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Fireball

Smooth transition? Think again. Trump slams Obama for inflammatory statements, roadblocks


RT
Wed, 28 Dec 2016 20:58 UTC
TrumpObama
© ReutersHot air beginning its rise.
President-elect Donald Trump has once again taken to Twitter to slam a supposed slight directed at him. This time his target is none other than President Barack Obama, whom Trump says reneged on his promise of a smooth transition between administrations. Trump tweeted Wednesday that he is "doing my best to disregard the many inflammatory... statements and roadblocks" made by Obama. "Thought it was going to be a smooth transition - NOT!" Trump seemingly backtracked his attacks about the transition later on Wednesday, the Huffington Post's Christina Wilkie reported.

The dig at Obama came after the outgoing president made a comment Monday that he would have won a third term in the White House if it had been possible.


"If I had run again and articulated it, I think I could've mobilized a majority of the American people to rally behind it," Obama told former adviser David Axelrod during an interview for The Axe Files podcast. "I know that in conversations that I've had with people around the country, even some people who disagreed with me, they would say the vision, the direction that you point towards is the right one."


Comment: And some think Trump has a 'grandeur" complex! Not to mention Obama's popularity ratings are now, and have been for a long time, in the toilet. His finger on the pulse of the nation? Naw, its squarely on the flusher...

Reminder: There is no third term. Others who have had this presidential complex were: Ulysses S Grant, Grover Cleveland, Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. Franklin D. Roosevelt was drafted into a third term, due to the war, and won a fourth term but died early on. He served as president for 12 years, 39 days. Thereafter the 22nd Amendment was ratified in 1947 to limit the presidency to two terms only.



Comment: The honeymoon is over. The war is within, dueling titans with the nation at stake.

See also: Biased #fakenews purveyor CNN anchor: Don't cover Trump's tweets; force him to rely on MSM

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USA

Mad dog Obama ready to 'punish Russia' for allegedly hacking US election

Alex Christoforou
The Duran
Tue, 27 Dec 2016 00:00 UTC
pouter in chief
© Your News WireThe Pouter-in-Chief doesn't much give a damn.
Obama is close to announcing measures to punish Russia for alleged election interference. Barack Obama's mad scramble to poison the office of the President before Donald Trump takes office continues to push forward.

Obama, [a] child of a President, is doing his very best to hand off a disaster of a nation to Trump. Last week we reported on the US's historic abstention during a UN Security Council vote condemning Israel. Alexander Mercouris has written an excellent analysis on Obama's divisive ploy to create crush US-Israeli relations. Yesterday we reported on Obama's decision to arm Al Qaeda and ISIS in Syria in hopes of keeping his jihadist war alive.

Finally let's not forget Obama's quiet signing of the "Countering Disinformation And Propaganda Act" into law last week, that will give the US government latitude to go after "fake news" sources...meaning any voices that dissent from the neo-liberal dogma. [Meanwhile] Obama is now doubling down on his very own "fake news" lie, that Russia interfered in the US elections...something that has been extensively disproven by valued sources, and never proven by anonymous shadow CIA sources.

The Washington Post (the publication that got the ball rolling on "fake news" fiction) is reporting that the Obama administration is close to announcing a series of measures to punish Russia for its interference in the 2016 presidential election, including economic sanctions and diplomatic censure, according to U.S. officials.

Comment: Obama is giving his parting shots and Trump will do his best to shake it all up. As president, Trump will have the power to roll back executive orders, picking and choosing what is theoretically possible and what is realistically doable in the allowed 100 days. Executive orders only require a new executive order to rescind the former. Further options allowed, he can:
  • Order every agency to begin a process of negating or replacing the rules of the previous administration.
  • Halt any rule-making that has not been finalized.
  • Make selective enforcement decisions to not enforce rules on the books.
In addition: There is a nuclear option for rules finalized in "midnight regulations" -- those made final in the last months of an administration. Trump is entering office with a Republican House and Senate. Under the Congressional Review Act, Republicans could pass a resolution of disapproval on any recent rule which would nullify the policy.

With all these means of revision immediately available to Trump, one has to wonder why Obama is bothering to create more mess in his last month in office, but then again, we likely know the answer.

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Smiley

'Mighty and pretty': China says Japan scrambled jets over its aircraft carrier 'for love of beauty'


RT
Thu, 29 Dec 2016 18:36 UTC
Liaoning, China's aircraft carrier
© AFP
China, in what it says was a "routine exercise," had its new aircraft carrier pass between two Japanese islands the other day, and Japan scrambled its jets in response. Beijing says beauty had a lot to do with it.

The Soviet-built Liaoning was accompanied on Sunday by several warships as it passed between the islands of Miyako and Okinawa - the island where the United States' regional air force bases are located.

The Japanese were notably distressed by the incident, and scrambled jets after spotting six Chinese vessels pass near Miyako Island, in the face of its Maritime Self Defense Force ships and a patrol aircraft.
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Snakes in Suits

George Soros: Open Society needs defending, I can't control EU anymore

George Soros
Project Syndicate
Thu, 29 Dec 2016 18:29 UTC
Children
Well before Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, I sent a holiday greeting to my friends that read: "These times are not business as usual. Wishing you the best in a troubled world." Now I feel the need to share this message with the rest of the world. But before I do, I must tell you who I am and what I stand for.

I am an 86-year-old Hungarian Jew who became a US citizen after the end of World War II. I learned at an early age how important it is what kind of political regime prevails. The formative experience of my life was the occupation of Hungary by Hitler's Germany in 1944. I probably would have perished had my father not understood the gravity of the situation. He arranged false identities for his family and for many other Jews; with his help, most survived.

In 1947, I escaped from Hungary, by then under Communist rule, to England. As a student at the London School of Economics, I came under the influence of the philosopher Karl Popper, and I developed my own philosophy, built on the twin pillars of fallibility and reflexivity. I distinguished between two kinds of political regimes: those in which people elected their leaders, who were then supposed to look after the interests of the electorate, and others where the rulers sought to manipulate their subjects to serve the rulers' interests. Under Popper's influence, I called the first kind of society open, the second, closed.

The classification is too simplistic. There are many degrees and variations throughout history, from well-functioning models to failed states, and many different levels of government in any particular situation. Even so, I find the distinction between the two regime types useful. I became an active promoter of the former and opponent of the latter.

I find the current moment in history very painful. Open societies are in crisis, and various forms of closed societies - from fascist dictatorships to mafia states - are on the rise. How could this happen? The only explanation I can find is that elected leaders failed to meet voters' legitimate expectations and aspirations and that this failure led electorates to become disenchanted with the prevailing versions of democracy and capitalism. Quite simply, many people felt that the elites had stolen their democracy.

Comment: Further reading:

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Star of David

Welcome to Greater Israel!

Philip Giraldi
The Unz Review
Tue, 27 Dec 2016 17:32 UTC
Man rides past Trump posters
While the presidential campaign was still in progress it was possible to think that there might be some positive change in America's broken foreign policy. Hillary Clinton was clearly the candidate of Washington Establishment hawkishness, while Donald Trump was declaring his disinclination for democracy and nation building overseas as well as promoting détente with Russia. Those of us who considered the foreign policy debacle to be the most dangerous issue confronting the country, particularly as it was also fueling domestic tyranny, tended to vote on the basis of that one issue in favor of Trump.

On December 1st in Cincinnati, president-elect Donald Trump made some interesting comments about his post-electoral foreign policy plans. There were a lot of good things in it, including his citing of $6 trillion "wasted" in Mideast fights when "our goal is stability not chaos." And as for dealing with real enemies, he promised to "partner with any nation that is willing to join us in the effort to defeat ISIS and radical Islamic terrorism..." He called it a "new foreign policy that finally learns from the mistakes of the past" adding that "We will stop looking to topple regimes and overthrow governments, folks."
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Arrow Up

Duterte responds to U.S. envoy's "destabilization blueprint": "They're all spies!"


RT
Thu, 29 Dec 2016 17:52 UTC
duterte
© Erik De Castro / ReutersDU30.
The outspoken president of the Philippines has lashed out at the former US ambassador to the country, who reportedly left a 'blueprint to destabilize' the country's government when leaving his post in November.

President Rodrigo Duterte said all ambassadors play a part in their respective countries' spying operations, but American ambassadors have a "forte" for undermining the government of their host countries.

"Most of the ambassadors of the United States, but not all, are not really professional ambassadors. At the same time they are spying, they are connected with the CIA," Duterte said in an interview with CNN Philippines.

Duterte was commenting on a Tuesday report in the Manila Times, which claimed that Philip Goldberg, who resigned in November his position as the US ambassador to the Pacific nation, has left behind a detailed plan on how to undermine the Philippines government and oust its president.

Comment: See: Alleged US plot to overthrow Philippine President Duterte exposed in The Manila Times

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MIB

Hypocritical US pretends to care about justice by acting as global policeman of the business world

Jeremy Tordjman
Yahoo
Thu, 29 Dec 2016 17:37 UTC
Brazilian construction company Odebrecht
© AFP Photo/YASUYOSHI CHIBABrazilian construction company Odebrecht is just one of the companies to feel the long arm of US law enforcement in recent cases, paying $2.6 billion in criminal penalties
Handing out multibillion-dollar fines right and left to domestic and foreign financial giants, the United States has taken on the role of the unforgiving global cop of the business world.

In stark contrast to the relative inertia of white-collar law enforcement in Europe, Washington most recently brought the hammer down on Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse, which sold junk-filled, mortgage-backed securities ahead of the 2008 financial meltdown.

Deutsche Bank has agreed to a payout of $7.2 billion, while Credit Suisse settled for $5.3 billion to resolve American authorities' allegations and avoid the lengthy headache of a trial.


Comment: To these extremely wealthy multi-national banking corporations, those amounts pretty much amount to a slap on the wrist, so the US government is hardly "laying down the law" on Big Banking.


Instead of dragging financial firms to court, the US has taken them to the cashier.
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Bulb

Trump meets with CEOs of top non-profit hospitals to discuss overhauling health care for veterans

Zachary Tracer, Shannon Pettypiece, and Jennifer Epstein
Bloomberg
Thu, 29 Dec 2016 17:24 UTC
trump
© Don Emmert/AFP via Getty ImagesDonald Trump at the Mar-a-Lago resort on Dec. 28.
President-elect Donald Trump met at his Florida resort on Wednesday with leaders of top U.S. nonprofit hospital systems to discuss overhauling health care for veterans, including by allowing them to more readily visit hospitals outside the Veterans Affairs system.

The group weighed public-private partnerships and other options that would make it possible for veterans to go to any hospital for care, inside the VA system or outside of it, a senior transition official said after the meeting. Some veterans advocacy groups have cautioned against expanding access to care outside the government-run hospitals under the Veterans Health Administration, fearing the system may be weakened by privatization.

The VA system spends about $70 billion a year on medical care, offering a potential windfall to private hospitals if more veterans are allowed into their beds.

John Noseworthy, chief executive officer of the Mayo Clinic; Paul Rothman, CEO of Johns Hopkins Medicine; David Torchiana, CEO of Partners HealthCare; and Toby Cosgrove, CEO of the Cleveland Clinic, whom Trump interviewed for VA secretary, traveled to Palm Beach for the meeting. A restructuring consultant, Marc Sherman of the firm Alvarez & Marsal, also participated, according to the transition official, who described the meeting on condition of anonymity.

A person close to Marvel Entertainment CEO Ike Perlmutter said he also participated in a meeting with Trump and the health-care executives. Perlmutter has contributed $50 million to New York University Langone Medical Center, where the cancer center is named for him and his wife.
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Info

Much needed change: France poised for pro-Russia pivot

Matthew Dalton
The Wall Street Journal
Wed, 28 Dec 2016 17:19 UTC
François Fillon, Vladimir Putin and Marine Le Pen
© MARTIN BUREAU/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES, VALERY SHARIFULIN/TASS/ZUMA PRESS, PANORAMIC/ZUMA PRESS
When France elects a new president in the spring, Russian President Vladimir Putin will likely gain an ally in the heart of Europe.

The two leading candidates, François Fillon and Marine Le Pen, are both avowed opponents of sanctions meant to punish Moscow for its annexation of part of Ukraine and its support for rebels in the country's east.

Russia's bombing of Syria's onetime commercial capital of Aleppo—called a war crime by France's current leaders—hasn't deterred either politician from urging closer ties between Paris and Moscow.

The victory of either candidate in the May election threatens to blow a hole in Europe's sanctions against Moscow, which are a centerpiece of the Continent's strategy for containing Russia's military assertiveness.
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Hourglass

Time's running short: Obama under pressure to release Russian hacking evidence

Katie Bo Williams
The Hill
Thu, 29 Dec 2016 10:00 UTC
obama
© Getty Images
The Obama administration is under intense pressure to release evidence confirming Russian interference in the presidential election before leaving office.

The administration up until now has provided little documentation to back up its official October assessment that the Russian government was attempting to interfere in the U.S. election.

Nor has it corroborated subsequent leaks from anonymous officials contending that the CIA believes the campaign was an attempt by Russian President Vladimir Putin to ensure Donald Trump's victory.

President Obama has ordered the intelligence community to produce a complete review of its findings before Trump takes office on Jan. 20. The White House has said it will make as much of the report public as it can.
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