Puppet MastersS


USA

Wall Street rips off 'The Sting'

Eric
© Brendan Bannon/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesNew York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman.

Hilarious corruption story hit the news wires this week. It's actually a two-part joke.

Part one is that Thomson Reuters got slapped in the face by New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman for its absurd practice of selling early access to the results of the Survey of Consumer Confidence Survey it conducts each month in conjunction with the University of Michigan.

It turns out that in recent times, if you paid them an extra subscription fee of a few thousand dollars a month, Thomson Reuters would allow you access to the Consumer Confidence data a full two seconds earlier than the rest of its subscribers - at 9:54:58 a.m., as opposed to 9:55:00 exactly.

Thomson Reuters suspended the activity at the request of Schneiderman, who released a statement about this humorously brazen effort at the systematic sale of inside information. From the L.A. Times:
The consumer confidence data can move financial markets, and Scheiderman's office said "that two-second advantage is more than enough time for these traders to take unfair advantage of their early access to this information as they execute enormous volumes of trades in the blink of an eye."

"The securities markets should be a level playing field for all investors and the early release of market-moving survey data undermines fair play in the markets," Schneiderman said Monday.
The two-second head start allows high-speed traders to plunge into the markets en masse and retreat all the way back again before most of the world sees this market-altering economic data.

Chess

Russian inquiry to UN finds Rebels, not Army, behind Syria Aleppo sarin gas attack

Vladimir Churkin
© RIA Novosti / Ruslan KrivobokRussia’s UN envoy Vladimir Churkin
Samples taken at the site where the chemical weapons were allegedly used indicate that it was rebels - not the Syrian army - behind the attack, Russia's UN envoy Vladimir Churkin has said.

Russia has handed over the analyzed samples to the UN, he added.

"I have just passed the analysis of samples taken at the site of the chemical attack to the UN Secretary General (Ban Ki-moon)," Churkin said on Tuesday.

Evidence studied by Russian scientists indicates that a projectile carrying the deadly nerve agent sarin was most likely fired at Khan al-Assal by the rebels, Churkin pointed out.

"It was determined that on March 19 the rebels fired an unguided missile Bashair-3 at the town of Khan al-Assal, which has been under government control. The results of the analysis clearly show that the shell used in Khan al-Assal was not factory made and that it contained sarin," he said.

Churkin stressed that unlike other reports which have been handed to the UN, the samples were taken by Russian experts at the scene, without any third party involvement.

Bad Guys

Snowden: Towards an endgame

The working title of the Edward Snowden movie is still The Spy Who Remains in the Cold. Here's where we stand:
Snowden could only fly out of Hong Kong because China allowed it.

Snowden could only arrive in Moscow because Russia knew it - in co-operation with China. This is part of their strategic relationship, which includes the BRICS group (along with Brazil, India and South Africa) and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. No official source though would ever confirm it.

With the Latin American offers of asylum (Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua; even Uruguay would consider it), we're approaching the clincher: Moscow is now calculating whether - and how - to help Snowden reach his final destination while extracting maximum political capital out of Washington.
Into this script comes roaring the coup-that-is-not-a-coup sub-plot in Egypt. Cynics' eyebrows will be raised that just as the Barack Obama administration was going mental over the National Security Agency (NSA) spy scandal a revo-coup-o-lution explodes in Egypt. New revelations about the extent of the NSA-centric Orwellian Panopticon keep on coming, but they have been totally downgraded by US corporate media; it's all Egypt all the time. After all, the Pentagon - to which the NSA is attached - owns the Egyptian military, something that even the New York Times had to acknowledge. [1]

Yet they don't own Snowden. This has nothing to do with "terra".

Meanwhile, the US intelligence gambit of intercepting a non-adversarial presidential plane spectacularly backfired in true Mad magazine Spy vs Spy fashion. Obama had said he would not "scramble fighter jets" to catch Snowden; of course not, just ground them.

Pistol

SOTT Focus: Manufacturing civil war in Egypt: 'Mystery' snipers massacre Morsi supporters

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A week after the Egyptian Army deposed President Mohamed Morsi, supporters of the ousted leader were massacred yesterday, allegedly during a sit-in protest at an "elite army base" in Cairo. So far over 50 have been reported dead, with hundreds injured. The Muslim Brotherhood is blaming the Egyptian army and police, but a military spokesman has said a "terrorist group" was responsible.

"We have people hit in the head, we have bullets that exploded as they entered the body, cluttering organs and body parts", said Gehad Haddad, a spokesman for Muslim Brotherhood.

Adamant that the role of police and army is to "safeguard the people's revolution", no matter their particular political affiliation, military spokesman Ahmed Ali said security forces acted "in self-defense against armed men attacking them from various locations, including rooftops."

No one disputes that there were clashes between Morsi supporters - at least some of whom also appeared to be armed and intent on violence - and the security forces sent in to remove them, but it's unclear who the gunmen were:
Witnesses, including Brotherhood supporters at the scene, said the army fired only tear gas and warning shots and that "thugs" in civilian clothes had carried out the deadly shooting.
This bloodbath comes on the heels of arguably the largest mass demonstrations in modern history, and is almost certainly going to spiral out of control and plunge Egypt into chaos.

Take 2

Egypt prepares for backlash as Morsi allies reject new regime


Ousted Muslim Brotherhood mobilises for day of protest as hundreds of party's members are seized

Egypt is braced for further dramatic events on Friday as the vanquished Muslim Brotherhood called for a "day of rejection" following a widespread crackdown on its leadership by the country's new interim president, Adli Mansour.

Supporters of the ousted president Mohamed Morsi, still reeling from the military coup that removed their leader from power, are expected to take to the streets after Friday prayers following a series of raids and arrests that decimated the Muslim Brotherhood's senior ranks and consolidated the miltary's hold on the country.

In a stark sign of Egypt's new political reality, the group's supreme leader, Mohamed al-Badie, who was untouchable under Morsi's rule, was one of those arrested.

Question

Republicans want to talk to Col. George Bristol about Benghazi

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© U.S. AFRICA COMMAND VIA FLICKRColonel George Bristol, outgoing commander, addresses the audience during the Change of Command Ceremony for the Joint Special Operations Task Force-Trans Sahara (JSOTF-TS), AFRICOM, on April 16, 2012, at Kelley Barracks, Vaihingen, Germany.
Marine Corps Col. George Bristol was in a key position in the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) chain of command the night of the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. As such, he's high on the list of people that some Republican members of Congress want to interview. But they don't know where he is and the Pentagon isn't telling.

Pentagon spokesman Major Robert Firman told CBS News that the Department of Defense "cannot compel retired members to testify before Congress."

"They say he's retired and they can't reach out to him," Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told CBS News. "That's hogwash."

Bristol, a martial arts master, was commander of Joint Special Operations Task Force-Trans Sahara based in Stuttgart, Germany until he retired last March. In an article in Stars and Stripes, Bristol is quoted at his retirement ceremony as telling his troops that "an evil" has descended on Africa, referring to Islamic militant groups. "It is on us to stomp it out."

Ambulance

Egypt's army declares state of emergency in Suez and South Sinai

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© Yahya Arhab/EPAEgyptian army helicopters, with the national flag hanging from them, fly over Cairo on Friday.
Move is prompted by armed attack on al-Arish airport, despite relative calm in rest of country

Egypt's army has declared a state of emergency in the Suez and South Sinai regions after an armed attack on al-Arish airport, despite relative calm elsewhere in the country on the first weekend since the ousting of Mohammed Morsi as president.

In Cairo, where Morsi's main support base had announced a "day of rejection" to coincide with Friday prayers, leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood have continued to urge peaceful demonstrations to demand that the vanquished leader be returned to office.

Only two of the 20 members of the Muslim Brotherhood Guidance Council attended the largest of twin pro-Morsi rallies in the capital. Most other senior leaders of the group have been detained by the military, or have been in hiding since the momentous events of Wednesday night.

The attack in al-Arish, around 40 miles (60km) south of the Gaza border, was sustained and intense, security officials said. One person was killed and several others wounded. The attackers are not yet known, and the Sinai has in recent months become an increasingly important theatre for jihadist groups.

Pills

Supreme Court rules drug companies exempt from lawsuits

Drug companies failed to warn patients that toxic epidermal necrolysis
© Unknown
Drug companies failed to warn patients that toxic epidermal necrolysis was a side effect. But the Supreme Court ruled they're still not liable for damages.
Washington. In case readers missed it with all the coverage of the Trayvon Martin murder trial and the Supreme Court's rulings on gay marriage and the Voting Rights Act, the US Supreme Court also made a ruling on lawsuits against drug companies for fraud, mislabeling, side effects and accidental death. From now on, 80 percent of all drugs are exempt from legal liability.

In a 5-4 vote, the US Supreme Court struck down a lower court's ruling and award for the victim of a pharmaceutical drug's adverse reaction. According to the victim and the state courts, the drug caused a flesh-eating side effect that left the patient permanently disfigured over most of her body. The adverse reaction was hidden by the drug maker and later forced to be included on all warning labels. But the highest court in the land ruled that the victim had no legal grounds to sue the corporation because its drugs are exempt from lawsuits.

Bad Guys

Prelude to civil war? Muslim Brotherhood calls for 'uprising' after supporters shot dead by snipers

Muslim Brotherhood Cairo
© UnknownSupporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and ousted President Morsi clash with Egypt police outside the elite Republican Guards base in Cairo, on July 8, 2013
Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has called for 'uprising' after dozens of its supporters were killed by the security forces in the capital, Cairo.

In a statement on Monday, the group's political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party, appealed for "an uprising by the great people of Egypt against those trying to steal their revolution with tanks."

It also urged the "international community and international groups and all the free people of the world to intervene to stop further massacres... and prevent a new Syria in the Arab world."

The party was reacting to killing of over 40 supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi in a sit-in in Cairo on Monday.

Star of David

Israeli doctors to advise US on Guantanamo hunger strikers

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America's official torture camp - Gitmo
Israeli doctors have been invited to the US to share their experiences of handling hunger-striking Palestinian prisoners as Washington comes under fire for its force-feeding of Guantanamo Bay detainees who refuse to eat.

Officials from the Israeli Medical Association have been invited to the U.S. to present policy makers there with their methods of handling hunger strikers, as the U.S. administration comes under fire for its own practice of force-feeding of Guantanamo Bay detention camp prisoners who refuse to eat.