Puppet MastersS


Arrow Down

US market meltdown wipes out 2018 gains - Trump's trade wars taking their toll on stocks

US stock market crash Oct 25 2018
© Reuters / Brendan McDermid
American equities faced another major selloff on Wednesday. It was one of the worst trading sessions for US stocks in years, erasing all gains seen in 2018. Analysts name President Donald Trump's trade wars as one of the reasons.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 608 points, or 2.4 percent, to 24,583.42. The S&P 500 plunged 84.59 points, or 3.1 percent, to 2,656.10, marking sixth straight losing session.

Meanwhile, the Nasdaq Composite Index dipped 329.14 points, or 4.4 percent, to 7108.4.

Blackbox

Jamal Khashoggi was killed because he advocated political Islam for Middle East

A new whisper campaign against him is trying to blur the truth: that he criticized certain U.S.-Arab alliances, and paid the price
Jamal Khashoggi
© Mohammed Al-Shaikh / AFPJamal Khashoggi
In the early summer of 2005, during the height of the U.S. war in Iraq, I arranged to have lunch with Jerry Jones, a special assistant to then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. I had heard rumors that Jones and a number of senior U.S. military leaders were holding quiet talks with prominent Islamists and other officials representing Iraq's tribes at a hotel in Amman, Jordan. The discussions were part of an effort by Jones and senior military officers to end the Anbar insurgency, which was responsible for a lengthening list of U.S. casualties in Iraq.

For the outset of our meeting, Jones (a gangly and affable Texan who'd served in influential positions in several Republican administrations), detailed the challenges facing the U.S. military in Anbar and provided a summary of the "brutal," "bloody" and "harrowing" fighting there. America's military deaths were spiking, with no end in sight. "We're in trouble," Jones concluded. While much of this was known at the time, Jones's narrative stunned me. "Are you telling me that we're losing the war in Iraq?" I asked. Jones chuckled and shook his head: "Losing? We're not only losing," he said, "we're on the wrong side."

Comment: The author's right and he's wrong. America is on the 'wrong' side, but the 'right' side isn't an 'Islamic-Democratic Arab Spring' across the region, which wold be mere window-dressing, but instead supporting the Axis of Resistance: Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, the Houthis in Yemen...

See also:


Eye 1

Trump campaign adviser Papadopoulos denied Russian collusion to FBI source early on - not included in FISA application

George Papadopoulos, Steven Halper, Alexander Downer
George Papadopoulos, Steven Halper, Alexander Downer
Just weeks after the FBI opened a dramatic counterintelligence probe into President Trump and Russia, one of his presidential campaign advisers emphatically told an undercover bureau source there was no election collusion occurring because such activity would be treasonous.

George Papadopoulos says his spontaneous admission to London-based professor Stefan Halper occurred in mid-September 2016 - well before FBI agents and the Obama Justice Department sought a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant to collect Trump campaign communications in the final days before the election.

"He was there to probe me on the behest of somebody else," Papadopoulos told me in an interview this week, recalling the Halper meeting. "He said something along the lines of, 'Oh, it's great that Russia is helping you and your campaign, right George?' "

Comment:


Passport

Republican leaders urge Homeland Security to adopt 'safe third country agreement' with Mexico over caravan

bridge mexico honduras migrants
© Agence France-Presse
Growing caravan from Central America gets closer to U.S. despite warnings from President Trump; reaction and analysis from 'The Five.'

Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley and Mike Lee are urging Department of Homeland Security head Kirstjen Nielsen to execute a "safe third country agreement" with the Mexican government, which would require members of the growing migrant caravan to stop and seek asylum there.

Such an arrangement requiring asylum seekers to make their claims in their first country of arrival, the senators noted, would also take some pressure off the overworked asylum system in the U.S., which has been increasingly inundated with claims -- the "vast majority" of which Trump administration officials have called fraudulent or legally dubious -- that judges must adjudicate.

Comment:


Eagle

US' ultimate goal is to deprive Russia of its nukes and finish it off

Iskander-M ballistic missile system
© SputnikLaunching the Iskander-M ballistic missile system at the Kapustin Yar range in the Astrakhan Region
The US' single strategic objective, in terms of Russian nuclear triad, is to strip it of its arsenal. This is what shapes all of the White House's foreign policy while any talk about nuclear arms reduction is just cover for that.

Last week, US President Donald Trump announced plans to pull out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. Since signing the document in 1987, the USSR/Russia had to get rid of several highly promising pieces of military hardware, such as intermediate-range two-stage solid-fuel ballistic missile, known as Pioner, with the associated mobile launchers and the Oka mobile theatre ballistic missile system. It's worth noting that these systems had outstanding operational capabilities, and their combat potential was a great concern to the US.

Under Boris Yeltsin, Russia almost lost its strategic air force and heavy multiple-warhead ballistic missiles. In comparison, what the US had to give up looks like a bare minimum.

So, let's not be under any illusion that negotiations with the US on limiting or reducing any types of nuclear weapons could actually lead to strengthening global peace and security or building mutual trust. Their one and only goal is to disarm Russia completely and finish it off.

Comment: See also:


Jet5

Lockheed and loaded: How the maker of junk fighters like the F-22 and F-35 came to achieve full-spectrum dominance over the US defense industry

Lockheed Martin
Lockheed-Martin is headquartered in the Bethesda, Maryland. No, the defense titan doesn't have a bomb-making factory in this toney Beltway suburb. But as the nation's top weapons contractor, it migrated to DC from southern California because that's where the money is. And Lockheed rakes it in from the federal treasury at the rate of $65 million every single day of the year.

From nuclear missiles to fighter planes, software code to spy satellites, the Patriot missile to Star Wars, Lockheed has come to dominate the weapons market in a way that the Standard Oil Company used to hold sway over the nation's petroleum supplies. And it all happened with the help of the federal government, which steered lucrative no bid contracts Lockheed's way, enacted tax breaks that encouraged Lockheed's merger and acquisition frenzy in the 1980s and 1990s and turned a blind eye to the company's criminal rap sheet, ripe with indiscretions ranging from bribery to contract fraud.

Now Lockheed stands almost alone. It not only serves as an agent of US foreign policy, from the Pentagon to the CIA; it also helps shape it. "We are deployed entirely in developing daunting technology," Lockheed's new CEO Robert J. Stevens told the New York Times report Tim Weiner. "That requires thinking through the policy dimensions of national security as well as technological dimensions."

Gold Coins

Trump: 'Saudis have been helping US a lot with respect to Israel, funding a lot of things'

Trump MBS Kushner
© Jonathan ErnstFILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump, White House senior advisor Jared Kushner and Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
US President Donald Trump said Saudi Arabia has been helping the US with Israel, with which the Kingdom has no official diplomatic relations. It marks the first time Trump has publicly recognized the sneaky alliance.

Speaking in the White House, Trump stood up in defense of Riyadh as it is facing mounting international pressure over the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in its consulate in Istanbul on October 2. As more gruesome details of the murder, allegedly perpetrated by a Saudi hit squad, emerge, the White House is increasingly bombarded by calls to punish Riyadh and cancel multi-billion dollar arms deals with the Saudi government.

While the US President has cast doubt on the official version of the events, calling it the "worst cover-up ever," he pointed to the virtues of the Saudi government, "a very good ally of ours."

Among other things, Riyadh has "been helping us a lot with respect to Israel. They've been funding a lot of things," Trump said without elaborating.


Comment: For more on the Dark Triad of the US/Israel/Saudi Arabia partnership, see:


Chess

Despite Khashoggi killing, Trudeau sticks to $12bn arms deal with Saudis

FILE PHOTO: A Canadian army Light Armoured Vehicle (LAV III) reacts to simulated chlorine gas as part of a training scenario during Operation Maple Resolve 2015 in Wainwright, Alberta, Canada
© REUTERS / US Army / HandoutFILE PHOTO: A Canadian army Light Armoured Vehicle (LAV III) reacts to simulated chlorine gas as part of a training scenario during Operation Maple Resolve 2015 in Wainwright, Alberta, Canada
Canada's PM says it is "very difficult" to drop the US$12 billion (Can$15 billion) deal on arms sales to Riyadh. It comes despite mounting allegations that the killing of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was "pre-planned."

The murder of the self-exiled writer which Turkey says was planned beforehand "is something that is extremely preoccupying to Canadians, to Canada and to many of our allies around the world" Prime Minister Justin Trudeau acknowledged. However, even on the heels of the latest tough accusations from Ankara, the North American country is not mulling to halt arms deliveries to the Saudi Kingdom.

Boat

Indian state government boat capsizes with chief secretary and officials on board

Indian state government boat
© ANI
A boat belonging to the Maharashtra government in India and carrying the state chief secretary has capsized, local media reports. At least one person is believed to be missing.

The boat, also carrying other government officials, upturned near Shivaji Smarak, about 2.6 km west of Mumbai's Nariman point.

The Coast Guard is at the scene of the incident. Most passengers have been rescued, Indian TV channel NDTV reports, but at least one person is reportedly unaccounted for.

Boat

Britain's biggest £3.1 billion warship parks off the US coast, looking just a little bit desperate

HMS Queen Elizabeth
© AFP Photo / Crown copyright 2018 / MOD / LPHOT Kyle HellerHMS Queen Elizabeth
If the Statue of Liberty looked a little surprised this week, it could be because Britain just sailed a 65,000 ton, £3.1 billion phallic symbol up the Hudson River.

The Royal Navy's brand spanking new aircraft carrier, the HMS Queen Elizabeth has been deployed on its first major mission, a jolly to New York. It's being used as a giant floating trade fair. There are no hostesses in bikinis luring in businessmen with free pens, instead there are highly-trained sailors standing to attention thinking "I didn't sign up for this shit".

My advice to the crew would be to try and enjoy it, get ashore, sample the restaurants, catch a show maybe, because they're more likely to be parked off countries covered in sand in the decades ahead.

Seeing 'Big Lizzie' (that's what they're calling it) steaming towards New York made me wonder if all this was part of the Admirals' original funding pitch for a brand new aircraft carrier or two. "You see minister, these ships will allow us to continue our pretense of being able to project power around the globe, and if that fails, we could just use it as a very expensive trade stall?"

Comment: They must be proud - that it didn't sink: Sinking feeling? UK's brand new £3.1bn aircraft carrier has sprung a leak as cost for F-35 jets skyrockets

See also: And check out SOTT radio's: Behind the Headlines: Perfidious Albion: If Russia is a Rogue State, What is the UK?