Puppet MastersS


USA

The State of Our Nation: The greatest threat to our freedoms is the government

John W. Whitehead
The Rutherford Institute
Wed, 29 Jan 2014 14:48 UTC
"Twelve voices were shouting in anger, and they were all alike. No question, now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which." ― George Orwell, Animal Farm
6 percent
© SOTT.net
What was striking about this year's State of the Union address was not the sheer arrogance of the president's remarks, the staged nature of the proceedings and interactions, or the predictable posturing of the rebuttals, but the extent to which the members of the various branches of government - President Obama, Congress, the Supreme Court, and the assorted government agencies - are just one big, brawling, noisy, semi-incestuous clan.

Watching these bureaucrats, both elected and appointed, interact in the unguarded moments before the event, with their hugging and kissing and nudging and joking and hobnobbing and general high spirits, I was reminded anew that these people - Republicans and Democrats alike - are united in a common goal, and it is not to protect and defend the Constitution.

No, as Orwell recognized in Animal Farm, their common goal is to maintain the status quo, a goal that is helped along by an unquestioning, easily mollified, corporate media. In this way, the carefully crafted spectacle that is the State of the Union address is just that: an exaggerated farce of political theater intended to dazzle, distract and divide us, all the while the police state marches steadily forward.

No matter what the president and his cohorts say or how convincingly they say it, the reality Americans must contend with is that the world is no better the day after President Obama's State of the Union address than it was the day before. Indeed, if the following rundown on the actual state of our freedoms is anything to go by, the world is a far more dangerous place.
Read More...
Star of David

"We need to get rid of the Palestinians" - Israeli minister Lapid


Redress Online
Fri, 17 Jan 2014 14:32 UTC
yair lapid
© Joe CummingsIsraeli finance minister Yair Lapid
We're beginning to get an idea of what the outcome of the latest series of US-sponsored Israeli-Palestinian talks might look like.

The talks began in July 2013 and are due to conclude with a final status agreement in April this year.

In a nutshell, the outcome is likely to be a double whammy of ethnic cleansing of some of Israel's Arab citizens and the annexation of large chunks of the illegally occupied Palestinian West Bank.

According to the Times of Israel, this diabolical plan - the brainchild of Israel's Moldovan foreign minister and former nightclub bouncer, Avigdor Lieberman, calls for towns in "The Triangle" region southeast of Haifa - including heavily populated Arab cities - to become part of a Palestinian state in any peace agreement, in exchange for the Jewish colonies of the West Bank. It would mean the ethnic cleansing of about 300,000 Israeli Arabs.
Read More...
Take 2

Coup in western Ukraine: The Arab Spring unleashed in Europe

Andrew Korybko
Eurasia Review
Sat, 25 Jan 2014 14:31 UTC
Image
Rioters have seized the administration building in Lvov and forced the governor to resign. It is not known who is currently in power in this region, but a puppet government formed by 'opposition forces' may soon be set up. Demands for 'autonomy', or quite possibly, explicit separatist flirtations, may give Klitschko and his thugs added bargaining power to use against the democratically elected government during 'negotiations'. It is likely that even more extremist activity will occur, led by Klischko, as he proclaimed on 22 January that, "If I have to go (on to the streets) under bullets, I shall go there under bullets." Batkivshchyna Party leader Arseniy Yatsenyuk seconded this provocative threat to delve Ukraine into de-facto civil warfare, as he similarly stated on 22 January that "Tomorrow [23 January] we will go forward together. And if it's a bullet in the forehead, then it's a bullet in the forehead, but in an honest, fair and brave way."

It is evident now that both men kept their threats in encouraging their respective militias to unleash carnage within the country. As with the Arab Spring events, these provocateurs are fiending for 'some of their own' to be killed by government forces seeking to re-establish control over anarchic areas. A full-fledged military or Berkut response by Yanukovich is exactly what Klitschko and Yatsenyuk want. For them, the more dead 'protesters', the better. It should be kept in mind that 1980s Poland was placed under martial law for much less violent disturbances than what we are witnessing in Ukraine at the moment.
Read More...
Star of David

White House reportedly losing patience with Israel's stooges in Congress


Redress Online
Thu, 23 Jan 2014 13:53 UTC
White House
© Unknown
For decades successive United States administrations have tolerated the fact that Congress is riddled with traitors who routinely put Israel's interests above those of their own country. However, ominous clouds are hovering over the heads of Israel's settlers on Capitol Hill.

According to an unnamed American official quoted by Israel Radio on 23 January, the White House, in particular President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry, are losing patience with "Jewish activity" on behalf of Israel in Congress.

Obama and Kerry, the official said, have had enough of the Israel stooges' constant criticism of the US government and their attempts at enabling Israel to set US policy.
Read More...
Eye 1

Gates Foundation to fund surveillance program, tracking students from pre-school to graduation


AlterNet
Wed, 29 Jan 2014 00:00 UTC
Image
© Konstantin Yolshin/Shutterstock

The education sector, long frustrated by transient fads that have failed to uplift decades of sub-par student achievement, thinks it has finally found its knight in shining armor: an omnipresent data archive that will track students from pre-school to graduation, noting every teacher and test score. Then it will tack that trail of data onto a person well after they leave school.

Enthusiasts say they hope the constant tracking will help policy-makers identify the precise factors that make a successful student, and foster the creation of well-informed education policy, while opponents worry that growing intrusiveness will normalize the mass surveillance and obsessive record-keeping of humans foretold in dystopian literature.
Read More...
Handcuffs

Cold punishment: Ukrainians outraged after policeman filmed abusing naked protester in freezing cold


The Raw Story
Thu, 23 Jan 2014 15:06 UTC
Image
© Astro Awani
A member of Ukraine's elite Berkut riot police force assaulted and humiliated a naked protester after he was detained in freezing cold temperatures in Kiev, according to a video posted Thursday.

The Ukrainian interior ministry swiftly apologised for the horrific incident, which recalled notorious prisoner abuse scandals like that at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

The man had apparently been arrested during the clashes between police and protesters that have rocked Kiev over the last days.

The video, which was posted on YouTube and was rapidly broadcast by Ukrainian opposition channels, shows the arrested protester completely naked except for his socks and being roughly pushed into a police bus.

But he is then called back and is forced to stand still on the snow in the freezing temperatures while a police officer in a balaclava films him with his mobile phone.

He is then forced to pose for pictures clutching a spade, alongside another balaclava-clad officer who mockingly puts his arm around the prisoner. This officer then hits him roughly on the back of the head.
Read More...
Sherlock

Fact checking the 2014 State of the Union address

Glenn Kessler
Washington Post
Tue, 28 Jan 2014 08:36 UTC
Image
© Charles Dharapak / APPresident Barack Obama gives his State of the Union address on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday Jan. 28, 2014, as Vice President Joe Biden and House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, listen.
A State of the Union address is often difficult to fact-check, no matter who is president. The speech is a product of many hands and is carefully vetted, so major errors of fact are relatively rare. But State of the Union addresses often are very political speeches, an argument for the president's policies, so context is sometimes missing.

Here is a guide through some of President Obama's more fact-challenged claims, in the order in which he made them. At the end, we also examine one fishy fact in the Republican response. As is our practice with live events, we do not award Pinocchio rankings, which are reserved for complete columns.

Comment: Also see: The real State of the Union

Read More...
Mr. Potato

Best of the Web: The real State of the Union

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times Online
Wed, 29 Jan 2014 05:47 UTC
State of the union 2014
© Getty ImagesAnd the circus continues. Another state of the union address, another set of lies to camouflage the fascist takeover of America.
US President Barack Obama's State of the Union (SOTU) address was a somewhat surrealist spectacle. Way beyond avalanches of PR spin, the US government for a long time has not exactly done wonders for the public good. So as it advertises itself in front of a dysfunctional US Congress dismissed as repellent by an overwhelming majority of Americans - including, and expanding, on those 76% who are living paycheck to paycheck - what's left is a grand, old Hollywood production.

And Obama, of course, is a decent actor who can deliver a decent speech - certainly better than Ronnie Reagan, whom Gore Vidal used to describe as "the acting president".

The key theme of SOTU 2014 was the appalling income inequality in the US. Call it an appendix of this past week at the World Economic Forum in Davos - that snowy Vegas for the 0.00001% - in which the Masters of the Universe finally "discovered" inequality. So much inequality, in fact, that 2014 was instantly tagged by the Masters - and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe - as the new 1914, all that furiously tweeted to all corporate boardrooms of the liquid modernity elite.

Comment: All just a show. The psychopaths in charge don't care one bit about the people. They are simply unable to, but they are good at pretending with lies and lies and lies with nicely choreographed Hollywood flair. Are you fed up of being lied to?

Read More...
Horse

Purge continues: More US nuclear missile officers involved in cheating scandal


Press TV
Wed, 29 Jan 2014 04:03 UTC
US airforce officers
© UnknownEarlier this month, the 34 officers, who were in charge of launching nuclear missiles, were suspended.

The number of nuclear missile officers under investigation by the US Air Force over allegations of cheating has doubled from 34 initially to several dozen, officials said.

An Air Force spokesman confirmed the increase Tuesday but refused to mention a precise number in order "to protect the integrity of the investigation."

Earlier this month, the 34 officers, who were in charge of launching nuclear missiles, were suspended either for cheating on a key monthly proficiency test last year or for knowing about the cheating but failing to report it.

On January 15, the Air Force said it discovered that one missile officer at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana had shared test questions with 16 other officers. Another 17 confessed to knowing about the misconduct but did not report it.

Comment: There has been a lot of house cleaning among those operating and in charge of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. The question is why now? Is there more to this than meets the eyes?

Obama purging military commanders
Why are dozens of high ranking officers being purged from the U.S. military?
Asleep on the job: US nuclear missile launch officers repeatedly compromised bunker safety

Read More...
Shopping Bag

Head of British spy agency GCHQ, Iain Lobban relieved from job


Press TV
Wed, 29 Jan 2014 03:32 UTC
Iain Lobban, the head of British spy agency GCHQ
© UnknownIain Lobban, the head of British spy agency GCHQ

The head of British spy agency, Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), has been relieved from his job.

A Foreign Office spokesman said on Tuesday that Iain Lobban, 53, will step down at the end of the year after serving six years in one of the most sensitive jobs in Whitehall.

"Today is simply about starting the process of ensuring we have a suitable successor in place before he moves on as planned at the end of the year," the spokesman said.

London calls the departure a long planned move and has rejected speculations that it is linked to recent controversy relating to the leak of classified documents by US whistleblower Edward Snowden, involving the GCHQ and its US counterpart the National Security Agency (NSA).

In November, Lobban along with the heads of MI5 and MI6, made a rare public appearance before a parliamentary committee.

This came after Snowden disclosed that British and US spy agencies had been intruding into the private communications of millions of ordinary citizens.

Why is it necessary to "collect information on the majority of the public in order to protect us from a minority of evildoers?" the MPs asked him.

Iain, who worked as GCHQ director for six years, first joined the agency in 1983.
Read More...