Puppet MastersS


Stop

The end of Merkel-ism in Europe

Tom Luongo
Halsey News
Mon, 20 Nov 2017 00:00 UTC
Merkel
© Reuters/Wolfgang RattayGerman Chancellor Angela Merkel
This is a headline I've been waiting to write for six years. German Chancellor Emeritus Angela Merkel can't put a bad coalition together. This is the result of an election that saw populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) rise and the Social Democrats, led by Soros-stooge Martin Schultz, fall.

Now the Free Democrats (FDP), led by Christian Lidner, understand just how strong their position is. They don't have to make a bad deal with Merkel to get a seat at the table only to have to share it with the ideologically-opposite Greens. They can force a re-vote, see their standing rise, along with AfD and go for a far bigger piece of the pie.

But, ultimately, if Merkel's CDU/CSU coalition party is to stay together, and there's no guarantee of that anymore, it will have to dump Merkel herself if it wants to survive as a voting bloc.

Comment: A bellwether? Losing her grasp on the EU, Merkel will be one of many global politicians on the sidelines if the current Western stage is finally swept.

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Snakes in Suits

US labels Venezuela a global threat at UN, EU approves arms embargo

Lucas Koerner
Venezuelanalysis
Wed, 15 Nov 2017 09:47 UTC
USsnakevenezuela
© US-Venezuela Solidarity
The US chaired an informal meeting at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Monday to discuss the situation in Venezuela despite a boycott from leading members such as China and Russia.

"The crisis in Venezuela today poses a direct threat to international peace and security. Venezuela is an increasingly violent narco-state that threatens the region, the hemisphere, and the world, "Washington's ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, declared during the session.

Also present at the meeting were Organization of American States Secretary General Luis Almagro and UN High Commissioner Human Rights Prince Zeid bin Ra'ad, both vocal critics of the government in Caracas.

The meeting was also boycotted by Bolivia and Egypt, who objected to Washington's interference in Venezuelan internal affairs. "The situation in Venezuela is an issue that is entirely the responsibility of Venezuelans and of course does not constitute a threat to international peace and security," said Bolivian UN Ambassador Sacha Llorenty at a press conference alongside his Russian, Chinese, and Venezuelan counterparts Monday.

Comment: See also:

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X

Trump's 'sanctuary cities' executive order deemed unconstitutional, blocked in US court


RT
Tue, 21 Nov 2017 03:28 UTC
JudgeOrrick/Trump
© americanthinker.comJudge William Orrick • President Donald Trump
A US judge berated and ruled President Donald Trump's "sanctuary cities" executive order unconstitutional. Cities that do not fully comply with federal immigration enforcement are still entitled to billions of dollars in federal money, the judge found.

On Monday evening, US District Court Judge William Orrick, of California's Northern District, slammed one of President Donald Trump's first executive orders. Executive Order 13768, titled "Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States," was determined to be "unconstitutional on its face," the judge wrote, according to documents obtained by USA Today.

Trump's order denied not only federal grants, but also federal funding for local jurisdictions with policies against cooperating or assisting federal immigration officers in identifying or detaining illegal immigrants. These so-called "sanctuary cities" or "sanctuary jurisdictions" have risen in number for several years, but they fall under a broad category.

San Francisco County and Santa Clara County claimed they were at risk of losing $2 billion in federal funds under the January 25 executive order. They argued that the executive order was unconstitutional, because it violated the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of government.

Comment: See also:

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Target

Ankara threatens to disable US radar over F-35 deal ban, blind Israeli defense


RT
Tue, 21 Nov 2017 16:16 UTC
NATO radar station
© AFPNATO radar station
An editorial in a Turkish conservative pro-government newspaper said Ankara could leave Israel exposed to an Iranian missile attack by disabling a US radar station, in retaliation for a possible Washington ban on the purchase of F-35 fighter jets.

The editorial was published on Sunday by the Yeni Safak newspaper in apparent response to concerns voiced by a US Air Force official. Heidi Grant, the deputy undersecretary of the USAF for international affairs, had earlier said that Turkey's deployment of the Russian-made S-400 long-range anti-aircraft missile system may expose vulnerabilities of the US-made F-35 Lightning II fighter jets. Turkey plans to purchase over 100 of the advanced warplanes from Lockheed Martin.

The newspaper called the implication that the planned deal may be frozen "blackmail" by Washington, and suggested that in retaliation Ankara could dismantle the Kurecik radar station. The powerful AN/TPY-2 X-band early-warning radar, which was set up by the US in the eastern province of Malatya in 2012, is part of NATO's system of airspace surveillance in the region.

The newspaper says that unlike similar surveillance sites in Israel, Jordan, Qatar and the UAE, the Kurecik radar station can detect missile launches from the entire western part of Iran. With the site disabled, that airspace would no longer be properly monitored by NATO, the editorial said.

Comment: See also:
Turkish threat to remove US 'intelligence gathering' radar systems indicative of changing relationships in Middle East

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Pirates

Six years after NATO 'intervention', Libya is home to an ACTUAL slave trade

John Wight
Sputnik
Tue, 21 Nov 2017 14:55 UTC
Libya
© Reuters/ Esam Omran Al-Fetori
NATO's military intervention in Libya in 2011 has justifiably earned its place in history as an indictment of Western foreign policy and a military alliance that, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, has been deployed as its sword. The destruction of Libya will forever be an indelible stain on the reputations of those countries involved.

But now, with the revelation that people are being sold as slaves in Libya (yes, you read that right - in 2017 the slave trade is alive and kicking Libya), the cataclysmic disaster to befall the country has been compounded to the point where it is hard to conceive of it ever being able to recover - and certainly not anywhere near its former status as a high development country, as the UN labeled Libya in 2010, a year prior to the "revolution."

Sarkosy,Cameron
© AFP 2017/ STEFAN ROUSSEAUSarkosy and Cameron, Benghazi Airport, 2011.
Back in 2011, it was simply inconceivable that the UK, the US and France would ignore the lessons of Iraq in 2003, just nine years previously. Yet ignore them they did, highlighting their rapacious obsession with maintaining hegemony over a region that sits atop an ocean of oil; this regardless of the human cost and legacy of disaster and chaos this particular obsession has wrought.

When former UK Prime Minister David Cameron descended on Benghazi in eastern Libya in the summer of 2011, basking in the glory of the country's victorious "revolution" in the company of his French counterpart Nicolas Sarkozy, he did so imbued with the belief he had succeeded in establishing his legacy as a leader on the global stage. Like Blair before him, he'd won his war and now was intent on partaking of its political and geopolitical spoils. Cameron told the crowd, "Your city was an inspiration to the world, as you threw off a dictator and chose freedom."

Comment: See also:

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Attention

President Trump at risk of a creeping coup

Andrei Akulov
Strategic Culture Foundation
Mon, 20 Nov 2017 18:30 UTC
Trump
President Trump is being attacked from all sides. On Nov.18, Air Force General John Hyten, commander of the US Strategic Command (STRATCOM), told an audience at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia, Canada, that he would resist President Donald Trump if he ordered an "illegal" launch of nuclear weapons. It's up to the general to decide if the order is legal or illegal! This is an extraordinary statement coming from a top official on active service! And it does not look like the general is going to resign or retire. It means he can afford it with no consequences to face. The statement came after Senate held the first congressional hearing in more than four decades on the president's authority to launch a nuclear strike.

Some senators want legislation to alter the nuclear authority of the US president. Questions were raised about Trump's authority to wage war, use nuclear weapons and enter into or end international agreements after he made threats to strike North Korea. The president's taunting tweets aimed at Pyongyang have sparked concerns primarily among congressional Democrats that he may be inciting a war. "We are concerned that the President of the United States is so unstable, is so volatile, has a decision-making process that is so quixotic that he might order a nuclear weapons strike that is wildly out of step with US national security interests," said US Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Connecticut.
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Star of David

Israel to cut off Palestinian access to spring, steal more land, by moving checkpoint deeper into West Bank

Sheren Khalel
Mondoweiss
Fri, 17 Nov 2017 19:46 UTC
West Bank water spring
© alt-arch.org/en/wallajaHistoric Ein al-Hanniya spring, in Walajeh.
Residents in al-Walaja are well versed in Israeli planning law. The small village has been in legal battles against Israel's separation wall, land confiscation and home demolitions for decades. This week Israeli authorities added another battle to the ongoing lists of obstacles faced by the rural village.

On Nov. 12, Israeli forces issued notices to Palestinians living in the area that the closest Israeli military checkpoint to the village, one of the two checkpoints between the Bethlehem district and Jerusalem, will be moved further into the West Bank, annexing more of al-Walaja land.

According to the notices, residents have 15 days to challenge the order.

Firas al-Atrash, a member of the Local Council of al-Walaja, told Mondoweiss that moving the checkpoint according to Israel's plans would have devastating effects on the farming village.

"Moving the checkpoint means that the Israel will take over around 1200 dunams (296 acres) of the land village, and prevent landowners to from accessing their land located behind the wall, including the Ein Al-Haniya spring and archaeological site," al-Atrash said.
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Attention

Moscow slams Kiev's permissive attitude toward repeated vandalism of WWII memorial


RT
Tue, 21 Nov 2017 19:39 UTC
Kiev WWII monument
© SputnikKyivgaz staff members clean the Eternal Flame in Kiev's Park of Eternal Glory after concrete had been poured over the memorial.
The Russian Foreign Ministry has expressed indignation over an act of vandalism committed at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Kiev. Moscow says this shows that the Ukrainian government is not able to counter extremism.

"To our indignation we have learned about another act of vandalism - on November 20, the Eternal Flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in central Kiev was put out with cement. The fact that this act of desecration took place for the second time in just one month and the culprits have not been found and punished speaks either about the criminal permissiveness of the Kiev authorities or about their lack of will and inability to counter unrestrained radicals," reads the statement released by the foreign ministry on Tuesday.
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Propaganda

Propaganda: Newsweek smears Donald Trump with Charles Manson comparison

Daniel J. Flynn
Breitbart
Mon, 20 Nov 2017 12:00 UTC
Charles Manson
© The Associated PressCharles Manson
"Manson was able to speak in a way that engaged those who felt marginalized or alienated," Newsweek's Melissa Matthews contends in an article titled "How Murderer Charles Manson and Donald Trump Used Language to Gain Followers." She then quotes a former president of the American Psychoanalytic Association, Mark Smaller, who tells her: "Our current president speaks in an emotional or affective way to large numbers of people in our country who feel a kind of alienation or disconnection from the government."


Comment: Barrack Obama did exactly the same. In fact, nearly every US politician does.


Yes, leaders persuade and water is wet. But Donald Trump is not Charles Manson is not Donald Trump. The people playing cheerleader to Charles Manson in 1969 appeared very different from the people wearing Make America Great Again hats in 2016. One gleans the opposite impression from Newsweek.

"I fell in love with Charlie Manson the first time I saw his cherub face and sparkling eyes on TV," Jerry Rubin of Chicago Seven fame proclaimed. He made the pilgrimage to Los Angeles County Jail to rap with Manson for three hours. The disruptive tactics Rubin and his six co-defendants used in their trial in the Windy City Manson and his three co-defendants plagiarized in their trial in the City of Angels. "His words and courage inspired us," Rubin reflected of the serial killer. "Manson's soul is easy to touch because it lays quite bare on the surface."
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Eye 2

Civilian deaths: US war records can't keep up

Paul R. Pillar
Information Clearing House
Tue, 21 Nov 2017 10:55 UTC
Killing More Innocents Than We Admit
© REUTERS/StringerShi'ite Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) advance towards the city of Al-Qaim, Iraq November 3, 2017.
Anyone willing to think carefully and critically about the use of armed force against a target such as Islamic State (ISIS) would do well to read the intensively researched piece in the New York Times by investigative journalist Azmat Khan and Arizona State professor Anand Gopal about civilian casualties from the air war waged by the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq. The key conclusion is that those casualties are far higher-probably many times higher-than what the U.S. military acknowledges.

Such a discrepancy has been suspected for some time, based on earlier work by private organizations that comb press reports and other publicly available information from afar. Khan and Gopal went beyond that work by selecting three areas in Nineveh province as samples in which they performed an exhaustive on-the-ground investigation, interviewing hundreds of residents and sifting through the rubble of bombed structures. They compared such direct evidence, incident by incident, with what the responsible U.S. military command said it had in its records about airstrikes it had conducted in the area and the results of those airstrikes.
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