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White House renovations begin while Trump starts 17-day working vacation in New Jersey

Andrew Blake
The Washington Times
Sat, 05 Aug 2017 20:42 UTC
PODS are loaded from the West Wing of the White House in Washington, Friday, Aug. 4, 2017. The West Wing is getting a renovation while President Donald Trump is away on vacation
© AP Photo/Laurie KellmanPODS are loaded from the West Wing of the White House in Washington, Friday, Aug. 4, 2017. The West Wing is getting a renovation while President Donald Trump is away on vacation.
White House renovators didn't waste any time overhauling the West Wing once President Trump left for a 17-day vacation Friday.

Renovations at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue began hardly an hour after Mr. Trump boarded Air Force One en route to Bedminster, New Jersey, according to his social media manager, Dan Scavino. The president is scheduled to spend the next two and a half weeks at his golf resort there as the White House receives a well deserved makeover.

Mr. Scavino tweeted a picture of the Oval Office being emptied hardly an hour after Air Force One left Joint Base Andrews on Friday.


Comment: Is it a continuation of this? Big dig at White House wraps up but the project remains shrouded in mystery

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Pirates

Taliban gain control of strategic hub in northern Afghanistan


RT
Sun, 06 Aug 2017 00:02 UTC
Taliban
© file photoTaliban on patrol
Taliban militants have taken control of a key area in the north of Afghanistan, a local official has said, blaming the latest defeat on the central government's failure to provide adequate military support to fend off the attack.

The terrorists launched a series of coordinated attacks in the northern Sari Pul province Saturday, taking control of the strategic Mirzawalang area in Sayad district, Zabi Amani, a spokesman for the provincial governor, told AP. "We requested reinforcement from the central government, unfortunately couldn't get any support, that is why the forces lost control of Mirzawalang," Amani said.

mapAfghan
© afghanmodelschool.org
Ten militants and seven security force oficers were killed in over two days of gun battles in the province. The attack was reportedly launched from three directions from areas that had fallen under the Taliban's control earlier. There's also unconfirmed reports that ten civilians had also been killed, according to Amani.

Comment: Afghanistan is not a zero-sum game...it is consistently a losing battle. Time to retreat for good and forget about the poppies? Perhaps that was 17 years and $700B dollars ago.

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Attention

Justice Minister defends Saudi secret court death sentences for 14 Shia protesters, some arrested as juveniles


RT
Sun, 06 Aug 2017 12:20 UTC
Saudi justiceweapons
© alamyDeath's Delivery
Saudi Arabia has issued a rare public response to accusations of torture used to force confessions from 14 Shia Muslims who were sentenced to death in July by the secretive Saudi Specialized Criminal Court. The 14 men participated in anti-government protests in 2011 and 2012 during the Arab Spring.

A statement by Sheikh Mansour Al-Ghafari described the trials as "terrorist cases" which were "held in the presence of their relatives and representatives of the media and the Human Rights Commission. All defendants before the Saudi courts get their right to fair trials," he added.

Al-Ghafari claimed the trials adhered to a multi-stage process involving 13 judges with Supreme Court oversight, adding that death sentences are only passed for the most dangerous crimes which threaten societal stability and violate human rights and dignity.

Human rights advocacy group Reprieve claims that Mujtaba al Sweikat, a juvenile, was denied access to a lawyer. He also told the court that he was tortured into making a false confession, but his assertions were dismissed.

Comment: When you think of all the atrocities performed by governments, dictators, monarchies and regimes, the crimes of simple people have no relevance except to enable the power ploy of the psychopaths who perpetrate them. Saudi Arabia is a prime example.

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Dig

Flashback Big dig at White House wraps up but the project remains shrouded in mystery

AP
NY Daily News
Thu, 13 Sep 2012 14:22 UTC
Construction in front of the West Wing at the White House in Washington
© Charles Dharapak/APConstruction in front of the West Wing at the White House in Washington.
The White House Big Dig is finally wrapping up, but the Big Reveal is proving to be a pretty big letdown.

After nearly two years and $86 million worth of noisy and disruptive construction, the West Wing has emerged from its visual seclusion remarkably unchanged. And deep underground, whatever has been built there remains shrouded in mystery.

Plus, if you ask what the next phase is in this massive, four-year project, the official answer is "TBD" - to be determined.

The construction project - officially a long overdue upgrade of White House utilities - began in September 2010 with the excavation of a huge, multistory pit in front of the West Wing, wrapping around to include West Executive Avenue, the street that separates the White House from the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. A tall, green construction fence sprang up that blocked America's most famous office complex from public view.

But now the fence has come down, revealing the familiar whitewashed sandstone facade and the lone Marine guard who stands watch at the entrance to the West Wing lobby.
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Snakes in Suits

Neocons leverage Trump-hate for more wars

Robert Parry
Consortium News
Sat, 05 Aug 2017 17:37 UTC
Dr. Strangelove movie capture
A savvy Washington observer once told me that the political reality about the neoconservatives is that they alone couldn't win you a single precinct in the United States. But both Republicans and Democrats still line up to gain neocon support or at least neocon acceptance.

Part of the reason for this paradox is the degree of dominance that the neoconservatives have established in the national news media - as op-ed writers and TV commentators - and the neocon ties to the Israel Lobby that is famous for showering contributions on favored politicians and on the opponents of those not favored.

Since the neocons' emergence as big-time foreign policy players in the Reagan administration, they also have demonstrated extraordinary resilience, receiving a steady flow of money often through U.S. government-funded grants from organizations such as the National Endowment for Democracy and through donations from military contractors to hawkish neocon think tanks.

But neocons' most astonishing success over the past year may have been how they have pulled liberals and even some progressives into the neocon strategies for war and more war, largely by exploiting the Left's disgust with President Trump.
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Bad Guys

Fomenting a color revolution? Hillary Clinton hires two former campaign aides for "Resistance" PAC

Ruby Cramer
BuzzFeed
Fri, 04 Aug 2017 20:19 UTC
hillary clinton podium
© Monica Schipper / Getty ImagesShe just keeps on going...like an insatiable zombie
Onward Together, the group Clinton formed earlier this year, has brought on Emmy Ruiz and Adam Parkhomenko, veterans of her 2008 and 2016 presidential campaigns.

Hillary Clinton has hired two political operatives from her 2016 presidential campaign to help manage Onward Together, the project she founded this spring with former governor Howard Dean to fund and support a coalition of Democratic groups led by activists and organizers.

The new additions, Emmy Ruiz and Adam Parkhomenko, held central roles on Clinton's campaign: Ruiz delivered key victories as state director in Nevada during the primary and in Colorado during the general election; Parkhomenko worked in headquarters as her director of grassroots engagement before moving to the Democratic National Committee. Both served on Clinton's first presidential bid in 2008.
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Attention

German FDP head makes controversial statement: May need to accept Crimea annexation 'for now'


RFE/RL
Sun, 06 Aug 2017 15:59 UTC
The Crimean port of Sevastopol
The Crimean port of Sevastopol
The head of Germany's Free Democratic Party (FDP) has said in an interview that Germany may need to accept the 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region as a "permanent provisional arrangement."

Christian Lindner told the Funke Mediengruppe newspaper chain on August 5 that the move might be necessary to allow Russian President Vladimir Putin to change his policies while still saving face.

"The conflict over the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Russia must be 'encapsulated' in order to make progress in other areas," he said.

"We have to get out of the dead-end situation," he added. "To break a taboo, I fear that we must see the Crimea as a permanent provisional arrangement, at least for now."

In a video statement after the interview was published, Lindner stressed that recognizing Crimea's annexation was still unacceptable, the Kyiv Post reported.
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SOTT Logo Radio

SOTT Focus: Behind the Headlines: Cosmic Weather Report: Trump Storms, Venezuela Cracks, Society Crumbles


Sott.net
Sun, 06 Aug 2017 16:00 UTC
Mueller
© Infowars
Russiagate has entered Phase 3,691, with leaks suggesting Mueller's FBI probe is targeting Trump for the ultimate takedown. Is it true? Venezuela had its controversial constituent assembly election amid accusations of fraud. Should America come to the rescue or mind its own business? For the first time, an incoming Harvard class has a majority of minorities. Equality of outcome, or the new racism?

Join us on Behind the Headlines, 12-2pm EST (4-6pm UTC, 6-8pm CET), for our discussion of the week's news and assorted topics.

Oh, and we'll also be talking about the weather - terrestrial and cosmic.

Running Time: 02:04:36

Download: MP3

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Info

Secret agreement to coordinate action against Daesh in Raqqa

Translation - Anoosha Boralessa
Voltaire Network
Sun, 06 Aug 2017 15:51 UTC
US soldier in Syria
The Syrian Arab Army, Russia, the United States and the Units of protection of the Kurdish Forces of the people have reached a secret agreement to coordinate their action against Daesh in Raqqa.

This information was published for the first time by the Qatarian press agency, Almodon on 23 July 2017, then denied, then published again by The Independent (London).

At the beginning of the war against Syria, from 2011 - 2014 Kurdish militia were fighting on the side of the Syrian Arab Army. However, on 31 October 2014 when France and Turkey undertook to create a Kurdish state in Syria (a country where the Kurds have not been massively present since the eighties) and to direct the Kurds living in the Turkish Kurdistan there, some of the Kurd militia crossed sides and joined NATO. It was only then that Damascus took these militia off its pay roll and furthermore, stopped equipping them with weapons. These militia only returned to Syria when Turkey began massacring its Kurds and when the U.S. President, Donald Trump, drove through new targets for his army.

The agreement on Raqqa is the second one of the year. It follows the agreement reached on Manbij/Al-Bab by virtue of which, the territories that the Kurds have liberated from Turkish occupation have been restored to Damascus.
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Info

'Unreliable partner': Is US hurting EU with Trump's stance on Iran nuclear deal and sanctions?


RT
Sun, 06 Aug 2017 15:00 UTC
Old leaders
© Leonhard Foeger / Reuters
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has criticized Washington's "lack of commitment" to the historic multinational nuclear deal, one of his first moves since being re-elected. Widely considered as one of the greatest achievements of former US leader Barack Obama, his successor has clearly shown opposition to the pact.

"Iran would not be the first to pull out of the nuclear deal, but it will not remain silent about the US repeated violations of the accord. Those who want to tear up the nuclear deal should know that they will be ripping up their own political life," said Rouhani, who was sworn-in for his second term as Iranian president Saturday.

"The US lack of commitment to implementation of the nuclear deal proved it to be an unreliable partner to the world and even to its longtime allies," Iran's leader, who was re-elected in May, said as quoted by Reuters.

Rouhani's remarks were delivered at his swearing in ceremony in Iran's parliament. A host of top foreign politicians, including senior European officials, were also in attendance.
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