Sparks were flying yesterday in what is typically a snooze-worthy Senate session. It felt like alien body snatchers had decided to remove the zombies and return the real U.S. Senators to their chairs on the Senate Banking Committee. Senators, right and left, asked tough, probing questions of the nation's banking regulators, leaving many squirming in their chairs.

The session was so unusual that Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts, and Senator Richard Shelby, a Republican from Alabama, closed out the session in complete agreement that there is something seriously broken about the justice system in America.

Senator Warren told the hearing that in the past year, three of the nation's largest banks - JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Bank of America - have admitted breaking the law and settled the claims for $35 billion. The Senator continued:

"As Judge Rakoff of the Southern District of New York has noted, the law on this is clear. No corporation can break the law unless an individual within that corporation broke the law. Yet, despite the misconduct at these banks that generated tens of billions of dollars in settlement payments by the companies, not a single senior executive at these banks has been criminally prosecuted. Now, I know that your agencies can't bring prosecutions directly, but you're supposed to refer cases to the Justice Department when you think individuals should be prosecuted. So, can you tell me how many senior executives at these three banks you have referred to the Justice Department for prosecution?"

New sanctions against Russia over the situation in Ukraine should be postponed, Swiss President Didier Burkhalter, who is the chairman-in-office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), said Wednesday in Prague.

Burkhalter was quoted by Reuters as saying the ceasefire is "a real opportunity". He also said the truce should be given time before the West adopts more punitive measures against Russia.

Russian officials and companies came under Western sanctions, including visa bans, asset freezes, and sectoral restrictions for Russia's incorporation of Crimea after a coup in Ukraine in February and for what the West claimed was Moscow's alleged involvement in mass protests in Ukraine's embattled southeast, which Russia has repeatedly denied.

In response, Moscow imposed on August 6 a one-year ban on imports of beef, pork, poultry, fish, cheeses, fruit, vegetables and dairy products from Australia, Canada, the EU, the United States and Norway.

Fierce clashes between troops loyal to Kiev and local militias in the southeastern Ukrainian Donetsk and Luhansk regions during Kiev's military operation to regain control over the breakaway territories, which call themselves the Donetsk and Luhansk People's republics (DPR and LPR), have killed hundreds of civilians, brought massive destruction and forced hundreds of thousands to flee Ukraine's southeast.

The parties to the Ukrainian conflict agreed on a ceasefire during OSCE-mediated talks in Belarusian capital Minsk on September 5.

Have you ever wondered how complete and unconditional betrayal looks? How a knife looks when it is stuck by a steady hand right between the shoulder blades during a friendly embrace? How poison looks when it is mixed into a glass of water given to a man dying of thirst? As it turns out, all this looks far more ordinary and prosaic than even the most meagre and impoverished human imagination could portray. As it turns out, betrayal is simply two sheets of paper with a row of signatures at the end of a column of dry, numbered paragraphs.

The publicized text of the ceasefire agreement that was signed in Minsk is what this very real betrayal looks like. The betrayal of everything that the Novorossiya Militiamen fought and died for. The betrayal of Novorossiya itself, because, based on the text of this agreement, there is no place envisioned for Novorossiya, nor for the Militia and nor even for any "special status" for the People's Republics.

All that this so-called ceasefire agreement provides for is a temporary status of local self-government in certain areas of the Donetsk and the Lugansk regions. Even that is conditional on the complete elimination of the Militia and the release of all Ukrainian prisoners of war; moreover, the Militiamen are obliged not only to lay down arms, but also to leave the territory of Ukraine. In return, Ukraine promises amnesty to the parties to the conflict, a national dialogue, and certain measures aimed at improving the humanitarian situation in the Donbass. The LPR and the DPR are not even mentioned in the text of the agreement, and their representatives have signed it without any titles or ranks.

Independence and statehood? Novorossiya? A temporary special status in certain areas of the Donetsk and the Lugansk regions - here is all you have of independent Novorossiya. Here is all your freedom and sovereignty. You can write out these words a thousand times, print them on paper, and then shove them deep down your throat. In any event, death by strangulation is better than death through shame. Ukraine does not even intend to give autonomy to the People's Republics. She did not even deign to mention these very Republics in the agreement. Temporary self-government in certain areas - that is the extent of Ukrainian generosity for the rebellious Donbass.

In April 2014, fresh from riots in Maidan Square and the February 22 coup, and less than a month before the May 2 massacre in Odessa, the IMF approved a $17 billion loan program to Ukraine's junta. Normal IMF practice is to lend only up to twice a country's quote in one year. This was eight times as high.

Four months later, on August 29, just as Kiev began losing its attempt at ethnic cleansing against the eastern Donbas region, the IMF signed off on the first loan ever to a side engaged in a civil war, not to mention rife with insider capital flight and a collapsing balance of payments. Based on fictitiously trouble-free projections of the ability to pay, the loan supported Ukraine's hernia currency long enough to enable the oligarchs' banks to move their money quickly into Western hard-currency accounts before the hernia plunged further and was worth even fewer euros and dollars.

This loan demonstrates the degree to which the IMF is an arm of U.S. Cold War politics. Kiev used the loan for military expenses to attack the Eastern provinces, and the loan terms imposed the usual budget austerity, as if this would stabilize the country's finances. Almost nothing will be received from the war-torn East, where basic infrastructure has been destroyed for power generation, water, hospitals and the civilian housing areas that bore the brunt of the attack. Nearly a million civilians are reported to have fled to Russia. Yet the IMF release announced: "The IMF praised the government's commitment to economic reforms despite the ongoing conflict."[1] A quarter of Ukraine's exports normally are from eastern provinces, and are sold mainly to Russia. But Kiev has been bombing Donbas industry and left its coal mines without electricity.

Update: Bloomberg notes that Russian gas deliveries to Europe are suddenly in accelerating flux.

• Ukraine today received request from Poland to ship 11mcm/d of Russian gas, Ihor Prokopiv, CEO of Ukraine's pipeline operator Uktransgaz, says in Kiev. Gazprom sent note it's ready to supply just 7mcm, Prokopiv says
• Poland halted reverse gas flow to Ukraine of 4mcm/d by 3pm Warsaw, later than initially planned, Prokopiv

And yet:

• Gazprom says gas flows to Poland remaining at 23mcm/d

So all is well on the surface. Just don't look underneath.

In Andrew Niccol's devastating character study, Hawke plays a drone pilot who's ordered by the CIA to off terrorists - as well as civilians - in a series of targeted strikes.

In the past few years, Hollywood, which has long held a mirror to society's myriad blemishes, began to focus its lens on the United States' controversial drone program - a battalion of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) issuing targeted missile attacks largely in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Northwest Pakistan. A drone targeting suspected terrorist Abu Nazir killed his family, setting into motion the events of Showtime's Homeland. The Fox miniseries 24: Live Another Day saw a massive drone wreak havoc on London. The superhero blockbuster X-Men: Days of Future Past involved Jennifer Lawrence and Co. going back in time to stop a campaign to unleash mutant-targeting drones, dubbed Sentinels. And another, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, centered on the nefarious organization Hydra's attempt to launch a trio of drone-dispatching megaships over the country for our own protection.

But never has the drone program, first implemented by then-President George W. Bush and accelerated under President Barack Obama, been critiqued with the level of precision and humanity as it does in Good Kill, which made its world premiere at the 2014 Venice Film Festival.

The film, which bears the disclaimer "based on actual events," is set in 2010 during the greatest string of targeting killing in our nation's history. That year, the U.S. carried out approximately 122 drone strikes, according to data supplied by the New America Foundation - killing 849 people, including 788 militants, 16 civilians, and 45 unidentified victims. By comparison, in the six previous years of the drone program's existence, 100 strikes were issued.

Russia is not going to get involved in a new arms race, President Vladimir Putin said as he ordered his government to work out "balanced and realistic" defense strategy for 2016 through 2025.

"Someone really wants to unleash a new arms race," Russia's president said at a meeting with senior defense industry officials. "We, of course, are not going to be involved in this race."

Putin tasked the defense industry to work out a new military doctrine by December. His comments came a week after Russia said Sept. 2 it would review the doctrine, in response to NATO announcing its intentions to expand in Eastern Europe amid Ukrainian crisis.

Ever since the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) expressed their unison through the formation of a joint Development Bank - Durban, South Africa on 27 March 2013 - the Zionist-Anglo-Saxon caliphate attempted to divide them. The BRICS constitute some 45% of the world population and close to 30% of global GDP. The BRICS idea is to issue a joint alternative currency, fully detached from the US dollar and its greed economy.

In the meantime a number of other countries would like to join the BRICS, including Argentina, Venezuela, Iran, Mongolia, Malaysia and others, which would result in about one third of the world's economic output and half of the global inhabitants.

This gives the BRICS a profile of strength surpassing that of the United States and Europe together. China alone is not only already the world's largest economy, China is also dominating the Asian market of some 4.2 billion people, 60% of the world populations and a combined GDP of about US$ 20 trillion, equivalent to about US$ 25 trillion, when comparing purchasing power with the dollar based US economy of about US$ 17 trillion. Asia registered an average growth rate of almost 8% over the past few years, compared to that of the western world, hovering around 1%.

There is no need for the BRICS to fear US interference - divide to rein - if they are able to solidify their union with solidarity - political and monetary solidarity, as well as common trade policies - and if they have the political will to decouple their economies from the dollar - which is key for the BRICS success.

Ukrainian government on Friday will consider Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk's border plan.

"We will approve the 'Wall' project," Yatsenyuk said at a cabinet meeting.

The border with Russia is 2,295 km long. It is necessary to immediately close the border, deputy border guard chief Pavel Shisholin said, when presenting the plan.

The plan calls for immediately starting engineering work to dig a four-metre wide and two-metre deep ditch and equip it with electronic systems. The border in the sea is also planned to be under full electronic monitoring.

Yatsenyuk said the government would apply to the EU for financial aid to impalement the project, adding the government had funds to implement the first stage.

A Russian senator said bridges, not walls and ditches, should be built between Russia and Ukraine.

"Yatsenyuk's statement about construction of a moat or a wall or mining of the border is quite an inadmissible move of history planned by Kiev authorities," Yuri Vorobyov, deputy chairman of the Russian parliament's upper house Federation Council, said on Thursday, commenting on Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk's statement about construction of a wall on the border with Russia.

"There is no innocent explanation for the sudden disappearance of MH17 from the media and political spotlight. The plane's black box has been held in Britain for examination for weeks, and US and Russian spy satellites and military radar were intensively scanning east Ukraine at the time of the crash. The claim that Washington does not have detailed knowledge of the circumstances of the crash and the various forces involved is not credible."

- Niles Williamson, "Why have the media and Obama administration gone silent on MH17?", World Socialist Web Site

See: 11 minute you tube "MH17 - We know with 99% certainty who shot down MH17"

The Obama administration has failed to produce any hard evidence that pro-Russia separatists were responsible for the downing of Malaysia Flight 17. The administration's theory - that the jetliner was downed by a surface-to-air missile launched from rebel territory in east Ukraine - is not supported by radar data, satellite imagery, eyewitness testimony or forensic evidence. In fact, there is no factual basis for the hypothesis at all. It's merely politically-motivated speculation that's been repeated endlessly in the media to shape public opinion. The preponderance of evidence suggests a different scenario altogether, that is, that MH17 was shot down by Ukrainian fighters in an effort to frame the pro-Russia separatists and demonize Russia by implication. This is precisely why the MH17 story has vanished from all the major media for the last three weeks. It's because the bloody fingerprints point to Obama's puppet-government in Kiev.

So what are the facts?