Puppet MastersS

Snakes in Suits

'Three minutes of nothing': Local newspaper reporter left unimpressed by Theresa May interview

Theresa May
© Leon Neal / Reuters
A regional journalist has described his interview with Prime Minister Theresa May as "three minutes of nothing." He says her answers were so vague he was left wondering whether he had interviewed her at all.

Plymouth Herald chief reporter Sam Blackledge met May during a visit to his patch on Wednesday, but was left feeling "deflated" and scratching his head as to what the top line of the story would be when the interview concluded.

"Before 8.30 am today, I had never interviewed a prime minister," wrote Blackledge.

"Heading back to the office to transcribe my encounter with Theresa May at Plymouth's fish market, I couldn't be certain that had changed."

Comment: Not going well for the Torries: Poll shows Labour slashed Tory lead to just 3 points after Theresa May dodges TV election debate


Chess

Pepe Escobar: Putin and Macron face-off in Versailles as EU looks to reappraise its relationship with Russia

putin macron versailles
The three-hour face-off between Vladimir Putin and Emmanuel Macron in Versailles offered some fascinating geopolitical shadow play.

Macron went so far as to say that, "No major problem in the world can be solved without Russia." On Syria's war, which topped their agenda, he said it needs "an inclusive political solution." While on terrorism, his guest offered: "It is impossible to fight a terrorist threat by dismantling the statehood of those countries that already suffer from some internal problems and conflicts."

That's hardly straight from the standard establishment playbook. More like a slight variation on 300 years of Franco-Russian diplomacy.

Putin and Macron got together to inaugurate an exhibition at the Grand Trianon in Versailles, in partnership with the Hermitage in St Petersburg, celebrating the 300th anniversary of Peter the Great's visit to France - which proved one of the founding stones of a complex cultural-political cross-fertilization.

Peter not only drew on the royal palace of Versailles as part of the inspiration for his new capital, St Petersburg, he also modernized the entire empire using many of the Enlightenment ideals that first took root in France. It was under Peter's rule that Russians were indelibly imprinted with a European identity.

Heart - Black

Antifa: A left-wing terrorist group in the blood-soaked Bolshevik tradition


Left wing terrorism has been part of Europe and the United States since before most people had ever heard of the word 'jihad'.

Tsar Nicholas and family
Long before most people in Europe or North America were familiar with the word 'jihad', left-wing terrorism ravaged much of Western Europe.

Groups like West Germany's Red Army Faction/Baader-Meinhof Gang, America's Symbionese Liberation Army, Italy's Red Brigades, Spain's First of October Anti-Fascist Resistance Groups, Portugal's FP-25, Action Directe in France and the IRA in Britain were left wing terrorist groups who committed numerous atrocities including targeted killings, bombings, kidnappings and torture on a wide scale.

At a time when most people correctly thought of Mosques as places of peace and holiness, these far-left groups put fear into the hearts of many in the west throughout the 1970s, 1980s and in some cases into the 1990s and beyond.

The violence of these groups should not be surprising. Violence is part and parcel of extreme left-wing militant politics.

The Bolsheviks were able to conquer the great Russian Tsardom not through the powers of persuasion as the left would like many to believe, but through a campaign of total terrorism. Civilians were massacred, women were raped by the hundreds, the legitimate leader of Russia was executed next to his family including his young children, priests were slaughtered, places of worship destroyed.

Comment: More on Antifa:


Info

Putin once again states 'Patriotic hackers' could exist, but 'Russia does not order state level cyberattacks'

Vladimir Putin
© Kremlin Pool / Global Look Press
Russian President Vladimir Putin once again rejected accusations that Russia is behind influential cyberattacks in the West, but said it was "theoretically possible" that freelance groups who think they are working in the country's interest could be behind them.

"On a state level, we have never participated in cyberattacks, and this is the important thing," Putin said during a media session with the heads of international news agencies in St. Petersburg.

The Russian leader, whose government has been accused of meddling in US and French elections with carefully-timed revelations of the candidates' private data, said that "patriotically-minded hackers" are capable of engaging in cyber warfare.

"Hackers are freelance artists, they can wake up one day and start painting pictures, and then wake up another, read international news, and if they are patriotically-minded begin to make their own contribution to fighting those who say bad things about Russia," said Putin, who dedicated a section of his speech to condemning a "flood of Russophobia" coming from the West.

Comment: There is no evidence yet of "Russia hacking": No surprise: French cyber defense chief reports no trace of Russian hacking in Macron election campaign attack


Chart Pie

Military budget is the biggest scam in American politics

US Military spending chart
Military spending is the biggest waste of federal tax dollars ever. Both political parties are equally complicit.

The militarism scam is the best-kept secret in American politics.

When you think about it โ€” but no one in the halls of Congress ever does โ€” it's hard to think of a country that has less to fear than the United States. Two vast oceans eliminate our vulnerability to attack, except by countries with sophisticated long-range ballistic missiles (5 out of 206 nations). We share long borders with two nations that we count as close allies and trading partners.

Info

US sanctions three Russian entities for connections to North Korean nuke program

US Treasury building
© AFP 2017/ PAUL J. RICHARDSUS Treasury building
The United States sanctioned three Russian companies in connection with North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear programs, the Treasury Department Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) said on Thursday.

OFAC sanctioned Igor Aleksandrovich Michurin, the Moscow-based companies Ardis-Bearings LLC and Independent Petroleum Company (IPC), and IPC'S subsidiary in Vladivostok, AO NNK-Primornefteproduct.

The Treasury sanctioned Russian, Chinese and North Korean nationals in connection with Pyongyang's ballistics and nuclear programs.

Megaphone

RNC Chair: Every time Killary opens her mouth, it reinforces why she lost

killary
Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel on Thursday said Hillary Clinton's latest interview shows she doesn't understand why she lost last year's presidential election.

"She seems to be totally unaware. She has no self-awareness. Maybe she needs a class or something," McDaniel said on "Fox & Friends."

She said Clinton's remarks were typical of the lack of accountability in her campaign.

"There's no accountability," she said. "And it reinforces every time why she lost when she goes out and does these interviews."

Info

French prosecutor opens probe into Macron minister over controversial property deals

Emmanuel Macron
© Damien Meyer / AFP
A French prosecutor has opened an investigation into a minister in Emmanuel Macron's government over controversial property deals. Alleged revelations about deals involving the minister's ex-wife and partner were published earlier in French media.

The case involves Richard Ferrand, minister of territorial cohesion, who assumed the post on May 17. Ferrand, a close ally of French leader Macron, is a member of the president's En Marche! Party, which he joined in 2016 after leaving the socialists.

Ferrand, who was a prominent figure in Macron's presidential campaign, has served as general secretary of En Marche since October 2016.

"After analyzing the complementary elements...I decided to organize the judicial police from Rennes [Brittany's capital] to initiate a preliminary investigation [into the case]," Eric Mathais, public prosecutor from the Breton city of Brest, northwest France, said in a statement.

Network

No surprise: French cyber defense chief reports no trace of Russian hacking in Macron election campaign attack

Emmanuel Macron
© Philippe Wojazer / Reuters
French investigators have found no traces of a Russian hacking group in the attack on President Emmanuel Macron's election campaign, in which thousands of emails were leaked, the head of the French government's cyber security agency told AP.

In an interview on Thursday, Guillaume Poupard, the head of the National Cybersecurity Agency of France (ANSSI), said the hack was "so generic and simple that it could have been practically anyone."

According to Poupard, the simplicity of the attack "means that we can imagine that it was a person who did this alone. They could be in any country."

Eye 1

Trump: Obama's surveillance of Americans during term "the big story"

trump
© Miguel Medina / AFP
Donald Trump says the "unmasking and surveillance" of people under the Obama administration is "the big story," just one day after subpoenas were issued over the naming of Trump campaign officials in classified reports while Obama was still in office.

"The big story is the 'unmasking and surveillance' of people that took place during the Obama Administration," US President Trump tweeted on Thursday.

It comes just one day after the House Intelligence Committee issued three subpoenas which seek information about how and why the names of Trump associates were revealed and distributed within classified reports by Obama administration officials during the transition period after the election - a process known as "unmasking."