Puppet MastersS


Eye 1

Victims' group quits UK child sex abuse inquiry branding it an 'unpalatable circus'

Professor Alexis Jay
© PAProfessor Alexis Jay is the national inquiry's fourth chair.
The independent inquiry into historical child sex abuse was thrown into further turmoil today when the largest victims' group withdrew, branding it an "unpalatable circus".

The Shirley Oaks Survivors Association, which represents 600 victims of alleged sexual abuse, said it has lost confidence in the inquiry's leadership. The group's withdrawal is yet another blow for the inquiry, which is on its fourth chairwoman in just two years and has seen a number of senior lawyers resign in recent months.

The group represents former residents of children's homes run by Lambeth council who claim they were abused by paedophiles over several decades. It said it believed the inquiry was a "botch job" and chair Professor Alexis Jay was the wrong person to lead it. Its representative, Raymond Stephenson, told the BBC's Radio 4 Today programme the inquiry was "failing tragically" and "failing publicly". He added: "They need to get rid of Alexis Jay, who has been parachuted in by the Home Office.

"She hasn't done anything wrong, she's just not the right person. We have to make a decision based on what we feel."

Comment: This latest setback for the UK child sex abuse inquiry comes just days after ITV News learned that the inquiry had postponed its investigation into the late Labour peer Lord Janner.

What links these stories, and is the real crux of the abject failure in providing justice for the victims, is one of intent.

The inquiry into historic child sex abuse in the UK is "failing tragically" by design. There is NO REAL INTENTION to sincerely investigate these vile crimes against innocent children by the very 'Establishment' that has always colluded to protect the depraved monsters who stalk the Establishment corridors of power.

The inquiry is an illusory smokescreen to create the impression that justice is being served, when in reality it is all part of their modus operandi. For more information, read: UK 'Establishment': Unmasking psychopathic faces - Pedophilia and murder in VERY high places


Document

Obama sets record: Slams Washington with 81,640 pages of regulations this year

Dolly truck of US regulations
Reminding Washington that he is still in control of the regulatory arm of the federal government, Barack Obama set a record by handing down a whopping 527 pages on Thursday, bringing his total to the highest amount of regulations in American history.

Obama shattered his old record with the November 17 release, according to a report by the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Thursday's release brought Obama's 2016 total to 81,640 pages of regulations. In 2010, Obama executed 81,405 pages of regulations for the year. Thus far in 2016 he has already surpassed that by 235 pages.

"No one knows what the future holds, but at a pace of well over 1,000 pages weekly, the Federal Register could easily top 90,000 pages this year. The simple algebra says that at the current pace we'll add 11,190 pages over the next 44 days, to end 2016 at around 92,830 pages," CEI's Clyde Wayne Crews said in its report.

Folder

A FEMA guide: How law enforcement labels protesters

Miami police officers
© Javier Galeano / Reuters
It's been written there are five people you meet in heaven, but the Federal Emergency Management Agency says there are seven types you meet at a protest, according to their guide for handling crowd dynamics.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) guide to protesters offers a unique insight to how law enforcement views people at demonstrations of all kinds, ranging from the ones taking place against the North Dakota Access Pipeline to others across the country against President-elect Donald Trump.

The guide to field force operations was obtained by Unicorn Riot through a Freedom of Information Act request and is available to the public on Muckrock. It describes the various stages of how to cope with protests before making mass arrests. One such tactic is declaring the assembly unlawful from multiple locations in English and other languages.

Comment: The guide is missing an important classification: agent provocateurs, masked groups sent in to disrupt a peaceful demonstration often from the police force themselves.


Handcuffs

Turkish AKP party puts forward motion that would allow 4,000 child rapists to be immediately freed if their victims agreed to marry them

Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag
© Umit Bektas / ReutersJustice Minister Bekir Bozdag
Turkey's ruling government has brought a motion to Parliament that would allow rapists to go free if they marry their victims, as a way to alleviate the legal complications associated with child marriage.

The Justice and Development Party (AKP) supported a motion, which was brought to the floor of the General Assembly on Thursday night, that would allow the immediate release of more than 4,000 convicted rapists from Turkish prisons if they marry their victim, reports Turkish Minute.

The AKP has defended the motion by saying it is needed to protect couples who had consensual sex and were too young to legally marry.

"When a child is then born from this non-official union, the doctor warns the prosecutor and the man is sent to prison, putting the child and mother into financial difficulties," Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ told AFP.

Comment: How exactly the courts will determine and prove whether a rape was committed without "force, threat, or any other restriction on consent," remains to be explained. And what if a child consents to marriage but has been coerced, groomed and forced into the marriage by his/her rapist?


Star of David

26-year-old Palestinian shot dead by IDF amid clashes at Israeli-Gaza border

Palestinian demonstrators react to tear gas fired by Israeli troops during a protest against Jewish settlements in Jordan Valley near the West Bank city of Jericho November 17, 2016
© Mohamad Torokman / ReutersPalestinian demonstrators react to tear gas fired by Israeli troops during a protest against Jewish settlements in Jordan Valley near the West Bank city of Jericho November 17, 2016
A 26-year-old Palestinian was killed and another two injured as Israeli troops fired shots at protesters gathered near the Israeli-Gaza border, Palestinian health authorities said. The IDF says it was retaliating after Palestinians violently stormed a fence.

Ashraf al-Qidra, a Palestinian Health Ministry spokesman, said in a statement that Mohammad Abu Seada, a Palestinian protester, died "after being shot in the chest by Israeli soldiers in clashes east of the Al-Bureij camp," i24news reported.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) justified the shooting by saying that Israeli soldiers opened fire at demonstrators "during a violent riot"after they stormed into a buffer zone separating Gaza from Israel, damaged the security fence at the border in an attempt to "infiltrate"the Jewish state.

The demonstration had been originally called in protest of the new Israeli bill, which, if approved by the Parliament, would impose ban on loudspeakers at mosques, which transmit the call for Muslim prayer, supposed to be performed by every Muslim five times a day.

Bad Guys

17 killed, dozens injured in E.Aleppo as rebels disperse protesters with machine gunfire - Russian MoD

Machine gun fire
At least 17 people were killed by heavy gunfire and about a dozen more were rounded up and executed after hundreds of civilians trying to leave eastern Aleppo protested against the rebel blockade of exit routes, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

Some 500 civilians took part in several protests in the rebel-occupied eastern part of Aleppo on Thursday, and at least 200 of them were trying to reach the Syrian government-controlled area at the time they were violently dispersed with live fire, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.

"The militants dispersed the demonstration, shooting at the protesters from a heavy machine gun and then mined all the approaches to the checkpoint and placed snipers on the roofs of nearby houses," Konashenkov said, as quoted by Sputnik news agency.

"Seventeen people died at the site, including two teenagers of 13 and 15 years of age, over 40 people were wounded," he added.

Upon quelling one of the rallies, militants launched a hunt for the presumed organizers of the protests, the ministry spokesman said.

War Whore

Moronic John Bolton says Iranian people would long for a new regime

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani
© GettyIranian President Hassan Rouhani
Former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton told Breitbart News Daily SiriusXM host Raheem Kassam on Thursday that he still believes the only real solution for Iran is "regime change."

"The only longterm solution is regime change in Tehran," said Bolton. "The ayatollahs are the principal threat to international peace and security and the Middle East."

Bolton continued, "Their ouster won't bring sweetness and light to the region, that's for sure, but it will eliminate the principal threat."


Comment: Before asserting that the Iranian people would welcome regime change, perhaps Bolton would do well to read recent polls:
New Poll Says Iranians Like Zarif, Dislike U.S.

A new poll of Iranians taken just before the landmark nuclear deal went into full effect shows strong support for Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and closer ties with Europe, but negative views of the United States

82% had a favorable opinion of Rouhani and 78% liked Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who led the negotiations with the United States and five other nations that culminated in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The poll also found that 59% of Iranians want supporters of Rouhani to win upcoming elections for a new parliament.



Bullseye

Trump's appointment of Michael Flynn is great news

trump michael flynn
Michael Thomas Flynn is a retired United States Army lieutenant general who served as the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, commander of the Joint Functional Component Command for Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, and chair of the Military Intelligence Board.
Preface: I've slammed Trump when I thought he might appoint bad guys. But there's now cause for celebration.

Trump has purportedly offered General Michael Flynn a post as National Security Advisor.

This is GREAT news ...

Flynn - a 3-star general - is former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency and director of Intelligence for the Joint Special Operations Command.

Why do we like Flynn?

Because he:
  • Said "What we have is this continued investment in conflict. The more weapons we give, the more bombs we drop, that just... fuels the conflict. Some of that has to be done but I am looking for the other solutions"
  • Said "We definitely put fuel on a fire [by going into Iraq]. Absolutely... there is no doubt, history will not be kind to the decisions that were made certainly in 2003. Going into Iraq, definitely... it was a strategic mistake."
  • He has called for greater accountability for US soldiers involved in abuses against Iraqi detainees:"You know I hope that as more and more information comes out that people are held accountable... History is not going to look kind on those actions... and we will be held, we should be held, accountable for many, many years to come."
  • Blew the whistle on the U.S. complicity of "the West, Gulf countries and Turkey" in the rise of ISIS
I am hopeful that Flynn will help overturn decades of Neocon and Neoliberal warmongering...

Comment: Washington's Blog does offer a warning to Gen. Flynn that he should not forget his own words:
Let's not let Flynn forget any of these words. On Syria he has blurted out some similar facts to those Trump has also articulated:
"Publicly commenting for the first time on a previously-classified August 2012 Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) memo, which had predicted 'the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in Eastern Syria (...) this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want' and confirmed that 'the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and [Al Qaeda in Iraq] are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria,' the former DIA chief told Head to Head that 'the [Obama] Administration' didn't 'listen' to these warnings issued by his agency's analysts. 'I don't know if they turned a blind eye,' he said. 'I think it was a decision, I think it was a willful decision.'"
Let that sink in. Flynn is taking credit for having predicted that backing fighters in Syria could lead to something like ISIS. And he's suggesting that Obama received this information and chose to ignore it.

Now, here's a question: What impact will "bombing the hell" out of people have? What good will "killing their families" do? Spreading nukes around? "Stealing their oil"? Making lists of and banning Muslims? Is it Flynn's turn to willfully ignore key facts and common sense in order to "advise" against his better judgement a new president who prefers to be advised to do what he was going to do anyway?

Or can Flynn be convinced to apply lessons learned at huge human cost to similar situations going forward even with a president of a different party, race, and IQ?
It will remain to be seen how well Trump will take advice. But one would think Flynn was offered the position of head of the NSA because his views and those of Trump more or less coincide.


Info

Ringside with Steve Bannon at Trump Tower as the President-elect's strategist plots 'an entirely new political movement'

Steve Bannon
© Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesSteve Bannon
"I'm not a white nationalist, I'm a nationalist. I'm an economic nationalist," Bannon tells THR media columnist Michael Wolff as the controversial Breitbart News chief turned White House advisor unleashes on Hillary Clinton, Fox News and his critics.

In late summer when I went up to see Steve Bannon, then recently named CEO of the Donald Trump presidential campaign, in his office at Trump Tower in New York, he outlined a preposterous-sounding scenario. Trump, he said, would do surprisingly well among women, Hispanics and African-Americans, in addition to working men, and hence take Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan — and therefore the election. On Nov. 15, when I went back to Trump Tower, Bannon, promoted by the president-elect to chief strategist for the incoming administration, and by the media as the official symbol of all things hateful and virulent about the coming Trump presidency, said, as matter-of-factly as when he first sketched it out for me, "I told you so."

Chess

Mounting tensions: Vietnam expanding military facilities on disputed Spratly Island in defiance of Chinese land claims

spratly island
© CSIS / AMTI DigitalGlobe
Vietnam is lengthening a runway and building large hangars on a disputed South China Sea island in defiance of Chinese efforts to build military facilities on artificial islands in the troubled region, a US-based think tank said in a report.

The Vietnamese are lengthening the runway on Spratly Island from less than 760 meters to about 1,000 meters, Washington-based Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) said in a new report on Thursday.

The island is one of 14 that, along with more than 100 reefs, make up the Spratly chain, which is claimed by China, Vietnam, Taiwan, and the Philippines.

Satellite images cited by the AMTI also show that Vietnam is building two large hangars on the island capable of housing all types of combat aircraft, including fighter jets, the Vietnamese Air Force's PZL M28B maritime surveillance aircraft, and CASA C-295 transport planes, though limited space on the tarmac would impose significant constraints on flight operations.

Comment: More on the South China Sea disputes: