Puppet Masters

Taliban rejects Afghan government's conditional prisoner release order

Drago Bosnic
FRN
Thu, 12 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC

The conditional prisoner release order announced by Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani is against the US-Taliban agreement signed in Doha last month, a spokesman for the Taliban armed group said on Wednesday.

"It is properly explained in the peace accord that first 5,000 prisoners would be freed and then the Afghan dialogue would be initiated," Suhail Shaheen, Spokesman for the Taliban in Doha, Qatar, stated, Al-Jazeera reported. "We never agreed to any conditional release of the prisoners. If someone claims this, it will be against the peace accord that we signed on February 29," he added.

The Taliban reaction comes after Ghani issued a decree ordering the release of 1,500 Taliban fighters, which Presidential Spokesman Sediq Sediqqi said was the first of two phases of releasing 5,000 Taliban prisoners. Sediqqi wrote on Twitter that the initial release was a goodwill gesture to kick-start peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban.

New lucrative military deal? Pentagon hands out contracts for portable nuclear reactors

RT
Fri, 13 Mar 2020 16:11 UTC

There's no shortage of hefty defense deals awarded by the US Department of Defense, but the $40 million contract for micro-reactors definitely stands out, as it hides safety risks and raises doubts over its economic efficiency.

The nuclear device that the DoD strategists want must have the capability to be safely and rapidly transported by road, rail, sea or air (sic!) as well as swiftly set up and shut down. The project split between three companies — BWX Technologies, Westinghouse Government Services and X-energy — calls for a "safe, mobile and advanced nuclear micro-reactor."

The safety part sounds particularly soothing, but how would it look on the ground? What if those miniature reactors, when moved by land, become targets of high-profile terrorist attacks? And will it prove to be a real alternative (which means cheaper price, of course) to conventional energy sources?

Comment: See also: Idaho advances plan to build first small US nuclear reactors

Chinese official speculates Americans may have infected Wuhan at army games, calls for them to be "transparent"

RT
Fri, 13 Mar 2020 01:00 UTC

© Reuters / Stringer; Reuters / China Daily
FILE PHOTOS: (L) Members of the US team during the opening ceremony of the 7th Military World Games in Wuhan, China; (R) A medical worker in protective suit prepares for an RNA test at Jinyintan hospital in Wuhan.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Lijian Zhao has demanded US authorities reveal what they're hiding about the origins of Covid-19, going as far as to suggest the coronavirus may have been brought to China by the US military.

Pointing to a video of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Robert Redfield apparently admitting the US had several deaths from Covid-19 before they were able to test for it, Zhao called on the American watchdog to come clean in a tweet posted on Thursday.

"It might be US army who brought the epidemic to Wuhan," Zhao suggested, calling for the CDC - and the US in general - to "be transparent" and share what they know about where and when "Patient Zero" was first diagnosed.

Comment: See also: Don't buy China's story: Clues that coronavirus may have leaked from a lab

Update: The Chinese ambassador was summoned to the US State Department over the "disinformation campaign" comments by the Chinese foreign ministry spokesman. The war of words between China and the US over the coronavirus continues.

Bias virus hits New York Times as double standards infect coverage of Covid-19 lockdown measures in China and Italy

Damian Wilson
RT
Fri, 13 Mar 2020 17:46 UTC

National responses to tackling the coronavirus pandemic in China and Italy have given rise to jaw-dropping double standards at The New York Times.

For it seems that locking down around 60 million people in China is tantamount to a gross human rights violation, while doing the same to 60 million Italians is a bold step forward showing an enhanced sense of community that should be universally applauded.

The West = good. China = bad.

This rank hypocrisy, borne of a desperate liberal need to unnecessarily politicize everything, including the Covid-19 outbreak, has revealed an unflattering truth about 'The Gray Lady,' its sobriquet that once conveyed the impression the paper possessed of high virtue. No longer.

World's 20 richest, led by Jeff Bezos, lost more than $78b in Thursday's market rout

Giacomo Tognini
Forbes
Fri, 13 Mar 2020 17:33 UTC

Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates et Bernard Arnault

As the Dow Jones suffered its worst decline since 1987 and coronavirus fears caused markets to slide around the globe, the world's twenty richest people lost just over $78 billion combined in a single day.

Jeff Bezos, the world's richest person, saw his net worth drop by $8 billion, shedding more than 7% of his net worth as Amazon shares fell by nearly 8%. Close behind was Bernard Arnault, chairman and CEO of French luxury conglomerate LVMH, whose net worth declined by $7.7 billion. Arnault, the world's third-richest person, finished the day with $82.5 billion, after shares in LVMH closed nearly 9% lower as the luxury retail industry was hit by the effect of the coronavirus on demand for luxury goods in China and Europe.

Comment: Somehow we think they'll be just fine.

Creepy Joe rolled to big win in Michigan, delegate lead over Sanders growing

Alex Seitz-WaldAlex
NBC News
Mon, 09 Mar 2020 20:30 UTC

Six states were voting in a key night in the battle for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.

Joe Biden extended his delegate lead over Bernie Sanders in Tuesday night's primaries, according to NBC News projections.

The former vice president now has a nearly 150-delegate lead over the Vermont senator after winning four of the six states that voted Tuesday, according to NBC News. Nationally, Biden has 837 delegates to Sanders' 689, as of 8 a.m. ET.

Biden appears on track to win Mississippi and Missouri by lopsided margins, which will lead to big delegate hauls since Democrats award delegates in proportion to the margin by which candidates win in each state. He won Idaho by a narrower margin, NBC News projected early Wednesday.

Comment: The rigged coronation continues for the running mate of the real presidential candidate, the VP yet to be announced.

Meanwhile Bernie's campaign starting to go low, though in their defense, Biden is making it awfully easy:

After a poor showing in the latest primaries, Bernie Sanders' campaign has adopted a more aggressive approach to highlighting Joe Biden's shortcomings - ahead of what could be a make-or-break debate for the Vermont senator.

Follow-up tweets expressed amazement at how Biden never apologized for the uncouth exchange, choosing instead to accuse Sanders of "joining" US President Donald Trump.

Sanders now seems set on turning the tables during Sunday's debate, with his press secretary Briahna Joy Gray stating that Americans will "finally get to see Biden defend his ideas, or lack thereof," during the one-on-one verbal match-up.

Fake news starts in Washington: Perception management and influence operations manipulate public opinion

Philip Giraldi
Strategic Culture Foundation
Thu, 12 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC

It is perhaps unusual to have a government that has as much disregard for what most would consider to be the truth as does the current group of rascals running the United States of America. To be sure, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is as shameless a liar as has ever been seen on any public platform while the president himself appears to make things up as he goes along, particularly if a certain embellishment makes him look good. Nevertheless, it is important to recognize that lying and government have a long history, possibly going back to when the first cave dwellers elected a leader to guide the tribe on a mastodon hunt.

Lying is a traditional role for intelligence services. The Romans had a spy service run out of the imperial palace that provided military and political intelligence all across their vast empire. It included what might be called deception operations carried out to confuse enemies about intentions and capabilities. In more recent centuries, the British became masters of both spying and deception. Major influencing intelligence operations run against the United States can be credited with having led to American involvement in both world wars.

Where's the liberal outrage now that Tulsi Gabbard has been silenced yet again?

Robert Bridge
Strategic Culture Foundation
Wed, 11 Mar 2020 00:00 UTC

Call someone by the wrong pronoun, or deny a biological male the right to use the women's toilet and a person will feel the unbridled wrath of the Liberal inquisition. Ban an anti-war candidate in your own ranks, however, and that's just par for course in the Democratic club.

'Bad publicity is better than no publicity,' as any marketer worth his salt understands. Yet Tulsi Gabbard, the anti-war, anti-interventionist Democratic presidential candidate, who should be the darling of every progressive, has virtually disappeared not only from the debate stage, but from the news cycle as well.

During Super Tuesday, the Iraq War veteran managed to pick up two delegates, which, under previous terms would have qualified her to participate, alongside Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden, in future Democratic debates on the road to the November elections. As predicted, however, the DNC changed the rules mid-game.

Comment: See also:

US-Iran covert war continues: US again strikes Iraqi forces aligned with Iran, possibly taking out another senior IRGC commander

Seth J. Frantzman
Jerusalem Post
Fri, 13 Mar 2020 11:11 UTC

Was Iranian IRGC General 'Siamand Mashhadani' killed in US airstrikes?

US airstrikes carried out in Iraq just after midnight on Friday may have killed an Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps general supposedly named Siamand Mashhadani.

Reports online in Arabic and in other local media have claimed he was killed in the attacks on five locations of pro-Iranian Kataib Hezbollah warehouses that the US carried out in retaliation to a rocket attack that killed three Coalition personnel on March 11. According to Al-Ain media the Iranian officer was killed in the US airstrikes that took place.

Reports of his death circulated around one in the morning in Iraq. He was an officer in the Quds Force of the IRGC, the same force once headed by Qasem Soleimani. Soleimani was killed by the US on January 3 in a drone strike in Baghdad.

An Iraqi official told Al-Ain media that Mashhadani was killed near the town of Jufr al-Sakhar, one of the sites of the airstrikes. The town is north of Karbala in Babil Governorate. Supposedly four other members of the Quds Force were also killed. They were in a command and control headquarters for Kataib Hezbollah when the airstrike hit.

Comment: Recall that Kataib Hezbollah is an Iraqi force that is aligned with Soleimani and the Iranians' anti-ISIS alliance, but which is, since late last year, formally incorporated under Iraqi military command.

Comment: The question behind all of this remains: is some faction inside Iran 'standing aside' to let the US 'take out' the network Soleimani built up in the Middle East?

Some in the militia targeted recently by the US - Kataib Hezbollah - certainly suspect that something like that is going on:

Iraq's Hezbollah accuses high-ranking officials of working with US to assassinate Qassem Soleimani

Trump: Domestic travel ban within US a 'possibility' to fight coronavirus

John Binder
Breitbart
Thu, 12 Mar 2020 08:11 UTC

President Trump says a domestic travel ban within the United States is "a possibility" to fight the spread of the coronavirus from Wuhan, China.

While answering questions at the White House on Thursday, Trump said he was not ruling out a plan to implement a domestic travel ban to stop state-to-state transmissions of the coronavirus.

The exchange went as follows:

REPORTER: Are you considering travel restrictions within the United States, such as to Washington State or California? [Emphasis added]

TRUMP: We haven't discussed that yet. Is it a possibility? Yes. If somebody gets a little bit out of control, if an area gets too hot. You see what they're doing in New Rochelle, which is — which is good, frankly. It's the right thing. But then it's not enforced, it's not very strong but people know that they're being watched ... New Rochelle, that's a hotspot. [Emphasis added]

The beatings will continue until morale improves.

Dementia13

.. .. Hey, Los Alamos-stein-etes! Did you really nuke Larry's twin towers?

Jibrish

IMO, this is not how you 'pay back' the 'elites'. It makes the rest of them more jumpy and gives them an excuse to do even stupider draconian...

beherenow

Bring on the comets...please.

Unkl Brws

This article is irrelevant. Hunter Biden was scheduled to be executed through hanging on Friday Oct. 15 at GITMO. Wake Up SOTT.net! [Link]

rbeltz48

Puppet Masters

Taliban rejects Afghan government's conditional prisoner release order

New lucrative military deal? Pentagon hands out contracts for portable nuclear reactors

Chinese official speculates Americans may have infected Wuhan at army games, calls for them to be "transparent"

Bias virus hits New York Times as double standards infect coverage of Covid-19 lockdown measures in China and Italy

World's 20 richest, led by Jeff Bezos, lost more than $78b in Thursday's market rout

Creepy Joe rolled to big win in Michigan, delegate lead over Sanders growing

Fake news starts in Washington: Perception management and influence operations manipulate public opinion

Where's the liberal outrage now that Tulsi Gabbard has been silenced yet again?

US-Iran covert war continues: US again strikes Iraqi forces aligned with Iran, possibly taking out another senior IRGC commander

Trump: Domestic travel ban within US a 'possibility' to fight coronavirus

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