Puppet MastersS


Camera

Assad: 'Boy in the ambulance' picture is fake


Moon of Alabama
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 09:21 UTC
assad interview
© Swiss SRF 1 TV
From an interview with the Syrian President Bashar Assad by the Swiss SRF 1 TV Channel published October 19 2016:
Journalist: This young boy has become the symbol of the war. I think that you know this picture.

President Assad: Of course I saw it.

Journalist: His name is Omran. Five years old.

President Assad: Yeah.

Journalist: Covered with blood, scared, traumatized. Is there anything you would like to say to Omran and his family?

President Assad: There's something I would like to say to you first of all, because I want you to go back after my interview, and go to the internet to see the same picture of the same child, with his sister, both were rescued by what they call them in the West "White Helmets" which is a facelift of al-Nusra in Aleppo. They were rescued twice, each one in a different incident, and just as part of the publicity of those White Helmets. None of these incidents were true. You can have it manipulated, and it is manipulated. I'm going to send you those two pictures, and they are on the internet, just to see that this is a forged picture, not a real one. We have real pictures of children being harmed, but this one in specific is a forged one.

Comment: The White Helmets, a fake humanitarian group, puts out fake propaganda pictures. Par for the course.

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USA

Washington's global economic warfare

James Petras
Petras.Lahain.org
Tue, 18 Oct 2016 22:53 UTC
Eagle with American flag
Introduction
During most of the past two decades Washington has aggressively launched military and economic wars against at least nine countries, either directly or through its military aid to regional allies and proxies. US air and ground troops have bombed or invaded Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon.

More recently Washington has escalated its global economic war against major economic rivals as well as against weaker countries. The US no longer confines its aggressive impulses to peripheral economic countries in the Middle East, Latin America and Southern Asia. It has declared trade wars against world powers in Asia, Eastern and Central Europe and the Gulf states.

The targets of the US economic aggression include economic powerhouses like Russia, China, Germany, Iran and Saudi Arabia, as well as Syria, Yemen, Venezuela, Cuba and the Donbas region of Ukraine.

There is an increasingly thinner distinction between military and economic warfare, as the US has frequently moved from one to the other, particularly when economic aggression has not resulted in 'regime change' - as in the case of the sanctions campaign against Iraq leading up to the devastating invasion and destruction.

In this essay, we propose to examine the strategies and tactics underlying Washington's economic warfare, their successes and failures, and the political and economic consequences to target nations and to world stability.
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USA

SOTT Focus: US Elections and the Bogus Left-Right Paradigm

Joe Quinn
Sott.net
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 23:24 UTC
US establishment party
Veteran Oscar-winning 'anti-American' documentary-maker Michael Moore appears to have lost the plot. Moore recently held a surprise sneak preview screening in NYC of his new documentary Michael Moore in TrumpLand. Recorded over two nights earlier this month in the pro-Trump town of Wilmington, Ohio, the film is much less an exercise in Trump bashing than a tribute to the dubious virtues of Hillary Clinton.

By way of introduction to the recent screening in NYC, Moore told the audience:
"What the country doesn't need is to be told that Trump is a crazy, dangerous psychopath [and] sociopath, all of that. He has written and produced that movie and it appears daily."
Moore's backing of Clinton is surprising given that he has been one of her most outspoken critics. In the run-up to the 2008 elections, he said he was "morally prohibited" from voting for Hillary due to her support for the invasion of Iraq, and as recently as March this year he called her 'Wall Street's paid candidate". Then again, that was when there was a 'Democratic' alternative in the form of Bernie Sanders, whom Moore strongly supported.

When questioned after the screening about his apparent change in opinion, Moore made it clear that he still doesn't like Clinton:
"She has a very close relationship with [Wall Street]. If you've read any of the Podesta emails—or her emails—you can see that she's inclined to that... The fight will continue. The Bernie Revolution on Nov. 9th is critical. If we just leave it up to her, she may tend to side with that which she's become used to. I feel the same way about the Iraq War vote, I don't feel any less passion about her mistake."
While this suggests that Moore has joined the ranks of the millions of Americans who plan on voting for Clinton simply because 'anyone is better than Trump', Moore's reference to Clinton's "mistake" over the Iraq war points to something else going on with the political 'left' in the USA.
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Radar

South China Sea tensions: US destroyer sails through contested waters amid Chinese warnings


RT
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 21:12 UTC
Guided-missile destroyer USS Decatur (DDG 73)
© Diana Quinlan / Reuters
The USS Decatur, an American destroyer, has sailed through disputed waters in the South China Sea, with China slamming the move as "illegal" and "provocative."

The guided-missile destroyer sailed through waters claimed by China on Friday, closely passing by the contested Paracel Islands which are de facto under Chinese control. The Chinese Defense Ministry has decried the American incursion as "illegal" and "provocative," but US officials have denied any wrongdoing, stating that America was exercising its rights to sail through international waters.

"This operation demonstrated that coastal states may not unlawfully restrict the navigation rights, freedoms and lawful uses of the sea that the United States and all states are entitled to exercise under international law," Reuters quoted White House spokesman Josh Earnest as saying at a news briefing.
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MIB

German MPs give spy agency wider powers while critics attack the law as 'unconstitutional'


RT
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 18:38 UTC
The lower house of parliament Bundestag in Berlin, Germany
© Stefanie Loos / ReutersThe lower house of parliament Bundestag in Berlin, Germany.
The German Parliament has adopted a bill granting country's intelligence agencies wider powers, including spying on EU facilities, but also introducing broader oversight. Critics of the legislation lambasted the law as "unconstitutional."

The bill, aimed at reforming Germany's spy agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), was adopted by legislators on Friday. MPs from the ruling Christian Democratic Union party (CDU), the Christian Social Union (CSU) and the Social Democrats (SPD) voted in favor, while the majority of opposition lawmakers voted against it.

According to the bill, the BND will be able to spy on facilities of the EU in case of interior and external security dangers, as well as risks to Germany's defensive capabilities. The agency will be also able to act when there is "a perception of foreign and internal political and security importance." The wording is considered by critics to be "too general," Germany's der Spiegel reports.
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Mr. Potato

Poroshenko in peril: Normandy Four roadmap spells doom for Kiev junta

Ruslan Ostashko (translated by J. Arnoldski)
PolitRussia / Fort Russ
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 20:08 UTC
poroshenko merkel
Sometimes one gets the impression that President Poroshenko only comes to negotiations to drink coffee (or something stronger) and eat sandwiches. Apparently they don't feed him well in Kiev. Assuming this theory is true, then it turns out that the Normandy format negotiations were crowned with resounding success for him. For 5 hours, he was able to eat German hamburgers. But other than that, no other important and positive results were achieved. As sources from the Russian delegation have reported, the Ukrainian president desperately tried to achieve a revision of the Minsk Agreements, but this didn't work out for him.

References to the complex foreign policy situation in Ukraine and Poroshenko's personal difficulties did not impress the rest of the Normandy Format participants, especially since Hollande and Merkel themselves complained to the Ukrainian leader of their own domestic political difficulties. Merkel has lost several key regional elections and her party is already thinking about getting rid of her. Hollande is having a difficult time with the consequences of foreign policy humiliations and the scandal related to his revelations in a recently published biography.

Thus, Poroshenko found no sympathy, as is evidenced by the absence of any signed documents. This means that Kiev is once again faced with the impossible task of fulfilling the Minsk Agreements, which has long since been a thorn in the side of the Ukrainian leadership.

Comment: Further reading: Tusk blames Moscow for EU failure to agree on new sanctions

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Cow Skull

Taking Mosul': Killary may be denied her 'October Surprise' by longer battle than projected

Alexander Mercouris
The Duran
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 20:29 UTC
battle mosul syria
Readying for the Battle of Mosul
Reports of a purge in Mosul suggest ISIS intends to defend the city in which Hillary Clinton may be denied her 'October Surprise'.

Whilst the 'Great Battle of Aleppo' in Syria grinds towards the inevitable government victory, attention is shifting the 'Great Battle of Mosul' in Iraq, which is about to begin.

As Joe Lauria has previously written for The Duran, the time of the attack on Mosul seems to have been largely dictated by the US electoral calendar, with the liberation of Mosul timed to help Hillary Clinton's prospects of winning the election in November.

This begs the question of whether there will be a battle of Mosul at all. When Joe Lauria wrote his piece for The Duran on 1st October 2016 all the indications were that there wouldn't be, and that ISIS was preparing to leave the city.

That may still be what is going on to happen. However there are reports of infighting within ISIS, with what appear to be well-sourced reports of the brutal execution of 58 ISIS leaders who were preparing to surrender the city.

If there are some within the ISIS leadership who are resisting proposals to surrender Mosul, it is not difficult to see why.
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Attention

Mosul fallout? Air raid kills 15 women, dozens more wounded at shrine near Kirkuk - Daquq airstrike kills 20


RT
Fri, 21 Oct 2016 16:49 UTC
Kirkuk, Iraq, October 21, 2016
© Ako Rasheed / Reuters
An airstrike has left 15 women dead and 50 more injured after it hit a Shiite shrine near the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, AFP reports, citing a local official and medic.

"Fifteen women were killed and another 50 wounded in a raid that targeted a Shiite place of worship at Dakuk," local council chief Amir Huda Karam told AFP.

The agency reports that the number of those killed and injured has been confirmed by a local medic, Dr Abbas Mustafa Dakuki.

There is no information on who exactly carried out the alleged bombardment.

Comment: Any guess who's to blame? Sputnik has additional details: the target was a mourning procession in Daquq, killing 20 and injuring 45:
According to the Shafaq News media outlet, the airstrike was mistakenly carried out by the US-led coalition while other media reports say the US air forces were responsible for the attack.

The incident occurred several hours after the Islamic State terror group attacked the city of Kirkuk as well as a power plant in the town of Dibis, about 35 miles northwest of Kirkuk.


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Dollars

Nuclear war scare is about preserving the dollar and US hegemony - which is why it won't work

Brandon Smith
Alt-Market
Wed, 19 Oct 2016 16:20 UTC
US nukes
The threat of nuclear war, like terrorism, is meant to make you and everyone else submit. Is it working?
The interesting thing about working in alternative economics is that inevitably you will become the designated buzzkill. You may be presenting the facts on the ground and the reality behind the numbers, but most of what you have to report will not be pleasant. Alternative economists are doomed to be labeled "doom and gloomers." And that's okay...

The truth is what it is, and sometimes it hurts people obsessed with undue positivism and bull market naivety. However, as bad as we seem to be when it comes to a negative outlook, we do not necessarily present the most ugly options on the table.

There is an undeniable trend by some within the liberty movement to assume a Mad Max-style end game to our ever expanding house of cards. That is to say, they see the only plausible outcome being apocalyptic in nature, and nuclear holocaust fits well within this viewpoint. In many cases, the argument is sometimes presented that WWIII is in the best interests of global elites seeking a catalyst for their so-called "new world order."


Comment: We've not heard that variant before, but 'nuclear armageddon' is certainly on a lot of people's minds.


This is not to say that I don't think WWIII is a possibility; it certainly is. But I remain rather skeptical of the usefulness of nuclear war for the elites. Primarily because everything they openly claim they hope to accomplish can be accomplished without nukes.


Comment: What's been useful for the elites, since 1945, is the THREAT of nuclear war, which is why they detonated those first ones in Japan - to show off 'what they can do'. From there, they've been able to bully and brutalize countries everywhere into toeing the line.


Comment: Speaking of nuclear armageddon being "subconsciously enticing", we've also wondered if that scenario is some sort of anthropomorphized cometary impact scenario. A small possibility, but then, there have been a lot of meteor fireball events in recent years...

Keeping to more 'down-to-Earth' scenarios, continued economic decay - in the West - is a certainty, and also more terrorism - lots of it, to distract from the continued economic decay:

Russia Checkmates US in Syria: Expect More Terrorism, Not Nuclear War

The author does make some good points throughout this article. However, it is peppered with divergence into black-and-white. It is not possible for China, Russia or anyone else to operate on the world stage while completely bypassing institutions like the IMF, so that's an unrealistic criticism. They've got to work with what they've got, and anyway, they're creating potential alternatives that are beneficial to the people of their countries and others. The Western elite will always have their hand in global systems, and at this stage in the game grassroots movements aren't going to change the fundamental underpinnings of our world. There might be a small chance to move towards a new type of world, but no one's going to do it by avoiding the world's systems.

On a practical and individual level, consider how we need to live in the world, but don't have to be of it. Just because we don't like the Western corporatocracy doesn't mean we can quit our jobs. Just because we don't like Saudi Arabian head-choppers doesn't mean we can avoid filling up our gas tanks. And just because we don't like the corrupt banking system doesn't mean we can avoid having a bank account. The alternative is to crawl up in a cave and wait to die. It's an unfortunate part of the control system in which we live that we need these things to fulfill life's responsibilities.

In the meantime, forget about "overthrowing globalism". Focus on trying to see what is true from what is false.

And one other thing:

putin support


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Eye 2

SOTT Exclusive: Al Nusra's treachery exposes Western propaganda in Aleppo

Corey Schink
Sott.net
Thu, 20 Oct 2016 14:21 UTC
Al Nusra terrorists jihadists
On October 20th Russian and Syrian forces initiated the first of four consecutive 11-hour humanitarian ceasefires in Aleppo after the West ramped up their 'war crimes' smear campaign against them, pressuring them to end their legitimate anti-terrorist operation, and after Western propaganda organ Syrian Observatory for Human Rights continued manufacturing evidence toward that end.

So, after delivering mountains of humanitarian aid and steadily liberating the country from terrorists, now Russia and Syria have to prove to the invading West that they are interested in ensuring Syria's safety.

Comment: Further reading: Russian Actions in Syria Part of Radical Remaking of Global Order: A New World Awaits

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