Puppet MastersS


Stock Down

Spain's loss: A fifth of its economy if Catalonia departs


RT
Mon, 02 Oct 2017 11:47 UTC
Votarem
© Juan Medina / Reuters
On Sunday Catalonia voted to secede from Spain and become independent. If this happens, it will have considerable economic impact on the country and region. Which is why Madrid will do everything in its power, including the use of force, to maintain control.

Catalonia is Spain's most productive region and generates about 20 percent of the country's GDP and roughly a third of its exports. The region contributes 21 percent of the country's total taxes, which is reportedly more than it gets back from Madrid.

Catalans, who support independence, believe the region could turn its budget into a surplus after stopping transfers to the federal government. Moreover, Catalonia attracts a record amount of investment, as nearly a third of all foreign corporations and production facilities represented in Spain are based in Barcelona or its outskirts.

However, it's not all good news for Catalonia.

Comment: The 'downside' as an incentive carrot?

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Arrow Up

Kabul: Afghan President Ghani and Pakistan Army Chief Bajwa meet to discuss cooperation and trust


RFE/RL
Sun, 01 Oct 2017 16:50 UTC
Ghani and Bajwa
© Social Media/Stars UnfoldedAfghan President Ghani and Pakistan Army Chief Bajwa
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has met with Pakistan's army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa in Kabul as part of the Pakistani general's visit aimed at repairing the strained ties between the neighboring states. "Both sides discussed regional security, bilateral relations, the fight against terrorism, trade, and transit," the Afghan presidential office said on October 1.

A statement quoted Ghani as calling for practical steps toward creating an atmosphere of trust between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Bilateral relations have long been tense, with the sides accusing each other of housing terrorist groups that launch attacks on the neighboring country. Ahead of Bajwa's first visit to Afghanistan since he took up the post nearly a year ago, the Pakistani military said he would also meet with Afghanistan's military leadership.

The visit comes after the White House recently unveiled a strategy to try to defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan after nearly 16 years of war. An important component of the new strategy is a threat to withdraw aid and other support for Pakistan if the country does not shut down what U.S. officials said are Afghan Taliban "safe havens" on its territory.

Comment: See also: Goodwill gesture: Pakistan reopens border crossings with Afghanistan

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Pirates

US lawmakers using fake Russia scandal to twist the technological arms of Google and Facebook

Nancy Scola and Josh Meyer
Politico
Sun, 01 Oct 2017 18:45 UTC
google
© Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg
The investigations into Russia's role in the 2016 election are threatening to pry the lid off tech companies' most prized possessions: the secret inner workings of their online platforms.

As the probes unfold into social media's role in spreading misinformation, U.S. lawmakers are beginning to show an interest in the mechanics of everything from how Facebook weights news items to how Google ranks search results. The questions, which echo European regulators' interventionist approach to technology, are a stark change for Silicon Valley companies accustomed to deference from U.S. officials on how they run their operations.

Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, warned Sept. 24 about "the use of Facebook's algorithms and the way it tends to potentially reinforce people's informational bias." He added, "This is a far broader issue than Russia, but one that we really need to know more about."

Comment: What this story comes down to is that people were becoming fed-up with the mainstream media over the past years and were using Google and Facebook to seek alternative sources of information. This was not permissible to the deep-state and greater restrictions were sought. Facebook and Google will only do so much in terms of control, so they need the government to step in and provide an excuse to really crack-down. It sounds like the days of using these outlets for spreading the truth are numbered.

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Bad Guys

New UKIP leader Bolton says Britain is being 'buried by Islam'

Alain Tolhurst
The Sun
Mon, 02 Oct 2017 17:51 UTC
UKIP Henry Bolton
© GettyNewly elected UKIP leader Henry Bolton said the population are concerned that Islam is pushing out Brit culture
New leader says the weight of immigration and the rise of Islam is 'burying British culture' .Henry Bolton said there is a concern among people that their way of life is being 'pushed aside' and vowed to 'address it'

The weight of immigration and the rise of Islam is leading to British culture being "buried", according to Ukip's new leader.

Henry Bolton said there is a concern amongst people that their way of life is being "pushed aside", and vowed to "address it" as he spoke to The Sun a day after his shock election.

The 54-year-old ex-Army officer had said he wanted to move the party away from focusing on Islam after their manifesto earlier this year contained an "integration agenda" which was almost entirely about Muslims.

And the issue had been brought back to the fore when the controversial anti-Islam campaigner Anne-Marie Waters was the favourite to win the leadership election.
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Vader

The insidious ISIS-US relationship: The West's tool for terrorizing and destroying countries

Mark Taliano
Global Research
Mon, 02 Oct 2017 17:17 UTC
Obama ISIS ISil
ISIS/Daesh have always been place-setters[1] for the U.S Empire and its Coalition of regime-change criminal cohorts.

Once Daesh is installed in an area, the area is destroyed and depopulated. Syrians flee from terrorist-held areas, to government -secured areas.

Now that the Syrian government and its allies are winning the just war against Western backed, sustained, and integrated terrorists, the West's strategic use of its terror proxies is becoming more apparent.

Video satellite imagery reveals, for example, Western military installations ensconced in Daesh territory. This is normal, because the West and Daesh are comrades-in-arms.

The fact that the "Kurdish" SDF are transparently aligned with ISIS in Deir ez Zor should be of no surprise either, since the SDF are also aligned with the West and its allies, including of course Israel.

Sometimes the terrorists fight each other, but those who pay the salaries and enable the chaos and destruction of Syria are the overlords.

The dirty war exists because of the West and its allies and their regime-change partners. There is nothing humanitarian about it, and it is not a counter-terrorism operation. It is a pro-terrorism regime change/dirty war.
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Wolf

Squeezing Manafort is seen as Mueller attack dog Weissmann's way to snare big prosecution targets in Russiagate witch-hunt

Rowan Scarborough
Washington Times
Sun, 01 Oct 2017 16:50 UTC
manafort
© Matt Rourke/Associated Press/FileFormer Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort is sure to be indicted as a result of the Mueller investigation, sources say.
Facing indictment and millions of dollars in legal debts, President Trump's onetime campaign manager maintains his innocence and has nothing incriminating to offer Special Counsel Robert Mueller, associates say.

But Paul Manafort, who once advised Ronald Reagan and went on to build a lucrative political consulting business overseas, knows he is up against one of the Justice Department's most relentless prosecutors.

Andrew Weissmann, who led Justice's fraud division before being reunited with Mr. Mueller, his former FBI boss, has an operational history of going after the relatively small to snare the big.

"I would bet the indictment will be right before Thanksgiving," said Sidney Powell, an appeals lawyer in Dallas who locked horns with Mr. Weissmann's Justice Department task force during the Enron prosecutions of the early 2000s. "Weissmann will want to maximize the trauma to his family."

Comment:

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Mr. Potato

Irrational or too smart? Trump reportedly urges staff to portray him as "crazy guy"

Jonathan Swan
Axios
Sun, 01 Oct 2017 16:53 UTC
Trump
© Joshua Roberts / Reuters
In an Oval Office meeting earlier this month, President Trump gave his top trade negotiator, Robert Lighthizer, an Art of the Deal-style coaching session on how to negotiate with the South Koreans.

Trump's impromptu coaching came in the middle of a pivotal conversation with top officials about whether or not to withdraw from the U.S.-Korean trade deal. Sources familiar with the conversation recounted the exchange for Axios, and the White House did not dispute this account.

A number of senior officials and cabinet secretaries were present for the conversation, including Defense Secretary Mattis, Agriculture Secretary Perdue, and Secretary of State Tillerson. At issue was whether the U.S. would withdraw from the Korean trade deal - an action Trump threatened but still hasn't done.
"You've got 30 days, and if you don't get concessions then I'm pulling out," Trump told Lighthizer.

"Ok, well I'll tell the Koreans they've got 30 days," Lighthizer replied.

"No, no, no," Trump interjected. "That's not how you negotiate. You don't tell them they've got 30 days. You tell them, 'This guy's so crazy he could pull out any minute.'"

"That's what you tell them: Any minute," Trump continued. "And by the way, I might. You guys all need to know I might. You don't tell them 30 days. If they take 30 days they'll stretch this out."

"You tell them if they don't give the concessions now, this crazy guy will pull out of the deal."

Comment: Another area where the technique seems to have worked: illegal immigration.
Under Trump illegal immigrant arrests up, but deportations down

President Donald Trump is on track to deport fewer illegal immigrants this year than were expelled from the country at the same point last year under the Obama administration, government documents show.
...
The perception of tougher enforcement by the Trump administration appears be a deterrent to illegal border crossings. Following Trump's inauguration, the number of people crossing the US border from Mexico illegally has declined dramatically.
See also: North Korea confused by Trump, asking U.S. experts for help: "He's either irrational - or too smart!"

Which is fascinating, because this has actually been North Korea's strategy until Trump came along: North Korea's strategy: Rational player pretending to be irrational

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Question

The Rohingya crisis in Myanmar

Amelia Smith
Middle East Monitor
Fri, 29 Sep 2017 15:57 UTC
Rohingya Myanmar
© Safvan Allahverdi / Anadolu AgencyA Rohingya Muslim woman fled from ongoing military operations in Myanmar’s Rakhine state and is seen holding her children at a refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh on 20 September 2017 [
"This village is a Muslim-free zone," reads a sign hanging at the entrance to a village in an area of Myanmar outside Rakhine state. The orders are directed at the country's Rohingya population, an ethnic group of around 1.3 million that live mainly in Rakhine and who have been described as the "world's most persecuted minority".

It's not difficult to see why. Since 1992 the Burmese government has imposed heavy restrictions on the Rohingyas. If they want to travel from one town to the other they have to pass immigration checkpoints and to do so the administration must grant them permission.

Because requests are regularly turned down the Rohingyas have become isolated within their own country:

"They've kept us in an open air prison for more than 25 years. Since 1978 they are propagating and they are brain washing the public that these people are invading the country, that they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh," says Nay San Lwin, an activist and blogger who has adopted the prefix "Ro" on social media to identify himself as Rohingya.

Comment: As usual, the situation is more complex than presented above. For a detailed history of the 'Rohingya' in Myanmar see here

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Chess

Syrian forces cross the Euphrates upending the neocon strategy of 'safe zones'

Tony Cartalucci
New Eastern Outlook
Mon, 02 Oct 2017 15:20 UTC
russian bridge Euphrates Deir Ezzor
© Zvezda TV
Syrian forces with the support of their Russian and Iranian allies, crossed the Euphrates River near the city of Deir ez-Zor in eastern Syria.

The move is not only a significant step forward in restoring security nationwide and ensuring the nation's territorial integrity, it is also a significant step toward turning the tables on the very interests who provoked and have perpetuated this conflict since 2011.

US policymakers as early as 2012 openly declared their intent to partition Syria through the use of "safe zones" or "buffer zones." From these zones - established with and protected by direct US military intervention - militant proxies would attempt to expand deeper into Syrian territory until the nation could either be toppled entirely, or sufficiently partitioned, effectively eliminating the Syrian Arab Republic as it was known before the conflict began.

Comment: The Iraqi Kurds have already realized their position vis a vis Baghdad and have approached the government for negotiations. Will the Syrian Kurds come to the same conclusion?

Breaking ranks: Iraq Kurdistan Regional Government dissolves High Referendum Council

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Attention

End the violence: Corbyn says May should urge Spanish PM to curb police violence over Catalan independence


RT
Mon, 02 Oct 2017 14:47 UTC
Catalonia independence
© Susan Vera / ReutersSpanish Civil Guard officers remove demonstrators outside a polling station for the banned independence referendum in Barcelona, Spain, October 1, 2017.
Prime Minister Theresa May should wade in on the Catalan independence referendum debacle after violence rocked the Spanish region this weekend, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has said.

Bloody scenes were broadcast from Spain after Catalonia held an independence referendum deemed illegal by the Spanish government and the Civil Guard was called in.

Rubber bullets were fired into the crowd and civilians struck by baton wielding officers.

The European Union was silent as the world watched in horror.

However, May is being called upon to act.


Comment: Catalonia heads to the polls for independence referendum amid violent police measures - UPDATES

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