Puppet Masters
Johnson, the frontrunner in the race to take over from Theresa May as British Prime Minister, told the Sunday Times that if successful in his bid for the role, he would bin the Northern Irish backstop element of the current exit plan and refuse to pay the Brexit bill until "there's greater clarity on the way forward."
The backstop has been a key barrier in seeing the Brexit deal agreed by May's government and the EU passed by British MPs.
"In getting a good deal, money is a great solvent and a great lubricant," Johnson said, adding that he'd ensure Brexit was delivered by the current deadline of Halloween 2019.

Protest against American attempts at a 'regime change' in Venezuela and Canada's complicity in the campaign, Toronto, 16 September, 2017.
Venezuelan Foreign Affairs Minister Jorge Arreaza announced on Saturday a temporary suspension of all services at the country's consulates general in Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal. All of their functions will fall upon the embassy in Ottawa, the ministry said in a statement.
The diplomatic scale-down comes in retaliation to the Canadian government's recent decision to temporarily close its embassy in Caracas and redirect all consular assistance to its embassy in Colombia.

Pavel Filip shows a decree to dissolve parliament and hold snap election.
The rapid succession of events in Moldova, a former Soviet republic located between Romania and Ukraine, stems from the inconclusive results of a parliamentary election in February, which produced no ruling majority.
The seats were more or less split evenly between three parties: the Russia-leaning Socialists, the EU-leaning Democrats (who are led by one of the wealthiest businessmen in Moldova), and the ACUM, a bloc formed by two new parties running on an anti-oligarch pro-European platform.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, followed by her brother, Tony Rodham, stop at Casa Bella Italian Restaurant in Scranton, Pennsylvania on Friday evening April 22, 2016.
Hillary Clinton announced on Twitter that her youngest brother passed away last night. She described him as "kind, generous and a wonderful husband and father", adding that they'll miss him very much.
The cause of his death has not been clarified yet.
Upon hearing the news, regular consumers of independent media knew exactly what to expect: Censorship. Corporate platforms use these vague terms that sound nice in theory to cast a wide net that also de-platforms independent, anti-war, and rational voices. Whether this is done on purpose or is a consequence of using artificial intelligence and algorithms to monitor content remains to be seen.

A man entering an AFP-marked vehicle after a raid in October at the Department of Home Affairs Canberra headquarters.
The Department of Home Affairs headquarters in Canberra was dramatically raided on October 11 as part of an investigation into leaks against Mr Dutton after he stepped in to stop two European au pairs from being deported.
AFP Deputy Commissioner Neil Gaughan told a Senate inquiry last year that he alerted Mr Dutton's chief of staff Craig Maclachlan to the raid ahead of time.
North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows (R) told Hannity Friday night that the FBI knew "within 60 days of them opening the investigation, prior to [Robert] Mueller coming on, the FBI and the [Department of Justice] knew that Christopher Steele was not credible, the dossier was not true, George Papadopoulos was innocent."
Meadows did not elaborate on why he believes the FBI knew their investigation was built on a mountain of lies, however according to The Hill's John Solomon last month, memos which were retroactively classified by the DOJ reveal that a high-ranking government official who met with Christopher Steele in October 2016 determined that information in the Trump-Russia dossier was inaccurate, and likely leaked to the media.
Kushner is traveling in Morocco, Jordan and Israel this week to meet with officials and drum up support for the long-awaited plan's economic portion, which will be unveiled during a June conference in Bahrain.
King Abdullah, who acts as custodian of Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem, has not committed to attend the conference.
Comment: See also:
- Jordan's King sacks intel chief, senior officials amid plot suspicions
- One insult after another: Kushner believes Palestinians can't govern themselves, more concerned with mortgages than statehood
- The king frowns: Complexities of Israeli-Jordanian relations
- Trump approves of map of Israel including occupied Golan Heights: Netanyahu says 'very nice'

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping get friendly at a ceremony to present Xi with a degree from the St Petersburg State University on June 6.
The image crystallizes the stuff of nightmares by those in the US that still follow the Eurasian prophecies of Halford Mackinder and his disciples, such as the late Zbigniew "Grand Chessboard" Brzezinski, that focused on the imperative of preventing the emergence of a peer competitor in Eurasia.
The peer competitor has emerged, in full: the Russia-China strategic partnership.
On Wednesday, Xi said at the Kremlin this was his eighth trip to Russia since 2013 - when the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), were announced. And he added he and Putin had met "almost 30 times" since then.
Comment: See also:
- 'Clash of Civilizations' or Crisis of Civilization?
- Modi Wins Second Term as India's PM Following 'Unexpected' Landslide Victory in Largest Ever Democratic Election - Globalist Media Seething
- Russia, China, India and Iran: The magic quadrant that is changing the world
- Far from quiet on the US vs Russia-China front
- Pepe Escobar: The Pentagon's obsession with China, and Putin's strategy
According to Le Figaro newspaper, the oak tree that President Trump planted on the lawn near the White House in April 2018 has died. The report specifies that the site where the tree was supposed to grow is now empty.
The tree originated from a forest in the French Ain department, where thousands of US Marines died during World War I and was deemed to be a sign of strong French-US ties when it grew.










Comment: Tony was one of the unsung members of the Clinton crime family. CNN adds: USA Today summarizes Rodham's proclivity to trade on his sister's name: :