Puppet MastersS


Stock Down

Twitter tanks 20 percent, loses $7.7 billion market cap - threatens to sue Obama administration

Jeff Morganteen
CNBC
Thu, 06 Feb 2014 18:02 UTC
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© Twitter
Twitter focus on engagement and growth: Analyst Thursday, 6 Feb 2014 | 10:03 AM ET "One of our primary concerns has been related to user and engagement growth," says Scott Kessler, senior equity analyst at S&P Capital IQ, and Colin Sebastian, senior research analyst at RW Baird, discuss Twitter's downside and concerns.

Shares of Twitter dropped about 24 percent Thursday - a paper loss of $8.7 billion - after it reported sluggish user growth. The selloff was a sign that the social network will have a tough time regaining its stature with advertisers, at least until it releases better numbers, a senior tech analyst told CNBC.

"To us, when you're talking about opportunities relative to communicating with advertisers, you want to lead with a large and growing and increasingly engaged user base," Scott Kessler of S&P Capital IQ told "Squawk on the Street." "And Twitter doesn't seem to have the data to support that proposition."

Twitter closed Wednesday's trading session at $65.97 a share before posting earnings after the bell, the first quarterly report since it went public in November. Shares reached a low of $50 during trading Thursday, on pace for Twitter's worst day on record. The formerly red-hot stock had zero room for error, said Colin Sebastian, a senior research analyst at Robert W. Baird & Co.

Despite a rocky trading session Thursday, Twitter's stock remained up 99 percent from its IPO price of $26 a share.
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Alarm Clock

SOTT Focus: Behind the Headlines: Terror Masters, Kenya mall terror attack, Navy Yard shooting, Mind Control, Electrophonic Meteors

Sott Editors
Sott.net
Sun, 22 Sep 2013 18:00 UTC
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Al-Shabab terrorists, aka CIA/Mossad/MI6/DGSE dupes, terrorise people in Nairobi Kenya on behalf of their corporate sponsors
In the following SOTT Talk Radio show from September 2013, the SOTT Editors discussed the bloody terror attack at a mall in Nairobi, Kenya, the mass shooting at the Navy Yard in Washington, DC (the 16th mass shooting of Obama's reign), secret government Mind Control, the 'strange sky sounds' and 'electrophonic meteors'.

Running Time: 01:59:00

Download: MP3

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Control Panel

EPA vastly misjudges methane leaks, new study confirms

Becky Oskin
Yahoo! News
Thu, 13 Feb 2014 00:00 UTC
EPA_Methane_Measurement
© UnknownMethods for detecting natural gas emissions. Top-down methods take air samples from aircraft or tall towers to measure gas concentrations remote from sources. Bottom-up methods take measurements directly at facilities.
The federal government has underestimated methane emissions from the United States by 50 percent for the past 20 years, according to a comprehensive new study.

Methane, also called natural gas, is a powerful but short-lived greenhouse gas. It lasts just nine years in Earth's atmosphere but is about 34 times more potent at trapping infrared radiation (the greenhouse effect) than carbon dioxide, which is more abundant and lasts longer. While methane spews into the sky from both natural sources, such as wetlands, and human activities, including oil and gas production, the government estimates only track manmade sources.

The review of scientific studies of methane emissions suggests that Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) methane counts are about 50 percent too low, though the underestimate could range from 25 percent to as much as 75 percent. That means the United States is pumping about 14 million tons more methane than thought into the atmosphere each year, according to the findings, published today (Feb. 13) in the journal Science.

"Evidence from numerous studies consistently suggest that methane emissions are larger than those estimated by the EPA inventory," said Adam Brandt, lead study author and an energy resources engineer at Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif.

The review analyzed the results of more than 200 studies that traced methane emissions across the United States and were published in the past 20 years. The results were compared to the EPA's Greenhouse Gas Inventory, which records methane emissions and other climate-changing gases.
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Star of David

Israel spies sent after boycott backers


PressTV
Fri, 14 Feb 2014 15:13 UTC
A report says Israeli spies have been ordered to try to link supporters of an economic boycott against Tel Aviv to terrorists and enemy states.

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Israeli Minister for Intelligence and Strategy, Yuval Steinitz
Israel has convened a ministerial meeting to discuss how to respond to the growing number of foreign companies refusing to do business with Israeli entities operating in illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, The Times reported on Tuesday.

The United Nations regards the Israeli settlements as illegal because the territories were captured in the war and are hence subject to the Geneva Conventions, which forbid any constructions on the occupied lands.

The meeting saw Israeli Minister for Intelligence and Strategy, Yuval Steinitz tabling a plan for media propaganda against organizations advocating boycotts.

Earlier in the month, US Secretary of State John Kerry pointed to "an increasing de-legitimization" campaign building up against Israel internationally and "talk of boycotts" if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict did not end.
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Eye 1

In America the gestapo has replaced the rule of law

Paul Craig Roberts
paulcraigroberts.org
Thu, 13 Feb 2014 13:55 UTC
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© Alex Wong / Getty Images / AFP(L-R) National Counterterrorism Center Director Matthew Olsen, FBI Director James Comey, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan, Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn testify during a hearing before Senate (Select) Intelligence Committee January 29, 2014
RT is the best English language news source available to Americans. On January 29, RT published a photo of 5 presidential appointees lying through their teeth to Congress.

All five of these Gestapo wannabes are in violation of their oath of office to protect the Constitution of the United States. They have relentlessly violated the Constitution, which makes these five, who are in charge of US intelligence and black operations, traitors to the United States. Yet, they have not been arrested and put on trial. Congress is content to sit there and listen to their ongoing lies time after time after time, despite the fact that these 5 have committed more and worse crimes against our country than the "terrorists" that serve as an excuse for the crimes committed by the intelligence agencies.

Remember, dear readers, it is a crime for you to lie to any federal agent even if you are not under oath or before Congress. How much more evidence do you need that you are not a citizen of the United States but a mere serf of the federal government? Will you ever wake up?
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Arrow Down

German cabinet minister warned lawmaker of global child porn investigation


Raw Story
Fri, 14 Feb 2014 13:47 UTC
Hans-Peter Friedrich
© Agence France-PresseGerman minister Hans-Peter Friedrich.
A German cabinet minister was under intense pressure Friday over suspicions he may have breached official secrecy in a widening scandal sparked by an international child porn investigation.

Agriculture Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich, in his former post as interior minister, tipped off the party leader of a prominent lawmaker whose name had cropped up in an international probe, Friedrich's spokesman said.

The move dates back to October, a month after German general elections when Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives were in the process of building a coalition government with the centre-left Social Democrats.

Friedrich, a conservative ally of Merkel in her left-right "grand coalition", insisted Friday he did not believe he had done anything wrong politically or legally but said he would resign if a legal inquiry was launched.

Merkel had held an "intensive discussion" with Friedrich on Friday, said her spokesman Steffen Seibert, adding that the minister "is aware of the dimension of the case".

The case has blown up after news broke early in the week that searches as part of a child pornography investigation had been carried out at the home and offices of Social Democrat (SPD) lawmaker Sebastian Edathy.
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Lemon

The new US-Russia cold war

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times Online
Fri, 14 Feb 2014 03:50 UTC
Victoria Nuland
© UnknownVictoria Nuland, previously foreign policy adviser to vice-president Dick Cheney. Married to neo-con Robert Kagan. Her slogan sums up the US' attitude towards the EU.
Meet the new (cold) war, same as the old (cold) war. Same same, but different. One day, it's the myriad implications of Washington's "pivoting" to Asia - as in the containment of China. The next day, it's the perennial attempt to box Russia in. Never a dull moment in the New Great Game in Eurasia.

On Russia, the denigration of all things Sochi - attributable to the inherent stupidity of Western corporate media "standards" - was just a subplot of the main show, which always gets personal; the relentless demonization of Russian President Vladimir Putin. [1]

Yet Nulandgate - as in US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria "neo-con" Nuland uttering her famous "F**k the EU" - was way more serious. Not because of the "profanity" (praise the Lord!), but for providing what US Think Tankland hailed as "an indicator of American strategic thinking".

Here's the game in a nutshell. Germany remote controls one of the leaders of the Ukrainian protests, heavyweight boxer Vitali Klitschko. [2]

"F**k the EU" is essentially directed towards Berlin and Klitschko, its key protege. Washington sees this going nowhere, as Germany, after all, has been slowly building a complex energy-investment partnership with Russia.

The Obama administration wants results - fast. Nuland herself stressed (check it out, starting at 7:26) that Washington, over the past two decades, has "invested" over US$5 billion for the "democratization" of Ukraine. So yes: this is "our" game and the EU is at best a nuisance while Russia remains the major spoiler. Welcome to Washington's Ukrainian "strategy".
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Laptop

Arab states step up policing of online media‏


AFP
Wed, 12 Feb 2014 13:51 UTC
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© AFP Photo/Yasser al-ZayyatKuwaiti activists gather outside the courthouse in Kuwait City on November 3, 2011 where two fellow leading youth activists were questioned for allegedly making remarks on their Twitter accounts deemed offensive to the status of the Gulf state ruler.
Fearful of Arab Spring-inspired unrest, Gulf monarchies have stepped up efforts to monitor and control the media, particularly online, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said Wednesday.

Saudi Arabia, which is on the group's "Enemies of the Internet" list and ranks 164 out of 179 on its 2014 World Press Freedom Index, has been particularly aggressive in policing the Internet, including by arresting those who post critical articles or comments, it said.
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Flashlight

Ukraine: Nuland's cookies


RT
Fri, 14 Feb 2014 02:22 UTC
Nuland's cookies
© RT
How will Victoria Nuland's embarrassing leak impact the political battlefield in Ukraine? How will it change EU-US relationships? And is the opposition in Ukraine now losing legitimacy? CrossTalking with Alexander Mercouris, Nebojsa Malic and Taras Kuzio.


Comment: See also:
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland says Washington has spent $5 billion trying to subvert Ukraine
The Anglo-American axis: Losing Ukraine, losing Europe
US regime-change operation in Ukraine exposed in leaked diplomatic phone call
What about apologizing to Ukraine, Mrs. Nuland?
US will give US tax-payer's money to Ukraine if Kiev makes necessary reforms - Nuland

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Arrow Down

Italy's prime minister announces resignation


Press TV
Fri, 14 Feb 2014 01:41 UTC
Enrico Letta
© REUTERS/Susana Vera
Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta has announced his resignation after the leader of his centre-left party, Matteo Renzi, pulled his support for the government.

On Thursday, Letta issued a statement saying he will tender his resignation to President Giorgio Napolitano on Friday at the Quirinale palace.

Letta's decision to quit came after the Democratic Party (PD), the largest party in the ruling coalition, supported a call by Renzi, the party leader and mayor of Florence, for a new government capable of opening "a new phase" of reform and pulling the economy "out of the quagmire."

"Italy cannot live in a situation of uncertainty and instability. We are at a crossroads," Renzi told a meeting of the PD's 140-strong leadership committee on Thursday.

Renzi, 39, has been criticizing the premier for failing to act aggressively enough to combat Italy's protracted economic downturn.

Napolitano is expected to accept Letta's resignation and then call on Renzi to form a new administration.
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