Puppet MastersS


Document

Rolling Stone report: Trump boasted he had intel on Macron's sex life

Camille Gijs
Politico
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 13:30 UTC
macron trump
© Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images
Former U.S. President Donald Trump for years bragged to close associates that he knew illicit details about French President Emmanuel Macron's sex life, gleaned from "intelligence" briefings, Rolling Stone reported late Monday, citing "two people with knowledge of the matter."

The issue has surged back into the spotlight in the wake of the FBI raid on Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, during which authorities seized sensitive documents, including one titled "info re: President of France."

It's unknown whether the document in question contained details about Macron's personal life. Rolling Stone has also not confirmed whether the information seized regarding Macron was classified or sourced from U.S. intelligence. But the magazine said the "mere revelation of [the document's] existence triggered a trans-Atlantic freakout."

Comment: Yes, Trump can be a braggart and he hasn't always delivered, but that's not to say that ALL his accusations are trumped up (no pun intended). Let's wait and see on this one. See also: Macron emails lead to allegations of homosexual adventurism, drug use and Rothschild money

Read More...
Attention

Ukraine: Somewhere between Afghanization and Syrianization

Pepe Escobar
The Cradle
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 20:12 UTC
Ukraine is finished as a nation - neither side will rest in this war. The only question is whether it will be an Afghan or Syrian style finale.

Ukraine War
© The Cradle
One year after the astounding US humiliation in Kabul - and on the verge of another serious comeuppance in Donbass - there is reason to believe Moscow is wary of Washington seeking vengeance: in the form of the 'Afghanization' of Ukraine.

With no end in sight to western weapons and finance flowing into Kiev, it must be recognized that the Ukrainian battle is likely to disintegrate into yet another endless war. Like the Afghan jihad in the 1980s which employed US-armed and funded guerrillas to drag Russia into its depths, Ukraine's backers will employ those war-tested methods to run a protracted battle that can spill into bordering Russian lands.

Yet this US attempt at crypto-Afghanization will at best accelerate the completion of what Russia's Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu describes as the "tasks" of its Special Military Operation (SMO) in Ukraine. For Moscow right now, that road leads all the way to Odessa.

It didn't have to be this way. Until the recent assassination of Darya Dugina at Moscow's gates, the battlefield in Ukraine was in fact under a 'Syrianization' process.

Like the foreign proxy war in Syria this past decade, frontlines around significant Ukrainian cities had roughly stabilized. Losing on the larger battlefields, Kiev had increasingly moved to employ terrorist tactics. Neither side could completely master the immense war theater at hand. So the Russian military opted to keep minimal forces in battle - contrary to the strategy it employed in 1980s Afghanistan.
Read More...
Stop

The conflict in Ukraine is precipitating the end of Western domination

Thierry Meyssan
Voltairenet.org
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 00:00 UTC
pot shot wall
© The Indian ExpressThe spoils of war
The Ukrainian conflict, presented as a Russian aggression, is only the implementation of the Security Council resolution 2202 of February 17, 2015. If France and Germany did not keep their commitments during the Minsk II Agreement, Russia prepared itself for seven years for the current confrontation. It had foreseen the Western sanctions well in advance and needed only two months to circumvent them.
These sanctions disrupt US globalization, disrupt Western economies by breaking supply chains, causing dollars to flow back to Washington and causing general inflation, and creating energetics in the West.
The United States and its allies are in the position of being the hosers hosed: they are digging their own grave. Meanwhile, the Russian Treasury's revenues have increased by 32% in six months.

For the past seven years, it has been the responsibility of the guarantor powers of the Minsk II Agreement (Germany, France, Ukraine and Russia) to enforce it. They had been endorsed and legalized by the United Nations Security Council on February 17, 2015. But none of these states have done so, despite the rhetoric about the need to protect citizens threatened by their own governments.
Read More...
Whistle

Elon Musk cites Twitter whistleblower in new bid to cancel $44 billion deal

Ariel Zilber
New York Post
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 09:08 UTC
Musk
© NTB/AFP via Getty ImagesElon Musk interview
Elon Musk fired another salvo in his bid to cancel the $44 billion buyout of Twitter, citing claims made by Twitter whistleblower Peiter "Mudge" Zatko as further proof that the social media company hasn't been forthcoming about its "far-reaching misconduct."

Mike Ringler, Musk's lawyer, from the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, wrote a letter to Twitter's top legal counsel on Monday — a follow-up to Musk's initial July 8 notice to the Securities and Exchange Commission seeking to terminate his acquisition of Twitter. Ringler wrote:
"Allegations regarding certain facts, known to Twitter prior to and as of July 8, 2022, but undisclosed to the Musk Parties prior to and at that time, have since come to light that provide additional and distinct bases to terminate the Merger Agreement."
Ringler, from the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP wrote that the second notice is "not legally necessary" to terminate the merger, but was filed in case the July 8 notice was "determined to be invalid for any reason."
Zatco
© Washington Post/Getty ImagesPeiter "Mudge' Zatko, former head of cybersecurity at Twitter

Comment: More details come from The Guardian:
Musk wants out of the deal and Twitter is asking Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick of the Delaware court of chancery to order him to buy the company for the agreed $54.20 per share.

A Twitter attorney said at a court hearing last week that Musk's focus on spam as a way to end his agreement to buy the company was "legally irrelevant" because Twitter always said its spam counts were only estimates, not binding representations.

Twitter's stock was down slightly at $40.36 on Monday morning in New York. Twitter declined to comment for this article.


Read More...
Laptop

GOP Senators press Zuckerberg about FBI telling Facebook to downplay Hunter Biden's laptop

Tom Howell, Jr.
Washington Times
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 00:00 UTC
Johnson
© AP/Andrew HornikSenator Ron Johnson (R-Wis)
Two Senate Republicans want Facebook to explain whether the FBI discussed Hunter Biden's laptop computer, his business dealings and "Russian disinformation" with the social media platform during the 2020 campaign, citing a revealing podcast appearance by CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Sens. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin told Mr. Zuckerberg, who leads Facebook parent company Meta, that his comments on Joe Rogan's podcast made them wonder if the social media platform was pressured to suppress information about President Biden's son. The senators wrote to Mr. Zuckerberg:
"You appeared to indicate that as a result of the FBI's warning, Facebook eventually took steps to censor news articles about Hunter Biden's laptop. Specifically, you said that 'distribution' of those articles on Facebook was decreased and explained that 'the ranking and newsfeed was a little bit less. So fewer people saw it than would have otherwise. Your revelation that Facebook took steps to censor information about Hunter Biden on its platform based on the FBI's guidance raises even more questions about the FBI's actions regarding Hunter Biden's laptop."
Facebook responded in a series of tweets that said "nothing about the Hunter Biden laptop story is new" and that they took general steps to avoid foreign interference without singling out the laptop reporting.
Read More...
Document

Trump documents: What we still don't know

Byron York
Washington Examiner
Fri, 26 Aug 2022 06:04 UTC
Trump
© MGN/Patrick Kelley/US Coast Guard/Google MapsFormer US President Donald Trump
A federal judge in Florida has released a heavily redacted copy of the affidavit used to justify the Aug. 8 FBI raid on former President Donald Trump's winter home in Florida. In the fragmentary affidavit — the judge let the Justice Department black out whatever it liked — we learn a little more about how many documents the FBI found and some of the classified markings on them. We learned that the National Archives and Records Administration found boxes filled with "newspapers, magazines, printed news articles, photos, miscellaneous print-outs, notes, presidential correspondence, person and post-presidential records, and 'a lot of classified records,'" which sounds about right, given our knowledge of the level or organization in Trumpworld. But we still don't know the answer to the most important question of the whole Mar-a-Lago affair: What are the documents about?

There's no need to repeat yesterday's newsletter, titled, "The gaping hole in our knowledge of the Trump documents." But think about the story this way:

Trump had many fights over classified documents when he was in the White House. He wanted to declassify some documents, and the FBI did not. The reason Trump wanted to declassify documents was he believed the FBI and other agencies had unfairly targeted him in the Trump-Russia investigation of 2016-2019. Trump believed there were documents that showed evidence of FBI misconduct in its pursuit of Trump. But those documents were classified. Trump wanted them brought to light. The FBI did not. It warned that declassifying such documents would compromise carefully guarded sources and methods of U.S. intelligence and damage American national security.

Comment: See also:

Read More...
Bullseye

Voice of reason: Odessa mayor calls for Ukraine and Russia to negotiate


RT
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 17:46 UTC
mayor Odessa Gennady Trukhanov
Gennady Trukhanov, Mayor of Odessa, Ukraine
The mayor of the southern Ukrainian city of Odessa, Gennady Trukhanov, believes the conflict with Russia should be resolved politically. Kiev and Moscow should cease the hostilities and return to the negotiating table, he told Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper in an interview published on Sunday.

Although he supports the idea of Ukraine "returning to [its] borders of 1991," including Donbass and Crimea, Trukhanov maintains that these disputes should be resolved at the negotiating table, not the battlefield.

"The lives of millions of people are at stake," therefore "it is necessary to negotiate step by step, to seek compromises gradually, to avoid confrontation," the mayor said. He argued that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has made "many" mistakes while in office.

Comment: Every chance at a negotiated settlement has been scuttled by one or another Western country. Initially, Russia may have been content with the Donbass and Lughansk territories, but now it appears they will settle for nothing less than control of ALL Russian-dominated areas. This includes the entire region bordering the Black Sea up to Odessa, and possibly taking Transnistria from Moldova. It's the only way Russia feels it can guarantee the safety of its sons and daughters.
politics history divide regions Ukraine
© GeoCurrents


Read More...
Bomb

From the didn't-think-it-through dept: US artillery stockpiles 'uncomfortably low' after splurging on Ukraine aid says WSJ


RT
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 17:24 UTC
munitions ukraine aid missiles
© US Army / Spc. Tanner DibbleUS troops are seen training with 155 millimeter howitzer rounds at Fort Riley, Kansas.
The Pentagon is conducting a review to determine how to meet its own supply needs while still arming Ukraine

The US military is running low on some types of ammunition after the White House approved and delivered billions of dollars in "lethal aid" for Ukraine since February, several military officials told the Wall Street Journal on condition of anonymity.

In addition to thousands of guns, drones, missiles, artillery platforms and rocket launchers, Washington has supplied Kiev with large amounts of ammo, including up to 806,000 155mm howitzer rounds. The stocks of the latter munitions are running "uncomfortably low," an unnamed Pentagon official told the Journal.

Comment: The Russians are very happy to help with the draw-down of US' and its allies' armaments, either by confiscation or outright destruction.

Read More...
Russian Flag

Kherson counter-offensive: Russia makes new claim about Ukraine's losses


RT
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 16:51 UTC
kherson
© Stringer/AFP via Getty ImagesA view of the destroyed Fabrika shopping mall in the Ukrainian city of Kherson on July 20.
Over 1,000 Ukrainian service members were killed in a botched operation in the south of the country, Moscow has said

Russian forces have taken out hundreds of Ukrainian troops and dozens of tanks and armored military vehicles after repelling Kiev's ill-fated offensive in southern Ukraine, which was mounted at the personal order of President Vladimir Zelensky, the Defense Ministry claimed on Tuesday.

"The effective actions by the Russian forces destroyed 48 tanks, 46 infantry fighting vehicles, 37 other armored combat vehicles, eight pickups with heavy machine guns and more than 1,200 Ukrainian servicemen in one day," the statement read, adding that Kiev sustained these losses during a botched offensive whose directions led to Nikolaev, Krivoy Rog, and other cities in southern Ukraine.

Comment: The Saker reports the Russian Defense Ministry says the promised "major Ukrainian counter-attack" has ended in disaster
Ukrainian troops attempted an offensive in the Mykolaiv and Kherson regions, as a result, the AFU units suffered heavy losses, the Russian Defense Ministry told reporters.

"Today, during the day, on the direct instructions of Zelensky, Ukrainian troops attempted an offensive in the Mykolaiv and Kherson regions in three directions. As a result of the active defense of the grouping of Russian troops, the AFU units suffered heavy losses," TASS reports.

The ministry added that "the enemy's losses in manpower amounted to more than 560 servicemen, another attempt at offensive actions of the enemy failed miserably."

According to the Defense Ministry, the Russian Armed Forces destroyed 26 Ukrainian tanks, 23 infantry fighting vehicles, nine other armored combat vehicles, shot down two Su-25 attack aircraft.

Earlier on Monday, Deputy head of the administration of the Kherson region Kirill Stremousov said: the AFU has been shelling several settlements of the Kherson region since Sunday evening. Schools, social infrastructure were destroyed, residential buildings were damaged, the official confirmed. But there is no question of any APU offensive on Kherson, statements in the Ukrainian media - "this is some kind of illusion, a movie," Stremousov pointed out.

As the head of the Kakhovsky district, Vladimir Leontiev, in turn, reported, the AFU inflicted more than 10 missile strikes on Novaya Kakhovka, including residential buildings and schools. Some strikes were carried out from HIMARS, residential buildings and a school were damaged, the head of the district said.

Aviation, missile troops and artillery hit nine control points of the Armed Forces of Ukraine during the day, including on the territory of the Mykolaiv region, the official representative of the Russian Defense Ministry, Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov, said on Monday.

Addendum 1: here is how CNN reported about this latest disaster "Ukrainian troops took back 4 villages in the south from Russian occupation, military source tells CNN". No, this is no joke, click on the link above and see for yourself.

Addendum 2: Map of the current situation

Kherson counter-offensive Ukraine
The Kherson counter-offensive August 29, 2022
Via Gazeta Vzglyad (machine translation)


Read More...
Attention

Europe's winter of self-inflicted chaos: Russia cuts gas supply to France as PM warns of future energy rationing

Peter Caddle
Breitbart
Tue, 30 Aug 2022 14:13 UTC
France Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne
© ERIC PIERMONT/AFP via Getty Images
Russia has reduced the amount of gas it is sending to a major energy company in France, the Prime Minister of which has already warned that energy rationing over the winter is now on the cards.

Vladimir Putin's Russia has once again cut down on the amount of gas it is sending to a European state, this time targeting France with the reduction in its much relied upon energy exports on Tuesday.

The action follows a warning from the French Prime Minister that the central European state could be forced to ration the use of energy over the winter months, while begging industry in the state to do all they can to reduce their own usage.

According to a report by Le Figaro, Russian state gas company Gazprom announced that it was reducing the amount of gas it is sending to French energy company Engie with immediate effect.

Engie has said that the sudden reduction in supply was allegedly down to what it called a "disagreement between the parties on the application of contracts" for the reduction.


Comment: Might the disagreement have to do with simply with not paying for Russian gas in rubles due to France's own sanctions? Seems France and other Europeans countries are intent on causing their people a lot of suffering over the US agenda in Ukraine.


Comment: The Powers that Be appear to be pushing people to the brink, seeing what people will accept. The end result will probably not be what they expect.

Read More...