Puppet MastersS


Blue Planet

China calls for lifting of North Korean sanctions and hails its role in the peace agreement

Lily Kuo
Guardian
Wed, 13 Jun 2018 07:08 UTC
China Trump Kim
© Greg Baker/AFP/Getty ImagesA large screen shows news footage of the summit meeting in Singapore between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, in Beijing
Chinese officials have been quick to take credit for some of the outcomes of a historic summit between the US and North Korea on Tuesday.

Following the meeting between US president Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore, China's foreign minister Wang Yi hailed China's "indisputable" role in the process.

"It is fair to say that the relevant approach and initiative proposed by China and its endeavours ... have played a positive and constructive role in getting the situation on the peninsula to where it is now."

China's state-run media called the summit a "success" and something China had long been "working toward."

Comment: Trump may have promised a freeze on military exercises, but will he be successful? After all, the Pentagon continues its belligerence in the the South China Sea. Also, we mustn't forget Russia's role in making this all possible.

Also check out SOTT radio's: Behind the Headlines: Trump Ditches Europe, Europe Bluffs, Russia and China Carry on With Eurasian Integration

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Marijuana

PM's husband, Philip May's Capital Group, profits from British weed-growing op while British patients are denied access

Padraig McCarrick
RT
Wed, 13 Jun 2018 17:01 UTC
pot enthusiast UK
© Velar Grant / Global Look Press
Charges of hypocrisy have been leveled against the Home Office for not granting patients access to medicinal cannabis, while relatives of Tory MPs are profiting from its production and export.

The accusations first surfaced in an article by Dr John Regan, published last April by the website urhealthguide.com, which accused the government of hypocrisy for its stance on medicinal cannabis.

Cannabis remains a schedule-one drug under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 (MODA), meaning it is regarded as having little or no therapeutic value and is subjected to the most restrictive controls. However, licenses have been granted to biotech firm GW Pharmaceutical to produce a medical cannabis product called Sativex, which is listed as a schedule-4 substance, meaning it can be prescribed for patients by doctors.

Comment: Say what you will about legalization of recreational marijuana, the separate debate around the continued ban on medicinal use of non-psychoactive extracts really has no leg to stand on. The UK government is clearly working in its own interests for profit and while doing so, are endangering lives and causing suffering. These patients are not people who 'just wanna get high'. They are suffering from medical conditions whose symptoms could be alleviated were it not for outdated, misguided, puritanical laws.

See also:

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Card - VISA

Best of the Web: Slavoj Žižek: EU must create a new world order to stop Donald Trump

Slavoj Žižek
RT
Tue, 12 Jun 2018 08:06 UTC
trump disruptor
While most other western leaders fiddle and seethe, Donald Trump powers ahead as bully-in-chief. A genuine new world order is the only way to stop him.

Trump's impulsive decisions, such as his refusal to endorse the G7 declaration agreed upon in Quebec, are not just expressions of his personal quirks. Instead, they are reactions to the end of an era in the global economic system, reactions which are sustained by an incorrect understanding of what is happening. However, Trump's misguided vision is nonetheless based on the correct insight that the existing global system no longer works.

An economic cycle is coming to an end, a cycle which began in the early 1970s, the time when what Yanis Varoufakis calls the "Global Minotaur" was born, the monstrous engine that was running the world economy from the early 1980s to 2008. The late 1960s and the early 1970s were not just significant for the oil crisis and stagflation; Nixon's decision to abandon the gold standard for the US dollar was the sign of a much more radical shift in the basic functioning of the capitalist system.

Indeed, by the end of the 1960s, the US economy was no longer able to continue the recycling of its surpluses to Europe and Asia because its surpluses had mutated into deficits. As a result, in 1971, the US government responded to this decline with an audacious strategic move: instead of tackling the nation's burgeoning deficits, it decided to do the opposite, to boost deficits.

And who would pay for them? The rest of the world!

Comment: Indeed, it's improbable. Europe has no plan, no vision - it just reacts to events and goes 'huh?'

The actor best positioned for implementing a new and sustainable world order is China, with its 'Dream', 'Belt and Road', 'multipolarity', etc.

The ultimate question is; will Europe facilitate or impede that vision?

But before that can be answered, the postmodernist-ultraliberal elites in Europe have got to get out of the way.

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Light Saber

Andre Vltchek: Why Venezuela and Syria cannot be allowed to fall

Andre Vltchek
New Eastern Outlook
Sun, 10 Jun 2018 00:00 UTC
Syria fight
Despite tremendous hardship which the Venezuelan people are having to face, despite the sanctions and intimidation from abroad, President Nicolás Maduro has won a second six-year term.

Two weeks ago, at the Venezuelan embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, where I addressed several leaders of East African left-wing opposition, an acting Charge d' Affaires, Jose Avila Torres, declared: "People of Venezuela are now facing similar situation as the Syrian people."

True. Both nations, Venezuela and Syria, are separated by a tremendous geographical distance, but they are united by the same fate, same determination and courage.

During the Spanish Civil War, Czech anti-fascist fighters, volunteers in the International Brigades, used to say: "In Madrid we are fighting for Prague". Madrid fell to Franco's fascists in October 1939. Prague had been occupied by German troops several months earlier, in March 1939. It was the blindness and cowardice of the European leaders, as well as the support which the murderous fascist hordes received from populations of all corners of the continent, which led to one of the greatest tragedies in modern history - a tragedy which only ended on May 9, 1945, when the Soviet troops liberated Prague, defeating Nazi Germany and de facto saving the world.
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Bad Guys

NATO adds Colombia to its list of members, and it's about more than just Venezuela

Elliott Gabriel
Mint Press News
Sat, 09 Jun 2018 00:00 UTC
Stoltenberg and President Juan Manuel Santos
© NATOSecretary General Jens Stoltenberg hosted President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia at NATO headquarters on May 31. Colombia has now become NATO’s first member in Latin America.
Faced with questions about the continued relevance of the North Atlantic alliance, NATO has sought justification for its existence from Central Asia to Sub-Saharan Africa and has even floated the idea of indirect intervention in the South China Sea dispute.

Colombia's formal partnership with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) marks the first time that a Latin American country has joined the European group, and signals a new shift toward the Global South by the Cold War-era alliance.

Colombia's entry into NATO as a "global partner" signals that the U.S. military top brass are likely to call the shots for the South American country both in terms of its security policies and its geopolitical orientation, which becomes all the more crucial as the North Atlantic alliance increasingly strives to become a power in the South Pacific amid rising friction between the U.S. and China.

Comment: Let's just call NATO what it is: The Pentagon's military and World domination club. Wanna be a member? Just sell out your soul and those of your countrymen, and you'll get to shake hands with Jens Stoltenberg.

A few other recent articles give us some idea of what NATO's malign intentions are - and just how far in reach their spheres of influence are now going:

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Pirates

'Twisted joke': Leaked photo of Australian soldiers flying Nazi swastika in Afghanistan sparks scandal


RT
Thu, 14 Jun 2018 08:26 UTC
Australian soldiers
© Omar Sobhani / Reuters
A photo of a Nazi flag on an Australian military vehicle in Afghanistan has been condemned by the country's PM and Jewish community, while its Defense Ministry says the soldiers responsible for the stunt have been "disciplined."

Australian soldiers were caught flying the Nazi swastika flag from their vehicle while conducting a mission in Afghanistan as part of a NATO-force deployment back in 2007, according to ABC, which obtained an exclusive photo of the incident.

It is believed that that the picture was just one of many photographs that were reportedly being circulated among military personnel. The news outlet also saw a second picture of the military vehicle flying a swastika. Furthermore, two separate defense sources revealed the identity of the Aussie soldier who took the flag with him on overseas duty. The person's name was not shared with the public.

Comment: See also: Leaked docs reveal Australian special forces under investigation for unlawful killings of civilians in Afghanistan

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Bug

Netanyahu neck deep in three corruption scandals


Middle East Monitor
Wed, 13 Jun 2018 14:16 UTC
Benjamin Netanyahu
© Samuel Corum/Anadolu AgencyIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) in Washington, US on 6 March 2018
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has become embroiled in yet another scandal. The Likud leader was questioned yesterday by police in connection with an investigation into alleged corruption relating to Israel's $2 billion purchase of submarines from Germany.

The Financial Times reported that Netanyahu was grilled for "several hours" at his official residence in Jerusalem. While Israel's premier is not thought to be a suspect at the moment, the questioning by police over such long hours is bound to raise suspicions given that he is already under investigation over several cases of corruption.

Yesterday's interrogation focused on a deal to buy three German submarines in 2016. The local representative for the German company, Miki Ganor, allegedly bribed Israeli officials to secure the deal. According to the FT Ganor signed an agreement last year to turn state's witness.

Comment: Not that Zionist aggression in the Middle East would end or even slow down, and not that the god-forsaken slow-motion genocide of the Palestinians would end or even slow down - but at least we wouldn't have Bibi's "I'm smarter than everyone in the world arrogance" to contend with every time we're to hear of another setback for humanity at the hands of Israel. And that's something.

Please oh please indict the worm already!

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Star of David

Flashback Ilan Pappe: Israel is not, and has never been, a Democracy

Ilan Pappe
Jacobin
Fri, 05 May 2017 00:00 UTC
Israel's jack boot
© Activestills.orgAn activist is arrested by Israeli forces during a Day Of Rage protest against the Prawer-Begin Plan in front of the Israeli settlement Beit El, Al Jalazun, West Bank, November 30, 2013.

Excerpted from Ten Myths About Israel, Verso Books.

Israel is not the only democracy in the Middle East. In fact, it's not a democracy at all.

In the eyes of many Israelis and their supporters worldwide - even those who might criticize some of its policies - Israel is, at the end of the day, a benign democratic state, seeking peace with its neighbors, and guaranteeing equality to all its citizens.

Those who do criticize Israel assume that if anything went wrong in this democracy then it was due to the 1967 war. In this view, the war corrupted an honest and hardworking society by offering easy money in the occupied territories, allowing messianic groups to enter Israeli politics, and above all else turning Israel into an occupying and oppressive entity in the new territories.

The myth that a democratic Israel ran into trouble in 1967 but still remained a democracy is propagated even by some notable Palestinian and pro-Palestinian scholars - but it has no historical foundation.
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Bad Guys

Bernie Sanders congratulates liberals for bringing 'extremist ideas' into the mainstream

Amber Athey
The Daily Caller
Wed, 13 Jun 2018 20:14 UTC
Bernie Sanders we the people summit
At the We The People Summit in Washington, D.C., the self-avowed democratic socialist cheered the progressive tilt of mainstream American politics.

"We are obviously in a pivotal and unprecedented moment in American history and the fights that we are waging are not just for ourselves, more importantly they are for our kids, our grandchildren and the future of this planet," Sanders said.

"I want to thank all of the groups here because whether you know it or not you have helped transform this country in so many ways," he declared. "A few years ago...many of the ideas that we talked about were thought to be fringe ideas, radical ideas, extremist ideas. Well, you know what? Because of your efforts those ideas are now mainstream American ideas."

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Propaganda

How the mainstream media is misleading us on the Trump-Kim summit

Gareth Porter
Truthdig
Mon, 11 Jun 2018 18:59 UTC
trump kim jong-un
© Ahn Young-joon / AP
For weeks, the corporate media have been saying that the Trump-Kim summit could have only two possible results: Either Trump will walk away angrily or Kim Jong Un will trick him into a deal in which he extracts concessions from Trump but never commits to complete denuclearization.

The idea that North Korea could not possibly agree to give up its nuclear weapons or its intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) has become an article of faith among the journalists covering the issue for big media. Two themes that have appeared again and again in their coverage are that the wily North Koreans are "playing" Trump and that previous administrations had also been taken by North Korea after signing agreements in good faith.

But the media have gotten it all wrong. They have assumed that North Korea cannot live without nuclear weapons - without making any effort to understand North Korea's strategy in regard to nuclear weapons. They have invariably quoted "experts" who haven't followed North Korean thinking closely but who express the requisite hostility toward the summit and negotiating an agreement with the Kim regime.

One of the few Americans who can speak with authority on North Korea's calculus regarding nuclear weapons is Joel S. Wit, who was senior adviser to the U.S. negotiator with North Korea, Ambassador Robert L. Gallucci, from 1993 to 1995, and who from 1995 to 1999 was coordinator for the 1994 "Agreed Framework" with North Korea. More importantly, Wit also participated in a series of informal meetings with North Korean officials in 2013 about North Korea's thinking on its nuclear weapons.

Comment: Given the US record of not exactly being the most 'trustworthy' partner, skepticism is understandable. But something that sets this apart is that they aren't the only players in the game. China and Russia also have an interest in seeing a diplomatic solution that will lead to better economic ties with the region. And although there's always the Deep State to throw wrenches into their plans, they may not be able to play out a 'Libya' type scenario without getting those big countries involved. See also:

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