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Bullseye

Turkey claims Trump targeted the lira, has counter-measures ready


RT
Mon, 13 Aug 2018 00:36 UTC
TurkLiraFlag
© Altan Gocher/Global Look Press
Turkey has accused Donald Trump of leading an attack on its national currency. The lira lost about 40 percent of its value against the US dollar this year and, to reduce its volatility, Ankara has prepared an urgent action plan.
"The currency of our country is targeted directly by the US president," Finance Minister Berat Albayrak told Hurriyet. "This attack, initiated by the biggest player in the global financial system, reveals a similar situation in all developing countries."
The Turkish lira took a massive hit against the dollar on Friday following Trump's decision to double tariffs on aluminum and steel imports from Turkey to 20 percent and 50 percent. Overall, the national currency lost roughly about 40 percent of its value this year.


Comment: Was Turkey made an example and meant as a warning? Or, were there some underlying and compounding faults in Erdogan's monetary policy?

More from RT:
...there are other factors weighing down the lira. On Monday, the currency dropped to a historic low of 7.2 lira against the dollar before recovering slightly to 6.8 against the greenback. Turkey's Istanbul 100 stock market hit its lowest level in dollar terms since March 2009.

Investors in lira are also concerned about Turkey's internal monetary policy. President Erdogan has been criticized for interfering in the central bank's monetary policy by reportedly not allowing the regulator to hike the interest rate to prevent the lira's collapse.

Additionally, Turkey has a vast amount of debt denominated in US dollars. So, when the lira falls, the debt becomes more expensive. The country has a debt in dollars and other foreign currencies accounting for a half of its gross domestic product.
"The decline in the lira is multifaceted, caused not only by a weak external position in terms of current account deficit and inadequate currency reserves, but also the challenging political environment which exacerbates the vulnerabilities in the lira," Kerry Craig, global market strategist at J.P. Morgan Asset Management, wrote, as quoted by CNBC.

"A mid-meeting rate hike and tightening of monetary policy may help to avert the lira's decline, to some extent," he added.


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Attention

Ray McGovern: Torture fan Senator Burr let Haspel cover up her 'black site' role to secure confirmation

Ray McGovern
Consortiumnews.com
Sat, 11 Aug 2018 00:00 UTC
Sen Richard Burr
© Jonathan Ernst/ReutersSenate Intelligence Committee Chair Richard Burr (R-NC)
Newly released declassified documents prove once and for all that CIA Director Gina Haspel oversaw torture in Thailand, which the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee knew all along, as Ray McGovern explains.

Newly released official documents obtained by the National Security Archive showing that CIA Director Gina Haspel directly supervised waterboarding at the first CIA "Black Site" simply confirm what Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Richard Burr (R-NC) already knew as he orchestrated the charade that was Haspel's confirmation hearing. Burr allowed her to "classify" her own direct role in waterboarding and other torture techniques so that it could be kept from the public and secure her confirmation--further proof that this Senate oversight committee has instead become an overlook committee.

That Haspel supervised the torture of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri at the first CIA "black site" for interrogation was already clear to those who had followed Haspel's career, but she was able to do a song and dance when Sen. Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-CA) asked her about it. Haspel declined to reply on grounds that the information was classified. It was of course because Haspel herself had classified it. All the senators knew that only too well. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) had strongly objected to this bizarre practice only minutes before.

Comment: See also:

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Target

More signs Mueller is zeroing in on Roger Stone

Morgan Chalfant
The Hill
Mon, 13 Aug 2018 05:01 UTC
Roger Stone
© Joe Raedle/Getty ImagesRoger Stone
Special counsel Robert Mueller appears to be narrowing his focus on Roger Stone in his investigation into Russian interference in the election, prompting widespread speculation that the longtime adviser to President Trump is likely a target in the probe.

Stone has long been subject to public scrutiny as a result of his connections to WikiLeaks and Guccifer 2.0, the hacking persona that Mueller's team now alleges was a front for Russian intelligence officers.

The focus on Stone has seemed to intensify in recent weeks, as Mueller has sought testimony from a growing number of individuals linked to him. Most telling, perhaps, is the fact that Roger Stone himself has not yet been called to interview with Mueller or testify before the grand jury. Legal analysts see this as a sign that Stone is a subject, if not a target, of the investigation into whether there was collusion between Trump's campaign and Moscow. "Mueller is obviously closing in on Stone," said Glenn Kirschner, a former federal prosecutor with the D.C. U.S. attorney's office.

Comment: See also:

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Star of David

Israel: Liberal Jewish-American reporter detained for questioning on his political beliefs


RT
Mon, 13 Aug 2018 19:22 UTC
Peter Beinart journalist
© Israel National NewsJournalist Peter Beinart
Liberal Jewish-American journalist Peter Beinart says he won't accept Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's apology to him for being detained and questioned about his political beliefs at an Israeli airport.

Beinart flew to Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport on Sunday to attend his niece's Bat Mitzvah - only to be intercepted by Israeli passport control and questioned for over an hour about his political beliefs and affiliations.

According to Beinart - who is an advocate for Palestinian rights, and is a regular contributor to the left-leaning Jewish-American outlet, The Forward - his Israeli interrogator asked "again and again" for the names of "objectionable" organizations that he was associated with.
"[The interrogator's] definition of objectionable, however, kept changing. At one point he asked about groups that incite or provoke violence. At another he asked about groups that threaten Israeli democracy. At another he asked about groups that promote anarchy," Beinart wrote in a piece he penned for The Forward about the ordeal. "Then he simply asked if I was connected to any organization - or involved in any activity - that he should be concerned about. I laughed and told him that if I thought he should be concerned about it I wouldn't be involved. But his imprecision was telling: He established no consistent or objective standard for my detention. His standard was whether I planned to cause trouble - trouble meaning whatever he and his superiors wanted it to mean."

Comment: It will only get worse the longer and stronger Israel's paranoia becomes.

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Question

Ron Paul: Trump versus his own administration?

Ron Paul
Ron Paul Institute
Mon, 13 Aug 2018 00:00 UTC
BoltTrumpPomp
© The HillNational Security Advisor John Bolton • President Donald Trump • Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
Are President Trump's senior cabinet members working against him? It's hard not to conclude that many of the more hawkish neocons that Trump has (mistakenly, in my view) appointed to top jobs are actively working to undermine the president's stated agenda. Especially when it seems Trump is trying to seek dialogue with countries the neocons see as adversaries needing to be regime-changed.

Remember just as President Trump was organizing an historic summit meeting with Kim Jong-Un, his National Security Advisor, John Bolton, nearly blew the whole thing up by making repeated references to the "Libya model" and how it should be applied to North Korea. As if Kim would jump at the chance to be bombed, overthrown, and murdered at the hands of a US-backed mob!

It seems that Trump's appointees are again working at cross-purposes to him.

Last week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that he was invoking a 1991 US law against the use of chemical weapons to announce yet another round of sanctions on Russia over what he claims is Putin's involvement in the poisoning of a former Russian spy and his daughter in the UK.

The alleged poisoning took place in March and only now did the State Department make its determination that Russia was behind it and thus subject to the 1991 sanction law. Was there new information that came to light that pointed to Russian involvement? According to a State Department briefing there was none. The State Department just decided to take the British government's word for it.

Where do we get authority to prosecute Russia for an alleged crime committed in the UK, by the way?

Comment: Trump's appointees may have been his compromise in order to remain on the planet or they may be the vice grip he can play from.

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Megaphone

It wasn't Russia who interfered in the 2016 election, it was the UK

Joe Hoft
Gateway Pundit
Fri, 10 Aug 2018 10:01 UTC
UK Trump
In May TGP reported... New evidence proves that a foreign government meddled in the 2016 US Election. But the government identified is the UK, not Russia!

We shared the following:
After more than a year of the Mueller investigation, millions of dollars and the Mainstream Media's (MSM) relentless attack on President Trump, what do we have? Nothing really.
President Trump tweeted in February that if the goal of Russia was to create discord in the US then they have succeeded. "They are laughing their asses off in Moscow. Get smart America!"

Since this tweet, the Russia fairy tale has fallen apart. Corrupt Mueller and his team of conflicted, biased and corrupt investigators and attorneys have found nothing related to their target, President Trump, and now their indictments are unraveling.

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Quenelle

"There is an economic attack against Turkey": Erdogan vows to boycott US electronics in retaliation to US sanctions


RT
Tue, 14 Aug 2018 09:13 UTC
turkey boycott iphone
© Murad Sezer / Reuters
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has announced a boycott of American electronic products in response to Washington's economic pressure against Ankara after the detention of a US pastor in Turkey.

"There is an economic attack against Turkey. Earlier such things were done in secret, and now they are open to us. We can react in two ways: economically and politically," Erdogan said in Ankara Tuesday.

"Our Ministry of Finance and the Treasury are working day and night...we will boycott electronic goods from the United States. They have iPhones, but on the other hand there are Samsungs. We have our local brand Venus Vestel, we will use it," the Turkish president added.

Share prices in Turkish electronics manufacturer Vestel rose sharply on Erdogan's comments.

Comment: It seems the recent sanctions against Turkey have given them the nudge they needed to stop trying to play both sides.

See Also:

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Jet3

Russia to modernize Tupolev Tu-95MS strategic missile-carrying bomber


TASS
Tue, 14 Aug 2018 09:57 UTC
Tupolev Aircraft Tu-95MSM
© Mikhail Tereshchenko/TASS
The Tupolev Aircraft Company will develop the modernized Tu-95MSM strategic missile-carrying bomber for Russia's Defense Ministry, the company's press office told TASS on Monday.

"The contract for creating the heavily-modernized Tu-95MSM aircraft has already been concluded," the company's press office said.

The details and the timeframe of the bomber's heavy upgrade have not yet been disclosed. As the company's press office said, the state trials of the operational Tu-95MS plane with the modernized engines are expected to be completed by the end of the year.

The Tu-95MS strategic missile-carrying bomber is designated to accomplish strike missions to destroy major targets in remote military and geographical regions and deep in the rear of the continental theaters of operations with the employment of nuclear missile weapons.

Russian Defense Minister Army General Sergei Shoigu earlier said that extending the service life of the strategic Tu-160 and Tu-95MS missile-carrying bombers and raising their combat efficiency were among priority tasks for Russia's Defense Ministry.

The Russian defense minister also said that the Tupolev would repair eight strategic Tu-160 and Tu-95MS missile-carrying bombers by the end of 2018.

Comment: See also: An eagle in the sky: Russia's new Tu-160M2 bomber leagues ahead of any other strategic bomber including US jets

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Bad Guys

Montenegro accuses ex-CIA officer of plotting coup with Russia to overthrow the government

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Mon, 13 Aug 2018 09:47 UTC
Joseph Assad Michele Rigby
Joseph Assad and wife Michele Rigby Assad
Prosecutors in Montenegro have demanded the arrest of former CIA officer Joseph Assad, accusing him of involvement in an alleged 2016 Russian-backed plot to overthrow the government and block the country's inclusion in NATO.

Assad - an Egyptian-American who came to the US in 1990 before serving as a counterterrorism specialist in the CIA, has denied the charges, claiming that he was in Montenegro to provide personal security advice to a political consultant from the west. He has asked that the US reject any extradition request.

"This is a deception campaign against a loyal American who had no role in any crimes or coup in Montenegro," Assad said in a statement issued on Saturday through his lawyer, reports The Guardian.
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Rocket

Russian military downs five drones near Khmeimim Air Base in Syria as UAV attacks increase


RT
Tue, 14 Aug 2018 08:15 UTC
S-400 missile system and Pantsir-S1 air defense system
© SputnikS-400 missile system and Pantsir-S1 air defense system seen at Khmeimim airbase
Five more drones have been shot down by Russia's Air Defense units near Khmeimim Air Base in Syria in the last 24 hours, the military confirmed. Drone attacks by militants have intensified in recent weeks.

The objects were launched from the militant-controlled area in the Idlib de-escalation zone, according to the head of the Russian Center for Reconciliation of the opposing sides in Syria, Maj. Gen. Alexei Tsygankov, as cited by TASS. The hostile unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was shot down not far from the base and the incident caused no injuries or damage, Tsygankov added.

Shooting down militant drones has become somewhat routine for the Russian military at Khmeimim Air Base, located south-east of the port of Latakia. On Sunday the Russian military said it had repelled two drone attacks "at a safe distance from the base." On Saturday a drone, apparently carrying explosives, was downed on approach to Khmeimim, also from the militant-held de-escalation zone in Idlib.

Comment: See also:

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