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Arrow Down

China sets new measures for spreading irresponsible rumors online

Internet Cafe
© Kai HendryAn Internet cafe in Beijing, China.
China is imposing new measures with regard to its residents' online activities, a move that tightens its ever-increasing restrictions on Internet usage and one that might raise a few more eyebrows.

According to a report from Reuters, state media reported that Internet users in the country who spread irresponsible online rumors will be charged with defamation if proven that what they shared online was viewed by 5,000 Internet users or reposted more than 500 times. A violator can be sentenced up to three years in jail.

In a news conference organized by the People's Daily, a spokesman from China's top court Sun Jungong described using the Internet to spread rumors and defame people as "criminal activities" and acts that deserve "serious punishment," adding that "no country would consider the slander of other people as freedom of speech."

Gold Seal

Best of the Web: Reality Check: More Americans "Rethinking" 9/11?

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© rethink911.org
Did you know that a 3rd building fell on 9-11? That bill board is today over Times Square. It was placed there through donations to a campaign called Rethink 9/11.

In fact, that group has placed posters and signs across the world, from Australia, to Canada, from San Francisco to right here in New York City.

So what is Rethink 9/11? Wouldn't only a fringe group of people would still question 9/11? Perhaps not, because today we will tell you about new polling that shows a majority of those polled either question the official 9/11 story or don't believe it at all. Is that possible?

The first step toward truth, is to be informed.


TV

Best of the Web: Video: Charlie Rose interview with Bashar al-Assad (full interview and transcript)

CBS news reporter Charlie Rose interviewed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on Sunday September 9, 2013.


USA

Jon Stewart frets over the parallels between Syria and Iraq: 'It's like we're the Bill Buckner of superpowers now'

Hearing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad cite the bad intelligence reports that led the U.S. into Iraq to protect his own country against an attack had Jon Stewart apopleptic on Monday night.


"You needlessly invade one country based on false evidence, suddenly you're bad at war" Stewart fretted. "Come on. We have had a very solid war career - between 40 to 60 percent justified. But all anybody wants to talk about is the most recent one of the wrong ones. It's like we're the Bill Buckner of superpowers now."

Magic Hat

International experts have strong proof images of chemical victims faked - Moscow

Syria chemical attack
© AFP Photo / Shaam News NetworkSyrian opposition's Shaam News Network shows people inspecting bodies of children and adults laying on the ground as Syrian rebels claim they were killed in a toxic gas attack by pro-government forces in eastern Ghouta, on the outskirts of Damascus on August 21, 2013.
Footage and photos of the alleged chemical attack in Syria, which the US cites as the reason for a planned military intervention, had been fabricated in advance, speakers told a UN human rights conference in Geneva.

Members of the conference were presented accounts of international experts, Syrian public figures and Russian news reporters covering the Syrian conflict, which back Russia's opposition to the US plans, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

The speakers argued that the suspected sarin gas attack near Damascus on August 21 was likely a provocation of the rebel forces and that a military action against the President Bashar Assad government will likely result in civilian casualties and a humanitarian catastrophe affecting the entire region.

War Whore

Obama: Military strikes on hold if Syria agrees to turn over chemical weapons

Obama Assad
© Unknown
President Obama said this morning that he would put strikes against Syria on hold if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad agrees to turn control of his country's chemical weapons over to the international community.

The possible agreement comes after Russia proposed the notion to Syria, and according to reports, Syria accepted. Secretary of State John Kerry made a seemingly rhetorical statement on Monday when he suggested that the United States would back down from military action if Syria turned its chemical weapons over, further stating that he believed there was virtually no likelihood of this ever happening. Russia took interest in that sentiment, and now a Syrian official is saying that the country has agreed to the proposal.

The announcement has been taken with understandable skepticism, however, as the United States and its allies worry that this could potentially be a tactic used to stall a military strike longer than it's already being stalled.

Still, President Obama said Monday that he's open to the possibility of this happening.

War Whore

Obama wants to bomb Syria, but Monsanto is already carpet-bombing us

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Obama accepting his Nobel Peace Prize.
Politics is the entertainment division of the military industrial complex ~ Frank Zappa

Recently, Maria Rodale, the CEO of the publishing company Rodale, Inc., wrote an open letter to President Obama regarding Syria, urging him to reconsider his position to press for a military strike against Syria.

While there is nothing unusual about Maria's anti-war sentiment, with a recent Washington/ABC poll finding nearly six in 10 Americans oppose military action as a response to the Syrian government's alleged use of chemical weapons, her reference to biotech companies like Monsanto poisoning our children and environment with the president's support and encouragement, and her claim that the viral Facebook meme below contributed to her realization, caused the mainstream media to fume with reactionary waves of criticism and character assault.

All of this, of course, distracts from the underlying context of the coming war in Syria, which is a war (like most wars in modern history) spurred by the geopolitical machinations of 'resource procurement,' and which like most wars, are many years in the making. All else, as Frank Zappa pointed out, has strictly entertainment value.

Dollar Gold

Best of the Web: Defence secretary praises 'fabulous' arms fair, stating selling weapons abroad is priority for Britain

Philip Hammond
© Shane Wilkinson/EPAPhilip Hammond, who said the UK government was 'not ashamed of promoting responsible defence exports'.
Philip Hammond praises 'fabulous' arms trade fair in London

Selling weapons abroad is a top priority for the government, Philip Hammond, the UK defence secretary, made clear on Tuesday, praising what he called a "fabulous show" displaying "fantastic kit".

It was the opening day of London Docklands' biennial arms bazaar, the biggest so far with 40 countries, including Russia and Israel, having their own national pavilions, and as many as 1,500 companies offering their wares.

Official guests at the arms show include the governments of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya - countries that need to build up their armed forces after recent conflicts in which Britain has played its part - as well as such traditional arms trade allies as Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Dollar

Still taking the money back: Top one percent took record 19.3 percent of U.S. income last year - the largest share of pre-tax income since 1927

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Almost two years to the day that the Occupy Wall Street movement started, a report confirms that the rich are getting even richer. The top 1 per cent of earners collected 19.3 per cent of household income in 2012, their largest share in Internal Revenue Service figures going back a century. U.S. income inequality has been growing for almost three decades.

But until last year, the top 1 per cent's share of pre-tax income hadn't surpassed the 18.7 per cent it reached in 1927, according to an analysis of IRS figures dating to 1913 by economist Emmanuel Saez of the University of California, Berkeley, and three colleagues.

Saez wrote that 2012 incomes of the richest Americans might have surged in part because they cashed in stock holdings to avoid higher capital gains taxes that took effect in January.

The nation's top 1 per cent have been the targets of resentment in recent years which was manifested in the Occupy Wall Street movement that started in September 2011. The movement started in New York's Zuccotti Park, and thousands camped out and marched for months calling for wide-reaching change in the capitalist system. The adopted chant was 'We are the 99 per cent' and the movement spread to cities throughout the U.S.

War Whore

John Kerry accused of lying about being opposed to the Iraq War as he built case for military action in Syria

Secretary of State John Kerry added to his public embarrassments as he was accused of lying today when he claimed that he and Secretary of State Chuck Hagel had 'opposed the president's decision to go into Iraq'. The Washington Post's Fact Checker column awarded Kerry four out of four 'Pinocchios,' its sliding scale of untruthfulness.

That ignoble result puts Kerry's comment on a credibility par with President Obama's recent claim that he articulated 'the world's red line' - not his own - when he first warned Syria's dictator of the consequences of using chemical weapons.

During an interview on MSNBC on September 5, Kerry said that air strikes against the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria would not become yet another U.S. military quagmire, citing his alleged opposition to the Iraq War. 'I think a lot of Americans, a lot of your listeners, a lot of people in the country,' Kerry said, 'are sitting there and saying, "Oh my gosh, this is going to be Iraq, this is going to be Afghanistan, here we go again."'

'I know this, I've heard it,' he continued. 'And the answer is no, profoundly no. You know, Senator Chuck Hagel, when he was senator - Senator Chuck Hagel, now secretary of defense - and when I was a senator, we opposed the president's decision to go into Iraq but we know full well how that [flawed] evidence [about weapons of mass destruction] was used to persuade all of us that authority ought to be given.'

But on October 11, 2002, according to Senate records, both Kerry and Hagel cast 'yea' votes on the 'Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002.'
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