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Russia-Gate is state-sponsored paranoid propaganda

Gilbert Doctorow
Russia Insider
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 12:00 UTC
trump putin art
The American public is now experiencing mass paranoia that is called Russia-gate. Obnoxious and dangerous as this officially encouraged madness may be, it is, alas, nothing new. As from 9/11, the same kind of group hypnosis was administered from the Nation's Capital on the body politic to serve the then agenda of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, turning back civil liberties that had accrued over generations without so much as a whimper from Congress, our political elites and the country at large.

This time the generalized paranoia started under the nominally left of center administration of Barack Obama in the closing months of his presidency. It has been fanned ever since by the centrists in both Democratic and Republican parties who want to either remove from office or politically cripple Donald Trump and his administration, that is to say, to overturn the results at the ballot box on November 8, 2016.


Comment: Vladimir Putin says 'absurd' election meddling claims are designed to hurt Donald Trump


Foreign policy issues are instrumentalized for domestic political objectives. In 2001 it was the threat of Islamist terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Muslim world attacking the American homeland. Today it is the alleged manipulation of our open political system by our enemies in the Kremlin.

Fear and alarm close minds to reason and facts. But in the case of our ongoing obsession with Russia there is more at stake than the careers of present-day victims of a McCarthyite witch-hunt.
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Footprints

'We will expect further improvements in US-Russia relations', says US Ambassador


Sputnik
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 17:22 UTC
US Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman
© AFP 2017/ PAUL J. RICHARDSUS Ambassador to Russia, Jon Huntsman
Earlier this week, the US and Russian presidents discussed the settlement of the North Korean crisis in their third phone conversation since Trump had assumed office.

"I think we will expect to see further improvements in the US-Russia relationship. Why do I say that? Because the American people expect it and demand it. And the Russian people expect it and demand it as well. Sometimes politics can get in the way, and the issue can be tricky. But I am convinced the longer that I am here, the American and Russians should be able to find common solutions to global problems," US Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman has stated in a video released on the embassy's Twitter page.

According to the envoy, the cooperation between Washington and Moscow has already been bearing fruit with regard to "gaining greater security in Syria or commitment to counter-proliferation issues with North Korea," adding that he hopes the parties would also find a common ground on the settlement of the crisis in Ukraine.

Comment: Nice to see some positive news from the American Ambassador to Russia. It would be great if all this Russian hysteria were put on the back burner and things could move forward in a cooperative manner. For more on the Trump-Putin phone call, see:

Putin thanked Trump for CIA tip-off which enabled Russia to prevent terror attack

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Russian Flag

Zakharova responds to Boris Johnson: 'Impossible to imagine anything more oligarchic than the UK'


TASS
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 11:16 UTC
Maria Zakharova
© Mikhail Japaridze/TASS


Earlier the UK's Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson compared Russia with closed, nasty ancient Sparta

Russia has never been a "militaristic" country, unlike European states, the Foreign Ministry's spokeswoman Maria Zakharova wrote on Facebook in response to the UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson's comparing Russia with Sparta.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, Johnson called Athens "the analogue of the United States and the West," and Russia - like "closed, nasty, militaristic and antidemocratic" Sparta, adding though the countries need to cooperate.

Comment: You can read the full article on historical comparisons here, as written by this guy:

Clown Boris Johnson
© AP Photo/ Jonathan Short


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Eye 1

Poor Sen. John McCain will miss GOP tax bill vote

Elizabeth Elizalde
New York Daily News
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 20:41 UTC
Sen. John McCain brain cancer
© J. Scott Applewhite/APSen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was diagnosed with brain cancer in July.
Sen. John McCain is returning home to Arizona after being hospitalized for side effects because of his cancer treatment and will miss the Republican's tax bill vote this week, according to a report.

The 81-year-old senator, who was admitted to the Walter Reed Medical Center in Maryland on Wednesday, was returning home from Washington, D.C., on Sunday, CBS News reported.

McCain (R-Ariz.) will not attend the GOP's tax bill vote that is expected to take place sometime early this week. The bill has the support of Republican Sens. Bob Corker of Tennessee and Marco Rubio of Florida. Both pols originally opposed the Senate's plan.

Comment: Aw, poor McCain is gonna miss the vote. Couldn't happen to a nicer person.

But seriously dude, you've got BRAIN CANCER. Maybe it's time to retire? There's enough evil in Washington that calling it a day probably isn't going to be noticed. Plus it would be a convenient time for you to exit the scene given that the Trump dossier scandal is edging closer to implicating your involvement. And we hear the stress is getting to you.

See also:

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Chess

Uzbekistan restores military ties with Russia, buys attack helicopters

Joshua Kucera
Eurasianet
Tue, 12 Dec 2017 10:57 UTC
Russian attack helicopter Mi-35
© mil.ruA Russian Mi-35 helicopter, of the type recently reportedly purchased by Uzbekistan.
Uzbekistan has agreed to buy Russian attack helicopters, the latest sign that the new leadership in Tashkent is committed to reversing the country's previous policy of shunning Moscow's military advances.

The purchase of the 12 Mi-35 helicopters wasn't formally announced, but reported by Russian news agency TASS, citing a "diplomatic source." The source said the deal was reached after "prolonged negotiations" during the visit of Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev to Tashkent in November.

The deal appears to be the first significant arms purchase made under the leadership of Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who assumed power last year after the death of longtime president Islam Karimov. Mirziyoyev has been opening up the country in a variety of directions, including in the military sphere.

And he seems to be opening up to no one as much as Russia. In October the two countries held their first joint military exercises since 2005. Uzbekistan also took part, albeit in a limited fashion, in Russia-led exercises in Tajikistan earlier this year, which would not have happened under Karimov

Comment: This is confirmation that the new president Mirziyoyev is moving in the direction of Asian integration:

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Mr. Potato

Hillary still publicly making excuses for election loss

Teri Webster
The Blaze
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 13:20 UTC
Hillary Clinton Ellen DeGeneres
© YouTube screenshotHillary Clinton appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show to talk about her book and why she lost the 2016 presidential election.
Hillary Clinton, appearing on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show," blamed misogyny, voter suppression, and "FBI intervention," as some of the key reasons for her loss in the 2016 presidential election.

Clinton told DeGeneres she wrote her book, "What Happened" because wanted to figure out...what happened. The book details her experiences during the presidential race.

Writing the book was so painful, Clinton said, that she would have to take small rest breaks to regain her strength to continue.

Comment: It's difficult to tell is Hillary is just delusional in pathologically and persistently insisting that she didn't lose the presidency fairly, or if she's creating spin for another shot at the White House in the future. Either way, she's crooked to the core and there's some satisfaction in seeing her run around like a chicken with its head cut off trying to make excuses for her failings. See also:

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Briefcase

Blackmail material? Mueller obtains tens of thousands of Trump transition emails - potentially illegally

Max Greenwood
The Hill
Sat, 16 Dec 2017 20:56 UTC
mueller
© Larry Downing / Reuters
Special counsel Robert Mueller's team of investigators is in possession of tens of thousands of emails from the Trump transition team, Axios reported Saturday.

Those emails include messages belonging to President Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, as well as other members of the transition team's political leadership and the foreign policy team, according to Axios.

Mueller's prosecutors reportedly used the emails to question witnesses, and are also looking to the messages to confirm information and follow new leads.

According to Axios, Mueller obtained the emails from the General Services Administration, which managed the transition team's email accounts. Transition officials had reportedly assumed that Mueller would want the emails, and separated ones that they believed contained privileged information.

But Mueller was reportedly able to obtain all the emails from 12 accounts.

Comment: According to Trump's lawyer, who wrote to Congress about it, Mueller did not obtain these emails legally:
In a letter sent to the House and the Senate and seen by Fox News, Kory Langhofer, lawyer for Trump's transition team, claimed that Mueller obtained "tens of thousands of emails," including confidential communications between a client and a lawyer, due to "unlawful conduct" by the staffers at the General Services Administration (GSA), which hosted the Trump team's email servers during the transition.

Accusing the GSA of "unauthorized disclosures" for giving Mueller access to private information it "did not own or control," Langhofer went to blame the agency for infringing on the right of the US citizens to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures, as guaranteed by the 4th Amendment.

The special counsel's office has reportedly made "extensive use"of the texts seized from Trump's transition team that include "materials that are susceptible to privilege claims," Langhofer wrote, adding that apart from internal emails, the GSA also handed over laptops, cell phones and an iPad at its own liberty.

Trump's team discovered what it believes a breach of privacy on December 12 and December 13, the lawyer said, noting that some of the compromised materials were leaked to the media by "unknown persons."

Appealing to the Senate Homeland Security and House Oversight Committee, Langhofer called on them to ensure future transitions are secured form being mishandled by government bodies, in particular when it is under an investigation driven by political motives.

With the lingering probe into Trump's alleged ties to Russia having failed so far to produce any proof to support the allegations, it itself has been hit with claims of potential conflict of interest. Last week, it was revealed that one of Mueller's investigative team members, prosecutor Andrew Weissmann, publicly expressed his admiration to former US Attorney General Sally Yates, fired by Trump after defying a travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries. It was also reported that Weissmann attended former Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's election party in November 2016.

In another revelation, Mueller's "right-hand man" investigator Aaron Zebley was found to have acted as an attorney for an IT staffer, who installed Clinton's email private servers and destroyed her old Blackberry phones. The report by Fox News raised more questions about the independence of the former FBI director's investigative machine.
This is essentially what they did with Flynn. They have the communications (obtained in a manner most politely termed "shady"), then try to catch you in a lie about things they already know about. If Mueller has any self-respect or concern for his credibility, he won't use the same dirty trick twice.

UPDATE - 12/17/2017: The Mueller office responded to Langhofer's accusation:
Special counsel Robert Mueller's office on Sunday defended its work after a lawyer for President Trump's transition team accused investigators of improperly obtaining thousands of emails from transition officials.

"When we have obtained emails in the course of our ongoing criminal investigation, we have secured either the account owner's consent or appropriate criminal process," Peter Carr, a spokesman for the special counsel's office, said in a statement to The Hill.


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Quenelle

Trolling Nikki! Russian Embassy online poll shows 82% think US is real threat in Middle East - Iran gets less votes than Aliens

Andrés Perezalonso
Sott.net
Mon, 18 Dec 2017 09:35 UTC
nikki haley
© Yuri Gripas / ReutersNikki Haley makes an embarrassment of herself - again.
After the disastrous wars on Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria, nowadays whenever a politician tries to pull a 'Colin Powell' on us, they deserve to be trolled. We are glad that the Russian Embassy in the Republic of South Africa has taken the initiative on this most important duty.

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Attention

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi to run for President of Libya in 2018

Adam Garrie
The Duran
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 00:00 UTC
A family spokesman has broken the news on Egyptian television.
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi
© EPA
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the second son and erstwhile heir apparent to revolutionary leader Muammar Gaddafi has confirmed to Egyptian television, through a family spokesman, Basem al-Hashimi al-Soul, that he seeks to run in next year's tenuous Presidential elections in Libya.

While Libya remains a failed state in the wake of the 2011 NATO war against the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, many have pinned their hopes on Saif al-Islam Gaddafi who since his release from captivity this year, has been touring the country and buildilng support among Libya's many tribal factions.

According to his spokesman,
"Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the son of the former Libyan president, enjoys the support of major tribes in Libya so he can run for the upcoming presidential elections due in 2018.

Saif al-Islam plans to impose more security and stability in accordance with the Libyan geography and in coordination with all Libyan factions".

Comment: See also:

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Attention

US defense secretary James Mattis rejects war on Iran

Adam Garrie
The Duran
Sun, 17 Dec 2017 00:00 UTC
James "Mad Dog" Mattis has injected some sanity into mad Nikki Haley's tirades.
Mad Dog Mattis
© Unknown
US Defense Secretary James "Mad Dog" Mattis has refuted claims that the US is preparing for war on Iran after US Ambassador to the UN, Nikkie Haley led a bizarre press conference in which she stated that Iran has armed Houthi fighters in Yemen and thus violating the terms of the JCPOA (aka Iran nuclear deal). Haley did not provide any evidence to substantiate her claims, claims which are logistically impossible given the Saudi led blockade of Yemen which predates the JCPOA by nearly four months.
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