Puppet MastersS


Eye 1

Propaganda Alert! 'Government backers' wreak havoc in Venezuelan town

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The motorcycles roared into the center of Los Teques and circled its town square, the tough-looking riders clad in T-shirts bearing the image of the late President Hugo Chavez and chanting "Chavez lives!" and "Maduro, president!"

The several hundred supporters of Chavez and his heir, President-elect Nicolas Maduro, converged on the local headquarters of the National Electoral Council, where backers of opposition leader Henrique Capriles planned to hold a protest against the official results of Sunday's election to replace Chavez.

As he drove down the street on a motorcycle, one young man shouted: "Here we are, defending our votes," and sped away. Another man climbed up a light post and pulled down a banner of Capriles, which his cohorts doused with gasoline and burned.

The frenzied government backers moved on to a building belonging to the opposition Democratic Action party and threw a Molotov cocktail inside, causing a small fire. State police arrived and safeguarded the building, but made no attempt to arrest the aggressors.

Bad Guys

FBI investigated Reid along with Whittemore in 2008

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Federal prosecutors have disclosed a 2008 FBI investigation of indicted Nevada power broker Harvey Whittemore and longtime friend Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

The investigation, conducted by the FBI's Washington field office, was sparked by media reports about Reid's role in helping Whittemore's Coyote Springs master- planned community north of Las Vegas clear government hurdles. It did not result in criminal charges against either man.

Whittemore's defense lawyers want a federal judge to allow testimony about the investigation at his federal trial next month on charges of unlawfully funneling $138,000 in campaign contributions to Reid in 2007. Prosecutors have said the Nevada Democrat was unaware of the alleged scheme.

Defense lawyers, led by Dominic Gentile and Vincent Savarese, argued in court papers filed this week that the 2008 investigation shows Whittemore had no criminal intent to make illegal campaign contributions.

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Baucus warns of 'huge train wreck' enacting ObamaCare provisions

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© AP Photo/J. Scott ApplewhiteSenate Finance Committee Chairman Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. questions Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius as she testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, April 17, 2013, before the committee's hearing on President Barack Obama's budget proposal for fiscal year 2014.
Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) said Wednesday he fears a "train wreck" as the Obama administration implements its signature healthcare law.

Baucus, the chairman of the chamber's powerful Finance Committee and a key architect of the healthcare reform law, said he fears people do not understand how the law will work.

"I just see a huge train wreck coming down," he told Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at a Wednesday hearing. "You and I have discussed this many times, and I don't see any results yet."

Baucus pressed Sebelius for details about how the Health Department will explain the law and raise awareness of its provisions, which are supposed to take effect in just a matter of months.

"I'm very concerned that not enough is being done so far - very concerned," Baucus said.

Vader

U.S. military to step up presence in Jordan in light of Syria civil war

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A man stands in the remains of a house following a reported airstrike by the Syrian air force in Aleppo on Monday, April 15. Tensions in Syria first flared in March 2011, escalating into a civil war that still rages.
In a critical indication of growing U.S. military involvement in the civil war in Syria, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has ordered the deployment of more American troops to Jordan.

Hagel announced the deployment, which was first reported on CNN, in a statement to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday.

He said the troops will work alongside Jordanian forces to "improve readiness and prepare for a number of scenarios."
The troops, which will number up to 200, are from the headquarters of the 1st Armored Division at Fort Bliss, Texas, two Defense Department officials told CNN.

The deployment "creates an additional capability" beyond what has been there, one official said, and will give the United States the ability to "potentially form a joint task force for military operations, if ordered."

The new deployment will include communications and intelligence specialists who will assist the Jordanians and "be ready for military action" if President Barack Obama were to order it, the official said.

Bomb

Experts: Antigovernment groups probably not behind Boston bombings

boston marathan
© Julio Cortez/AP
While officials are still investigating who was behind the deadly bombings at the Boston Marathon, President Obama made it clear on Tuesday that authorities still don't know whether domestic or foreign actors are responsible for the attack.

But one message from domestic terrorism experts is clear: Most of the evidence points against an antigovernment group being responsible for the attack. Several militia groups, who fiercely and sometimes violently fight to keep their Second Amendment rights, have come out against the bombings in Boston.

While some of the factors surrounding the Boston bombings could point to these groups - a simplistic homemade bomb, causing mass casualties, falling on Tax Day - other factors don't add up. For many of these groups, the date that most matters to them is not Tax Day or Patriots' Day or even Hitler's birthday, but the anniversary of the Waco siege (pictured below). On April 19, 1993, 76 people died when a radical, antigovernment sect's compound in Texas burnt to the ground after days of firefights with federal officials. When Timothy McVeigh bombed the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people, it fell on the anniversary of the Waco raid, which he cited as a motivation for the attack.

Bomb

"False-flag" meme goes mainstream with Boston Marathon bombing

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© unknown
On September 11th, 2001, the US media began chanting "Bin Laden" in unison almost from the moment the attack was reported. The possibility that US government insiders had orchestrated the attack - in order to blame Muslims, launch wars on Muslim countries, and seize near-absolute power - was never mentioned.

Bin Laden's repeated statements that he deplored the 9/11 attacks, considered them un-Islamic, and suspected that American supporters of Israel were behind them failed to penetrate the corporate media bubble. When the FBI definitively stated that Bin Laden was "not wanted" for 9/11 because there was "no hard evidence" of his involvement, the media blacked out the story.

But after the Boston bombings of April 16th, 2013, even the corporate monopoly media could no longer ignore the possibility of a false-flag attack. Yahoo News asked "Who's behind the Boston Marathon bombings?" and offered 4 theories: (1) Islamic jihadists, (2) Right-wing militia types, (3) the government, and (4) a criminally-insane lone wolf.

Numbers (1), (2), and (4), of course, are the usual suspects. But including (3) "the government" on the suspects list is unprecedented for a mainstream news story reporting on a domestic terror incident.

Bad Guys

Best of the Web: The Boston bombings in context: How the FBI fosters, funds and equips American terrorists

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The Boston Marathon bombing has provoked shock, grief and outrage from around the world. After decades of conditioning, the public automatically equates such terrorism with Muslim radicals. But the evidence shows that every major terror plot on American soil in the past 10 years has been fostered, funded and equipped by one organization: the FBI.

People around the world watched in horror this week as explosions rocked the finish line of the Boston Marathon, turning a day of sportsmanship and celebration into one of shock, grief and outrage. As with all such events, the desire to discover who was behind this cowardly act has driven many into a speculative frenzy. And, in a sad reminder of the indoctrination that the Western world has been under for over a decade now in the mythical "war of terror," it did not take long at all before the collective finger of the mob was pointed squarely in the direction of Muslim terrorists.


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Failure of U.S. war on terror and hyper security state: Clueless on Boston

Boston marathon bombings
© EPA
The bombing at the Boston Marathon was a tragic event, which like the events of 9-11, caused, are causing and have caused, untold suffering and pain to innocent unsuspecting civilians, and my heart and I am sure the hearts of all normal, thinking people go out to the innocent people who were killed or had their lives torn apart. Condolences certainly go out to all of those affected by this, but in light of more than a decade of a U.S. war on terror, the tragedy would indicate a complete and utter failure in protecting the citizenry.

Even before the dust had settled the finger pointing began worldwide and the usual suspects were named: Al-Qaeda, Muslims, Tuareg sympathizers, terrorists of every persuasion and, according to one Russian media outlet citing CNN, a "dark-skinned" suspect. Of course it is a natural function, when an event like this occurs, after the initial shock and trauma recede, to feel anger and a desire for retribution, yet no one has really pointed the finger where it should be pointed because people are too afraid or too conditioned or both to actually face the truth that is right before their eyes.

Americans love to point to the perpetrators of their endless events of mass violence, child killings, mass shootings and now terrorism as being some sort of abomination and isolated single events or as being in some way "evil victimizing innocents" yet refuse, no matter how clear and in their faces the evidence is, that American society, their own government and they themselves and the culture they support are directly to blame.

Attention

Obama quietly passed law making insider trading easier for US politicians

The whole concept of avoiding 'conflicts of interest' is a virtue now consigned to history in the United States.

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© 21st Century Wire
Remember the good old days, when the good men and women of America got into politics to help serve their country, and not for the money?

Imagine if you were able to pass a law that would regulate your own behavior and ultimately define the consequences of that behavior. That's what all politicians in Washington DC do on a regular basis.

When it comes to regulating their investments whilst in office, they are able to pass laws that allow them to use special foreknowledge (that only lawmakers and government regulators have) for personal gain.

It's all about finding that golden loophole. Once upon a time it was called "insider trading"... hardly a crime on Wall Street anymore (props to Goldman Sachs), and neither in Washington DC, or so it seems, according to the President and his legislative branch.

Now we know how hard it is to be a politician these days. Many of you genuinely feel that their should be some additional value-added perks to your job as a public servant. After all, our elected officials deserve some extra compensation for shunning the public sector and offering their incredible talents for the public good, right?

While tragic events in Boston are dominating the national media this week, US President Barack Obama quietly signed a bill, and one which passed rather swiftly through Congress we might add... it's a bill that prevents key financial disclosure forms filed by senior governmental employees from being posted online. In a rare display of cross-party cooperation, both sides of the aisle seemed happy to approve (surprise, surprise) by unanimous consent.

Bomb

Israeli police head to US to aid in Boston Marathon bombing investigation

 Israel Police, Major General Yohanan Danino
© AFP Photo / Jack GuezThe head of the Israel Police, Major General Yohanan Danino
The investigation into Monday's deadly bombing at the Boston Marathon has officially gone international: law enforcement officials from Israel have been sent to the United States to assist in the probe.

Israel Police Chief Yohanan Danino says he has dispatched officials to Boston, Massachusetts, where they will meet with Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and other authorities, the Times of Israel Reports.

Citing an earlier report published by the newspaper Maariv, Times of Israel writes that Danino has dispatched police officers to participate in discussions that "will center on the Boston Marathon bombings and deepening professional cooperation between the law enforcement agencies of both countries."

The paper reports that Israeli law enforcement planned the trip before the deadly pair of bombings on Monday that has so far claimed three lives, but the discussions will now shift focus in order to see how help from abroad can expand the investigation.

In an address made Tuesday, Israel President Shimon Peres said that tragedies such as this week's incident in Boston, sadly, bring people together from across the world.

"When it comes to events like this, all of us are one family. We feel a part of the people who paid such a high price. God bless them," Peres said. "Today the real problem is terror, and terror is not an extension of policy: Their policy is terror, their policy is to threaten. Terrorists divide people, they kill innocent people."