Puppet MastersS

Dollar

Popular Russian bloggers who publish unverified information or use obscene language can now be fined by the government

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© Reuters/Eric Thayer
As of August 1 all blogs having 3,000 daily readers or more will have to follow many of the rules that exist in conventional mass media, such as tougher control on published information or the ban on use of explicit language.

The set of amendments to the Administrative Code, the Law on Information and the Law on Communications , dubbed by reporters as the 'Bill on Bloggers', was signed into force by President Putin in early May this year.

The draft introduced the definition of a popular blogger as someone whose internet page attracts at least 3,000 readers every day (earlier this week the authorities announced that these should be unique visitors, not just page hits). Such authors will now have to register with the state watchdog Roskomnadzor, disclose their real identity and follow the same rules as journalists working in conventional state-registered mass media.

The restrictions include the demand to verify information before publishing it and abstain from releasing reports containing slander, hate speech, extremist calls or other banned information such as, for example, advice on suicide. Also, the law bans popular bloggers from using obscene language, drawing heavy criticism and mockery from the online crowd.

Vader

Nowhere to turn: Gaza genocide and Arab fratricide

gaza coverage
© unknown
While many have not been shy about calling these crimes genocide, they have come under attack for using the "G" word. Is genocide an appropriate term to use? Well, it is if one has respect for international law and the rules of the genocide convention.

Lets not mince words. Israelis are committing genocide in Gaza. But the United Nations is loath to use the "G" word and it us using the "C" (condemn) word instead. Why? Money talks. The top financier of the United Nations is America with a whopping 22.00% in direct funds (followed by Japan 10.83%, Germany 7.14%, France 5.59%, and GB 5.18%), if the United Nations called out the genocide in Gaza, its top financier would have to be punished for its complicity.

Eye 1

Google having a hard time complying with EU privacy law

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© Reuters/Francois Lenoir
Google says that complying with the EU court ruling is difficult as some requests from users who want to be forgotten contain "false and inaccurate information."

"We generally have to rely on the requester for information, without assurance beyond the requester's own assertions as to its accuracy. Some requests turn out to have been made with false and inaccurate information," Google said in a letter to the European Court of Justice (ECJ).

The letter, written by Peter Fleischer, Google's Global Privacy Counsel, contains responses to the questionnaire that the ECJ sent to Google. It also listed some challenges that the Internet giant faced while complying the rule.

Google also added that in some cases the requests lack "the larger factual context... without which it is difficult to balance the competing interests."

Megaphone

Russia slams Kiev satellite images of MH17 that carry altered time stamps

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© Image from mil.ruThe satellite image on the left was provided by the Russian Defense Ministry on 14 July, 2014. On the right is the image that Kiev claims were taken by its satellites on July 16, 2014.
Satellite images Kiev published as 'proof' it didn't deploy anti-aircraft batteries around the MH17 crash site carry altered time-stamps and are from days after the MH17 tragedy, the Russian Defense Ministry has revealed.

The images, which Kiev claims were taken by its satellites at the same time as those taken by Russian satellites, are neither Ukrainian nor authentic, according to Moscow's statement.

The Defense Ministry said the images were apparently made by an American KeyHole reconnaissance satellite, because the two Ukrainian satellites currently in orbit, Sich-1 and Sich-2, were not positioned over the part of Ukraine's Donetsk Region shown in the pictures.

Moscow claims weather and lighting conditions in the images were not possible at the dates and times Ukraine claims they were made, the Russian ministry said.

USA

Obama: After 911 "we tortured some folks"

torture bush obama
© Unknown
President Barack Obama says in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, the United States did things that were wrong and crossed the line. He says, quote, "we tortured some folks."

Obama is commenting on a Senate investigation into the CIA's interrogation techniques. A report on that investigation's results is expected to be released in the coming weeks.

Obama says it's important to remember how horrified Americans were after 9/11. But he says it's important to remember the U.S. must live up to its values.

Obama also says he has full confidence in CIA Director John Brennan. The CIA director has apologized to senators after the CIA's inspector general found agency employees improperly searched the computers of Senate staffers conducting the investigation into post-9/11 interrogation and detention practices.

Life Preserver

Best of the Web: Ukraine: Can the US save face from a fact-free zone of its own creation?

US and fact-free zone
© Unknown
The Americans are finding out the hard way that a fact-free zone is not a comfortable place to inhabit. The initial knee-jerk allegations, voiced by Obama, by the screechy UN representative Samantha Power, by John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, and any number of talking heads, were that the downing of flight MH17 was all Putin's fault. These were swiftly followed by a complete and utter lack of official evidence of any Russian involvement but lots of strange, unexplained coincidences pointing to Ukrainian and American involvement. These were, in turn, followed by an uncharacteristically frank admission from US intelligence that there is no proof of Russian involvement. The newly installed Ukrainian oligarch-turned-president Poroshenko (code-name "Piglet") switched from claiming that he had proof of Russian complicity to being very very quiet.

Incompetently concocted fake "evidence" of this and that continues to appear on social media sites, only to be swiftly disproved. Once disproved, the fake evidence vanishes, only to be replaced by more of the same. The latest fake is of Russian artillery bombardment from across the border. All of this has added up to quite an awkward situation for the Americans. Barefaced lying may be fun and profitable, but it does not provide a solid foundation for foreign policy. Nobody wants to go down in history for blowing up the world over some fake Youtube videos.

Brick Wall

Another BRICS member stands up!: India slams US global hegemony by scuttling global trade deal putting future of WTO in doubt

BRICS members
© UnknownThe information and economic wars being waged against Russia are just the beginning. From now on, every BRICS nation should expect similar treatment.
Yesterday we reported that with the Russia-China axis firmly secured, the scramble was on to assure the alliance of that last, and critical, Eurasian powerhouse: India. It was here that Russia had taken the first symbolic step when earlier in the week its central bank announced it had started negotiations to use national currencies in settlements,a process which would culminate with the elimination of the US currency from bilateral settlements.

Russia was not the first nation to assess the key significance of India in concluding perhaps the most important geopolitical axis of the 21st century - we reported that Japan, scrambling to find a natural counterbalance to China with which its relations have regressed back to World War II levels, was also hot and heavy in courting India. "The Japanese are facing huge political problems in China," said Kondapalli in a phone interview. "So Japanese companies are now looking to shift to other countries. They're looking at India."

Of course, for India the problem with a Japanese alliance is that it would also by implication involve the US, the country which has become insolvent and demographically imploding Japan's backer of last and only resort, and thus burn its bridges with both Russia and China. A question emerged: would India embrace the US/Japan axis while foregoing its natural Developing Market, and BRICS, allies, Russia and China.

We now have a clear answer and it is a resounding no, because in what was the latest slap on the face of now crashing on all sides US global hegemony, earlier today India refused to sign a critical global trade dea. Specifically, India's unresolved demands led to the collapse of the first major global trade reform pact in two decades. WTO ministers had already agreed the global reform of customs procedures known as "trade facilitation" in Bali, Indonesia, last December, but were unable to overcome last minute Indian objections and get it into the WTO rule book by a July 31 deadline.

Rocket

NATO confirms: Kiev did use ballistic missiles in E. Ukraine

Kiev ballistic missile
© RIA Novodti/Igor Zarembo
NATO has confirmed that Ukrainian forces have started using powerful ballistic missiles against militants in the east of the country. Kiev previously denied the fact, revealed to DW television by NATO sources in Brussels.

The use of missiles starting this week was first broken by CNN's Barbara Starr on Wednesday, who cited "three sources" in the Pentagon who said that evidence had been obtained with satellite imagery.

A source in NATO's press service speaking to Deutsche Welle also cited US intelligence. Confirming the strikes, the official did not provide any further details.

DW, which published the information on its Russian-language and Ukrainian-language websites, says that it has lodged an official query about the use of ballistic missiles with Pentagon, but has so far received no answer.

Most experts thought that the likely weapon involved in shelling the militants, who have been retreating in the face of an intensifying government offensive, was the OTR-21 Tochka.

Arrow Up

Western plutocracy goes bear hunting

Putin and Bear
© dragonflycap.com

The post-Cold War status quo in Eastern Europe, not to mention in Western Europe, is now dead.

For Western plutocracy, that 0.00001% at the top, the real Masters of the Universe, Russia is the ultimate prize; an immense treasure of natural resources, forests, pristine water, minerals, oil and gas. Enough to drive any NSA-to-CIA Orwellian/Panopticon war game to ecstasy. How to pounce and profit from such a formidable loot?

Enter Globocop NATO. Barely out of having its collective behind unceremoniously kicked by a bunch of mountain warriors with Kalashnikovs, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is now fast "pivoting" - that same old Mackinder to Brzezinski game - to Russia. The road map will be put in place at the group's summit in early September in Wales.

Meanwhile, the MH17 tragedy is undergoing a fast metamorphosis. When the on-site observations by this Canadian OSCE monitor (watch the video carefully) are compounded with this analysis by a German pilot, a strong probability points to a Ukrainian Su-25's 30 mm auto-cannon firing at the cockpit of MH17, leading to massive decompression and the crash.

No missile - not even an air-to-air R-60M, not to mention a BUK (the star of the initial, frenetic American spin). The new possible narrative fits with on-site testimony by eyewitness in this now famously "disappeared" BBC report. Bottom line: MH17 configured as a false flag, planned by the US and botched by Kiev. One can barely imagine the tectonic geopolitical repercussions were the false flag to be fully exposed.

Malaysia has handed out the flight recorders to the UK; this means NATO, and this spells out manipulation by the CIA. Air Algerie AH5017 went down after MH17. The analysis has already been released. That begs the question of why it is taking so long for MH17's black boxes to be analyzed/tampered with.

Yoda

Putin reminds the world of dangers of excessive ambitions - WWI tragedy

Putin WW1
© RIA Novosti/Aleksey NikolskyiPresident Vladimir Putin speaks at a ceremony to unveil a monument to WWI heroes on Poklonnaya Hill.
The tragedy of WWI reminds us what excessive ambitions, an unwillingness to listen to each other and violations of liberties lead to, Russia's president said. He was speaking at the opening ceremony of the memorial to the Heroes of WWI in Moscow.

According to Putin, the memorial is not only "a tribute to the great deeds," but also a warning that "this peace is fragile."

"And we have to guard peace. And remember that the most valuable thing on Earth is a peaceful and quiet life," he added.

Numerous examples in world history show "what a terrible price" is paid if human rights and liberties are violated for the sake of serving vested interests.
"Humankind should grasp one truth: violence generates violence. And the way to peace and prosperity is made up of good will and dialogue, and the memory of the lessons of the last wars."
He added that Russia stepped for strong and trusting relationships between the countries throughout the centuries.