Puppet MastersS


Bomb

13 killed, 32 wounded by explosion at Afghanistan parliamentary rally for female candidate


AlJazeera
Sat, 13 Oct 2018 10:22 UTC
afghanistan soldiers
© AP / Musadeq Sadeq
An explosion has hit an election rally in Afghanistan's northeastern Takhar province killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens, according to Associated Press news agency.

Official casualty figures are still awaited.

A police spokesman told Reuters news agency on Saturday that explosives were placed in a motorcycle near the rally for Nazifa Yousufi Bek, the candidate for the upcoming parliamentary elections.


Comment: Note that the bomb was pre-placed, as are the vast majority of so-called 'suicide bombings' in Muslim countries.


She had not arrived at the rally when the explosion occurred.

Authorities said there was no claim of responsibility yet, but the Taliban said ahead of the elections it would target "people who are trying to help in holding this process successfully by providing security."

Comment: And so continues the legacy of US meddling:

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Sherlock

Western media, investors and governments suddenly develop conscience surrounding Saudi Arabia and Khashoggi case


RT
Fri, 12 Oct 2018 17:55 UTC
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
© Reuters / Hamad I MohammedSaudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman attends the Future Investment Initiative on October 24, 2017.
A number of media outlets, including CNN, CNBC and the Financial Times, have announced they will not be participating in a high-profile investment conference in Saudi Arabia over the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

CNN, CNBC, and the FT all stated on Friday that they would not be attending the upcoming Future Investment Initiative (FII) in Riyadh, which has been dubbed "Davos in the Desert" in reference to the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

Some reports have claimed that Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, was abducted and murdered after entering the Saudi consulate in Turkey.

"CNBC will no longer participate in the FII in Riyadh due to the continuing questions surrounding the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi," the network said in a tweet.

Comment: The Saudi's have been waging a war on Yemen for years, slaughtering tens of thousands of Innocent civilians and putting millions at risk of starvation, but all of a sudden the mainstream media, investors and governments develop a conscience? It's likely there's more to the story: "King, we're protecting you": Saudi Arabia tells Trump no more oil

See also:

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Attention

Trump: "The Fed has gone crazy." Here are 101 reasons why It should be shut down

Michael Snyder
The American Dream
Thu, 11 Oct 2018 08:28 UTC
Trump
© Getty Images
Donald Trump just made one of the most brilliant moves of his entire presidency. By accusing the Federal Reserve of "going loco", he is placing the blame for the coming stock market crash and horrifying economic downturn squarely where it belongs, and he is firing up millions of true conservatives among his base at the same time. For many, many years, a lot of us have been trying to educate the American people about the deeply insidious Federal Reserve system. As Ron Paul once so astutely observed, it is actually about as "federal" as Federal Express is. The Federal Reserve is an unelected cabal of central bankers that is running our economy into the ground, and the only way we are going to fix our long-term economic and financial problems is if we abolish it. So for those of us that understand these things, it is extremely exciting to hear President Trump use language such as this...
President Donald Trump knocked the Federal Reserve for continuing to raise interest rates despite some recent market turbulence.

"I think the Fed is making a mistake. They are so tight. I think the Fed has gone crazy," the president said after walking off Air Force One in Erie, Pennsylvania for a rally.
That may be one of the greatest things that Donald Trump has ever said.

Comment: See also:

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Pyramid

Americans are now stuck in an abusive relationship with the power elite

Michael Krieger
Liberty Blitzkrieg
Tue, 09 Oct 2018 11:24 UTC
washington dc evil
And we recently discovered, if it was not known before, that no amount of power can withstand the hatred of the many.

- Marcus Tullius Cicero
Americans are brought up to believe all sorts of myths about the country we call home. We're told our economy is a free market meritocracy governed by the rule of law. We're told our civil liberties, enshrined in the Bill of Rights, are inviolable and protected by the most powerful military in the world. A fighting force entrusted with the admirable and monumental task of defending freedoms at home, and democracy and human rights abroad. We're told we exist in a system of self-government, in which our votes matter and our voices heard. In practice, none of this is true.

The fact of the matter is American citizens in 2018 are just a nuisance for the real power players. Useful as consumers, but increasingly problematic as larger numbers start to ask questions about how things really work. For far too long, we've been ignorant and willing accomplices in our own bondage. This allowed the concentrated and unaccountable power that really calls the shots to go for broke in recent decades, with unsurprisingly tragic results.
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Vader

Lil' Miss AIPAC Nikki Haley terminates her reign of terror at the U.N. - but why?

Tom Luongo
Gold, Goats 'n Guns
Tue, 09 Oct 2018 01:00 UTC
Haley Nikki
The world is not shedding any tears now that Lil 'Miss AIPAC, Nikki Haley, has finished her time puffing up her political resume at the U.N. To describe her performance as U.N. Ambassador over the last two years as strident and obnoxious would be a kindness.

Haley, simply put, was out of her depth as a diplomat, preferring to pre-run for President and shore up the support of the Israeli lobby in the U.S. rather than do her job with any modicum of honesty or integrity.

Her resigning quickly after the confirmation of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court is interesting, however.

While she has been, nominally, one of President Trump's most public supporters she has also been instrumental in undermining Trump on foreign policy initiatives that do not comport with the wishes of her pay-masters at AIPAC.

While it is questionable how far Trump bows to the powerful Israeli lobby, no such questions should arise with Haley. She literally invites my nickname for her with every public pronouncement.

Comment: See also:

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Eye 1

Five Eyes intelligence network has fixed its focus squarely on China


RT
Fri, 12 Oct 2018 15:25 UTC
National Security Agency
© AFP / Paul J. RichardsFILE PHOTO: Experts man their stations at the Threat Operations Center inside the National Security Agency (NSA)
The intelligence agencies of the US, Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand have been cooperating closely on countering China's "foreign activities" since the start of the year, Reuters reports.

The so-called Five Eyes network is also sharing intelligence with allies such as Germany and Japan, in what has become a multinational coalition against Beijing's alleged foreign meddling. Washington and its partners have accused China of using foreign investments to pull political strings - an accusation that Beijing denies.

"Consultations with our allies, with like-minded partners, on how to respond to China's assertive international strategy have been frequent and are gathering momentum," a US official told Reuters. The unnamed source added that informal discussions on the matter have quickly turned into "detailed consultations on best practices and further opportunities for cooperation."

Comment: See:

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Chess

Uzbekistan is the key to Russia's counter terrorism strategy in Central Asia

Andrew Korybko
Eurasia Future
Fri, 12 Oct 2018 00:00 UTC
Russian Defence Minister in Uzbekistan
Russian Defence Minister announces about close cooperation with Uzbekistan in security sphere
The Russian Defense Minister's visit to Uzbekistan yielded a landmark agreement that allows each of their military aircraft to use the other's airspace, which will in practice enable Russia to more speedily supply its forces in Tajikistan in the event of an anti-terrorist emergency there and thus prevent the actualization of any worst-case scenarios stemming from the potential spread of Afghan-originating terrorist threats throughout the region.

Comment: See also:

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Bulb

Rand Paul is seeking to cut off military aid to Saudi Arabia over missing Saudi journalist


RT
Thu, 11 Oct 2018 21:58 UTC
Rand Paul
© Reuters / Joshua Roberts
Kentucky Senator Rand Paul has said he will introduce a bill that would cut off military aid to Saudi Arabia until the missing Saudi-born dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi is found safe and well.

Khashoggi, who writes opinion columns for the Washington Post, was last seen entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last Tuesday and Turkish officials have claimed that he was possibly murdered while inside the building, before being dismembered and then secretly driven away.

Speaking to Fox News, Paul said the incident was "just one more reason" why the United States should be wary of selling arms to Saudi Arabia. "If they have the ability and also the audacity to go into another country and kill a journalist, these aren't the kind of people maybe that we want to be selling arms to," he said.
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Bullseye

Senate pulls Hillary's security clearance amid email scandal

Cristina Laila
The Gateway Pundit
Fri, 12 Oct 2018 21:47 UTC
hillary clinton evil
Hillary Clinton lost her security clearance according to an announcement from the Senate Judiciary Committee on Friday.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley also revealed that Hillary Clinton's aide (who magically became her lawyer) Cheryl Mills along with four others also no longer have clearance.

Via the Senate Judiciary Committee:
The U.S. State Department recently confirmed that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's security clearance has been withdrawn at her request. Clearances for five other individuals whom Clinton designated as researchers have also been withdrawn, including close aide Cheryl Mills, according to the State Department's update of its ongoing review of the mishandling of classified information related to the use of Clinton's non-government email server.
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X

Best of the Web: Facebook, Twitter Purge More Dissident Media Pages In Latest Escalation - UPDATE

Caitlin Johnstone
caitlinjohnstone.com
Fri, 12 Oct 2018 00:01 UTC
Free Thought Project banned
Facebook has purged more dissident political media pages today, this time under the pretense of protecting its users from "inauthentic activity". In a statement co-authored by Facebook Head of Cybersecurity Nathaniel Gleicher (who also happens to be the former White House National Security Council Director of Cybersecurity Policy), the massive social media platform explained that it has removed "559 Pages and 251 accounts that have consistently broken our rules against spam and coordinated inauthentic behavior."

This "inauthentic behavior", according to Facebook, consists of using "sensational political content - regardless of its political slant - to build an audience and drive traffic to their websites," which is the same as saying they write about controversial things, and posting those political articles "in dozens of Facebook Groups, often hundreds of times in a short period, to drum up traffic for their websites."

In other words, the pages were removed for publishing controversial political content and trying to get people to read it. Not for writing "fake news", but for doing what they could to get legitimate indie media news stories viewed by people who might want to view it. The practice of sharing your material around in Facebook groups is common practice for most independent media content creators; I did it myself a lot in late 2016 and early 2017, and pretty much all my indie media peers at the time did too.

Comment: It appears another wave in the ongoing social media purge has just hit the shore. The fact that this is another multi-platform event, like the Alex Jones fiasco back in August, should scream loud and clear that this is coming from higher up than the individual social media companies themselves. This is the controllers silencing dissident voices, plain and simple.

See also: Update: De-platformed sites hit back. RT reports:
Alternative voices online are incensed after Facebook and Twitter closed down hundreds of political media pages ahead of November's crucial midterm elections. Facebook says they broke its spam rules, they say it's censorship.

Some 800 pages spanning the political spectrum, from left-leaning organizations like The Anti Media, to flag-waving opinion sites like Right Wing News and Nation in Distress, were shut down. Other pages banned include those belonging to police brutality watchdog groups Filming Cops and Policing the Police. Even RT America's Rachel Blevins found her own page banned for posts that were allegedly "misleading users."


Journalist Glenn Greenwald hit out at those on the left who cheered Facebook and Twitter's coordinated 'deplatforming' of right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones in August. "Those who demanded Facebook & other Silicon Valley giants censor political content...are finding that content that they themselves support & like end up being repressed," he wrote. "That's what has happened to every censorship advocate in history."

Facebook claims that the accounts were shut down for "coordinated inauthentic behavior," and, disturbingly, the company said in a blog post that it is working hard to root out pages, groups and accounts "created to stir up political debate."

In America, Conservatives were the first to complain about unfair treatment by left-leaning Silicon Valley tech giants. However, leftist sites have increasingly become targets in what Blumenthal calls "a wider war on dissident narratives in online media." In identifying enemies in this "war," Facebook has partnered up with the Digital Forensics Lab, an offshoot of NATO-sponsored think tank the Atlantic Council. The DFL has promised to be Facebook's "eyes and ears" in the fight against disinformation (read: alternative viewpoints).


With the Atlantic Council funded by a plethora of private donors, state institutions, and arms manufacturers, it is little wonder that some commenters on Twitter saw the group's fingerprints all over the latest round of bans.


For now, Facebook and Twitter have been free to censor with impunity. This places alternative journalists and news outlets at the companies' mercy: no viable competitors to Facebook and Twitter exist, save for twitter-clone Gab.ai, which has been slammed by mainstream media as a breeding ground for far-right extremism.

Citizen journalist Lee Stranahan called for a stockholder lawsuit against Facebook, arguing that repeated terms-of-service changes are killing the company's business. However, until that happens, users will have to accept censorship as just another one of these terms.


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