Puppet MastersS


Info

BRICS free trade area proposed by China

BRICS Summit in Goa
China's Ministry of Commerce (MOC) said Sunday a free trade area would be "a significant form of cooperation" between BRICS nations.

By setting up a free trade area, BRICS countries would be able to remove tariff and non-tariff barriers, give play to their comparative advantages, and advance trade and investment liberalization between them, MOC spokesperson Shen Danyang said at a press briefing.

The official comments came ahead of the 8th BRICS Summit in Goa, India where the five leaders will hold discussions on increasing intra-BRICS trade and investment.

The Chinese Ministry of Commerce spokesperson noted that China has not formally raised the issue for an upcoming BRICS meeting, but many experts have proposed a free trade area.

Chess

Lavrov: Reagan created al-Qaeda and Bush Jr. created Daesh. Will Obama be remembered as ensuring the sucess of al-Nusra?

lavrov
© Sputnik
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Moscow does not see any signs that the US is fighting the Al-Nusra terrorist group in Syria.

Moscow "doesn't see any facts that the US is seriously battling Al-Nusra [now known as Jabhat Fateh al-Sham]," Lavrov said in an interview to Channel One Russia on Sunday. He said that American fighter jets return to their air bases with unspent ammunition. The jets make a lot of flights but their efficiency is very low, about 15-20%. Washington even called on Moscow to cease bombing runs in Aleppo, because "there are also allegedly representatives of the "moderate opposition," who are surrounded and have nowhere to go except to Al-Nusra," he said.

These calls are suspicious, the minister said. According to Lavrov, Washington officials ask, "So don't touch Al-Nusra, because it is not humane in relation to the normal guys, and we will fight Al-Nusra later." But "this 'later' never comes. They promised to separate these normal guys from Al-Nusra back in February," he added. At the same time, Lavrov said that the US Secretary of State John Kerry denied any "hidden intention to preserve this terrorist organization and to bring it out from under the strikes in order to make it the main force to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad at some point."

"Under the pressure of such conversations the Americans declared that they killed one of the Nusra Front leaders," he said claiming that it was "a separate, isolated case" that does not reflect the real US policy. "After the administration of Ronald Reagan created al-Qaeda, and the administration of George W. Bush created Daesh we would not like the administration of Barack Obama to go down in history as the one which reinforced and ensured the success of another terrorist organization called Nusra Front," the minister continued. However, "Obama has repeatedly told Russian President Vladimir Putin that he stands for a political solution to the crisis," Lavrov said.


Comment: As usual, Lavrov nails it. The US has long been in the business of creating terrorism and ensuring its success.


Stock Down

OPEC chief says cartel lost $1 trillion in revenue due to oil price bust

Secretary General of Opec Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo (C), poses with Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih (R) and OPEC President Qatar's Minister of Energy and Industry Mohammed bin Saleh al-Sada
© Ramzi Boudina / Reuters Secretary General of Opec Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo (C), poses with Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih (R) and OPEC President Qatar's Minister of Energy and Industry Mohammed bin Saleh al-Sada at the 15th International Energy Forum Ministerial in Algiers,Algeria September 27, 2016.
Due to the slump in oil prices, OPEC producers have lost more than US$1 trillion in revenues over the past three years, OPEC Secretary General Mohammad Barkindo has told reporters in Washington DC.

Investments in the oil industry shrank more than 26 percent last year and are projected to drop by another 22 percent this year, Barkindo said on the sidelines of meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank in the U.S. capital.

The estimates for 2017 are also "looking very bleak," Nigeria's The Nation quoted Barkindo as saying. For the first time in recent memory, OPEC is not only facing three years in a row of low crude prices, but also declining capex, especially in the upstream business, according to the OPEC official.

Most experts, analysts and agencies, including the IMF and the World Bank, failed to predict correctly how long it would take the market to rebalance, Barkindo noted.

Comment: The proposed oil output freeze in increasingly coming under question as oil output increases: Oil price falls as OPEC production hits record in September


Info

Russia ready to join OPEC oil production freeze but Rosneft has doubts

Oil drilling rig
© REUTERS/ Sergei Karpukhin
Russia is ready to join the oil production freeze as part of the efforts to stabilize the global oil market and supports the decisions adopted by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Energy Minister Alexander Novak said Tuesday.

OPEC agreed in late September to cut its oil production for the first time in eight years. The output ceiling was set at 32.5-33 million barrels a day. Further details of the deal are due to be unveiled at the group's meeting in November.

"At this point, the freeze or even the reduction is the most reasonable way to re-balance the market in order to reduce the volatility risks for all of us...which could have a negative impact on the current market situation, especially on investments in the sector," Novak said addressing the World Energy Congress in Istanbul. "We, in turn, are ready to join the freeze as we already stated in January and confirmed our readiness in April," Novak stressed.

Stock Up

Oil price falls as OPEC production hits record in September

Oil production facility
The International Energy Agency reported today that crude oil output in OPEC reached a new record of 33.64 million barrels per day, causing crude oil prices to tick back down after they reached a one-year high on Russian President Putin's announcement that the oil giant would join freeze talks with OPEC.

Oil supply went up by 600,000 bpd globally in September, with non-OPEC supply rising by half a million barrels daily thanks to output increases in Russia and Kazakhstan.

World daily production in the reported month reached 97.2 million barrels, a 200,000-bpd increase on September 2015.

The IEA noted that OPEC was the main contributor to this annual growth.

TV

CNN reporter caught on air coaching presidential debate focus group

cnn coaching
Make no mistake about it, Hillary Clinton and her elite backers control the mainstream media narrative. However, the illusion of an unbiased press is quickly falling apart as multiple leaked emails, and now, a video from last night's debate on CNN shows.

During a brief clip, which has now been posted to YouTube, CNN forgot to kill reporter Pamela Brown's mic when they cut away. As the camera cuts back to the allegedly 'unbiased' debate focus group, Brown can be heard speaking to the group under her breath.

"America is great, because we're good," Brown whispers to the group in an obvious attempt to coach their answers.

Once Brown realizes she is back on air, she quickly asks a participant in the focus group what anti-Trump argument from Clinton impressed her most. Having just been told what to say by Brown, the participant quickly regurgitated her canned response, adding her own adaptation for good measure.

Comment: Sure.


Alarm Clock

Russia to deploy anti-aircraft missile system to Syria in response to US threat

VRK missle system
Russia is strengthening Syria's anti-air defense systems with the latest ZRK missile system, Izvestiya has reported citing a source in military-diplomatic circles.

Russian authorities are considering sending a batch of "Pantsir" anti-aircraft rocket missile and gun systems (ZRPK) to Syria. The deal, concluded a few years ago, was only partially realized for financial reasons. Now Moscow has decided to send the remaining Pantsir's to Damascus without demanding immediate payment.

Interviewed experts believe that Moscow's decision was influenced by the tense situation in Syria and the Americans' threat to strike Assad's troops.

As the director of the Foreign Policy Agency and program director of the Valdai Club, Andrey Sushentsov says, if the now Syrian Pantsir's shoot down an American plane, then we will find ourselves in an even more difficult political situation than now, because the blame will be put on Russia and thereby bring the US-Russia confrontation to a new level.

However, for now everything is being done to ensure that the Pentagon will not decide to launch such strikes.

Black Cat

If Hillary wins, will she kill us all?

hillary
© Unknown
'For Hillary, killing is like cocaine. And like an addict, she may not know when to stop'

The author is a licensed clinical psychologist and long-time human rights activist who lives and practices in New York City

That's the bottom line.

Based on my 47 years in the field of psychology, that's the simple truth I've been forced to reach from everything I've seen and read about this depraved, sociopathic woman.

Yet it's a truth I resist with every fiber of my being.

For I love life greatly and wish to relish it as long as I can.

Just look at me and this lovely home I've created for myself and my loved ones--complete with my own, personally designed Walden pond--with a wisteria-covered pondhouse cantilevered out over the water so that my family and I can dive with delight right into it whenever we like in spring, summer, and fall. In winter we love to ice skate on it .

Attention

Wikileaks: Hillary Clinton told oil majors environmentalism is a Russian hoax

Hillary Clinton and Vladimir Putin
© RIA Novosti. Aleksey Nikolskyi
In 2014, United States presidential candidate Hillary Clinton purportedly accused the Russians of running fake anti-fracking and environmentalist groups who were trying to upend major projects such as the Keystone XL pipeline.

According to Sputnik International, Wikileaks reportedly uncovered a paid-for speech made in 2014 by the former Secretary of State in front of an audience of "North American oil and natural gas tycoons."

"We were up against Russia pushing oligarchs and others to buy media. We were even up against phony environmental groups, and I'm a big environmentalist, but these were funded by the Russians to stand against any effort, oh that pipeline, that fracking, that whatever will be a problem for you, and a lot of the money supporting that message was coming from Russia," Clinton allegedly said.


Comment: It is notable that the speech occurred in 2014 before she officially began running for office signaling that her hysteria that Russians are lurking behind anything that she opposes is not merely a contrivance in response to leaked documents in the 2016 election but rather speak to some broader issue in her thinking.


Comment: So once again we can see Hillary Clinton tailors her message to the audience which results in lies and confusion on where she really stands on anything.


Cow Skull

Depressing alternatives: Neither Clinton nor Trump likely Putin preferences for White House

Putin
© Aleksey Nikolskyi / SputnikNo good options for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Journalists, columnists, academics, pundits, politicians, your average man on the street — they all have one thing in common: They all think they know what Vladimir Putin wants.

The exact phrase "what Putin wants" has shown up on Google more than 22,000 times. At the same time, the question "what does Putin want?" has shown up more than 9,000 times — so it seems the few who don't already think they know, would really like to find out.

Pointing the finger at Moscow and making baseless claims about 'what Putin wants' to win political points has become an entirely predictable strategy — but it's a popular strategy because it's a remarkably simple and convenient one. No substance required, just good old-fashioned fear-mongering.

In the US, efforts to link Russia to domestic politics have ranged from the absurd to the outright comical. Cast once again as the Evil Empire, Russia has become one of the most persistent themes in what is playing out as perhaps the biggest presidential election train wreck in history.

For Hillary Clinton, no one has been a more convenient scapegoat and bogeyman than the Russian president, as evidenced by her ongoing strategy of attempting to bury the content of various unflattering leaks by insisting that anything that reflects negatively on her is simply part of a Kremlin plot to discredit her and help Donald Trump to victory.