Puppet Masters
In an early-morning tweet Monday, Trump went after the "BlacKkKlansman" writer-director for remarks he made about the current administration while accepting his first Oscar for the movie's screenplay, calling Lee's speech a "racist hit" on him.
"Be nice if Spike Lee could read his notes, or better yet not have to use notes at all, when doing his racist hit on your President, who has done more for African Americans (Criminal Justice Reform, Lowest Unemployment numbers in History, Tax Cuts,etc.) than almost any other Pres!" he tweeted.
"To [Omidyar] it's about... integrating things together to give technocrats, business executives and government officials a God's-eye view of the world - to manage and control society more efficiently."
¬ Yasha Levine, author of Surveillance Valley: The Military History of the Internet

Pierre Omidyar introduces the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet for his public talk, 'Advancing Peace Through the Power of Aloha'.
In February of last year, USAID's Global Development Lab published a series of reports furnished for it by a small, Arlington, Virginia-based company focused on design solutions for national security problems, with a mere 10 employees listed on its website and eight on its LinkedIn page. Those reports caught the attention of journalist Michael Igoe at Devex on Tuesday.
The company, Frontier Design Group, analyzed the feasibility of essentially militarizing USAID. The report proposals like "Rapid Expeditionary Development" (RED) teams. Those teams would be embedded with U.S. Special Forces, the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration outside of typical USAID areas of operation.
Venezuela's Minister of Popular Power for Communication and Information, Jorge Rodriguez, has claimed that the opposition was planning to kill people crossing the Simon Bolivar Bridge in the western state of Tachira after receiving humanitarian aid across the border between Venezuela and Colombia.
"The first false-positive [fabricated] operation planned the theft of a tank by two terrorists. It was planned to use that stolen military vehicle to cross the Simon Bolivar Bridge, hitting all pedestrians along the way and trampling them to death, and then blaming the National Guard and the government of Nicolas Maduro", the minister said at a press conference in Caracas.
Despite the obvious defeat - and as contemporary American history has illustrated - the US will unlikely relent and instead, do all within its power to complicate the war's conclusion and disrupt desperately needed reconstruction efforts.
Encapsulating current American intentions in Syria is a Foreign Policy article titled, "The New U.N. Envoy to Syria Should Kill the Political Process to Save it."
The article - written by Julien Barnes-Dacey of the NATO-Soros-funded European Council on Foreign Relations - suggests the otherwise inevitable end of the conflict be delayed and that reconstruction aid be held hostage until political concessions are made with the militarily-defeated foreign-backed militants dislodged from much of Syria's territory by joint Syrian-Russian-Iranian-Hezbollah efforts.
The article makes an unconvincing argument that maintaining Idlib as a militant bastion, delaying the conflict's conclusion, and withholding reconstruction aid will somehow positively benefit the day-to-day lives of Syrian civilians despite all evidence suggesting otherwise.
Business leaders and MPs reacted with anger and dismay at the news, which also prompted fresh calls to delay Brexit to avoid a damaging "no deal" exit on March 29. Three of May's ministers had earlier warned that the House of Commons would seek a delay if there was no breakthrough this week.
May had raised the possibility of a vote on her deal in the coming days, but said on Sunday she was still negotiating with the European Union.
"As we're continuing with those talks, we won't bring a meaningful vote to parliament this week," she said at a summit of European and Arab leaders in Egypt. "But that will happen by March 12. And we still have it within our grasp to leave the European Union with a deal on March 29."
Lawmakers last month rejected her withdrawal deal, and since then, May has sought to address their concerns about its so-called "backstop" plan for the border between Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland.
Comment: See also:
- May defends Brexit plan despite MP rebellion and cabinet resignations
- Corbyn lays out Labour's terms for backing May on her Brexit deal
- PM May humiliated yet again as MPs demand more of say in Brexit, DUP say offer is "meaningless"
- Former Brexit Sec Raab would rather scrap Brexit than accept May's deal, others agree
- Sunday Times: UK govt planning to 'engineer financial crash' to frighten MPs into voting for Brexit deal
- Brexit: A Political Farce Based on a Public Lie
Trump hinted that an agreement might be concluded during a face-to-face meeting with Xi at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, but gave no concrete time frames, saying that "additional progress" was needed.
Beijing and Washington are struggling to come to an agreement before the March 1 deadline that marks the end of a 90-day truce the leaders agreed-to when they met in Argentina late last year.

On February 28, the EU will discuss preparations for a new ministerial meeting of the Contact Group on Venezuela
"We need a peaceful political and democratic and Venezuelan-owned resolution of this crisis. This obviously excludes the use of force," she said.
On February 28, the EU will discuss preparations for a new ministerial meeting of the Contact Group on Venezuela, Kocijancic noted, adding that no date for the meeting had been determined so far.
Comment: So the EU declared Guaido as Venezuela's president despite the fact that by the country itself had legitimately voted Maduro as its leader, but now its calling for a 'peaceful Venezuelan-owned' resolution? So has the EU suddenly changed its mind or is it just looking to appear impartial while the US and its lackeys stir up trouble?
- Trump betrays MAGA over Venezuela
- "Their future vassal": US meddling in Venezuela just like Iraq and Libya - Russian Foreign Ministry
- BoE refuses to return Venezuela's $1.2 billion in gold, US intends to use it to fund illegitimate Guaido
- Venezuelan authorities boot 'interventionist' team of European MPs who planned to meet with Guaido

Vietnamese Police stand guard outside the North Korea USA summit's media center in Hanoi, Vietnam February 23, 2019.
"North Korea should be provided security guarantees in case a complete denuclearisation really take place. And those guarantees must be iron-clad", the minister said at Valdai forum in Vietnam.
Lavrov continued by saying that the six-party format that includes North Korea, the United States, Russia, China, South Korea, and Japan may be revived to address the Korean Peninsula issue provided that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump make progress at the upcoming summit in Hanoi.
"I hope that the six-party mechanism, primarily on issues of peace and security, can be very useful if there is progress in bilateral communication between the United States and North Korea", Lavrov said in Ho Chi Minh City.
The minister stressed that there had already been some improvements in the North Korean problem and urged the UN Security Council to lift some of its sanctions with regard to inter-Korean projects in order to further facilitate a settlement.
Former Venezuelan vice president Ramon Carrizales and former minister of defense Jorge Garcia Carneiro have both been added to the list, along with Socialist Party politicians Rafael Lacava and Omar Prieto.
The new sanctions come as relations between Washington and Caracas continue to deteriorate over the US' decision to recognize opposition leader Juan Guaido as interim president of Venezuela, and repeated calls by top American officials for current President Nicolas Maduro to step down.
The politician noted that "US interest in their own gas sales in Europe" underlies the threat voiced by US Vice President Mike Pence during the Munich security conference over the purchases of energy resources.
"To pursue your own goals in economics is normal. However, it is unconvincing to link such interests to security issues," Soder pointed out. "It is difficult to understand the US government when they call German cars a risk to national security, and then sits down at the same table as we do at NATO," he added, Sputnik reported.
Soder noted that Germany is interested in all possible options for gas purchases especially after the country ditched peaceful nuclear development and coal. "Can't understand, why the pipeline that comes from Russia via Ukraine, should be safer than a direct pipeline between Russian and Germany", Bavaria's minister president stated.
Comment: Europe is starting to wake up and act in its own interest. High time.
- Austrian president: 'No need for Europe to buy US gas at triple the price, will continue imports from Russia'
- America can't substitute Russian gas in Europe even it ships it for free, meanwhile Gazprom boosts gas exports to Turkey and Southern Europe
- Why American LNG is not a viable alternative for Russian gas in Europe












Comment: Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said in an interview on NBC a couple of years ago that Russians are "genetically driven to co-opt and penetrate" other countries.
There are certainly large numbers of people "genetically driven to co-opt and penetrate" other countries, but they aint Russian.