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Bad Guys

Washington Makes Biggest Geopolitical Blunder Since 1776

Editorial Board
Russia Insider
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 00:00 UTC
Puin, Xi, Obama
Many thought it could never be done, but Washington has actually managed to unite the East against a faltering, aimless West

We're still recovering from Marine Le Pen's 60 Minutes interview with Anderson Cooper.

We guess that Cooper doesn't have a lot of practice interviewing adults. "So it goes".

In particular, we were struck by how Le Pen perfectly understood what's at stake for Europe as Washington continues to beat its anti-Russia bongos:
Cooper: You don't believe Russia is a threat to Europe?

Le Pen: I don't believe that at all. I think that's a big scam.

Cooper: The invasion of Ukraine...

Le Pen: I'll tell you what the danger is for Europe. It's carrying out a Cold War against Russia, and pushing Russia into China's arms. THAT'S the threat to Europe.
Maybe it seems self-evident to our geopolitically-savvy readership, but we imagine that the vast majority of Americans are completely unaware that the New Cold War hasn't just ruined relations with Russia for the foreseeable future — it has also driven Moscow into the arms of Beijing.
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Bad Guys

Kim Sharif - Director of Human Rights for Yemen: 'US Navy SEALS in Yemen shot everything that moved, including women & children'


RT
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 19:48 UTC
Man is looking for something
© Mohamed al-Sayaghi / Reuters
The Yemeni people are saying: 'Where are the other powers in the Security Council? Why aren't they standing up for the sovereignty of Yemen, when clearly it is in their best interest as well to do so,' Kim Sharif, Director of Human Rights for Yemen, told RT.

The Saudi-led coalition backed both by the US and the UK began its intervention in Yemen in March 2015 in order to stifle the Houthi uprising. Over 10,000 people have been killed since the start of campaign.

Many humanitarian organizations accuse coalition forces of deliberately targeting civilians while the UN says the intervention puts the whole nation at risk of famine.

Comment: See also: Trump adopts new strategy to counter Al Qaeda terrorism in Yemen

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Chess

Clapper and Comey carefully qualify their denials regarding Trump's wiretap accusations

Alexander Mercouris
The Duran
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 16:46 UTC
Comey Clapper
© Joe Raedle/Agence France-PresseNational Intelligence Director James Clapper (centre), FBI Director James Comey (left) and Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan testify before the Senate (Select) Intelligence Committee on January 10.
Former DNI Clapper and (reportedly) current FBI Director Comey make strictly qualified denials of President Trump's wiretap claims.

Following Saturday's charges come Sunday's denials.

On Saturday in a series of tweets Donald Trump accused his predecessor Barack Obama of wiretapping his office in Trump Tower. A few hours later Obama responded with a statement published by his spokesman which neither admitted nor denied the wiretap but which said that Obama himself had never ordered surveillance within the US on anyone.

Then came an interview for NBC by Obama's former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. In it in carefully chosen words Clapper said that he had "no knowledge" of any FISA court authorising wiretaps of Trump Tower, and that no section of the US intelligence community which he supervised had carried out such a wiretap.

Some sections of the media - especially in Britain the BBC and the Guardian - have reported these denials in a way that gives the impression to a casual viewer or reader that Clapper has denied the existence of the wiretap outright. This is certainly not so. Clapper carefully words were
[For the part of the national security apparatus that I oversaw] there was no such wiretap activity mounted against the president, the president-elect at the time, or as a candidate, or against his campaign.....I can't speak for other authorized entities in the government or a state or local entity
(bold italics added)

Comment: Former Bush AG Mukasey said yesterday that Trump Tower was likely surveilled, but it's unlikely Obama ordered it personally: "I think he's right in that there was surveillance and that it was conducted at the behest of the attorney general — at the Justice Department."

But there's also this to consider: the allegation that the NSA routinely spies on ALL upcoming presidents:
Russ Tice worked as an offensive National Security Agency (NSA) analyst from 2002 to 2005, before becoming a source for this Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times article exposing NSA domestic spying.

Tice claimed that he held NSA wiretap orders targeting numerous members of the U.S. government, including one for a young senator from Illinois named Barack Obama.

"In the summer of 2004, one of the papers that I held in my hand was to wiretap a bunch of numbers associated with a forty-some-year-old senator from Illinois. You wouldn't happen to know where that guy lives now would you? It's a big White House in Washington D.C. That's who the NSA went after. That's the President of the United States now."

Tice added that he also saw orders to spy on Hillary Clinton, Senators John McCain and Diane Feinstein, then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, Gen. David Petraeus, and a current Supreme Court Justice.
As Russia Insider comments: "The difference between Trump and Obama? Obama bent the knee, while Trump blew the whistle." Radio host Mark Levin is calling the latest developments a "silent coup" by the former Obama admin against Trump:
"They are not going to stop, I told you that the day after the election," Levin urged.
...
About Obama's efforts against Trump: "There's a much bigger scandal here: We have a prior administration. Barack Obama and his surrogates, who are supporting Hillary Clinton and her party, the Democratic Party. Who were using the... intelligence activities to surveil members of the Trump campaign, and to put that information out in the public. Those are police state tactics. Nothing Flynn or Sessions has done is even in the same category as that," Levin said.

"The question is: Was Obama surveilling top Trump campaign officials during the election?" he asked.

"We absolutely know this is true, the FBI did a preliminary criminal investigation based on a potential connection between a server in Trump Tower and a couple of Russian banks. That turned out to be a dry hole, but one of the most outrageous things I've ever seen... totally uncovered by the media. Instead of closing the investigation, the Obama administration tried to turn it into a FISA court investigation in June [2016]. Apparently the first application they submitted named Trump."

"Even the FISA court said no. There wasn't enough evidence to make out probable cause involving Donald Trump," he said. "In the middle of the campaign the administration was actively having Trump investigated."

The White House has formally asked Congress to investigate alleged abuse of executive power by the Obama admin:
The accusation apparently refers to the reported surveillance of two Russian banks authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court as part of the investigation of the alleged Russian meddling. The initial FBI request specifically targeted four members of the Trump campaign but was rejected by the FISC, so the agency filed a new request that targeted the banks instead.


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Attention

Emperor of Japan's resignation signals an acceleration of the country's 'restoration' trend

Vladimir Terekhov
New Eastern Outlook
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 18:08 UTC
japanese Emperor Akihito
One of the most significant events of the last year in Japan was Emperor Akihito's official speech on national television on August 8, in which he pointed out the possibility of his resignation due to health issues. The exceptional nature of this statement can explain the fact that contradictory information had been leaking to the public for half a year prior to this speech.

The acting monarch said in particular that he had been reflecting upon the duties he had to perform in relevance to his health condition over the past few years. According to him, "so far" his overall health has allowed him to perform these duties, but he is also feeling a deterioration of health both due to his age of 82 years, as well as a number of surgeries he had undergone in the past. The Emperor made it clear, using carefully measured expressions, that he would like to resign and expressed hope for understanding by the Japanese people.

The thoroughly chosen verbal execution of Akihito's statement can be explained by its unprecedented content. Throughout the history of the Japanese monarchy there had only been one case of the acting sovereign resigning: in 1817, when the monarchy itself was a conditionality.

Comment: Japan is preparing to launch a new era

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Wolf

New book just another hatchet job on Snowden

Ray McGovern
Consortium News
Fri, 03 Mar 2017 18:09 UTC
snowden
© The GuardianFormer National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden.
The hatchet jobs against NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden keep on coming with a new book whose author says he applied James Angleton's counterintelligence techniques to Snowden, says ex-CIA analyst .

In depicting National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden as a Russian spy, author Edward Jay Epstein acknowledges his debt to the CIA's famously paranoid counterintelligence chief James Jesus Angleton, who specialized in counterintuitive thinking that surely smeared more honest CIA officers than it snared actual spies.

At a recent book signing at the Hoover Institute in Washington, D.C., for How America Lost Its Secrets: Edward Snowden, the Man and the Theft, Epstein proudly announced that he learned the tricks of the counterintelligence trade from the now-deceased Angleton.

But Angleton, like other counterintelligence sleuths, assumed the carte-blanche right to smother a slender fact with weighty assumptions and then weave upon them a hefty garment of allegations, speculation and imagination fitting with the occupational predisposition to detect a spy.

Comment: The argument can still be made that the whole Snowden affair was a limited hangout, a pysop operation to scare the public and limit the sharing of information.

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No Entry

Easier said than done: Advisers push Trump to purge Obama appointees

Josh Dawsey
Information Clearing House
Sat, 04 Mar 2017 00:00 UTC
Purge
Advisers to President Donald Trump are urging him to purge the government of former President Barack Obama's political appointees and quickly install more people who are loyal to him, amid a cascade of damaging stories that have put his nascent administration in seemingly constant crisis-control mode.

A number of his advisers believe Obama officials are behind the leaks and are seeking to undermine his presidency, with just the latest example coming from reports that Attorney General Jeff Sessions met twice last year with the Russian ambassador to the U.S. and apparently misled senators about the interactions during his confirmation hearing.

That was coupled with a New York Times story that Obama appointees spread information about the investigation into the Trump campaign's contacts with Russia in an attempt to create a paper trail about the probe. Trump's aides have also blamed Obama appointees for other damaging leaks, like Trump's erratic phone calls with foreign leaders.

Inside the White House, the chatter about Obama officials in the government has heightened in recent weeks, one administration official said. And advisers are saying it is time to take action.

Comment: The process of purging Obama's loyal minions has already begun, but there certainly appears to be a long way to go - and much conflict that is likely to arise from it.

See:

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Handcuffs

Daesh Leader Al-Baghdadi's Cousin Reportedly Captured in Mosul


Sputnik News
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 00:00 UTC
Iraqi Federal Police have captured the cousin of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, leader of the Daesh terrorist group, local media said Sunday.
Al-Baghdadi
© AP Photo/ Militant video
The Daesh leader's relative was captured after an intelligence tip-off in Mosul's western Josaq district, which had recently been retaken from terrorists, the Al Sumaria channel reported, citing its own sources.

Iraq's Federal Police, a militarized Interior Ministry unit, is taking part in the operation to liberate Mosul from Daesh alongside the Iraqi military and militia groups. Al Sumaria provided footage of uniformed people escorting a man with an orange beard, with one officer stating that the man is "the son of Baghdadi's uncle."
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Eye 1

Russian Embassy Inquires About Detention Over Contacts With Ambassador Andrei Karlov's Killer


Sputnik
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 12:14 UTC
Russian Embassy
© AFP 2016/ ADEM ALTAN
The Russian Embassy in Ankara requested additional information regarding the detention of a Russian citizen allegedly linked to the suspected assassin of the Russian ambassador to Turkey.

The Russian Embassy in Ankara told Sputnik on Monday it requested additional information regarding the detention of a female Russian citizen allegedly linked to the suspected assassin of Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov.

"Due to the latest media reports, the embassy sent an official inquiry to determine the causes, the date and circumstances surrounding the detention of the Russian citizen. So far, the embassy has not received a response," embassy spokeswoman Irina Kasimova said.

Comment: See also: Russian ambassador in Ankara shot dead in gun attack (Updates)

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TV

Marching towards Independence? Donetsk launches a new television and radio broadcaster

Adam Garrie
The Duran
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 00:01 UTC
It will help to end the Kiev media blockade
Novorossiya flag
© Shamil Zhumatov / ReutersA woman walks with a flag of Novorossiya during a rally on Lenin Square in the center of Donetsk, eastern Ukraine.
The Donetsk People's Republic has entered the war for hearts and minds by launching a new television and radio broadcaster. The transmissions will help explain developments, goals and achievements in Donbass, both in the two republics and to regions like Kharkov and Dnipropetrovsk, where many people also seek to end rule from the fascist regime in Kiev.

Comment: See also:

The Saker: An interesting week for Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump
Putin signs order recognizing DPR/LPR documents and visa-free travel to Russia

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2 + 2 = 4

Le Pen: 'Russian threat to Europe' is a big scam - Real threat is pushing Russia into China's arms, and savage ideology of globalization


RT
Mon, 06 Mar 2017 17:01 UTC
Marine Le Pen
© Robert Pratta / ReutersMarine Le Pen, French National Front political party leader and candidate for the French 2017 presidential election.
French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen has branded the claims that Russia poses a threat to Europe "a big scam." She believes that the real danger is "carrying out a Cold War against Russia and pushing Russia into China's arms," she said in a CBS interview.

During the interview, CBS host Anderson Cooper challenged Le Pen with questions such as, "You don't believe Russia's a threat for Europe?" while raising the familiar "Crimea invasion" argument against Moscow.

The right-wing French presidential candidate dismissed the "Russian threat" claims as a "big scam," saying she doesn't believe in it "at all."

Comment: Yep, it's looking like a run-off between the French establishment's candidate Emmanuel Macron and La Marine.

Here's Le Pen hammering Merkel and Hollande at the European Parliament two years ago, while Euro-liberals howl with derision...



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