The leaked private phone conversation between senior US State Department official Victoria Nuland and the American ambassador to Ukraine - in which Nuland is heard to disparage the European Union with a vulgar expletive - comes as a welcome relief. It is a moment of clarity, in which the US government inadvertently comes clean on its hidden agenda...

All the elusive speculation about what Washington's agenda in Ukraine is now laid to rest. Nuland's own words make it clear that the US agenda is all about orchestrating regime change in Kiev. Needless to say, that constitutes an infringement of that country's sovereignty and should now be a matter of applying sanctions under international law against the US.

It also undermines the political cause of protesters in Maidan Square. They are now seen, more than ever, as a Trojan Horse for external political interference in Ukraine. This is not a cause of patriotism, as we have been led to believe in the Western media, but rather more like grubby treachery to serve a foreign agenda.

For nearly three months, the American and European governments have been playing a frustratingly devious game of piously pretending to support the people of Ukraine in their bid for attaining EU integration and democracy. The charade has been frustrating because there is abundant evidence to show that both Washington and Brussels are engaging in regime change by subterfuge, but all the while the West maintains that it is simply acting as an honest broker to resolve a regional political crisis.

"The Unknown Putin" - a documentary by well-known Russian journalist Andrei Karaulov. The first part of the film is devoted to the struggle for oil, which was unfolding during the first presidential term of Vladimir Putin. There were a lot of serious, yet unknown incidents that occured during that struggle. Andrei Karaulov formulated his idea of the documentary as follows: he wanted to understand what Putin had to experience from 2000 till 2010.

I just finished reading a ridiculous hit piece published at Eurasia.Net accusing the Turkish people of being conspiracy theorists for believing that the imperial US and EU are engaged in schemes towards regime change around the world. According to the article and its sources, one must be ignorant, uninformed, uneducated and a big time conspiracy theorist in order to believe that the US-EU are engaged in political manipulations and regime change operations around the world.

Here is one of the article sources attributing the Turkish people's distrust of the West to their ignorance, paranoia and conspiracy mindedness:

A number of confirmations have come in from readers that Washington is fueling the violent protests in Ukraine with our taxpayer dollars. Washington has no money for food stamps or to prevent home foreclosures, but it has plenty of money with which to subvert Ukraine.

One reader wrote: "My wife, who is of Ukrainian nationality, has weekly contact to her parents and friends in Zhytomyr [NW Ukraine]. According to them, most protesters get an average payment of 200-300 grivna, corresponding to about 15-25 euro. As I additionally heard, one of the most active agencies and 'payment outlets' on EU side is the German 'Konrad Adenauer Stiftung', being closely connected to the CDU, i.e. Mrs. Merkel's party."

Johannes Loew of the Internet site elynitthria.net/ writes: "I am just back from Ukraine (I live in Munich/Germany) and I was a lot at the Maidan. Most of those people get only 100 grivna. 300 is for Students."

As I reported on February 12, "Washington Orchestrated Protests Are Destabilizing Ukraine," Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, a rabid Russophobe and neoconservative warmonger, told the National Press Club last December that the US has "invested" $5 billion in organizing a network to achieve US goals in Ukraine in order to give "Ukraine the future it deserves."

A new report on the U.S. drone missile strike that killed 12 members of a Yemeni wedding convoy has renewed calls for the Obama administration to make public its own investigations into the incident - and explain how such strikes are consistent with international laws of war.

The detailed, 28-page report from Human Rights Watch describes conflicting accounts of the December 12 attack, but nevertheless concludes that some, if not all, of the victims may have been civilians.

Cats vs. dogs. Coke vs. Pepsi. Democrats vs. Republicans.

These are the great divisions of life. But what if one of those rivalries isn't actually much of a division at all?

Don't worry, I'm not trying to reignite the cola wars of the 90s. (Besides, we all know Coke is the clear winner: Do you order a Jack and Pepsi?)

No, I'm talking about Democrats and Republicans - or rather, the out-of-date and out-of-step establishments of both parties.

For libertarians, saying both parties are the same is a common theme. Democrat and Republican partisans dismiss such critiques as cynical or unserious, but there's a real case to be made if we look at the cold, hard facts.

Detention of former Guardian journalist's partner was justified by 'very pressing' interests of national security, judges say

Three high court judges have dismissed a challenge that David Miranda, the partner of the former Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, was unlawfully detained under counter-terrorism powers for nine hours at Heathrow last August.

The judges accepted that Miranda's detention and the seizure of computer material was "an indirect interference with press freedom" but said this was justified by legitimate and "very pressing" interests of national security.

The three judges, Lord Justice Laws, Mr Justice Ouseley and Mr Justice Openshaw, concluded that Miranda's detention at Heathrow under schedule 7 to the Terrorism 2000 Act was lawful, proportionate and did not breach European human rights protections of freedom of expression.

The ruling says that Miranda was stopped in transit between Berlin and Rio de Janeiro after meeting the film-maker Laura Poitras, who had been involved in making disclosures based on documents leaked by the US National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden.

Miranda was carrying encrypted files, including an external hard drive containing 58,000 highly classified UK intelligence documents, "in order to assist the journalistic activity of Greenwald". The Guardian made his travel reservations and paid for the trip.

Laws said he noted that the seized material included personal information that would allow staff to be identified, including those deployed overseas.

Greenwald told the judges that the security services were well aware that the seized material was in connection with journalism and not terrorism. He said there was no evidence to indicate that any disclosure had actually threatened or endangered life or any specific operation.

At least every week now, there is a new story supporting the narrative of an inevitable 2016 Hillary Clinton presidential bid. Indeed, the conventional wisdom is that it is an absolute certainty that she will run. If anyone is currently saying, flat out, that Hillary isn't running, I haven't come across them. Is the inevitability of her run really as certain as the conventional wisdom suggests, and further, is it unfolding in an optimal manner for the potential candidate?

In all likelihood, Clinton will not make a final, "go-or-no-go" decision until early next year, after the dust has settled from the midterm election. Generally speaking, few presidential contenders make their final decisions before the preceding midterm, and, with the notable exception of Texas Gov. Rick Perry in 2011, most have been laying the groundwork for a long time for a potential run. Most have already been attending countless state and county Jefferson-Jackson (for Democrats) or Lincoln (for Republicans) dinners, meet and greets, and other events to prepare for the potential campaign and the ensuring shakedown (if they do, in fact, decide to run).

I've always loved the First Amendment, it's my favorite constitutional amendment of them all. (Close behind is the Third, which forbids the government from quartering soldiers in our homes.)

So it makes me feel great when top U.S. officials talk about how much America supports free speech. As Obama told the whole world at the UN last year, true democracy "depends on the freedom of citizens to speak their minds ... efforts to restrict speech can become a tool to silence critics."

And who's going to stop the bad guys? We are, because as Obama's also said, "standing up for our values at home is only part of our work. Around the world, we stand up for values that are universal." I sincerely love that, hearing it makes me a little verklempt about being American.

So ever since I heard about the UK's treatment of David Miranda, I've been waiting for the U.S. to bring the hammer down. Miranda is the husband of journalist Glenn Greenwald, and was carrying encrypted NSA documents from Laura Poitras in Berlin back to Greenwald in Brazil - when he was stopped and held at London's Heathrow airport for nine hours.

According to the British government, what Miranda did "falls within the definition of terrorism." And he was held at Heathrow under the UK Terrorism Act of 2000.

I guess some would say the British could have questioned him under some other law. But claiming that journalism = terrorism? It's hard to square that with the popular image of Great Britain - those people on Dowtown Abbey all seem so nice. No matter what your perspective is on Edward Snowden, everyone should be able to agree this was an ominous sign. It's what the worst countries on earth do.

But don't just take my word for it. According to Under Secretary of State Tara Sonenshine last April, many awful governments "misuse terrorism laws to prosecute and imprison journalists." And then Tara told us we all have to fight back:

The United States of America was built on freedom of expression. It was one of our first breaths of life as a nation - and remains an indispensible and enduring element of who we are.

And it is a fundamental freedom for all people, enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights...

We urge all people - members of news organizations, civil society and think tank institutions; political leaders, scholars, and citizens of every faith and ethnicity - to call for accountability. To demand that governments enforce human rights that protect journalists and this fundamental freedom. To shine a light on long-standing and emerging repressive restrictions on, and threats to, freedom of expression whether they are through traditional media or online.

I heard this and I was raring to go. I thought the first person who could help with the Miranda situation would be Tara herself - she's left the State Department and is now totally free to speak her mind. So I got in touch and waited for her to get back to me. Was she just going to issue a statement ripping the Brits a new one? My guess was no - clearly this is something she feels so strongly about she's going to insist on leading the demonstration at the British Embassy herself.

The U.S. Army's Operating Concept 2016-2028 was issued in August 2010 with three goals. First, it aims to portray how future Army forces will conduct operations as part of a joint force to deter conflict, prevail in war, and succeed in a range of contingencies, at home and abroad. Second, the concept describes the employment of Army forces at the tactical and operational levels of war between 2016 and 2028. Third, in broad terms the concept describes how Army headquarters, from theater army to division, organize and use their forces. The concept goes on to describe the major categories of Army operations, identify the capabilities required of Army forces, and guide how force development should be prioritized. The goal of this concept is to establish a common frame of reference for thinking about how the US Army will conduct full spectrum operations in the coming two decades (US Army Training and Doctrine Command, The Army Operating Concept 2016 - 2028, TRADOC Pamphlet 525-3-1, dated 19 August 2010, p. iii. Hereafter cited as TD Pam 525-3-1. The Army defines full spectrum operations as the combination of offensive, defensive, and either stability operations overseas or civil support operations on U.S. soil).