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Saber-rattling: Naval drills, sanctions and Taiwan weapon sales revive US tensions with China

Talisman Saber 2017 drills off the coast of Sydney
© Jason Reed / ReutersA landing craft launches from the USS Bonhomme Richard amphibious assault ship during Talisman Saber 2017 drills off the coast of Sydney.
The US and Australian navies kicked off their biggest-ever joint amphibious drills, described as a message to friends and foes alike, as Washington sanctioned two Chinese businessmen and a bank over North Korea and announced a sale of weapons to Taiwan.

On Thursday, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin announced sanctions against China's Bank of Dandong, Dalian Global Unity Shipping Co, and two Chinese business executives the US accuses of running front companies on behalf of North Korea.

Washington also announced a $1.4 billion deal to sell weapons to Taiwan, a Chinese island ruled as a de facto independent country by the nationalist government ousted from power on the mainland in 1949.

Attention

OSCE denies Kiev's claim monitoring mission was shelled by rebels

Representatives OSCE Mission to Ukraine in Lugansk Region
© Sergey Averin / ReutersRepresentatives OSCE Mission to Ukraine in Lugansk Region.
The OSCE has dismissed as "incorrect" claims by Kiev that the Special Monitoring Mission's base in Ukraine's Lugansk Region was shelled by the rebels.

The Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) took to Facebook to respond to "incorrect information issued by the press center of [Kiev's] anti-terrorist operation."

"The OSCE SMM's forward patrol base in Popasna in Luhansk region was not shelled; no damage has been sustained and all staff are safe," it added.

Arrow Up

Truth will out! CNN commentator caught on camera admitting Russiagate is a big 'nothing-burger' - UPDATE

CNN Van Jones Russiagate
Van Jones, CNN's political commentator who has played up the Russiagate non-story to an extreme degree has been caught on camera by Project Veritas, saying the story amounts to nothing. Project Veritas is the same group that recently filmed senior CNN producer John Bonifield saying that Russiagate was "bullshit" and just designed to attain higher ratings for CNN.


Now, Van Jones has been filmed calling Russiagate a "nothing burger" a euphemism for a non-story/non-event.

Watch the video and see for yourself.


Comment: Update: Van is doing damage control:
On Thursday, Jones wrote an Op-Ed for CNN, criticizing the man behind the camera and founder of Project Veritas, James O'Keefe, accusing him of editing the video to take his words out of context.

"If you take any one line of my argument out of context, you can use it to pull off a hoax," Jones wrote. "That's what O'Keefe's minions did."

Jones began his piece criticized O'Keefe a "notorious con artist" and stated that he has been busted "so many times" for posting videos that are "fake" and "doctored."

The CNN commentator cited the fact that O'Keefe agreed to pay $100,000 to settle a lawsuit after he secretly filmed employees at an ACORN office in California in 2009. Additionally, Jones cited an instance in 2010, where O'Keefe pleaded guilty to entering federal property under false pretenses in order to investigate complaints that staff members at former Senator Mary Landrieu's (D-Louisiana) office were ignoring phone calls from constituents.

"In other words: O'Keefe is the kind of person from whom decent people run like the plague," Jones said.
...
Jones then broke down the short video, explaining that when he told O'Keefe "there is nothing you can do," he was talking about Democrats' efforts to impeach Trump. Jones said that there will be no evidence from the investigation that would cause the Republicans to impeach Trump.

"I am glad there is a Russia investigation, and I hope they get to the bottom of it. But I think Democrats are fooling ourselves if we think that something is going to come out of this investigation that is somehow going to end the Trump presidency and make everything better," Jones said in a recent Twitter chat. "Unless there is a real smoking gun, which there is probably not, it's just going to be a big old mess."

Jones states that he believes "there probably was collusion" between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives. He also thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin "must have something over Trump," and Trump fired former FBI Director James Comey in order to stop the investigation.

However, Jones ended the piece by saying that he thinks Trump will not be impeached during his first term, or if he is, he will still be president until 2020.

He called on those who oppose Trump to leave the investigation to Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

"The rest of us can best undercut Trump by focusing on real issues that will bring voters back to the Democratic Party - creating jobs, fighting poverty, battling addiction, defending democracy and human rights, winning health care for all," Jones wrote.



Info

Trump trashes "Crazy Mika" and "Psycho Joe" from MSNBC

Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough of MSNBC
President Donald Trump turned his ire on MSNBC's Joe Scarborough and his fiancé Mika Brzezinski, branding them with new nicknames and dishing embarrassing details about their relationship.

Trump called Scarborough "Psycho Joe" on Twitter Thursday morning and labeled his co-host Brzezinski "low I.Q. Crazy Mika."

He recalled that the television couple both wanted to join him during a New Year's Eve party at his Mar-a-lago club, but he refused.

"Crazy Mika, along with Psycho Joe, came to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year's Eve, and insisted on joining me," he wrote. "She was bleeding badly from a face-lift. I said no!"

Trump again insisted that he did not watch their show anymore but was told that the couple "speaks badly of me."

Prior to Trump's tweets, the pair sneered mockingly at Trump because of his healthcare bill and started ridiculing the president because of a fake TIME magazine cover spotted in his golf club.


Comment: Low-brow, un-presidential, sticks in your head.






Propaganda

New York Times retracts longstanding Russian hacking lie: 17 intel agencies did NOT agree

New York Times headquarters
© Wikipedia
"Seventeen intelligence agencies" — if you've been following the maniacal #TrumpRussia coverage to any extent, you've heard this phrase used uncritically, time and again, regardless of your ideological loyalties. Pundits, papers and rank-and-file establishment loyalists have been unquestioningly regurgitating the nonsensical line that 17 intelligence agencies confirmed Russian interference in the US elections ever since Hillary Clinton made that baseless assertion in a debate back in October.


The innate absurdity of the claim was immediately attacked by WikiLeaks and anti-establishment outlets who pointed out that this would necessarily need to involve full investigations from agencies like the Coast Guard, the DEA and the Energy Department in order to be true. Nevertheless, many high-profile pro-establishment outlets like Politifact and USA Today found Clinton's claims to be 100 percent true on the grounds that James Clapper, then-Director of National Intelligence and notorious Russophobic racist, "speaks on behalf of" all 17 intelligence agencies. To this day Politifact stands by its false claim on the basis of that same spurious assertion.

Attention

HRW: US coalition turns blind eye to 'rampant torture of Mosul men and boys'

Displaced Iraqi civilians walk past the ruined Grand al-Nuri Mosque after fleeing from the Old city in Mosul, Iraq, June 30, 2017
© REUTERS/ Alaa Al-MarjaniDisplaced Iraqi civilians walk past the ruined Grand al-Nuri Mosque after fleeing from the Old city in Mosul, Iraq, June 30, 2017
On Thursday, the Iraqi ministry of defense announced that Daesh had been driven out of all districts of the city of Mosul, ending an anti-terror operation that began last October.


However, a US spokesman for Operation Inherent Resolve said that fighting continues in some areas of the Old City.

Iraqi government troops have liberated the area around the ruined Great Mosque of al-Nuri, which was constructed in 1172. The mosque, where Daesh leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi announced the establishment of an Islamic caliphate in June 2014, was destroyed by Daesh in an explosion on June 21.

Comment: See also:Turning a blind eye? US State Department 'not aware' of torture and extrajudicial executions by Iraqi forces


Info

Kissinger: Global leadership part of Washington's DNA, while Russia has been 'defender and advocate'

Henry Kissinger
© Valeriy Melnikov / Sputnik
Global leadership is part of US foreign policy DNA, according to former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, while Russia has previously positioned itself as "defender and advocate" of a world order based on religion, and then on Marxist principles.

Speaking alongside Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the Primakov Readings International Forum on Friday, Kissinger said that
"the idea of global leadership is almost part of the American foreign policy DNA," adding that the US has positioned itself not simply as a leader, but as "the leader."

"In a similar way, Russia for the past two centuries has positioned itself as the defender and advocate of a view of world order based first on religion, then on Marxist principles."

Attention

Pepe Escobar - Washington and Berlin on a collision course

German/US Flags
© AFP 2017/DanielNIEL RolandThe German and the US flags fly at the US Airbase in Ramstein, southern Germany, on November 6, 2013.

The Russia sanctions bill that passed the US Senate by 98:2 on June 15 is a bombshell; it directly demonizes the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, under the Baltic Sea, which is bound to double Gazprom's energy capacity to supply gas to Europe.


The 9.5 billion euro pipeline is being financed by five companies; Germany's Uniper and Wintershall; Austria's OMV; France's Engie; and Anglo-Dutch Shell. All these majors operate in Russia, and have, or will establish, pipeline contracts with Gazprom.

In a joint statement, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel and Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern stressed that, "Europe's energy supply is a matter for Europe, not the United States of America"; "instruments for political sanctions should not be tied to economic interests"; and the whole thing heralds a "new and very negative quality in European-American relations".

An oil trader in the Gulf bluntly told me, "the new sanctions against Russia basically amount to telling the EU to buy expensive US gas instead of cheap Russian gas. So the Germans and the Austrians basically told the Americans to buzz off."

A top US intel source, Middle East-based and a dissident to the Beltway consensus, stresses how, "the United States Senate by a nearly unanimous vote have decided to declare war on Russia (sanctions are war) and Germany has threatened retaliation against the United States if it initiates sanctions.

Info

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov: Russia, US & China able to join forces in tackling global challenges

Vladimir Putin,Donald Trump,Xi Jinping
© Reuters / Sputnik
Russia, the US, and China uniting to tackle global challenges is still a realistic scenario, given the three nations' influence on international affairs, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
"It is impossible to speak of a scenario [in which] the US and China would unite against Russia, or Russia and China would stand against the US," Lavrov said on Friday in Moscow at the 2017 Primakov Readings, a high-profile international forum named after the late Yevgeny Primakov, former foreign minister.

"But I believe it is still possible to comprehend how [our] three countries - given their influence on world affairs and world economy - are able to help address global challenges," Lavrov said, as cited by TASS.
Russia-US relations are crucial for the rest of the world, as the international community is watching closely how Moscow and Washington approach pressing issues, including strategic stability and regional crises, the foreign minister said.
"We see that the majority of countries are concerned about the current abnormal state of these relations which were taken hostage by [the] domestic struggle for power in the US," he continued. "We [believe] that our presidents' meeting in Hamburg [at the G20 summit] would clarify [the] prospects of the Russia-US ties."

Megaphone

U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley tweet sparks social media liberal backlash

nikki haley UN Syria
© Nikki Haley/Twitter
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley celebrated a milestone of her tenure at the helm under President Donald Trump, but her accomplishment led to a lot of consternation from the other side of the aisle.

"Just 5 months into our time here, we've cut over half a billion $$$ from the UN peacekeeping budget & we're only getting started," she tweeted with a picture of herself smiling.