillary Clinton, after Clinton and others suggested that Gabbard is a "foreign asset" for Russia amid reports that Moscow's online bots and trolls are supporting her campaign.

In a tweet, the Vermont senator and runner-up for the 2016 Democratic nomination called such accusations "outrageous," pointing to Gabbard's background as a military veteran.

Sanders's comments come after Clinton said during a podcast on Thursday that she believes Moscow is "grooming" a candidate, clearly referring to Gabbard, to run as a third-party candidate and split the Democratic vote in 2020. "I'm not making any predictions, but I think they've got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate," Clinton said.

Here's the latest debacle for the United States in Central America, the region that has already sent several hundred thousand refugees fleeing northward. On Friday, a New York court found the brother of Honduras's dictator guilty of drug trafficking. Angry anti-regime demonstrations erupted all over Honduras, but the U.S. showed no sign that it will abandon the dictator, Juan Orlando Hernández. (A poor New York Times article rattled on at unnecessary length about the specifics of the case, but took until paragraph 24 to briefly point out that the Hernández regime is sustained by Washington.)

What's the Israel connection? First, let's be clear; the U.S. all by itself has promoted one crisis after another across Central America since back in the 1980s, when the Reagan administration supported and financed right-wing allies in El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua who murdered tens of thousands of their countrymen who were only struggling for a better life.

And back in 2009, before Donald Trump was anywhere near the White House, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tacitly approved a right-wing coup d'etat in Honduras, in which the elected president was kidnapped and flown out of the country.

Justin Trudeau is poised to serve another term as Canadian prime minister after his Liberal Party earned a plurality of seats in the general election, according to projections from CBC News.

The news network is projecting that the Liberals will form a minority government.


The official results will be announced once all of the votes are counted, according to NBC News. Trudeau's victory comes after polls indicated he would be pitted in a tight race against the Conservative Party's Andrew Scheer.

Russian military police and Syrian servicemen will be deployed to northeastern Syria, while Turkey's operation 'Peace Spring' will continue in a limited area, presidents of the two countries have agreed after lengthy talks.

Moscow understands the reasons behind the ongoing Turkish military incursion into Syria, Putin said, though he stressed it must not play into the hands of terrorists and that the territorial integrity of Syria must be preserved. Ultimately, the country must be freed from all "illegal foreign military presence," the President added, reiterating Moscow's long-time position.

The almost-seven-hour-long talks in Sochi, Russia were focused on the situation in Syria, particularly the ongoing offensive in its northeastern region.

America laughed at Hillary Clinton's remarks about Tulsi Gabbard, but her ideas fit perfectly in the intellectual mainstream

Hillary Clinton, not long ago the nominee of the Democratic Party, had some choice words about the state of American politics Friday.

"I'm not making any predictions, but I think they've got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate," Clinton said on a podcast with former Barack Obama aide David Plouffe. "She's the favorite of the Russians."

Clinton appeared to be talking about Hawaii congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, a combat veteran. She wasn't done, teeing off on former Green Party candidate Jill Stein:

"[Jill Stein's] also a Russian asset... Yeah, she's a Russian asset — I mean, totally. They know they can't win without a third-party candidate."

"Politicians are more likely than people in the general population to be sociopaths. I think you would find no expert in the field of sociopathy/psychopathy/antisocial personality disorder who would dispute this... That a small minority of human beings literally have no conscience was and is a bitter pill for our society to swallow — but it does explain a great many things, shamelessly deceitful political behavior being one."

— Dr. Martha Stout, clinical psychologist and former instructor at Harvard Medical School

Twenty years ago, a newspaper headline asked the question: "What's the difference between a politician and a psychopath?"

The answer, then and now, remains the same: None.

There is no difference between psychopaths and politicians.

Nor is there much of a difference between the havoc wreaked on innocent lives by uncaring, unfeeling, selfish, irresponsible, parasitic criminals and elected officials who lie to their constituents, trade political favors for campaign contributions, turn a blind eye to the wishes of the electorate, cheat taxpayers out of hard-earned dollars, favor the corporate elite, entrench the military industrial complex, and spare little thought for the impact their thoughtless actions and hastily passed legislation might have on defenseless citizens.

Psychopaths and politicians both have a tendency to be selfish, callous, remorseless users of others, irresponsible, pathological liars, glib, con artists, lacking in remorse and shallow.

Charismatic politicians, like criminal psychopaths, exhibit a failure to accept responsibility for their actions, have a high sense of self-worth, are chronically unstable, have socially deviant lifestyles, need constant stimulation, have parasitic lifestyles and possess unrealistic goals.

It doesn't matter whether you're talking about Democrats or Republicans.

Political psychopaths are all largely cut from the same pathological cloth, brimming with seemingly easy charm and boasting calculating minds. Such leaders eventually create pathocracies: totalitarian societies bent on power, control, and destruction of both freedom in general and those who exercise their freedoms.

Once psychopaths gain power, the result is usually some form of totalitarian government or a pathocracy. "At that point, the government operates against the interests of its own people except for favoring certain groups," author James G. Long notes. "We are currently witnessing deliberate polarizations of American citizens, illegal actions, and massive and needless acquisition of debt. This is typical of psychopathic systems, and very similar things happened in the Soviet Union as it overextended and collapsed."

In other words, electing a psychopath to public office is tantamount to national hara-kiri, the ritualized act of self-annihilation, self-destruction and suicide. It signals the demise of democratic government and lays the groundwork for a totalitarian regime that is legalistic, militaristic, inflexible, intolerant and inhuman.

Monday marks the thirteenth day since Turkey began its third cross border military operation in Syria ironically named "Operation Peace Spring". In the past two weeks civilian and militant lives on both sides have been lost, a large exodus has taken place, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a resolution that opposes US troop withdrawal, a five-day ceasefire was brokered between Turkey and the United States, and Kurdish militias have withdrawn from the "safe-zone".

On Wednesday, there was overwhelming bipartisan approval for a measure that opposes President Trump's U.S. forces withdrawal from Syria. The resolution was introduced by Reps. Michael McCaul, Republican from Texas and Eliot Engel, Democrat from NY and it calls on the White House to put forth a plan for the "enduring defeat" of Daesh and demand that Turkey cease its military operations in Syria.

The measure which passed 354-60 with four members voting present, and all sixty of the nays coming from Republicans, stated, "An abrupt withdrawal of United States military personnel from certain parts of Northeast Syria is beneficial to adversaries of the United States government, including Syria, Iran and Russia."


It's absurd that there's outrage about ending a war and allowing Syria to handle its own domestic affairs. However, nothing of the sort happened when Nobel Peace Prize winner and former US President Barack Obama was bombing seven countries and creating some of the wars that President Trump has inherited including Syria. Bipartisan support for carrying on with endless wars is mindboggling.

The US' so-called "maximum pressure" campaign targeting Tehran is certainly having a lasting effect on the people of Iran and its economy, but it may not be having its intended effect of squeezing Iran into total submission.

Under the surface, there are at least three signs that suggest, despite the draconian nature of the sanctions regime hitting the Islamic Republic, Iran may in fact be able to weather the storm (for now).

Iran's resilient economy

Firstly, Iran's currency regained 40 percent of its value in the past year, recovering from the all-time lows it had reached since Donald Trump unilaterally pulled the plug on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). According to the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency, Iran's central bank governor, Abdolnaser Hemmati, said the economy had grown over the past year even in the face of sanctions and the repeated threats of war. It bears mentioning that when it comes to Iran, the threat of war comes from multiple venues at multiple times in the day. If it isn't Israel, Saudi Arabia, or the United States threatening to attack Iran, there is always the potential for the on-the-ground situations in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, and Afghanistan to result in a breakout of war which could cross over into Iran's territory.

President Donald Trump doubled down on his defense of Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) on Monday after former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton seemed to suggest that the Democratic presidential candidate is an asset that the Russians are "grooming" in preparation of the 2020 election.

"Hillary Clinton, I don't know if you've heard of her, she's the one accusing everybody of being a Russian agent," Trump told reporters during a Cabinet meeting. "Anybody that is opposed to her is a Russian agent — that's a scam that was pretty much put down."

"I don't know Tulsi, but she's not a Russian agent," he continued. "I don't know Jill Stein. I know she likes the environment. I don't think she likes Russians. If she does like them, I know she's not an asset — [Clinton] called her an asset of Russia. These people are sick. There's something wrong with them."

US forces that crossed into Iraq after pulling out from Syria can only use its territory for transit and do not have permission to stay, the Iraqi military said on Tuesday.

Hundreds of military vehicles carrying American troops crossed into the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq in a long convoy on Monday.

The Iraqi statement adds more uncertainty to a vision of what will actually happen to the troops after their withdrawal from Syria. In the last few days, the American military were simultaneously reported to be "going home" - that's according to President Trump - and continuing their mission in Iraq to conduct operations against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) in a plan outlined by US Defense Secretary Mark Esper. He also mentioned some soldiers may remain in Syria to protect oil fields from IS takeover.

On Tuesday, Esper told reporters during his stop in Saudi Arabia that his troops would make preparations in Iraq to go home from there - without specifying how long they would stay. "The aim isn't to stay in Iraq interminably, the aim is to pull our soldiers out and eventually get them back home," the defense secretary said in front of a Patriot missile battery at the Prince Sultan Air Base near Riyadh.